Plato credited the invention of disco to his mentor, Socrates. However, most modern historians and classics scholars believe the style originated with an earlier, unknown Athenian proto-philosopher.
The guitar is a Steelcaster built by my pal James Trussart. If you’re not familiar with his breathtaking work, stop now and visit his site. (If you’re going to NAMM 2019 in Anaheim, you can meet us both at the same time, since we’ll be sharing a booth.)
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
I’ve been obsessed with Henry Mancini’s music for decades. Here’s an example of his “tropical” exotica side.
My Mancini loved deepened after I joined Oranj Symphonette, a ’90s band founded by cellist Matt Brubeck (Dave’s son). It’s fascinating how accessible and catchy all his tunes are, even though you realized they’re incredibly weird and original once you look under the hood. You can hear those albums on YouTube. Plays Mancini includes only Mancini music (including a version of “Lujon” featuring our sorely missed friend Ralph Carney). The Oranj Album mixes Mancini with other retro sounds track themes.
Are you old enough to identify the sampled sound that starts at 01:25?
Here’s where my title comes from.
I’m playing my Resistocaster, a DIY instrument with Warmoth parts and Lollar Gold Foil pickups.
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
Was a prettier song ever written?
Admittedly, there’s only a smidgen of looping here. I usually play this without a looper, but it’s nice being able to grab that lovely falsetto line at 02:25.
The guitar is a Guild X-15 arch top from the ’90s. It’s had many pickups over the years. This one is a lovely Lollar Charlie Christian model.
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
I probably sound like I’m being ironic, but no — I really love this Taylor Swift song.
The Hello Kitty! Stratocaster was a gift from my lovely friend and bandmate Jane Wiedlin. I replaced the factory humbucker with a Duncan Phat Cat (sort of a humbucker-sized P-90). Again, no irony intended. I like Sanrio characters! (Especially Aggretsuko!)
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
Who amongst us does not love the Cure?
I got to interview Robert Smith for a Guitar Player cover story in 1992. It was one of funnest of the 1,000+ musician interviews I’ve conducted over the last few decades. Robert is brilliant, bitchy, and hilarious. We talked most of the night over too many drinks.
Years later I was recording with sociopath Courtney Love at Chateau Miraval in Provence, where the Cure recorded their Kiss Me Kiss Me Kiss Me album, including “Just Like Heaven.” The studio manager recalled how Robert would quote Apollinaire and Verlaine around the dinner table. En francais, bien sûr.
The guitar is a 000-sized Lowden I’ve owned since the early ’90s and have used on many sessions and tours. It’s fun playing acoustic guitar with distortion and effects, as long as you give up on the idea of generating traditional acoustic tones.
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
For Day 2 of Loopocalypse, here’s an angst-ridden original featuring brutal bit-crushed distortion and Tesla coil samples.
Thunderbeast Park was an Oregon roadside tourist attraction with cheesy plaster dinosaurs. I think I visited here as a kid, though I’m not certain. At least I would have pleaded for us to stop on one of my family’s up-the-coast road trips. I often got my way, ’cause my folks liked this stuff too.
The guitar is my DIY Birdmaster. The pickups are unpotted Duncan/Bonnamassa PAFs — probably the best humbuckers I own.
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig.
On the occasion of a daunting round-number birthday, I’ve just completed Loopocalypse, a concert-length video of my live looping show. I’ll be posting a song per day, each featuring a different guitar, from now till Thanksgiving/birthday. Here’s Day 1 of 17, a tribute to that dearest of the dearly departed, David Bowie. I’ve been playing this for years, and it just gets sadder and sadder. Tomorrow I’ll share something appropriately angst-ridden for the US election day. (Here’s a remembrance of my brief Bowie encounters, written the day after he died.)
Here’s an explanation of my live looping rig. The guitar is an all-original 1963 Strat that I’ve owned since 1980. For many years it was my only good guitar.
I’ve just finished recording a concert’s worth of live looping performances. I’ll be posting these a day at a time, starting later today and continuing through Thanksgiving, 2018. (And there’s a daunting round-number birthday in there somewhere.) I’ve covered my looping setup before, but it’s changed a lot since the last time I wrote about it.
MainStage users, you can download my looping template here. It includes no user patches or third-party plug-ins — it’s just a raw template. But if I’d had this when I started out, it would have saved me a day or two!
I haven’t posted any new video in months and months. It’s not just laziness or business, though I suffer from both. I’ve just been locked away in my studio, trying to create a new live looping system.
I still haven’t nailed it down, so I’m not going to get into a complete run-down yet. But here are the basic ideas.
• I’ve moved from a hardware looper to software looping. When I started this godforsaken looping project years ago, I’d just finished a lot of work on Apple’s then-new MainStage software. At the time, the program’s looper simply wasn’t reliable enough for live performance. Also, my intense signal processing was pushing my MacBook Pro to its limits. But since then, the program has gone through many upgrades. Meanwhile, after years of relative stagnation, Apple finally issued a major MacBook Pro upgrade in 2017. Between the more powerful computer and the refined software, I could finally shift looping and signal processing to the computer. Yeah, there are a couple of disadvantages. For one thing, MainStage’s looper lacks a “copy” function, something I’ve come to rely on a great deal in my arrangements. But it sure is nice not having to run the entire mix through the relatively cheap hardware looper convertors — just the snazzy ones in my Apollo interface. (Of course, now that I’ve transitioned, Electro-Harmonix has just announced a compelling-looking 6-track looper. I’ll have to check that out…)
• I’ve put aside for now the Fishman TriplePlay MIDI pickup. I have no complaints about TriplePlay, which is far and away the best MIDI pickup ever created, and a product I recommend without reservation. But I wanted to be free from the hardware setup. This way, I can plug in any guitar, any time. (I’ve been experimenting with acoustic looping — more on that soon.) I’m still using MIDI sounds, but again, it’s all in software via Jam Origin’s brilliant MIDI Guitar plugin. It works incredibly well without a MIDI pickup, but it’s not nearly as fast as TriplePlay. It’s fine for doubling, or for melodic and textural stuff, but it’s just not speedy enough to play MIDI drums at even moderate tempos. Which bring me to the other big departure …
• I confess: I’m playing to a drum machine. I’m triggering and changing patterns using a KMI !2 Step foot controller. I really wrestled with this decision. I loved the idea of using no machine tempos — it all came from the hands. But at some point I realized that the main reason I was committed to that approach was for bragging rights: “No prerecorded tracks, and no machine rhythms” I could boast. But who cares except geeks like me? Anyway, I still have misgivings about the change, but I’m going with it for now. I think that means, though, that I’ll create more arrangements without percussion, just so I’m not locked to the machine for an entire set.
Meanwhile working with a tempo clock lets me do fun stuff with synchronized effects. I’m especially besotted with Sugar Bytes’s Effectrix, a mind-bending multi-effector that lets you activate and edit effects on a note-by-note basis. You hear it a lot in the “solo” in this video.
I’ve played a few shows with the new setup. The first one was flawed but promising. The second was an unmitigated disaster. Then I doubled up on practicing and (not kidding) started meditating again, which helped a lot. Last time I tried this live, it went really well! We’ll see how it goes at my gig this week.
Anyway, it’s still a work in progress. I’ll keep the curious updated.
I played this cover tune with no irony whatsoever. I love the original.