Cover Band

A garage rock band is nothing more than some guys and gals who live in the neighborhood and know some musical instrument and enjoy the same music played on the radio and like to get together and try and duplicate that sound.

If they get good, they might go on to great fame and fortune, but that is for another story.

A garage rock band has to first find a place to make their noise. A room is usually too small to cram the drums in, so it is the basement or the garage. Both spaces have wonderful acoustics and lack enough electricity.

In the maze of extension cords and feeding back microphones, with the smell of oil and the moldy dampness, this rag tag group searches for songs they all know. Once a list is made, each has to find enough chords and note they can play. It is a learning experience.

They may be good enough for the police to come by, but proud parents wanting to show off the skills of their children who couldn’t get a place on the team or be invited to join a fraternity, find events that will accept their sound for free.

Birthday parties, pool parties, bar mitzvahs, school dances, battle of the bands…. It is all a progression.

Each show will get better and better due to practice and bonding together.

To be popular they play dance music heard on the radio and records, but styles change. Players who could reproduce English pop couldn’t fill the sound of horns in funky town. Kids would come and go as the garage band morphed into different forms and configurations.

Some breakaways consider themselves composers but without proper promotion and airplay to convince the kids this was the new sound, they fade away or become local celebrities.

The garage bands that want to take the cover to other’s songs decide on one group and pantomime them.

Tribute bands are cover bands that dress and act and play like what they have seen in concert and YouTube videos of bands that made the Big Time. The audience knows what to expect when they see the promotion for a ‘Grateful Dead tribute band’ or a ‘Pink Floyd tribute band’ or a ‘Kiss tribute band’ or a ‘Captain and Tennille tribute band’. Of course they will never measure up to the original but people like to relive when the music was.

After awhile the drummer decides to get a job at the car wash, the bass player gets caught embezzling from his day job at the bank, the keyboard player impregnates his girlfriend, the singer dies of a bad dose, and the guitar player decides to produce instead of the road.

What about those BIG cover bands?

An orchestra is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which mixes instruments from different families, including bowed string instruments such as violin, viola, cello, and double bass, as well as brass, woodwinds, and percussion instruments, each grouped in sections. Other instruments such as the piano and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments.

A full-size orchestra may sometimes be called a symphony orchestra or philharmonic orchestra. The actual number of musicians employed in a given performance may vary from seventy to over one hundred musicians, depending on the work being played and the size of the venue. The term chamber orchestra (and sometimes concert orchestra) usually refers to smaller-sized ensembles of about fifty musicians or fewer. Orchestras that specialize in the Baroque music of, for example, Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel, or Classical repertoire, such as that of Haydn and Mozart, tend to be smaller than orchestras performing a Romantic music repertoire such as the symphonies of Johannes Brahms. The typical orchestra grew in size throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, reaching a peak with the large orchestras (of as many as 120 players) called for in the works of Richard Wagner, and later, Gustav Mahler.

Orchestras are usually led by a conductor who directs the performance with movements of the hands and arms, often made easier for the musicians to see by use of a conductor’s baton. The conductor unifies the orchestra, sets the tempo and shapes the sound of the ensemble. The conductor also prepares the orchestra by leading rehearsals before the public concert, in which the conductor provides instructions to the musicians on their interpretation of the music being performed.

The leader of the first violin section, commonly called the concertmaster, also plays an important role in leading the musicians. In the Baroque music era (1600–1750), orchestras were often led by the concertmaster or by a chord-playing musician performing the basso continuo parts on a harpsichord or pipe organ, a tradition that some 20th century and 21st century early music ensembles continue. Orchestras play a wide range of repertoire, including symphonies, opera and ballet overtures, concertos for solo instruments, and as pit ensembles for operas, ballets, and some types of musical theatre (e.g., Gilbert and Sullivan operettas).

Amateur orchestras include those made up of students from an elementary school or a high school, youth orchestras, and community orchestras; the latter two typically being made up of amateur musicians from a particular city or region.

This cover band usually comes out dressed to the nines sitting in a semi-circle seated with music stands facing the audience. The maestro stands with his back to the audience (how rude?) and waves all the players to reproduce what is written on the pages in front of them. If the audience approves with applaud, he turns around and takes a bow (as if he did anything more than keep time) then points out the band’s caste system. No one ever introduces the oboe player.

When you buy a ticket, know what you are about to listen to.

Why didn’t I think of that?

Was listening to an interview the other day. It was from ancient history but something caught my eardrob.

The speaker, Mister Robert Wyatt of the progressive musical as semblance called “Soft Machine”, was talking about their sets on stage.

“Why play a one hour concert and not three minute songs?

You do a number and stop and everyone loses attention but if you keeping going continuously they can’t lose attention until you are ready to stop anyway.

Where the group can tune up but the audience shuffles around and lites cigarettes and…”

“Ah Ha” moment!!!

For anyone who performs to an audience, one must understand that the public gets bored easily and given half a chance will wander.

Unlike a book where the reviews have been wonderful but into a couple of chapters you mind starts to glaze over but you plod forward trying to find that sweet spot that will reward your expectations.

Every orchestra can acknowledge that after intermission, half the audience has left the building.

The next time you go to a concert (or check out a YouTube video of your favorite live act) and see all the seemingly confusion between songs. Maybe everyone has to retune or switch instruments or get a drink or fix a plug or take a leak or whatever slows down the show, but it happens.

If there is a good front man (or woman) who can keep the interest focused while all this other humdrum is going on with folks in black all scurrying around the stage and terrible sounds coming out of the speakers in hopes that the delays will be as short as lines waiting for flights.

If you give an audience enough time they will order another drink, settle back into some discussion about why China wants to land on the dark side of the moon, or any other distraction because the music is NOT playing.

I have recordings to remind me of those awkward breaks that the audience had to endure.

The worst were the dance numbers. Get everyone hopping to the keen riffs and pounding beat then a speaker blows out and everything comes to a grinding halt. While repairs or adjustments are being made, the dancers wander off into the distance.

Sometimes a slow song will bring them back to the dance floor so they can hang their sweaty teenage bodies on each other or you might as well pack up.

It is good advice: Keep the show going, no matter what.

Things You Learn If You Pay Attention

There is some science out there realizing one who is described, as ‘artist’, is different from what was expected.

Whether it is mental health or just an extra chromosome, we are different.

While others sit and wonder why, we express ourselves. While others look on, we perform the history, dreams, good and bad of life, seemingly to understand the mystery.

Much of my life I don’t remember.

I can relate to certain dates and places but can’t remember who else was there or what we did.

Yet, I can remember the wallpaper design. The smell of oil ties a connection between living in the mountains and living at the beach. Flashes of images, either recorded in my mind or on paper, give glimpses of a past without sub-titles.

Can you look at a photo and remember the feel of the clothing.

Sensory overload happens when I walk into a room. A room I may have entered a dozen times, my senses gather the lights and shadows, the sounds and the smells, the feel of the room.

Overwhelmed with places to look and explore like opening a book and flipping through the pages. Not only do I see the photos hanging on the wall, but also I notice how they are hung, the placement, the order, the frames, and the mats. The subject of the photo or artwork and how it matches the wall color and the surrounding adornments is more than interior design, but personal taste.

Museums are a difficult traverse. Though designed to be unobtrusive to the artwork, the pedestals, cameras, lighting, sounds of the footsteps and the whispered breathing of participants in this cathedral of artistic presentation become the experience.

There is probably a psychological ‘ism’ for this absorption of awareness, but it is the artist curse.

Don’t lose it in the day-to-day boring rush to check and see if anyone sent you a text about some food they ate or how their baby pooped.

It is a gift.

Writing….

Put a pen or pencil to an empty page and scribble some lines to form a letter. Connect that letter with another letter and form a word. Line up a bunch of words and make a sentence. Collect several sentences with the same thought and form a paragraph. Gather the paragraphs in order and you have written a book.

There seems to be some mystic about authors who write books. Anyone can write a book. We all have something to say and books are a good way to tell others.

Recently I read about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Abortion:_An_Historical_Romance_1966

I probably read this in the 70’s like all the other radical writings of the time, but didn’t know about the library.

http://brautiganlibrary.com/index.html

What a great idea, a library reservoir for unpublished books to be available for anyone to read.

I worked at the local public library during college. I was never a good student or an avid reader so the library was just another room I didn’t venture into.

In college I became aware of the behind-the-scenes activity of running this massive storage house for pubic consumption of knowledge. I was working in the middle of the Internet of the time with resources most don’t appreciate.

Here were books written on every subject imaginable purchased by the city to be cataloged for easy access and with only a library card (sorta like a ‘terms and conditions’ agreement to your browser) and you can take a book(s) home and read them at your leisure with a promise to bring them back.

The artificial intelligence at the time was called a librarian. They would guide your request to the proper room for browsing or sending one of the pages to retrieve your reading.

The only request in the library was to be QUIET!

This blog “Just Another Life” is an unpublished book or journal or continuing thought process of one person’s point of view that was started 10 years ago as a challenge and grew from silliness to deep personal reactions to topical thoughts never spoken to another human out loud. There are even pictures.

Instead of printing the pages and binding the pages and trying to find fame and fortune with constant book reviews and signing tours, I posted my thoughts online for anyone to read or comment.

Why?

As I express many times, everyone has something to say. Whether it be combining words or painting on canvas or singing out loud or shuffling around the floor, we all express ourselves. It is our dialog with humanity.

With a click we can now instantly search for any question from DIY techniques with visual variations to how to boil water and even an on line encyclopedia (don’t forget to donate) that is as current as your refresh button can handle.

What do you say?

Why Don’t They Tell Us?

You are creative.

Everyone has the power creative, but many do not understand the magic. They suppress the wonder and rot in routine.

But you have found the gift.

It wasn’t written on the back of your birth certificate or taught in any classroom. It was presented to you and you accepted it. (Alison Leslie Gold)

Even through weak eyes and dirty glasses you view the wonders so many miss. You can’t help it.

As if in some weird psychedelic visual the blades of grass and the shadows and the bird songs that many pass by is your pallet. The colors nature presents that no one can match change before your eyes everyday. How can people not appreciate the sky and clouds but be restrained to the domain of dullness?

How do you explain this wonder to another? A few seem to be in the club with the secret handshake and will freely converse in their interpretations of our combined experiences.

This creativity does have its obligations. This creative stuff needs to be expressed.

The ‘others’ will come admire your presentation and wonder why they cannot do that (of course we all know, they can)

The ability is in all of us, like breathing, but we have to realize the gift and us it.

It is not just painting or sculpture or writing or poetry or dancing or singing or acting or the many common forms declared as ART, but those who created the airplane or the crosswalk or zippers or bubble gum (see how it all comes back around?)

What they didn’t tell you, it doesn’t go away.

You sleep only brings dreams of macaroni and bank robberies and dirty old buildings. The morning brings a new amazing blank screen that will make each day a lasting memory.

How long with this pixie-dust last, is unknown. The grandfather smile before he closed his eyes may have been a sign if anyone noticed. The quilt passed down and added onto through the generations may have a bigger story to tell.

Age is slowing down the body, but not the ability to enjoy the visions and the sounds and the thoughts that flood the mind. When that goes?

Take time to listen to a street musician or a corner shop poet. They are trying to express themselves without the costly promotion and marketing. This creativity is all around and it is free.

This post is coming to an end, but in every corner of the room, the light reflecting off the screen, the tapping of the keys, the imagined dance steps to the music, and I’m lucky enough to participate.

Now that is something to be thankful for.

Sophomore

As an artist, experimentation is key. A painter has many mediums and pallets, a dancer has styles from ballet to free form, a writer has science fiction to historical novels, a musician has classical to rock and roll, a singer has religious choir to solo rap each giving the artist trials of what works best for their techniques and preference.

Once presented to the public (and critics) the artist must decide to continue with that particular style or go in a different direction. If the work is popular it could continue the financial security but stifle the creative urge to explore. Plus the taste of the public is fickle.

An artist, who can make a ‘name’ for themselves through media coverage and promotion, can carry on so that anything done will be considered art due to celebrity. Will the ‘art’ become a corporation stifling creativity?

Think of the bands that came out with a hit record only to fade away. The record companies want another bestseller and the management wants additional funds for photo sessions, interviews, write-ups, and tour dates to promote the last hit, yet maybe there is domestic tension within the members and the writing fails to succeed in the sophomoric record. Few will get a chance for a third try.

Good luck.

Stage Presences

Persona grata is always a positive and rewarding and sometimes financially beneficial to an artist.

An artist, no matter what category, must sell themselves to an audience to be recognized, thus a stage presence is necessary to not only sell your work but your value.

Some of the earliest painters worked the hierarchy of the nobles for grants to create. Now art and craft fairs dot the landscape offering imagination and artisan with a value to recover cost of materials and time to continue the creative journey.

Have you ever watched a play? A presentation of words and songs and everyone on the stage is moving and making a moment to remember. The same is true with a rock concert or a dance or even an orchestration event.

While an orchestra sits still in there black uniforms, the conductor keeps the audience amused until all can stand to get their applause. A singer on a stool with a guitar must keep the crowd interested before the sound of laugher and bottles clinking drown out the message.

Politicians work-the-room very well. Pointing out people of importance or acknowledging those who are paying attention.

So artist, get off your holier-than-though and welcome people to your art. Learn to interact with the common folk who are just venturing by to see what there is to see. Make a connection and that ‘stage presence’ will turn into dollars filling your wallet.

Break out of your shell and give it a try.