ILX Gonna Shine in My Backdoor Someday (new post-Fahey folk for ppl posting in Takoma/Tompkins Square threads Pt II)

kinda got away from doing my acoustic stuff for awhile but got a pretty solid recording of a song i've had kicking around for awhile in dadgbd (nick drake tuning, someone of FB said jimmy page used it too)

http://soundcloud.com/matthew-lee-helgeson/landr-nick-drake-song-mix-2

Ooh I like this one UMS. Really nice descending lines, as well as pace (I don't know why but the tempo/phrasing is really working for me). Glad to have you back at it!

Funny, since my early days posting here I have moved farther away from "straight" playing it seems. Kind of a shame, but I just can't escape the drone/minimal crap I get up to. I should get back to it as well.

In other news, I have been listening to Dr. Ragtime and his Pals and the Steve Gunn & Black Twig Pickers collab albums a lot these days. Maybe this is what is getting me all riled up for some tunes.

thanks! i've never listened to dr. ragtime & his pals i should do that

it might be my favorite Rose-related release, seriously

yeah, it's fantastic!

Yeah UMS, you will not be disappointed. Let's just say that Jack had some serious pals!

kinda got away from doing my acoustic stuff for awhile but got a pretty solid recording of a song i've had kicking around for awhile in dadgbd (nick drake tuning, someone of FB said jimmy page used it too)

http://soundcloud.com/matthew-lee-helgeson/landr-nick-drake-song-mix-2

Spinning this in plug rn.

:-)

I just googled plug, looks cool like that old site where ilxors used to dj I can't recall the name of

i don't follow this thread intensely - has this vintage vid of ted lucas been around here yet? because man! what a thing this is!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WUfG-4VX2-E

https://joostdijkema.bandcamp.com/album/sacred-revelations

Joost Dijkema is an aspiring musician, as well as one of the few young fingerpick guitarists from the North of the Netherlands. He performs astounding acoustic guitarinstrumentals, mixed with wonderful songs and warm vocals, in which observations and stirrings of the soul from the past and present play a central role.

Do you guys/gals (those of you who play) ever feel self-conscious about chops? This guy Joost is crazy proficient and this is one of those genres where proficiency could easily be over-valued. I've been finding a little niche in something more formless than what I've shared here years ago now. Sometimes I wonder whether it would feel a little more "legit" if I could add some more technical flare to it overall.

Joost vocals are straight up Michael Chapman to me. This record is really nice.

yeah that joost stuff is nice, as is that ted lucas video, sent me back to the wayfaring strangers comp

re: chops, i generally think i'm pretty average, but then i listen to things i'd recorded years/months prior and find them pretty good so who knows. i do feel like my muscle memory/accuracy has faded in recent years, it's very frustrating. i've taken to just doing basic patterns to a timer/metronome

also re: chops, i've come around to thinking that generally, fahey is underrated and basho is overrated. it's a cliche to say that fahey wasn't a 'technical' player and while i get what people mean by that, watching a lot of those late 60s videos of fahey, he has this very alien poise and control in his picking hand. it's really hard to play simple music that delicately and accurately (especially on older guitars like he was using). it's fairly easy to create furious cascades of arpeggios on a 12 string. i love them both fwiw

this genre isn't really about chops anyway

It's not about chops for those of us engaged with it, but chops do play a bigger part in the overall. In other genres there are all sorts of elements that work together to communicate the feeling, but here we literally have chops and approach and nothing else (usually). That doesn't mean that better chops mean better music but it's an important tool. You work within your limitations as a player, and sometimes you have a vision for your music that is beyond your current ability. And sometimes the listener can pick up on that. I guess my point is that chops have more responsibility here than in other genres.

chops are situational not absolute imo

one string sam had some sort of chops

there are lots of people with some notional chops who could not play certain things as well as I can

nonetheless, i would enjoy more chops

Yeah, chops are really personal and weird to directly apply/correlate to musical success or depth or value or whatever you want to apply to them (good summary of the issue Evan). I mean, if you are going to lay down solo guitar in 2017 there is some basic reckoning with history you need to do to decide what place at the table you want to sit at, but generally I think the musical choices you make and the way you own them and personalize them probably have a lot to do with whether you feel good about what you are doing or can convey it to someone listening to your music. Just my opinion, and it kind of comes down to a "it's all cool if you MEAN it man" kind of idea, which is a bit silly if you pick it apart, but in my experience so many people with chops are brought down some dumb and/or arbitrary roads simply because they did all that work and want to show you what they can do. Of course some audiences get off on that kind of thing but to Global's point I don't think it often serves the world of solo guitar very well, or at least not the kind I have found enjoyable. Still, when you begin down the road of playing solo tunes or trying to set substantial moods with straight playing techniques, the spell can be broken pretty quickly if you don't hit the mark consistently.

David Fair to thread :)

Now mind you I still at times go and listen to Jack Rose and find myself thinking "what the fuck am I doing calling myself a guitar player" hah hah.

I love David Fair, and his instructions for playing guitar!

so many people with chops are brought down some dumb and/or arbitrary roads simply because they did all that work and want to show you what they can do

this is very true, having extra tools in your box is tempting, power corrupts & all that, and yet quite a lot of my absolute favourite bits of guitar playing are really stylishly deployed moments of virtuosity that just make you want to laugh and give up and disqualify them for cheating

I mean, is classical guitar "about" chops or is the virtuosity simply a necessity?

Hah hah very good point Ogmor. Generally anyone who can deploy virtuosity stylishly get a pass! I laugh out loud at shows frequently, and it is almost always at a moment exactly like the one you are describing.

Classical guitar is kind of its own thing, as yeah you are playing pieces written to a set of expectations, and if you can't deliver them then you are in the wrong game.

each style has it's own prized values, but equally there is a lot of grey ineffable 'feeling' which exists beyond/outside of chops. there is def a real sense in which technique can limit you, both in terms of your own playing and how you hear - cf the famous story fahey told about segovia, who upon hearing mississippi john hurt's frankie refused to believe it was being played by one guitarist

The version of the story I've read is that Segovia asked who the second guitarist was on first hearing, not that he refused to believe it was one person after being told. Assuming that the story is true (a big assumption), I'm not sure it shows that Segovia's way of hearing was limited by his technique.

At most, it might suggest a kind of elitism: that he didn't think that an untrained blues guy could do all that fingerpicking by himself. Maybe that's what you meant.

if that's the accurate story then it's barely an anecdote & no wonder I've adorned it. saying technique limits you is kind of misleading, but I think everyone's hearing is shaped by how they engage with music and sometimes the harder you grab on to one sensibility/approach/set of values the harder it is to appreciate another

this sounds good:

Feeding Tube Records presents the debut of the duo of guitarist Tony Pasquarosa and drummer John Moloney, out March 24.

"Tony's acoustic guitar playing makes me think of the work of India's great string master, Brij Bhushan Kabra. Raga-like twirls and filigree emerge like puffs of wet smoke, drifting away lazily in the sharp light of a winter's afternoon. And Moloney, who is best known for throwing down thunder with Sunburned, Chelsea Light Moving, Dino Jr, Caught on Tape, and other Giants of Thud, matches Tony's mood effortlessly. Sweet light rhythm patterns are not something one often associates with Moloney's music, but his playing here with both percussion and wind show a very different side of his chops. At some points the overall sound recalls one of Sandy Bull's "Blends" with Billy Higgins, but the music on My Pharaoh, My King is entirely its own trip."
--Byron Coley, 2017

That does sound cool. Guitar/drum duos bear some great fruit. Gunn/Truschinski (sp?) one we have talked about here more than once, but the Dorji/Damon release that came out recently is pretty great too. Not quite guitar/drums, but the Flower/Corsano duo another great example. Neu! of course. Pasquarosa/Moloney sounds like a good one to add to the mix.

Vampire Belt too. Also countless local bands.

Saw Bill Orcutt last night in a pretty packed room. His amp fell over during the first song and overall the show was insanely piercingly -- not loud, but painful without earplugs (I always have mine so it wasn't a problem but I saw a few ppl holding their ears). His playing was totally bonkers and I can't really say what he was doing but I enjoyed it.

Never seen Vampire Belt, but I am sure I would dig them live. Orcutt too (as I like the Orcutt records plenty). Hope to see him at some point.

Just saw Bachman on Wednesday. New tunes all sounded great, and the guy who played the octotone (an instrument he built) on the record came down from Northern Virginia to play on one of the long "Brightleaf Blues" jams as well. The slide playing in particular was really really nice. He pulled out a 12-string too, which I had never seen live. Just a great set all around, but I love the new record so it is not surprising I was very into it. The octotone ringing out into the room sounded very very cool though.

tony pasquarosa meets sandy bull sounds legit

Hey, our man at Dying For Bad Music just pointed out that you can listen to a whole side of the Pasquarosa/Moloney record here:

http://feedingtuberecords.com/releases/my-pharaoh-my-king/

Nice cover.

Dying for a bad feeding tube records

if feeding tube has a fault its that their site/marketing blurbs for their records make everything sound fucking amazing haha

y'all get that myriam gendron album? one of the best of the last 10 years imo

Coley's greatest skill might be getting you to want records you might not really want...

haha OTM

I stopped buying many things during the early to mid-2000s due to the wave of Coley acolytes. David Keenan (whom I like in many ways) made several crappy CDRs I purchased sound like the most amazing underground finds in existence. They were not.

heh heh yeah, i do respect his boundless ability to make things sound enticing in an underground way

he was right about that Myriam Gendron record though! wonder when she'll have a new one ...

(i mean, he's right about a lot of stuff, not just that ... )

Clinging to the wreckage of early 80s suburban Pittsburgh, Broken Len grew out of the scene surrounding the legendary steeltown free jazz squat/warehouse space Urgent Care. Three teen savants, they met in chemistry club and soon launched a campaign of aural terror on the unsuspecting Pittsburgh hardcore scene. Imagine Negative Approach knifing Sun Ra and Half Japanese to death in the back of an abandoned muffler shop, then using their guitars to broadcast their confession in Morse code while drummer Ralph Mordant fell down a flight of stairs. This slab of primal no wave jive will leave stains on your carpet. Limited pressing of 500. $20

*sounds like shitty hardcore band that never rehearsed*

I was at a record label fair recently and I overheard someone describing a cassette release as "Sun Ra with sex and drum machines"
lol

I mean, I like Coley a lot, and I really appreciate that he covers/reviews a lot of stuff across the spectrum in regards to well-known to completely unknown musicians. I just don't buy stuff I can't at least get a quick listen to any more. I assume that Coley actually hears things this way (he has been an early champion of many underappreciated but actually great weirdo musicians out there), and finds these connections to be very real for himself, but it doesn't mean that the stuff is gonna resonate that way with most folks.

I only tease out of love, mad respect to the OG, there ain't 10 ppl that did more for underground music in this country

To bring this convo somewhat full-circle-ish to one earlier, one of my favorite Coley quotes comes from the Half Japanese documentary "The Band That Would Be King" (not an exact quote, just an approximation):

"Jan Wenner would rather die from having spaghetti force fed to him than admit that a band like Half Japanese exists."

ha!
vaguely recall people on ILM complaining about Coley's liners for the Daydream Nation reish because he spent some time complaining (along with SY) about how much sandwiches cost these days in NYC. But I liked that.