The Third Man Band

Last night Jack White was on Conan with rockabilly legend Wanda Jackson and the Third Man Band promoting their new collaborative album, The Party Ain't Over.



The band also appeared on The Late Show with David Letterman last week playing the rock and roll standard "Shakin' All Over."



In addition to his own bands (The White Stripes, The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather), White has played with Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones, appearing in the latter's concert film, Shine a Light.



He also become a renowned producer when he set up Third Man Records in Nashville and worked with legendary artists like Jackson and Loretta Lynn.

I could do an entire post about why I think Jack White is the best musician of the last decade but I'll save that for later. This is just a bit of a news update, as I happened to catch the end of Conan last night and was thrilled to see him on the show again. He was also first musical guest on the show back in November.

Led Zeppelin Song of the Week: In My Time of Dying

This song wasn't actually written by Led Zeppelin, although their version is certainly the most famous. It appears as the third song on Physical Graffiti and is the longest song in the Led Zeppelin studio catalog.


(due to the Youtube restrictions, the video cuts a bit off the end of the song)

The song is a folk/blues standard and the lyrics are based on an old gospel tune called "Jesus Make Up My Dying Bed." The music here, however, is all original, featuring Jimmy Page on slide guitar in Open A tuning, and the writing credits list all four band members.

Gibson's Top 10 Guitar Stylists

Over at gibson.com they've made up a list of the "most influential guitar stylists."

10. Curtis Mayfield


Along with James Brown guitarist Jimmy Nolan, Curtis Mayfield pioneered the funk-guitar sound that continues to be adopted by such torch-bearers as Prince and Nile Rodgers. Utilizing a self-devised tuning based on the black keys of the piano, Mayfield played with a choppy, muted style that revolutionized R&B rhythm playing. His masterpiece, the Superfly soundtrack, sounds as fresh today as it did upon its initial release nearly 40 years ago.


9. Jonny Greenwood


Few contemporary guitarists have forged a style as eclectic as that of Jonny Greenwood. Citing such far-flung influences as Miles Davis, Can and (especially) new wave guitarist John McGeoch, Greenwood often uses his instrument to achieve near-symphonic effects that range from lush soundscapes to aggressive maelstroms. A supremely gifted composer, Greenwood has said his playing is so closely aligned with Radiohead’s distinctive songcraft, he’s not sure he could play with another band.


8. The Edge


Lots of guitarists have forged a style based on the judicious use of effects, but few players have done that with as much finesse as The Edge. As its most recognizable, The Edge’s sound chimes and shimmers with a clarion beauty, as the U2 veteran employs delay and reverb to add specific colors to the notes emanating from his fingertips. Many contemporary players have cited The Edge’s influence, among them Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood and Coldplay’s Jonny Buckland, but no one else sounds quite like him.


7. Tony Iommi


Heavy metal would be far less heavy were it not for the dark, minor key riffs of Tony Iommi. With his ever-present SG, Iommi continues to craft melodically menacing leads and foreboding blues-based solos that sound like the aural equivalent of the Frankenstein monster. As evidenced by such Black Sabbath classics as “Iron Man” and “Paranoid,” no one has managed to combine brooding tempos and memorable riffs in the way Iommi has.


6. Les Paul


Simply put, the great Les Paul was the man who made the sound of rock and roll possible. Paul’s technical innovations were so pioneering, people sometimes forget that he was a premier guitar stylist. Singing six-string trills, newfangled fretting techniques and dizzying manipulations of time signatures were all part of his stylistic repertoire. No less an icon than Jeff Beck once said, “When I heard Les Paul [playing] things like ‘How High the Moon’ and ‘The World is Waiting for the Sunrise,’ I wanted to be that. It goes way before the influence from ’60s rock and roll.”


5. Duane Eddy


No guitarist is more closely associated with “twang” than Duane Eddy. Along with his close friend and producer Lee Hazlewood, Eddy forged his unique style by playing lead on his bass strings, employing a technique that produced a low, reverberant sound. Hazlewood suggested the distinctive approach after hearing a pianist who’s own style incorporated playing melodies on the low keys of the piano.


4. Robert Fripp


Sometimes fitted with a serrated edge, other times delivered with celestial beauty, Robert Fripp’s ferociously original playing has always pushed at the boundaries of what rock music could be. In an era when his peers were immersing themselves in the blues, the King Crimson mastermind embraced avant-garde influences, and in the process created painterly experiments with ambiance and tone. King Crimson songs such as “20th Century Schizoid Man” and “Larks’ Tongue in Aspic, Pt. 2” pit melody against maelstrom in ways that thrill to this day.


3. Bo Diddley


The late Bo Diddley will forever be best-known for developing the “Bo Diddley beat,” a percolating, rumba-like chug based on the “hambone music” popularized by street performers. Fact is, however, Diddley’s hard-edged guitar style was just as distinctive. First with a Gibson L-5, and later with custom-made instruments, Diddley became a master at dialing in just the right tone and attack to achieve his driving rhythms.


2. Pete Townshend


Windmilled power chords, controlled feedback and calypso-on-steroids strumming continue to be the hallmarks of Pete Townshend’s pioneering style. Live, Townshend’s playing often takes on an orchestral power, as it approximates the majestic sweep of such masterworks as Tommy, Who’s Next and Live at Leeds. Asked about the origins of feedback as musical texture, Jimmy Page once observed, “Pete Townshend obviously was the one … who made the use of feedback more his style.”


1. Chuck Berry


By melding the swing rhythms and horn-like solos of Charlie Christian to the electric blues of T-Bone Walker, Chuck Berry essentially created guitar-based rock and roll. Utilizing the simplest of ingredients – double-stop riffs, memorable intros and well-place slurs and bends – Berry came up with boundless six-string permutations. With the possible exception of Robert Johnson, no guitarist forged a style that had a greater impact on rock and roll’s seminal players.

A few glaring omissions (Jimi Hendrix, Eddie Van Halen?), but a pretty solid list I suppose. The top two specifically I could not agree with more. Pete Townshend gets a lot of praise at Gibson but is a criminally underrated guitarist- it seems very few people really understand his role in the creation of rock music.

And of course, Chuck Berry started it all. As Ted Nugent puts it, "If you don't know every Chuck Berry lick, you can't play rock guitar." 

Improvisation vs. Composition

Alright, this topic will probably only appeal to fellow musicians, but it's one that has been bothering me for a long time.

I first started playing guitar because I was listening to guys like Eric Clapton, Duane Allman, Pete Townshend, Jimi Hendrix, Jimmy Page, etc. Their music appealed to me a hell of a lot more than whatever it was that I was listening to before that (mediocre indie bands), and I loved listening to live recordings of these guys- they put out some of the best live albums ever (Clapton in Cream with Wheels of Fire and Live Cream, Duane Allman in the Allman Brothers with At Fillmore East, Pete Townshend in the Who with Live at Leeds, etc).

If there's one thing that all of those players have in common it is that they improvise every solo they play (for the unaware, "improvise" just means that they make it up on the spot). So naturally, when I began playing the guitar, I just always knew that you were "supposed" to improvise your solos. It never occurred to me that you might play the same thing every time, honestly. Obviously I learned some solos note for note, but I just assumed that when I got in a band I would improvise because that's what all my heroes did.

The first full song I learned, like a lot of people, was "Stairway to Heaven." The guitar solo in that song is legendary. It's a magical melodic masterpiece. Everyone knows it. It's probably the most renowned solo on any instrument ever.

But when playing it live, Jimmy Page always improvised it.



Yeah, the first couple measures are about the same, and the ending is the same, and there's that repeating lick in there that he always plays, but everything else is wide open.

Like most budding rock guitarists, I spent hours learning the studio version of that solo. But I spent many more hours improvising in the key of A minor over the song. Like anything in music, improvisation is a skill that needs to be honed and I've spent countless hours attempting to hone it (with mixed results).

Fast forward a few years and I "discover" Guns N' Roses. Also around this time I am listening to a lot of Rush and I greatly admire both Slash and Alex Lifeson. I look up live videos of these two great musicians and I discover that every solo they play live is almost identical to the one they played on the record. And I'm baffled.

Perhaps the MOST baffling part is that these two guitarists, Slash and Alex Lifeson, had the same influences as me. They were all into Clapton, Hendrix, Page, Townshend, et al. Now to this day I still do not understand why they do not improvise like their heroes did. It can't be that they think people expect to hear the same solo as they recorded on their album and will be disappointed if they don't...because Jimmy Page clearly never had that problem. So what is it?

Now, we all know that music is an expression of emotion. Maybe more accurately, a communication. To me it seemed obvious that when you play a guitar solo it should very much be in the moment- you should be expressing or communicating what you feel as you're feeling it, and not trying to replicate what you felt a year or a decade ago when you recorded the song.

Of course, you can express yourself by playing composed music...that's what all the classical players do. But to be honest, I am not interested in classical music for that very reason. It's not coming from the player, it's coming from some dead white guy from hundreds of years ago. But that's a different story.

Now, there are certain cases where I can see that playing a guitar solo note-for-note can be great. There are some solos that are just so good you know you'll never top them so you might as well not even try (but again, that never stopped Jimmy Page). There are some solos that are more than just solos...they're melodies, they're themes for the song. Take "Estranged" by Guns N' Roses. Slash composed melodies on the guitar that are integral to the song. You wouldn't want to improvise those. I also saw an interview with Tony Iommi, the guitarist from Black Sabbath, who made that same comment about one of his solos in "War Pigs." It sounds more like a riff than a solo, really, and it sort of just became another riff of the song, so he played it the same way each time.

These cases are excusable. But everything else? Well, in my opinion they should be improvised. But that's not going to stop me from seeing these artists who don't improvise live. I've already seen Slash once and am going to again next month, and I'm going to be seeing Rush in April. I'm sure the shows will be great, but think of how much greater they might be...

Soundgarden Update

A few hours ago, seven photos of Soundgarden rehearsing in a studio were posted on Facebook in an album called "January 21, 2011," all with 2011 copyright tags so we can assume they're new.

(note the Pete Townshend portrait in the upper right)

New album? Tour?  Earlier this week Chris Cornell announced a solo acoustic tour set for spring, something I've been hoping he'd do for a while. It's a little early for the band to be rehearsing for a summer tour, though. Could they be planning something before Cornell's solo tour in April?

Some acoustic Chris Cornell for you guys:

Pearl Jam 20th Anniversary

From Rolling Stone:

Dreamed up by their manager, Kelly Curtis, on a drunken night in Las Vegas 10 years ago, Pearl Jam’s plan for the 20th anniversary of their first album, 1991’s Ten, is ambitious. Starting with a deluxe reissue of their second and third albums (1993’s Vs., 1994’s Vitalogy), the yearlong celebration will also include the unveiling of a Cameron Crowe-directed documentary about the band and a massive self-curated festival this summer.

“In our wildest imagination, we never even thought we’d last this long,” says bassist Jeff Ament. Adds Curtis, “Our goal is to document the fact that we’ve been around for 20 years – people who haven’t seen this band for a long time are gonna say, ‘Oh, yeah, I remember!’"

At first, the band members were reluctant to devote much of the year to nostalgia, but Curtis slowly persuaded them. “It’s not something they normally think about,” says Curtis. “They’re always thinking about the next record – not old stuff.”

First up is the Vs. and Vitalogy box, which comes with previously unheard bonus tracks (including an alternate version of “Corduroy” and a guitar-and-organ version of “Betterman”), an entire 1994 Boston show and a cassette from their Monkeywrench radio series. “On the Vitalogy tour, Eddie [Vedder] drove around in a van with a little pirate radio station in it,” says Ament. “It was a way to play music with our friends, and an anti-big-label thing. It was like a house party.” 

The band has also been working with Crowe on a documentary that chronicles its entire career. “I just saw a rough cut,” says Ament. “It was so fucking weird seeing footage of stuff I didn't know anybody was taping at the time. The whole movie is Cameron’s love letter to us – but it’s equal parts complimentary and really painful. It shows our growing pains and some real bad times, including Roskilde [the 2000 Danish festival where nine fans were trampled to death during the band’s set]. It was just really hard to watch.”

Around the time that Crowe’s movie opens in late summer, Pearl Jam are planning a massive “weekend bash,” as Curtis calls it, somewhere in the middle of the country. Details are still being worked out, but it will probably be a two-day event involving multiple bands and Pearl Jam headlining both nights. “We’ve played enough festivals that we know what makes them exciting,” says Ament. “We want to give people places to go that aren’t necessarily musical – second stages and all that kind of stuff. We’re asking our friends if they want to play a couple of shows with us.”


The group plans special sets at the festival, but don't expect to hear any of their classic albums performed straight through. "We talk about that stuff," says Ament. "For me, personally, it starts to become a little bit of a nostalgia thing. I remember we once did Tenstart to finish and it didn't work very well because it was kind of a little bit too down...I think we did a good enough job of mixing up the sets every night that we give people a taste of every record."

When the festival is over, however, it’s back to business as usual. “Ed and I were just going through old photos, journals and clippings for the box set,” says Ament. “By the end, we were both like, ‘Ugh, we’re done with the past for a while.’ We’re ready to work on new songs and get excited about what’s 
ahead.”

 Whoa. A lot of information there.

I only recently (relatively speaking) got into Pearl Jam so I haven't yet had a chance to see them live. I would travel quite a ways to see this Pearl Jam festival. My guess is it will be held in Eddie Vedder's home town of Chicago (that's the middle of the country, right? And it's a hell of a lot closer to me than Seattle). And I can only imagine who they are going to get to back them up- Soundgarden surely, Neil Young, maybe even the motherfucking Who themselves...it could easily be the top festival of 2011.

I'm also excited about Cameron Crowe's documentary. He's been connected to the band since their inception (Eddie Vedder, Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament all had acting roles in Singles and contributed to the soundtrack).

They also unofficially announced that they would be working on a new record, I suppose that will be out in 2012. I hope it's as good as their last one (Backspacer, 2009), which I thought was easily the album of the decade.

Here's a taste of what might be on the new album- a song called "Of the Earth" that they performed several times on their 2010 European tour:

And in this corner, weighing in at 850 pounds...

When I first started typing this post it was going to be about Guns N' Roses' most recent album, Chinese Democracy, but I decided to just make this an all-encompassing GNR post- what I like about them, what you should like about them, and maybe some info for people who don't know much about this awesome band.





Those of my followers who are Guns N' Roses fans may have already noticed that the name of my blog is taken from a song from their second (technically third) studio album, Use Your Illusion I (released in 1991). I make it no secret that I love Guns N' Roses, which always gets me flak from various groups of people. In a way I can understand where they are coming from. I used to dislike Guns as well...before I listened to them. Actually listened to them, I mean. Everyone has heard "Sweet Child o' Mine" and "Welcome to the Jungle," but how many people have heard "Mr. Brownstone" or "Locomotive?"

I've found on multiple occasions that if you really explore a band's catalog you discover that their best songs are almost never the most well-known. It's tough to get over the stigma of listening to such a massively popular band as Guns N' Roses, though. Hipsters and other people who hate anything that is popular will certainly tell you that you have shit musical taste, but that's fine, they will just never appreciate the majestic masterpiece that is "Estranged."



The song was popular at the time of its release, mainly due to this video (the most expensive music video ever at the time), but is certainly not one of their most well-known songs now. It's a shame, because in my opinion it is the greatest song of all time and embodies everything that is great about Guns N' Roses that people fail to recognize. It's not a mindless hard rock song, it's an intricate and complex musical journey through the entire spectrum of human emotion over an epic 9 and a half minutes.

There was a thread recently on a forum I post on that said Slash was overrated. I'm not sure what to think of that. Certainly he's not the greatest guitarist of all time, but in my opinion he is easily in the top 10 (possibly the top 5, it depends on how I'm feeling). "Estranged" demonstrates exactly why: he's tasteful. Taste is one of the most important qualities a guitarist can have, and Slash has it in spades. He rarely overplays. He can play fast, obviously, and does (when the song calls for it), but he also comes up with incredible melodic ideas. Slash's melodic sense is his greatest strength. The guitar melodies in "Estranged" are fantastic.

Slash's tone is legendary, as well. People have been trying for almost 25 years to replicate the tone he got on Appetite For Destruction, GNR's debut (and also the best-selling debut album of all time). It had a crazy amount of distortion but was never muddy like a lot of metal guitar players.

Songs like "Sweet Child o' Mine" show just how easily Slash could switch from a tasteful, melodic, beautiful solo to a heavy, fast, hard rock solo and they show just how easily Guns N' Roses could switch from tasteful, melodic, beautiful ballads to heavy, fast, hard rock songs. It baffles me that so many people think of Guns as a one-dimensional rock band, judging them on songs like "Welcome to the Jungle" instead of songs like "Estranged."

I often run into people that say they don't like the band because of Axl Rose's voice, to which I reply, "Which voice?" Axl is one of the most dynamic vocalists in the history of humanity. Look no further than GNR Lies (their actual second album, made up of three new songs and a bunch of old songs re-released) for the perfect example. Anyone unfamiliar with the band would have no idea that Axl Rose sings "Patience" (trust me, I had no idea myself when I first heard it). It sounds nothing like the gravelly, howling Axl Rose that we all know, and that's the genius of him. He uses his voice like a guitar in a way- just as a guitarist can play clean and distorted, Axl Rose can sing clean or distorted. Just as a guitarist can use a wah-wah pedal, Axl Rose can make his voice sound like a wah-wah pedal. Compare his voice on "Reckless Life" to "Patience." It sounds like two completely different singers.

People love to hate on Axl though. He's made it quite easy through many of his actions, like appearing on stage late on a regular basis, using racial and homophobic slurs in a song, and firing various band members and driving the rest to quit. As a result of this, even people who like Guns N' Roses hate Axl and his new version of the band. Many of them hate the newest album, Chinese Democracy, on principle, without even listening to it.

The truth is, Chinese Democracy is a good album, with many songs that are pretty good and a few songs that are truly great. No, it's not Appetite, but why would it be? What is the point in releasing the same album over and over again? You can listen to Nickelback and the like if you are into bands with no musical development.

I, on the other hand, will be enjoying great songs like "I.R.S.," "Street of Dreams" and "Chinese Democracy," and watching the new band tear through the old stuff perfectly:



I've seen Slash's band live, but nothing beats the original singer shredding on the songs he wrote himself. Here's a video from 2010:



Whatever it was that Axl Rose had, he's still got it.

Plinkett Reviews

This isn't really music related but I wanted to share it anyway. Over at Red Letter Media you will find the "Plinkett Reviews," a collection of video reviews of (mostly) science fiction movies that are both hilarious and insightful. The main draw here are the reviews of the Star Wars prequel trilogy. He has a review of each film, each one nearly as long as the films themselves. If you like Star Wars and have a few hours of free time, check these out. You will not regret it.

Van Halen Recording New Album

After reuniting with original vocalist David Lee Roth, hard rock band Van Halen will be going into the studio to record their first studio album in 13 years, and the first album with Diamond Dave since 1984. Roth rejoined the band in 2007 for a tour that included Eddie Van Halen's son, Wolfgang, on bass guitar (pictured above on the far right).

With Roth the band recorded a streak of classic albums in the late 70's-early 80's. Their debut album, Van Halen, was a magical miraculous masterpiece of rock and roll with such classic hits as "Jamie's Crying," "You Really Got Me," "Ain't Talkin' 'bout Love," "Runnin' with the Devil" and everyone's favorite guitar instrumental:



I listened to Van Halen II for the first time recently, and although it isn't as good as the debut, it's very similar, with plenty of guitar and vocal theatrics. The thing I love about Van Halen is that although they were a hard rock band that used a hell of a lot of distortion, their songs are essentially pop songs, with conventional pop structures and plenty of great hooks and harmonized backing vocals, demonstrated perfectly in songs like "I'm The One."



Source: http://www.ultimate-guitar.com/news/upcoming_releases/right_now_van_halen_to_record_new_studio_album.html

Canada Bans "Money For Nothing"

Dire Straits' 1985 hit "Money for Nothing" has been banned from public radio and television in Canada 26 years after its release due to singer/guitarist Mark Knopfler's use of the word "faggot" in the song:

It was No. 1 in 1985, but it's unacceptable for Canadian eyes and ears today.

The Dire Straits song "Money for Nothing" was ruled by the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council to be "extremely offensive" and thus inappropriate for airing on radio or television because it uses an anti-gay slur.

The decision against St. John's radio station CHOZ-FM in Newfoundland was released Wednesday. In it, the panel ruled that the word "faggot" "contravened the Human Rights Clauses" and its ethics code and is "no longer" permitted "even if entirely or marginally acceptable in earlier days."

Ron Cohen, the CBSC's national chairman, told The Washington Times on Thursday that the decision effectively sets a "nationwide" precedent binding on all private license holders for TV, cable-TV and radio broadcasting. It does not cover the state-run Canadian Broadcasting Corp. or "community and university" stations.

Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/jan/13/dire-straits-song-banned-canada-anti-gay-slur/



The song features the singer/bass player from the Police, Sting, on vocals, parodying the Police's hit "Don't Stand So Close to Me" in the intro as Sting sings the lines "I want my/I want my/I want my MTV." Incidentally, the animated music video for the song (which Mark Knopfler was against) was a huge hit on MTV and the first video to be aired on MTV Europe.

The song reached number one in the Billboard charts at the time of its release, with the single version of the song being edited down from its original 8-minute length, cutting out Sting's intro and the verse with the word "faggot."

Mark Knopfler on his use of the word:

I got an objection from the editor of a gay newspaper in London - he actually said it was below the belt. Apart from the fact that there are stupid gay people as well as stupid other people, it suggests that maybe you can't let it have so many meanings - you have to be direct. In fact, I'm still in two minds as to whether it's a good idea to write songs that aren't in the first person, to take on other characters. The singer in "Money for Nothing" is a real ignoramus, hard hat mentality - somebody who sees everything in financial terms. I mean, this guy has a grudging respect for rock stars. He sees it in terms of, well, that's not working and yet the guy's rich: that's a good scam. He isn't sneering.

Led Zeppelin Song of the Week: Communication Breakdown

This song, the seventh track on their debut album Led Zeppelin, was an archetype for punk music that emerged in the late 70's. Although most punk bands claimed to have hated Led Zeppelin, it's easy to see that they were hugely influenced by the hyper-speed power chord riff of this song and its chugging groove was an influence on both heavy metal and punk.

The song features an incredible wah-wah solo by guitarist Jimmy Page, who achieved his signature tone on this song by using the wah pedal rocked all the way forward.



The song has been covered by quite a few great artists (Soundgarden, Iron Maiden to name a few), but this is my favorite:



Vocalist Myles Kennedy shreds on this track even more than Slash does.

Learning guitar?

If you are, this is by far the best resource I've found:

http://www.justinguitar.com/index.php

His name is Justin Sandercoe and he has hundreds of video lessons available for free on Youtube, including full song lessons. He has an entire comprehensive free beginners course and lessons ranging from metal to jazz to folk fingerstyle. The site works on an honor basis, he doesn't charge money for anything other than a few products, most of which are already available for free, and the site runs entirely on donations. So pay for what you use!

He also released an album last year called Small Town Eyes, available on iTunes. It's a very folky Neil Young-inspired album with plenty of great guitar playing. Justin also sings and plays harmonica, but the best track is probably "From Katie's Window," which is an amazing pastoral folk instrumental piece with a great bluesy solo in the middle. Here's a performance and complete lesson taught by Justin:









And for the record, I have no affiliation with Justin or his site, I'm simply a fan that has learned a lot from him and I want to spread the word.

Soundgarden Reunion

I went through a big Soundgarden phase recently, right around the time they announced they were reuniting after 13 years apart. They played a show under the name Nudedragons (anagram for Soundgarden) in April,



and headlined the 2010 Lollapalooza but haven't done much since. The reunion was of course an excuse to re-release their music, which they did in the form of the Telephantasm compilation album. The record featured a "new" song (written during the Badmotorfinger sessions)  called "Black Rain," but other than that, no new music has been released and they haven't played any more shows. They did play on the second episode of Conan O'brien's new show, though, which can be seen here.

Chris Cornell has certainly proved that he can still sing. Now they just need to record an album so they can prove that this reunion was not just a cash grab.

Welcome to the Jungle

I will be posting music and music related topics (including album reviews, lists, news, etc) here whenever I can. I hope to cover a wide range of music styles but most of it will probably be rock.