Long Hair and Mid-Air

I haven't written many blog entries in the past year, and I'm finding it odd that the reason is that I haven't been doing much business travel.

Well maybe this year will bring more. I'm once again writing from 37,000 feet in the air, over central Greenland.

This is my first flight to Europe since late 2011. And I have been growing my hair since the last time I was there. I've gone from a short-haired computer geek to a rock star wanna-be in that short time.

After watching two movies it seems time to settle down during the dark of the winter night. Sadly, I started the trip with a discharged laptop battery and the Lufthansa A340 I'm in has no seat power (at least not in economy). So although I had hoped to put in a few hours of office work, I'm out of luck. And I'm thus writing another blog entry on my iPhone.

The soundtrack to this blog is Peter Frampton's incredible Grammy-winning Fingerprints album. It's now been a top pick for me for a few years. Not yet at the level of Miles' Kinda Blue, but getting there.

In the past few weeks I had arrived at the point of feeling like I needed new music, and have been a bit disappointed in the process.

First off, I had been waiting quite awhile for the North American release of an album I'd seen buzz about on Twitter. Sweet Billy Pilgrim (@sweetbillyp) is an indie band from the UK, and I found myself oddly compelled by their latest album Crown and Treaty. In the end, they did not release it on iTunes in Canada, and I waited while their website finally got able to sell direct.

Now, I can understand the view that you'll make more money per sale when selling direct. But honestly, my opinion is that this is creating a barrier to entry that will not maximize total sales. The same reason that iPods took over the digital music player industry holds for music sales as well. On a whim, anywhere I happen to be, I can buy a track in the iTunes store for a good price and have it immediately available to listen to. I have a few examples from past business trips where I bought music on the plane before we left the gate.

In the case of the Crown and Treaty album, when I finally got access to their store, there wasn't even a simple way to buy the whole album. You had to select each track separately, at a total well above a typical album purchase for me. So in the end, instead of buying the album, I bought only the one song from it that had been haunting me: Archaeology. If the album had been available on iTunes, they would have made $7 or so from me. Instead they got probably $2. And frankly I'm sorry, but that's business. The album's tracks can be streamed from sweetbillypilgrim.com. Check it out.

So, the other "new" music I bought was intended to re-inspire me, but has been less than totally awesome.

Beth Hart released a new album recently called Bang Bang Boom Boom. It's very good, but a bit further from my favorite tastes than the previous one with Joe Bonamassa. I think the new one feels a bit more "country", but my wife disagrees. And she is quite keen on this new one. Beth's voice is fantastic.

I truly loved the last Dream Theater album A Dramatic Turn of Events. That was my first Dream Theater, so knowing they're again recording a new album, I thought I'd buy something from the back catalog. In the end, I bought the previous one, Octavarium. It's quite good, but I found it "less" interesting than the Dramatic Turn one. It didn't floor me on initial listen, and although it's grown on me, I'm still not enjoying it as much.

I got in the mood for some ragtime and bought The Very Best of Scott Joplin, which was very cheap on iTunes and includes dozens of tunes. Very solid, though a bit much to listen to all the way through in one sitting.

Then Joe Bonamassa has teamed up with a different sort of outfit and released a Funk album with a group called Rock Candy Funk Party. The album is We Want Groove, and it's actually pretty good. I'm a bit of a funk fan, and feel so vindicated that Joe has validated this love. Maybe I'm not the only one who thinks of his influences as Blues-Rock/Jazz/Funk. I still find it disturbing that Funk isn't a category on iTunes, actually. I'd probably find lots on speculation if I could search for it by category. Anyway this album reminds me of early 70s funk in many places. Feels like low-ceiling rooms, dark lighting and cigarette smoke. There are a few real grooving tracks, though. Overall, probably the best find of the lot here.

Then I bought the brand new Steve Lukather Transition album. I really liked his last one All's Well That Ends Well. This one is decent, but feels a bit less inspired. I think I'll queue it up for another listen next, hoping that it keeps improving for me. The singing, in particular, seems weaker than his last album, which is too bad. There are really some very excellent guitar parts, which isn't a surprise from this guitar legend, much-demanded session guitarist, and member of Toto.

Well, from the north coast of Iceland, I'll call it a night. Rock on...

From Beyond the Blogosphere

OK, well finally I return from wherever I really was for the past 6 months or more.  Pretty sad, really, that I couldn't get my act together for a blog post.  I have remained relatively active (for me) on Twitter, but this seemed more than I could manage for some reason.

Nevertheless, here I am again.  I'll keep this post to a quick update on everything, and hopefully follow up with more detailed discussion of a few specific subjects soon.

My Music

In brief, I've recorded virtually nothing in the past year.  The major renovation of our house was completed at the end of the summer 2011, and I should have been able to take over the new music room with gusto.  I kind of did that, but without getting around to recording in it.  That said, there's lots of music going on, whether it be noodling around on whatever guitar is handy, or getting together with friends for informal musical exchanges on a near-weekly basis.

I think I now have the setup I need to record all the instruments in the arsenal, and it's time to sit down and do just that.  There's always something new flowing from my fingers, though taming it to the point of a decent recording is more challenging.  I've actually been writing some lyrics in the past 6 months, which is almost a first for me.

I am significantly influenced (encouraged) by the musical interactions with my friends who come by weekly to share musical ideas.  Whether it's an attempt on a cover tune of some sort, or exploring originals from the guys, it's always interesting and pushes and pulls me to move forward.  I was sad to see a key member of our posse say goodbye at the end of 2011 and return home to England... his influence is still felt in the room, but sadly his great fingerstyle guitar playing is missed.  We've added a new face as a result, though, which pushes some new influences into play.  Always for me it's a good time when sharing music with others.

My Instruments

As is my nature, and my luck, I tend to find myself with new instruments every now and then.  Although I think of myself primarily as a guitarist, I'm by no means particular about it.  I welcome any instrument into my home.  And we have a couple of weird ones, which I suppose I should discuss at some point in the future.

Since last summer, there are a few new items of note.  For the most part, I tend towards quite affordable instruments (quantity over quality, perhaps):

• 1/2-scale Applause AA12 (by Ovation) steel string guitar
• Korg O1/Wfd Synthesizer (early 90's synth... quite used)
• Behringer Ultratone K1800FX Keyboard Amplifier
• Johnson JB110 5-string Banjo
• 10-string Electric Guitar (shown at right)

My Consumption of Music

The best concert I've seen in a long while was Joe Bonamassa, who I managed to see twice last December.  I drove to Seattle for the first show with two buddies, and had a really great guys evening out road trip.  Seats were way up high and off to one side of the auditorium, but the sound was great after the first few songs.  Two nights later, I saw Joe again with my wife, sitting in row 6 at the Orpheum theater in Vancouver.  The show was definitely better from close up, but the sound was pretty similar in both settings, and the sets were virtually identical.  I was sad not to see my favourite of his songs, though: Stop!  Ah, well, we can't have everything.

I have purchased a few albums over the past months (as usual), and this latest batch includes:

• Dream Theater -- A Dramatic Turn of Events **** [out of 5*... I think only Kinda Blue gets that score]
• Van Halen -- A Different Kind of Truth ***1/2
• Steve Lukather -- All's Well that Ends Well ***1/2
• Garrett -- Seventh Star ***1/2
• Five Alarm Funk -- Anything is Possible **1/2
• Corea, Clarke & White -- Return to Forever IV ****
• Chickenfoot -- Chickenfoot III ***
• Barry Greenfield -- The Early Years (1973 & 1975) [too dated to fairly rate: has some good material]
• Beth Hart & Joe Bonamassa -- Don't Explain ****
• Marcus Miller -- Marcus ***1/2

You can see that most of these have been pretty solid.  The one I have liked the most, and played a LOT is the Dream Theater album.  I wasn't previously a fan, but have found this to be enduringly enjoyable.

My Reading

In the area of music, I have enjoyed the following over the past months:

• When Giants Walked the Earth (Led Zeppelin) -- Mick Wall ****
• Guitar Boy -- M. J. Auch ***
• Guitar -- Tim Brookes *****

I also have enjoyed a number of other books, though I often find business inspiration from the music industry stories as well.  On the business side:

• What EveryBODY is Saying -- Joe Navarro, Marvin Karlins [Recently started as Audio book. Narrator is quite poor]
• Taking People With You -- David Novak ****
• The Steve Jobs Way (iLeadership) -- Jay Elliot, William L. Simon
• In the Plex (the Google Story) -- Steven Levy ****
• iWoz -- Steve Wozniak, Gina Smith ****

Novels:

• Freedom (TM) -- Daniel Suarez *****
• Locked On -- Tom Clancy, Mark Greaney ***1/2
• Against All Enemies -- Tom Clancy, Peter Telep ****

Well, as usual it's past bedtime, so off I go.  Thanks for reading.  Let me know what you're reading or listening to that i should have a look at.

Cheers

Dave

Lots'a Blues

Saw B.B.King in concert last weekend at the Red Robinson Show Theatre [great venue].  I had seen B.B.King in concert once before, about ten years back, on his 75th birthday.  So here he is now at 85, still doing 250 shows a year.  That's stamina!  The show was good.  The band was decent, and Mr. King's voice is still incredibly strong.  I even managed to stay awake for the whole show, despite having flown home from Italy that afternoon.

I recently bought Eric Clapton's newest album, Clapton.  Initially I liked it a lot.  It's kind of gentle... a mature sort of blues that's not rushed.  I'm less sure it's going to become a favourite for me.  It's very solid, but perhaps short of great.  I'll keep playing it and see if it grows on me more.  So far I'd give it about 7/10.

Less bluesy, I also bought Joe Satriani's new one, Black Swans and Wormhole Wizards. It's actually quite a nice album.  I haven't previously owned one of his albums, though I did buy one track on iTunes last year.  I think this new album is nicely evolutionary, while staying pretty true to the feel of the Surfing with the Alien stuff. This one so far rates 8/10 for me.

The best deal of the year was my purchase of Django Reinhardt's Greatest Hits album.  71 tracks of really pleasant music for $5.99.  Much as everyone seems to refer to him as a guitar influence, I hadn't consciously heard his music up 'till now.  I was happy to see that some of the tracks also have Stéphane Grappelli on violin, who I quite like.

Not so much bluesy, but I purchased Marcus Miller's A Night in Monte Carlo, partly because it contained a couple of Miles Davis tunes I really like.  That then convinced me to finally pony up and buy Miles Davis' Tutu album as well.  The Marcus Miller live album is good.  Solid and enjoyable but not spectacular.  I think the guy's probably a genius in the studio... harder to bring others into the picture live -- 7/10.  The Miles Davis album is really really good, and makes me kick myself for not buying it 20 years ago when I first wondered about it.  I have owned Miles' Amandla album since about 1989... didn't realize Marcus Miller was such a strong influence on that album at the time.  But I love that album and Tutu is similar enough to be absolutely great as well -- 10/10.

Finally, two more blues albums I bought earlier this year:

Steve Miller's newest album Bingo! is pretty solid.  It's enjoyable bluesfest in that fine tradition, and Miller (Steve) does a very good job in this genre.  Like most, I haven't followed his career and mostly know him from the great stuff in the 70s like Fly Like an Eagle.  This album is nice to listen to, contains some solid guitar playing, but I think it's overly memorable for me.  I'll give it 7/10.

Joe Bonamassa's Black Rock is one that's staying with me.  There are a couple of songs on there that are really great, and the rest is very solid and enjoyable.  Good blues-based stuff, but a little less predictable/standard than many blues albums, which increased my enjoyment.  I don't own any of Joe's earlier work, but this one is really great, and I'll be following him in the future.  I keep hoping he'll come to Vancouver for a show, but it doesn't look like he's heading this way soon.  I'll give Black Rock a 8/10.