"Don't mind dyin' but I hate to see my children cry"

My first introduction to the jam band scene was through Col Bruce Hampton and the Aquarium Rescue Unit. I think I had it on cassette, which was a review copy sent to my student paper.

I think.

Later I tried Phish and Blues Traveler and such, but I am sure it started with ARU. Certainly some great players came up through them, including Oteil Burbridge and Jimmy Herring.

Jam scene patriarch Col. Bruce Hampton died on stage during the final moments of a benefit concert honoring his 70th birthday at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta on Monday night. Hampton passed out with nearly the entire all-star lineup for Hampton 70: A Celebration Of Col. Bruce Hampton surrounding him as the “Turn On Your Lovelight” finale was nearing a conclusion. 

 I'm saddened, of course, but, as Alex Scolnick tweeted, what a way to go.

Today Just Sucks

Jon Lord, keyboardist for Deep Purple

Bob Babbitt, bassist on many classic Motown tracks

Kitty Wells, first woman to make the country charts

Donald J. Sobol, author of the Encyclopedia Brown books

Stephen J. Covey, author of Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

Rest in Peace

Doc Watson RIP

Gettin' The Story Told

I can't say I bought my first Dio album — it was part of a cache of albums that my sister's boyfriend gave up when he moved, years ago — but it was one of the first albums I listened to. Last In Line. After that, I listened back some, into Sabbath and Rainbow. Don't listen to him as much anymore, but I'm still a fan.

Ronnie James Dio was coming back, touring with the Heaven and Hell lineup as Heaven and Hell, rather than Sabbath, which is a decision I don't get. Still, what I heard, I liked, and I was glad to see that sort of rock come back.

Ronnie James Dio died today after an extended battle with stomach cancer.

Ain't No One Gonna Turn Me 'Round

First, there was the Box Tops. "The Letter". Sounds like a big old blues voice, but the singer was a teen at the time. Then there was the next project. Big Star. A couple of Memphis boys who loved the Beatles. It was shimmering and brilliant. Alex Chilton.

Honestly, it was Paul Westerberg who introduced me. Gave me some of the best advice ever. "Never go far without a little Big Star."

Rest in Peace.

In Memory of Duane Allman

When I get it, I will call it "Duane"

Was Miles the Anti-Frank?

This is the opposite of the Frank Zappa audition-from-hell story. The gig was Robbin's. He was asked in.

Problem is, you have to work to let it stay that way, and as Mr. Ford says, folks were falling by the wayside.

There's more there, where you can compare and contrast the two. Zappa has vibes double melody lines, really complex lines, just to say "I wrote this and they practiced hard to make it like I imagined it". Davis, especially Miles when Zappa was starting to roll in the late 60s and early 70s, was surrounding himself with people he liked and started playing. (Yeah, the jams were spliced into structure by Teo Macero.) Still, after some of the Zappa horror stories, I thought I was due an easy audition story.

In Memory of Duane Allman

People Who Died

Jim Carroll

That's Gotta Hurt

Perhaps this is a lesson in ergonomics.

Phil Collins was the drummer for Genesis, and when Peter Gabriel left, he took over the singing duties, but he always saw himself as a drummer first.

But no more. Due to spinal injury, he's giving up the drums. Evidently, it's hooked to how he sits on the drum throne.

I've never really looked into ergonomics, especially the ergonomics of guitar. I know that I used to sit at an ergonomic desk with a keyboard extender that sat below my knees. That desk actually hurt me until I took off the keyboard extender.

Anyway, I always liked a bunch of his work. Sad to see him leaving the drum kit.

How Faint The Tune...

First, Les Paul is an outstanding guitarist. Absolutely fantastic. But that is only the beginning of the story.

But he was an outstanding guitarist at a point where there were very few outstanding guitarists, because they were quiet and trying to fill larger and larger rooms surrounded by drums and horns. So he worked on how to make a guitar loud without feeding back, and one of the iconic solid-body electric guitars bears his name.

You'd think that would be enough. You'd be wrong.

He was recording with his wife, Mary Ford, and he worked out how to combine a new recording and a pre-recorded track onto a third track. He invented multi-tracking. He invented modern recording.

It would be easy to not realize it, but Les Paul was one of the giants of the 20th Century.

Lester William Polsfuss, better known as
Les Paul
1915-2009
Rest In Peace

Bob Bogle of the Ventures, Dead at 75

Rest In Peace

Connections James Burke Would Have Missed

This is "See That My Grave Is Kept Clean" by Blind Lemon Jefferson.


Notice the last verse. Blind Lemon uses the low E to stand in for the tolling of a church bell. I was sitting, playing around when it struck me that this concept was part of "Hell's Bells" by AC/DC. So, I started trying to pick it from memory. Turns out that they used the open A.

E -----------------------------------------------------
B ---3---1-----0-----1-------3---1-----0-----1---------
G -----2---0-----0-----0-------2---0-----0-------------
D -----------0-----0-----0-----------0-----0-----------
A -0-----------------------0--------------------3-2-0--
E -----------------------------------------------------

I am not 100% sure on that, but that's at least a start. What I find interesting about it is that it implies G major ( D C2 G ) over a droning A.

What amazes me was that I wasn't going over and over on the record. I was able to think it through. Then again, there's not a bad song on Back in Black.

Red Eyed and Blue

If you saw I Am Trying To Break Your Heart, you know that much of the documentary is about the failing relationship between Jay Farrar and Jay Bennett, going to Bennett having a separate soundcheck from the rest of the band to complete separation.

Jay Bennett RIP



ETA:
Whatever Happened I Apologize (Free Download)
The FrontLoader
Aquarium Drunkard
Addicted to Vinyl
My Old Kentucky Home
Chicago Sun-Times

I Guess It's All On Barrett Strong's Shoulders Now

I really don't know much about Norman Whitfield. Only he was a songwriter and producer for the great Motown hit machine of the 1960s.

He produced the songs "I Heard It through the Grapevine", "Ain't Too Proud to Beg", "War" and "Papa Was a Rolling Stone", among many many many others, which, to my mind, makes him one of the Great Men of the 20th Century.

"Levi Stubb's Tears", Billy Bragg's take on the central importance of Motown.

The Great Gig In The Sky

Richard Wright, keyboardist for Pink Floyd.

1943-2008

The Claw

Most know Jerry Reed as Snowman from the Smokey and the Bandit movies. Pickers know him as a great guitar player. He was called "The Claw" after his incredible finger-picking. Steve Goodman once called his take on "Careless Love" "the world's longest guitar lick".

This was posted to TDPRI by Julie Mason, the wife of Brent Mason:

He passed at home Sunday at 12:15am. Even though his passing was expected due to his decline in the past months and his admission to hospice care - it is still quite a shock. His final request was to be taken home to his room to be with his family until the end. Thankfully it all stayed under the radar long enough for his passing and funeral to be simple and peaceful for his wife and the rest of his loved ones.

1937-2008
RIP

There's Floodin' In Texas....

It has been eighteen years.

I first heard of the man when the first video from his second album came out. A great song, but not the best on the album. Mostly just him walkin' around, with his guitar over his shoulder like a hobo with his stick and bag. It was his second video that made me get his album.

And man, that's all it took. I think that's all it took for everybody.

A friend of mine met the man once. He was a fellow guitarist and editor of the college paper and used that to get a backstage pass and interview time. Complete abuse of power, but hey, I'd do it too. Anyway, he struggled to get past his idol-worship and do the interview, and after a while the tour manager knocked on the door and said "Hey, wrap it up! We gotta go!" The man said "Hey, I'm talking to this guy!" It would've been the easiest thing to blow off the rest of the interview, but he finished it, which made the man so much cooler in my friend's eyes. And in mine.

The state of the art has not, as of yet, moved past him.


1954-1990

A Little Green Rosetta

After church on Wednesday, I went to the library with my eldest, quick before it closed, to pick up my holds. The Wreckers, Old Crow Medicine Show, Joan Osborne. And my eldest picked up something he was interested in.

Joe's Garage: Acts I, II and III by Frank Zappa.

I told him "Don't let your mother hear any of this."

I told him "It isn't the most offensive recording I have ever heard. That's Sheik Yerbouti. But it's up there." And I think that's true. While I really don't want to get into Appliantology, but "Broken Hearts are for Assholes" and "Bobby Brown" really top anything here.

(And yes, when I think about Mr. Whitney Houston, I get strange mental images.)

I have it on cassette, but I don't think there's anything in the household except Mom's car that even plays cassettes anymore. And the first side of the first tape, going from "Joe's Garage" to "On The Bus", is as strong a first side as I have ever heard. And there are few pieces of music more beautiful than "Watermelon in Easter Hay".

I've been thinking about songwriting recently, and the key to Zappa, I think, is the xylophone. It shows up everywhere, doubling melody parts, and I think the point is to say "Hey, I wrote all this. Nobody's improvising here. Everything you hear is composed and conducted by me." Composed being the operative word. There are songs, but he's not a songwriter. A songwriter writes words, and put it to music that helps the words express themselves. A composer writes music, and fits words around it, as necessary. Not that Zappa didn't mean his words, or at least some of them. There's a clear theme of "everything's so stupid" in his work, a worldview more persistent in his work than anyone else I know. But I'm sure he'd rather you think "Hey, this is a song in 7/4!" than "Hey, this is a song about dog pee!" Not that he didn't know this was a major attraction to his work.

As I grow as a musician, I hear more and understand more about what Zappa was doing musically. I hope that some day, my big guy can hear the music and not the songs, too.

And I really hope Mom never hears him playing "Dong Work For Yuda".