Musings of a Musical Chameleon
Well folks, now it's time to sink down into it and see what lurks in the mind of a guitarist on "hiatus"...A thumbnail sketch; I've been a club musician for 20 plus years, played in California, through Oregon, Washington and then came up here to Alaska, where I've been for awhile. I came up here in '87 for a six month tour and it's been--17 years? Time flies doesn't it? And when they say what a long, strange trip it's been, they ain't kidding! The "Long and Winding Road" has taken a dip into a few deep valleys of hell along with Himalayan stays in hedonism. This "chameleon" has changed colors perhaps a few too many times as well. During this ride through almost every conceiveable type of music and bar I picked up many different styles of playing, so many that sometimes I have an identity crisis.
You see way back when, when I first picked up the guitar it was the Beatles, Dylan, the Stones, Jefferson Airplane, the Doors, Bread, Zeppelin, etc etc...This was on acoustic, then I switched to electric rather late at 18 and practiced 8 hours a day for a year...Ever tried to play "Purple Haze" on acoustic? No, it doesn't quite get it! The albums (yes, they were called albums back then-ha ha) of choice were the Derek & the Dominos "In Concert", Hendrix "Band of Gypsys", other Eric Clapton gems "Wheels of Fire", "Live Cream Vol 2", the John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers "Beano" album, the Who's "Live at Leeds" and Santana LPs, mainly because they had extended jams for a nubile like myself to learn the craft of guitar. And who wants to waste time pulling the needle up and placing back down on a 3 minute tune over and over? Unless you're learning it note for note, and I was nowhere near the level where I could learn songs well by ear then. Man, these were primitive times, cassettes hadn't even been invented--ho ho...Of course the cave dwellers had reel to reel tape and had just discovered fire! There are countless other guitarists and bands that I probably will mention some other time-this is 3 thousand word thumbnail sketch, remember?! (riiiight)
From the get go I had an affection for the blues, there was something incredibly spellbinding about the raw emotions conveyed by the intense, deep bends and singing vibrato. You could feel it right down to the depths of your soul...So by the time I began playing in my first band I was one of those blues/rockers from the start. Then we started gigging and as luck would have it, guess who had to play disco music to make the green? Yep...I had a bet with a progressive rock wizard friend of mine on who would play "Shake Your Booty"first? Guess who won? yesssirrreee...but he ended up playing it a year later in a Nevada showband! Just desserts for gloating SOB's. I was not real happy about this development and really felt like the proverbial "sell out". As we had quite a few personnel changes, we began to do some soul and funk, Aretha, James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone, Kool and the Gang and others. I'd always loved Sly and really began enjoying the rhythm playing that's involved in alot of this stuff. Plus I was playing with this incredible rhythm section who had been gigging together for 8 years-groove machine to the max! The drummer had gone to Berklee and was really, really smooth.
I would insist that we do some rock and so we did practically every style imaginable. No, we didn't do "Muskrat Love", but we did do another Captain and Tennille song-ha ha! We crossed paths with them later on at a fair, a very funny story about that sometime later on. Flash forward a few years and I was playing all sorts of 80's rock and the other top-40. We were playing our originals, people were digging them, the vibe was happenin'. I had realized part of my dream, things looked promising. Then an originally oriented band came up here to Alaska and dissolved after some heavy traveling. I still am trying to figure out what we sounded like-ha ha!
The whole Alaskan experience involved being able to get back to my rockin' blues roots (very cool!) and a couple years of country! For anyone who knew me in my California days, besides the occasional "Don't Let Your Babies Grow up To Be Cowboys" and "On the Road Again" at gunpoint, I hated playing the stuff. I was once proclaimed the worst country player in the state by one of our singers-haw haw! Anyway, after a reintroduction to the style by some geniune pickers and grinners, it began to grow on me and now I have incredible respect for the style. I did spend some time on it and started to even get some kudos from the "Telemonster" pickers around. And a sidebar, pedal steel guitar can be the most amazingly beautiful and poignant instrument around...
So, to make this "thumbnail" sketch not to include every finger and toe, along with my musical career I had my other one. You see, one of the "rules of the road" for us macho lead guitarists is drinking. Alot. It used to be a requirement. So what started out as an idealistic foray into hedonism turned into a career in alcoholism. Suffice to say, it could've been much worse. But the general topic of this is "Jack of all trades, Master of some!". I took some time off from music to get some bad financial wreckage taken care of. I was burnt out on playing gigs on practically a mercenary basis and needed to re-examine things. I was hoping that after awhile what musical direction I wanted to go in would make itself known. It hasn't exactly happened. Now I'm becoming interested in acoustic singer/songwriting again, and...classic rock, jazz, old school R&B, funk , and yes, even country etc. As Jeff Beck once said when he was given free rein as a band leader; "it's like being a kid and being let out in a playground that's about 3 square miles--where do you start?"
I've been gradually working on my little studio, it's coming along. I bought a couple more Stratocasters, now have 6 electrics, don't have an acoustic, believe it or not...it's crazy...lost my beloved Guild in a pawn shop. But I feel having a good digital recording deck and few other items will allow me to get to work on some of the serious music in my head. My antique 4 track is just a notepad/plaything...It gets the ideas down, then I want a mix that somebody else might want to listen to, won't happen with that deck! My life of sobriety is considerably less social than when I was the life of the party drinking...the old "lubricant" is gone. I've gone back to my sequestered ways. I was a classical clarinetist before I took up guitar and the practice regimen made an imprint on me. As any classical player can tell you, it involves alot of time alone, sometimes with a metronome in a practice room, going over passages over and over and over and....over! (and over! and...) So I'm used to solitude...perhaps TOO used to it. People wear me out at times. My battle with depression continues, some days are better than others, life goes on...At times I feel very fortunate that I'm still living, then there are others where...well, that's another subject altogether. over n out...
You see way back when, when I first picked up the guitar it was the Beatles, Dylan, the Stones, Jefferson Airplane, the Doors, Bread, Zeppelin, etc etc...This was on acoustic, then I switched to electric rather late at 18 and practiced 8 hours a day for a year...Ever tried to play "Purple Haze" on acoustic? No, it doesn't quite get it! The albums (yes, they were called albums back then-ha ha) of choice were the Derek & the Dominos "In Concert", Hendrix "Band of Gypsys", other Eric Clapton gems "Wheels of Fire", "Live Cream Vol 2", the John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers "Beano" album, the Who's "Live at Leeds" and Santana LPs, mainly because they had extended jams for a nubile like myself to learn the craft of guitar. And who wants to waste time pulling the needle up and placing back down on a 3 minute tune over and over? Unless you're learning it note for note, and I was nowhere near the level where I could learn songs well by ear then. Man, these were primitive times, cassettes hadn't even been invented--ho ho...Of course the cave dwellers had reel to reel tape and had just discovered fire! There are countless other guitarists and bands that I probably will mention some other time-this is 3 thousand word thumbnail sketch, remember?! (riiiight)
From the get go I had an affection for the blues, there was something incredibly spellbinding about the raw emotions conveyed by the intense, deep bends and singing vibrato. You could feel it right down to the depths of your soul...So by the time I began playing in my first band I was one of those blues/rockers from the start. Then we started gigging and as luck would have it, guess who had to play disco music to make the green? Yep...I had a bet with a progressive rock wizard friend of mine on who would play "Shake Your Booty"first? Guess who won? yesssirrreee...but he ended up playing it a year later in a Nevada showband! Just desserts for gloating SOB's. I was not real happy about this development and really felt like the proverbial "sell out". As we had quite a few personnel changes, we began to do some soul and funk, Aretha, James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone, Kool and the Gang and others. I'd always loved Sly and really began enjoying the rhythm playing that's involved in alot of this stuff. Plus I was playing with this incredible rhythm section who had been gigging together for 8 years-groove machine to the max! The drummer had gone to Berklee and was really, really smooth.
I would insist that we do some rock and so we did practically every style imaginable. No, we didn't do "Muskrat Love", but we did do another Captain and Tennille song-ha ha! We crossed paths with them later on at a fair, a very funny story about that sometime later on. Flash forward a few years and I was playing all sorts of 80's rock and the other top-40. We were playing our originals, people were digging them, the vibe was happenin'. I had realized part of my dream, things looked promising. Then an originally oriented band came up here to Alaska and dissolved after some heavy traveling. I still am trying to figure out what we sounded like-ha ha!
The whole Alaskan experience involved being able to get back to my rockin' blues roots (very cool!) and a couple years of country! For anyone who knew me in my California days, besides the occasional "Don't Let Your Babies Grow up To Be Cowboys" and "On the Road Again" at gunpoint, I hated playing the stuff. I was once proclaimed the worst country player in the state by one of our singers-haw haw! Anyway, after a reintroduction to the style by some geniune pickers and grinners, it began to grow on me and now I have incredible respect for the style. I did spend some time on it and started to even get some kudos from the "Telemonster" pickers around. And a sidebar, pedal steel guitar can be the most amazingly beautiful and poignant instrument around...
So, to make this "thumbnail" sketch not to include every finger and toe, along with my musical career I had my other one. You see, one of the "rules of the road" for us macho lead guitarists is drinking. Alot. It used to be a requirement. So what started out as an idealistic foray into hedonism turned into a career in alcoholism. Suffice to say, it could've been much worse. But the general topic of this is "Jack of all trades, Master of some!". I took some time off from music to get some bad financial wreckage taken care of. I was burnt out on playing gigs on practically a mercenary basis and needed to re-examine things. I was hoping that after awhile what musical direction I wanted to go in would make itself known. It hasn't exactly happened. Now I'm becoming interested in acoustic singer/songwriting again, and...classic rock, jazz, old school R&B, funk , and yes, even country etc. As Jeff Beck once said when he was given free rein as a band leader; "it's like being a kid and being let out in a playground that's about 3 square miles--where do you start?"
I've been gradually working on my little studio, it's coming along. I bought a couple more Stratocasters, now have 6 electrics, don't have an acoustic, believe it or not...it's crazy...lost my beloved Guild in a pawn shop. But I feel having a good digital recording deck and few other items will allow me to get to work on some of the serious music in my head. My antique 4 track is just a notepad/plaything...It gets the ideas down, then I want a mix that somebody else might want to listen to, won't happen with that deck! My life of sobriety is considerably less social than when I was the life of the party drinking...the old "lubricant" is gone. I've gone back to my sequestered ways. I was a classical clarinetist before I took up guitar and the practice regimen made an imprint on me. As any classical player can tell you, it involves alot of time alone, sometimes with a metronome in a practice room, going over passages over and over and over and....over! (and over! and...) So I'm used to solitude...perhaps TOO used to it. People wear me out at times. My battle with depression continues, some days are better than others, life goes on...At times I feel very fortunate that I'm still living, then there are others where...well, that's another subject altogether. over n out...
1 Comments:
You should know I've had this post open all day long on my computer--couldn't wait to find time to read it! As a fellow musician you know I'm devouring every word--and I love how you write niiice and lonnnng ;).
Derek, this is gonna be a great blog; I've always loved your colorful way with words and phrases. Can't wait til your next post!
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