Should Adam Lambert Join Queen?

I've been listening to Adam on American Idol and he has a truly special voice and a confidence that takes over the stage. I think that Queen should snap him up immediately before someone else does. He has the range and stage presence to cover all of their old Freddie material and could collaborate with them to make some of the best music they have ever done. No, Freddie will never be replaced. He was a singer who comes along once in a generation. Adam has his own special qualities that make him a perfect fit with Queen. While they are at it they need to also drag John Deacon out of his self-imposed musical exile and put together a reincarnation of Queen that would blow everyone away. Talk among yourselves.

Joe Satriani and Mountain

We went to the Satriani/Mountain concert last night. I suppose that a sign of the times is that most of the audience had graying hair. Anyway, we had a great time. Leslie West was in excellent form as was Satriani. The sound balance was perfect for this theater and the acoustics were excellent. Joe did his usual spot-on solos that made instrumental guitar popular in the 1990's. They seemed to be having a good time and put a lot of energy into the show. The show ended with a couple of duets with West and Satriani trading licks. It was awesome seeing these two masters of the guitar on stage together.

CD finished

"I have a fever and the only prescription is more cowbell!" - with apologies to Saturday Night Live.

I've disappeared from the blog world for a little more than a week so I could put on the finishing touches to my new instrumental CD "More Cowbell". I think these songs are the best ones this amateur musician has ever made. I am really happy with the songs. No vocals because I can't sing but I did the drums, bass, electric and acoustic guitars, piano, organ, and synthesizers. My favorites are "Fill Your Hand", "Big Red Boogie", "Harvest", and "Moonlight". It is a learning experience for me and I am pushing my meager talents to the limit with each new song. As I make more tunes I think they will continue to evolve and become more interesting and complex. The experience is very rewarding and I am having a ball with it. For these songs I used several keyboards, my old Gibson Invader, Gibson SG, Gibson ES-335, Reverend Slingshot Custom, Fender American Fat Strat, and acoustic guitars by Martin and Blueridge. I also used some synth programs on the computer for drums and strings. Recording and mixing was done on my home computer with help from Fender Blues Deluxe
and Martin acoustic amplifiers as well as various microphones and effect boxes.

If you would like to listen to the new CD, it is located HERE.
I would greatly appreciate any feedback or rating vote on the site.

Guilty Pleasures: Ted Nugent

What in the world is a vegetarian, anti-hunting person like me doing listening to the Nuge? Well, I like his raw, in-your-face approach to life. While I don't hunt, I do share his enthusiasm for guns (target shooting only!), bows (ditto), and wild guitar work (can't do it but enjoy listening to it). He really makes his Gibson Byrdland scream with the help of a bank of Fender Twins that will peel the paint off the walls. Ted should have been born 150 years ago. He is unique.

Random Thoughts At 3 AM

1) Occasionally I am reminded why I am a teacher. Today when looking at a sponge under the microscope one of my students yelled out "Come here! This is just so cool!" Moments like these make me proud of my students and very happy I decided on the teaching profession 29 years ago.

2) On TV now the PBS station is showing speeches of many of our political experts talking about the Iraq war in 2003. Their statements were, in hindsight, about 95 percent wrong. It amazes me just how totally wrong a large group of our (supposedly) most intelligent people in Washington and in the military could be so blatantly wrong. What is more amazing is that they could not only apparently not learn from their mistakes but have spent the intervening years trying to spin their positions to justify their actions and make themselves look reasonably competent. It is eerily similar to the decisions made by the top levels of education. As Yogi Berra said, "It's deja vu all over again".

3) The acupuncture treatments had minimal effect upon my "pinched" nerve. That's why I am up now. I have an appointment Monday afternoon with a chiropractor and will let you all know how it goes over the next few treatments.

4) I finished my 4th song on my new CD "More Cowbell". I think they are my best instrumentals ever and are very proud of my amateur efforts at composing. The songs along with my earlier ones are at http://www.mp3.com/artist/the-unexcused/songs/
I would appreciate those with a few moments to listen to some of my songs and even give a review or rating. It is a neverending source of pleasure to be able to take a computer, some software, an amplifier, microphone, and a few guitars to make compositions like these that could only have been produced in a studio a few years ago.

That's all for now. I'm going to go back to bed in a few minutes, shove the cats aside, and try to get some rest when the feeling in my arm eases up.

Guilty Pleasures: The Sweet

I saw Sweet in 1973 and 1975. They put on quite entertaining shows. Sometimes the "glam" image they had and the outrageous lifestyles made people forget that they were actually good musicians. "Action", "Sweet FA", and "Love Is Like Oxygen" are a few of their memorable hits. Time has not been kind to the members of Sweet. The singer Brian died young, aided at least in part by alcohol use. Mick the drummer died of leukemia. The only two living original members do not play together any more. The guitarist Andy Scott occasionally fronts his Andy Scott's Sweet group. The bass player, Steve Priest, now lives in California. Unfortunately like so many other groups of that era the egos, drug use, and other excesses caused a great group to disintegrate.

St. Augustine Blues Festival

The wife and I just got in from a great afternoon and evening at the local blues festival. The acts we saw were fantastic! We sat in the front row and blew our diets with fruit smoothies and blooming onions. The first group we saw was Jody And The Crankshafts.

They played a variety of old rock tunes. The next act was Conrad Oberg, a 13 year old Jacksonville, Florida blues prodigy who is almost totally blind. He will be a real powerhouse with a little more experience and had a great backing band.

The headliner was James Cotton, a famous harp player who played with Muddy Waters. His set was very dynamic and polished. The crowd went wild with every harp or guitar solo.

For the first time in 32 years since Karen the wife and I have been together she finally danced with me. Yes, these 50 something guys can still boogie! We had a really wonderful time there and brought back a lot of good memories, including these photographs. I think Karen knows just about everybody in town since she introduced me to a lot of them there.

Update On The Music

At
http://www.mp3.com/artist/THE-UNEXCUSED/songs/
you can play and download five songs from my new CD "Night and Day". You can click on the "View Tracks" button to see the tracks I've uploaded. I scrapped song #2 after listening to the final mix and replaced it with a nice instrumental called "It Is What It Is". This CD is a mix of hard and soft instrumentals that I spent weeks composing, recording, and mixing. I am very proud of these efforts. Please take a listen to them and give the album a rating. Thanks!

Woo Hoo!!! My Music!

I finally am entering the present in music composition. I made my first CD and am working on my second one. More exciting, I published songs for the first time in mp3 format.

My songs are at THIS URL

Please listen to them when you have time. I do this for a hobby and am not a professional musician but I have a lot of fun composing and the songs are interesting and different. I play guitar and bass on the songs and compose everything else on the computer with drum programs and a MIDI composition program.

Take care,
Ken

Meet Angus!

Yesterday we went to a music store to replace my dead guitar tuner with a new strobe tuner. I don't travel 50 miles to go to this store often so while there I played several guitars on one of their typical horrible sounding solid state amps. All of the guitars had problems with build and/or intonation problems. Then I picked up a faded cherry Gibson SG Special. It has the same wood, pickups, tuners, and electronics as the Standard model at $300 less. It's made in the USA. They save money by avoiding cosmetic enhancements like binding and a polished finish. The wood's pores are filled and sanded and it has a light clear coat on top. The trapezoids in the neck are replaced with small dots. None of these things affect the sound and it is sonically like the SG Standard.

With the first strum of a chord I knew this was something special. It had terrific sustain and could go from rock to folk with no effort. The neck has the perfect width for my hands and it is wide enough for easy finger picking as well. If it sounded this good on a mediocre amp I knew it would sound great with my Blues Deluxe amp at home. I looked at the wife and said "This guy is going home with me!". So here is Angus, the newest guitar in our family. I just finished putting new strings on it and intonating it. Watch out, AC/DC! Back In Black never sounded so good on my amp. With soft songs like "Beth" by KISS the notes stand out great and the chords ring forever.

What I've Been Doing This Week Off

This is the CD cover and inner page of my new CD of 10 songs. The style is what you might call eclectic. It is a combination of soft rock, folk, and a little country. I had a lot of fun putting the songs together. Here is how I made them:

1) Laid down the drum part with either a drum synth program called Hammerhead or a MIDI program called PowerTracks Pro Audio.
2) Recorded the bass using a regular guitar, a program called Kristal, and a VST plugin that changes it to a bass sound.
3) Recorded the rhythm guitar parts.
4) Recorded the lead guitar.
5) Added any necessary organ with MIDI and the PowerTracks program.
6) Mixed everything in Kristal, adjusted sounds and levels, and then did any necessary trimming with a program called Audacity.
7) Saved the song in AIFF format and when I had enough songs for a CD I burned the CD with Nero Express Essentials.

It was a labor of love and a great way to be creative. I am very pleased with how the songs turned out. It amazes me how you can create an entire realistic band just using some guitars, an amplifier, a microphone, and the computer. We have come a long ways since I used to program 4 note polyphony songs on my old Tandy Color Computer that sounded like a kid's toy.

It's The Little Things I Appreciate The Most

What is a great evening for me? Driving home tonight with the top down on the Miata and singing along with the White Stripe's "Hotel Yorba" on the CD player while enjoying a warm, starry night.

What I've Been Up To

Sorry for the long delay with posting. Tommy's death hit us very hard here and I took some time off.

School has been exhausting lately. This is a period of time with no breaks or holidays and the students are getting cranky. We're dissecting cats in Anatomy now, just finishing a test on muscles last Thursday. In Biology we are working on fossils and we had an interesting fossil lab. Next Thursday we begin midterm exams so we are almost at the halfway point in our studies.

Saturday night we went to the local amphitheatre to watch Little Richard. He was in great form and didn't sound like he was 74. He is on crutches now because of arthritic knees and is in a lot of pain but still somehow manages to keep a good outlook on life.
His 10 piece group sounded great as well. We really enjoyed the show.

My Song

A long time ago I wrote lyrics for this song. The performance would be better if I could sing but I have never let a lack of talent stop me! Enjoy.

Wing

I got this link the other day and you absolutely have to hear these samples! Your life will never be the same. The link is Wing Music

Springing The Blues Festival

With a beautifully clear day we decided to run up to Jacksonville to catch a couple of acts this afternoon at the start of the largest free blues festival in Florida. This is one of our local favorites, Greg Baril. He is a fantastic player and singer with a similar style to Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Here is Karen, the wife, relaxing at the festival

and here is yours truly.

Guilty Pleasures - KISS

OK, I admit it. I've been a fan of the original lineup of KISS since the 1970's. Their music isn't intricate and it will never be mistaken for classical music. In spite of that, the great drumming of Peter combined with the smooth solos of Ace, raspy singing of Paul, and solid bass of Gene gives their energetic performances a special spark that most groups today simply don't have. When I'm depressed and need a lift I reach for their DVD set 1. It's time to... call out the firehouse!!

Time to tune up

One more week until it's time to start the annual music projects where the students take a song I supply and put lyrics to it, then perform and videotape the song. It will go along with whatever we are studying at the moment, which is the nervous system in Anatomy and weather in Physical Science. So... I have to change strings and pick a guitar and make sure the Fender Blues Deluxe amp is purring. What song to pick? It has to be simple enough for beginners to play. Maybe "Wild Thing" or "Crazy Little Thing Called Love" ??? Gotta go through the sheet music and see what I can scape up. I usually play support rhythm guitar when they need it.