The Armadillo Sound

Before last night at the Armadillo Palace, I had never played a gig with my one-man-show where the venue provided a soundman. I alwalys set up my own PA system and just mix the volume of the various instruements from the stage.

A good sound man (or woman) can make you sound good but I didn't know the guy who was doing the sound. I spoke to him on the phone in advance and he did seem like a nice guy and sounded pretty confident about everything.

Before the gig, My real concern was that I might piss the guy off the same way I have pissed off several drummers. I am kind of particular about the mix and turning the whole thing over to someone else is not that easy for me.

When Brandon, the sound man for the Armadillo Palace showed up, I already had all my instruments & mics set up. He was very easygoing & said he wanted to add a mic to the guitar amp and then he plugged everything in. We did a quick sound check and that was it. No Problems at all. It turns out he is a musician also and has a good ear for music. He knows what he is doing and he did a great job.

What a difference a Professional Sound Man can make.

Thanks Brandon.

Marc Twyman "Gipson" Hummingbird signature edition

(left) "Nickel" from the Vintage Bar








The Red Acoustic Guitar I use is a copy of a Gibson Hummingbird that I bought about 18 or 20 years ago at Rockin Robin Guitars on Shepherd. It had a cracked neck and was in a bath tub with other clearance items. I used epoxy to repair it and have gotten alot of good use out of it. It also had a split in the wood at the back of the body that I filled with wood puddy and sanded off.

Several months ago, I took a Fender Single Coil Pick-up and installed it in this guitar. I had bought some new pick-ups for one of my electric guitars several years ago and it was one of the ones that I had replaced & had just been sitting around in a box of stuff.

I used masking tape & Coat-hanger wire to attach the pick-up in the sound hole of the acoustic guitar. I didn't do any fancy wiring either. I just soldered the positive and negative wires to a cable and I plug it straight in to my amp. It is a little noisy but when I plug it into a fender tube amp, The tone is pretty good.

In my show I now use it for the Robert Johnson bottleneck slide stuff(open G tuning), Several Lightnin' Hopkins tunes, & a few other tunes also in standard tuning except I have been keeping it tuned down a half a step.

It doesn't have the built in EQ controls that most acoustics have with built in pickups but I keep my amp close enough that I can reach over and make adjustments. I generally have to cut the treble and gain back about 20% from when I am using the electrics.

Even though it was realatively cheap guitar & doesn't sound like a Martin or Taylor, It does have pretty good balance in terms of how it resonates. The low end, Middle and high notes all come out at about the same volume. I have traded away a better made guitar because it didn't have the good low end & didn't work as well for hitting the bass notes with a metal thumb pick.

Remembering Bill

February before last when I first started the one man band, I had a gig at a neighborhood bar not too far from my house.

I think it was my third gig ever and I had told the owner I would play cheap so they could check out my show. I specifically told her that I would do the gig at the low price only if she was going to be there and she told me that she would be there when I played. I asked her if there were usually very many people in the bar on Sunday nights and she responded "I doesn't matter how many people are going to be there. I will be there"

I played for three hours and she never showed up.

At the end of the night I asked the bartender what he thought about the show & he said "It sounded OK but you didn't bring in many people"




I played three sets that night & had some technichal problems the first set & it went not so great.

I was a couple of songs into the second set when this dude walked in the bar and just walked straight over and sat on the edge of the stage about a foot from where I was and started clapping along. He then got up and started doing a dance like something you would see Grandpa from HeeHaw doing. It was clear that he had already had one or two beers before coming to the bar. He basically stayed right in front of me either sitting on the stage or doing his crazy looking dance & it was starting to get on my nerves.


Then I noticed how was livening up the rest of the folks there.

He really did make the party happen & the whole rest of the show he stayed right there did his thing while the whole time throwing verbal encouragement my way which did liven up my playing quite a bit. It was like somebody flipped a switch and the everybody just started having a good time.

The type of music I play (& I guess all live music) really only works if I put alot of feeling and engergy into it & like most other musicians, I can really feed off of an audience & tend to give a little more back when I get some feedback.

But the reality is that I can't base my performance on the audience. It just isn't how it works. I need to give 100 percent either way or it is not worth doing it at all. There are going to be times where I run into a lull.


And now almost 2 years later, I still think about Bill. If I am doing a song and it feels like I am dragging a little, I just try to imagine how I would play if my old friend (who I just met one time) was doing his HeeHaw Dance and encouraging me along.

It really seems to help.


Thank You Bill, I really appreciate your support.

hollywood

Here is what Roger Ebert had to say about the Hollywood Studios in an artilcle he wrote about the Johnny Cash Movie: (THE RED PART)

"...Mangold had been shopping the Johnny Cash biopic around Hollywood with no luck. Even after he had Joaquin Phoenix and Reese Witherspoon on board to play John and June, he was told the studios "don't want to make movies about people." William Goldman, the veteran screenwriter, had a gloomier analysis: "No one wants to make a movie that depends on you pulling it off."
They want, in other words, to make movies that don't need to be pulled off. Movies that are foolproof. Formula pictures, teenage action movies, video game adaptations, sequels..."

I found it very interesting to see Roger Ebert say that.

When I watch a Hollywood Movie, I usually can picture a bunch of corporate types sitting in a board room talking about how a scene test-marketed or how they need to put in more action or whatever else it is that will help gaurantee a better return on the investment.

The problem with that is that you lose the thing where one person has a vision of the story they want to tell and freedom to do it & you just end up with mindless crap.

For the past several years I have been watching alot of the foreign films (subtitles) that have been released here. We get them from the Libary & also the foreign section at Blockbuster.

I don't remember any of the names fo the famous Japanese or French filmakers or any of the actors either. My general thinking is that if it gets released here, There is a good chance that it did pretty well in it's home country.

I don't think any of the ones that I have seen have had probably one tenth the budget of the average Hollywood movie but they usually tell more of a story and rely on the actual art of making a film.

I never saw the American version of "Dance With Me" with Jenfier Lopez but one of the things that was a huge part of the story in the Japanese (original) version was that Ballroom Dancing didn't fit the Japanese Culture and was a violation of how men were supposed to act.

Please don't get me wrong. I am not looking down on anybody here. I still watch American Movies.

I guess a good example would be sports. The difference between professional sports and college sports before college sports became professional sports. Maybe that is not a good example.


The other thing I like about seeing movies from Poland, Iran, France, Germany, Mexico, Argentina, Japan, or any of the other various Countries is that it can give you insight into the cultures of those places. I remember an Iranian Movie that is about a boy and pair of shoes. They actually got me to care about the boy and his shoes. For me, They "pulled it off"

Here are some movie sites if you want to see how a movie is rated before you watch it. You can also get ideas about movies to rent on these sites also.


www.imdb.com

http://www.metacritic.com/

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/


May the Force be with you

Whooping Cranes

Check out the National Wildlife Federation Whooping Crane Web page

http://www.nwf.org/wildlife/whoopingcrane/

"There is only one wild migratory flock of whooping cranes of about 194 birds. The flock migrates from Wood Buffalo National Park in Canada to Aransas National Wildlife Refuge in Texas. This arduous journey of 2,700 miles takes weeks.In the 1950s, there were less than 20 birds left. Governments and conservation groups helped save the flock. " Read more on the web page - click the link above.


The Whooping Crane is a pretty awesome bird to look at but at the same time still pretty fragile as a species. I haven't visited t the Aransas Refuge for quite a few years now & I hope I get a chance to go down there sometime pretty soon.

I hope the Supergroup "The Whooping Cranes" does happen. I guess we will have to wait and see what Bob Dylan, Neil Young, Willie Nelson decide. I know it would be one hell of a concert/event.

Mance Lipscomb

Mance Lipscomb was from Navasota Texas and like Lightnin' Hopkins had early exposure to farm work. Lightnin' told the story about how he was working one day and he just started walking & then just kept on going. From what I have read, Mance's dad was the one to walk away in his family and left Mance (Derived from eMANCipation) to support the family. He would work all day and play in the evenings at Barnyard dances & such.

I first learned about him from a book of Song Transcriptions by Stefan Grossman called Texas Blues which is part of a 5 book series that also includes Mississippi Blues, Rev Gary Davis Blues, Ragtime Blues, & Country Blues. If you are interested in learning fingerpicking style blues, I would highly recommend the series. Stefan has a catalog and a web page which you can find by doing an internet search.

Mance played blues but also played other types of music and was know as a "Songster" He knew over 600 Songs and was an excellent guitar player and musician and was basically huge.

When I played the gig last Friday which did happen to be in a barn near Navasota, I did throw in a Mance Lipscomb tune called Charlie James. It is kind of cool to me to think that he probably played at some point in a barn not to far from where I was.

Blues for Food

Tonight (sunday) I stopped over and listened to a few tunes a the "Blue Flash" blues jam in Alief. I didn't stick around to jam since I wanted to head over to the Annual Blues for Food drive at the Shakespeare Pub on Memorial.

They were collecting canned food for the Houston Food Bank and had bands playing from 2pm all the way till 2 am. "Spare Time" Murray was going to finish things off with his weekly blues jam.

It is a great tradition and a great cause. I have been going to the Shakespeare Pub ("Home of the Blues") for several years on and off. Tonight was the first time I have ever spoken with the lady who is one of the owners. She seemed like a delightful person & was telling me how the food banks are all low on food because of the recent huricanes.

I have to take me hat off to these folks for making a difference.

Quesadilla style Chicken Tacos

A recipe for tacos is about like a recipe for a sandwich. But if you really want to make them right, You need to a cast iron pan. I have a cast iron griddle made by Lodge like the one pictured above. Martha Stewart swears by these things. I heard that since she got out of prison she swears much more than she used to.

Pre-heat the griddle but not too hot.

Put only enough cooking oil on it so that it covers just a small portion of the pan. Heat up one side of the tortilla without getting too much oil on it and then turn it over and let the other side get some oil on it. Put some Sharp Cheddar Cheese and cut up or shredded Chicken in the middle and fold it over and cook both until they are browned but it is not too hard. Also, you want the cheese to be completely melted and the chicken to be hot. This is why you don't want the pan too hot so you give it time to heat up the cheese & chicken with out buring the tortilla.

Then put it on some paper towels to drain the oil. Since you were carful not to get too much oil on the inside-side, It will not be too greasy.

Then add plenty chopped Iceberg Lettuce and tomatoes.

You should have some pretty authentic tasting tacos.

As far as spices, either use picante sauce to top it off or add it to the chicken directly. Chili powder & paprika both will work. If you want to take the time to do it, You can chop up some garlic & onions & carmelize them in a pan & then add in the cooked chicken (chopped or shredded) & then add the spices.

You can make up to three or four at a time. Once you have the step done where it has the chicken & cheese and it is folded, leave it on the edge of the pan and start heating up the next tortilla. Remove them all from the pan at the same time and add the lettuce and tomatoes right way serve them while they are hot.

If you want to make a different type of taco, You can substitute whatever you want for the Chicken. If you want to go vegetarian, Try black beans. If you use canned black beans, put them in a colander and rinse off all the goop that they are packed in.

I usually use corn tortillas myself but flour will work also if you are trying to gain a few pounds.


Next week I think I will cover Grilled Cheese Sandwiches.

"Left on 2"

Those were the directions to the gig last friday night. Just head towards Navasota from Hempstead & Take a left on FM 2 & it's the 4th driveway on the right.

I went out to Brookshire and cut over on 359 through Pattison & Monaville. It was much more relaxing drive than I would usually have going through Hoston rush hour traffic for an early Friday night gig.

It was a good opportunity to get a good listen to Neil Young's latest CD which Larry Jackson gave me. Larry is a friend from work who is a huge music and Neil Young fan. I have seen Neil twice this century and both times went with Larry. The first time was in the Summit/Compaq Center/Lakewood Church venue with CSN&Y, & the second time was the Greendale Conert at Cynthia Woods Pavillion.

This record was the perfect soundtrack for my commute. It is amazing how rural it gets so close to home. It really makes you remember that you are in Texas.

Neil does have a band backing him up on this CD but he plays acoustic guitar and it sounds like Vintage Neil.

I had read an article in a magazine that he had recorded the first three songs between the time he was diagnosed with a brain aneurysm and the operation. He also wrote & recorded the songs in the order they are presented. He actually would write the lyrics the night before and then run through the song with the other musicians the next day at the recording session. What an Amazing Dude. I hope Lynyrd Skynyrd will remember that we really do "need him around anyhow"

The gig was at the Haven Hill Farm which is a nice place. It is on rolling hills and has a lake, lots of horses, pastures, & stables. When I got there I saw my old freind Dennis Ginn who was in charge of entertainment for the party & had hired me for the event. His wife Nancy & son Bill were there also & Nancy was going to be competing in the Carriage Driving competition the next day. He had a sound system arleady set up with Asleep at the Wheel cranking out the Western Swing. They served up dinner & drinks & I played for about 30 minutes & then they had a drawing and an Auction & then I played for about another hour or so. About 8 of the people there had enough to drink that they wanted to dance and there was one dude, "Dr Bill" who was leading the way.

The staff were all very nice folks and Mario hung out with me while I loaded up my stuff. He lives at the farm and had recently broken his hand when he got attacked by a Pit Bull in Navasota.

Official World Series Memorabilia

I have lived in Houston for quite some time and I know people( if yoiu know what I mean). I didn't make it out to the World Series because I was otherwise engaged not going to the World Series but a friend of mine was thinking about me and brought me an actual World Series peanut from Game 4. I am thinking that if I can get the team to sign it, It might be worth something.

I have always liked the PBS show Antiques Roadshow & now I have an excuse to go stand in line and meet the experts. I hope the one that looks at my peanut wears the white gloves and puts it on one of the special felt covered item holders with a little light attached to it. I guess I need to practice looking surprised when they tell me how valuable it is.

Louis Jordan

http://www.louisjordan.com/history.asp


Back around 1981 I was at a friends house listening to records and he put on "Joe Jackson's Jumpin Jive" I read the liner notes and it was the first time I ever knew about Louis Jordan. Here is a link to a page that has samples of the songs you can hear on your computer. http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00000HY5I/103-5295015-0075010?v=glance




http://www.zoo.co.uk/~primer/pdjordan.html

"...From 1942 to 1951, Jordan scored an astonishing 57 R&B chart hits (all on Decca). This may come as a surprise to some and yet there won't be many who don't know at least half a dozen of the man's hits. How about 'Let The Good Times Roll', 'Caldonia', 'Buzz Me', 'Choo Choo Ch' Boogie', 'Ain't That Just like a Woman', 'Ain't Nobody Here but Us Chickens', 'What's The Use Of Getting Sober', 'Beans and Cornbread', 'Saturday Night Fish Fry', and 'Blue Light Boogie..."



Check out what Sammy Davis Jr. & some other cool "cats" had do say about Louis Jordan here: http://www.louisjordan.com/allquotes.asp

Show Biz Music News - "The Whooping Cranes"

www.ape.com/entermazementpressrel/02345%/copyright/047

a.p.e News Service
November 3, 2005 10:57.32

"The Whooping Cranes" The next Super Band

(from thier press release earlier today)
Entermazement Management is pleased to announce that the next Super-Allstar Legend Band is in the Works. The Details are yet to be worked out but the concept phase is Completed.

The Band:

Willie Nelson
Bob Dylan
Neil Young
Melissa Ethridge



Both Bob Dylan and Willie Nelson are All-star "Legend" Super Group veterans and Neil Young was part of Crosby Stills Nash & Young.

Expect original material plus a tip of the hat to a few greats also with sounds ranging from un-plugged acoustic to power chords, steel guitar, string arrangements, and who knows what else these great artists may come up with.

While Entermazement Management intends for it to be an artistic commercial venture & maintains a philosophy that Artists be compensated for there efforts, The name "The Whooping Cranes" is intended to bring attention to conservation of habitat and wetlands in the Gulf Coast Region and further to promote Conservation of the Planet as a whole. It has been suggested that a Greendale style Multimedia presentation accompany a live concert broadcast. In keeping with the Entermazment policy, the final decisions will always be made by the Artists themselves.

Voter Guide

http://www.lwvhouston.org/VotersGuideNov0005/HarrisEnglish.pdf

Click on the above link to get the Voter Guide for Harris County.

Read the guide & then Get out and Vote!

White Walls

http://www.whitestripes.com/ http://www.theredwalls.com/




I saw the Redwalls on Conan Obrian so I guess most of the kids will know who they are. The guy(on right in picture) kinda sounded like Rod Stewart. The dude in the front is his younger brother & him and the other guy on the left sang harmony backup vocals. They have the whole late 60s British Invasion thing working but thier hair is not quite big enough & the cloths are a little less colorful.


The White Stripes have been around a little longer and have several CDs out so I will have to try to figure out which one to get. I saw them being interviewed on Charlie Rose (PBS). For some reason he kind of gets on my nerves but these two were a pretty interesting interview. Jack did most of the talking. Meg is the Drummer and does some vocals also & Jack is guitar & vocals and I think keyboard sometimes also. They are a Two-Man-Band except for the fact that Meg is not a man. They are sort of Punk with a Blues roots.

Carriage Inn

This gig was at 10:30 this morning I wanted to not be in a rush setting up so I left the house at about 8:20. It kinda reminded me of getting up early to go fishing. Of course I did't get up quite that early but it had the expedition type feel like I was doing something.

This place is located not too far from where I live. It is a retirement Community and not an assisted living center. They residents have thier own apartments/condos but they do have a dining area and meals are provided. .

I played in the "living room" which is located adjacent to the dining area. They moved the furniture around and placed the couches so they faced me and brought in additional chairs. While I was setting up, the lady who hired me told me they never know what to expect and there could be anywhere from 2 to 20 people that might show up.

I was scheduled to play exactly one hour & I played about 1 hour and 8 minutes. They did do a good job advertising the show and there was a good turn out. All the seats were filled & some folks standing.

The challenge this gig presented is that I needed to entertain these folks for an hour straight. & unlike most gigs I have played, There was no drinking, eating, & not much conversation going on either. They basically all were there to watch and hear. If I bombed, I knew the room would soon be empty. It was a very honest but polite group. They laughed at some of my jokes but there were a couple that left the room silent. It is a hell of a thing to come to a part of the show where you are going for a chuckle and you look out into the room and everybody is looking straight back at you with either no expression or a look of confusion. It is a completely different type of silence. I am know alot of people think I am strange but I loved it.

I knew exactly where I was with these poeple and It was real. & that my friends is what live music and particularly the blues is about. Truth.

Not that that is a definition for the blues. In fact I don't there is a good defintion but I do think one of the basic ingredients is raw truth.

Later

Howdy

Hi,

Welcome to my "Blog" (Short for WebLog). I guess it would have been less typing to just type out Web Log in the First Place. Sorry for the Confusion.


I don't know how often I will update it but I figure it will give me something to do instead of watching TV.

I checked around and compared prices and found that this was as good as any deal out there. My web site is a free site (freeservers.com) also but it does have those irritating pop-ups and banner ads.

In the Bizzaro Univers, there is a Dude Named Marc Twyman who has made it to the big time and has a fancy web site to go with it.