Bilbo

[quote name='Muzz' timestamp='1439203405' post='2840715'] I'd say that when done well it's a real skill, a real musical talent, more akin to production and engineering than actually playing the instruments, perhaps, but within it's genre completely valid. [/quote] It all sounds a bit 'wannabe' to me. Like darts players calling themselves 'atheletes'.

Having spent the first few years of my Jazz career playing regularly at The Four Bars Inn in Cardiff (the original venue, not the one at the Sandringham Hotel), I woudl argue that the presence of a perfectly credible piano that was rarely moved, a decent PA and a couple of PZMs for miking the instrument, you can improve the experience for all parties, thereby improving the attraction of attendance. We regularly hosted solo pianists and piano players in trio and they sounded wonderful. You can't call guys like Liam Noble and the like and expect them to bring a NORD!! I am not expecting anything to change for the better in this regard but I thought it was worth highlighting what a shame it is that these kinds of venues which cater properly for instrumentalists whose instrument is not portable are not more common.

Am liking Focus 3 - I know some of the tunes (all the hits) but the rest are pretty good too. No Crimson on Spotify!!

I will watch that next time I am laid up with Lymes disease. It will make the time go faster.

Semantics, guys. Not the point. It's not acoustic!! Electric, electronic, electrical? It's not what it is that matters here but what it isn't.

I am now listening to Tarkus. Can't say the Banks recording has anything to worry about It has merit but I have always struggled with Palmer's drumming and there is a 'thrashing about' sensibility that I find less than appealing.

I now have 27 more recordings I need to listen to .

Acknowledging I am both an old fart and a Jazz nazi, I was just reading a BBC article about the demise of the nightclub (apparently they are closing at a rate not dissimilar to pubs). My attention was drawn to the fact that DJs are no w 'playing' festivals. I have to say that I have never 'got' the idea of a DJ as anything other than a bloke that plays records and the idea that these people are now appearing at festivals just leaves me aghast. I only ever have contact with DJs when I do wedding gigs and they are almost always socially inadequate nerds who know an astonishing amount about the music of the 1960s and very little about holding a conversation, particulary if it is with a girl. Now, it appears, they are festival headliners. Has the world gone mad. Oh - and apparently they class themselves as musicians. Can anyone of you youngsters explain all of this to an old feller?

I have used Band In A Box in the past quite successfully for demoing songs. Can't say I use it nowadays because I am in a different space composing-wise but It is a great tool for sketchng ideas and trying things out. A means to an end and not an end in itself.

For my money, the essential difference with prog. was that, unlike most other genres, it was essentially 'English', not blues based and not dance orientated. Adding stuff around epic fantasy, mellotrons and long solos was peripheral. It is music that is generally less 'groove' orientated and more cerebral. The fact that there was no expectation that I would have to dance to it was a major attraction

Lots of yummy things to listen to!!

Absolutely. Two tracks on his Back On The Streets lp were fusiony, and a track on Cozy Powell's Tilt lp.

Been a while. I just listened back to that old Colloseum slbum 'Strange New Flesh' and the track 'Down To You' with vocalist Mike Starrs who is astonishingly good. Gary Moore, Don Airey and Neil Murray leaving us wondering what may have been had Heavy Metal not come calling!!

Vocalist Kim Beacon (I think there are one or two instrumentals). The vocals are an important element to the album. My kid brother always says that the trouble with prog is that, with the exception of Genesis and Yes, the vocalists are all sh**. This album is a massive exception. Beacon's vocals are exquisite.

I love it just the way it is.

We have all seen that 'electric bass in Jazz' threads that appear here intermittently but, eb v db discussions aside, it has recently occured to me how rarely we get to play with a real acoustic piano, even an upright instrument, never mind a proper grand piano. Since I took up the double bass (about 5 years now?), I have played in an ensemble with a pianist only twice. Once in a recording studio (grand) and once on a gig at The Fleece in Stoke By Nayland (upright). Modern electric pianos are very good but it's a shame that more venues cannot accommodate the Real McCoy. I am sure it would improve the audiences if they could hear acoustic Jazz played 'properly'.

You are in for a treat, Kev!!

I have just re-discovered Tony Bank's album 'A Curious Feeling' - based on the book Flowers for Algernon. I had this on cassette 1,000 years ago and always loved it but forgot it. Just looked it up on youtube (it is not on Spotify). I love Tony Banks's writing and found that the Genesis songs I liked the most (One For The Vine, Guide Vocal, Evidence of Autumn etc) were almost always his but this album is something else. It is perfect end to end. If I had written it, I would have had to stop. It's the 'To Kill A Mockingbird' of Prog!!

Expectations vary. I have had guys send me two cds with 32 tunes to learn by rote for one gig (I didn't) and I have done deps where I turn up knowing nothing and busk the whole gig. I have seen charts where every note is written out (the most relaxed gigs, in my experience) and where charts are written on fag papers in crayon. It is often about relationships; you are booked as a dep because someone respects your ability and gets along with you. Sometimes it is ok to crash and burn on the occasional tune as long as everyone can laugh about it and keep some perspective. It is rare to be depping on the last night of an internation tour; it's mostly one off functions in places where the audience are only half listening. You don't need to 'know' all of the tunes; it is often enough just to recognise them (this is getting harder for me as I never listen to the radio and there is next to no music on TV so I don't know the 'hits' past about 1990) and then approximating stuff. Most 60s through 80s stuff is already in there but more recent stuff is a tougher call for me personally. You may find it the other way around.

It's called The Inner Game of Music. How self talk disables you as a performer. The best playing is done in a zone where external factors are completely ignored. Achieving that state takes discipline. It is fragile and can be broken far more easily than it can be achieved.

[quote name='Skol303' timestamp='1438937675' post='2838747'] You must be the only person who does[font=Helvetica][size=4]… [/size][/font] [font=Helvetica][size=3][size=4]My idea is currently a cross between Brazilian capoeira music and Caribbean dancehall/[color=#545454][font=Arial]reggaeton. [/font][/color][/size][color=#545454][font=Arial][size=4]Neither of which countries are home to tigers, granted. But that's what I'm hearing in my head; so that's where I'm heading... And besides, tigers are good swimmers, right?[/size][/font][/color][/size][/font] [/quote] Asia to South America? I think their swimming runs to about 100 yards across a slow running river but, hell, I can't talk about idiomatic integrity? My tiger plays a bhodran!!

[quote name='Bassassin' timestamp='1438892260' post='2838534'] Plus he did base his early career on sounding ever-so-slightly exactly the same as Mr. Squire, which might help. [/quote] An interesting point in that I remember vividly having conversations around that time in which it was commented upon that they sounded quite different not the least because Squire played with a pick and Lee with his finger. Nevertheless, I get your point. $64,000 question, though. Could his high voice replace Anderson at the same time!!!

The great Brazilian Tiger..... I know him well.

Nuevo Flamenco is the thing!!

Plenty of non bass players like a decent bass solo. I get applauded regularly by lay people