Infinitesimal gradations.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 10:56 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Idiot glee (?)

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 10:54 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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This just defies description.

The high heels on the pedal board. The room full of like-attired women. The tambourines that come out of nowhere.

Click the video to go to the source page at YouTube and enjoy the comments.

Posted by: JohnL at 10:12 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Here's my mix CD for this month:

1. Morgenspaziergang, Kraftwerk
2. Praeludium und Fuga, a moll, Georg Böhm
3. Growing Up, Peter Gabriel
4. Baker Street, Foo Fighters (covering Gerry Rafferty)
5. 2112 Overture, The Vitamin String Quartet (covering Rush)
6. Prelude and Fugue in D Major (BWV 532), J.S. Bach
7. Flesh for Fantasy, Billy Idol
8. Darkness, Peter Gabriel
9. Magic Power, Triumph
10. The Low Spark of High-Heeled Boys, Traffic

(Ten Songs, 1 hour, 68.5MB)

This is one of the more eclectic mixes to fall out of my music library. It makes a good driving mix. I have to say that Bach's D Major Fugue here is one of the happiest pieces of music in the organ literature. The recording I have is Helmut Walcha's, a nicely articulated and beautifully registered version: maybe not historically "authentic" enough for some prissy scholars, but eminently listenable.

If I weren't such a lazy blogger, I'd provide links to Amazon or iTunes, but you can use a search engine as easily as I.

Update:

Here's a video of a stunningly fast rendition of BWV 532:

Posted by: JohnL at 08:26 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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So, Fred has gotten himself an iPod. I haven't gotten any audio books yet (I'm still attached to paper versions). But I do have several gigs of music on my hard drive.

Typically, I take luck-of-the-draw when synching my iPod, but I also like to cut a variety of mix CDs to match my mood. These are usually for car rides only (the interior of my car is hard on CDs, so I like to use disposable, homemade, CDs rather than originals).

Here's my January 2008 mix:

1. Battleflag, Lo Fidelity All Stars
2. Pretty Pink Rose, Adrian Belew
3. The Main Monkey Business, Rush
4. Every Day is Exactly the Same, Nine Inch Nails
5. The Ecstasy of Gold, Ennio Morricone
6. Man With a Gun, Jerry Harrison
7. Ah! Leah!, Donnie Iris
8. Judith, A Perfect Circle
9. Baker Street, Gerry Rafferty
10. The Analog Kid, Rush
11. The Hand That Feeds, Nine Inch Nails
12. Malignant Narcissism, Rush
13. I Still Believe, The Call
14. Turn The Page, Rush
15. Synchronicity 2, The Police
16. Astradyne, Ultravox

A bit of this, a bit of that.

Posted by: JohnL at 09:04 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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So, according to this, my obsession with collecting books and games is actually good for the environment.

Like I needed an excuse...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 09:12 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Combined review can now be found here.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 06:01 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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My friend Pete Young's pictures in various categories at Flickr. Various subjects, including SF author's with pending Big Works A'Coming.

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 01:02 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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There's a man who leads a life of danger
To everyone he meets he stays a stranger
With every move he makes another chance he takes
Odds are he won't live to see tomorrow

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

Beware of pretty faces that you find
A pretty face can hide an evil mind
Ah, be careful what you say
Or you'll give yourself away
Odds are you won't live to see tomorrow

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

------ lead guitar ------

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

Swingin' on the Riviera one day
And then layin' in the Bombay alley next day
Oh no, you let the wrong word slip
While kissing persuasive lips
The odds are you won't live to see tomorrow

Secret agent man, secret agent man
They've given you a number and taken away your name

Secret agent man

(Johnny Rivers) more...

Posted by: Fred Kiesche at 07:40 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Robbo has an interesting bit up today about the Bach Toccata and Fugue in d minor (not the far-superior Dorian one, mind you).

First, I have to disagree with Rob's reflexive dismissal of the Bach:Led Zeppelin analogy that Camille Paglia makes in the article he's initially discussing. I know it's a matter of taste, but I at least have experienced emotions inspired by the "heaviness" ("darkness"?) of the organ literature that are very similar to emotions prompted by hard rock and electric blues in the Zeppelin tradition. And I know plenty of rock musicians and metal fans who also like heavy baroque music.

Second, I share Rob's dislike for the Stokowski version of the T&F in d.

Finally, unlike Rob, for the reasons laid out in another article he cites (and which I cited about a year ago), I still believe that the T&F in d was not authored by Bach, at least not as an organ work. I had the privilege of attending a master class with Peter Williams back in 1999, and he delivered quite a persuasive argument that it was not a Bach organ work. Even when compared with other "youthful" Bach organ works, it just sticks out like a sore thumb. Williams then presented his compelling case that the T&F in d was most likely a transcription from a piece for solo violin.

For further reading, this article expands on Williams' core idea, but explains how the T&F can be "suspiciously" easy to re-transcribe for play on a 5-string cello.

Posted by: JohnL at 11:27 AM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
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Greetings faithful readers. Sorry for the thin gruel served up around here recently.

When you don't have original material, what do you do? Borrow!

Here's a Rush lyric that has some significance to me these days:

Open Secrets

It went right by me
At the time it went over my head
I was looking out the window
I should have looked
At your face instead.

It went right by me
Just another wall
There should have been a moment
When we let our barriers fall
I never meant what you're thinking
That is not what I meant at all.

Well I guess we all have these feelings
We can't leave unreconciled
Some of them burned on our ceilings
Some of them learned as a child
The things that we're concealing
Will never let us grow
Time will do its healing, You've got to let it go.

Closed for my protection
Opened to your scorn
Between these two directions
My heart is sometimes torn.

I lie awake with my secrets
Spinning around my head
Something that somehow escaped me
Something you shouldn't have said
I was looking out the window
I should have looked at your face instead.

Well I guess we all have these feelings
We can't leave unreconciled
Some of them burned on our ceilings
Some of them learned as a child
The things that we're concealing
Will never let us grow
Time will do its healing, You've got to let it go.

I find no absolution
In my rational point of view
Maybe some things are instinctive
But thereÂ’s one thing you could do
You could try to understand me
I could try to understand you.

From 1987's Hold Your Fire, an album that I was too immature to appreciate fully when it came out. Now that I'm about the same age Neil Peart was when he penned those lyrics, I completely understand where he's coming from. Nice nod to The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock in there, too.

Posted by: JohnL at 09:24 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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Jon Lord, of Deep Purple (for most of its history), is the apotheosis of a hard-rock organist. And he's probably the greatest influence on my own Hammond style.

Sure, Keith Emerson and Rick Wakeman each had a better classical technique. But Emerson was much more of a Jazzer, and Wakeman was just, well, kind of effete, what with his flourishes and ornamentation. Both fantastically talented, but neither really representative of rock and roll.

Lord, on the other hand, manhandled the Hammond organ. Made it a coequal to Blackmore's overdriven guitar and Ian Gillan's wailing vocals.

Check out this classic video of a riff-based jam, entitled "No, No, No." Lord's solo kicks in at around 3:45 and the song just builds from there:

Enjoy.

Posted by: JohnL at 11:27 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
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I've previously mentioned in passing that Ben Folds is one of my favorite contemporary musicians. His first group was a hard-rocking piano trio (piano-bass-drums) known as the Ben Folds Five.

I first learned about them when I saw them play "Song for the Dumped" on David Letterman. (Hilarious song, at least for guys). Ironically, it was that performance that triggered (or at least coincided with) their decision to break up.

Anyway, check out this amazing 1998 performance of their song "Philosophy," available on this DVD:

Posted by: JohnL at 11:09 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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One of my favorite musical themes of all time, Ennio Morricone's masterful The Ecstasy of Gold from his soundtrack for The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly:

My favorite version is the one performed by Yo Yo Ma on his Yo Yo Ma Plays Ennio Morricone album.

Posted by: JohnL at 11:20 PM | Comments (4) | Add Comment
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This article has me more excited than usual about Rush's new studio release due in early 2007. This extended quote from drummer and lyricist Neil Peart especially piqued my interest:

"You try to put your own way of seeing the world into some kind of congruence with other peoples, and that's difficult for me... I mean, I see the world in what I think to be a perfectly obvious and rational way, but when you go out into it and see the way other people think and behave, and express themselves on church signs, you realize, 'Well, I'm not really part of this club....'"

"I looked for the good side of faith.... To me it ought to be your armor, something to protect you and something to console you in dark times. But it's more often being turned into a sword, and that's one big theme I'm messing with."

What particularly interests me about this is that he has already touched on the "faith as sword" theme in the song Peaceable Kingdom from Vapor Trails (lyrics and some commentary here), which was a pretty obvious condemnation of jihadist Islam.

Peart is familiar with the church signs he mentions based on his wide-ranging motorcycle tours of North America (chronicled here and here -- the latter one notably recounting his painful journey through the continent to deal with the grief of losing his wife and daughter within a year of each other.)

Posted by: JohnL at 09:30 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
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Wow. This is too cool. A video that accompanies one of my favorite songs from the psychedelic 60s, Time of the Season by the Zombies:

That video is WAY ahead of its time, long before MTV and music videos were standard in the industry. Check out the fashions, some of which would still look good today. Then remember that many of those nice looking models are likely grandmas by now. Ha.

(By the way, the song was recorded at Abbey Road studios the year before I was born and then released in 1968, the year of my birth.)

Posted by: JohnL at 11:29 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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How could I have missed a blog devoted to my favorite band all this time?

Thanks to fellow Rush-head Free Will for the pointer.

Posted by: JohnL at 10:47 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Go check out the unplugged video version of Peter Murphy's A Strange Kind of Love, as performed by Trent Reznor (of Nine Inch Nails), Jeordie White (of Marilyn Manson and A Perfect Circle), and Murphy himself (Bauhaus and solo).

Via Bill INDC Ardolino.

I had to google Jeordie White to find out he is the bass player for A Perfect Circle. But before Jeordie, APC had quite a striking bassist: Paz Lenchantin. Great player, but check out her especially unique move from around 1:50 to 2:05 in Judith:

Posted by: JohnL at 11:29 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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INDCent Bill found a clip on YouTube illustrating the famous synchronicity between the Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon and The Wizard of Oz.

I particularly love how the spinning Leslie in "The Great Gig in the Sky" mirrors the spinning tornado in Oz.

I guess this is as good a place as any to note the recent passing of Floyd founder Syd Barrett, who gave Pink Floyd their name and whose LSD-and-fame-fueled descent into insanity colored all of the band's subsequent output.

Posted by: JohnL at 11:13 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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I was first introduced to acid jazz trio Medeski Martin & Wood about 4 years ago when a bass player in my old group who knew that I liked Emerson Lake & Palmer loaned me his Uninvisible CD. John Medeski, the organist, is one of the best (if not *the* best) Hammond organ players working these days. Check out this super trippy video of the song Uninvisible:

Posted by: JohnL at 07:19 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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