JCHRants

A compendium of musings on music and this business we call show

Progress (Fourth Progress Snippet)

11.15.2016

This is the big one, folks. The eponymous fourth snippet from the new album, Progress. Genesis 1:28. Property management. Nietzche and Also Sprach Zarathustra. ELP and Jerusalem. Gentle Giant and selling out. Nobody’s Fool–he grows on people.

RCWow. I thought I was listening to Return To Forever for a minute.I take back everything I ever said about you not ‘shredding’ anymore.

JCHWell, it’s an eight minute (cough) ‘snippet’.

RCNow I like that. It’s like the Detroit (Medley) you used as a bonus track for Nice Cuts. I never thought the snippets really worked well for ‘epics’–they don’t give the listener a good idea of the whole thing. On the other hand, new people are not going to listen to thirty minutes–they want to get to the meat of the thing. I know it’s extra work for you, but I think it’s a great solution.

JCHRog are you sick? I can’t tell […]

Reg Kehoe And His Marimba Queens (Amazing Bass Solo)

11.14.2016

Culture, Music Appreciation

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e1tQNqQqIU8

I will never get tired of watching this. It is ‘show biz’ to me. And that matters. It’s got a great gimmick. Now do I want to watch ninety minutes of this? Probably not. But it harkens back to a time of Vaudeville or Ed Sullivan–real variety shows. If only I could figure out a gimmick as cool as this.

Of course, the highlight is the totally insane bass solo. I want that guy in my band. I mean any band I could ever imagine in any style of music? I want that guy. He has the attitude. 😀

NB. I got started playing in supper clubs where you’d see a selection of entertainers during an evening and frankly, I think it’s the way to spend an evening out. Now? We stay in and flip through our ‘devices’ and ‘self-curate our entertainment experience’. I now see the wisdom of a great show: a complete evening experience where you got a series of entertainments that were curated with great care, to great a particular effect. Today, I suppose it’s just like how a great DJ chooses a complete set to tell a story. Same difference. Structure is structure.

Is This Any Way To Write Music?

11.8.2016

Albums, Culture

If you’re here once in a while, you can see some changes going on in preparation for the release of Progress. So we’re gettin’ close. As I write this, it’s election day in America and Rog is taking the week off. So coincidentally I want to talk about some (cough) ‘polarisation’ he and I routinely have going on.

If you read this regularly, you know how Rog has encouraged me over the years to market better. That’s his job and I am forever grateful for his advice and support. I’ll go even further and say that if not for him, ninety percent of the ‘content’ on this site simply would not exist. That said, I think that he thinks of what I do as you probably do and that creates some ‘friction’. He literally cannot wrap his mind around the idea of not generating ‘product’ according to a schedule. Everyone works on a schedule, right? That kitchen remodel? You know how long it will take. The term paper? It’s […]

Cristoph Niemann On Creativity

11.4.2016

Culture

This may be the best short explainer on how the creative process actually works. It’s totally not fun. But what Mr. Niemann gets right (and I never seem to) is why it’s a great life in spite of all the pain and suffering. Highest possible recommendation.

How Does Christoph Niemann make art look effortless? With a lot of work

Allison Lupton Band – Where O Where My Rising Star

11.2.2016

Music Appreciation

I got worn out of most ‘fiddle and banjo crap’ (as Martin Mull put it) DECADES AGO. But every once in a while, there’s something that still has the magic for me–and this is one of them. Great folk music–even at its happiest–simply has to have a certain weariness to be worth much. At its source are people who never get the smell of work off their skin.