Leonard Smalls

The actual problem was they mixed it in Dobly. Everyone knows you don't do heavy metal in Dobly!

I always thought Bob Marley was being a touch sexist with his "No Woman" - after all, you can't really blame women for all the murders and robberies and other bad stuff! That was until I realised he wasn't actually singing "No woman no crime"

There's definitely an art to using a sample in a groovy and musical way... Frinstance, Bug Powder Dust by Bomb the Bass really funks up a snippet of bass line from a Flora Purim tune!

Crazy nutter music...

I discovered him by accident, having bought this on spec from the record and tape exchange on Goldhawk Road back in the 90s for 50p!

I'm afraid I've been busy.... This month I've been mostly listening to Albert Collins. So I thought I'd do some blues, with keyboards duelling with guitars, more guitars and more keys. I felt this was far kinder than unleashing my much-feared "blues voice"! Bass is a Sandberg Basic, Drums Jabo Sparks via EZ Drummer with extras by me, guitars a mixture of strat and Ample guitars vst, all through various Amplitube and Bias FX sims. Keys are sounds from Addictive Keys vst. Polish and glitter supplied by Ozone 9 and Neutron 3.

After enjoying Amyl and the Sniffers latest, I went searching for other Aussie Mulleteers In Shorts... Enjoy!

I think this was the first thing I heard when I switched on 6Music in the morning... I'm liking it!

Aye! But only for those who might be anywhere near our shop just outside Ludlow... Still swear by it!

Callouses will build up over time...but meanwhile, I'd recommend a hand cream called "Farmer's Hand Cream". When I was sparkying I found it would prevent my finger tips from splitting - this happened after repeated contact with sharp copper cable ends. And if I haven't been playing enough smearing some on soothes any soreness and speeds callous formation... It's not cheap, but last for ages - luckily we sell it in our shop so I get it at discount!

2 from the stranger end... Both contain some awesome playing!

Eek! I've got to be at work today so only this eve to get cracking! If my entry sounds even more like a drunken fistfight than usual it's because I cracked open the Chivas Royal Salute...

That ain't necessarily so! No matter what technical level a player is at, if they can't feel the funk they'll be fakin' it. And as George said, "if you fake The Funk, your nose gotta grow!" In other words,in order to properly play The Funk you've got to know and love it; The Funk not only moves, it can Re-move, ya dig?

I think most stuff other folks called influential passed me by, whether at the time or in retrospect... When folks were into the Smiths I was spending my time listening to dub, gogo and free jazz. When I was a kid and all my little mates liked the Sweet (boys) or Bay City Rollers (girls) I discovered James Brown and Parliament. When Oasis came along I was obsessed with Baroque music, and hair metal pushed me towards Kraftwerk, Front 242 and Einstürzende Neubauten! And most 70s rock makes me want to listen to Magma...

Aye! Was blown away when I heard Reel to Reel Cacophony... And the dancefloor was always absolutely rammed at Angels Chester Roxy Bowie Nite when they played this:

Still on old 7"ers...

Having a dig through my old 7" singles and just came across this, featuring the brother of our own @lurksalot First bass I ever played (violin bass!) was his...

And many more, including:

Here's one of me playing probably far too many notes...

It's not micro-tonal as such, tis Ornette Coleman's harmolodic thang where everything is just that bit Rong but somehow also just that bit Rite! Band is basically Ornette's Prime Time but under James Blood's name, 1978-9ish. Bass player is one of my faves - Jamaaladeen Tacuma...

To be fair, the "rap" above is by some deeply untalented people, who seem to labour under the misapprehension that attempting rhythmic spoken word to convey a message requires little more than a mouth and a serious lack of clue. There's quite a lot of relatively decent musicians who are fiercely vegan - e.g. KRS-1, RZA of WuTang, all of Blink 182, Rob Zombie of White Zombie - and make music about it. And despite being a rabid meat-eater myself, it doesn't bother me a bit - in fact the singer in our band is vegan (but doesn't crow about it at all) and was part of the late 90s straight edge hardcore scene... Meanwhile, here's some jazz:

I've scrapped my original idea of a Cars/Groove is in the Heart mashup as my attempts at vocals were uniformly terrible... But I've fiddled with a live desk recording from a recent gig of our cover of Penetration's "Don't Dictate", which also has a hint of "Word Up" just for fun! Drums were a bit distorted so I added phaser and hoped, meanwhile everything else is as was, bar a bit of extra reverb on the vox and a light smattering of Ozone 9 and Neutron just to make it sound a bit less duff...

I think you'll find there isn't 😁 As the great Chuck Brown said "If it ain't funky don't ya know we can't use it now!"

Original's a cracker... Careful with them lyrics though! Then there's Bootsy, making Silent Night into the funkiest thing ever (check the "Pass The Peas" chorus!)