From Dan Lewis' "Now I Know", here is a snap of the first known coupon in America, and your trivia quota. Coke figures in today's blog. The winter solstice and I stayed inside with good books and good intentions. I’ve constructed a complex circuit that created more questions than answers. Ray-B called and we talked music theory for most of an hour. I’ll get to that. I’m in the home stretch with “Eclipse”, which coasts along in a unique mixture of warfare and courtroom drama, never preferring one over the other. That’s a gift.
The book also takes digs at the big picture. The Chinese whose human rights abuses are their foreign policy, the total corruption of overseas American corporations, and the sad fact that God put all the really good oilfields in really bad countries. The author keeps the tale lively by throwing in these nuggets, and he is totally convinced of the superiority of American lawyers, forgetting that most of the world does not think so.Patterson, the writer, also has a tendency to cook up fantasies that non-American readers might not latch on to. He does go on about older men with younger women like it is not natural. Somebody could tell him that people elsewhere are not really that shocked to learn a 15 year old girl is sexually active. The way things are going, that might be her only chance for variety before she balloons out on Big Macs and joins a dating club.
Ray-B reports Johnny D is doing an open mic on the beach. If it wasn’t already so late, I’d have headed over, not having seen Johnny for what, three years now? No doubt, he’s got the same tunes but I did not care to jam with him for one reason. His guitar technique uses a lot of bass string work. He does not compensate for this when a bass player arrives. The low guitar notes clash with the upper bass notes, making for a muddy sound that bespeaks amateurism. Then again, I do play a lot of upper bass notes and don't compensate for the lower guitar parts.
But this time, I play guitar and don’t need accompaniment. Johnny was very influential in my strumming, since he was one of the few guitarists that would have made a great country duo. Alas, solo performers rarely sustain the ability to team up with others over time, though some of them talk the talk. I require a non-singing rhythm player and that takes some doing around here. I specify non-singing so I don't wind up teaching the other guy to solo.
The topic quickly turned to rhythm styles, since Ray-B agrees with most of my analysis of what I need on stage. We put in an hour on musical theory. I will never consider jazz an “advanced” form of music, rather a cacophonic 1940’s flash in the pan whose primary role is to sell more guitar lessons. Ray-B learns by watching other players, myself I don’t yet know enough to know what to look for. We concur that most on-line lessons consist of some dull guy showing off.
The correct blend seems to be lighter strumming with more bass runs. My wrist conditioning for bass makes this super hard work for me. Ray-B reports Sweeny is playing out in Sunrise, I may go out to see the show. I only know her from a couple tunes over the years when I was in the audience. The word is she still plays everything with the same strum, something I’m striving to avoid from the start. But I need to see how others are being hired to do this and how to maintain the competitive advantage.
Author's note 2015-12-21: at this time I do not know if this "Sweeny" is or could be the same lady I finally met at the Broadwalk last month. I strongly suspect it is. ". . . plays everything the same way" is not something I would forget.]
Guitarist number 18 is on hold for Xmas. This is the guy who answered my ad last August. If nothing else, he is consistent about answering my e-mails. That hasn’t happened before. His name is Trent, and he has passed other tests as well. For example, I’ll provide a song list that I know will choke a blues or rock guitarist who only claims to play country. Or I’ll mean-mouth a guitar hero to see how stuck on idol worship the new guy can be. So far, he’s passed.
Anything else? Well, I was a good neighbor and lent out my garden rake. Then I looked up all my meds in “The Pill Book” seeing most are half the strength I had to take five years ago. Give me another Robynette (nice young wife) and I’ll make the Olympics yet. I love my new Ibanez stage guitar, and so do most people. One thing, when I bought it, the lady threw in an expensive tuner, saying her husband couldn’t get the built-in unit to work. Don’t ask me, it works perfectly.
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