Podcasts about Danelectro

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  • 116EPISODES
  • 53mAVG DURATION
  • 1EPISODE EVERY OTHER WEEK
  • Dec 28, 2024LATEST
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Best podcasts about Danelectro

Latest podcast episodes about Danelectro

The Guitar Pirates Podcast
e150: Happy Holidays

The Guitar Pirates Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 28, 2024 36:38


Send us a textThis episode is brought to you by mean beard, green beard, analog pedals, and Franklin straps.2 e.o.y. lists, Danelectro gas, Rat Love, and Xmas gift love.Thank you all.See you next year!

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 19, 2024 Thursday Hour 1

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 19, 2024 60:05


Less than SIX DAYS! Just a reminder, as I don't believe any store will be open on Christmas Day! Another reminder…my size is “left-handed 12-string Danelectro in any color other than black!” The Music Authority Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Mixcloud, Player FM, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, Pocket Cast, APPLE iTunes, and direct for the source distribution site: *Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  AND NOW there is a website! TheMusicAuthority.comThe Music Authority Podcast! Special Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! Seeing that I'm gone from FB now…Follow me on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority*Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *The Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6-7PM EST!*AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!December 19, 2024, Thursday, opening stanza…@Orbis 2.0 - TMA SHOW OPEN THEME@Day & Dream - December [Comfort and Joy - A Shiny Happy Christmas Compilation]@The Natives - Got Me Going@Blueanimal - Anyone But Me [Figment That Was Me]@The Decca Concert Orchestra - Silver And Gold (Soundtrack Of Rudolph The Red Nosed Reindeer)@Sandy McKnight & @Fernando Perdomo - Melody Anne [San Fernando Blast!]@Halie & The Moon - The Story (Never Told) [Blue Transmissions Vol 1 & 2]@The Tearaways - The Wrecking Crew@Bing Crosby & @The Andrew Sisters - Here Comes Santa Claus@The New Twentys – Rush@The English Beat - Mirror In The Bathroom@Nervous Eaters - Girl Next Door [Rock n Roll Your Heart Away] (@Wicked Cool Records)@Blake Jones And The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart@The Embryos - Spend Tonight [National Absurdatory] (koolkatmusik.com)@Downtown Patriots - Nobody's Hero [We Don't Need You - EP]@Steve Stoeckel & @Irene Pena - Why (@Big Stir Records)@Monsterpop - Wonderland@Ken Sharp - My Lullaby [Miniatures]@Leo Sayer - When I Need You@Keith Klingensmith & @Wendi Dunlap – Fairytale Of New York [Wonderful Christmastheme]

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 16, 2024 Monday Hour 1

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 16, 2024 60:51


EIGHT shopping days left! All purchases need to be made by the 24thas nothing is open on Christmas Day. Remember, my size is Left-handed 12-string Danelectro in metallic red or blue! The Music Authority Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Mixcloud, Player FM, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, Pocket Cast, APPLE iTunes, and direct for the source distribution site: *Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/   AND NOW there is a website! TheMusicAuthority.comThe Music Authority Podcast! Special Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! Seeing that I'm gone from FB now…Follow me on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority*Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *The Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6-7PM EST!*AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!December 16, 2024, Monday, the week starts like this…@Orbis 2.0 - TMA SHOW OPEN THEME@Joe Normal - Christmas Peace@20/20 - Laurel Canyon [Back To California] (@Big Stir Records)@BrianKrollMusic - The Future's Door@BrianKrollMusic – Vacation To Know Where@Sandy McKnight & @Fernando Perdomo - Pay It Any Mind [San Fernando Blast!]@LesFradkin - Sabre Dance@LisaNemzo - I Can't Stop (@DreamWildRecords)@Louise Goffin - Whole Damn Reason@The New Twentys - The Way [Power - EP]@TheHollywoodAllstars - Trust Me@Alex Ohm - When The Sea Came To Tea@Ballard - Maybe I'll@Barry J Walsh - The Sound@The Embryos - Smoldering Remains [National Absurdatory] (koolkatmusik.com)@Big Sean And The Steel People - UK Fire Safety Dance@Boys'N'Barry - Safe At Home This Christmas@Brad Marino - Not Foolin' Me@Celine Rae - It Ain't Christmas@CJ Wildheart - The Baddest Girl In The World

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 13, 2024 Friday Hour 1

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 13, 2024 60:01


All I require this Christmas, please & thank you…is IF you are on FB still…share this message for me. “James Jim Prell was kicked off FB a few months ago. His podcast is still running daily. Find his show at TheMusicAuthority.com, his playlists are posted on “X” at Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority. Email has NOT changed jrprell@mindspring.com.” If you could just copy and paste once for me that would make my Christmas even more than a 12-string left-handed Danelectro guitar in metallic blue! The Music Authority Podcast... listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Mixcloud, Player FM, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, Pocket Cast, APPLE iTunes, and direct for the source distribution site: *Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  AND NOW there is a website! TheMusicAuthority.comThe Music Authority Podcast! Special Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! Seeing that I'm gone from FB now…Follow me on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority*Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *The Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6-7PM EST!*AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!December 13, 2024, Friday…page one…@Orbis 2.0 - TMA SHOW OPEN THEME@Make It Home - Juliana Hatfield@Agent 13 - Home [Observation]@The Ohms - Shakin' All Over@The Stillsouls - Wasting All Her Christmas Time [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Kinks - The World Keeps Going Around [The Kinks Kontroversy]@Brother Dynamite - The Girls In Love@Greg Polcari's All-Star Christmas - Rockin' Round The Christmas Tree [Santa's Got A Brand New Band]@The Brothers Steve - Songwriter [#1]@Joe Strummer And The Mezcaleros - Yatta Yatta [Rock Art And The X-Ray Style]@Nouvelle Vague - I'll Melt With You@The New Favourites - Underneath the Christmas Tree [Wonderful Christmastheme]@Telyscopes - By Oceanside [Banarang, Blood]@John Berenzy - Beautiful Mystery [This Defining Moment]@Lisa Mychols & @Super 8 - Baba O' Riley [Jem Records Celebrates Pete Townshend] (@Jem Records)@Jack Lee – Hangin' On The Telephone [Greatest hits Vol 1]@Keith Klingensmith & The TM Collective – Under The Christmas Tree

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
Pop Radio UK Show #321

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 13, 2024 60:04


Pop Radio UK Show #321!!!  If you were wondering what I need for Christmas…T-Shirt size is XXL…or maybe some super light left-handed guitar strings…or if you are in the giving mood, a left-handed 12 string Danelectro in any color than black. Please, keep downloading and sharing the podcast! All the usual download spots. Oh! And the website, too – TheMusicAuthority.com! The Music Authority Podcast... heard daily on TheMusicAuthority.com, Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! Follow the show on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority! How to listen in?*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  The Music Authority Podcast! *Website – TheMusicAuthority.comSpecial Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6PM ET! *AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!Pop Radio UK Show #321…@Super8UK – TMA Opening Theme@The Dollyrots - Santa Baby [A Very Dollyrots Christmas]@The Beach Boys - Little Saint Nick (Alternate Version)@The Ramones - Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)@Mychols, Mychols, Mychols - A Towne and Country Christmas [The Waking Hours]@Michael Bublé - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow@Irene McNeil - Le Rock 'n' Roll du Pere Noel@My Forever DJ - Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree [Rockin' The Holidays] (@Phonophone Records)@Mannheim Steamroller - Carol Of The Birds@Aimee Mann - God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman@SoulBird - The Music Authority Jingle@Joe Riccardello - (To Me) Christmas Means@Los Straightjackets - A Marshmellow World [The Complete Christmas Songbook]@The Crew Cuts - Dance Mr. Snowman Dance@Eric Peter Schwarz - Let's Pretend It's Christmas [Mustard On My Sexy Dress]@Bearkat - Merry Christmas, Ah Hum [It's Christmas Time]@Nolan Voide - The Music Authority Jingle@Geno & The Jukebox - Christmas Movie Marathon@Pamela Davis - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus@The Crushtones - The Night Before Christmas@George Winston - Sussex Carol@Blake Jones & The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Lettermen - Our Winter Love@Quint Featuring @Karen Basset - Beaus Of Holly [Soundtrack of the ION channel movie “Beaus Of Holly”]@Guy Paul Thibault - Blue Christmas@Burl Ives - Have A Holly Jolly Christmas@George Finizio - I Remember Christmas@The Brian Setzer Orchestra - Dig That Crazy Santa Claus@Frank Sinatra & @Bing Crosby - We Wish You The Merriest@Tim Anthony – I Still Believe In Christmas

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
Rockin' The KOR Show #337

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 10, 2024 60:04


Rockin' The KOR Show #337! If you were wondering what I need for Christmas…T-Shirt size is XXL…or maybe some super light left-handed guitar strings…or if you are in the giving mood, a left-handed 12 string Danelectro in any color than black. Please, keep downloading and sharing the podcast! All the usual download spots. Oh! And the website, too – TheMusicAuthority.com! The Music Authority Podcast... heard daily on TheMusicAuthority.com, Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! Follow the show on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority!  How to listen in?*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  The Music Authority Podcast! *Website – TheMusicAuthority.comSpecial Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/  Monday Through Friday 6PM ET! *AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!Rockin' the KOR! Show #337…@Super8UK – TMA Opening Theme@The Dollyrots - Santa Baby [A Very Dollyrots Christmas]@The Beach Boys - Little Saint Nick (Alternate Version)@The Ramones - Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)@Mychols, Mychols, Mychols - A Towne and Country Christmas [The Waking Hours]@Michael Bublé - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow@Irene McNeil - Le Rock 'n' Roll du Pere Noel@My Forever DJ - Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree [Rockin' The Holidays] (@Phonophone Records)@Mannheim Steamroller - Carol Of The Birds@Aimee Mann - God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman@SoulBird - The Music Authority Jingle@Joe Riccardello - (To Me) Christmas Means@Los Straightjackets - A Marshmellow World [The Complete Christmas Songbook]@The Crew Cuts - Dance Mr. Snowman Dance@Eric Peter Schwarz - Let's Pretend It's Christmas [Mustard On My Sexy Dress]@Bearkat - Merry Christmas, Ah Hum [It's Christmas Time]@Nolan Voide - The Music Authority Jingle@Geno & The Jukebox - Christmas Movie Marathon@Pamela Davis - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus@The Crushtones - The Night Before Christmas@George Winston - Sussex Carol@Blake Jones & The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Lettermen - Our Winter Love@Quint Featuring @Karen Basset - Beaus Of Holly [Soundtrack of the ION channel movie “Beaus Of Holly”]@Guy Paul Thibault - Blue Christmas@Burl Ives - Have A Holly Jolly Christmas@George Finizio - I Remember Christmas@The Brian Setzer Orchestra - Dig That Crazy Santa Claus@Frank Sinatra & @Bing Crosby - We Wish You The Merriest@Tim Anthony – I Still Believe In Christmas

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
Radio Candy Radio Show #195

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 9, 2024 60:04


Radio Candy Radio Show #195! If you were wondering what I need for Christmas…T-Shirt size is XXL…or maybe some super light left-handed guitar strings…or if you are in the giving mood, a left-handed 12 string Danelectro in any color than black. Please, keep downloading and sharing the podcast! All the usual download spots. Oh! And the website, too – TheMusicAuthority.com! The Music Authority Podcast... heard daily on TheMusicAuthority.com, Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! Follow the show on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority! How to listen in?*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  The Music Authority Podcast! *Website – TheMusicAuthority.comSpecial Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6PM ET! *AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!Radio Candy Radio Show #195…@Super8UK – TMA Opening Theme@The Dollyrots - Santa Baby [A Very Dollyrots Christmas]@The Beach Boys - Little Saint Nick (Alternate Version)@The Ramones - Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)@Mychols, Mychols, Mychols - A Towne and Country Christmas [The Waking Hours]@Michael Bublé - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow@Irene McNeil - Le Rock 'n' Roll du Pere Noel@My Forever DJ - Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree [Rockin' The Holidays] (@Phonophone Records)@Mannheim Steamroller - Carol Of The Birds@Aimee Mann - God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman@SoulBird - The Music Authority Jingle@Joe Riccardello - (To Me) Christmas Means@Los Straightjackets - A Marshmellow World [The Complete Christmas Songbook]@The Crew Cuts - Dance Mr. Snowman Dance@Eric Peter Schwarz - Let's Pretend It's Christmas [Mustard On My Sexy Dress]@Bearkat - Merry Christmas, Ah Hum [It's Christmas Time]@Nolan Voide - The Music Authority Jingle@Geno & The Jukebox - Christmas Movie Marathon@Pamela Davis - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus@The Crushtones - The Night Before Christmas@George Winston - Sussex Carol@Blake Jones & The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Lettermen - Our Winter Love@Quint Featuring @Karen Basset - Beaus Of Holly [Soundtrack of the ION channel movie “Beaus Of Holly”]@Guy Paul Thibault - Blue Christmas@Burl Ives - Have A Holly Jolly Christmas@George Finizio - I Remember Christmas@The Brian Setzer Orchestra - Dig That Crazy Santa Claus@Frank Sinatra & @Bing Crosby - We Wish You The Merriest@Tim Anthony – I Still Believe In Christmas

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
Sole Of Indie Show #87

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 9, 2024 60:04


Sole Of Indie Show #87!! If you were wondering what I need for Christmas…T-Shirt size is XXL…or maybe some super light left-handed guitar strings…or if you are in the giving mood, a left-handed 12 string Danelectro in any color than black. Please, keep downloading and sharing the podcast! All the usual download spots. Oh! And the website, too – TheMusicAuthority.com! The Music Authority Podcast... heard daily on TheMusicAuthority.com, Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! Follow the show on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority! How to listen in?*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  The Music Authority Podcast! *Website – TheMusicAuthority.comSpecial Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6PM ET! *AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!Sole Of Indie Show #87…@Super8UK – TMA Opening Theme@The Dollyrots - Santa Baby [A Very Dollyrots Christmas]@The Beach Boys - Little Saint Nick (Alternate Version)@The Ramones - Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)@Mychols, Mychols, Mychols - A Towne and Country Christmas [The Waking Hours]@Michael Bublé - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow@Irene McNeil - Le Rock 'n' Roll du Pere Noel@My Forever DJ - Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree [Rockin' The Holidays] (@Phonophone Records)@Mannheim Steamroller - Carol Of The Birds@Aimee Mann - God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman@SoulBird - The Music Authority Jingle@Joe Riccardello - (To Me) Christmas Means@Los Straightjackets - A Marshmallow World [The Complete Christmas Songbook]@The Crew Cuts - Dance Mr. Snowman Dance@Eric Peter Schwarz - Let's Pretend It's Christmas [Mustard On My Sexy Dress]@Bearkat - Merry Christmas, Ah Hum [It's Christmas Time]@Nolan Voide - The Music Authority Jingle@Geno & The Jukebox - Christmas Movie Marathon@Pamela Davis - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus@The Crushtones - The Night Before Christmas@George Winston - Sussex Carol@Blake Jones & The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Lettermen - Our Winter Love@Quint Featuring @Karen Basset - Beaus Of Holly [Soundtrack of the ION channel movie “Beaus Of Holly”]@Guy Paul Thibault - Blue Christmas@Burl Ives - Have A Holly Jolly Christmas@George Finizio - I Remember Christmas@The Brian Setzer Orchestra - Dig That Crazy Santa Claus@Frank Sinatra & @Bing Crosby - We Wish You The Merriest@Tim Anthony – I Still Believe In Christmas

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
ALTPHILLIE.ROCKS - Show #33

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 9, 2024 60:04


ALTPHILLIE.ROCKS - Show #33! If you were wondering what I need for Christmas…T-Shirt size is XXL…or maybe some super light left-handed guitar strings…or if you are in the giving mood, a left-handed 12 string Danelectro in any color than black. Please, keep downloading and sharing the podcast! All the usual download spots. Oh! And the website, too – TheMusicAuthority.com! The Music Authority Podcast... heard daily on TheMusicAuthority.com, Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! Follow the show on “X” Jim Prell@TMusicAuthority! How to listen in?*Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/  The Music Authority Podcast! *Website – TheMusicAuthority.comSpecial Recorded Network Shows, too! Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, & Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! *Sole Of Indie https://soleofindie.rocks/ Monday Through Friday 6PM ET! *AltPhillie.Rocks Sunday, Thursday, & Saturday At 11:00AM ET!ALTPHILLIE.ROCKS - Show #33…@Super8UK – TMA Opening Theme@The Dollyrots - Santa Baby [A Very Dollyrots Christmas]@The Beach Boys - Little Saint Nick (Alternate Version)@The Ramones - Merry Christmas (I Don't Wanna Fight Tonight)@Mychols, Mychols, Mychols - A Towne and Country Christmas [The Waking Hours]@Michael Bublé - Let It Snow, Let It Snow, Let It Snow@Irene McNeil - Le Rock 'n' Roll du Pere Noel@My Forever DJ - Rockin' Around The Christmas Tree [Rockin' The Holidays] (@Phonophone Records)@Mannheim Steamroller - Carol Of The Birds@Aimee Mann - God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman@SoulBird - The Music Authority Jingle@Joe Riccardello - (To Me) Christmas Means@Los Straightjackets - A Marshmellow World [The Complete Christmas Songbook]@The Crew Cuts - Dance Mr. Snowman Dance@Eric Peter Schwarz - Let's Pretend It's Christmas [Mustard On My Sexy Dress]@Bearkat - Merry Christmas, Ah Hum [It's Christmas Time]@Nolan Voide - The Music Authority Jingle@Geno & The Jukebox - Christmas Movie Marathon@Pamela Davis - I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus@The Crushtones - The Night Before Christmas@George Winston - Sussex Carol@Blake Jones & The Trike Shop - (Jingle Bells) Ringing In Your Heart [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (@Big Stir Records)@The Lettermen - Our Winter Love@Quint Featuring @Karen Basset - Beaus Of Holly [Soundtrack of the ION channel movie “Beaus Of Holly”]@Guy Paul Thibault - Blue Christmas@Burl Ives - Have A Holly Jolly Christmas@George Finizio - I Remember Christmas@The Brian Setzer Orchestra - Dig That Crazy Santa Claus@Frank Sinatra & @Bing Crosby - We Wish You The Merriest@Tim Anthony – I Still Believe In Christmas

The High Gain
Episode 343 - Jackson Monarkh Baritone

The High Gain

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 4, 2024 28:01


It was Danelectro that brought us the baritone electric guitar, but it's Jackson that has now released what is perhaps the doomiest version of that instrument. We tried our hand at some death metal this week (glad that's over). Enjoy! Like the show? Follow us at these fine establishments: Patreon || https://www.patreon.com/thehighgain Instagram || @thehighgain Web || https://www.thehighgain.com

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons
Ep. 138: "Check for Ticks"

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 24, 2024 79:49


It's the 138th episode of the Truth About Vintage Amps podcast, where amp tech Skip Simmons fields your questions on all-things-tube amps!  This week, we pay tribute to Angela Instruments founder and former guest Steve Melkisethian (1950-2024); talk resistors and transformers; catch up on the 2024 Fretboard Summit; and much more. Want to be a part of our show? Just email us a question or voice memo to podcast@fretboardjournal.com. Don't forget, we have a Patreon page. Join us to get show updates and get to the front of the question line.  Some of the topics discussed this time around: :58 R.I.P. Nick Gravenites (Electric Flag, Mike Bloomfield) 3:08 Our sponsors: Amplified Parts, Emerald City Guitars, and Grez Guitars. (Watch Emerald City Guitars' Fretboard Summit video here.)  5:32 The 2024 Fretboard Summit in a nutshell  10:29 R.I.P Steve Melkisethian (Angela Instrument); read our tribute here 18:42 R.I.P. Stephen Fitzstephens, member of our Kegger Facebook group 19:18 What was Skip listening to as a kid? 22:08 Skip's Music vintage gear headed to auction  24:42 When to use old, mismatched resistors?  26:39 The 2003 interview in Vacuum Tube Valley with Steve Carr (PDF link) 27:41 Removing surface rust from transformers  30:27 A 1964 Ampeg Reverberocket that pops when you turn it off 31:10 You all need a Variac  33:03 A pig farm mini-baffler; Papa Murphy's in a Weber grill 36:56 Dropping the B+ with a solid state rectifier  39:47 Flattening a Fender eyelet board, redux; how to flatten a ‘70s Fender grill cloth frame?  42:52 Aux phono input on a tube amp; replacing plastic knobs; movie recommendation: 'As It Is In Heaven'  46:48 An original 1963 Fender Vibroverb in the UK with a switchable voltage panel; John Kelly amps; Rainer Ptacek  52:33 How to select an output transformer for an amp when you don't know its specs  1:00:55 The wrong tube in Danelectro amplifiers (12AU6 vs 12AV6) 1:04:02 What's on Skip's bench? An Alamo amp; kudos to Larry Chung  1:05:43 Recommended reading: 'The Feather Thief' (Amazon link); TAVA listener and winemaker William Downie (link) 1:10:36 Using Meguiar's Convertible Top Cleaner to clean up a Premier amp 1:11:35 A Pepco Riviera 725; Frazey Ford  1:14:04 Posters by Serifs & Whiskey (link) 1:15:10 Blossom Valley Foods' Pepper Plant sauce (link) 1:15:37 Fixing a reverb tank by changing the transducer; Fender's specific use of European tubes Hosted by amp tech Skip Simmons and co-hosted/produced by Jason Verlinde of the Fretboard Journal.     

Chasing Tone - Guitar Podcast About Gear, Effects, Amps and Tone
513 - Indiana Blake and Brian's one mistake

Chasing Tone - Guitar Podcast About Gear, Effects, Amps and Tone

Play Episode Listen Later May 15, 2024 58:53


Brian, Max, and Richard are back for Episode 513 of the Chasing Tone PodcastOur good buddy Max is back once again, as Blake is out of town on important string business, and he has a new job which causes some speculation before the guys chat about the gear they have been gassing over. Richard attempts to describe a form of small British boat and Brian is most confused by both Richard and Artificial Intelligence. David Gilmour is going on tour and the British King of Fuzz tries to get tickets - and this leads to a discussion about ticket prices, free pedals, and naughty romps. Richard has been sent a pedal as a gift from an old friend and tells us all about it and he also has a theory about the re-release of a certain pedal. He is of course wrong. Max and Brian discuss the classic Danelectro pedals and reflect on the used market for them and Richard has fallen in love with the new Thorpy FX WOPR purely for aesthetic reasons. Do you use an attenuator with your amplifier? The guys discuss the pros and cons of a few different models. Richard grills Max for dirt on Brian.   Vintera Guitars, Saucerful of Secrets, Desitone Pedals, McDonalds, 70th Stratocaster...it's all in this week's Chasing Tone!Thanks to all our supporters - you are awesome!We are on Patreon now too!Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/chasingtonepodcast)Awesome Course, Merch and DIY mods:https://www.guitarpedalcourse.com/https://modyourownpedal.com/Find us at:https://www.wamplerpedals.com/https://www.instagram.com/WamplerPedals/https://www.facebook.com/groups/wamplerfanpage/Youtube:https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdVrg4Wl3vjIxonABn6RfWwContact us at: podcast@wamplerpedals.comSupport the Show.

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast
#161. Fler eller färre?

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 22, 2024 70:20


Fredrik och Ulf pratar om hur man kan tänka när man samlar på gitarrer. Fölster tar sig an ämnet aktiva mickar. I veckans pryl testar vi Drive In Style, en overdrive från Skipper's Amps. I detta avsnitt: Gibson, Fender, Rickenbacker, Danelectro, Schecter, Gretsch, EMG, Seymour Duncan, Alembic, Tyler, Valley Arts, Dimarzio, Bartolini, UA, Skipper's Amps.

The High Gain
Episode 304 - Graig Markel of Recovery Effects / Danelectro Double Neck 3923

The High Gain

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 28, 2024 27:49


Graig Markel and Zera Marvel of Recovery Effects have been making some of our favorite effects for a long time. At any moment they can be found on our pedal boards, emitting the precise lushness Recovery has become known for. So when Graig stopped by with two of his latest, the Moonstruck reverb/delay and the Revere overdrive, we knew what we had to do. The Danelectro Double Neck 3923 proved the perfect vehicle for the time, even if it did end up receiving a (rare) triple-deny. Enjoy! Like the show? Follow us at these fine establishments: Patreon || https://www.patreon.com/thehighgain Instagram || @thehighgain Web || https://www.thehighgain.com

Rig Rundowns
Mudhoney

Rig Rundowns

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 21, 2023 24:30


Universe: “Super Fuzz or Big Muff?”Mudhoney: “Both!”What else would you expect from a band that titled their mischievously visceral '88 debut EP after both pedals (Superfuzz Bigmuff)?Formed in the late '80s by guitarists Mark Arm and Steve Turner after the dissolution of their band Green River (which included future Mother Love Bone and Pearl Jam cofounders Jeff Ament and Stone Gossard), Mudhoney long ago solidified themselves as the Seattle scene's big brothers and tightest pack. Through their 11 LPs, five EPs, and six live albums, Mudhoney has routinely diversified and further defined their eccentric brand of raucous, aggressive, unfiltered rock 'n' roll. Possibly more impressive than the band's wide influence and devoted authenticity is the foursome's bond. Drummer Dan Peters and bassist Matt Lukin (also a founding member of the Melvins) were the rhythmic bedrock for Arm and Turner's exploding-M-80 tones since the beginning. (Arm and Turner have been friends since high school and have been playing off each other since then.) But Lukin left the band in 2001 because tour life became too much, and Guy Maddison has been thundering ever since. To see a group's career that's pushing past 35 years and only have one member swap is as inspirational as it is baffling. How?!“We like each other a lot. We get along. We love what we're doing,” remarks Arm. “Why stop, even if no one gives a shit?”Friendship matters to Arm and Turner, but gear isn't a concern unless it points them in one direction—east. More specifically, toward Detroit, Michigan. And even more specifically, to the Stooges. Both namecheck the livewire band and their raw power several times in our Rig Rundown. However, in a 2018 interview with Premier Guitar, they acknowledged regenerating sounds that echo influences from Neil Young and the Byrds to Devo and the Dead Kennedys. But after chasing “I-Wanna-Be-Your-Dog” sizzle, what else leads them to the gear they use? Has that mentality changed since the late '80s?“If you think about the aesthetics of where we come from—garage punk, and punk rock in general—a lot of it was made with cheap gear, and a lot of it was reclaiming gear that guitarists had kind of dismissed as garbage. Like the Mustang. That was my ultimate guitar back when I was a kid, but it was poo-pooed when I finally got one. I could get them for $150. The Danelectro and Silvertone amps were kind of high-rated garbage when we were getting into them. We based a lot of our sound on cheap gear, so it makes sense to me that I still buy the cheap gear,” concluded Turner.They're still pragmatic about their setups, preferring equipment that's familiar and reliable. Where they chase the dragon is in stompboxes. Turner trusts the Big Muff (his favorite iteration is from the mid-'80s), while Arm's torrid tone burns with a Super Fuzz clone. However, both have additional hot-sauce stompboxes and other effects on their pedalboards that are being auditioned trial by fire.Hours before Mudhoney's headlining set at Nashville's Basement East, Arm and Turner brought PG's Chris Kies onstage to catalog their setups. Turner started the party by talking about a pair of guitars—his battle-tested late-'60s Guild Starfire IV and a recently-acquired Fender Gold...

The Fret Files
Ep 183 – Q&A

The Fret Files

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 16, 2023 48:10


In this episode of the Fret Files Podcast, Eric and Nat talk about Eric's ten tips for independent luthiers. Then, they take questions regarding 5 way super switch wiring, pickup height, vintage Danelectro necks, friskets vs. silkscreening on Gibson headstock logos, and a curious pickguard screw question.

Yes Music Podcast
Yes Album Listening Guides – Tales From Topographic Oceans Part 5 – Steve Howe's guitars – 601

Yes Music Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 15, 2023 55:18


Produced by Joseph Cottrell, Jeffrey Crecelius and Ken Fuller This week Mark and I returned to Tales form topographic oceans to consider Steve Howe's guitars, based on Mark's expert knowledge and thanks to Geioff Bailie kindly sending us photos of the Steve Howe guitar collection book. After recording I also heard from Nick Kokoshis that he has assembled a set of photos on Facebook all about the guitars on Tales so please see the link below to see what he has found out. You may need to join the Facebook group to view the photos. What guitars did Steve Howe use for Tales and why? How did he create consistency? Did he use his 'usual' guitars? Let us know if you agree with us! Geoff Bailie's photos: The Gibson ES345TD The Les Paul Junior The Les Paul Junior TV The bizarre 'guitar tree' The Danelectro 12-string The Portuguese guitar Nick Kokoshis' annotated Tales guitar photos (may require joining a Facebook group to view) Support the Fundraiser! Yes - The Tormato Story Available now! TormatoBook.com YMP Patrons: Producers: Joseph Cottrell Ken Fuller Jeffrey Crecelius Patrons: Jim Morrison Jon Pickles Declan Logue Gary Betts Alan Begg Michael Handerhan Barry Gorsky Steve Perry Doug Curran Martin Kjellberg Todd Dudley Rachel Hadaway Lind  Paul Hailes Craig Estenes Mark James Lang Steve Rode David Bob Martilotta John Holden Stephen LambeDem Fred Barringer Scott Colombo Chris Bandini David Heyden John Thomson Mark Baggs John Cowan John Parry Dave Owen Simon Barrow Steve Scott Terence Sadler Steve Dill Robert Nasir  Fergus Cubbage William Hayes Geoff Bailie Steven Roehr Lobate Scarp Geoffrey Mason David Watkinson Tim Stannard Robert VandiverBrian Sullivan David Pannell Jamie McQuinnMiguel Falcão Paul Tomei Michael O'ConnorBrian HarrisHogne Bø PettersenGuy DeRome Become a Patron! Our (not really) new Facebook YMP Discussion Group is open to anyone to join but I'll be adding rules and joining requirements when I have time (one day…). One of the advantages of the new format is that all members of the group have the same ability to post content, so it's a bit more egalitarian, or somesuch. Please do search for the group and join in. https://www.facebook.com/groups/3216603008606331/ Please follow/subscribe! If you are still listening to the podcast on the website, please consider subscribing so you don't risk missing anything: Theme music The music I use is the last movement of Stravinsky's Firebird Suite. This has been used as introduction music at many Yes concerts. My theme music is not take from a live concert – I put it together from: archive.org

tales guitar guides fundraisers stravinsky steve howe danelectro tales from topographic oceans jeffrey crecelius
The Fret Files
Ep 179 – Q&A

The Fret Files

Play Episode Listen Later Aug 16, 2023 53:48


In this episode of the Fret Files Podcast, Eric and Nat take questions regarding Gibson wiring, stripped pickup mounting holes, rewinding Danelectro pickups, refinishing a 90's Tele, and more hyper analysis of Eric's pronunciations and mis pronunciations.

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons
Ep. 118: "Pirate Ale" (Special Guest: Ben Harper)

The Truth About Vintage Amps with Skip Simmons

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 20, 2023 103:44


This week, we're joined by the one-and-only Ben Harper, who has a couple of questions for Skip right before his Lyon, France concert. Ben regales us with tales of a rare Weissenborn spotted on a Disneyland ride, Dumbles, and pre-show skateboarding (which Skip is a little worried about). He also spills the beans on his new touring amp of choice… a Two-Rock. Before Ben joins us, we've got our usual assortment of listener-submitted questions on tremolo and speaker impendence, Larry Chung references, and a tamale suggestion. Want to be a part of the show? Keep the amp questions for Skip coming to podcast@fretboardjournal.com! Voice memos or emails are welcome. Don't forget we now have a Patreon if you'd like to support the show. Some of the topics discussed in this episode:  :34 Special thanks to Shure for that MV7 that Skip uses; the Fretboard Summit (August 24-26 in Chicago; www.fretboardsummit.org) 1:51 PSA: Skip is retired through September 2:23 A forthcoming Danelectro documentary, early Nat Daniel-built Epiphone Model M amps 15:32 This week's sponsors: Emerald City Guitars, Stringjoy Strings (use the code FRETBOARD to save 10% off your first string order), Amplified Parts, and Grez Guitars.  19:05 Peter Jensen's Magnavox 12" speakers 20:54 Don Pepino canned tomato sauce (thanks, Rob), Remington Model 5 typewriters 22:27 A 1964 Fender Vibrolux Reverb with a replaced power transformer…but not really; Skip gets a visit from Larry Chung 29:46 The dangers of playing a bass through a small guitar amp; Versatone amps; Los Hernandez tamales in Union Gap, Washington (https://www.loshernandeztamales.com); Bruce Harvie & the Sound Flea's ‘Overhead at Darrington' (Bandcamp link) 38:47 A humming Ampeg GS-12 Reverberocket: Was the speaker affecting the reverb spring? 43:26 Changing the tremolo depth on an Ampeg Jet 46:12 Skip's favorite trem circuit; a Massie that modulates the guitar signal; Chris Vincent  (https://www.instagram.com/djlavalamp/) 51:03 Tube amp kits (Mod 102 and Mod 102+ from AmplifiedParts.com https://www.amplifiedparts.com/products/amp-kit-mod-electronics-mod102-guitar-amp ); grilled asparagus; the Good Ol' Grateful Deadcast 59:54 The rising cost of everything 1:02:17 Speaker impedance for a Gibson Falcon GR-19RVT Crestline 1:02:53 What to do with the reverb on a Silvertone 1484; JHD Audio Ice Cubes 1:06:09 Special guest: Ben Harper! Forestry; a vintage Weissenborn spotted on Disneyland's Pirates of the Caribbean ride; Ben's new Two-Rock Bloomfield Drive; Marcus Eaton; Jimmy Page seeing David Lindley's Kaleidoscope; Liuteria Guarnieri guitars (https://www.liuteriaguarnieri.com/en/acoustic-guitars/); Dumbles are like Basquiats; skateboarding before a concert; kicking Princeton Reverbs; tech Bill Webb; and vintage Gibson amps  Recorded July 19, 2023.  Hosted by amp tech Skip Simmons and co-hosted/produced by Jason Verlinde of the Fretboard Journal.  Support us on Patreon.com for added content and the occasional surprise and don't forget to get a subscription to the Fretboard Journal (link). Digital subscriptions start at just $30. Ben has a huge feature in our 53rd issue!  Submit your amp questions, recipes, and life hacks to podcast@fretboardjournal.com and don't forget to share the show with friends on social media.

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast
#124. När inspirationen tryter

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 10, 2023 68:51


Det här blir det sista avsnittet innan vårt sommaruppehåll och vi pratar om vad man kan hitta på när man hamnar i en svacka och det enda alternativet verkar vara att sälja allt. Fölster har plockat fram fem riff som man kan inspireras i sommar. I veckans pryl pratar vi om förstärkaren Benson Monarch. I veckans avsnitt: Gibson, Gretsch, Valley Arts, Marshall, James Tyler, Danelectro, Benson…

Ask Zac
Danelectro Baritone - VS - Fender Squier Bass VI - Which is best for you? - Ask Zac 109

Ask Zac

Play Episode Play 30 sec Highlight Listen Later Jul 8, 2023 21:06 Transcription Available


To Support the Channel:Tip jar:  https://paypal.me/AskZacVenmo @AskZac  Or check out my store for merch  - www.askzac.comBeing a huge Bass 6 fan, there are 2 major types, the Danelectro and the Fender. And of course, being fully immersed into the "sickness" I had to finally have one of each. In today's episode, I look at the strengths and weaknesses of both designs. Not really a shootout, but more of a look at which might be more suited to you, unless of course you are like me and need both types.Gear for this video:2000 Danelectro Hodad Bass 6 Baritone six-string bass2018 Squier Bass VI Strings: La'Bella flat wound BassVI - Amazon affiliate link -  https://amzn.to/3rvJY57Ernie Ball Bass 6 strings round wound - https://amzn.to/34z5exRPick:D'Andrea Medium-HeavyAmp:1964 Vox JMI AC10 with 12" Celestion Blue Alnico Speaker in a custom cab built by Kyle Bollendorf. Effects used:Boss RV-2Analog Man Sunface 2N FuzzAmp tremolosix-string bass baritone guitar tic tac#askzac #guitartech #telecaster #askzac #guitartech #telecasterSupport the show

Los conciertos de Radio 3
Los conciertos de Radio 3 - Generador - 04/07/23

Los conciertos de Radio 3

Play Episode Listen Later Jul 4, 2023 30:20


Generador es la nueva reencarnación en formato dúo de Annie Baby (batería y voz) y J. Horror (guitarra Danelectro y voz). Su música es una mezcla de rock and roll, garage, surf, punk rock…salvajes y dinámicas canciones de explosiva factura que trituran los sonidos más añejos y excitantes del rock and roll para servirnos un adictivo cóctel de sonido minimalista y tribal. Monstruosas piezas de rock’n’rollgaragero que te vuelan la cabeza con su poderosa interpretación vocal, supremos riffs de guitarra y una potente sección rítmica. Adoradores del fuzz y la estética del trashrock and roll, vigorosos himnos de letal pegada y divertida lírica listos para hacerte mover espasmódicamente el esqueleto y corear sus pegadizos estribillos. Entre sus influencias pueden estar grupos y artistas como The Cramps, Link Wray, Desechables, Gories, Hasil Adkins y Sonics. Las letras nos hablan de licántropos, vampiresas, desencanto, odio, amor, mutar, pelear… Tienen publicados un single, un elepé y tres EP. Actualmente están presentando su último EP. Cuesta Abajo, y la reedición de su LP Sonrío Demasiado en formato 7 pulgadas retitulado cómo Sonrío Demasiado Edición especial para pobres. Escuchar audio

Performance Anxiety
Dan Montgomery

Performance Anxiety

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 20, 2023 63:44


Today's guest has unusual mentors. It's Dan Montgomery and he's got a new album out called Cast Iron Songs and Torch Ballads. We start off reminiscing about the great state of New Jersey and how local radio was a huge influence on him, back when stations would play a wide variety of genres and styles. He started playing in bands at the tender age of 14. And Dan gives a few wild stories from some fun and sometimes frightening gigs. But after years of playing in bands and developing some unhealthy habits, he took time off from playing. That's when he got into tour management. It actually helped him get clean. He talks about ill fated moves for marriages and jobs that didn't work out but did help his writing, how a gig in a yarn store ended up in marriage, and how his biggest mentor started out as his meth dealer. I also find out who the Von Crack Family Singers are. Dan's sound has always straddled the line between country and roots rock, playing a lot of acoustic guitar. But buying a Danelectro guitar online on a whim gave him a ton of inspiration and solidified the electric sound on his new album. It's definitely one to check out. And you can do that at danmontgomerymusic.com, on Bandcamp, or look him up on Facebook. Look us up @PerformanceAnx on Twitter and Instagram, Performance Anxiety on Facebook. Reach out at theperformanceanxietypod@gmail.com. We like to get coffee at ko-fi.com/performanceanxiety. Merch is available at performanceanx.threadless.com. Now prepare to possibly meet YOUR new mentor in Dan Montgomery on Performance Anxiety on the Pantheon Podcast Network. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast
#121. I en perfekt värld.

Ultimate Guitar Gear Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later Jun 19, 2023 60:08


Vi pratar om hur vi i en värld med utrustning som håller mycket hög kvalitet, letar efter det personliga. Fölster dyker ned i ämnet cellulosalack. I veckans pryl pratar vi om en gitarr från Gammelgura. I veckans avsnitt: Mastery, Ronin, Bigsby, Gibson, True Temperament, Evertune, Fender, Novo, Descendant, Harmony, Kay, Wandre, Danelectro, Teisco, Silvertone, Airline, Vox, Gammelgura, Ibanez, Vega Trem, Seymour Duncan, Gretsch, Björk, Nordin.

Talk and Rock Radio Podcast
The Chambers Brothers 'Willie Chambers, A Soul Psychedelicized'

Talk and Rock Radio Podcast

Play Episode Listen Later May 4, 2023 98:57


Willie Chambers (born March 3, 1938) is a singer, guitarist, and former member of The Chambers Brothers, a rock band in the 1960s with hits "In The Midnight Hour", "I Can't Turn You Loose", and "Time Has Come Today". He continues to be a regular attraction at various venues in Los Angeles and further afield.   Early career Edit Originally from Carthage, Mississippi, the Chambers Brothers first honed their skills as members of the choir in their Baptist church. This arrangement ended in 1952 when the eldest brother, George, was drafted into the Army. George relocated to Los Angeles after his discharge, and his brothers soon joined him. Beginning in 1954, the foursome played gospel and folk music throughout the Southern California region, but remained little known until 1965 when they began performing in New York City. Consisting of George (September 26, 1931 – October 12, 2019)[5] on washtub bass (later on bass guitar Danelectro and Gibson Thunderbird), Lester (b. April 13, 1940) on harmonica, and Willie (b. March 3, 1938) and Joe (b. August 22, 1942) on guitar, the group started to venture outside the gospel circuit, playing at coffeehouses that booked folk acts. They played at places like The Ash Grove, a very popular Los Angeles folk club. It became one of their favorite haunts and brought them into contact with Hoyt Axton, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, Reverend Gary Davis, and Barbara Dane. When Dane spotted the brothers there, she knew they would be perfect to do these freedom songs that people wanted to hear then. Dane became a great supporter, performing and recording with the brothers. With the addition of Brian Keenan (January 28, 1943 – October 5, 1985) on drums, Dane took them on tour with her and introduced them to Pete Seeger, who helped put the Chambers Brothers on the bill of the 1965 Newport Folk Festival. One of the songs they performed, "I Got It", appeared on the Newport Folk Festival 1965 compilation LP, which was issued on the Vanguard label. They were becoming more accepted in the folk community, but, like many on the folk circuit, were looking to electrify their music and develop more of a rock and roll sound. Joe Chambers recalled in a May 1994 Goldmine article that people at the Newport Folk Festival were breaking down fences and rushing to the stage. "Newport had never seen or heard anything like that." After the group finished and the crowd finally settled down, the MC came up and said "Whether you know it or not, that was rock 'n' roll." That night they played at a post-concert party for festival performers and went to a recording session of the newly electrified Bob Dylan. Shortly after appearing at Newport, the group released its debut album, People Get Ready. The group recorded "All Strung Out Over You" which was composed by Rudy Clark. It was released on Columbia 4-43957 on December 19, 1966. It was rushed out by Columbia after the label had rejected an early version of "Time Has Come Today". "All Strung Out Over You" became a regional hit for the group which gave them the opportunity to re-record "The Time Has Come Today".

Zig at the gig podcasts
Dan Montgomery

Zig at the gig podcasts

Play Episode Listen Later May 3, 2023 84:00


Singer-songwriter Dan Montgomery will be releasing his seventh album Cast-Iron Songs and Torch Ballads April 7. It was recorded at The Shack in the Back studio in Memphis, TN with Montgomery and Robert Mache producing. It's being issued on 12” vinyl LP, digital download and via streaming services by Fantastic Yes Records. It's not unusual for an artist to signal a “return to their roots” a few albums into a career. Usually this brings out mandolins, banjos, and variations of the folk tradition. Cast-Iron Songs and Torch Ballads is NOT that. After six critically acclaimed Americana albums later, Montgomery reconnected with the raw rock he played in his youth. “I came into possession of a Danelectro, plugged it into an amp and new songs immediately came pouring out. And they were songs with riffs. It was wild to experience my current singer/songwriter self, meeting up with that Classic Rock kid from the past. But it felt totally natural. I knew right away that I had to book time and cut an album with my band while the moment was hot. And I did.” Dan's roots may not be folksy and down home but they are no less real. Coming of age in South Jersey in the early Seventies, he cut his teeth gigging at dances and parties when he was fourteen. “I was the youngest in the band,” says Montgomery. “The first songs I played on stage were by Grand Funk, Bad Company, and Bachman Turner Overdrive. It was wild. At one of our gigs a guy showed up with a gun because our drummer was fooling around with someone's wife. And he was only a junior in high school!” The time and the place were ripe for Dan to begin his musical education, performing what is now called Classic Rock. “It was just new rock back then, pre-Freebird rock. I loved it.” Ultimately, Dan began writing his own songs and quickly found this environment to be unsuited for his compositions. “I became really serious about lyrics and that flew in the face of dancing and fist fighting so I began playing solo on the local coffeehouse circuit. It was great. I learned a lot about folk and country songwriting and eventually, my electric guitar began to gather more and more dust.”     Dan's Info  https://m.facebook.com/people/Dan-Montgomery/100058434918202/ https://danmontgomery.bandcamp.com/ https://twitter.com/DanMont18783799 https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8NqgqEFDkEw6Pn-HZF9Xqw

Ask Zac
Why You Need a Fender/Squier Bass VI - ASK ZAC - EP 13

Ask Zac

Play Episode Play 30 sec Highlight Listen Later Apr 4, 2023 16:28 Transcription Available


To Support the Channel:Patreon  https://www.patreon.com/AskZacTip jar:  https://paypal.me/AskZacVenmo @AskZac  Or check out my store for merch  - www.askzac.comA good friend of mine gifted me a Squier Bass VI, and I have had so much fun learning about the instrument, and how to use it in both performance and recording environments. In this episode, I share both the Danelectro 6 string bass and the Fender Bass VI's history, and the players that put them both on the map. I also give some EQ, effect, and playing tricks for 6-string bass guitars. Here is my Spotify Playlist for this episode:https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6St...James Burton on Bass VI with fuzz   • Jimmy Burton - Ji...  Gear Used:2018 Fender Squier Vintage Modified Bass VIStrings: La Bella Flatwound 767-6F  https://amzn.to/2Wio3iuAmp: 1965 Deluxe Reverb with Celestion V30 speakerCables: George L's.Effects: Mirage CompressorBoss TR-2 TremoloBoss DM-3 DelayLine 6 Echo ParkBoss VB-2W  https://amzn.to/39T5CVJPower: Truetone CS6  https://amzn.to/38S9rZK #askzac  #guitartech #bassviSupport the show

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!
Danelectro U2, Would Guitar Youtube Die without Guitar Heroes? Stumpcaster, Corner guitar

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 20, 2023 82:31


Episode 469 is brought to you by... Stringjoy: https://stringjoy.com/partner/60cyclehum/ Big Ear Pedals: https://www.bigearpedals.com/ Chase Bliss Audio: https://www.chaseblissaudio.com/ Support this channel: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Want to send us mail? 60 Cycle Hum #615 9450 Mira Mesa Blvd. San Diego, CA 92126 What's your favorite pizza? 00:00 Danelectro U2 Baritone 24:00 Stumpcaster 33:00 Steve got a Flamma FX10 and Ryan got a Dipper Tremolo Arm 41:30 Would guitar youtube die without guitar heroes? 1:10:20 Corner Guitar This week's song was from Rachel Hoots of Dragonfly Raptor and is called "No More" ***************************** 60CH on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Buy Something with our affiliate links: Buy a Shirt - https://teespring.com/stores/60-cycle-hum Sweetwater: https://imp.i114863.net/rMb1D zZounds: https://www.zzounds.com/a--3980929 Thomann: https://www.thomannmusic.com/thlpg_1a2l8gl9bs.html?offid=1&affid=405 Amazon: https://amzn.to/2PaUKKO Perfect Circuit: https://bit.ly/3YQG309 Ebay: https://ebay.to/2UlIN6z Reverb: https://reverb.grsm.io/60cyclehum6164 Cool Patch Cables: https://www.tourgeardesigns.com/discount/60cyclehum +++++++++++++++++++++ Social Media Stuff: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/60cyclehum/ Discord: https://discord.gg/nNue5mPvZX Instagram and Twitter @60cyclehum TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@60cyclehum? Hire us for Demos and other marketing opportunities   https://60cyclehumcast.com/marketing-packages/ #60cyclehum #guitar #guitars #shameflute

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!
Does Fender Deserve Gold Foils? Danelectro case, Payola Tele, Guitars and More!!!

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 23, 2023 65:45


Episode 462 is brought to you by... Stringjoy: https://stringjoy.com/partner/60cyclehum/ Big Ear Pedals: https://www.bigearpedals.com/ Chase Bliss Audio: https://www.chaseblissaudio.com/ Support this channel: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Want to send us mail? 60 Cycle Hum #615 9450 Mira Mesa Blvd. San Diego, CA 92126 Congrats to Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan on their Golden Globes wins 00:00 We're talking about the Fender Gold Foil guitars that were just announced 19:00 Danelectro Case 33:15 Ryan's been practicing with Dinosaur Ghost 44:25 Payola Tele 53:20 Guitars and More This week's song was from Trust Club and is called "Not Quite" ***************************** 60CH on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Buy Something with our affiliate links: Buy a Shirt - https://teespring.com/stores/60-cycle-hum Sweetwater: https://imp.i114863.net/rMb1D zZounds: https://www.zzounds.com/a--3980929 Thomann: https://www.thomannmusic.com/thlpg_1a2l8gl9bs.html?offid=1&affid=405 Amazon: https://amzn.to/2PaUKKO Ebay: https://ebay.to/2UlIN6z Reverb: https://reverb.grsm.io/60cyclehum6164 Cool Patch Cables: https://www.tourgeardesigns.com/discount/60cyclehum +++++++++++++++++++++ Social Media Stuff: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/60cyclehum/ Discord: https://discord.gg/nNue5mPvZX Instagram and Twitter @60cyclehum TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@60cyclehum? Hire us for Demos and other marketing opportunities   https://60cyclehumcast.com/marketing-packages/ #60cyclehum #guitar #guitars #shameflute

The High Gain
Episode 243 - Danelectro Hawk

The High Gain

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 28, 2022 23:55


THE HIGH GAIN PODCASTWEBSITEwww.thehighgain.comPATREONBecome a SubscriberDISCORDhttps://discord.gg/XUMEzkjYOUTUBEhttps://www.youtube.com/thehighgainTHE SOCIALSInstagramFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedInEMAILthehighgainpod@gmail.comPRODUCED BYVerkstad - Seattle, WA

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!
Play Authentic Givson, CSGuitars' spiky Metal Zone guitar, Wallpaper Danelectro, Turtle Guitar

60 Cycle Hum: The Guitar Podcast!

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 28, 2022 54:29


Episode 455 is brought to you by... Vibes Earplugs: https://www.discovervibes.com/our-products (60CYCLE for 15% off) Stringjoy: https://stringjoy.com/partner/60cyclehum/ Big Ear Pedals: https://www.bigearpedals.com/ Chase Bliss Audio: https://www.chaseblissaudio.com/ Support this channel: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Want to send us mail? 60 Cycle Hum #615 9450 Mira Mesa Blvd. San Diego, CA 92126 Tonight's video detail write up is accompanied by Smashing Pumpkins' "Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness" album 00:00 Givson is a real brand and I'm not even sure they're trying to rip off Gibson...too much 19:20 Ryan got a free Yamaha Reverb out of a sidewalk giveaway box 23:00 Colin Scott (CSGuitars) sold this Metal Zone guitar  34:20 Wallpaper Danelectro 40:20 Is this turtle enough to get into the Turtle Club? 45:30 Steve rambles about eating the vegetarian sandwiches at work This week's song was from Crappy Pedal Demos and is called "Confessions of An Average Guy" **************************** 60CH on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/60CycleHumcast Buy Something with our affiliate links: Buy a Shirt - https://teespring.com/stores/60-cycle-hum Sweetwater: https://imp.i114863.net/rMb1D zZounds: https://www.zzounds.com/a--3980929 Thomann: https://www.thomannmusic.com/thlpg_1a2l8gl9bs.html?offid=1&affid=405 Amazon: https://amzn.to/2PaUKKO Ebay: https://ebay.to/2UlIN6z Reverb: https://reverb.grsm.io/60cyclehum6164 Cool Patch Cables: https://www.tourgeardesigns.com/discount/60cyclehum +++++++++++++++++++++ Social Media Stuff: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/groups/60cyclehum/ Discord: https://discord.gg/nNue5mPvZX Instagram and Twitter @60cyclehum TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@60cyclehum? Hire us for Demos and other marketing opportunities   https://60cyclehumcast.com/marketing-packages/ #60cyclehum #guitar #guitars #shameflute

The Fret Files
Ep 162 – Q&A

The Fret Files

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 15, 2022 55:33


In this episode of the Fret Files Podcast, Eric and Nat read a few book reviews of Eric's guitar wiring book, Solid Sound. Then the two read and answer questions regarding guitar repair costs, acoustic guitar pickups, cleaning gold plated hardware, Danelectro lipstick tube pickups, and refinishing a neck with a mystery undercoat.

Tweed Couch Guitar Therapy Session
88- Back Into Pedals (Chris)

Tweed Couch Guitar Therapy Session

Play Episode Listen Later Oct 5, 2022 59:31


Back in the day I played Danelectro mini's, the Visual Sound Jekyll & Hyde, & Vox Wah's. Years later I started to dabble in pedal building with Build Your Own Clone. As time moved on, so did my needs, and I went to multi effects. Now I am all over the place but ready to get back into the pedal world. But what's out there? Does it have to be boutique? Is True Bypass still a thing? Does the power supply matter? Am I using the right cables? Should I do rack gear? Does the amp matter? Is PRS really in the pedal game? And Mount Rushmore Pedals… what are 4 iconic pedals that deserve monumental status? Well we will discuss this, and more on this group therapy session with Chris, on the Tweed Couch. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/tweedcouch/support

A History Of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs
Episode 146: “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys

A History Of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs

Play Episode Listen Later Mar 25, 2022


Episode one hundred and forty-six of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs looks at “Good Vibrations” by the Beach Boys, and the history of the theremin. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a ten-minute bonus episode available, on "You're Gonna Miss Me" by the Thirteenth Floor Elevators. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Resources There is no Mixcloud this week, because there were too many Beach Boys songs in the episode. I used many resources for this episode, most of which will be used in future Beach Boys episodes too. It's difficult to enumerate everything here, because I have been an active member of the Beach Boys fan community for twenty-four years, and have at times just used my accumulated knowledge for this. But the resources I list here are ones I've checked for specific things. Stephen McParland has published many, many books on the California surf and hot-rod music scenes, including several on both the Beach Boys and Gary Usher.  His books can be found at https://payhip.com/CMusicBooks Andrew Doe's Bellagio 10452 site is an invaluable resource. Jon Stebbins' The Beach Boys FAQ is a good balance between accuracy and readability. And Philip Lambert's Inside the Music of Brian Wilson is an excellent, though sadly out of print, musicological analysis of Wilson's music from 1962 through 67. I have also referred to Brian Wilson's autobiography, I Am Brian Wilson, and to Mike Love's, Good Vibrations: My Life as a Beach Boy. As a good starting point for the Beach Boys' music in general, I would recommend this budget-priced three-CD set, which has a surprisingly good selection of their material on it, including the single version of "Good Vibrations". Oddly, the single version of "Good Vibrations" is not on the The Smile Sessions box set. But an entire CD of outtakes of the track is, and that was the source for the session excerpts here. Information on Lev Termen comes from Theremin: Ether Music and Espionage by Albert Glinsky Transcript In ancient Greece, the god Hermes was a god of many things, as all the Greek gods were. Among those things, he was the god of diplomacy, he was a trickster god, a god of thieves, and he was a messenger god, who conveyed messages between realms. He was also a god of secret knowledge. In short, he was the kind of god who would have made a perfect spy. But he was also an inventor. In particular he was credited in Greek myth as having invented the lyre, an instrument somewhat similar to a guitar, harp, or zither, and as having used it to create beautiful sounds. But while Hermes the trickster god invented the lyre, in Greek myth it was a mortal man, Orpheus, who raised the instrument to perfection. Orpheus was a legendary figure, the greatest poet and musician of pre-Homeric Greece, and all sorts of things were attributed to him, some of which might even have been things that a real man of that name once did. He is credited with the "Orphic tripod" -- the classification of the elements into earth, water, and fire -- and with a collection of poems called the Rhapsodiae. The word Rhapsodiae comes from the Greek words rhaptein, meaning to stitch or sew, and ōidē, meaning song -- the word from which we get our word "ode", and  originally a rhapsōdos was someone who "stitched songs together" -- a reciter of long epic poems composed of several shorter pieces that the rhapsōdos would weave into one continuous piece. It's from that that we get the English word "rhapsody", which in the sixteenth century, when it was introduced into the language, meant a literary work that was a disjointed collection of patchwork bits, stitched together without much thought as to structure, but which now means a piece of music in one movement, but which has several distinct sections. Those sections may seem unrelated, and the piece may have an improvisatory feel, but a closer look will usually reveal relationships between the sections, and the piece as a whole will have a sense of unity. When Orpheus' love, Eurydice, died, he went down into Hades, the underworld where the souls of the dead lived, and played music so beautiful, so profound and moving, that the gods agreed that Orpheus could bring the soul of his love back to the land of the living. But there was one condition -- all he had to do was keep looking forward until they were both back on Earth. If he turned around before both of them were back in the mortal realm, she would disappear forever, never to be recovered. But of course, as you all surely know, and would almost certainly have guessed even if you didn't know because you know how stories work, once Orpheus made it back to our world he turned around and looked, because he lost his nerve and didn't believe he had really achieved his goal. And Eurydice, just a few steps away from her freedom, vanished back into the underworld, this time forever. [Excerpt: Blake Jones and the Trike Shop: "Mr. Theremin's Miserlou"] Lev Sergeyevich Termen was born in St. Petersburg, in what was then the Russian Empire, on the fifteenth of August 1896, by the calendar in use in Russia at that time -- the Russian Empire was still using the Julian calendar, rather than the Gregorian calendar used in most of the rest of the world, and in the Western world the same day was the twenty-seventh of August. Young Lev was fascinated both by science and the arts. He was trained as a cellist from an early age, but while he loved music, he found the process of playing the music cumbersome -- or so he would say later. He was always irritated by the fact that the instrument is a barrier between the idea in the musician's head and the sound -- that it requires training to play. As he would say later "I realised there was a gap between music itself and its mechanical production, and I wanted to unite both of them." Music was one of his big loves, but he was also very interested in physics, and was inspired by a lecture he saw from the physicist Abram Ioffe, who for the first time showed him that physics was about real, practical, things, about the movements of atoms and fields that really existed, not just about abstractions and ideals. When Termen went to university, he studied physics -- but he specifically wanted to be an experimental physicist, not a theoretician. He wanted to do stuff involving the real world. Of course, as someone who had the misfortune to be born in the late 1890s, Termen was the right age to be drafted when World War I started, but luckily for him the Russian Army desperately needed people with experience in the new invention that was radio, which was vital for wartime communications, and he spent the war in the Army radio engineering department, erecting radio transmitters and teaching other people how to erect them, rather than on the front lines, and he managed not only to get his degree in physics but also a diploma in music. But he was also becoming more and more of a Marxist sympathiser, even though he came from a relatively affluent background, and after the Russian Revolution he stayed in what was now the Red Army, at least for a time. Once Termen's Army service was over, he started working under Ioffe, working with him on practical applications of the audion, the first amplifying vacuum tube. The first one he found was that the natural capacitance of a human body when standing near a circuit can change the capacity of the circuit. He used that to create an invisible burglar alarm -- there was an antenna sending out radio waves, and if someone came within the transmitting field of the antenna, that would cause a switch to flip and a noise to be sounded. He was then asked to create a device for measuring the density of gases, outputting a different frequency for different densities. Because gas density can have lots of minor fluctuations because of air currents and so forth, he built a circuit that would cut out all the many harmonics from the audions he was using and give just the main frequency as a single pure tone, which he could listen to with headphones. That way,  slight changes in density would show up as a slight change in the tone he heard. But he noticed that again when he moved near the circuit, that changed the capacitance of the circuit and changed the tone he was hearing. He started moving his hand around near the circuit and getting different tones. The closer his hand got to the capacitor, the higher the note sounded. And if he shook his hand a little, he could get a vibrato, just like when he shook his hand while playing the cello. He got Ioffe to come and listen to him, and Ioffe said "That's an electronic Orpheus' lament!" [Excerpt: Blake Jones and the Trike Shop, "Mr. Theremin's Miserlou"] Termen figured out how to play Massenet's "Elegy" and Saint-Saens' "The Swan" using this system. Soon the students were all fascinated, telling each other "Termen plays Gluck on a voltmeter!" He soon figured out various refinements -- by combining two circuits, using the heterodyne principle, he could allow for far finer control. He added a second antenna, for volume control, to be used by the left hand -- the right hand would choose the notes, while the left hand would change the volume, meaning the instrument could be played without touching it at all. He called the instrument the "etherphone",  but other people started calling it the termenvox -- "Termen's voice". Termen's instrument was an immediate sensation, as was his automatic burglar alarm, and he was invited to demonstrate both of them to Lenin. Lenin was very impressed by Termen -- he wrote to Trotsky later talking about Termen's inventions, and how the automatic burglar alarm might reduce the number of guards needed to guard a perimeter. But he was also impressed by Termen's musical invention. Termen held his hands to play through the first half of a melody, before leaving the Russian leader to play the second half by himself -- apparently he made quite a good job of it. Because of Lenin's advocacy for his work, Termen was sent around the Soviet Union on a propaganda tour -- what was known as an "agitprop tour", in the familiar Soviet way of creating portmanteau words. In 1923 the first piece of music written specially for the instrument was performed by Termen himself with the Leningrad Philharmonic, Andrey Paschenko's Symphonic Mystery for Termenvox and Orchestra. The score for that was later lost, but has been reconstructed, and the piece was given a "second premiere" in 2020 [Excerpt: Andrey Paschenko, "Symphonic Mystery for Termenvox and Orchestra" ] But the musical instrument wasn't the only scientific innovation that Termen was working on. He thought he could reverse death itself, and bring the dead back to life.  He was inspired in this by the way that dead organisms could be perfectly preserved in the Siberian permafrost. He thought that if he could only freeze a dead person in the permafrost, he could then revive them later -- basically the same idea as the later idea of cryogenics, although Termen seems to have thought from the accounts I've read that all it would take would be to freeze and then thaw them, and not to have considered the other things that would be necessary to bring them back to life. Termen made two attempts to actually do this, or at least made preliminary moves in that direction. The first came when his assistant, a twenty-year-old woman, died of pneumonia. Termen was heartbroken at the death of someone so young, who he'd liked a great deal, and was convinced that if he could just freeze her body for a while he could soon revive her. He talked with Ioffe about this -- Ioffe was friends with the girl's family -- and Ioffe told him that he thought that he was probably right and probably could revive her. But he also thought that it would be cruel to distress the girl's parents further by discussing it with them, and so Termen didn't get his chance to experiment. He was even keener on trying his technique shortly afterwards, when Lenin died. Termen was a fervent supporter of the Revolution, and thought Lenin was a great man whose leadership was still needed -- and he had contacts within the top echelons of the Kremlin. He got in touch with them as soon as he heard of Lenin's death, in an attempt to get the opportunity to cryopreserve his corpse and revive him. Sadly, by this time it was too late. Lenin's brain had been pickled, and so the opportunity to resurrect him as a zombie Lenin was denied forever. Termen was desperately interested in the idea of bringing people back from the dead, and he wanted to pursue it further with his lab, but he was also being pushed to give demonstrations of his music, as well as doing security work -- Ioffe, it turned out, was also working as a secret agent, making various research trips to Germany that were also intended to foment Communist revolution. For now, Termen was doing more normal security work -- his burglar alarms were being used to guard bank vaults and the like, but this was at the order of the security state. But while Termen was working on his burglar alarms and musical instruments and attempts to revive dead dictators, his main project was his doctoral work, which was on the TV. We've said before in this podcast that there's no first anything, and that goes just as much for inventions as it does for music. Most inventions build on work done by others, which builds on work done by others, and so there were a lot of people building prototype TVs at this point. In Britain we tend to say "the inventor of the TV" was John Logie Baird, but Baird was working at the same time as people like the American Charles Francis Jenkins and the Japanese inventor Kenjiro Takayanagi, all of them building on earlier work by people like Archibald Low. Termen's prototype TV, the first one in Russia, came slightly later than any of those people, but was created more or less independently, and was more advanced in several ways, with a bigger screen and better resolution. Shortly after Lenin's death, Termen was invited to demonstrate his invention to Stalin, who professed himself amazed at the "magic mirror". [Excerpt: Blake Jones and the Trike Shop, "Astronauts in Trouble"] Termen was sent off to tour Europe giving demonstrations of his inventions, particularly his musical instrument. It was on this trip that he started using the Romanisation "Leon Theremin", and this is how Western media invariably referred to him. Rather than transliterate the Cyrillic spelling of his birth name, he used the French spelling his Huguenot ancestors had used before they emigrated to Russia, and called himself Leo or Leon rather than Lev. He was known throughout his life by both names, but said to a journalist in 1928 "First of all, I am not Tair-uh-MEEN. I wrote my name with French letters for French pronunciation. I am Lev Sergeyevich Tair-MEN.". We will continue to call him Termen, partly because he expressed that mild preference (though again, he definitely went by both names through choice) but also to distinguish him from the instrument, because while his invention remained known in Russia as the termenvox, in the rest of the world it became known as the theremin. He performed at the Paris Opera, and the New York Times printed a review saying "Some musicians were extremely pessimistic about the possibilities of the device, because at times M. Theremin played lamentably out of tune. But the finest Stradivarius, in the hands of a tyro, can give forth frightful sounds. The fact that the inventor was able to perform certain pieces with absolute precision proves that there remains to be solved only questions of practice and technique." Termen also came to the UK, where he performed in front of an audience including George Bernard Shaw, Arnold Bennett, Henry Wood and others. Arnold Bennett was astonished, but Bernard Shaw, who had very strong opinions about music, as anyone who has read his criticism will be aware, compared the sound unfavourably to that of a comb and paper. After performing in Europe, Termen made his way to the US, to continue his work of performance, propagandising for the Soviet Revolution, and trying to license the patents for his inventions, to bring money both to him and to the Soviet state. He entered the US on a six-month visitor's visa, but stayed there for eleven years, renewing the visa every six months. His initial tour was a success, though at least one open-air concert had to be cancelled because, as the Communist newspaper the Daily Worker put it, "the weather on Saturday took such a counter-revolutionary turn". Nicolas Slonimsky, the musicologist we've encountered several times before, and who would become part of Termen's circle in the US, reviewed one of the performances, and described the peculiar audiences that Termen was getting -- "a considerable crop of ladies and gentlemen engaged in earnest exploration of the Great Beyond...the mental processes peculiar to believers in cosmic vibrations imparted a beatific look to some of the listeners. Boston is a seat of scientific religion; before he knows it Professor Theremin may be proclaimed Krishnamurti and sanctified as a new deity". Termen licensed his patents on the invention to RCA, who in 1929 started mass-producing the first ever theremins for general use. Termen also started working with the conductor Leopold Stokowski, including developing a new kind of theremin for Stokowski's orchestra to use, one with a fingerboard played like a cello. Stokowski said "I believe we shall have orchestras of these electric instruments. Thus will begin a new era in music history, just as modern materials and methods of construction have produced a new era of architecture." Possibly of more interest to the wider public, Lennington Sherwell, the son of an RCA salesman, took up the theremin professionally, and joined the band of Rudy Vallee, one of the most popular singers of the period. Vallee was someone who constantly experimented with new sounds, and has for example been named as the first band leader to use an electric banjo, and Vallee liked the sound of the theremin so much he ordered a custom-built left-handed one for himself. Sherwell stayed in Vallee's band for quite a while, and performed with him on the radio and in recording sessions, but it's very difficult to hear him in any of the recordings -- the recording equipment in use in 1930 was very primitive, and Vallee had a very big band with a lot of string and horn players, and his arrangements tended to have lots of instruments playing in unison rather than playing individual lines that are easy to differentiate. On top of that, the fashion at the time when playing the instrument was to try and have it sound as much like other instruments as possible -- to duplicate the sound of a cello or violin or clarinet, rather than to lean in to the instrument's own idiosyncracies. I *think* though that I can hear Sherwell's playing in the instrumental break of Vallee's big hit "You're Driving Me Crazy" -- certainly it was recorded at the time that Sherwell was in the band, and there's an instrument in there with a very pure tone, but quite a lot of vibrato, in the mid range, that seems only to be playing in the break and not the rest of the song. I'm not saying this is *definitely* a theremin solo on one of the biggest hits of 1930, but I'm not saying it's not, either: [Excerpt: Rudy Vallee, "You're Driving Me Crazy" ] Termen also invented a light show to go along with his instrument -- the illumovox, which had a light shining through a strip of gelatin of different colours, which would be rotated depending on the pitch of the theremin, so that lower notes would cause the light to shine a deep red, while the highest notes would make it shine a light blue, with different shades in between. By 1930, though, Termen's fortunes had started to turn slightly. Stokowski kept using theremins in the orchestra for a while, especially the fingerboard models to reinforce the bass, but they caused problems. As Slonimsky said "The infrasonic vibrations were so powerful...that they hit the stomach physically, causing near-nausea in the double-bass section of the orchestra". Fairly soon, the Theremin was overtaken by other instruments, like the ondes martenot, an instrument very similar to the theremin but with more precise control, and with a wider range of available timbres. And in 1931, RCA was sued by another company for patent infringement with regard to the Theremin -- the De Forest Radio Company had patents around the use of vacuum tubes in music, and they claimed damages of six thousand dollars, plus RCA had to stop making theremins. Since at the time, RCA had only made an initial batch of five hundred instruments total, and had sold 485 of them, many of them as promotional loss-leaders for future batches, they had actually made a loss of three hundred dollars even before the six thousand dollar damages, and decided not to renew their option on Termen's patents. But Termen was still working on his musical ideas. Slonimsky also introduced Termen to the avant-garde composer and theosophist Henry Cowell, who was interested in experimental sounds, and used to do things like play the strings inside the piano to get a different tone: [Excerpt: Henry Cowell, "Aeolian Harp and Sinister Resonance"] Cowell was part of a circle of composers and musicologists that included Edgard Varese, Charles Ives, and Charles Seeger and Ruth Crawford, who Cowell would introduce to each other. Crawford would later marry Seeger, and they would have several children together, including the folk singer Peggy Seeger, and Crawford would also adopt Seeger's son Pete. Cowell and Termen would together invent the rhythmicon, the first ever drum machine, though the rhythmicon could play notes as well as rhythms. Only two rhythmicons were made while Termen was in the US. The first was owned by Cowell. The second, improved, model was bought by Charles Ives, but bought as a gift for Cowell and Slonimsky to use in their compositions. Sadly, both rhythmicons eventually broke down, and no recording of either is known to exist. Termen started to get further and further into debt, especially as the Great Depression started to hit, and he also had a personal loss -- he'd been training a student and had fallen in love with her, although he was married. But when she married herself, he cut off all ties with her, though Clara Rockmore would become one of the few people to use the instrument seriously and become a real virtuoso on it. He moved into other fields, all loosely based around the same basic ideas of detecting someone's distance from an object. He built electronic gun detectors for Alcatraz and Sing-Sing prisons, and he came up with an altimeter for aeroplanes. There was also a "magic mirror" -- glass that appeared like a mirror until it was backlit, at which point it became transparent. This was put into shop windows along with a proximity detector -- every time someone stepped close to look at their reflection, the reflection would disappear and be replaced with the objects behind the mirror. He was also by this point having to spy for the USSR on a more regular basis. Every week he would meet up in a cafe with two diplomats from the Russian embassy, who would order him to drink several shots of vodka -- the idea was that they would loosen his inhibitions enough that he would not be able to hide things from them -- before he related various bits of industrial espionage he'd done for them. Having inventions of his own meant he was able to talk with engineers in the aerospace industry and get all sorts of bits of information that would otherwise not have been available, and he fed this back to Moscow. He eventually divorced his first wife, and remarried -- a Black American dancer many years his junior named Lavinia Williams, who would be the great love of his life. This caused some scandal in his social circle, more because of her race than the age gap. But by 1938 he had to leave the US. He'd been there on a six-month visa, which had been renewed every six months for more than a decade, and he'd also not been paying income tax and was massively in debt. He smuggled himself back to the USSR, but his wife was, at the last minute, not allowed on to the ship with him. He'd had to make the arrangements in secret, and hadn't even told her of the plans, so the first she knew was when he disappeared. He would later claim that the Soviets had told him she would be sent for two weeks later, but she had no knowledge of any of this. For decades, Lavinia would not even know if her husband was dead or alive. [Excerpt: Blake Jones and the Trike Shop, "Astronauts in Trouble"] When Termen got back to the USSR, he found it had changed beyond recognition. Stalin's reign of terror was now well underway, and not only could he not find a job, most of the people who he'd been in contact with at the top of the Kremlin had been purged. Termen was himself arrested and tortured into signing a false confession to counter-revolutionary activities and membership of fascist organisations. He was sentenced to eight years in a forced labour camp, which in reality was a death sentence -- it was expected that workers there would work themselves to death on starvation rations long before their sentences were up -- but relatively quickly he was transferred to a special prison where people with experience of aeronautical design were working. He was still a prisoner, but in conditions not too far removed from normal civilian life, and allowed to do scientific and technical work with some of the greatest experts in the field -- almost all of whom had also been arrested in one purge or another. One of the pieces of work Termen did was at the direct order of Laventy Beria, Stalin's right-hand man and the architect of most of the terrors of the Stalinist regime. In Spring 1945, while the USA and USSR were still supposed to be allies in World War II, Beria wanted to bug the residence of the US ambassador, and got Termen to design a bug that would get past all the normal screenings. The bug that Termen designed was entirely passive and unpowered -- it did nothing unless a microwave beam of a precise frequency was beamed at it, and only then did it start transmitting. It was placed in a wooden replica of the Great Seal of the United States, presented to the ambassador by a troupe of scouts as a gesture of friendship between the two countries. The wood in the eagle's beak was thin enough to let the sound through. It remained there for seven years, through the tenures of four ambassadors, only being unmasked when a British radio operator accidentally tuned to the frequency it was transmitting on and was horrified to hear secret diplomatic conversations. Upon its discovery, the US couldn't figure out how it worked, and eventually shared the information with MI5, who took eighteen months to reverse-engineer Termen's bug and come up with their own, which remained the standard bug in use for about a decade. The CIA's own attempts to reverse-engineer it failed altogether. It was also Termen who came up with that well-known bit of spycraft -- focussing an infra-red beam on a window pane, to use it to pick up the sound of conversations happening in the room behind it. Beria was so pleased with Termen's inventions that he got Termen to start bugging Stalin himself, so Beria would be able to keep track of Stalin's whims. Termen performed such great services for Beria that Beria actually allowed him to go free not long after his sentence was served. Not only that, but Beria nominated Termen for the Stalin Award, Class II, for his espionage work -- and Stalin, not realising that Termen had been bugging *him* as well as foreign powers, actually upgraded that to a Class I, the highest honour the Soviet state gave. While Termen was free, he found himself at a loose end, and ended up volunteering to work for the organisation he had been working for -- which went by many names but became known as the KGB from the 1950s onwards. He tried to persuade the government to let Lavinia, who he hadn't seen in eight years, come over and join him, but they wouldn't even allow him to contact her, and he eventually remarried. Meanwhile, after Stalin's death, Beria was arrested for his crimes, and charged under the same law that he had had Termen convicted under. Beria wasn't as lucky as Termen, though, and was executed. By 1964, Termen had had enough of the KGB, because they wanted him to investigate obvious pseudoscience -- they wanted him to look into aliens, UFOs, ESP... and telepathy. [Excerpt, The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations (early version)" "She's already working on my brain"] He quit and went back to civilian life.  He started working in the acoustics lab in Moscow Conservatory, although he had to start at the bottom because everything he'd been doing for more than a quarter of a century was classified. He also wrote a short book on electronic music. In the late sixties an article on him was published in the US -- the first sign any of his old friends had that he'd not  died nearly thirty years earlier. They started corresponding with him, and he became a minor celebrity again, but this was disapproved of by the Soviet government -- electronic music was still considered bourgeois decadence and not suitable for the Soviet Union, and all his instruments were smashed and he was sacked from the conservatory. He continued working in various technical jobs until the 1980s, and still continued inventing refinements of the theremin, although he never had any official support for his work. In the eighties, a writer tried to get him some sort of official recognition -- the Stalin Prize was secret -- and the university at which he was working sent a reply saying, in part, "L.S. Termen took part in research conducted by the department as an ordinary worker and he did not show enough creative activity, nor does he have any achievements on the basis of which he could be recommended for a Government decoration." By this time he was living in shared accommodation with a bunch of other people, one room to himself and using a shared bathroom, kitchen, and so on. After Glasnost he did some interviews and was asked about this, and said "I never wanted to make demands and don't want to now. I phoned the housing department about three months ago and inquired about my turn to have a new flat. The woman told me that my turn would come in five or six years. Not a very reassuring answer if one is ninety-two years old." In 1989 he was finally allowed out of the USSR again, for the first time in fifty-one years, to attend a UNESCO sponsored symposium on electronic music. Among other things, he was given, forty-eight years late, a letter that his old colleague Edgard Varese had sent about his composition Ecuatorial, which had originally been written for theremin. Varese had wanted to revise the work, and had wanted to get modified theremins that could do what he wanted, and had asked the inventor for help, but the letter had been suppressed by the Soviet government. When he got no reply, Varese had switched to using ondes martenot instead. [Excerpt: Edgard Varese, "Ecuatorial"] In the 1970s, after the death of his third wife, Termen had started an occasional correspondence with his second wife, Lavinia, the one who had not been able to come with him to the USSR and hadn't known if he was alive for so many decades. She was now a prominent activist in Haiti, having established dance schools in many Caribbean countries, and Termen still held out hope that they could be reunited, even writing her a letter in 1988 proposing remarriage. But sadly, less than a month after Termen's first trip outside the USSR, she died -- officially of a heart attack or food poisoning, but there's a strong suspicion that she was murdered by the military dictatorship for her closeness to Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the pro-democracy activist who later became President of Haiti. Termen was finally allowed to join the Communist Party in the spring of 1991, just before the USSR finally dissolved -- he'd been forbidden up to that point because of his conviction for counter-revolutionary crimes. He was asked by a Western friend why he'd done that when everyone else was trying to *leave* the Communist Party, and he explained that he'd made a promise to Lenin. In his final years he was researching immortality, going back to the work he had done in his youth, working with biologists, trying to find a way to restore elderly bodies to youthful vigour. But sadly he died in 1993, aged ninety-seven, before he achieved his goal. On one of his last trips outside the USSR, in 1991, he visited the US, and in California he finally got to hear the song that most people associate with his invention, even though it didn't actually feature a theremin: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations"] Back in the 1930s, when he was working with Slonimsky and Varese and Ives and the rest, Termen had set up the Theremin Studio, a sort of experimental arts lab, and in 1931 he had invited the musicologist, composer, and theoretician Joseph Schillinger to become a lecturer there. Schillinger had been one of the first composers to be really interested in the theremin, and had composed a very early piece written specifically for the instrument, the First Airphonic Suite: [Excerpt: Joseph Schillinger, "First Airphonic Suite"] But he was most influential as a theoretician. Schillinger believed that all of the arts were susceptible to rigorous mathematical analysis, and that you could use that analysis to generate new art according to mathematical principles, art that would be perfect. Schillinger planned to work with Termen to try to invent a machine that could compose, perform, and transmit music. The idea was that someone would be able to tune in a radio and listen to a piece of music in real time as it was being algorithmically composed and transmitted. The two men never achieved this, but Schillinger became very, very, respected as someone with a rigorous theory of musical structure -- though reading his magnum opus, the Schillinger System of Musical Composition, is frankly like wading through treacle. I'll read a short excerpt just to give an idea of his thinking: "On the receiving end, phasic stimuli produced by instruments encounter a metamorphic auditory integrator. This integrator represents the auditory apparatus as a whole and is a complex interdependent system. It consists of two receivers (ears), transmitters, auditory nerves, and a transformer, the auditory braincenter.  The response to a stimulus is integrated both quantitatively and selectively. The neuronic energy of response becomes the psychonic energy of auditory image. The response to stimuli and the process of integration are functional operations and, as such, can be described in mathematical terms , i.e., as  synchronization, addition, subtraction, multiplication, etc. But these integrative processes alone do not constitute the material of orchestration either.  The auditory image, whether resulting from phasic stimuli of an excitor or from selfstimulation of the auditory brain-center, can be described only in Psychological terms, of loudness, pitch, quality, etc. This leads us to the conclusion that the material of orchestration can be defined only as a group of conditions under which an integrated image results from a sonic stimulus subjected to an auditory response.  This constitutes an interdependent tripartite system, in which the existence of one component necessitates the existence of two others. The composer can imagine an integrated sonic form, yet he cannot transmit it to the auditor (unless telepathicaliy) without sonic stimulus and hearing apparatus." That's Schillinger's way of saying that if a composer wants someone to hear the music they've written, the composer needs a musical instrument and the listener needs ears and a brain. This kind of revolutionary insight made Schillinger immensely sought after in the early 1930s, and among his pupils were the swing bandleaders Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey, and the songwriter George Gershwin, who turned to Schillinger for advice when he was writing his opera Porgy and Bess: [Excerpt: Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong, "Here Come De Honey Man"] Another of his pupils was the trombonist and arranger Glenn Miller, who at that time was a session player working in pickup studio bands for people like Red Nichols. Miller spent some time studying with him in the early thirties, and applied those lessons when given the job of putting together arrangements for Ray Noble, his first prominent job. In 1938 Glenn Miller walked into a strip joint to see a nineteen-year-old he'd been told to take a look at. This was another trombonist, Paul Tanner, who was at the time working as a backing musician for the strippers. Miller had recently broken up his first big band, after a complete lack of success, and was looking to put together a new big band, to play arrangements in the style he had worked out while working for Noble. As Tanner later put it "he said, `Well, how soon can you come with me?' I said, `I can come right now.' I told him I was all packed, I had my toothbrush in my pocket and everything. And so I went with him that night, and I stayed with him until he broke the band up in September 1942." The new band spent a few months playing the kind of gigs that an unknown band can get, but they soon had a massive success with a song Miller had originally written as an arranging exercise set for him by Schillinger, a song that started out under the title "Miller's Tune", but soon became known worldwide as "Moonlight Serenade": [Excerpt: Glenn Miller, "Moonlight Serenade"] The Miller band had a lot of lineup changes in the four and a bit years it was together, but other than Miller himself there were only four members who were with that group throughout its career, from the early dates opening for  Freddie Fisher and His Schnickelfritzers right through to its end as the most popular band in America. They were piano player Chummy MacGregor, clarinet player Wilbur Schwartz, tenor sax player Tex Beneke, and Tanner. They played on all of Miller's big hits, like "In the Mood" and "Chattanooga Choo-Choo": [Excerpt: Glenn Miller, "Chattanooga Choo-Choo"] But in September 1942, the band broke up as the members entered the armed forces, and Tanner found himself in the Army while Miller was in the Air Force, so while both played in military bands, they weren't playing together, and Miller disappeared over the Channel, presumed dead, in 1944. Tanner became a session trombonist, based in LA, and in 1958 he found himself on a session for a film soundtrack with Dr. Samuel Hoffman. I haven't been able to discover for sure which film this was for, but the only film on which Hoffman has an IMDB credit for that year is that American International Pictures classic, Earth Vs The Spider: [Excerpt: Earth Vs The Spider trailer] Hoffman was a chiropodist, and that was how he made most of his living, but as a teenager in the 1930s he had been a professional violin player under the name Hal Hope. One of the bands he played in was led by a man named Jolly Coburn, who had seen Rudy Vallee's band with their theremin and decided to take it up himself. Hoffman had then also got a theremin, and started his own all-electronic trio, with a Hammond organ player, and with a cello-style fingerboard theremin played by William Schuman, the future Pulitzer Prize winning composer. By the 1940s, Hoffman was a full-time doctor, but he'd retained his Musicians' Union card just in case the odd gig came along, and then in 1945 he received a call from Miklos Rozsa, who was working on the soundtrack for Alfred Hitchcock's new film, Spellbound. Rozsa had tried to get Clara Rockmore, the one true virtuoso on the theremin playing at the time, to play on the soundtrack, but she'd refused -- she didn't do film soundtrack work, because in her experience they only wanted her to play on films about ghosts or aliens, and she thought it damaged the dignity of the instrument. Rozsa turned to the American Federation of Musicians, who as it turned out had precisely one theremin player who could read music and wasn't called Clara Rockmore on their books. So Dr. Samuel Hoffman, chiropodist, suddenly found himself playing on one of the most highly regarded soundtracks of one of the most successful films of the forties: [Excerpt: Miklos Rozsa, "Spellbound"] Rozsa soon asked Hoffman to play on another soundtrack, for the Billy Wilder film The Lost Weekend, another of the great classics of late forties cinema. Both films' soundtracks were nominated for the Oscar, and Spellbound's won, and Hoffman soon found himself in demand as a session player. Hoffman didn't have any of Rockmore's qualms about playing on science fiction and horror films, and anyone with any love of the genre will have heard his playing on genre classics like The Five Thousand Fingers of Dr T, The Thing From Another World, It Came From Outer Space, and of course Bernard Hermann's score for The Day The Earth Stood Still: [Excerpt: The Day The Earth Stood Still score] As well as on such less-than-classics as The Devil's Weed, Voodoo Island, The Mad Magician, and of course Billy The Kid Vs Dracula. Hoffman became something of a celebrity, and also recorded several albums of lounge music with a band led by Les Baxter, like the massive hit Music Out Of The Moon, featuring tracks like “Lunar Rhapsody”: [Excerpt: Samuel Hoffman, "Lunar Rhapsody”] [Excerpt: Neil Armstrong] That voice you heard there was Neil Armstrong, on Apollo 11 on its way back from the moon. He took a tape of Hoffman's album with him. But while Hoffman was something of a celebrity in the fifties, the work dried up almost overnight in 1958 when he worked at that session with Paul Tanner. The theremin is a very difficult instrument to play, and while Hoffman was a good player, he wasn't a great one -- he was getting the work because he was the best in a very small pool of players, not because he was objectively the best there could be. Tanner noticed that Hoffman was having quite some difficulty getting the pitching right in the session, and realised that the theremin must be a very difficult instrument to play because it had no markings at all. So he decided to build an instrument that had the same sound, but that was more sensibly controlled than just waving your hands near it. He built his own invention, the electrotheremin, in less than a week, despite never before having had any experience in electrical engineering. He built it using an oscillator, a length of piano wire and a contact switch that could be slid up and down the wire, changing the pitch. Two days after he finished building it, he was in the studio, cutting his own equivalent of Hoffman's forties albums, Music For Heavenly Bodies, including a new exotica version of "Moonlight Serenade", the song that Glenn Miller had written decades earlier as an exercise for Schillinger: [Excerpt: Paul Tanner, "Moonlight Serenade"] Not only could the electrotheremin let the player control the pitch more accurately, but it could also do staccato notes easily -- something that's almost impossible with an actual theremin. And, on top of that, Tanner was cheaper than Hoffman. An instrumentalist hired to play two instruments is paid extra, but not as much extra as paying for another musician to come to the session, and since Tanner was a first-call trombone player who was likely to be at the session *anyway*, you might as well hire him if you want a theremin sound, rather than paying for Hoffman. Tanner was an excellent musician -- he was a professor of music at UCLA as well as being a session player, and he authored one of the standard textbooks on jazz -- and soon he had cornered the market, leaving Hoffman with only the occasional gig. We will actually be seeing Hoffman again, playing on a session for an artist we're going to look at in a couple of months, but in LA in the early sixties, if you wanted a theremin sound, you didn't hire a theremin player, you hired Paul Tanner to play his electrotheremin -- though the instrument was so obscure that many people didn't realise he wasn't actually playing a theremin. Certainly Brian Wilson seems to have thought he was when he hired him for "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times": [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "I Just Wasn't Made For These Times"] We talked briefly about that track back in the episode on "God Only Knows",   but three days after recording that, Tanner was called back into the studio for another session on which Brian Wilson wanted a theremin sound. This was a song titled "Good, Good, Good Vibrations", and it was inspired by a conversation he'd had with his mother as a child. He'd asked her why dogs bark at some people and not at others, and she'd said that dogs could sense vibrations that people sent out, and some people had bad vibrations and some had good ones. It's possible that this came back to mind as he was planning the Pet Sounds album, which of course ends with the sound of his own dogs barking. It's also possible that he was thinking more generally about ideas like telepathy -- he had been starting to experiment with acid by this point, and was hanging around with a crowd of people who were proto-hippies, and reading up on a lot of the mystical ideas that were shared by those people. As we saw in the last episode, there was a huge crossover between people who were being influenced by drugs, people who were interested in Eastern religion, and people who were interested in what we now might think of as pseudo-science but at the time seemed to have a reasonable amount of validity, things like telepathy and remote viewing. Wilson had also had exposure from an early age to people claiming psychic powers. Jo Ann Marks, the Wilson family's neighbour and the mother of former Beach Boy David Marks, later had something of a minor career as a psychic to the stars (at least according to obituaries posted by her son) and she would often talk about being able to sense "vibrations". The record Wilson started out making in February 1966 with the Wrecking Crew was intended as an R&B single, and was also intended to sound *strange*: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: Gold Star 1966-02-18"] At this stage, the song he was working on was a very straightforward verse-chorus structure, and it was going to be an altogether conventional pop song. The verses -- which actually ended up used in the final single, are dominated by organ and Ray Pohlman's bass: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: Gold Star 1966-02-18"] These bear a strong resemblance to the verses of "Here Today", on the Pet Sounds album which the Beach Boys were still in the middle of making: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Here Today (instrumental)"] But the chorus had far more of an R&B feel than anything the Beach Boys had done before: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: Gold Star 1966-02-18"] It did, though, have precedent. The origins of the chorus feel come from "Can I Get a Witness?", a Holland-Dozier-Holland song that had been a hit for Marvin Gaye in 1963: [Excerpt: Marvin Gaye, "Can I Get a Witness?"] The Beach Boys had picked up on that, and also on its similarity to the feel of Lonnie Mack's instrumental cover version of Chuck Berry's "Memphis, Tennessee", which, retitled "Memphis", had also been a hit in 1963, and in 1964 they recorded an instrumental which they called "Memphis Beach" while they were recording it but later retitled "Carl's Big Chance", which was credited to Brian and Carl Wilson, but was basically just playing the "Can I Get a Witness" riff over twelve-bar blues changes, with Carl doing some surf guitar over the top: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Carl's Big Chance"] The "Can I Get a Witness" feel had quickly become a standard piece of the musical toolkit – you might notice the resemblance between that riff and the “talking 'bout my generation” backing vocals on “My Generation” by the Who, for example. It was also used on "The Boy From New York City", a hit on Red Bird Records by the Ad-Libs: [Excerpt: The Ad-Libs, "The Boy From New York City"] The Beach Boys had definitely been aware of that record -- on their 1965 album Summer Days... And Summer Nights! they recorded an answer song to it, "The Girl From New York City": [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "The Girl From New York City"] And you can see how influenced Brian was by the Ad-Libs record by laying the early instrumental takes of the "Good Vibrations" chorus from this February session under the vocal intro of "The Boy From New York City". It's not a perfect match, but you can definitely hear that there's an influence there: [Excerpt: "The Boy From New York City"/"Good Vibrations"] A few days later, Brian had Carl Wilson overdub some extra bass, got a musician in to do a jaw harp overdub, and they also did a guide vocal, which I've sometimes seen credited to Brian and sometimes Carl, and can hear as both of them depending on what I'm listening for. This guide vocal used a set of placeholder lyrics written by Brian's collaborator Tony Asher, which weren't intended to be a final lyric: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations (first version)"] Brian then put the track away for a month, while he continued work on the Pet Sounds album. At this point, as best we can gather, he was thinking of it as something of a failed experiment. In the first of the two autobiographies credited to Brian (one whose authenticity is dubious, as it was largely put together by a ghostwriter and Brian later said he'd never even read it) he talks about how he was actually planning to give the song to Wilson Pickett rather than keep it for the Beach Boys, and one can definitely imagine a Wilson Pickett version of the song as it was at this point. But Brian's friend Danny Hutton, at that time still a minor session singer who had not yet gone on to form the group that would become Three Dog Night, asked Brian if *he* could have the song if Brian wasn't going to use it. And this seems to have spurred Brian into rethinking the whole song. And in doing so he was inspired by his very first ever musical memory. Brian has talked a lot about how the first record he remembers hearing was when he was two years old, at his maternal grandmother's house, where he heard the Glenn Miller version of "Rhapsody in Blue", a three-minute cut-down version of Gershwin's masterpiece, on which Paul Tanner had of course coincidentally played: [Excerpt: The Glenn Miller Orchestra, "Rhapsody in Blue"] Hearing that music, which Brian's mother also played for him a lot as a child, was one of the most profoundly moving experiences of Brian's young life, and "Rhapsody in Blue" has become one of those touchstone pieces that he returns to again and again. He has recorded studio versions of it twice, in the mid-nineties with Van Dyke Parks: [Excerpt: Brian Wilson and Van Dyke Parks, "Rhapsody in Blue"] and in 2010 with his solo band, as the intro and outro of an album of Gershwin covers: [Excerpt: Brian Wilson, "Rhapsody in Blue"] You'll also often see clips of him playing "Rhapsody in Blue" when sat at the piano -- it's one of his go-to songs. So he decided he was going to come up with a song that was structured like "Rhapsody in Blue" -- what publicist Derek Taylor would later describe as a "pocket symphony", but "pocket rhapsody" would possibly be a better term for it. It was going to be one continuous song, but in different sections that would have different instrumentation and different feelings to them -- he'd even record them in different studios to get different sounds for them, though he would still often have the musicians run through the whole song in each studio. He would mix and match the sections in the edit. His second attempt to record the whole track, at the start of April, gave a sign of what he was attempting, though he would not end up using any of the material from this session: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: Gold Star 1966-04-09" around 02:34] Nearly a month later, on the fourth of May, he was back in the studio -- this time in Western Studios rather than Gold Star where the previous sessions had been held, with yet another selection of musicians from the Wrecking Crew, plus Tanner, to record another version. This time, part of the session was used for the bridge for the eventual single: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations: Western 1966-05-04 Second Chorus and Fade"] On the twenty-fourth of May the Wrecking Crew, with Carl Wilson on Fender bass (while Lyle Ritz continued to play string bass, and Carol Kaye, who didn't end up on the finished record at all, but who was on many of the unused sessions, played Danelectro), had another attempt at the track, this time in Sunset Studios: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations: Sunset Sound 1966-05-24 (Parts 2&3)"] Three days later, another group of musicians, with Carl now switched to rhythm guitar, were back in Western Studios recording this: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations: Western 1966-05-27 Part C" from 2:52] The fade from that session was used in the final track. A few days later they were in the studio again, a smaller group of people with Carl on guitar and Brian on piano, along with Don Randi on electric harpsichord, Bill Pitman on electric bass, Lyle Ritz on string bass and Hal Blaine on drums. This time there seems to have been another inspiration, though I've never heard it mentioned as an influence. In March, a band called The Association, who were friends with the Beach Boys, had released their single "Along Comes Mary", and by June it had become a big hit: [Excerpt: The Association, "Along Comes Mary"] Now the fuzz bass part they were using on the session on the second of June sounds to my ears very, very, like that intro: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations (Inspiration) Western 1966-06-02" from 01:47] That session produced the basic track that was used for the choruses on the final single, onto which the electrotheremin was later overdubbed as Tanner wasn't at that session. Some time around this point, someone suggested to Brian that they should use a cello along with the electrotheremin in the choruses, playing triplets on the low notes. Brian has usually said that this was Carl's idea, while Brian's friend Van Dyke Parks has always said that he gave Brian the idea. Both seem quite certain of this, and neither has any reason to lie, so I suspect what might have happened is that Parks gave Brian the initial idea to have a cello on the track, while Carl in the studio suggested having it specifically play triplets. Either way, a cello part by Jesse Erlich was added to those choruses. There were more sessions in June, but everything from those sessions was scrapped. At some point around this time, Mike Love came up with a bass vocal lyric, which he sang along with the bass in the choruses in a group vocal session. On August the twenty-fourth, two months after what one would think at this point was the final instrumental session, a rough edit of the track was pulled together. By this point the chorus had altered quite a bit. It had originally just been eight bars of G-flat, four bars of B-flat, then four more bars of G-flat. But now Brian had decided to rework an idea he had used in "California Girls". In that song, each repetition of the line "I wish they all could be California" starts a tone lower than the one before. Here, after the bass hook line is repeated, everything moves up a step, repeats the line, and then moves up another step: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: [Alternate Edit] 1966-08-24"] But Brian was dissatisfied with this version of the track. The lyrics obviously still needed rewriting, but more than that, there was a section he thought needed totally rerecording -- this bit: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations: [Alternate Edit] 1966-08-24"] So on the first of September, six and a half months after the first instrumental session for the song, the final one took place. This had Dennis Wilson on organ, Tommy Morgan on harmonicas, Lyle Ritz on string bass, and Hal Blaine and Carl Wilson on percussion, and replaced that with a new, gentler, version: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys: "Good Vibrations (Western 1966-09-01) [New Bridge]"] Well, that was almost the final instrumental session -- they called Paul Tanner in to a vocal overdub session to redo some of the electrotheremin parts, but that was basically it. Now all they had to do was do the final vocals. Oh, and they needed some proper lyrics. By this point Brian was no longer working with Tony Asher. He'd started working with Van Dyke Parks on some songs, but Parks wasn't interested in stepping into a track that had already been worked on so long, so Brian eventually turned to Mike Love, who'd already come up with the bass vocal hook, to write the lyrics. Love wrote them in the car, on the way to the studio, dictating them to his wife as he drove, and they're actually some of his best work. The first verse grounds everything in the sensory, in the earthy. He makes a song originally about *extra* -sensory perception into one about sensory perception -- the first verse covers sight, sound, and smell: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations"] Carl Wilson was chosen to sing the lead vocal, but you'll notice a slight change in timbre on the line "I hear the sound of a" -- that's Brian stepping into double him on the high notes. Listen again: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations"] For the second verse, Love's lyric moves from the sensory grounding of the first verse to the extrasensory perception that the song has always been about, with the protagonist knowing things about the woman who's the object of the song without directly perceiving them. The record is one of those where I wish I was able to play the whole thing for you, because it's a masterpiece of structure, and of editing, and of dynamics. It's also a record that even now is impossible to replicate properly on stage, though both its writers in their live performances come very close. But while someone in the audience for either the current touring Beach Boys led by Mike Love or for Brian Wilson's solo shows might come away thinking "that sounded just like the record", both have radically different interpretations of it even while sticking close to the original arrangement. The touring Beach Boys' version is all throbbing strangeness, almost garage-rock, emphasising the psychedelia of the track: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations (live 2014)"] While Brian Wilson's live version is more meditative, emphasising the gentle aspects: [Excerpt Brian Wilson, "Good Vibrations (live at the Roxy)"] But back in 1966, there was definitely no way to reproduce it live with a five-person band. According to Tanner, they actually asked him if he would tour with them, but he refused -- his touring days were over, and also he felt he would look ridiculous, a middle-aged man on stage with a bunch of young rock and roll stars, though apparently they offered to buy him a wig so he wouldn't look so out of place. When he wouldn't tour with them, they asked him where they could get a theremin, and he pointed them in the direction of Robert Moog. Moog -- whose name is spelled M-o-o-g and often mispronounced "moog", had been a teenager in 1949, when he'd seen a schematic for a theremin in an electronic hobbyist magazine, after Samuel Hoffman had brought the instrument back into the limelight. He'd built his own, and started building others to sell to other hobbyists, and had also started branching out into other electronic instruments by the mid-sixties. His small company was the only one still manufacturing actual theremins, but when the Beach Boys came to him and asked him for one, they found it very difficult to control, and asked him if he could do anything simpler. He came up with a ribbon-controlled oscillator, on the same principle as Tanner's electro-theremin, but even simpler to operate, and the Beach Boys bought it and gave it to Mike Love to play on stage. All he had to do was run his finger up and down a metallic ribbon, with the positions of the notes marked on it, and it would come up with a good approximation of the electro-theremin sound. Love played this "woo-woo machine" as he referred to it, on stage for several years: [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Good Vibrations (live in Hawaii 8/26/67)"] Moog was at the time starting to build his first synthesisers, and having developed that ribbon-control mechanism he decided to include it in the early models as one of several different methods of controlling the Moog synthesiser, the instrument that became synonymous with the synthesiser in the late sixties and early seventies: [Excerpt: Gershon Kingsley and Leonid Hambro, "Rhapsody in Blue" from Switched-On Gershwin] "Good Vibrations" became the Beach Boys' biggest ever hit -- their third US number one, and their first to make number one in the UK. Brian Wilson had managed, with the help of his collaborators, to make something that combined avant-garde psychedelic music and catchy pop hooks, a truly experimental record that was also a genuine pop classic. To this day, it's often cited as the greatest single of all time. But Brian knew he could do better. He could be even more progressive. He could make an entire album using the same techniques as "Good Vibrations", one where themes could recur, where sections could be edited together and songs could be constructed in the edit. Instead of a pocket symphony, he could make a full-blown teenage symphony to God. All he had to do was to keep looking forward, believe he could achieve his goal, and whatever happened, not lose his nerve and turn back. [Excerpt: The Beach Boys, "Smile Promo" ]

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The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
February 16, 2022 Wednesday Hour 2

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 16, 2022 59:57


Resonate.  Resonance. Resonating.  I was asked yesterday as to HOW I choose what I play.  In simplest terms, IF I LIKE IT, IT PLAYS! I am NOT a musician, but there has been a sound, a rhythm, a harmony that has haunted me since childhood…a sound.  Closest that I can place to it, a 12 string Danelectro playing an open “D” chord.  I seek out bands that have “that” sound as it is in resonance with me.  I still get submissions from all styles…the ones that get played, strike a chord, resonate within me.  I just hope you like them, too! The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast... listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podchaser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes!  Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority!  Are you sharing the show? Are you listening? How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...*Listen LIVE here - https://fastcast4u.com/player/jamprell/ *Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/   The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast!  Special Recorded Network Shows, too!  Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT!  February 16, 2022, Wednesday, for the week, hour eight…Freeana - Just Be Yourself [Just Be Yourself]Groovy Uncle & Suzi Chunk - 12 Now Your Pain Is OverBob Koenig - The Apple [Prose & Icons]Chris Richards and the Subtractions - 03 What's On Your Mind [That Covers That 2- Electric Boogaloo] (Futureman Records)The Flashcubes Feat. @Shoes - Tomorrow NightAnton Barbeau - B1 Black Lemon Sauce [Magic Act]Ransom and the Subset - Anna [No Time To Lose]Soraia - My Sharona (Wicked Cool Records)Emperor Penguin - Asking for a friend [Walnut Fascia] (koolkatmusik.com)@Dario & The Clear - Now Is Not The TimeLes Fradkin - 05 Dance Like No One Is Watching [Welcome to The New Age]Blake Jones & the Trike Shop - 04 Goldfinger [Make A New Day]@Gentle Brent - B06 At the Bazaar [Just Dandy] (You Are the Cosmos)The Muffs - I'm A Dick [Happy Birthday To Me]SFB - Shit For Brains- Sucker For A PsychoR.E. Seraphin - 6. Fortuna [Tiny Shapes]Daisy House - Rolling That Stone@Squeeze - Is That Lovenits - 19. Table Town

The High Gain
Episode 198 - The Danelectro U2

The High Gain

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 16, 2022 23:00


THE HIGH GAIN PODCASTWEBSITEwww.thehighgain.comPATREONBecome a SubscriberDISCORDhttps://discord.gg/XUMEzkjYOUTUBEhttps://www.youtube.com/thehighgainTHE SOCIALSInstagramFacebookTwitterPinterestLinkedInEMAILthehighgainpod@gmail.comPRODUCED BYVerkstad - Seattle, WA

The Fret Files
Ep 143 – Q&A

The Fret Files

Play Episode Listen Later Feb 1, 2022 52:52


In this episode, Eric and Nat take questions about upgrading cheap resonators, improving an electric guitar's resonance, polishing frets, vintage Danelectro neck reinforcement, and chasing strange overtones.

Who's on Bass?
Silvertone or Danelectro?

Who's on Bass?

Play Episode Listen Later Jan 25, 2022 57:07


We check out the Silvertone 1303 and the Danelectro 56 U2. Landon is back and feeling way better!!! Austin gets out his new Gamechanger!!!! Fun night!!!

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 21, 2021 Tuesday Hour 2

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 21, 2021 59:55


What do I want for Christmas?  Health, happiness, peace, love, understanding, kindness…a metal flake blue 12 string  left handed Danelectro guitar, mostly all the stuff before the guitar, though, mostly…The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat…heard daily on Podcahser, Deezer, Amazon Music, Audible, Listen Notes, Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! MORNINGS IN CANADA!  Hamilton Co-Op Radio! https://s1.citrus3.com:2000/public/HCRRadio  Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority! Are you listening? How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...*Listen LIVE here - https://fastcast4u.com/player/jamprell/ *Podcast - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/   The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast!  Special Recorded Network Shows, too!  Different than my daily show! *Radio Candy Radio Monday Wednesday, & Friday 7PM ET, 4PM PT*Rockin' The KOR Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT  www.koradio.rocks*Pop Radio UK Friday, Saturday, & Sunday 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT!December 21, 2021, Tuesday…verse twoKimberley Rew & Lee Cave-Berry - 03 All I Want Is You For Christmas [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)@The JAC - 15 Broken Gnome [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)Dolph Chaney - 03 Christmas [Big Stir Holiday Maxi Single] (Big Stir Records)@Kelly's Heels with @Steve Rinaldi - 18 Merrie Christmas [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)Terry Draper - Christmas Time Is Here AgainRogers & Butler - Fashion Industry [Poets & Sinners] (Zip Records)The Stan Laurels - 05 Noche Buena [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)Athanor - 11 I Remember You On Christmas [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)Brad Marino - 03 Blue Christmas@Peggy Lee - Happy HolidaysTad Overbaugh - End Of The Decade [Open Road & Blue Sky] (Rum Bar Records)Ken Lintern Singer/Song Writer - The Best Christmas Present EverMatchbook Romance - I'll Be Home For ChristmasThe Tearaways - Helluva ChristmasDana Countryman - It Happens Every Time [Come Into My Studio]The Monkees - Riu ChiuGrey DeLisle-Griffin - Oh, Holy NightThe Jigsaw Seen - What About Christmas [Hi-Fi Christmas Party]The Dollyrots - 01 Santa Baby [A Dollyrots Christmas EP]

A History Of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs
Episode 136: “My Generation” by the Who

A History Of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 3, 2021


Episode one hundred and thirty-six of A History of Rock Music in Five Hundred Songs is a special long episode, running almost ninety minutes, looking at "My Generation" by the Who. Click the full post to read liner notes, links to more information, and a transcript of the episode. Patreon backers also have a fifteen-minute bonus episode available, on "The Name Game" by Shirley Ellis. Tilt Araiza has assisted invaluably by doing a first-pass edit, and will hopefully be doing so from now on. Check out Tilt's irregular podcasts at http://www.podnose.com/jaffa-cakes-for-proust and http://sitcomclub.com/ Errata I mispronounce the Herman's Hermits track "Can't You Hear My Heartbeat" as "Can You Hear My Heartbeat". I say "Rebel Without a Cause" when I mean "The Wild One". Brando was not in "Rebel Without a Cause". Resources As usual, I've created a Mixcloud playlist of the music excerpted here. This mix does not include the Dixon of Dock Green theme, as I was unable to find a full version of that theme anywhere (though a version with Jack Warner singing, titled "An Ordinary Copper" is often labelled as it) and what you hear in this episode is the only fragment I could get a clean copy of. The best compilation of the Who's music is Maximum A's & B's, a three-disc set containing the A and B sides of every single they released. The super-deluxe five-CD version of the My Generation album appears to be out of print as a CD, but can be purchased digitally. I referred to a lot of books for this episode, including: Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069 by William Strauss and Neil Howe, which I don't necessarily recommend reading, but which is certainly an influential book. Revolt Into Style: The Pop Arts by George Melly which I *do* recommend reading if you have any interest at all in British pop culture of the fifties and sixties. Jim Marshall: The Father of Loud by Rich Maloof gave me all the biographical details about Marshall. The Who Before the Who by Doug Sandom, a rather thin book of reminiscences by the group's first drummer. The Ox by Paul Rees, an authorised biography of John Entwistle based on notes for his never-completed autobiography. Who I Am, the autobiography of Pete Townshend, is one of the better rock autobiographies. A Band With Built-In Hate by Peter Stanfield is an examination of the group in the context of pop-art and Mod. And Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere by Andy Neill and Matt Kent is a day-by-day listing of the group's activities up to 1978. Patreon This podcast is brought to you by the generosity of my backers on Patreon. Why not join them? Transcript In 1991, William Strauss and Neil Howe wrote a book called Generations: The History of America's Future, 1584 to 2069. That book was predicated on a simple idea -- that there are patterns in American history, and that those patterns can be predicted in their rough outline. Not in the fine details, but broadly -- those of you currently watching the TV series Foundation, or familiar with Isaac Asimov's original novels, will have the idea already, because Strauss and Howe claimed to have invented a formula which worked as well as Asimov's fictional Psychohistory. Their claim was that, broadly speaking, generations can be thought to have a dominant personality type, influenced by the events that took place while they were growing up, which in turn are influenced by the personality types of the older generations. Because of this, Strauss and Howe claimed, American society had settled into a semi-stable pattern, where events repeat on a roughly eighty-eight-year cycle, driven by the behaviours of different personality types at different stages of their lives. You have four types of generation, which cycle -- the Adaptive, Idealist, Reactive, and Civic types. At any given time, one of these will be the elder statespeople, one will be the middle-aged people in positions of power, one will be the young rising people doing most of the work, and one will be the kids still growing up. You can predict what will happen, in broad outline, by how each of those generation types will react to challenges, and what position they will be in when those challenges arise. The idea is that major events change your personality, and also how you react to future events, and that how, say, Pearl Harbor affected someone will have been different for a kid hearing about the attack on the radio, an adult at the age to be drafted, and an adult who was too old to fight. The thesis of this book has, rather oddly, entered mainstream thought so completely that its ideas are taken as basic assumptions now by much of the popular discourse, even though on reading it the authors are so vague that pretty much anything can be taken as confirmation of their hypotheses, in much the same way that newspaper horoscopes always seem like they could apply to almost everyone's life. And sometimes, of course, they're just way off. For example they make the prediction that in 2020 there would be a massive crisis that would last several years, which would lead to a massive sense of community, in which "America will be implacably resolved to do what needs doing and fix what needs fixing", and in which the main task of those aged forty to sixty at that point would be to restrain those in leadership positions in the sixty-to-eighty age group from making irrational, impetuous, decisions which might lead to apocalypse. The crisis would likely end in triumph, but there was also a chance it might end in "moral fatigue, vast human tragedy, and a weak and vengeful sense of victory". I'm sure that none of my listeners can think of any events in 2020 that match this particular pattern. Despite its lack of rigour, Strauss and Howe's basic idea is now part of most people's intellectual toolkit, even if we don't necessarily think of them as the source for it. Indeed, even though they only talk about America in their book, their generational concept gets applied willy-nilly to much of the Western world. And likewise, for the most part we tend to think of the generations, whether American or otherwise, using the names they used. For the generations who were alive at the time they were writing, they used five main names, three of which we still use. Those born between 1901 and 1924 they term the "GI Generation", though those are now usually termed the "Greatest Generation". Those born between 1924 and 1942 were the "Silent Generation", those born 1943 through 1960 were the Boomers, and those born between 1982 and 2003 they labelled Millennials. Those born between 1961 and 1981 they labelled "thirteeners", because they were the unlucky thirteenth generation to be born in America since the declaration of independence. But that name didn't catch on. Instead, the name that people use to describe that generation is "Generation X", named after a late-seventies punk band led by Billy Idol: [Excerpt: Generation X, "Your Generation"] That band were short-lived, but they were in constant dialogue with the pop culture of ten to fifteen years earlier, Idol's own childhood. As well as that song, "Your Generation", which is obviously referring to the song this week's episode is about, they also recorded versions of John Lennon's "Gimme Some Truth", of Johnny Kidd and the Pirates' "Shakin' All Over", and an original song called "Ready Steady Go", about being in love with Cathy McGowan, the presenter of that show. And even their name was a reference, because Generation X were named after a book published in 1964, about not the generation we call Generation X, but about the Baby Boomers, and specifically about a series of fights on beaches across the South Coast of England between what at that point amounted to two gangs. These were fights between the old guard, the Rockers -- people who represented the recent past who wouldn't go away, what Americans would call "greasers", people who modelled themselves on Marlon Brando in Rebel Without A Cause, and who thought music had peaked with Gene Vincent and Eddie Cochran -- and a newer, younger, hipper, group of people, who represented the new, the modern -- the Mods: [Excerpt: The Who, "My Generation"] Jim Marshall, if he'd been American, would have been considered one of the Greatest Generation, but his upbringing was not typical of that, or of any, generation. When he was five, he was diagnosed as having skeletal tuberculosis, which had made his bones weak and easily broken. To protect them, he spent the next seven years of his life, from age five until twelve, in hospital in a full-body cast. The only opportunity he got to move during those years was for a few minutes every three months, when the cast would be cut off and reapplied to account for his growth during that time. Unsurprisingly, once he was finally out of the cast, he discovered he loved moving -- a lot. He dropped out of school aged thirteen -- most people at the time left school at aged fourteen anyway, and since he'd missed all his schooling to that point it didn't seem worth his while carrying on -- and took on multiple jobs, working sixty hours a week or more. But the job he made most money at was as an entertainer. He started out as a tap-dancer, taking advantage of his new mobility, but then his song-and-dance man routine became steadily more song and less dance, as people started to notice his vocal resemblance to Bing Crosby. He was working six nights a week as a singer, but when World War II broke out, the drummer in the seven-piece band he was working with was drafted -- Marshall wouldn't ever be drafted because of his history of illness. The other members of the band knew that as a dancer he had a good sense of rhythm, and so they made a suggestion -- if Jim took over the drums, they could split the money six ways rather than seven. Marshall agreed, but he discovered there was a problem. The drum kit was always positioned at the back of the stage, behind the PA, and he couldn't hear the other musicians clearly. This is actually OK for a drummer -- you're keeping time, and the rest of the band are following you, so as long as you can *sort of* hear them everyone can stay together. But a singer needs to be able to hear everything clearly, in order to stay on key. And this was in the days before monitor speakers, so the only option available was to just have a louder PA system. And since one wasn't available, Marshall just had to build one himself. And that's how Jim Marshall started building amplifiers. Marshall eventually gave up playing the drums, and retired to run a music shop. There's a story about Marshall's last gig as a drummer, which isn't in the biography of Marshall I read for this episode, but is told in other places by the son of the bandleader at that gig. Apparently Marshall had a very fraught relationship with his father, who was among other things a semi-professional boxer, and at that gig Marshall senior turned up and started heckling his son from the audience. Eventually the younger Marshall jumped off the stage and started hitting his dad, winning the fight, but he decided he wasn't going to perform in public any more. The band leader for that show was Clifford Townshend, a clarinet player and saxophonist whose main gig was as part of the Squadronaires, a band that had originally been formed during World War II by RAF servicemen to entertain other troops. Townshend, who had been a member of Oswald Moseley's fascist Blackshirts in the thirties but later had a change of heart, was a second-generation woodwind player -- his father had been a semi-professional flute player. As well as working with the Squadronaires, Townshend also put out one record under his own name in 1956, a version of "Unchained Melody" credited to "Cliff Townsend and his singing saxophone": [Excerpt: Cliff Townshend and his Singing Saxophone, "Unchained Melody"] Cliff's wife often performed with him -- she was a professional singer who had  actually lied about her age in order to join up with the Air Force and sing with the group -- but they had a tempestuous marriage, and split up multiple times. As a result of this, and the travelling lifestyle of musicians, there were periods where their son Peter was sent to live with his grandmother, who was seriously abusive, traumatising the young boy in ways that would affect him for the rest of his life. When Pete Townshend was growing up, he wasn't particularly influenced by music, in part because it was his dad's job rather than a hobby, and his parents had very few records in the house. He did, though, take up the harmonica and learn to play the theme tune to Dixon of Dock Green: [Excerpt: Tommy Reilly, "Dixon of Dock Green Theme"] His first exposure to rock and roll wasn't through Elvis or Little Richard, but rather through Ray Ellington. Ellington was a British jazz singer and drummer, heavily influenced by Louis Jordan, who provided regular musical performances on the Goon Show throughout the fifties, and on one episode had performed "That Rock 'n' Rollin' Man": [Excerpt: Ray Ellington, "That Rock 'N' Rollin' Man"] Young Pete's assessment of that, as he remembered it later, was "I thought it some kind of hybrid jazz: swing music with stupid lyrics. But it felt youthful and rebellious, like The Goon Show itself." But he got hooked on rock and roll when his father took him and a friend to see a film: [Excerpt: Bill Haley and the Comets, "Rock Around the Clock"] According to Townshend's autobiography, "I asked Dad what he thought of the music. He said he thought it had some swing, and anything that had swing was OK. For me it was more than just OK. After seeing Rock Around the Clock with Bill Haley, nothing would ever be quite the same." Young Pete would soon go and see Bill Haley live – his first rock and roll gig. But the older Townshend would soon revise his opinion of rock and roll, because it soon marked the end of the kind of music that had allowed him to earn his living -- though he still managed to get regular work, playing a clarinet was suddenly far less lucrative than it had been. Pete decided that he wanted to play the saxophone, like his dad, but soon he switched first to guitar and then to banjo. His first guitar was bought for him by his abusive grandmother, and three of the strings snapped almost immediately, so he carried on playing with just three strings for a while. He got very little encouragement from his parents, and didn't really improve for a couple of years. But then the trad jazz boom happened, and Townshend teamed up with a friend of his who played the trumpet and French horn. He had initially bonded with John Entwistle over their shared sense of humour -- both kids loved Mad magazine and would make tape recordings together of themselves doing comedy routines inspired by the Goon show and Hancock's Half Hour -- but Entwistle was also a very accomplished musician, who could play multiple instruments. Entwistle had formed a trad band called the Confederates, and Townshend joined them on banjo and guitar, but they didn't stay together for long. Both boys, though, would join a variety of other bands, both together and separately. As the trad boom faded and rock and roll regained its dominance among British youth, there was little place for Entwistle's trumpet in the music that was popular among teenagers, and at first Entwistle decided to try making his trumpet sound more like a saxophone, using a helmet as a mute to try to get it to sound like the sax on "Ramrod" by Duane Eddy: [Excerpt: Duane Eddy, "Ramrod"] Eddy soon became Entwistle's hero. We've talked about him before a couple of times, briefly, but not in depth, but Duane Eddy had a style that was totally different from most guitar heroes. Instead of playing mostly on the treble strings of the guitar, playing high twiddly parts, Eddy played low notes on the bass strings of his guitar, giving him the style that he summed up in album titles like "The Twang's the Thang" and "Have Twangy Guitar Will Travel". After a couple of years of having hits with this sound, produced by Lee Hazelwood and Lester Sill, Eddy also started playing another instrument, the instrument variously known as the six-string bass, the baritone guitar, or the Danelectro bass (after the company that manufactured the most popular model).  The baritone guitar has six strings, like a normal guitar, but it's tuned lower than a standard guitar -- usually a fourth lower, though different players have different preferences. The Danelectro became very popular in recording studios in the early sixties, because it helped solve a big problem in recording bass tones. You can hear more about this in the episodes of Cocaine and Rhinestones I recommended last week, but basically double basses were very, very difficult to record in the 1950s, and you'd often end up just getting a thudding, muddy, sound from them, which is one reason why when you listen to a lot of early rockabilly the bass is doing nothing very interesting, just playing root notes -- you couldn't easily get much clarity on the instrument at all. Conversely, with electric basses, with the primitive amps of the time, you didn't get anything like the full sound that you'd get from a double bass, but you *did* get a clear sound that would cut through on a cheap radio in a way that the sound of a double bass wouldn't. So the solution was obvious -- you have an electric instrument *and* a double bass play the same part. Use the double bass for the big dull throbbing sound, but use the electric one to give the sound some shape and cut-through. If you're doing that, you mostly want the trebly part of the electric instrument's tone, so you play it with a pick rather than fingers, and it makes sense to use a Danelectro rather than a standard bass guitar, as the Danelectro is more trebly than a normal bass. This combination, of Danelectro and double bass, appears to have been invented by Owen Bradley, and you can hear it for example on this record by Patsy Cline, with Bob Moore on double bass and Harold Bradley on baritone guitar: [Excerpt: Patsy Cline, "Crazy"] This sound, known as "tic-tac bass", was soon picked up by a lot of producers, and it became the standard way of getting a bass sound in both Nashville and LA. It's all over the Beach Boys' best records, and many of Jack Nitzsche's arrangements, and many of the other records the Wrecking Crew played on, and it's on most of the stuff the Nashville A-Team played on from the late fifties through mid-sixties, records by people like Elvis, Roy Orbison, Arthur Alexander, and the Everly Brothers. Lee Hazelwood was one of the first producers to pick up on this sound -- indeed, Duane Eddy has said several times that Hazelwood invented the sound before Owen Bradley did, though I think Bradley did it first -- and many of Eddy's records featured that bass sound, and eventually Eddy started playing a baritone guitar himself, as a lead instrument, playing it on records like "Because They're Young": [Excerpt: Duane Eddy, "Because They're Young"] Duane Eddy was John Entwistle's idol, and Entwistle learned Eddy's whole repertoire on trumpet, playing the saxophone parts. But then, realising that the guitar was always louder than the trumpet in the bands he was in, he realised that if he wanted to be heard, he should probably switch to guitar himself. And it made sense that a bass would be easier to play than a regular guitar -- if you only have four strings, there's more space between them, so playing is easier. So he started playing the bass, trying to sound as much like Eddy as he could. He had no problem picking up the instrument -- he was already a multi-instrumentalist -- but he did have a problem actually getting hold of one, as all the electric bass guitars available in the UK at the time were prohibitively expensive. Eventually he made one himself, with the help of someone in a local music shop, and that served for a time, though he would soon trade up to more professional instruments, eventually amassing the biggest collection of basses in the world. One day, Entwistle was approached on the street by an acquaintance, Roger Daltrey, who said to him "I hear you play bass" -- Entwistle was, at the time, carrying his bass. Daltrey was at this time a guitarist -- like Entwistle, he'd built his own instrument -- and he was the leader of a band called Del Angelo and his Detours. Daltrey wasn't Del Angelo, the lead singer -- that was a man called Colin Dawson who by all accounts sounded a little like Cliff Richard -- but he was the bandleader, hired and fired the members, and was in charge of their setlists. Daltrey lured Entwistle away from the band he was in with Townshend by telling him that the Detours were getting proper paid gigs, though they weren't getting many at the time. Unfortunately, one of the group's other guitarists, the member who owned the best amp, died in an accident not long after Entwistle joined the band. However, the amp was left in the group's possession, and Entwistle used it to lure Pete Townshend into the group by telling him he could use it -- and not telling him that he'd be sharing the amp with Daltrey. Townshend would later talk about his audition for the Detours -- as he was walking up the street towards Daltrey's house, he saw a stunningly beautiful woman walking away from the house crying. She saw his guitar case and said "Are you going to Roger's?" "Yes." "Well you can tell him, it's that bloody guitar or me". Townshend relayed the message, and Daltrey responded "Sod her. Come in." The audition was a formality, with the main questions being whether Townshend could play two parts of the regular repertoire for a working band at that time -- "Hava Nagila", and the Shadows' "Man of Mystery": [Excerpt: The Shadows, "Man of Mystery"] Townshend could play both of those, and so he was in. The group would mostly play chart hits by groups like the Shadows, but as trad jazz hadn't completely died out yet they would also do breakout sessions playing trad jazz, with Townshend on banjo, Entwistle on trumpet and Daltrey on trombone. From the start, there was a temperamental mismatch between the group's two guitarists. Daltrey was thoroughly working-class, culturally conservative,  had dropped out of school to go to work at a sheet metal factory, and saw himself as a no-nonsense plain-speaking man. Townshend was from a relatively well-off upper-middle-class family, was for a brief time a member of the Communist Party, and was by this point studying at art school, where he was hugely impressed by a lecture from Gustav Metzger titled “Auto-Destructive Art, Auto-Creative Art: The Struggle For The Machine Arts Of The Future”, about Metzger's creation of artworks which destroyed themselves. Townshend was at art school during a period when the whole idea of what an art school was for was in flux, something that's typified by a story Townshend tells about two of his early lectures. At the first, the lecturer came in and told the class to all draw a straight line. They all did, and then the lecturer told off anyone who had drawn anything that was anything other than six inches long, perfectly straight, without a ruler, going north-south, with a 3B pencil, saying that anything else at all was self-indulgence of the kind that needed to be drummed out of them if they wanted to get work as commercial artists. Then in another lecture, a different lecturer came in and asked them all to draw a straight line. They all drew perfectly straight, six-inch, north-south lines in 3B pencil, as the first lecturer had taught them. The new lecturer started yelling at them, then brought in someone else to yell at them as well, and then cut his hand open with a knife and dragged it across a piece of paper, smearing a rough line with his own blood, and screamed "THAT'S a line!" Townshend's sympathies lay very much with the second lecturer. Another big influence on Townshend at this point was a jazz double-bass player, Malcolm Cecil. Cecil would later go on to become a pioneer in electronic music as half of TONTO's Expanding Head Band, and we'll be looking at his work in more detail in a future episode, but at this point he was a fixture on the UK jazz scene. He'd been a member of Blues Incorporated, and had also played with modern jazz players like Dick Morrissey: [Excerpt: Dick Morrissey, "Jellyroll"] But Townshend was particularly impressed with a performance in which Cecil demonstrated unorthodox ways to play the double-bass, including playing so hard he broke the strings, and using a saw as a bow, sawing through the strings and damaging the body of the instrument. But these influences, for the moment, didn't affect the Detours, who were still doing the Cliff and the Shadows routine. Eventually Colin Dawson quit the group, and Daltrey took over the lead vocal role for the Detours, who settled into a lineup of Daltrey, Townshend, Entwistle, and drummer Doug Sandom, who was much older than the rest of the group -- he was born in 1930, while Daltrey and Entwistle were born in 1944 and Townshend in 1945. For a while, Daltrey continued playing guitar as well as singing, but his hands were often damaged by his work at the sheet-metal factory, making guitar painful for him. Then the group got a support slot with Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, who at this point were a four-piece band, with Kidd singing backed by bass, drums, and Mick Green playing one guitar on which he played both rhythm and lead parts: [Excerpt: Johnny Kidd and the Pirates, "Doctor Feel Good"] Green was at the time considered possibly the best guitarist in Britain, and the sound the Pirates were able to get with only one guitar convinced the Detours that they would be OK if Daltrey switched to just singing, so the group changed to what is now known as a "power trio" format. Townshend was a huge admirer of Steve Cropper, another guitarist who played both rhythm and lead, and started trying to adopt parts of Cropper's style, playing mostly chords, while Entwistle went for a much more fluid bass style than most, essentially turning the bass into another lead instrument, patterning his playing after Duane Eddy's work. By this time, Townshend was starting to push against Daltrey's leadership a little, especially when it came to repertoire. Townshend had a couple of American friends at art school who had been deported after being caught smoking dope, and had left their records with Townshend for safe-keeping. As a result, Townshend had become a devotee of blues and R&B music, especially the jazzier stuff like Ray Charles, Mose Allison, and Booker T and the MGs. He also admired guitar-based blues records like those by Howlin' Wolf or Jimmy Reed. Townshend kept pushing for this music to be incorporated into the group's sets, but Daltrey would push back, insisting as the leader that they should play the chart hits that everyone else played, rather than what he saw as Townshend's art-school nonsense. Townshend insisted, and eventually won -- within a short while the group had become a pure R&B group, and Daltrey was soon a convert, and became the biggest advocate of that style in the band. But there was a problem with only having one guitar, and that was volume. In particular, Townshend didn't want to be able to hear hecklers. There were gangsters in some of the audiences who would shout requests for particular songs, and you had to play them or else, even if they were completely unsuitable for the rest of the audience's tastes. But if you were playing so loud you couldn't hear the shouting, you had an excuse. Both Entwistle and Townshend had started buying amplifiers from Jim Marshall, who had opened up a music shop after quitting drums -- Townshend actually bought his first one from a shop assistant in Marshall's shop, John McLaughlin, who would later himself become a well-known guitarist. Entwistle, wanting to be heard over Townshend, had bought a cabinet with four twelve-inch speakers in it. Townshend, wanting to be heard over Entwistle, had bought *two* of these cabinets, and stacked them, one on top of the other, against Marshall's protestations -- Marshall said that they would vibrate so much that the top one might fall over and injure someone. Townshend didn't listen, and the Marshall stack was born. This ultra-amplification also led Townshend to change his guitar style further. He was increasingly reliant on distortion and feedback, rather than on traditional instrumental skills. Now, there are basically two kinds of chords that are used in most Western music. There are major chords, which consist of the first, third, and fifth note of the scale, and these are the basic chords that everyone starts with. So you can strum between G major and F major: [demonstrates G and F chords] There's also minor chords, where you flatten the third note, which sound a little sadder than major chords, so playing G minor and F minor: [demonstrates Gm and Fm chords] There are of course other kinds of chord -- basically any collection of notes counts as a chord, and can work musically in some context. But major and minor chords are the basic harmonic building blocks of most pop music. But when you're using a lot of distortion and feedback, you create a lot of extra harmonics -- extra notes that your instrument makes along with the ones you're playing. And for mathematical reasons I won't go into here because this is already a very long episode, the harmonics generated by playing the first and fifth notes sound fine together, but the harmonics from a third or minor third don't go along with them at all. The solution to this problem is to play what are known as "power chords", which are just the root and fifth notes, with no third at all, and which sound ambiguous as to whether they're major or minor. Townshend started to build his technique around these chords, playing for the most part on the bottom three strings of his guitar, which sounds like this: [demonstrates G5 and F5 chords] Townshend wasn't the first person to use power chords -- they're used on a lot of the Howlin' Wolf records he liked, and before Townshend would become famous the Kinks had used them on "You Really Got Me" -- but he was one of the first British guitarists to make them a major part of his personal style. Around this time, the Detours were starting to become seriously popular, and Townshend was starting to get exhausted by the constant demands on his time from being in the band and going to art school. He talked about this with one of his lecturers, who asked how much Townshend was earning from the band. When Townshend told him he was making thirty pounds a week, the lecturer was shocked, and said that was more than *he* was earning. Townshend should probably just quit art school, because it wasn't like he was going to make more money from anything he could learn there. Around this time, two things changed the group's image. The first was that they played a support slot for the Rolling Stones in December 1963. Townshend saw Keith Richards swinging his arm over his head and then bringing it down on the guitar, to loosen up his muscles, and he thought that looked fantastic, and started copying it -- from very early on, Townshend wanted to have a physical presence on stage that would be all about his body, to distract from his face, as he was embarrassed about the size of his nose. They played a second support slot for the Stones a few weeks later, and not wanting to look like he was copying Richards, Townshend didn't do that move, but then he noticed that Richards didn't do it either. He asked about it after the gig, and Richards didn't know what he was talking about -- "Swing me what?" -- so Townshend took that as a green light to make that move, which became known as the windmill, his own. The second thing was when in February 1964 a group appeared on Thank Your Lucky Stars: [Excerpt: Johnny Devlin and the Detours, "Sometimes"] Johnny Devlin and the Detours had had national media exposure, which meant that Daltrey, Townshend, Entwistle, and Sandom had to change the name of their group. They eventually settled on "The Who", It was around this time that the group got their first serious management, a man named Helmut Gorden, who owned a doorknob factory. Gorden had no management experience, but he did offer the group a regular salary, and pay for new equipment for them. However, when he tried to sign the group to a proper contract, as most of them were still under twenty-one he needed their parents to countersign for them. Townshend's parents, being experienced in the music industry, refused to sign, and so the group continued under Gorden's management without a contract. Gorden, not having management experience, didn't have any contacts in the music industry. But his barber did. Gorden enthused about his group to Jack Marks, the barber, and Marks in turn told some of his other clients about this group he'd been hearing about. Tony Hatch wasn't interested, as he already had a guitar group with the Searchers, but Chris Parmenter at Fontana Records was, and an audition was arranged. At the audition, among other numbers, they played Bo Diddley's "Here 'Tis": [Excerpt: Bo Diddley, "Here 'Tis"] Unfortunately for Doug, he didn't play well on that song, and Townshend started berating him. Doug also knew that Parmenter had reservations about him, because he was so much older than the rest of the band -- he was thirty-four at the time, while the rest of the group were only just turning twenty -- and he was also the least keen of the group on the R&B material they were playing. He'd been warned by Entwistle, his closest friend in the group, that Daltrey and Townshend were thinking of dropping him, and so he decided to jump before he was pushed, walking out of the audition. He agreed to come back for a handful more gigs that were already booked in, but that was the end of his time in the band, and of his time in the music industry -- though oddly not of his friendship with the group. Unlike other famous examples of an early member not fitting in and being forced out before a band becomes big, Sandom remained friends with the other members, and Townshend wrote the foreword to his autobiography, calling him a mentor figure, while Daltrey apparently insisted that Sandom phone him for a chat every Sunday, at the same time every week, until Sandom's death in 2019 at the age of eighty-nine. The group tried a few other drummers, including someone who Jim Marshall had been giving drum lessons to, Mitch Mitchell, before settling on the drummer for another group that played the same circuit, the Beachcombers, who played mostly Shadows material, plus the Beach Boys and Jan and Dean songs that their drummer, Keith Moon, loved. Moon and Entwistle soon became a formidable rhythm section, and despite having been turned down by Fontana, they were clearly going places. But they needed an image -- and one was provided for them by Pete Meaden. Meaden was another person who got his hair cut by Jack Marks, and he had had  little bit of music business experience, having worked for Andrew Oldham, the Rolling Stones' manager, for a while before going on to manage a group called the Moments, whose career highlight was recording a soundalike cover version of "You Really Got Me" for an American budget label: [Excerpt: The Moments, "You Really Got Me"] The Moments never had any big success, but Meaden's nose for talent was not wrong, as their teenage lead singer, Steve Marriott, later went on to much better things. Pete Meaden was taken on as Helmut Gorden's assistant, but from this point on the group decided to regard him as their de facto manager, and as more than just a manager. To Townshend in particular he was a guru figure, and he shaped the group to appeal to the Mods. Now, we've not talked much about the Mods previously, and what little has been said has been a bit contradictory. That's because the Mods were a tiny subculture at this point -- or to be more precise, they were three subcultures. The original mods had come along in the late 1950s, at a time when there was a division among jazz fans between fans of traditional New Orleans jazz -- "trad" -- and modern jazz. The mods were modernists, hence the name, but for the most part they weren't as interested in music as in clothes. They were a small group of young working-class men, almost all gay, who dressed flamboyantly and dandyishly, and who saw themselves, their clothing, and their bodies as works of art. In the late fifties, Britain was going through something of an economic boom, and this was the first time that working-class men *could* buy nice clothes. These working-class dandies would have to visit tailors to get specially modified clothes made, but they could just about afford to do so. The mod image was at first something that belonged to a very, very, small clique of people. But then John Stephens opened his first shop. This was the first era when short runs of factory-produced clothing became possible, and Stephens, a stylish young man, opened a shop on Carnaby Street, then a relatively cheap place to open a shop. He painted the outside yellow, played loud pop music, and attracted a young crowd. Stephens was selling factory-made clothes that still looked unique -- short runs of odd-coloured jeans, three-button jackets, and other men's fashion. Soon Carnaby Street became the hub for men's fashion in London, thanks largely to Stephens. At one point Stephens owned fifteen different shops, nine of them on Carnaby Street itself, and Stephens' shops appealed to the kind of people that the Kinks would satirise in their early 1966 hit single "Dedicated Follower of Fashion": [Excerpt: The Kinks, "Dedicated Follower of Fashion"] Many of those who visited Stephens' shops were the larger, second, generation of mods. I'm going to quote here from George Melly's Revolt Into Style, the first book to properly analyse British pop culture of the fifties and sixties, by someone who was there: "As the ‘mod' thing spread it lost its purity. For the next generation of Mods, those who picked up the ‘mod' thing around 1963, clothes, while still their central preoccupation, weren't enough. They needed music (Rhythm and Blues), transport (scooters) and drugs (pep pills). What's more they needed fashion ready-made. They hadn't the time or the fanaticism to invent their own styles, and this is where Carnaby Street came in." Melly goes on to talk about how these new Mods were viewed with distaste by the older Mods, who left the scene. The choice of music for these new Mods was as much due to geographic proximity as anything else. Carnaby Street is just round the corner from Wardour Street, and Wardour Street is where the two clubs that between them were the twin poles of the London R&B scenes, the Marquee and the Flamingo, were both located. So it made sense that the young people frequenting John Stephens' boutiques on Carnaby Street were the same people who made up the audiences -- and the bands -- at those clubs. But by 1964, even these second-generation Mods were in a minority compared to a new, third generation, and here I'm going to quote Melly again: "But the Carnaby Street Mods were not the final stage in the history of this particular movement. The word was taken over finally by a new and more violent sector, the urban working class at the gang-forming age, and this became quite sinister. The gang stage rejected the wilder flights of Carnaby Street in favour of extreme sartorial neatness. Everything about them was neat, pretty and creepy: dark glasses, Nero hair-cuts, Chelsea boots, polo-necked sweaters worn under skinny V-necked pullovers, gleaming scooters and transistors. Even their offensive weapons were pretty—tiny hammers and screwdrivers. En masse they looked like a pack of weasels." I would urge anyone who's interested in British social history to read Melly's book in full -- it's well worth it. These third-stage Mods soon made up the bulk of the movement, and they were the ones who, in summer 1964, got into the gang fights that were breathlessly reported in all the tabloid newspapers. Pete Meaden was a Mod, and as far as I can tell he was a leading-edge second-stage Mod, though as with all these things who was in what generation of Mods is a bit blurry. Meaden had a whole idea of Mod-as-lifestyle and Mod-as-philosophy, which worked well with the group's R&B leanings, and with Townshend's art-school-inspired fascination with the aesthetics of Pop Art. Meaden got the group a residency at the Railway Hotel, a favourite Mod hangout, and he also changed their name -- The Who didn't sound Mod enough. In Mod circles at the time there was a hierarchy, with the coolest people, the Faces, at the top, below them a slightly larger group of people known as Numbers, and below them the mass of generic people known as Tickets. Meaden saw himself as the band's Svengali, so he was obviously the Face, so the group had to be Numbers -- so they became The High Numbers. Meaden got the group a one-off single deal, to record two songs he had allegedly written, both of which had lyrics geared specifically for the Mods. The A-side was "Zoot Suit": [Excerpt: The High Numbers, "Zoot Suit"] This had a melody that was stolen wholesale from "Misery" by the Dynamics: [Excerpt: The Dynamics, "Misery"] The B-side, meanwhile, was titled "I'm the Face": [Excerpt: The High Numbers, "I'm the Face"] Which anyone with any interest at all in blues music will recognise immediately as being "Got Love if You Want It" by Slim Harpo: [Excerpt: Slim Harpo, "Got Love if You Want it"] Unfortunately for the High Numbers, that single didn't have much success. Mod was a local phenomenon, which never took off outside London and its suburbs, and so the songs didn't have much appeal in the rest of the country -- while within London, Mod fashions were moving so quickly that by the time the record came out, all its up-to-the-minute references were desperately outdated. But while the record didn't have much success, the group were getting a big live following among the Mods, and their awareness of rapidly shifting trends in that subculture paid off for them in terms of stagecraft. To quote Townshend: "What the Mods taught us was how to lead by following. I mean, you'd look at the dance floor and see some bloke stop during the dance of the week and for some reason feel like doing some silly sort of step. And you'd notice some of the blokes around him looking out of the corners of their eyes and thinking 'is this the latest?' And on their own, without acknowledging the first fellow, a few of 'em would start dancing that way. And we'd be watching. By the time they looked up on the stage again, we'd be doing that dance and they'd think the original guy had been imitating us. And next week they'd come back and look to us for dances". And then Kit Lambert and Chris Stamp came into the Railway Hotel. Kit Lambert was the son of Constant Lambert, the founding music director of the Royal Ballet, who the economist John Maynard Keynes described as the most brilliant man he'd ever met. Constant Lambert was possibly Britain's foremost composer of the pre-war era, and one of the first people from the serious music establishment to recognise the potential of jazz and blues music. His most famous composition, "The Rio Grande", written in 1927 about a fictitious South American river, is often compared with Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue: [Excerpt: Constant Lambert, "The Rio Grande"] Kit Lambert was thus brought up in an atmosphere of great privilege, both financially and intellectually, with his godfather being the composer Sir William Walton while his godmother was the prima ballerina Dame Margot Fonteyn, with whom his father was having an affair. As a result of the problems between his parents, Lambert spent much of his childhood living with his grandmother. After studying history at Oxford and doing his national service, Lambert had spent a few months studying film at the Institut des hautes études cinématographiques in Paris, where he went because Jean-Luc Godard and Alain Renais taught there -- or at least so he would later say, though there's no evidence I can find that Godard actually taught there, so either he went there under a mistaken impression or he lied about it later to make himself sound more interesting. However, he'd got bored with his studies after only a few months, and decided that he knew enough to just make a film himself, and he planned his first documentary. In early 1961, despite having little film experience, he joined two friends from university, Richard Mason and John Hemming, in an attempt to make a documentary film tracing the source of the Iriri, a river in South America that was at that point the longest unnavigated river in the world. Unfortunately, the expedition was as disastrous as it's possible for such an expedition to be. In May 1961 they landed in the Amazon basin and headed off on their expedition to find the source of the Iriri, with the help of five local porters and three people sent along by the Brazillian government to map the new areas they were to discover. Unfortunately, by September, not only had they not found the source of the Iriri, they'd actually not managed to find the Iriri itself, four and a half months apparently not being a long enough time to find an eight-hundred-and-ten-mile-long river. And then Mason made his way into history in the worst possible way, by becoming the last, to date, British person to be murdered by an uncontacted indigenous tribe, the Panará, who shot him with eight poison arrows and then bludgeoned his skull. A little over a decade later the Panará made contact with the wider world after nearly being wiped out by disease. They remembered killing Mason and said that they'd been scared by the swishing noise his jeans had made, as they'd never encountered anyone who wore clothes before. Before they made contact, the Panará were also known as the Kreen-Akrore, a name given them by the Kayapó people, meaning "round-cut head", a reference to the way they styled their hair, brushed forward and trimmed over the forehead in a way that was remarkably similar to some of the Mod styles. Before they made contact, Paul McCartney would in 1970 record an instrumental, "Kreen Akrore", after being inspired by a documentary called The Tribe That Hides From Man. McCartney's instrumental includes sound effects, including McCartney firing a bow and arrow, though apparently the bow-string snapped during the recording: [Excerpt: Paul McCartney, "Kreen Akrore"] For a while, Lambert was under suspicion for the murder, though the Daily Express, which had sponsored the expedition, persuaded Brazillian police to drop the charges. While he was in Rio waiting for the legal case to be sorted, Lambert developed what one book on the Who describes as "a serious anal infection". Astonishingly, this experience did not put Lambert off from the film industry, though he wouldn't try to make another film of his own for a couple of years. Instead, he went to work at Shepperton Studios, where he was an uncredited second AD on many films, including From Russia With Love and The L-Shaped Room. Another second AD working on many of the same films was Chris Stamp, the brother of the actor Terence Stamp, who was just starting out in his own career. Stamp and Lambert became close friends, despite -- or because of -- their differences. Lambert was bisexual, and preferred men to women, Stamp was straight. Lambert was the godson of a knight and a dame, Stamp was a working-class East End Cockney. Lambert was a film-school dropout full of ideas and grand ambitions, but unsure how best to put those ideas into practice, Stamp was a practical, hands-on, man. The two complemented each other perfectly, and became flatmates and collaborators. After seeing A Hard Day's Night, they decided that they were going to make their own pop film -- a documentary, inspired by the French nouvelle vague school of cinema, which would chart a pop band from playing lowly clubs to being massive pop stars. Now all they needed was to find a band that were playing lowly clubs but could become massive stars. And they found that band at the Railway Hotel, when they saw the High Numbers. Stamp and Lambert started making their film, and completed part of it, which can be found on YouTube: [Excerpt: The High Numbers, "Oo Poo Pa Doo"] The surviving part of the film is actually very, very, well done for people who'd never directed a film before, and I have no doubt that if they'd completed the film, to be titled High Numbers, it would be regarded as one of the classic depictions of early-sixties London club life, to be classed along with The Small World of Sammy Lee and Expresso Bongo. What's even more astonishing, though, is how *modern* the group look. Most footage of guitar bands of this period looks very dated, not just in the fashions, but in everything -- the attitude of the performers, their body language, the way they hold their instruments. The best performances are still thrilling, but you can tell when they were filmed. On the other hand, the High Numbers look ungainly and awkward, like the lads of no more than twenty that they are -- but in a way that was actually shocking to me when I first saw this footage. Because they look *exactly* like every guitar band I played on the same bill as during my own attempts at being in bands between 2000 and about 2005. If it weren't for the fact that they have such recognisable faces, if you'd told me this was footage of some band I played on the same bill with at the Star and Garter or Night and Day Cafe in 2003, I'd believe it unquestioningly. But while Lambert and Stamp started out making a film, they soon pivoted and decided that they could go into management. Of course, the High Numbers did already have management -- Pete Meaden and Helmut Gorden -- but after consulting with the Beatles' lawyer, David Jacobs, Lambert and Stamp found out that Gorden's contract with the band was invalid, and so when Gorden got back from a holiday, he found himself usurped. Meaden was a bit more difficult to get rid of, even though he had less claim on the group than Gorden -- he was officially their publicist, not their manager, and his only deal was with Gorden, even though the group considered him their manager. While Meaden didn't have a contractual claim though, he did have one argument in his favour, which is that he had a large friend named Phil the Greek, who had a big knife. When this claim was put to Lambert and Stamp, they agreed that this was a very good point indeed, one that they hadn't considered, and agreed to pay Meaden off with two hundred and fifty pounds. This would not be the last big expense that Stamp and Lambert would have as the managers of the Who, as the group were now renamed. Their agreement with the group had the two managers taking forty percent of the group's earnings, while the four band members would split the other sixty percent between themselves -- an arrangement which should theoretically have had the managers coming out ahead. But they also agreed to pay the group's expenses. And that was to prove very costly indeed. Shortly after they started managing the group, at a gig at the Railway Hotel, which had low ceilings, Townshend lifted his guitar up a bit higher than he'd intended, and broke the headstock. Townshend had a spare guitar with him, so this was OK, and he also remembered Gustav Metzger and his ideas of auto-destructive art, and Malcolm Cecil sawing through his bass strings and damaging his bass, and decided that it was better for him to look like he'd meant to do that than to look like an idiot who'd accidentally broken his guitar, so he repeated the motion, smashing his guitar to bits, before carrying on the show with his spare. The next week, the crowd were excited, expecting the same thing again, but Townshend hadn't brought a spare guitar with him. So as not to disappoint them, Keith Moon destroyed his drum kit instead. This destruction was annoying to Entwistle, who saw musical instruments as something close to sacred, and it also annoyed the group's managers at first, because musical instruments are expensive. But they soon saw the value this brought to the band's shows, and reluctantly agreed to keep buying them new instruments. So for the first couple of years, Lambert and Stamp lost money on the group. They funded this partly through Lambert's savings, partly through Stamp continuing to do film work, and partly from investors in their company, one of whom was Russ Conway, the easy-listening piano player who'd had hits like "Side Saddle": [Excerpt: Russ Conway, "Side Saddle"] Conway's connections actually got the group another audition for a record label, Decca (although Conway himself recorded for EMI), but the group were turned down. The managers were told that they would have been signed, but they didn't have any original material. So Pete Townshend was given the task of writing some original material. By this time Townshend's musical world was expanding far beyond the R&B that the group were performing on stage, and he talks in his autobiography about the music he was listening to while he was trying to write his early songs. There was "Green Onions", which he'd been listening to for years in his attempt to emulate Steve Cropper's guitar style, but there was also The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, and two tracks he names in particular, "Devil's Jump" by John Lee Hooker: [Excerpt: John Lee Hooker, "Devil's Jump"] And "Better Get Hit in Your Soul" by Charles Mingus: [Excerpt: Charles Mingus, "Better Get Hit In Your Soul"] He was also listening to what he described as "a record that changed my life as a composer", a recording of baroque music that included sections of Purcell's Gordian Knot Untied: [Excerpt: Purcell, Chaconne from Gordian Knot Untied] Townshend had a notebook in which he listed the records he wanted to obtain, and he reproduces that list in his autobiography -- "‘Marvin Gaye, 1-2-3, Mingus Revisited, Stevie Wonder, Jimmy Smith Organ Grinder's Swing, In Crowd, Nina in Concert [Nina Simone], Charlie Christian, Billie Holiday, Ella, Ray Charles, Thelonious Monk Around Midnight and Brilliant Corners.'" He was also listening to a lot of Stockhausen and Charlie Parker, and to the Everly Brothers -- who by this point were almost the only artist that all four members of the Who agreed were any good, because Daltrey was now fully committed to the R&B music he'd originally dismissed, and disliked what he thought was the pretentiousness of the music Townshend was listening to, while Keith Moon was primarily a fan of the Beach Boys. But everyone could agree that the Everlys, with their sensitive interpretations, exquisite harmonies, and Bo Diddley-inflected guitars, were great, and so the group added several songs from the Everlys' 1965 albums Rock N Soul and Beat N Soul to their set, like "Man With Money": [Excerpt: The Everly Brothers, "Man With Money"] Despite Daltrey's objections to diluting the purity of the group's R&B sound, Townshend brought all these influences into his songwriting. The first song he wrote to see release was not actually recorded by the Who, but a song he co-wrote for a minor beat group called the Naturals, who released it as a B-side: [Excerpt: The Naturals, "It Was You"] But shortly after this, the group got their first big break, thanks to Lambert's personal assistant, Anya Butler. Butler was friends with Shel Talmy's wife, and got Talmy to listen to the group. Townshend in particular was eager to work with Talmy, as he was a big fan of the Kinks, who were just becoming big, and who Talmy produced. Talmy signed the group to a production deal, and then signed a deal to license their records to Decca in America -- which Lambert and Stamp didn't realise wasn't the same label as British Decca. Decca in turn sublicensed the group's recordings to their British subsidiary Brunswick, which meant that the group got a minuscule royalty for sales in Britain, as their recordings were being sold through three corporate layers all taking their cut. This didn't matter to them at first, though, and they went into the studio excited to cut their first record as The Who. As was typical at the time, Talmy brought in a few session players to help out. Clem Cattini turned out not to be needed, and left quickly, but Jimmy Page stuck around -- not to play on the A-side, which Townshend said was "so simple even I could play it", but the B-side, a version of the old blues standard "Bald-Headed Woman", which Talmy had copyrighted in his own name and had already had the Kinks record: [Excerpt: The Who, "Bald-Headed Woman"] Apparently the only reason that Page played on that is that Page wouldn't let Townshend use his fuzzbox. As well as Page and Cattini, Talmy also brought in some backing vocalists. These were the Ivy League, a writing and production collective consisting at this point of John Carter and Ken Lewis, both of whom had previously been in a band with Page, and Perry Ford. The Ivy League were huge hit-makers in the mid-sixties, though most people don't recognise their name. Carter and Lewis had just written "Can You Hear My Heartbeat" for Herman's Hermits: [Excerpt: Herman's Hermits, "Can You Hear My Heartbeat?"] And, along with a couple of other singers who joined the group, the Ivy League would go on to sing backing vocals on hits by Sandie Shaw, Tom Jones and others. Together and separately the members of the Ivy League were also responsible for writing, producing, and singing on "Let's Go to San Francisco" by the Flowerpot Men, "Winchester Cathedral" by the New Vaudeville Band, "Beach Baby" by First Class, and more, as well as their big hit under their own name, "Tossing and Turning": [Excerpt: The Ivy League, "Tossing and Turning"] Though my favourite of their tracks is their baroque pop masterpiece "My World Fell Down": [Excerpt: The Ivy League, "My World Fell Down"] As you can tell, the Ivy League were masters of the Beach Boys sound that Moon, and to a lesser extent Townshend, loved. That backing vocal sound was combined with a hard-driving riff inspired by the Kinks' early hits like "You Really Got Me" and "All Day and All of the Night", and with lyrics that explored inarticulacy, a major theme of Townshend's lyrics: [Excerpt: The Who, "I Can't Explain"] "I Can't Explain" made the top ten, thanks in part to a publicity stunt that Lambert came up with. The group had been booked on to Ready, Steady, Go!, and the floor manager of the show mentioned to Lambert that they were having difficulty getting an audience for that week's show -- they were short about a hundred and fifty people, and they needed young, energetic, dancers. Lambert suggested that the best place to find young, energetic, dancers, was at the Marquee on a Tuesday night -- which just happened to be the night of the Who's regular residency at the club. Come the day of filming, the Ready, Steady, Go! audience was full of the Who's most hardcore fans, all of whom had been told by Lambert to throw scarves at the band when they started playing. It was one of the most memorable performances on the show. But even though the record was a big hit, Daltrey was unhappy. The man who'd started out as guitarist in a Shadows cover band and who'd strenuously objected to the group's inclusion of R&B material now had the zeal of a convert. He didn't want to be doing this "soft commercial pop", or Townshend's art-school nonsense. He wanted to be an R&B singer, playing hard music for working-class men like him. Two decisions were taken to mollify the lead singer. The first was that when they went into the studio to record their first album, it was all soul and R&B apart from one original. The album was going to consist of three James Brown covers, three Motown covers, Bo Diddley's "I'm a Man", and a cover of Paul Revere and the Raiders' "Louie Louie" sequel "Louie Come Home", retitled "Lubie". All of this was material that Daltrey was very comfortable with. Also, Daltrey was given some input into the second single, which would be the only song credited to Daltrey and Townshend, and Daltrey's only songwriting contribution to a Who A-side. Townshend had come up with the title "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere" while listening to Charlie Parker, and had written the song based on that title, but Daltrey was allowed to rewrite the lyrics and make suggestions as to the arrangement. That record also made the top ten: [Excerpt: The Who, "Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere"] But Daltrey would soon become even more disillusioned. The album they'd recorded was shelved, though some tracks were later used for what became the My Generation album, and Kit Lambert told the Melody Maker “The Who are having serious doubts about the state of R&B. Now the LP material will consist of hard pop. They've finished with ‘Smokestack Lightning'!” That wasn't the only thing they were finished with -- Townshend and Moon were tired of their band's leader, and also just didn't think he was a particularly good singer -- and weren't shy about saying so, even to the press. Entwistle, a natural peacemaker, didn't feel as strongly, but there was a definite split forming in the band. Things came to a head on a European tour. Daltrey was sick of this pop nonsense, he was sick of the arty ideas of Townshend, and he was also sick of the other members' drug use. Daltrey didn't indulge himself, but the other band members had been using drugs long before they became successful, and they were all using uppers, which offended Daltrey greatly. He flushed Keith Moon's pill stash down the toilet, and screamed at his band mates that they were a bunch of junkies, then physically attacked Moon. All three of the other band members agreed -- Daltrey was out of the band. They were going to continue as a trio. But after a couple of days, Daltrey was back in the group. This was mostly because Daltrey had come crawling back to them, apologising -- he was in a very bad place at the time, having left his wife and kid, and was actually living in the back of the group's tour van. But it was also because Lambert and Stamp persuaded the group they needed Daltrey, at least for the moment, because he'd sung lead on their latest single, and that single was starting to rise up the charts. "My Generation" had had a long and torturous journey from conception to realisation. Musically it originally had been inspired by Mose Allison's "Young Man's Blues": [Excerpt: Mose Allison, "Young Man's Blues"] Townshend had taken that musical mood and tied it to a lyric that was inspired by a trilogy of TV plays, The Generations, by the socialist playwright David Mercer, whose plays were mostly about family disagreements that involved politics and class, as in the case of the first of those plays, where two upwardly-mobile young brothers of very different political views go back to visit their working-class family when their mother is on her deathbed, and are confronted by the differences they have with each other, and with the uneducated father who sacrificed to give them a better life than he had: [Excerpt: Where the Difference Begins] Townshend's original demo for the song was very much in the style of Mose Allison, as the excerpt of it that's been made available on various deluxe reissues of the album shows: [Excerpt: Pete Townshend, "My Generation (demo)"] But Lambert had not been hugely impressed by that demo. Stamp had suggested that Townshend try a heavier guitar riff, which he did, and then Lambert had added the further suggestion that the music would be improved by a few key changes -- Townshend was at first unsure about this, because he already thought he was a bit too influenced by the Kinks, and he regarded Ray Davies as, in his words, "the master of modulation", but eventually he agreed, and decided that the key changes did improve the song. Stamp made one final suggestion after hearing the next demo version of the song. A while earlier, the Who had been one of the many British groups, like the Yardbirds and the Animals, who had backed Sonny Boy Williamson II on his UK tour. Williamson had occasionally done a little bit of a stutter in some of his performances, and Daltrey had picked up on that and started doing it. Townshend had in turn imitated Daltrey's mannerism a couple of times on the demo, and Stamp thought that was something that could be accentuated. Townshend agreed, and reworked the song, inspired by John Lee Hooker's "Stuttering Blues": [Excerpt: John Lee Hooker, "Stuttering Blues"] The stuttering made all the difference, and it worked on three levels. It reinforced the themes of inarticulacy that run throughout the Who's early work -- their first single, after all, had been called "I Can't Explain", and Townshend talks movingly in his autobiography about talking to teenage fans who felt that "I Can't Explain" had said for them the things they couldn't say th

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Who's on Bass?
Hofner 172

Who's on Bass?

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 29, 2021 119:51


Ok strange night... Our plan was a little thrown off but we made it. Tonight's episode we deep dive into a 1963 Hofner 172!!!! We deep dive into the Lovepedal Amp 11!!!! We deep dive into the Biyang Overdrive!!!! We deep dive into the Danelectro 56 U2!!!! And then we just hit the bottom. Enjoy

Who's on Bass?
Zoom G3 and the Dano

Who's on Bass?

Play Episode Listen Later Sep 22, 2021 59:55


Solo episode tonight! I check out a new Danelectro 56 U2 reissue, and I run it into my Zoom G3. I show my favorite way to use the G3 and I jam a little at the end. Enjoy!!!!

The Superweaks Superweekly Supercast
Surfing Your Own Life with Sean Reilly

The Superweaks Superweekly Supercast

Play Episode Listen Later May 14, 2021 66:22


We present to you one of Evan's hometown heroes from Berkley Heights: Sean Reilly of Brown Rainbow and Mumblr! In our winding walk down memory lane we talk about A Purple Circle, the demerits of John Frusciante, ego death, relinquishing control and getting through it, finding peace on the road through arm chair psychology, looking for love on the Christmas block, a wacky Danelectro bass, a thrice broken collar bone, choosing our superpowers, who smokes, and we finish it all off by listing a bunch of ABBA songs we like. Hosts: Evan Bernard, Chris Baglivo, and Mikey Tashjian a.k.a. The Superweaks Edited by Chris Baglivo Theme Song: "No Sorrow" by The Superweaks Podcast art: Ben Rausch --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/swswsc/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/swswsc/support

Get Offset
Let Me Thank The Ratboys For Their Music

Get Offset

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 20, 2021 55:33


This week, Andrew and Emily are joined once again by Julia from Ratboys. We talked to Julia back in the early days of the pandemic and this time we chatted about their new/old record, Skyline Chili, guitar pedals, property theft, and more. Get tickets to the 10th anniversary virtual Ratboys show: ratboys.bandcamp.com/ Watch the Derby Day stream on May 1: watchratboys.com Read the Danelectro article we were talking about: https://reverb.com/news/are-we-witnessing-a-danelectro-revival  Like the podcast? Support us on Patreon for some sweet perks! We have merch, including additions to our For Fuzz Sake lineup! Get some, get SOME. Outro song is “Little Pink Room” by Michelle Sullivan and the All Night Boys (feat. Emily on guitar) Support Get Offset by... Shopping on Reverb.com: https://reverb.grsm.io/getoffset7407 Shopping on Sweetwater: https://imp.i114863.net/GetOffset Subscribing on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/getoffset Shopping our Merch: https://getoffsetpodcast.com/shop/ Saving 7% on Your DistroKid Account for the First Year: http://distrokid.com/vip/getoffset Leaving us a review on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple

The Tone Control
Ep. 185 - It Could Also Stand For "A Bass"

The Tone Control

Play Episode Listen Later Apr 5, 2021 49:51


Greg Koch Gristle 90 model from Reverend - (stab: Apollo Phaser) Features two Fishman P90s Push/pull tone pot for out of phase option. The Fishman Fluence pickups have a midrange boost button as well. Tele style chambered korina body but a 24.75” scale length, Korina neck w/binding, ebony fretboard with 12” radius, raised center block like a Firebird. Bigsby B50 with roller bridge Comes in Midnight Black, Venitian Gold, and Bradford Beach Blue $2,159 MSRP Gibson announces a 15% price drop across their entire lineup (stab: Bogner Oxford) This is huge! Gibson has finally recognized that they’re not staying competitive with Fender Press release says they’re trying to become more attractive to younger players who often have tighter budgets Les Paul Standard goes from $2500 to $2099. Fender launches new Acoustasonic P-bass (stab: JHS Warlbetron) Everyone loves acoustic bass! Alder body with a spruce top, maple neck and rosewood fingerboard Like the other Acoustasonic models, this has a pickup selector and mode knob which has been expanded to up to 15 different sounds. Blends between models like the classic P-bass, the J-bass, a Ric 4001, Hofner, upright bass plucked AND bowed, uke bass and a new proprietary “washtub” mode. P-bass model sounds from every year between 1951 and 1960 Commemorative stamps of American guitar amp companies (stab: KHDK Abyss) Friedman, Bogner, Ampeg, Carvin, Danelectro, Fender, Kustom, Mesa/Boogie, and Marshall for some reason BIG SHOUT OUT TO OUR PATRONS! Rosinfox Abbot West Jameson Earnheart Jeremy Withers Dante Knight Debben Grom Robbin John-win Sean Horselton Jebethan Swami Enrique Gerald-Alery Bowman Razzlesnaz Dananthan Chips of Thirty7 FX Samuel Wrigley of Lollygagger FX Bippen Grumble and Kiteland Macintosh of The Tone Jerks Podcast The Tone Control has a Discord server! If you like the show and enjoy talking about everything from new gear to music theory to video games, come hang out and chat with us. Discord is open and free to all fans of The Tone Control! We’re also now on Patreon! For $1 per month, you get a shout-out in every episode and our unconditional love. For a mere $2 per month, you’ll get exclusive access to the Recording Booth in Discord where you can listen to us record the show LIVE in all its unedited glory and chat with us about the show, during the show, every other Thursday at 8 pm. Bring your best gifs for the ad break! The Tone Control is sponsored by Pedal Genie. Head to PedalGenie.com to start your wishlist today and tell them you heard about it on The Tone Control! Facebook, Instagram, & Twitter: @thetonecontrol Thanks to our lovely wives for joining us on this episode for some added April Fool's Day fun :) --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/thetonecontrol/message

Truetone Lounge
Truetone Lounge - Rick Holmstrom

Truetone Lounge

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 21, 2020 94:14


Rick Holmstrom is an esteemed blues artist with a new solo album, See That Light, releasing on February 26th. Besides his esteemed solo work, he is also the bandleader and guitarist for legendary Gospel/R&B singer, Mavis Staples. In our Lounge interview, we cover how he got the Mavis gig at the urging of Ry Cooder, the low down on his new solo album, and an amazing walk-through of his favorite guitars including his 1953 Telecaster, Harmony Stratotone, and Danelectro double cutaway.

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 17, 2020 Thursday Hour 2

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 17, 2020 59:04


Seven, count ‘em, SEVEN days left! Santa…still time to get me those left-handed super light guitar strings…or even the 12-string left-handed Danelectro in Seafoam…What do I genuinely want. For you to be blessed, happy, healthy, safe, and free of all worry. That is my wish for everyone! I know it's asking a great deal…The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat daily on Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! AND NOW ON MORNINGS IN CANADA!  https://s1.citrus3.com:2000/public/HCRRadio Hamilton Co-Op Radio! Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority! Are you listening? How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...Listen LIVE here - https://fastcast4u.com/player/jamprell/ Podcast recorded here - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/ Take a moment and share this post! Share it! Share it!! Share It!!! SHARED! The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast! Please check out my shows special recorded hour, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT Now Rocking The KOR! www.koradio.rocks ALSO! Hear a completely different recorded hour of Power Pop, Rock, Soul, Rhythm & Blues...NO TWO LIVE SHOWS THE SAME, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday on Pop Radio UK 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! December 17, 2020, Thursday, act two…Dana Countryman - It's An Amazon.com Kinda Christmas [The Joy Of Pop]Jef Scott - PretendThe Monkees - A Little Bit Me, A Little Bit YouThe Supahip - 09 The Radio [Seize The World]Vince Guaraldi Trio - Christmastime Is Here [Vocal]Theatre Royal - 05 Just-Like A Sunny Day In June [B-sides and other cuts] (koolkatmusik.com)Dave Scarborough - 06 Catherine (Futureman Records)Dave Caruso - Mystery & Sweetness [Cardboard Vegas Roundabout]Halie Loren - 01 The Christmas SongThe Amplifier Heads - 08 Big Wax Lips [Loudah]Dr. Barnes - 12 All of My Friends Were There [Dr. Barnes Are The Village Green Re-Interpretation Society] (Futureman Records)The Crown Vics - Southwest Harbor Girl [Hell Yeah]Autopilot - 09_Hurricane [Afterglow]The Click Beetles - Wonderful Christmas [Hi-Fi Christmas Party]Pamela Davis - Whatever Happened To [Dear John]The Chamberdeacons - 15 One Of These Days [Gigant 200]Keith Klingensmith and the TM Collective - 07 Metarie [kk + tm]The Overly Polite Tornadoes - Empty Light Squares [When You Wake Up] (Jam Records)Heatwaves ft. Freddie Dilevi - What Will Santa Bring (Rum Bar Records)

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 14, 2020 Monday Hour 1

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 14, 2020 61:48


TEN DAYS until Christmas Eve! Still no left-handed guitar strings, extra light weight in the mail. One tee shirt, Red On Red Records IN THE CORRECT Size XXL…sometimes XXXL depending on the cut. Still no Seafoam Left-Handed 12 string Danelectro guitar…Santa, I've been the prime example of what good can be while in lockdown. Maybe next year…The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat daily on Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! AND NOW ON MORNINGS IN CANADA!  https://s1.citrus3.com:2000/public/HCRRadio Hamilton Co-Op Radio! Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority! Are you listening? How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...Listen LIVE here - https://fastcast4u.com/player/jamprell/ Podcast recorded here - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/ Take a moment and share this post! Share it! Share it!! Share It!!! SHARED! The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast! Please check out my shows special recorded hour, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT Now Rocking The KOR! www.koradio.rocks ALSO! Hear a completely different recorded hour of Power Pop, Rock, Soul, Rhythm & Blues...NO TWO LIVE SHOWS THE SAME, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday on Pop Radio UK 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! December 14, 2020, Monday, verse one…Orbis Max - TMA SHOW OPEN THEMEBear of Bombay - Something StrangerBrume - J'ai écritChange of Key - Sweet Little Miss ChristmasDagnell' - Ave MariaPamela Davis - One Of The Boys [Dear John]Danielle Dayton - Sleigh BellsDave Molter - It Was YouDave Molter & Al Snyder - 14 Where Is ChristmasDef Robot - Up To SomethingTheatre Royal - 13 All-I-Need [B-sides and other cuts] (koolkatmusik.com)Geoff Palmer & Lucy Ellis - 05 They Don't Know [Your Face Is Weird] (Rum Bar Records)Guy Paul Thibault - Blue ChristmasHightown Pirates - Jet GirlJeffery Straker - 01 Comin Home For ChristmasJeffery Straker - 02 Come Walking in the Snow With MeThe Amplifier Heads - 10 Rock Candy [Loudah]kay Pink And The MEDICINE - Candy CaneLittle Roger - 01 Chew Toy (She Keeps Comin' Around) (Big Stir Records)Little Roger - 02 Someone Else's Problem (Big Stir Records)

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show
December 10, 2020 Thursday Hour 2

The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show

Play Episode Listen Later Dec 10, 2020 60:13


To be a part of The Music Authority Musical Family, send high quality sound files to jrprell@mindspring.com, CD's or thumb drives to Jim Prell 990 Fulton Lane NE, Palm Bay, Florida 32905. Tee shirts, left-handed guitar strings or that ever elusive 12 string left-handed Danelectro in Seafoam to the same address! The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast...listen, like, comment, download, share, repeat daily on Google Podcast Manager, Mixcloud, Player FM, Stitcher, Tune In, Podcast Addict, Cast Box, Radio Public, and Pocket Cast, and APPLE iTunes! AND NOW ON MORNINGS IN CANADA!  https://s1.citrus3.com:2000/public/HCRRadio Hamilton Co-Op Radio! Follow the show on TWITTER JimPrell@TMusicAuthority! Are you listening? How does and can one listen in? Let me list the ways...Listen LIVE here - https://fastcast4u.com/player/jamprell/ Podcast recorded here - https://themusicauthority.transistor.fm/ Take a moment and share this post! Share it! Share it!! Share It!!! SHARED! The Music Authority LIVE STREAM Show & Podcast! Please check out my shows special recorded hour, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 7PM UK time, 2PM ET, 11AM PT Now Rocking The KOR! www.koradio.rocks ALSO! Hear a completely different recorded hour of Power Pop, Rock, Soul, Rhythm & Blues...NO TWO LIVE SHOWS THE SAME, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday on Pop Radio UK 6PM UK, 1PM ET, 10AM PT! December 10, 2020 Thursday, act two…The Brothers Steve - 02 Listen Up! It's Christmastime (Big Stir Records)Linus Of Hollywood – BiographySugar Wings - Up and DownDrew Holcomb & The Neighbors - Have Yourself A Merry Little ChristmasSurf katz - Moonlit Surf [Surf katz II]The Supahip - Everything's AlrightThe Junior League - 07 Someday [Eventually Is Now] (koolkatmusik.com)Emperor Penguin - Good Grief [Crumhorn] (koolkatmusik.com)The Tearaways - 09. Helluva Christmas [Anthems And Lullabyes]The Vapour Trails - 12 Seabird [Golden Sunshine] (Futureman Records)Nick Eng - On Cloud 9Trashcan Sinatras - Earlies [In The Music]Vanilla - 04 Sweetshop [Mystik Knights of Tacoma]Vista Blue - 02 Gee Whiz, It's Christmas [Why Does It Take Forever]Rich Williams - New Girl In The City [The Art Of The Empty Room]Chris Richards and the Subtractions - 06 Thirteen [That Covers That - Vol 1 - deluxe edition]The JAC - 15 Broken Gnome [Big Stir Singles The Yuletide Wave] (Big Stir Records)

Truetone Lounge
Andy Reiss

Truetone Lounge

Play Episode Listen Later Nov 17, 2020 69:58


Andy Reiss is one of the true western swing and jazz guitar greats in Nashville and can be seen just about every Monday night with the amazing Time Jumpers. In our Truetone Lounge interview, Andy discusses his time in San Francisco during the height of the hippy movement, his move to Nashville and mentorship with Harold Bradley, and how he ended up on tours with everyone from Slim Whitman to Reba McEntire. Reiss also educates us in the traditional 1950's-60's guitar styles utilized by the Nashville A-Team using a 1959 ES-335, 1958 Danelectro 6-string Bass, Waterloo WL-14, and a 1941 Stromberg archtop. For good measure, he also discusses and demonstrates his 1952 Les Paul, incredibly rare blond 1966 Barney Kessel Custom, and his 1964 Fender Pro amp.