Thinking about getting a real soprano uke

I have been having a good time playing around with Ru-Jun's toy $20 soprano uke, since I was able to get it into the BEAD tuning that I'm used to on my other ukes.  That uke does not stay in good tuning and doesn't sound very good overall. So I want to get a real soprano uke.  For the heck of it, I'm thinking about getting this pineapple uke.  It should be fun...

merging folk and electronica

I've been thinking a lot about strange hybridizations and juxtapositions that might be possible with acoustic instruments.  Here is a uke guy who does some amazing electronica sounds with his (pretty high end acoustic electric) uke. It's quite amazing. The acoustic pickup can be used in essentially infinite ways to make sounds that are the same as analog synths. So this is one angle on the idea of producing modern sounds with roots instruments.  There are other angles, such as doing covers of electronica music on all acoustic instruments, which would appropriate the song into a different sound genre.

Sugar Hiccup - Cocteau Twins

From 1988. This is very early in the SG era and arguable a precursor.  I've seen it argued that CT invented the instrumental, "ethereal" sound of SG and 4AD records became known for this sound. Pale Saints and Lush followed at 4AD and became two of the central bands of the SG sound.

Rave Down - Swervedriver

[link]  Among other things, these guys have one of my favorite band names.  They have a pretty tight, polished sound among those on the hard rock end of SG. There is definitely some overlap with more mainstream hard rock of the time.

Train whistle sounds

Here is a great explanation and some samples of various train whistle sounds.

Stella Harmony

A close friend of my parents, who sung folk songs in our church back in the day, was cleaning out her house and my parents got this guitar from her to give to me. The Stella Harmony was a very popular folk guitar in the 60s.  It's still in great shape and sounds good.  I absolutely cannot play chords in standard tuning, so I decided to tune it in Taro Patch slack-key (DGDGBD) and am able to make music with it now.  It will be fun to mess around with.

train whistles

I grew up about 1/2 mile from a major railroad line.  Just visited there this week. The chord of a train whilstle, which is something like a minor 7th chord, has a huge amount of narrative quality.  My predilection toward this type of chord is probably explained by this influence during my childhood.

Pitch the Baby - Cocteau Twins

[link] The first song on 1990's amazing album Heaven or Las Vegas. Did a lot of driving to this album back in the early 90s. Really great set of songs all around.

Soprano uke

[link] I bought this uke as a toy for Ru-Jun; it cost $20 new.  It doesn't sound like much but I finally got it into the tuning that I play (the gears are really crappy on it) and have been messing around with it. Off to Palmyra for a few days.  Will catch up on blogging when we get back.

Rev it Up - Jerry Harrison

From 1988.  I've always like the basic groove of this song. Was pretty popular on college radio in the day.

Sweet Water Pools - Screaming Blue Messiahs

[link] I've always liked these guys' rather nonsensical lack of control.  They have some really good, sweet songs, and can clearly write and play.  But they also seem really nonchalant about it.  It's cool.

House - the Psychedelic Furs

[link] One of the better of their later body of work.  The chorus is very hooky.  Good to see them still rocking.

Lights Go Out - the March Violets

[link] One of my favorite of the 80s goth bands. They still kept the lighter poppy side of the sound, unlike the better known Sisters of Mercy and most of the other well known goth acts.

Porcelain - Pretenders

[link] Great to see live footage of the Pretenders from 1980. They were great with very simple, but sophisticated, guitar and bass licks.  They could turn them into incredible hooks. Less than two years after this, guitarist James Honeyman-Scott and bassist Pete Farndon were both dead from drug-related causes.  The two LPs with this original lineup were their best (as well as stuff that was on EPs).  Their first album with their post-1982 lineup, Learning to Crawl, was also amazing.

Weightless - Thomas Dolby

[link] An epic classic.  The conventional parts of this song are bouncy pop, sort of, at first.  Then it builds through a B-ish part. Then there is a break. Atmosphere through out.  Then back to the bouncy little verse. Then the cycle repeats.  The whole effect puts me in a late-tech/retro world, existential, lonely.  The little song near the end completes the loneliness and nostaligia.  I've never heard pop like this by anyone else.  Ending on the bouncy little verse provides the abruptness that finishes the thought and the feel.

Miss Drugstore - Medicine

[link] From 1992.  Hard edged SG from its early high period.  Pretty conventional in the song structure.  The SG comes from the guitar sound and the vocal and production.

One Simple Thing - the Stabilizers

Remembered because of the similarity of the band names (not the sounds). [link] From 1986.  A great pop/rock song.  The video is more over-wrought than the song.  The mid-late 80s were full of really image conscious stuff, most of the time trying to cover up the vapidity of the music.  But in this case, the song is worth listening to.  Even if these guys put every good musical idea they'll ever have into it and didn't do anything else after that (as may be the case here).

I See Red - the Silencers

[link] Great mid-80s alternative pop hit. I think these guys were mainstream pop in the UK and elsewhere but I only heard them on college/alternative stations here.  This song brings back some memories...

Bigfoot

Love bigfoot/yeti/sasquatch/skunkape stories and the classic (now pretty much known to be faked) footage form the Pacific NW footage from the 70s scared the crap out of me as a kid.  Of course, there is no way bigfoot can be real.  There would be physical evidence all over the place.  But here's they way I would write bigfoot in a SF story: they are the remnant of a civilization that predated Homo sapiens. Thousands of years ago, aliens arrived, made contact with them, and befriended them.  The aliens left behind a cloaked space station to watch over them and protect them.  These aliens had the power to eliminate all signs of the bigfoot species existence to H. sapiens. The plot of the story would be that the alien civilization is in decline and has not visited or provisioned the space station for hundreds of years.  There is only one alien left on the station and it is his/her job to continue to protect the bigfoots.  Something like that.

Shirley Temple Tidal Wave - Airiel

[link] From 2005.  Latter day SG that really gets the sound down and even enhances it was a smoothness and a melding of the layers.