MRambler Central » Music

Desert island music

huskysooner — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 22:32:31 +0000

I think each person on here fancies themselves a musical aficionado. Typically, “Top X” lists are pretty silly (e.g., the Rolling stone top-100 guitarists list we discussed sometime back), but….

It would be cool to hear peoples’ lists of desert island albums. As to arbitrary ground rules, I’m thinking top-10 albums/CDs. They can be double-albums but no “Complete Works of the Beatles” or any other circumventing of the rules like that . Live albums are fine. Rock, blues, gangsta rap, jazz, classical, or anything else musical is fine.

I mostly have my list down but need to think about it a bit more…

Feel free to discuss the ground rules and we can modify if desired.

Hard Day’s Chord……

MRambler — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 14:25:34 +0000

Obscure Musicology 101 – Another good one from Anon….. The first chord of “A Hard Day’s Night” – Never thought of it much, other than it was pretty cool and kicked the song off great… After finding out how it was done and that John, George, and Paul are ALL playing different parts on that single chord, I’ll never hear it in the same way again!…. I never noticed Paul’s Bass note before, or the double guitars with the complicated strange fingerings that John and George added….. Timeless Music at it’s best!…..

Check it out for yourself: HDN Opening Chord

Jimi “Snowman” Hendrix…..

MRambler — Tue, 17 Jan 2012 22:30:41 +0000

Anon sent me this pic of Jimi Hendrix’s statue that’s located in downtown Seattle….. Some ingenious pranksters turned Jimi into a snowman…… The other pic is one I took years ago without the snowman disguise……

Bottom Line: Don’t become a ground level statue if you can’t stand the attention…..

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MR Rock Coroner 01.11.12

J.J. — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 02:52:12 +0000

Our offices have just learned of the death of Jim “Motorhead” Sherwood on 25 Dec 2011.
Fans of Frank Zappa will know Motorhead as the head roadie, equipment handler, eventual Baritone Sax Player, and Teen Heartthrob When he was not hustling groupies. On the back cover of The 1968 Album “Were Only In It For The Money” He is the only one facing the camera. He passed in Los Angeles he was 69.
Suzy Creamcheese could not be reached for comment.

A Weird New Years…..

MRambler — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 22:13:46 +0000

To celebrate New Years, Oklahoma City has what it calls, “Opening Night” on New Year’s Eve….. This event takes place in the section of OKC called, “Bricktown”….. There’s music, food, entertainment, and fireworks….. This year they’ve got two headliner music acts – The Flaming Lips, which is an Oklahoma group that made it fairly big, and, get this, which I still don’t believe – Yoko Ono (I pronounce it “Oh-No”) and The Plastic Ono Band with Sean Lennon….. I’m speechless – I mean I didn’t think that there were more than a handful of people in the whole state of Oklahoma who had ever even heard of The Plastic Ono Band….. Maybe the ones that booked the gig have never heard her sing (I use the term loosely)….. On the other side – Why would anybody that’s internationally known want to perform in OKC?… Truth is definitely stranger than fiction….. I wouldn’t mind going just to check it out, but, at $120 a ticket, I think I’ll have to pass….. I do know they’re not advertising it much – I caught it on the news….. I’m going to check into it further as I would like to know just how this all came about – I’m stunned!…….

Happy Birthday Jimi

J.J. — Sat, 26 Nov 2011 17:50:17 +0000

I know I’m a day Early But Happy 69th Birthday to the worlds greatest guitar player. James Marshall Hendrix
Should be a national holiday.

MRambler’s Archives #3

MRambler — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 18:09:17 +0000

When we started Wolfbrand Band, we decided to make a “Demo” tape that we could give to prospective employers (i.e. Club Owners, Organizations, etc.)…. We recorded Five (5) songs in November of 1973….. Now, we had no funds to go into an actual recording studio, nor did we have a mixer or any of the fancy stuff you would find in a recording studio….. All we had was Roger’s Panasonic Reel-to-reel and my newly assembled HeathKit cassette deck…. We recorded the basic rhythm tracks in a huge house in N.W. OKC (Tom’s house, I think) on the R-to-R…. There was a full size grand Piano in the living room (I guess you would call it that – there were so many rooms)…. We set-up in two separate rooms – Drums, Bass, and Piano in one, and Guitars and Harp in the other to get as much stereo separation as we could….

We then returned to Roger’s small above a garage Apartment to do the Vocals and Instrument overdubs….. Since we didn’t have a mixer, the overdubs were added and mixed in real time back and forth between the two recorders…. I’m amazed that they turned out as good in quality as they did…. Tell me what you think….

Here’s two of them… There’s about Ten Seconds or so of silence at the beginning of each of them – Just keep listening, the songs are there…. The first one is another Neil Young song, “Are You Ready for the Country” and the second one is a Jethro Tull song off their first album, which was all Blues…. “Someday the Sun won’t shine for You“…. Give ‘em a listen….. For more info on WBB check out the Archives #1 Post….

Watermelon Slim, Again……

MRambler — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 17:47:50 +0000

Got to see Watermelon Slim again at the Blue Door in OKC… It turned out to be a Grateful Dead length gig…. He started about 15 minutes after 8 pm, took a short 15 minute break after about 1 1/2 hours, then played ’til they had to close the place at Midnight!…. I think he would’ve played longer, but, Oklahoma Law prevails….. It was a great show for any Blues/Rock fan…. He even did a compilation of Hendrix songs – About six minutes worth – It was really cool and different hearing Hendrix done with a slide guitar complete with feedback using the volume knob on his guitar….. If you’re into Blues and ever have the chance to see Watermelon Slim, DON’T pass it up!……

Six Days on the Road……

MRambler — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 16:21:26 +0000

Just talked to J.J., the “Road Master”, and he said he was almost back in OKC…. Thought I would give him a song to listen to next time he hits the Interstates…. It’s another “Wolfbrand Band” track from the 30MAY74 gig (for more info on WB, check the Archives #1 Post)…. Here’s “Wolfbrand Band’s” version of Six Days on the Road….. Enjoy….

MRambler’s Archives #2

MRambler — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 20:58:24 +0000

Since I’m going to be heading out of town on Thursday, and, as par for the course, I’m not packed and ready yet, I thought I would Post this Archive a bit early…. Since there was a request for “King Crimson”, here’s “Terraplane’s” version of “Lark’s Tongue in Aspic“, and since this is an instrumental, I thought I would throw in our version of a “Jethro Tull” track called “Bungle in the Jungle” with Randy on Vocals…. These were recorded on August 26, 1975 on the OU campus live and outside between the Housing Towers….. These cuts are the most heard of any of our stuff, as I made a CD from them in 2000 for the band members and a few friends…. Again, this was recorded on my self-built HeathKit cassette deck placed about 100 feet out in front of the stage with two little cheap mikes (the good ones were on the stage)…. I made a direct copy of the cassette to a CD recorder – There was no tweaking, post editing, processing, compression…. What you hear is what the audience heard that day….

The personnel in “Terraplane” changed on occasion…. We’ll call this one: Terraplane Main Version, as the bulk of our recorded output came from this line-up…. The members were Randy Stark: Lead Vocals, Moog, Flute – Roger Harrison: Vocals, Bass – Rick Lopez: Drums, Occasional vocal harassment of the audience and band members (in jest, of course) – Dan Rowell: Vocals, Lead Guitar, Guitar – MRambler: Vocals, Slide Guitar, Guitar, Harp….

Here’s what the CD cover front and back looked like…. I’m going to have to run me off a copy as it seems PD Bob made a coaster out of the one I had (A-R-R-GH!)..

The back cover shot was from a rehearsal we did out on “The Farm” on N.E. 63rd St., Spencer, OK … I Might be talked into making a few extra copies if enough people indicate that they would be wanting to “Live in the Past”…. Of course, there would be a nominal fee – Too-Loose Productions doesn’t run for free, you know (Ha!)…..