Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The threshold of recognition

I play in a cover band . We play live less than 6 times a year. That makes for a lot of fun at gigs because they occur so far apart. For us, one of the pinnacles in performing is that exquisite moment when someone in the audience recognizes what you are playing. Usually this moment is punctuated by a "yeah!" or on occasion "dude! That's [______] (insert artist/song name)." Whenever it happens we all get a little jolt of pride in our playing and a little bit of confirmation that we are playing to "our crowd." I call that moment the threshold of recognition . I also listen to a lot of music - sometimes live music. On quality live recordings I often enjoy hearing that moment on a macro level: the crowdsourcing version. One in particular that I like is from Underworld's Everything, Everything Live album . Underworld is a group that has been around since the 1980s and for the past 16 or 17 has been making excellent music that sits somewhere between ind...
Read more

Classic Rock V. I

I live in suburban NY - which means I have little or no access to radio stations. I get WNYC which gives me NPR and there is a year-old station called The Peak 107.1 which plays 50% good music in my opinion. They play a decent mix of music aimed at my demographic. i will leave it at that. Classic rock drives me crazy in two ways: it is so predictable that you can almost pick the next three songs and it is occasionally so enticing because it can catch you in the perfect mood. Most of the time, the three classic rock stations in my area play the standards: Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Who, Allman Brothers you get the idea. The problem is that most of the time they play the exact same songs: "Wish You Were Here," "Another Brick In the Wall," "Rock & Roll," "Stairway to Heaven," "Kashmir," "Jessica," "Melissa" etc. When they throw a random song at you like "Going Mobile" or "That's the Way" i...
Read more

More lists of five

Five Drummers Who Rock 1. Mark Brzezicki (the Cult & Big Country) 2. Phill Rudd (AC/DC) 3. Charlie Watts 4. Reni (The Stone Roses) 5. Rick Buckler (The Jam) Five Songs You Will Never Hear At My House 1. (anything) - by Billy Joel 2. The Chicken Dance 3. Brown-Eyed Girl - Van is the Man but I have to draw the line 4. Celebration - Kool & the Gang 5. American Pie - Don McLean (or anyone else) Five Songs You Might Be Surprised to Hear at My House 1. Groove Is In the Heart - Deelite 2. Gimme Gimme Gimme - ABBA 3. Photograph - Def Leppard 4. Last Train To Trancentral - The KLF 5. Rubber Band Man - the Spinners The Last Five Songs Played At My Last Party (New Year's Eve) 1. Train In Vain - The Clash 2. You Shook Me All Night Long - AC/DC 3. Jane Says - Jane's Addiction 4. Panama - Van Halen 5. Photograph - Def Leppard Long live the list...
Read more