#Nels Cline interview

[rayroa]

Q&A: Nels Cline for Creative Loafing Tampa Bay

I just got done transcribing a Nels Cline interview I did on Friday, Feb. 24, 2023 ahead of Wilco’s April 20, 2023 stop in Clearwater, Florida. I hope to turn it into a 1,500-word featured before the printer comes calling, but wanted to get the Q&A down somewhere.

If you get sick of talking to me just let me know.

Ask me a question and watch an hour go by, so beware.

You need that space. Your whole thing is taking space and creating texture and all that stuff, so I'm not surprised that you can talk for an hour.

Right on. 

And I might bounce around a little bit, too. It was funny trying to come up with questions for this because they're all very guitar centric, and it's such a testament to the career you've built and identity that you've built. You know what I mean?

Sort of. I didn't think about the identity much. I'm not really aware of it, actually. But I know I feel respected. And that's nice.

Yeah, for sure. I think you're beyond respected, obviously. We'll just get right into it. Wilco is on a tour, right, and essentially, that's why we're talking—although I'm talking to Nels Cline.

Yeah, we're coming to Florida.

And we won't get too political here because I think you've already made your views on that clear, and I know you don't see Cruel Country as a political thing. But I wanted to ask you: You're coming up on your 20 year Wilco-versary. 

It'll be 19 next month.

Right. So 2024 marks two decades in this band. And I know when you joined, Jeff was going through what he was going through.

Yeah.

He got through it, and it's been a really productive few years. But I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, when you joined, you didn't necessarily want to bring your personality as a jazzer or soundscape kind of guy to the band. But that kind of happened. And there's this part about the Wilco songbook that kind of brought out that 14 year old fan of the Byrds and Buffalo Springfield, right?

Yep.

So thinking about that 14 year old that was brought out when you join the band, that 14 year old would be 33 or 34 now. I know Jeff has encouraged you to not be so reverent, maybe, to the songs that he brings to the table...

Yeah the one predictable thing about Wilco recording is that it's not going to be predictable.

Right. But when you look back on the last few decades of Wilco, look back to that 14 year old who was reawakened. Can you talk about how that person has grown over the last 20 years with just being in this band—that guitar player?

I was playing rock and roll settings prior to joining Wilco, along with the other improvised music and whatever else music that I've been doing. I guess that 14 year old is 33, you say now, he just still loves to rock. The feeling of the rock band, and at this point, the pageantry of it, like I don't really know about the show aspect of it, I'm comfortable with—but I don't see it really. I'm not seeing all these design things and all these changes that are happening that are supposed to be enhancing the product. So the 14 year old never cared about that so much and still doesn't, but the rocking is great.

OK. I think it’s Jeff that tells you, "Just shred, man."

That was what he said to me when I asked him what he wanted me to do at the end of "Art of Almost." He said, "just shred."

That's awesome. OK, cool. I love hearing your stories about all the rock you love—and I want to ask you a little bit about that—but I wanted to stay in Wilco world for a little bit, and kind of bring some reader questions that were presented to me. There's this jam on "Many Worlds" that feels like this high point in the Wilco canon as far as guitar and you're place in it and stuff like that. Obviously, fans are obsessed with some of the older stuff, and there's a solo on "Ashes Of American Flags," and obviously, the many think pieces on "Impossible Germany." But as far as solo on "Ashes," would you consider that the pinnacle of your fretwork achievements?

No, I mean, I don't even think about music that way. Whatever my pinnacle achievement is, I probably didn't notice it. But it was my idea to do that coda at the end of "Ashes" in my early days in the ensemble, and it turned into a big guitar solo thing, which I was probably encouraged to do. But I don't think about pinnacles. I do so much music, and a lot of it is Wilco, and I'm just trying my best.

OK. That's cool. I think what it is, is that a lot of people, guitar players specifically, they want to be you. You know?

Oh my god.

I know you don't want to hear that.

I'll say this. I'm a very fortunate human. It's OK to want to have a fortunate, nice, decent way of life. And I have that. You know, it's pretty cool. And I get to play and travel and do all the stuff that people do. I don't really care much for airplane stuff and airports, but that's part of the job.

This is kind of a watered down version of a follow up to that. Talking about the people that obsess over your work, is there a solo out there that you are still working to decode or one you hold in mythical, kind of air?

Oh my god. It might take me a minute to think of specific solos. But I mean, I could just think of hundreds, thousands of them.

What about one that you can't decode? Like one that bothers you.

By decode, you mean like, comprehend?

Or even, like, put your hands on your guitar and feel like you could kind of visit or touch it, you know?

Well, there's a lot of solos that have influenced me if that's relevant in terms of not just one thing. So I could feel very close to that soloist and possibly do some sort of emulation. But that's usually, for me, more in the rock or blues world because so much of the intricacies and nuances of so-called jazz elude me. I'm no jazz expert, but I do love the music, so I try to play it sometimes. But if I heard somebody I felt really close to do something that I felt a very  personal connection to, I might be able to, you know, pick up some of that stuff. But I don't think that answers your question. 

I mean it's all in context, right? You hit it right in the beginning—we're just trying to understand each other more.

Right.

Do you sit down to practice solos?

I don't practice solos. I don't think I ever learned anyone else's solo. There's certain solos that I can play by ear because they're so kind of memorable, or I can get close to them: Jimi Hendrix, or Dickey [Betts] or Duane [Allman]. I was never in cover bands, and bar bands, and things like that. So I'm not one of these guys that just says, "Hey, which Rush epic do you wanna do today?" or, "We know all of them!"

And you hate to sight read, right?

Well, it's not that I hate to do it. I'm terrible at it. I have a mental block about it. It's awful. If somebody wants to write a bunch of intricately-notated, dense music and put it in front of me, I can guarantee that they won't hear any of their music played by me. If I have a recording of it, then I can take the music home, and I'll do everything I can to learn a piece. That's how I do it.

OK. And this leads to my other question, because I think it's part of the core of who you are. I think we view you as an emotional player and sometimes an emotional composer. And emotion sometimes comes from melody, or for Western listeners there's harmonic information and modal elements, too. So this kind of piggybacks on what I asked you earlier, and you kind of mentioned it when you're talking about jazz. Are there still emotions, or modes or harmonies that you still hope to unlock from the guitar?

Absolutely. Yeah, I think sometimes the way I get around is when I'm just messing around, because I've actually been able to live, in the last year, someplace where I can—if I want to—I can play through an amplifier and not bother anybody. I didn't plug in and practice for I don't know how long—at least 30 years, hardly ever. Just to test the pedal or something, maybe. But it's been rather revealing about certain things. One of the things has to do with experimenting with different pedals, which I never allowed myself to do before except maybe on the gig. I just didn't sit around for hours working stuff out. I just got a little setup, and I just mess around.

One of the things I like to do is open tune the guitar and just start playing. That's a pleasing sound to me. It also means that I can use a lot of open strings, and everything's ringing. And it's kind of my own personal methodology that is from an extension of a trio that I had for a while in Los Angeles—three acoustic guitar players—that's how we started improvising. We would make up a tuning before every improvisation and then just start. It's fun, and it takes me sort of out of the patterns and habits and crutches—and it's pleasing to my ears. Does that even answer your question?

I think it does. And it might not have been a fair question because how can you know what emotion you're trying to unlock if you haven't felt it yet?

Well, I mean, OK, speaking to emotion. I do have a near consistent reaction to certain sonorities. And I guess what I was trying to get at by telling you about messing around with tunings, is something I do with a harmonizer pedal—a really shitty one—where I can just detune the guitar by hitting the pedal and play chord clusters. That's fun. But in terms of the emotion, sometimes that detuned sound for example, if as harsh and abrasive as possible, can be a very strong emotion. Just as a perfectly voiced major minor ninth chord, can just send me. I do experience emotion in a non-theoretical way, but unfortunately, I've also thought about the theoretical way, which sometimes can be, you know, a bit of a cage I guess.

I was gonna call it a jail cell, but "cage" works.

Here's something I can toss at you that has nothing to do with anything you're asking me but kind of covers almost everything. 

OK.

David Crosby. So David Crosby died, as we all know, The Byrds were extremely important to me, I even saw them with David Crosby as my first big rock concert in Central Park, 1967. When he died, I immediately wanted to listen to two songs: "Déjà Vu" from the album Déjà Vu, not some sort of live version. And "Guinnevere" from the Crosby, Stills & Nash record, which in my view is very Croz.

These made me realize upon listening to them that I wanted to go back to The Byrds songs that he had the most to do with—he actually had everything to with. When I did that, I listened to "Everybody's Been Burned " from Younger Than Yesterday. I'm assuming that "I See You" is the Croz, but I could be wrong. Anyway, I started listening to these pieces of music and realized that a huge part of my so-called jazz harmonic language that I'm drawn to, I may have first heard when I was listening to The Byrds when I was 10, 11 years old. And I've heard so much of my own happiness. There's so much harmonic interest and and it's so gorgeous to my ears. And then his voice is incredible. So I realized like, "Holy shit," I think that David Crosby may be very, very responsible for my earliest leanings, in terms of harmonic information, particularly, but also in the case of a song like “Déjà Vu,” it's episodic. It starts with his that super brisk and amazing vocal harmonic thing, the goes into the down, sort of Crazy Horse kind of tempo that we all love to play over for the rest of the song—it's amazing harmonies, it's just so great. And I really respond to that.

The same way I respond to hearing Tom Verlaine [Television], now the late Tom Verlaine, and all the things that I basically remember, so many of his solos. I can probably sing almost all of them along with records, maybe—after Flash Light I lost the thread a bit. So these languages, what I'm trying to say—they live. And at the same time, I'll just mention something that I first encountered when I was 10 that had a huge impact on me. My twin brother Alex's band was The Rolling Stones, so basically, it was Byrds and Stones until maybe '67, or late-'66 for us.

Definitely not the Beatles, because only girls like The Beatles, you know?

Exactly. That's why we didn't like them until we saw "Help!," and then we loved them.

You couldn't help it. I liked that you mentioned Croz because I had a question about Croz in the context of your love for The Byrds. I know you never wanted to be this amp-humping shaman, you know, but "Manic Depression" was kind of an inception point for you. Then Miss Godwin plays Ravi Shankar for you, and you get to drone. Then I started thinking about Croz, and Jimi, and Ravi and then also I started thinking about Tom and your wiggle, right. You kind of answered it a little bit, but I wondered how deaths of musicians affect you because when a musician dies, it's a little bit different than somebody else in our life since musicians have such this body of work that you can revisit. It sounds like when Croz died, it triggered all these memories for you.

It started with Jeff Beck. Jeff Beck was a big shock. I think to everyone, Jeff Beck just seemed like he was gonna live forever. He always had this a bit of a larger than life quality, and at the same time obviously really kind of a humble dude, because the musical path that he chose is just what he wanted to do and not rock and roll stardom. But his language that you've developed on a guitar had become so personal, and so at times, utterly profound, and always entertaining and expressive as fuck.

So it started with Beck, then David Crosby dies. And by this time most people are probably thinking like, "Oh, who's the third?" or, “Croz made it to 81, that's awesome.” And a lot of people thought he was a jerk. Then two, three days later, people started writing about David Crosby a bit, and talking about it, so I was very happy because I had gone into a David zone for a while there.

Tom Verlaine was the crushing blow, and also totally unexpected. I didn't know anything about what was going on with his health and stuff. Basically, as I tried to process this, I can tell you that as the senior in the band Wilco, the cold tap of death finger on the backline edges is not infrequent. So, I'm just going to try to stay positive, and and stay alive. It's sobering is what I'm saying. Maybe it's a little different than some musicians I don't know. I have an emotional reaction sometimes. And other times I just go, "Yeah, we're all gonna die."

This is what happens. We're looking at two generations of old people dying because that's what they do. They're very noticeable old people because their media figures, they're celebrities or notable in some way that we read about these other people. So that's what's happening. We're just watching them go, many of them in their 80s and 90s, but a lot in the 70s, and even in the 60s—my age. So it's sobering.

The Tom and the Croz thing definitely sent me into a bit of a nostalgia haze there for a while. I'm still not out of the Tom Verlaine one. It's an ongoing thing. His songs have been parading in my head for days and days and days, like two weeks. Then I just had to start reinvestigating. I hadn't heard Cover or Flash Light in a long time. Anyway, that's a whole other story. It's hard. It's really hard, but it's going to just keep happening. I could have said that in one sentence and saved you five minutes.

Dude, people don't want you to tell them something in one sentence. I think that's why they listen to your music, right? Like they want to sit down.

Oh god. All my records under my own name are pretty damn long.

Yeah, but that's why people come to them.

I hope so because I can't seem to self-edit to save my life. Whatever.

That's why you're in a band with Jeff. That's why you have strong band leaders like Jeff. They'll edit you in that realm.

Yeah, Jeff's a strong bandleader. He's a smart dude, too. He's just amazing.

I'm actually going to miss the show here because I'll be in Monterey with my wife who's running a marathon.

Whoa.

So I'm pretty bummed because I haven't seen Wilco since the Bob Dylan tour with My Morning Jacket. I've seen Jeff a couple of times since. This is probably too much information, but I know exactly when my son was conceived because it was after a solo show from Jeff. And I blame Jeff. 

Oh that is too much information.

My whole review that night was about this woman in front of me who was holding her son, and about Jeff's music and how warm and familial it can be sometimes. I was mad at people for hushing people. I was like, "Gosh, everything we have is in our arms," you know? Anyway that's too much information. So you mentioned Déjà Vu and going back to Croz and feeling these things that you felt when you were 10. I'm thinking of "Manic Depression" and that kind of innocence or nativite. It sounds like you get to tap into that 10 year old person and be innocent when you listen to music quite frequently.

I can kind of feel it almost anywhere except for maybe in a straight ahead jazz setting, which I don't do anyway. But if I'm just improvising in pure sound world, or playing some of my friends' music and we get into a thing—I particularly like improvising. We can, you know, honor—I don't even know how to say this, I'm sorry I lost the thread there, I immediately started thinking about something else...

It's OK. We're talking about how sometimes you're in a strange jazz setting which you don't really do and you're improvising and there's this pure sound and, or maybe you're playing with some friends...

Put it this way. Here's another example—a succinct example. I like soundchecks, like on tour with Wilco. As soon as sound starts and everybody starts playing, I'm in a very happy place. Especially when there's no bullshit and it's just functional—not coldly efficient, but still very efficient, very together. It makes the whole thing so cool that even soundcheck—which we don't always do—I like them, because we get to play more.

The point is really when sound starts and there's that sort of feeling of connectedness, or chemistry, or whatever you want to call it. Everyone's just kind of creating something together. I live for that—that's really it.

That's awesome. You're really good at this by the way. You're good at giving the pull quote but setting up the pull quote in a really good way that gives us great context.

Oh my god. It must be my over attention to... I try to examine to some extent the erudite among us, and my wife started to watch this documentary on Margaret Atwood, who she really likes. And I've never read Margaret Atwood, but I watched this documentary, I think twice because she watched it a couple of times at least, and it was incredibly inspiring and super interesting. But there's also a level of erudition involved in various statements, and quotes, and things like that. So without trying too hard, I do like to think that there's a phrase, like a kind of a cool phrase. It's just another improvising moment I guess. You know what I'm saying, it's fun. And also, my brother and I are the sons of two English teachers. I think being too language oriented can be actually a hindrance to certain ways of experiencing life, but I'm damaged. It's OK. I learned to live with it.

No, you're right. I mean, language is a barrier to emotion sometimes, and that's why, you know, we like German, you know, it's more precise...

It's funny because I actually was going to study German. I studied French in junior high and high school—that's what they called it back then, junior high. And then I thought because I was a philosophy major for a sec there, which by the way [Wilco multi-instrumentalist] Patrick Sansone, who has a degree—and I never got a degree—I was a philosophy major. I thought, "I'll take German and read the real dudes in our own language." Oh my god. If you've never been in college level German where it was going so fast. Oh my god, it's the only class I think, besides algebra, that I ever had to cram to pass. I feel so behind in German, and it's so hard, and yes, it is very precise.

Going back to Wilco world. Talking about loving the soundcheck. I'm curious about the title track on Cruel Country. Pat's playing this B string Fender, and some people think that’s you. While he's doing the twang, you're more like on the lap steel or neck dobro. How often do people mistake you for Pat, do you think?

Well, on this last record, I think almost consistently. In the past, I don't think Pat has recorded a lot of guitar solos, until Cruel Country, and then he and I are head-to-head a couple of times during the program, and then his B-Bender thing was absolutely delighting Jeff, and it just ended up all over it. It made Jeff smile from ear-to-ear, pretty much, and I was digging it. I think we got a lot of pleasure out of Pat's contribution on the B-Bender Tele. Now that we've been playing the songs out, playing them live, now he's crushing even more. And then mixing up, I don't know that anybody mixes us up other than that. Live, you know, Pat gets to wail on a couple of songs, but that's kind of like more digging into, almost inheriting a part and a solo, because they're older Wilco songs.

Right, right, right.

I can't get out of the sound of total rock guitar when I solo on songs. Sometimes I think, "Why don't I just take a completely weird approach one night?" But I'm just rocking out. I just kind of want it to be identified as full rocking. Because that's how the architecture of the show kind of is. Jeff likes to have an innocent rock out where it's just completely communal at the end of the night—I'm down. Rock and roll, the chiming guitars, it's a very good feeling for me. I think for all these other folks that decide to attend recitals.

No, I think people like to come to the recitals, and I like to hear you talk about your bandmates. They all have their own activities that they do on tour—hiking, coffee photography—but you are not a sightseer. You just sit there and you play guitar, but in Tampa there's a guitar maker James LeClair who makes some of your guitars. Do you have any plans to see James while you're here?

He's in Wyoming now.

Oh, I thought he was still here.

I thought it was a part-time thing. I can tell you that he's no longer in Tampa. And I can tell you that we met when we were down in—I think it might have been an Orlando show, I can't remember now, it might have been Tampa—and a friend of the band's, I believe his name is John Close, I don't really know him well, but I should have looked this up while I'm talking to you. Not that I can find it, but anyway, he introduced us all and Jim brought some guitars. He's my age about, I think, and we hit it off, and I bought one of his guitars—a weird kind of Tele-shaped guitar that's nothing like a Tele. He wasn't making guitars for a living. He still doesn't. He's, I think, a commercial photographer or something, but he's a lovely guy, and I have a bunch of his guitars now. And I can give myself credit for one thing: I'm the one that convinced him to put his name on his guitar headstocks. He's a lovely guy, and he likes to mess around with various guitar design ideas.

I know you like your Mike Watt Fender a lot, but how do the LeClairs hold up to your Fenders, specifically on tour and during the recording and composition process?

Honestly, I don't play a whole lot of Jim's guitars on one show, so they've never they've never taken he beating that my Jazzmaster's been taking all these years. But they're totally A-okay. The one I play the most is what I call the "Almosta-Tele." I hadn't played that on tour for a little while, but I played it with Phil Lesh. It turned out to be the right guitar for that kind of Grateful Dead language. And it's got a beautiful neck pickup that I never get to use because everybody wants me to play that guitar like a Tele, super-trebly with the bridge pickup.

This said I have a funny story, which I just remembered. I played the "Almosta-Tele" as the only guitar on a four-CD set by Anthony Braxton that I'm on, and it was a total accident. Because I played with Phil Lesh & Friends in Port Chester the night before. I was on my way to New Haven to to record with Anthony Braxton, and Phil's guitar tech—I mean, he literally had my stuff broken down within three seconds after the show and sitting waiting for me, it was insane—but he switched the gig bags, and I didn't check before I left. So I went to New Haven, and I opened my gig bag, and the LeClair "Almosta-Tele" was in the bag. And I was like, "Oh my god. No strings behind the bridge. No tremolo. It's not my Jazzmaster." So I made the entire thing, which is completely avant garde, improvised music with some structure dictated by graphic scores from Anthony Braxton, with Deerhoof drummer Greg Saunier,  and brass instrumentalists Taylor Ho Bynum, and Braxton—it's a quartet. So there's a four-CD set with Jim LeClair guitar, everything I play on this thing is that guitar. So everybody go buy that record, a four-CD set, I can't remember what it's called. I actually really like it, certainly not for everybody. But man actually when I heard it all finally—it came out at least two years after we recorded it—and I had some good strategies and kind of rebounded and got a lot out of the "Almosta-Tele."

And I have a Gibson-scale fake Tele, one of his earliest guitars, I think, that's out in the barn. Most of our stuff is in storage and has been since we left the city in March 2020.

Oh, by the way, that record I think is called Quartet (New Haven) 2014. I know we're getting to our mark, but I want to go back to Wilco. Jeff came into Cruel Country kind of on a tear. I think it was something like 50 songs in 52 days, or something, and he was still kind of really running hot. And when you got the Cruel Country songs, it kind of struck you as being classic—you know, classic country or folk with these big strong choruses and traditional song structures—but Wilco, I think, was also working on an art-pop kind of type record over the winter. How did that go?

That's what Jeff called it, I think. Art-pop. It's still going. It's going well, I think. It's a completely other vibe. I can't wait to hear it finished.

Did you stay in the loft for it?

I did. Yeah, I always do. Unless it's deemed that there'll be too much traffic, and I won't be able to rest, in which case we'll insist that I go elsewhere to some sort of hotel.

So it's still kind of like that live recording setup from Cruel Country.

Yeah. It's mere yards away from my bunk.

And I wanted to ask you about Yoko Ono. She just had a birthday. And she's 90 years old, the same age as Willie Nelson. And I wanted to ask you how Yoko has pushed your art artistry in a way that no one else really could.

Oh. Oh my god, how much time do you have?

I figured I better sneak this one in.

So my involvement with playing with Yoko is because of Yuka [Honda] and Sean Ono-Lennon. Sean specifically, kind of, music directs her, and Yuka is sort of like a lieutenant or something who takes care of all these musical details. And, and I came in to play on three, four songs in the course of an evening with the Plastic Ono Band with Yuka and Sean, and at that time this amazing drummer Yuko Araki from Japan who also plays with Cornelius, just a monster, and this guitarist named Hirotaka Shimizu also from Japan. Various people, Michael Leonard would play. Devin Haas played with us. We would get our shit together, and then Yoko would come in and soundcheck, and then just totally go for it. We did this big show at the Orpheum with all these guests. Iggy Pop, Lady Gaga, these are like people who cannot phone it in. The soundcheck was nuts, the rehearsal already, whatever, you know. But beyond that, it's hard for me to speak really, candidly or objectively because I do feel like Yoko and her family are kind of like all part of a family of some sort. And so I kind of don't want to go into any of that, it's too personal.

But the thing about Yoko that's amazing is pretty much everything. For example, when I saw the exhibit—I'm trying to remember where it was now, might've been Berlin, of because I played with her on her 80th birthday, I can't remember—anyway her early work during what people generally term her Fluxus movement was represented in this gallery of work from the early-'60s, like '62. I guess you would loosely call it multimedia work or something. It's just always with the same level of—I don't know how to describe it—it's poetic and so direct, and profound but so simple. She just has always had this amazing sensibility, and in terms of womanhood in Japanese of her generation, very revolutionary. So anyway, Yoko's amazing.

It's time for us, but you mentioned your dad being an English teacher.

My mom and dad, both of them were English teachers.

Both in Los Angeles, right?

Yep.

And your dad bought a guitar from a student once he realized that you needed to play—you know since your brother is out here banging on boxes, you're sitting around...

That's right, the Melody...

And you still have it. It's that one pickup half scale guitar, right? Do you still play it?

No, it's in storage. It hasn't had strings on it for a long time. I kind of messed it up because when I was working at Rhino Records, my sort of third official task was to be the indie and import rock buyer in the early-'80s, which was a very fun time to be an import rock byer. But anyway, I made a window display for Sonic Youth's album Evol. It was a good one actually, and might be my favorite I ever did. That and the Charlie Haden Liberation Music Orchestra window I suppose—those were pretty good ones. So I hung the guitar in the window, and I put a drum stick through the strings, and then I shot the whole thing with silly string. OK, I gotta go. Thanks so much for the call.

Talk to you later, Nels.

Bye bye.

#Nels Cline #Wilco #Yoko Ono #Jeff Beck #David Crosby #Tom Verlaine #Nels Cline interview #Creative Loafing Tampa Bay

[mmguitarbar]

A bad guitar, 1961

In a recent interview with Reverb.com, Fender CEO Andy Mooney laid bare his true feelings about the Jazzmaster and Jaguar, and let me tell you, they were anything but glowing. In the exchange, he brands Leo Fender’s original designs as “not very good guitars” at the time of release, declaring the mistakes of the past fixed in Fender’s latest entries into the offset line. 

Mooney takes a hard stance here, but to be honest his perspective here is nothing new. These critiques have been around for years, and even with the informed views of dedicated users of the Offset Guitar forum, the main axe associations with high profile players like Chris Stapleton and Nels Cline, and my own work over the last decade advocating for the guitars in print and performance –– pardon the horn tooting –– opinions on these fascinating guitars among the general populace are still very much divided.  

I don’t blame folks for holding these opinions because even I, Dear Reader, once believed the very same things. Back in high school I had an Olympic white Japanese Jaguar, a parental purchase spurred on by my love of the band Bush. The kindest way I could describe the guitar is problematic; the strings skipped off of their saddles, the bridge shimmied down, and it would not stay in tune no matter what I did. 

Eventually I traded it in on something more reliable, unwilling to wrestle with the instrument. When I finally came back to the offset guitar 14 years later, I realized that insatiable tinkerer Leo Fender wouldn’t have released a guitar he didn’t think was ready, and so I pushed through my preconceived notions of its flaws to gain a better understanding of the thing. I came out on the other side with a deeper appreciation for the man’s work. 

It seems to me that when a player has a bad experience with these guitars, it’s often because they’ve been poorly maintained. In cases such as these, I view it as an opportunity to educate and reevaluate. After a conversation or a quick adjustment, the player might still decide the models aren’t for them, but more often than not they seem to “get it.” And that’s enough for me.

So here I am, returning from an extended hibernation like a grumpy, shaggy bear; like the aging ensemble cast of a ‘90s sitcom, lured into a reunion for the cameras by the dangling carrot of a handsome payday, each secretly knowing that the end product would not be nearly as good as the show’s initial run; like a cherished childhood movie that, upon re-viewing for the first time in 30 years, has way more adult themes than your young mind could then comprehend, causing feelings of retroactive discomfort because you watched it with your parents in the SAME ROOM???

Prodigal namesake that I am, I have returned with my proverbial pen pressed to the also proverbial page of the Guitar Bar website to feverishly scrawl this open[ish] response in an attempt to give some context and gentle rebuttal to his comments. 

“They were not particularly good guitars when they were first introduced.”

When the Jazzmaster and Jaguar were first released in 1958 and 1962 respectively, they were not only top of the line models, but top sellers as well. While neither model was exactly embraced by the Jazz community, they nonetheless found favor with a varied group of players and all but defined the sound of Surf music while still in its infancy. For a time, they seemed to be everywhere. Admittedly, perceived popularity does not a good guitar make, so let’s look at a handful of early adopters.

At first, session players and country pickers liked the models well enough to use them on stage and in the studio, including Wayne Moss, Hank Garland, Willie Nelson, and Luther Perkins, who has an engraving of the model on his tombstone. If more proof is needed, here are three separate performances of Roy Clark absolutely shredding “12th Street Rag” on a bone stock Jazzmaster and Jaguar. These videos remain favorites of mine because they show someone really digging in and playing fast melodic runs on guitars that people seem to think can’t handle that kind of vigorous right hand technique. 

But if they were so good to begin with, why did sales eventually taper off?

A refinished ’65 from a couple of years back. I actually put the stock bridge back on this one instead of the sloppily installed TOM. It was awesome.

Previously, I’ve explained that the most common complaints with the model aren’t the fault of the design, but rather, trying to make that design do things it was never intended to do: wearing a set of light gauge strings. In the Jazzmaster, Leo Fender’s intention was to appeal to Jazz guitarists by creating a solid body guitar with the string geometry of an archtop: a pitched-back neck, a floating bridge, and a tailpiece, and most importantly, all specifically designed to work with heavy gauge flat wound strings. We’re talking 12s, 13s, and 14s. 

Once lighter gauges (9s and 10s) became the norm in the early to mid 1960s, inadequate string tension reduced the downward force on the bridge, resulting in tuning problems and string skipping. It’s like going off-roading with bald tires: you can certainly do it, but expect to slide around a bit.

At this point in my career I’ve set up well over a thousand of these guitars over the course of my career, and in the overwhelming majority of cases, once you throw on a set of 11 gauge rounds and shim the neck as Leo intended, they just work. They were good guitars then, and they’re still good guitars today.

For more information on setting up these guitars, have a look at our Demystifying series and my May 2017 cover story for Premier Guitar. 

“We’ve made them functionally better”

It’s true that Fender has devoted a significant amount of time and resources into solving the perceived problems with these guitars, including modified vibrato positioning, redesigned bridges, strategically placed nylon bushings, and even neck pockets angled at the factory to eliminate the need for shims. These are all good ideas, a few even great; as is often the case when chasing mass appeal, some have not been as successful as Fender might have hoped.

Take the Classic Player, which features an angled neck pocket and an Adjust-O-Matic bridge yet can still fall prey to the same string path issues of more vintage-correct models. The AOM style bridge was not designed with a vibrato in mind, with sharp, shallow saddle slots that can cause tuning problems of their own. And that’s to say nothing of the mismatched 12” radius bridge on a 9.5” neck, which causes the E strings to be higher off of the fretboard than the D and G in the middle and makes for an inconsistent feel across the neck. 

My friend Brian’s wonderful later model MarrGuar. An amazing guitar that set up beautifully.

Mooney specifically mentions the Johnny Marr model –– indeed a killer guitar ––  yet it’s worth noting that many of the earliest of the bunch left the factory with 56mm bridge string spacing, which turned out to be only a hair slimmer than the width of the neck. Many players reported problems keeping the outer strings on the fretboard, which eventually led to Fender adopting slimmer 52mm spacing in later production runs (linked in case you need one). Here’s a shot of a lovely black one with the worst example of this I have yet to see. 

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Scroll to see the neck and bridge string spacing problems.

A too-wide bridge…

…causing the E strings to fall off the neck when fretted

Strangely, the earliest American Professionals which came a few years later had the same problems, sometimes necessitating the need for aftermarket parts and prompting another mid-run update. 

As for the new American Ultra guitars, they may not be for me but I can understand why many of the features might appeal to other players looking for a more modern take on the Jazzmaster. With an additional lead circuit control knob, a re-purposed rhythm circuit layout for out of phase operation, rollers for individual pickup volumes, and an S-1 switch for series options, it could be argued that functionally they’re more complex than ever. 

However, once agin Fender curiously employs a mismatched bridge radius, this time a 9.5” bridge mated to a compound 10-14” radius neck, which puts the D and G strings higher off of the fretboard than the Es. Generally, compound necks work best when the string path is treated as a cone, flattening as it expands. In this case, a 16” bridge radius would set up far better than that of the stock part. I suspect we’ll start seeing even these guitars sporting alternative bridges before too long. 

So yes, while it’s good that we’re seeing R&D dedicated to making adjustments, some of those adjustments haven’t actually solved the problems, but rather, changed the nature of them instead.

“Now you can actually play them.”

I’ve made this point abundantly not only in this piece but in nearly everything else I’ve done over the years, but the fact is that Jazzmasters and Jaguars were always playable –– stock bridge included. Take it from an ardent Mastery user: the original bridge is as viable as any other, and once it’s adjusted correctly it’s as fun as it is functional.

Not only is there a wealth of great music made with them over the years as proof, you can refer to articles on this blog, numerous posts on both my personal Instagram as well as Mike & Mike’s showing that the stock bridge is dependable and musical. Hell, every offset guitar the shop sells goes through the same setup process to show off what incredible instruments they can truly be with just a little extra effort.

Closing Arguments

Would you play this stripped ’61, original bridge and all? It was a total beast of a guitar.

Real talk: I get that Mooney’s comments may be a marketing tactic to steer customers toward the current lineup in the Fender catalog, and just in time for the holidays at that. You know the old song and dance: newer is better! Fender does make a great guitar and innovation can be a good thing, so to this I say, fair play. 

Still, I have to believe there’s a better way to say so without throwing heritage –– and our beloved vintage instruments –– under the bus. 

You see, over the last five or so years, it seems to have become fashionable in Fender’s corporate culture to downplay or outright disparage the legacy of Leo Fender, with reps at NAMM overheard saying things like “Leo didn’t get everything right” and “we fixed his mistakes,” phrases repeated at the onset of the latest feature set or spec tweak. 

At best, comments like those in the previous sentence (as well as those which are the basis of this response) make Fender seem out of touch, and at worst, could erode the trust of a very loyal legion of customers.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll be saying it for as long as it needs saying: the Jazzmaster and Jaguar are Leo Fender’s most brilliant and misunderstood designs. It may have taken us 50 years to catch up, but now a growing and dedicated group of fans have found a unique sound here unlike anything you can get from other more traditional guitars. 

Speaking personally, no matter what other instruments are available to me, I reach for an offset first. I have found my musical voice in the Jazzmaster and Jaguar, and I’m never more comfortable or more adventurous than when I have one in my hands.

One last quote: 

“I have Jazzmasters and Jaguars… I have four in a line on my wall from 1966.” 

Andy, if you’ve read this and have found any of it compelling, I’d love the chance to show you just how good those guitars on your wall can be. All I’ll need is a few sets of 11s or 12s, a screwdriver or two, and maybe a couple Cold Ones to share between us. Burritos are good, too.

Oh, and parking validation –– it’s a bit of a drive up from Long Beach and the last thing I want to deal with is finding a spot on those notoriously crowded Hollywood streets.

A bad guitar. A very bad guitar

  An Open[ish] Response to Fender CEO Andy Mooney’s Thoughts on Offset Guitars In a recent interview with Reverb.com, Fender CEO Andy Mooney laid bare his true feelings about the Jazzmaster and Jaguar, and let me tell you, they were anything but glowing.

#Andy Mooney #CEO #fender #Fender CEO #Guitar #guitar tech #interview #jaguar #jazzmaster #Mastery Bridge #Michael James Adams #mike adams #mike and mike&039;s guitar bar #offset guitars #open letter #puisheen #radius #response #reverb #Seattle #set up #vibrato

[dracoandtheecliptic]

Jazz

I have been listening to a lot of Nels Cline and John Scofield recently, now expanding my repetoire to include Ben Monder, I don’t know about Kurt Rosenwinkel though, a lot of people like him, my old guitar teacher said he liked him. I think he sings too much, and his solos are not technical enough, Monder ,though , is a great architect of soundscapes, and I feel like his work is probably the next step forward in Jazz. So, I am still dating, but nothing is materialising in terms of a relationship, I have to hang in there, keep knocking on that door and hoping, eventually, that it wil open. It’s like a job interview where you know you are doomed to fail, I am not working at the moment so I know that is the main reason why women don’t want to go out with me, but then I think to myself, if you are willing to give me the time of day then there must be a chance? It’s like they are just giving me a vague hope on the off-chance that I am amazing in real life, it doesn’t seem fair, I am not amazing ,but I am a good guy, and it isn’t fair to just dangle a vague or vain hope in front of someone when you know realistically there is only a 2% chance that you will go out with them. Friends with benefits: That’s something I am not really comfortable with, I want to be in a relationship with a woman. To return to jazz, I think Kamasi Washington’s latest release is great, it’s called Heaven and Earth, and I am happy to promote that on here, just check out ‘Fists Of Fury’ for a taste of the album. For people who say “Jazz isn’t heavy enough, I want some real rock guitar riffs!” I would say that is no excuse, there are plenty of jazz musicians who write music that is just as heavy or even heavier than rock, Nels Cline (Dirty Baby and Interstellar Space Revisited) and Allan Holdsworth (Metal Fatigue, Atavachron) are outstanding at playing heavy music within a jazz context, so not only do you get rock within jazz, you get jazz and other genres mixed in with that too. Bill Frisell, at least in terms of his early work, and albums like Unspeakable and ,particularly Silent Comedy have proved that they can write music just as heavy as rock. If guitar’s not your thing but you’re still looking for that rock intensity, try Ascension by John Coltrane. That is one HEAVY album. Also, see the live version of Protocol by John Scofield off Pick Hits Live for a further example, it’s blistering! double-bass on the drums and everything!.

I have also been playing Dark Souls III: The Fire Fades Edition, and I think it is a really good game, wherein you must summon your entire arsenal of Soulsborne experience in order to play the game effectively and efficiently. When that member of the legion of the undead transformed into a mini-boss that resembled one I had faced earlier, I was really happy with that, and impressed by the sudden and unexpected spike in difficulty. Dark Souls III offers a wealth of intricate game mechanics. After an hour or so playing, I knew I would have to level up significantly in order to get anywhere. And what of Tellus of Athens? The happiest man who ever lived, according to Herodotus, a man who had four sons, and went on to see them have children. He died in battle, for a noble cause, a noble, victorious death it was. But what is better than a good death? An excellent death, in old-age, surrounded by your loved ones and grand-children, to pass peacefully away in your sleep. That is the supreme victory.

[bringinbackpod]

Interview with Jim Keller of Tommy Tutone

Together with American Songwriter, we had the pleasure of interviewing Jim Keller over Zoom video! 

Jim Keller has shared "Find My Shadow," a brand new song and video from his upcoming album By No Means (February 12). While each song on the new album features Los Lobos frontman David Hidalgo on guitar, this new offering is particularly special for the legend's work accentuating Keller's rich bass notes on vocal duties. The pair are joined on "Find My Shadow," and throughout the new album, by the top-notch rhythm section of Michael Urbano (Todd Rundgren, John Hiatt) and Bob Glaub (Jackson Browne, Warren Zevon), as well as by producer Mitchell Froom (Randy Newman, Crowded House) - who also hosted the recording sessions in his Los Angeles home studio as seen in the accompanying "Find My Shadow" visual. Keller adds: "what I love about the song is the melody is upbeat and happy, like a Roger Miller tune, but the lyrics are really about being lost." 

Listen to "Find My Shadow" and watch the in-studio visual via American Songwriter: https://americansongwriter.com/jim-keller-of-tommy-tutone-fame-debuts-new-single-with-david-hidalgo/

Pre-order By No Means here: https://ffm.to/bynomeans

“Keller has a knack for making seemingly simple lines sink a little deeper, especially when you add them all up in connection with the world-weary gravitas of his rumbling voice.... but it's Keller’s songwriting, wry and understated, yet always gently stirring, holds center court.” - American Songwriter

By No Means marks the next chapter in one of music’s most unusual careers. In addition to his lauded solo work, Keller penned the smash hit “867-5309 / Jenny” as a member of Tommy Tutone in the 80s and has served as Philip Glass’ manager over many of the intervening years. His songs have earned high praise from Tom Waits, who noted they “make me feel like I have big plans, no worries and all my hair.” Keller also counts Nels Cline and Marc Ribot as supporters and collaborators, and they are among over two dozen musicians who’ve re-worked “Don’t Get Me Started,” another track from By No Means, over the past year.

Check out all those performances here: https://www.jimkellermusic.com/dont-get-me-started-video-project/

We want to hear from you! Please email [email protected].

www.BringinitBackwards.com

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source https://bringin-it-backwards.simplecast.com/episodes/interview-with-jim-keller-of-tommy-tutone-TCTjG4_U

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[superfan99records]

Late 70s indebted melodic power-pop. Meet Rooftop Gardens AKA Peter Maffei whose debut single is released this Friday. We caught up with Peter for a little chit-chat.

STREAM https://soundcloud.com/superfan99/rooftop-gardens-circles

Hey Peter, where in the world are you right now? How's the weather? I'm English so we love to start a conversation by discussing this.

Hey Luke! I am currently at my house in Los Angeles. I live in the Highland Park area, it’s about 9am and the sun is out. It’s set to be 74°F today (about 23°C for you), so quite the opposite of a typical February day in London.

We first met a couple of years back in London when you were playing guitar for Sugar Candy Mountain and you just toured with them again in 2019. You also played guitar for Pearl Charles, The Blank Tapes and are currently in Cosmo Gold and Born Fighters. How do you approach these different projects? Do any of them share a through line or are you having to adapt and try different things for each?

Every group that I play with has a very different dynamic, and I think that’s what really keeps me on my toes going between them on a regular basis. Some of them share common ground, for example in Sugar Candy Mountain and Blank Tapes, I am learning specific parts and melodies for the songs that I will play the same every time, but there are still sections that are totally improvised. But even within that, the improvisation styles are different. For SCM, I will use a lot of guitar effects to create ambient soundscapes, and in Blank Tapes we will take a section of a song and extend it and jam on it, more akin to The Grateful Dead. Cosmo Gold is completely different from those two because I am writing all of my own parts and we are not improvising at all. It is my job to produce my own parts that fit the vibe of Emily’s songs.

These two tracks are your first as a solo artist, is this something you've always wanted to do and will there eventually be an album?

A solo project has truthfully always been the last thing on my list when it comes to my ambitions with music. I enjoy collaborating with other folks, I find a lot of my musical inspiration comes from those who surround me. But over the last few years I have been writing some songs that haven’t quite fit any of the projects I have been working on, so I decided to give my misfit songs a home and myself a place to experiment and hone my craft. There may be an album at some point, but for now I will be sticking with singles periodically. It’s been exiting to have a new musical outlet.

Who else is playing on these tracks or is this all you?

My roommate and Cosmo Gold bandmate Mike DeLuccia plays drums on both tracks, and I was lucky enough to have one of my oldest friends Sam Faw play bass on the B-side. He and I have been playing music together on and off since we were in our early teens. Go check out his newest single, "Heavy Boots".

You have recorded a cover for our forthcoming Jon Brion compilation. How did you find that and were you familiar with Jon's work at all prior to the project?

I had a great time recording my version of Jon’s “Get What Its About” from the I Heart Huckabee’s soundtrack. I did not know his music much before attempting the cover, but I have since become a big fan. I love the versions that Jon has done of this particular song (check out the acoustic version on youtube where he plays it on a mandolin), so I felt the need to switch it up and use some electronic elements like a drum machine and a Moog synthesizer. I love what he has done with the recent Mac Miller release which funny enough shares a title with this single.

So your pet Labrador is called George and that solo on 'Never Let Me Go' certainly sounds Harrison indebted, safe to say George is your favourite Beatle?

Definitely. The older I get, the more I relate to him over the others. I also find myself listening to his solo work more than the rest of the other Beatles these days.

Who are your other favourite guitar players and for the guitar geeks out there, what is your favourite pedal?

Nels Cline has been a huge influence on me lately, I actually had a dream last night that he was my dad! lol. Classic players would be people like Jimmy Page, Alex Chilton, Tom Verlaine and Richard Lloyd, Jerry Garcia. Contemporary players would be Mark Ronson, Jared Mattson of Mattson 2, Mark Speer of Khruangbin, Moodoïd. my favorite pedal is either my Catalinbread Echorec delay pedal or my Caroline Guitar Company Haymaker Dynamic Overdrive. I never leave home without those two.

Shaun Miller did the artwork for the single, did you brief him with a definite idea or was it a case of just trusting where he takes it? I know he often likes to hear the music for a project and that helps lead him.

I the only real instructions I gave to Shaun were “make it bold because I want it to pop as a thumbnail on Spotify since this is a digital release”, sent him the songs and I left the rest to him. He did not disappoint.

What else do you have planned for 2020 musically? Are there more tours and session work in the pipeline?

Right now I am looking forward to recording some new material with Cosmo Gold within the next few months. We have plans to work with a veteran producer on a new single that I am excited about. Also looking forward to releasing the next Born Fighters single! It’s a real banger, penned by the interviewer himself! I am excited to see what else 2020 has to offer musically. :)

‘Circles’ is released digitally this Friday (28.02.20).

[kevindurkiin]

Julian Lage: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview

During a recent set with the Nels Cline 4 at the Musical Instrument Museum, guitarist Julian Lage couldn't stop smiling. It was a repeated sight. Whether aggressively dueling with Cline or offering supportive chords, Lage appeared to be having the most fun. That joyful spirit is also audible on his latest record as a bandleader, Love Hurts. Working with drummer Dave King (of the Bad Plus) and bassist Jorge Roeder, the set was cut mostly off-the-cuff at the Wilco Loft, and it's a beautiful, layered testament to spontaneity.

The post Julian Lage: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview appeared first on Aquarium Drunkard.

Julian Lage: The Aquarium Drunkard Interview published first on https://soundwizreview.tumblr.com/

[teramelos1]

Nick Reinhart Interview // Marcel’s Music Journal

Big Walnuts Yonder–an incredible supergroup featuring Minutemen’s Mike Watt, Wilco’s Nels Cline, Deerhoof’s Greg Saunier, and Tera Melos’ Nick Reinhart–just put out one of the most powerful and marvelously eclectic rock records of the year. Even though the band formed way back in 2008 and didn’t record the album until 2014, it still sounds raw and fresh as hell. The dirty funk of opener “All Against All” accurately portrays the LP’s unique blend of lo-fi math rock and noisy, throwback ‘90s skate punk, while the energetic “Raise the Drawbridges?” gloriously flaunts ear-piercing guitar licks and groove-heavy percussion.

Aside from recording seriously great music with Watt, Cline, and Saunier, Nick Reinhart has proved himself to be one of the most strikingly innovative guitarists in recent memory with his countless other bands and side projects. He is best known as the frontman of Sacramento-based experimental rock trio Tera Melos, who explored complex, mind-bending indie-math zones on their most recent release, 2013′s X’ed Out.

Reinhart has also worked with drummer Zach Hill in Bygones and Death Grips; played live in Rob Crow’s band Goblin Cock; and performed a series of engrossing, entirely improvised live sets with Dot Hacker’s Eric Gardner as Swollen Brain, all of which are discussed in our interview below (the power of collaboration is definitely key here).

 You and Eric Gardner from Dot Hacker just played some shows as Swollen Brain. How did this whole project come about?

I met Eric through my friend Jonathan Hischke, who plays bass in Dot Hacker. When I originally moved down to Los Angeles I lived in a duplex next door to Eric. I would house sit his Vietnamese pot bellied pig, Francis, a lot. I was a big fan of his drumming in Dot Hacker and at some point it came up that we should play music together for fun. We had a pretty immediate chemistry in playing free, improvised stuff. We played our first show in September 2015 and we had a nice response, so we figured make it a regular thing. No intense band practices, no songs, no rules. It’s a really fun musical project to be a part of.

How do you feel playing improvised sets?

I really enjoy improvising. While I’ve done solo improvised sets, it’s a lot more fun having someone else to connect with on previously unpaved musical roads. With my band Tera Melos we take practice and preparing for a set/tour pretty seriously. We usually need around 12 full days, give or take, of long band rehearsals before we’re comfortable enough to play a show. We even dump lots of brain power into designing the set and which songs or transitions go where. For me practice is usually fairly stressful, as I wear a few different hats- playing guitar, singing and running some sort of sampler/keyboard rig all while doing the pedal tap dancing thing, and I want it all to sound cohesive and thoughtful. there’s a lot of work that goes into that. So as far as improvising goes- it’s amazing to ditch all the preparation and just play music without preconception. It’s very liberating. With Swollen Brain we do play together in our rehearsal studio, but it’s less “practice” and more just playing little sets. We’ll generally do 20 minute bursts of sound just to keep our improv brains fresh, which after 2 rounds of bursts our brains are actually very not-fresh haha. To get better at improvising it seems you just need to do it often. So in a way it’s sort of practicing, but not really… “Practicing” is also a way of familiarizing ourselves with whatever gear we happen to be using at the time. In my case it’s usually a freshly constructed pedal board. I like to have time to see what works sonically and what doesn’t before we play a show. The other thing I like to consider when playing a free-form set is how to keep things flowing and interesting- for me and the audience. Obviously you can’t force magical moments to appear in that context, but I want to set myself up for those moments to occur. Generally that means having the tools that will allow me to make little musical stories with dynamics and tension. One of my favorite parts of an improvised performance is when someone walks up to you afterwards and asks, “so how much of that was improvised?” and the answer is, “well, all of it.” I’ve been the person asking that question and when you get that answer it’s a magical moment in and of itself.

Do you think Swollen Brain will remain solely a live band? Would you ever be interested in recording studio material?

We actually just started making a record. The process of how to go about capturing our vibe was hard for me to envision. It took me a second to wrap my mind around how we could best accomplish a recording. Because it’s very much a live, organic process of improvising it would make sense to just set up some mics and hit record on a bunch of sound bursts, but we felt that it should be sonically more interesting than just drums and a single guitar track. When we play live I end up looping layers of sounds and then repurposing the loops to relate to what I’m doing with the live guitar sounds. Then once we land on something that works we turn that into a little mini song. So one of the recording methods was playing until we landed on some interesting loops, then capturing the performance of drums + loop action, and then overdub myself improvising over that. We did variations of that method for a couple of days. The next step is sifting through all of that and making sense of it.

You also played in Rob Crow’s band Goblin Cock on a tour of theirs late last year. What was that like?

It was great. I love Rob Crow. He’s one of my favorite musicians. Tera Melos toured with Pinback a couple years ago and it was one the my favorite tours we’ve ever done. He’s super thoughtful and just a really great person all around. I was stoked when he asked if I wanted to do the Goblin Cock tour. It was challenging because i had to learn a style of music that I wasn’t really familiar with- whatever brand of metal Goblin Cock is I guess. He uses alternate tunings and B.C. Rich Warlock guitars exclusively. So I had to relearn chord shapes and which notes went where on a really weird guitar, then apply all that to a kind of music I’d never played. Oh and we wore cloaks and face masks that were very hard to see out of, plus all fog machines and strobe lights raging. So there’s actually just about zero visibility on stage. But yea, it was strange and really fun.

You’ve mentioned before that Aphex Twin, Squarepusher, and Underworld rank among your top influences when it comes to electronic music. What drew you to the sound of those artists and what impact did it ultimately have on your own playing style?

When I was 16 a friend showed me those artists. At that point I was really into punk rock. The electronic music that I was hearing had this relentless energy and all these really melodic sounds mixed with abrasive sound effects. That was really new and exciting to me. I had a super natural, positive reaction to it. The same friend had a Playstation and a game called MTV Music Generator. You could make your own songs by placing pre-recorded samples onto a timeline. It was a very dumbed down way to make something resembling the electronic music that we were listening to. So I’d mess around with that at his house after school. A couple years later I got a desktop computer and found the program Fruity Loops, which was the next step up in music programming from the video game. A couple years after that I got a program called Reason, which I have worked out of ever since. At that point I hadn’t really gotten into guitar pedals and sonic exploration. I mean, I had some pedals, but I was still playing in a punk-ish band and bedroom moonlighting as some electronic music poser. Eventually Tera Melos was created and the guitar pedals section of my brain expanded. I started to recognize the ability to recreate some of the sounds I had learned to make on the computer. Incorporating that sort of stuff into an outside-the-box rock band became really exciting, and still is for me. I should also mention that my knowledge of electronic music in general never really reached beyond those three artists. I think there was just something really special about them that opened my mind at the right time.

Do you think collaborating with other people allows you to think outside the box and push the limits of your own sound? I can sense an almost cosmic force from these Big Walnuts Yonder recordings.

Yes, 100%. Musical collaborations that take you outside your comfort zone are crucial for growth and creativity. When I began playing music with Zach Hill it was like my musical brain got super charged and started wandering in different directions that I previously hadn’t really explored. Rob Crow and I have been batting ideas back and forth for awhile now as well that will hopefully take shape soon. I’m excited to see where that collaboration will take me in terms of new musical territory. And yes, of course the Big Walnuts Yonder thing had a lot of cosmic force going for it. Those guys are all very big inspirations for me, so making that record was a big part of my creative timeline. I think it’s too soon and close to the album release to be able to recognize the greater impact it had on me, but what comes to mind immediately is exercising the ability to to maintain creativity and keep up with these musical giants, and for them to be stoked on what I was bringing to the table. It would be like an indie game dev that grew up playing Nintendo all of the sudden getting to work on a new game with Shigeru Miyamoto. And not only that, but Miyamoto is excited about your ideas and he’s reacting to them with new ideas. It’s sort of like that. Pretty crazy. The other thing that comes to mind is that I had never written guitar parts to pre-existing bass parts in this capacity. 8 of the 10 Big Walnuts Yonder songs were born in Mike Watt’s brain and started with his bass as “song forms,” as he calls them. In other words, I was having to figure out how to write interesting guitar parts to songs that consisted of only bass. In Tera Melos I can probably count on one hand the amount of times where even just a small portion of a song’s construction started with bass. I can recall being very frustrated trying to come up with guitar parts that way because it’s so foreign to me. Of course out of that frustration comes great things. I was well prepared for this challenge though. It took me a while to understand Watt’s compositions (they’re pretty wild) but once I was comfortable with his approach to song writing I think some really cool, unique stuff came out of it.

What was it like recording the album in just three days?

When we started the process of creating Big Walnuts Yonder Mike had been sending me songs that were just bass compositions. So I would sit with them and contemplate different ways to compliment what Mike had written. Now Nels and Greg on the other hand- they had heard what Mike and I had worked on, but I don’t believe they had fully composed “parts” like me and Mike, that is to say I think they had “ideas” and then brought them to life in the studio. It was so crazy and inspiring to see it happen like that. So when we were all set up and ready to play we would jam a song through a few times, talk about the sections, iron out a thing or two and then hit record. It was 99% live. I was actually a little nervous because I hadn’t recorded live like that for many many years, since being in a crappy sounding punk band as a teenager. I mean, my bands usually record live, but then guitars are scratched and then redone. So this is truly a live record with all of us in the same room reacting to each other. I think that nervous energy really helped me pull it together personally.

I think Zach Hill is an artist who compliments your musical style and approach really well. You played on the last two Death Grips albums, Jenny Death and Bottomless Pit. Was that a particular collaboration that gave you the chance to explore new themes and ideas? What were the recording sessions for those records like?  

Zach Hill is a very big inspiration for me. He’s one of my favorite musicians of all time and I think he’s contributed some really important things to music. The way I play and perceive music is directly related to him, so it makes sense that what we compliment each other. Contributing to Death Grips’ body of work was really special for me. I respect that band so much and to be able to help them shape their vision is a really cool thing. I think the reason it works well is because I understand where they’re coming from and where they want to go. I haven’t worked with anyone else in that context, so in that sense there are new ideas that appear that otherwise wouldn’t. A lot of the time our creative ideas are simpatico and feel really natural. It’s like as soon as I’m around those guys my brain’s bluetooth automatically connects to their system.

Aside from the recently announced tour with CHON, Covet and Little Tybee, does Tera Melos have any special plans for this year?

I think Tera Melos will probably start doing fun stuff pretty soon here.

Reinhart has a new band with Mike Watt (Minutemen), Nels Cline (Wilco), and Greg Saunier (Deerhoof) called Big Walnuts Yonder. Their self-titled debut is out now on Sargent House.

Via Marcel’s Music Journal

#Tera Melos #Sargent House #Big Walnuts Yonder

[blue-note-lp]

bluenoterecords: Read the DownBeatMag interview with NelsCline! New album "Currents, Constellations" by The Nels Cline 4 featuring Julian Lage, Scott Colley & Tom Rainey is out now: https://t.co/56RLq2uBmm https://t.co/FPz8PzkOb6 http://twitter.com/BlueNoteVinyl/status/993547811500314626 BlueNoteVinyl

bluenoterecords: Read the DownBeatMag interview with NelsCline! New album "Currents, Constellations" by The Nels Cline 4 featuring Julian Lage, Scott Colley & Tom Rainey is out now: https://t.co/56RLq2uBmm https://t.co/FPz8PzkOb6

— Blue Note Collector (@BlueNoteVinyl) May 7, 2018

from Twitter https://twitter.com/BlueNoteVinyl May 07, 2018 at 01:47PM via IFTTT

#jazz #vinyl #jazzvinyl

[savetopnow]

2018-03-08 07 MUSIC now

MUSIC

Brooklyn Vegan

Lily Allen preps new LP, touring, playing NYC in April (listen to "Trigger Bang")

Thursday add two more 'Full Collapse' & 'War All The Time' NYC shows

NYC's first Night Mayor has been named

CupcakKe packed Le Poisson Rouge (pics)

YOB announce new LP for Relapse, tour with Bell Witch

Consquence of Sound

CoS Readers’ Poll Results: Favorite Gorillaz Songs

Film Review: A Wrinkle in Time Brings Its Realm-Hopping Source Material to Vivid Life

Album Review: SOB x RBE Carve Out a Distinct Vocal Identity on Gangin’

Neil Young and Daryl Hannah’s fantasy western Paradox to premiere on Netflix later this month

The Cranberries will release final album with Dolores O’Riordan in 2019

Fact Magazine

Equiknoxx, Tim Hecker, Telefon Tel Aviv and more announced for MUTEK San Francisco

Thrush Metal songwriter Stella Donnelly is a feminist folk hero on the rise

5ive Beatz – Against The Clock

Fyre Festival founder Billy McFarland facing prison spell after pleading guilty to fraud

Steven Julien’s new mini-album is a tribute to his family and Roland founder Ikutaro Kakehashi

Fluxblog

An Emotional Sexual Bender

Straight To Your Face

The Last Year Has Been Kinda Rough

Radion Beams Casting Vibrant Views

Build It To Burn It Down

Idolator

Years & Years Explore A Bold New Pop Sound On “Sanctify”

Sade Returns With Dreamy Ballad “Flower Of The Universe”

Ariana Grande’s 4th Album Was Produced By Pharrell & Max Martin

Two Madonna Collectibles Are Being Reissued For Record Store Day 2018

Cardi B Meets Madonna, Announces “Bartier Cardi” Video Release Date

Listen to This

hamond -- copacabana [electronic/r&b] (2016)

Seamus Fogarty - - Carlow Town [Irish Folk/Electronic] (2017)

[Discussion] Trying to find more Japanese music like this

Crimer -- Cards [Electronic Pop] (2018)

No Torso - Fatal Fraud [ska / rock] (2006)

Popjustice

New Music Friday: When it’s time to put Andrew WK at the top of the playlist it’s time to put Andrew WK at the top of the playlist hard

Important service announcement for anybody intending to travel on today’s M-Train

So obviously the latest CHVRCHES track is fairly incredible

Troye Sivan interview: “I feel more fully-realised as a person”

New Music Friday: Janelle’s double-whammy and numerous other moments of wonder

Reddit Music

{playlist} its snowy in new york so here's some old and new dance music for your commute

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones - The Impression That I Get [Ska]

CKY - 96 Quite Bitter Beings [Rock]

Electric Light Orchestra - Don't Bring Me Down [Classic Rock]

Billy Talent - Red Flag [Punk Rock]

Rolling Stone

Beyonce and Jay-Z's First 'On the Run' Tour, Song by Song

Cranberries Will Release New Album, 25th Anniversary Reissue

Q-Tip Named Advisor of Kennedy Center's New Hip-Hop Culture Council

Hear James Bay's New Rock Song 'Pink Lemonade' Ahead of 'SNL' Debut

Wilco's Nels Cline Debuts Jazz Band on Upcoming Record

Slipped Disc

Canadians replace suspended conductor

Just in: The arts ‘add $763.6 billion to the U.S. economy’

MASH actor had second life as symphony conductor

The Met last night at Semiramide – half-empty

They met at an airport piano. Now they’re working in studio

Spotify Blog

Spotify’s Electrifying Concert Series “RapCaviar Live” Returns with a New Tour Lineup featuring Migos, 2 Chainz, Tory Lanez, DJ Mustard, Lil Pump, and more

When It Comes to Sex, The Weeknd Delivers as Spotify’s Sexiest Artist This Valentine’s Day

Spotify Launches New Songwriter Credits Feature

Spotify Launches Good As Hell Podcast in Partnership with Refinery29, Hosted by Lizzo

Spotify and Discord bring shared listening to your gaming sessions

We Are the Music Makers

Finally having a real DAW, almost feels like cheating

Turning your hobby into a career?

Arturia announce 6 new VST effects plugins: 3 classic analog synth filters, and 3 modelled studio preamps

How to tell if you've chosen a good name?

The 2018 NPR Music Tiny Desk Contest to discover a great unknown artist to come play a Tiny Desk concert is now open! Anyone interested?

#music

[dankassquickscopes]

via Premier Guitar

#IFTTT #Premier Guitar

[jazzworldquest-blog]

USA: New York Jazz Stories Bernard Purdie, David Haney, Ken Filiano and special guests: 12 Houses OrchestraJoe's Pub Febuary 22, 2020

New York Jazz Stories Bernard Purdie, David Haney,  Ken Filiano and special guests: 12 Houses Orchestra

Joe's Pub Febuary 22, 2020

Ticket Price: $20

Doors at 9pm

Show at 9:30pm

Tickets now on sale

 Pianist and composer David Haney and legendary drummer Bernard Purdie will bring another performance of NewYork Jazz Stories to Joe’s Pub.  New York Jazz Stories combines swinging, electrifying music, featuring Bernard Purdie and company along with some highly entertaining stories retold by David Haney. These are real storiestold directly to Haney, transcribed and brought to life with a soundtrack by “Pretty” Purdie and friends. "Haney and Purdie fit together like interlocking parts of a jigsaw puzzle. The drums gives a center to the piano's drifting improvisations and the piano creates fantastic shapes about the drum foundation. These two makes a really strong and fascinating team." -Cadence Magazine BERNARD PURDIE, the world’s most recorded drummer, was born June 11, 1939 in Elkton, Maryland as the eleventh of fifteen children. Purdie moved to New York in 1960 and soon after recorded his first hit with King Curtis. This led to his engagement with Aretha Franklin in 1970, which marked the beginning of an unparalleled career. Since then, Purdie has worked with a vast array of artists, such as Paul Butterfield, Larry Coryell, Miles Davis, Hall & Oates, Al Kooper, Herbie Mann, Todd Rundgren, and Cat Stevens, as well as regularly producing his own solo albums. DAVID HANEY studied composition with Czech American composer Tomas Svoboda and piano with jazz pianist Eddie Wied. As music editor for Cadence Magazine, David interviewed over 60 jazz artists for the Jazz Stories project. The following artists have worked and recorded with David: Roswell Rudd, Julian Priester, John Tchicai, Steve Swell, Roy Campbell, Bud Shank, Wolter Weirbos, Han Bennink, Andrew Cyrille, Bernard Purdie, Marvin Bugulu Smith, Gerry Hemingway, Dylan Van de Schiff, Buell Neidlinger, Dominic Duval, Adam Lane, Michael Bisio, Paul Blaney, Perry Robinson, Johannes Bauer. As a leader, Haney has over 20 albums on CIMP-USA, Cadence-USA, SLAM-UK, NoSe-So-Argentina, La Gorda-Argentina, and Canada Jazz Studio-Canada. Ken Filiano (born 1952) is an American jazz and orchestral bassist based in Brooklyn, New York. Since the 1970s, Filiano has played or recorded with Anthony Braxton, Fred Ho, Nels Cline, Bill Dixon, Fay Victor, and others. Filiano is on the teaching roster at the New School in New York. He teaches master classes in bass and improvisation and has a private studio in Brooklyn. Ken is a member of the Creative Music Studio. Twelve Houses Orchestra Matt Lavelle, conductor, reeds, trumpet Mary Cherney- flute Chris Forbes-piano Art Baron-Trombone Ben Stapp-Tuba Charles Waters-Alto sax Ras Moshe-Tenor sax Claire Daly-bari sax Claire Du Brunner-bassoon Evan Crane-bass Jack DeSalvo-guitar Matt Lambiase-trumpet Cheryl Pyle-flute In 2011 Matt Lavelle created the12 Houses Orchestra, comprised mostly of musicians he has collaborated with over a 20 year period in New York City. The 12 Houses have performed thirty-five concerts in New York City as of March 2016. Currently the 12 Houses have an every Sunday residency at Nublu in downtown New York City, and have a book of over 50 compositions. This Spring of 2016 the 12 Houses released their debut album on Unseen Rain records called Solidarity.

via Blogger https://ift.tt/2SthV4G

[songwritingguide]

#songwriting #blogs #wilco

[buttonpusherdiy]

Interview : Aiming For Enrike

Norwegian mathrock duo Aiming for Enrike will be touring the UK for the first time this October, we caught up with them for a chat ahead of the tour

Hi Guys, can you introduce yourselves to our readers? We are a guitar and drum duo from Oslo, Norway. Somebody once described us as progressive fuzz pop. Its still the same band, but we are now more suited for the dance floor.

Who are your influences? Thats a lot! We like a lot of different music. Here are some names: Miles Davis, Josh Homme, James Brown, Nels Cline, Røyksopp, Radiohead, Sonic Youth, Deerhoof, Hot Snakes, Wilco, Glen Branca, Mike Patton, Louis Cole, Fela Kuti, Todd Terje.

You guys have a massive sound for a two piece, Can you talk us through your writing process? We write everything in the rehearsal room. We spend a lot of time jamming out ideas. Sometimes we have musical references that we try to imitate and put into our musical environment. That can be a feel, sound, structure, etc. After we have made a sketch, we record it. Later we go through the bank of ideas and find the essence of what we like about a certain part, and make songs around that. Because of our limitations our music is very dogmatic, and that often put stuff in a certain direction. We spend a lot of time arranging the music to make the songs as solid as possible.

What gear can’t you live without? Simens pedal board is very specific and the songs often needs those exact models to be played. So when airlines fuck up, we are in trouble ;)

This will be your first time in the UK, how do you feel about touring in new places and what are you expecting from the UK scene? We are always exited about going to new places. Its kind of weird that we never played in the UK before. Its about time! The UK scene is a good and important scene, so we expect to play cool shows, have a good time and hopefully meet a lot of nice people!

Whats the worst thing that’s ever happened on one of your tours? We never had a really bad experience on a tour, but its been very stressful when the gear has not showed up. And the best? Fresh bonito sashimi in Japan.

What can people expect from your live shows? Good times. Four on the floor.

Are there any places on the tour that you’re particularly excited about visiting? I have never been to Edinburgh before. Heard its a beautiful city! London is always a cool town!

And Finally, What was the last record you bought? Skillkillz (amazing japanese weird hip hop band)

[teramelos1]

Big Walnuts Yonder with Nick Reinhart announce self-titled album, release “Raise The Drawbridges?” via Consequence of Sound

This year has already seen its fair share of mighty supergroups, featuring various members of At The Drive-In, Melvins, Grandaddy, and Franz Ferdinand. Big Walnuts Yonder is a collection of similarly talented veteran musicians — Mike Watt (Minutemen, The Stooges), Nels Cline (Wilco, Nels Cline Singers), Greg Saunier (Deerhoof) and Nick Reinhart (Tera Melos) to be exact — but the chemistry and creative process behind the new outfit are decidedly of a different breed.

“It’s worlds colliding,” Watt explains of the four-piece, which draws in elements of “proto-punk, free jazz, power pop, experimental music, psych-rock and your first teenage acid trip all in one.” Big Walnuts Yonder’s beginnings date back to a 2008 conversation between Watt and Reinhart, but because of hectic, overlapping schedules, it hasn’t been easy to sit down and polish off an official album.

“We had planned it for so long,” recalls Saunier. “Then several years passed in which nothing occurred due to everyone’s schedules. It was 2-3 years of warm, leisurely prep time, then suddenly made in a panic with time and money on the line.” The resulting effort is the band’s self-titled debut, due out May 5th via Sargent House.

The LP was recorded in just three days over the summer of 2014 with the help of producer and former Pere Ubu bassist Tony Maimone engineering at his Studio G in Brooklyn. Its collects 10 songs, eight of which started as “song forms” on Watt’s bass, then later fleshed out and added to by other band members; Saunier and Cline each contributed one track of their own to the final product. “I’m pretty sure the other guys didn’t have parts set before going into the studio,” says Reinhart. “But it’s interesting how a lot of the songs began as Mike Watt basslines, and everyone was able to pull songs and melodies out of them.”

The whole thing seemed to materialize in a way that was spontaneous, but also quite focused — a “concentrated sort of freakout,” according to Saunier. “We basically had to invent a new band on the spot. And, people might have a stereotype of what each person does, but we all showed up to do what we’re prevented from doing in other groups.”

As a first look at Big Walnuts Yonder, the group has shared “Raise the Drawbridges”, a track that captures an instance of police brutality. “He [Watt] takes the voice of an officer acting too tough and provoking conflict,” Saunier explains, “and then comments on the transparency of the officer’s fear and the futility of this dynamic.” Stream it down below.

To accompany the song premiere, Consequence of Sound is happy to present an expansive interview with Saunier, Reinhart, and Cline, in which each talks at length about Big Walnut Yonder’s formation, the importance of each member’s contributions to the album, and the newly released lead single. (Note: All questions were submitted by our one and only News Editor Ben Kaye.)

You guys all come from pretty disparate musical backgrounds. When you were first forming the idea for Big Walnuts Yonder, what was it that drew you to go a little outside the box and bring such different styles together, and how did you figure out what sonic direction you’d be going in as a unit?

Greg Saunier: I sort of felt the opposite. Playing with Nick Nels and Watt was a piece of cake. Like coming home to a band you’ve never been in. I can think of musical projects each member has done that seems like way more of a stretch.

Nels Cline: I live in the cracks musically and always have. “Styles” and “genres” are not really my thing, so all I know is that I respect the musicians I play with and that I will do my best to participate in any endeavor in which we coalesce. It’s been my way since the late 70s! The sonic direction presents itself and demands respect more than we direct it when there is true collaboration in my opinion.

All the songs began with Mike’s basslines and then were built out from there, starting with NIck’s guitar riffs. What are some of the challenges writing in that way present, and how did you guys all figure out how to pull together a song from such basic starting points?

GS: I contributed one song, and its garageband demo was emailed to the gang the day before meeting up. I played all the parts myself but when I say parts you must understand I mean I played them on the computer with electronic sounds, using something called the “musical typing” feature in garageband. The funny thing about musical typing is that if your RAM isn’t up to scratch, some of the notes you type come out late. Like every note is a different amount late. The result is woeful. I hoped that even though my demo was so out of rhythm and discombobulated that they would still somehow glean what I’d meant, and come in the next day saying “no problem Greg, bad RAM, happens to the best of em” but actually I think they were really worried that I had no idea what rhythm was.

Nick Reinhart: I remember being really excited and nervous when my email dinged and there were mike watt bass demos sitting in my inbox. I listened through the 8 tracks and initially felt overwhelmed about how to approach adding guitars and doing justice to these bass parts. Watt’s musical language is so curious and unique. that’s part of the watt legacy — he sounds like himself. Finding interesting ways to dance around the bass and add to the conversation was really special.

NC: This is really the same way I recorded with Watt on “Contemplating the Engine Room” and Brother’s Sister’s Daughter (Japanese project). As Daevid Allen once sang with Gong, “Imagination is the key!”.

It sounds like a lot of the songs came together in a rather improvisational manner. How do you go from that to performing the songs in a live setting? Have you ever had to sit and re-listen to a track and sort of reverse engineer the music for yourself?

GS: I wouldn’t quite call it improv but it was pretty crazy how quick everybody came up with their parts even if they didn’t know the song. Particularly Nels hadn’t prepared any parts before recording but within seconds of hearing stuff he was playing stuff that sounded etched in stone like it had always been there.

NC: In this case I will definitely have to listen to stems or something to re-learn my parts! How we end up playing this ‘live’ is still a mystery and will be a fun challenge. I hope!

There’s a pretty big age gap between members of the band. What was surprising or inspiring about working with people from different generations? Any tips or tricks you picked up from the opposite end of the generational spectrum that you weren’t expecting?

GS: When everybody is able to quote Buddy Rich bus tape insults, age disappears.

NR: The creative wisdom these guys possess is totally amazing and being able to make art with musical giants is a real pleasure. I had previously learned so much from them from a distance, so being able to see it all from the inside out was super inspiring. They’re still ripping and learning. For me it was like looking into a crystal ball and seeing my future. It’d be like if I saw a newborn baby today and said, “Hi, in 30 years we’ll have a band and do something cool.”

NC: I play with people from their 20s to 70s. I don’t really think about age unless someone mentions it or brings up a reference that I am unaware of that is of their generation, so to speak. But in this case I think we all like sound and rock music, so…”

Most of the album was actually recorded in 2014, after some years of trying to get everyone in the same room together. Why has it taken three years to go from there to here? How does it feel to finally have it coming out and what’s it like having to talk about a project that’s, in a way, three years old already?

GS: Well I mixed this record so even though there was a gap after we did it, that was kind of useful. Came back to it ultra-fresh. And just finished the mixes recently, like three months ago or something. Stuff takes time especially when you’re DIY.

NC: My massive record from last year “Lovers” also took forever to come out and I am performing it this year. I don’t know… In this case it was Nick’s lyric writing/vocal recording that seemed to take some time. But we didn’t do an “Obama Suite” or anything, so I guess time isn’t really an important factor, really. “No wine before its time”! The music sounds fresh to me.

Watt, you wrote the lyrics for “Raise the Drawbridges” — can you tell me a little bit about what the track is about? It sounds to me like it’s about people too afraid to take charge of their life and face down challenges or those who try to stand in their way. Am I far off?

GS: I’m going to answer this because who says the person who wrote it is the only one who knows what something is about? This vocal moved me deeply when Watt first sent it to me. In the instrumental version this is probably the goofiest one we did, but the meaning completely changed once this portrait of police brutality was recorded. He takes the voice of an officer acting too tough and provoking conflict, and then comments on the transparency of the officer’s fear and the futility of this dynamic.

In his own words, Watt offered up a very detailed account of how Big Walnuts Yonder the album came together from start to finish:

“Eight of the ten songs started w/ Watt composition via bass only and he sent these out. nick worked on his developing his parts in response. this all happened well before ever getting into studio g in brooklyn. what I presented the band for my compositions were bass only (deliberately, to let Nick, nels and greg bring in their own for the collab) but they are what I would call SONG FORMS and not just bass lines. what I mean by that is there’s this part so many times and then it goes to this part so many times and so on. it’s supposed to be a foundation for a song form which I guess is made out of bass lines.

all four of us together for first time in brooklyn, we first attack these eight tunes as a team. the only titles they had were letters like song a, song b and so on. I’m re-enacting what I did at my pad by myself but w/these guys, I’m using tony maimone’s bass. nick’s doing the same except I think w/some of his solos cuz he’s interacting w/nels in real time. I remember greg asking me for a tiny bit of direction explanation for what was to become “I’ve got marty feldman’s eyes” when I put out a statement like, “I was influenced a little bit here by doing stuff from the clash’s first singles and album” cuz yeah, I had just done a benefit gig for the strummerville foundation and had to learn some of those tunes but it was still just a pure musical ref – I ended up using that confusion (sorry to confuse you, greg!) for the gist of my spiel when laster nick asked me to do spiel for it… I thought that point was very relevant! it was “dreamed up by committee” but still very connected to the cats on this proj.

nels brought his tune and explained what he wanted from each of us and made out a brief sketch roadmap the piece. we all four acted on that in real time, being it our first time for all of us – no “demo” to hear beforehand. same thing ‘pert-near happened w/greg’s tune. so there was actually two processes used: 1) eight had the watt, then nick and then all of us together and 2) two had their composers show us (the other three in each case) in the studio and then we went at it. to examine further, here’s my take. we got ten tunes recorded the way I just described and then were given roughs. down the road nick asks me to get spiel for two of the tunes, he gives me which ones, I think they might’ve been song t and song u. then he starts recording from his pad his spiel for seven of the other ones.

nels tune he decided was gonna remain instrumental. greg decided he would mix everything which is what we all wanted from the git-go and were very happy excited. I sent my two spiels but screwed up somehow so he mixed my two as instrumentals ’til I got him my spiels proper. he had gotten nick’s spiels from him. he had a few runs of mixes, each run being sent to us all and then he’d hear our opinions and do another run of mixes under those influences. I think there were four runs maybe altogether.”

(via Consequence of Sound)

#big walnuts yonder #nick reinhart #consequence of sound #mike watt #greg saunier #nels cline #wilco #the stooges #minutement #deerhoof #tera melos #raise the drawbridges #sargent house

[gamzart]

...

CIRCLES: Emanations Sephirot Transmission 

VIctoriaville, Quebec 2017

Festival Music International Victoriaville  

Gambletron

Sculptural broadcast and performance platform taking the shape of a Kabalistic structure revelatory of the infinite, this sculpture explores the evocation of totality that often occurs during improvisational performance.

An antenna situated in the centre of the space feeds a low power FM transmitter.  A signal from the transmitter was relayed to several radios placed in ten concentric circles. Sound will be broadcast into the installation from a roving radio station throughout the week, creating a sound piece sourced from interviews and interventions with improvisors participating at the festival.

Each Radio represents a line on the above Kabbalistic chart. This project hopes to redefine these 10 steps that bring us closer to the divine through the act of improvisation.

A more in depth description along with the interviews that were broadcast can be experienced here at the sculpture’s live blog:

https://sephirot-transmission.tumblr.com/

Chapter one includes interviews with: Emilie Mouchous, Julie Richard, Shahzad Ismaily, and Nels Cline.

[iowamusicshowcase]

This week Foxholes came on the show, and what a great experience I had getting to know and talk to the band! We were all over the place as far as topics go, from the bands origins, to shows they had been at, to getting paid $300 bucks for a gig, using paint for dinosaur music videos, jamming with Nels Cline, and so much more! This interview was a real treat and they played a fantastic stripped down set with tunes that normally don't get played on stage. This podcast is powered by ZenCast.fm All Recordings done in the Studio at [88.5 KURE Ames Alternative]

Episode 7: Foxholes - Part 1 of 2 by Richard Sutton Episode 7: Foxholes - Part 2 of 2 by Richard Sutton

Home page: http://ift.tt/2hJhYWX Facebook:

http://ift.tt/2zXkmDM BandCamp: http://ift.tt/2hKTaxw Foxholes' home page: http://ift.tt/2dVHTqh Foxholes on Facebook: http://ift.tt/2dbOOhz

PREVIOUSLY ON IOWA MUSIC SHOWCASE: One week ago... YOUR OWN PRIVATE IOWA - Episode 5: Pink Neighbor - http://ift.tt/2Bh1Szx Two weeks ago... YOUR OWN PRIVATE IOWA - Episode 2: Nate Logsdon - http://ift.tt/2AnPIVk Three weeks ago... Just what the heck is on this website! - http://ift.tt/2n363sh One month ago... Leave me alone! I'm resting! - http://ift.tt/2A2Mfv1 Three months ago... OTHER SOURCES: An Iowa Noise Music Compilation - http://ift.tt/2f0X7Aw Six months ago... PLAYLISTS: Random Iowa Music BandCamp Playlist 1 - http://ift.tt/2AnshvB One year ago... Episode 39: Happy Hawkeye Holidays 2016, Part 2 of 2 - The Cola Edition - http://ift.tt/2hBnokE Two years ago... Episode 21: Happy Hawkeye Holidays 2015, the Flurries Edition - http://ift.tt/1T4ITam OTHER IMSC WEBSITES AND LINKS: Feed: http://ift.tt/20G781V Facebook: http://ift.tt/1wSfofJ Twitter: https://twitter.com/iamusicshowcase Instagram: http://ift.tt/1BG7ZBT

#Iowa #Iowa Music #Music #Midwest Music #Midwestern Music