Ain't Too Proud To Beg

Last week, some high school kids approached me about a project they were working on and wondered if I would answer some questions. I agreed and their first question was a huge, fascinating, and vague one: How do you feel about homelessness? I went on to answer a bunch of their questions and although I feel like I got my point across, it got me to thinking that I really should organize my thoughts on this matter. First off, let's get clear on what does it mean to be homeless. I'm not talking about a buddy who's crashing for a week on your couch until his basement suite is available for him to move into, I'm talking about so called "rough sleepers". Now to be fair, I know little to nothing of the homeless plight; I mean, this side of seeing Curtis in front of Bar None begging for change. I really have never worked with them or know anything about their life other than what I see and read , although I'm not sure I need to. It seems to me that there might be a conception of homeless people (even in their own mind or so they would have me believe) that they are down on their luck people that lost their job and had no other alternative than the street. From what I can tell, this isn't the case. From what I can see there are 3 types of rough sleepers: mentally ill, drug addicts, and 20 something kids who want to stick it to the man. Many people (friends of mine included) have taken one of three approaches to the homeless and people begging for change: help them by giving them something (food, change, cigarrettes, etc.), not doing anything, or getting in their face about getting a job. I'm not sure that any of these three approaches are particularily effective although I understand the thinking behind each. I'd like to start my thoughts here by changing the vocabulary a bit. "Homelessness" not only suggests that these individuals are without a home, it also presupposes that they want to have a home. How would you account for the paranoid schizophrenic guy in White Rock then that refuses shelter on the basis of that he thinks the government is trying to capture him and that he believes man should be with nature. Shouldn't this individual be free to pursue his values? He isn't harming anyone or anything. Calling him "homeless" would be missing the point/problem. A capitalist society is truly an amazing thing. I would encourage everyone to read anything by Joseph Heath if you disagree with that statement. Imagine a group of people move into a house together. Now most of you know how difficult it can be to manage household chores in a roommate situation. Even when you assign jobs to everyone, there is no guarantee that the other roomates will hold up their end or to the level of expectation that you'd like. The problem is incentive. If your livelihood depended on your ability and quality of doing your chores, things would turn around quite quickly. Also, if you could all divide up the chores to the those that you performed the best at and you found the most satisfying it would be even better. Also, if someone else said that they'd do your job even better than you, it would ensure quality. This is the greatest organizing principles of any society. This is why we enjoy the quality of life that we do. Now what do you do if one of the roommates becomes disadvantaged and can't perform their job. Well, this begs the question, what is his/her disadvantage? Philosopher Martha Nussbaum compiled a list of what she considers to be categories of human functioning which if one doesn't have access to, constitutes a disadvantage. Here is that list: 1. Life - being able to live to the end of a human life of normal length; not dying prematurely, or before one's life is so reduced as to be not worth living. 2. Bodily health - being able to have good health; to be adequately nourished and sheltered. 3. Bodily integrity - being able to move from place to place freely having one's bodily boundaries treated as sovereign. 4. Sense, imagination, and thought - being able to express yourself and being able to have experiences. 5. Emotions - being able to have attachments to things and people outside ourselves. Not having emotional development slighted by fear, anxiety, abuse, or neglect. 6. Practical reason - being able to form a conception of the good and top engage in critical reflection about the planning of one's own life. 7. Affiliation - being able to associate, work, and engage in various forms of interaction with others. 8. Other species - being able to live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants, and the world of nature. 9. Play - being able to laugh, play, and enjoy recreational activities 10. Control over one's environment - being able to participate in political choices. Being able to hold property and employment. 11. Showing gratitude or doing good for others 12. Being able to live in a law abiding fashion 13. Understanding the law The last three were added from Jonathan Wolff and Avner De-Shalit's wonderful book "Disadvantage". All of these disadvantages are based on two premises. Firstly, that these disadvantages are imposed involuntarily. For instance, if someone were to decide that they wanted to only watch Matlock reruns for all of their waking hours, they might make the argument that they are disadvantaged because they don't have any money, but of course that would be ridiculous. Secondly, these disadvantages are based on capability. A barista at Starbucks may think, I'd like to make the kind of money a doctor makes and cry disadvantage because they make a barista's salary, whereas if I were a woman in Saudi Arabia I actually couldn't become a doctor even if I wanted to. So the question of the "homeless" is what is their disadvantage and is it involuntary? Do yourself a favor, go to the front of the Vogue theater one night and ask yourself if those kids out front of it are disadvantaged or do they just want to smoke pot all day? Then have a look a Curtis, who's frozen his feet a few times, has a serious crack habit, and is severely mentally ill. Maybe a better word would be "unemployable". That brings the problem right into focus. These aren't people that could sustain a job. I don't think there is such thing as a functioning meth addict. So what do we do? If we give money to the "homeless" this may help some who are legit, but it also creates a free ride for those who want to not contribute to society's household chores. What about the ones who are legit, but don't want government help? Can or should the government force mentally ill to "stay on their meds"? There is a value to society to help "unemployables". Less crime, less mentally ill, less poverty, and most importantly perhaps, more human compassion. I would like to see my tax dollars spent for the creation and upkeep of a modest facility that offers mental health and drug abuse assessment, medication, and treatment for rough sleepers....well I suppose for everyone. I wouldn't force anyone into my facility but I give them incentive to go to it. Dropping off blankets, offering housing, and food is all compassionate, but it's not providing an incentive to get back into life. There are real solutions now for the drug addicted and mentally ill and we should try to steer people towards that solution. It should sting a bit to be out in the streets and it should feel like the only solution should be to get help. I encourage everyone to read two books, the first of which led me to the second. Crazy: A Father's Search Through America's Mental Health Madness by Pete Earley and American Psychosis: How the Federal Government Destroyed the Mental Illness Treatment System by E. Fuller Torrey. Torrey as once part of the NIMH has a bird's eye view of the situation and persuasively argues for a return to the state hospital model. Although, his detractors rightly bring up many civil liberty issues and they are right to do so, the solution might soon warrant such drastic measures as "homeless" populations continue to grow but perhaps there's an incentive or nudge based solution that might be the way forward.

Always Fresh

Sorry everybody. It's been busy. The marathon is Sunday and I'm going to take another shot at Boston. Things are busy with teaching, practicing, and gigs, so unfortunately blogging has taken a back seat. But now I find myself between soundcheck and gig in Coquitlam. I'm playing tonight for....uh....well, some big event at the Red Robinson show theater at the Coquitlam casino. I was getting lost in YouTube videos of Pat Martino (which will inevitably lead to Fainting Goats) when I realized my mom will be pissed if I don't blog soon (hi Mom). So I was trying to think of things that have been on mind lately.... Oh yeah.... Is nothing sacred? This was a question posed by a friend when confronted with the possibility of a Tim Horton's being opened on Commercial Drive here in Vancouver. For those of you not in the know, here are two givens: Tim Horton's is a doughnut chain here in Canada. Some feel it is as synonymous with Canada as beavers, beer, and hockey. Hell, Tim himself was a hockey player. Also for those of you not in the know, Commercial Drive is an area of Vancouver that's home to many artists of all different mediums and general funky types. Wal-mart haters in other words. So, IS nothing sacred? Well, there are a couple deductions one can make from that statement. One is that, Commercial Drive is sacred. The other is that Tim Horton's will degrade the holy drive. I often hear people refer to Commercial Drive as "THE DRIVE" (picture someone closing their eyes as they say "THE DRIVE") ala "The Village" in New York. This implies a certain smugness. "Where do you live?" "Oh, I live on THE DRIVE". They might as well say, "I'm totally hip, obviously you philistine." My response to "THE DRIVE" is "Oh, Marine Drive? That's near me! Howdy neighbour!" At which point, they give me this look of disgust that I'm so out of touch with what is cool that I don't even know what THE DRIVE that they are talking about. Don't get me wrong, I like Commercial and my friends that live there. I just hate the smugness. Most of the people are not saying THE DRIVE to be smug, I think it's just a phrase that's made it's way into the lexicon of Vancouver-speak that originates with smug asses. However, I think many of those people who are not being smug would also say that "they" shouldn't open a Tim Horton's on Commercial and that IS smug. Let's take a look at 2 scenarios. First off, let's say that the predominant attitude on Commercial is not in favor of T-Ho's. Then, it would die a death because of lack of business from the locals. What about the non-locals? Well, in fact much of the business generated on Commercial Drive comes from the locals (in the 2001 transit strike, while other shopping districts reported a decrease in sales, Commercial reported an increase! That comes from thedrive.ca). In other words, economics 101 would suggest that if no one wants it, it will close. Hippies win. The other scenario, and more likely, is that T-Ho's will thrive. Good, tasty, healthy eats at a low price with quality assurance that Timmy himself puts his name on. So what does it mean to be sacred? I would assume that my friend meant locally owned and operated businesses, not some big corporation, right? Like Cobs Bread on Commercial? Busy Bee Dry Cleaners on Commercial? How come no one considers these franchises to be sabotaging the holiness of Commercial?? I'll tell you why, because they're not fast food. Fast food is the new smoking. It's an easy target so that we can feel morally superior to others. We've hunted down McDonald's, Wendy's, and Burger King, now we're on to doughnuts. People, leave it alone. Tim Horton's will not hurt your neighbourhood. Starbucks is on Commercial and yet Calabria, JJ Bean, and Turks thrive. Leave it to the consumer to make the choice, don't legislate it. I remember reading about an old turn of the century Heinz ad that read something to the effect, "Protect yourself from your local Farmer, buy brand names. Buy Heinz."

i love the Java Jive and IT loves me

I drink a lot of coffee. I love coffee; AND I love going for coffee. The president of Starbucks when asked what his vision for his company was, said that he saw it as the "third place". In other words: home, office, and Starbucks. Now, some might see that as a scary proposition and from a certain perspective it is (anti-trust, monopolization, corporate cannibalism, etc.). However, when I thought about his statement, it does ring true for me a bit. I have read literally hundreds of books, created a website, done taxes, created my business, kept in touch with friends, transcribed hundreds of songs, and drank TONS of coffee at my Starbucks.

I have also learned a lot about people.

I am (obviously) considered a "regular" and there are others of me. My brother is also a regular at my coffee shop although we hold different hours (the staff was floored to learn that we were brothers after serving both of us daily for years). Throughout the years, I've had the opportunity to eaves drop on many conversations.

Right now, I'm sitting beside a bible study group here at the coffee shop. Sorry this is not the coffee blog, it's the religion blog disguised as the coffee blog. Anyone easily offended should either tune in or tune out immediately. I've taken in many religious conversations in fact at my coffee shop. Some intriguing and some annoying. One annoying cliche is this one:

I'm spiritual but not religious.

(Oh Science, I hate that one)

Or the bumper sticker version:

Spiritual people enlighten me, Religious people frighten me.

(Jerome Iginla, that pisses me off!!!)

When I was young I began with the notion that there is no God and being a student of truth, I then searched for evidence. Well, I am now past the searching. I have accepted that there is no God and have quit the search altogether. This is in fact liberating. I've discovered that the world is enough for me. I don't need a heaven. I'm blown away by all of the things around me here on earth that I don't need to think beyond it. In fact, I'm more thoughtful of it. Also, I can't be forgiven by any higher power; I have to be forgiven for my wrong doings by the people around me, which makes me want to do the right thing right away. If this is the only life that there is, then I want to make the most of it and get it right. I have to develop a code of behaviour that is right, not because this book or that book says, but because it IS right. It also helps me to see everyone as equal, not us and them or the saved and heathens.

Although not everyone is like me. Some people need religion and a prescribed code of ethics and people to be around.

I once had a student, let's call him Mike. He had a very tough life. He got into drugs, crime, the underworld.....all while he was a police officer. He is now a born again Christian and he's doing great! He's got his life together and he's doing "good" things. I think there are people in organized religion that have had similar difficulties whether it be drugs or abuse and act out and religion was a way out. Like AA. Perhaps that's why sometimes we see the good church going individual be the sex offender or drug addict or the serial killer. Only 5% of people in AA actually quit drinking.

Now spiritual people. I guess this means that they believe that there is a God but don't want to associated with an organized religion. Does this mean that they believe in creationism? What about life after death? One God or many? Is there a code of ethics in spiritualism? What are the consequences of disobeying those codes? Hell? Heaven? Did Jesus exist? Was he the son of God? How about Buddha? Muhammed? I guess that would be getting to close to an organized religion to start answering those questions and chances are, if you ARE spiritual but not religious, you have never bothered to answer them anyways even though they are crucial to the idea of God.

Religious people frighten me.....so do spiritual people.....as does Steven Seagal.

Start of Something New

Ok. I've been slacking. Not on life. On blogging. I have received three complaints in the last week so I decided to take that as a cue.

So what's new?

Well....lots. First off the St. George Marathon. I ran 3:22 at the St George Marathon in Utah on Oct and considering that my last marathon in Victoria a year earlier I ran 4:02, I felt pretty good about it. I was 11 minutes and 3 seconds away from qualifying for Boston though, so let that be the quest for this year. I guess it was a little too much to ask to take almost an hour off of my marathon time in a year. I'm going to keep up the running blog a little better too, so for more details about how I took 40 minutes off, tune in to robcanrun.blogspot.com otherwise I'll spare the rest of you the geek details.

Some other big news is that I have finally left the Neil Douglas Guitar Shop after 10 years of faithful teaching service. This job has played a pivotal role in my development as a teacher, a guitarist, and an artist. First of all, the students that I have taught in New West have been some of the most talented, committed, and respectful students I've ever had the pleasure of teaching, making it an especially hard decision to move on and at the same time an easy one as a result. The selfish part of me wanted to continue teaching these students, but I really felt as if my ever busy schedule as a professional musician was interfering in the most essential part of the learning process: consistency. Neil and my students have always understood that a big part of my life is playing the guitar professionally, which can be a nightmare sometimes for scheduling. It's recently got to the point where I've had to cut my days from originally when I started there at 6 days a week teaching all the way to 2 days and even with 2 days, I was having to sub out and reschedule a lot. I simply felt it was unfair to my students to continue being their teacher. As hard as it is to give them up, I would rather have them have a set, consistent time and teacher. That coupled with my own teaching studio at home taking off, the amount of gigs that I've been doing, and the right sub being available to take over my job at Neil's, made my final decision for me. The studio at home has been awesome though! The commute is obviously fantastic and being my own boss and controlling my own schedule makes things incredibly easier to accommodate the busy playing schedule. For more info on lessons, check out http://www.robhamilton.ca/lessons/

The Soulstream 10 year anniversary went off like gangbusters. Thanks to all that attended and took in the festivities. A special thanks to CBC for hanging out and recording it and I will keep all of you posted on when it will air. One little thorn in my side though was the obvious lack of advertising for the event. Don't get me wrong, the place was packed and any more people packed in there would've made the fire marshall raise an eyebrow, but in telling some people to come down and celebrate the 10 year with us was met more than once with the reply, "You guys are still playing there?" Uhh.....yeah. Every Monday and Tuesday for 10 years. In other words, some people even close to me were unaware that the gig was still happening, let alone the general public!! What does this say about "getting the word out"? Now, here's this 10th anniversary. A great way to invigorate this gig for another 10 years. Hell, considering the roster and accomplishments of the members of this band, I'm certain that the Georgia Straight, Westender, Terminal City......hell, the Globe and Mail might have done a story. Maybe even a front page. In my opinion this was a golden opportunity for free advertising. A gift really. Oh well. I guess people don't want to make money.

Some of you having been asking about the book, CD, and stuff....

It's all still happening. In fact, quitting Neil's has afforded me some "me" time to focus on the book and getting together some tunes for an album/gig. Randall is going to be doing a regular Thursday at the Yaletown brew pub and so maybe that'll be a great way to start introducing some of the new originals. In the meantime, I've purchased Quicktime Pro which essentially make the laptop into a video camera and I'll be posting some of my lessons on my website as soon as I figure out how to.

OH....and only one week left of High School Musical at Centennial Theater in North Van so make sure you check it out. Kids are losing their mind seeing this show. It sounds like the Beatles at Shea Stadium with all of the screaming. They bring signs and hold them up as if this was the Stanley Cup....they're just loving it. As they should, URP always does great shows and this one is no exception.

That Night in Toronto

If Toronto is the certer of the universe, then I'm at the center of the center of the universe. I'm sitting on the corner of Queen street west and John street in Totonto, directly accross from Much Music. I've come out here to play a gig with Famous Players for the company, Flight Center. The gig was on Saturday night and went well, although the sound was as if we had a digereedoo player with us all night. They have put us up a a great hotel right down by the CN tower and I've taken an extra couple of days here to hang out and basically get some rest.

My good friend Tino lives here now. I have played with Tino for many years in such varied bands as Souldecision, Moka Only, and Retrofits and I'm pretty sure he is one of the funkiest bassists in the country. I remember him explaining that a lot of his practicing simply focused on grooving. He would literally just practice being funky.....and it shows!!!

I met up with him on Friday night at a place called The Drake Hotel. It seemed to me like a place to be seen. The kind of place that you have to stand in a line up for an hour just to get into one of the trendier rooms in the joint....which we did. Later that night, we met up with Coco's dad, John at the Rex and caught some of Mike Murley's set there. The next morning Tino flew off to Halifax to play with Ashley MacIssac, opening for the White Stripes (nice gig, eh??) which worked out well considering we had the Flight Center gig.

Yesterday, the band left and left me here to fend for myself. I decided that I wasn't gonna set my alarm, wake up when I want, and have zero agenda. I did a little exploring and ended up at the Hockey Hall of Fame. Really fascinating and what Canadian in their right mind wouldn't well up a little listening to stories of Rocket Richard, Gordie Howe, and the Great One.

Last night, Tino and I once again hit the road and checked out some local music. We went to a place called The Supermarket in Kensington which had some great, and not so great, singer songwriters doing an open mic. Then we headed over to the College St Bar and watched a funk band, whose repertoire was similar to Soulstream's. They were all great players and really nice.

Today.....we'll see. I might go see a movie. Maybe.

Forget All About That Macho Sh#t and Learn How to Play Guitar

Alright, for those of you that aren't into serious guitar geekness, I would suggest you skip this blog. I recently have had my pedal board made for me and I thought this might be a good opportunity to talk a little about my gear, which I've been asked about a few times.

I've never really looked at myself as a guitarist. I just happen to play the guitar. There are many, many, many guys that can really PLAY THE GUITAR. I have just looked at someone who's participating in music through the guitar. It's only really been in the last 5 years that I think I've actually developed into a guitar player. I didn't even really understand tablature until about 2000. There lives a certain breed of guitarists who owns every video, book, magazine and seem to collect every vintage pedal, amp, and guitar and participate in all of the discussion groups, message boards, and forums concerning our 6 string obsession. I am not one those BUT I'M NOT KNOCKING THEM EITHER. My geeking lies in different areas; theory, music history, and my album collection! Now, that's not to say that I'm not interested in guitar sounds and tone, quite the opposite. I have spent countless hours and dollars trying to get a great sound and I'm thankful to the endless supply of information online to help me investigate these things. It's only recently that I've been nuturing my inner guitar geek.

First off, my guitars:

Washburn H335 semi-hollow body electric. This is one of my most special guitars. I won this guitar when I was 14 from the Lionel Hampton jazz festival for winning the "soloist" category. Basically, you play 2 tunes with a trio with you as the featured instrument. There were all types of instrumentalists competing in this category (saxophonists, bassists, trumpeters, etc.) and I'm guessing if one of them would have won, they would have been presented with an instrument they played. Mine happened to be this Washburn. This guitar was later stolen from me and I found it on EBay. It was about 6 months after the guitar was stolen from me, I was online one night. This was when Ebay was new and I'd heard about this online auction site. I decided to have a look and bingo, up came my guitar. It said it was located in Victoria. I called the police and they suggested I buy it and when I got the guy's email, they would get in touch with him and get the guitar back. Turns out that this guy bought it legitimately at a pawn shop in Vancouver, it just sort of slipped through the cracks. Anyways, I got it back. I have since replaced the electronics on the guitar with a Gibson Humbucker in the neck and a Seymour Duncan Jeff Beck in the bridge. I've used this guitar on jazz gigs and Lee Aaron Metal Queen gigs and it rips. As a jazz guitarist, I've always played hollow bodies and they are the guitars that I'm the most comfortable with regardless of the style of music I'm playing. I always feel a bit like Alex Lifeson in the 70's playing all that great rock stuff on a hollow body.

Gibson ES 175. This is my baby. I love this guitar although it once suffered an injury and it has yet to get into the regular rotation. I was adjusting the truss rod and the screw/nut and the threaded end of rod that the screw is on snapped off. I replaced the entire rod, but the neck has yet to comfortable get back to 7 thousandth of a millimeter of relief at the 7th fret.

Gibson ES 135. This guy has been my workhorse through the last 5 years. One of my favorite guitarists is an Isreali guitarist named Ofer Ganor that I went to Berklee with. I hung out and played a couple of times with him and he played one of these guitars. He played it through a pignose and it was such a great sound!!! This is one of my main guitars with Soulstream.

Kinal Stratocaster. I decided that I wanted famed Vancouver guitar builder Mike Kinal to build me a guitar, but I hadn't decided what to get. My decision came from one of the most unlikely sources: Dr Dre. I have always loved those early NWA (Straight out of Compton) and Snoop Dogg (Doggystyle) albums and the session guitarist for those records had this great strat sound. Growing up, I was obsessed with Stevie Ray and Jimi Hendrix, so a strat was a sound that has always been in my head. Mike builds beautiful instruments and I'm lucky to have this guitar in my collection.

Fender Reissue Japanese Telecaster. I always thought that Andy Summers from the Police had the coolest guitar. In 98 when I saw that Fender had reissued that 50's sunburst tele with the binding around the edges, I had to have one. While playing Joseph and the Technical Dreamcoat, I met a friend after the show briefly and left the guitar in my car. Someone broke in and stole it along with my Roland Cube 60 amp. I was devastated. I did so much work to that guitar (Gibson Humbucker, Gotoh bridge, Tung Oiled Neck). I looked for years to replace the amp and guitar to no avail, scouring Ebay and Craigslist weekly. A year ago some guy walked into the guitar shop I was teaching at with one and I ended up replacing not only the guitar, but also the roland amp a few days later.

Ibanez RG 550. I bought this for the Cirque Pop show at the PNE that required me to play a Joe Satriani tune....plus it just feels so good!!! Everyone should own an Ibanez hockey stick shredder with a Floyd Rose, if for no other reason than fun!

Aria (Made in Spain) nylon string electric acoustic. I bought this at a time when I was just learning how to play classical and fingerstyle in general. When I worked on the cruise ships in 2000 I brought 3 guitars and ended up using this almost exclusively.

Amps:

Vox AC30 2xCCH with Alnico Blue celestion speakers and 2 x 12 extension speaker cabinet with Alnico Blues. The best thing I ever did was buy this amp. I first heard these amps live (aside from the obvious Beatles, U2, Queen, and Radiohead) when I opened for Heart with Lee Aaron. The guitarist had a row of these and his tone was buttery sweet. Then, I heard local guitarist Marc Wyld gushing about the one he just bought and I just happened to be in L&M one day and plugged one in. I just about died. I bought it the next day.

Fender Reissue Twin Reverb. This amp has played over 1000 gigs and sessions for me (think about that....that's a gig a day for almost 3 years straight!!!). It's actually literally fallen apart and put back together (thanks Richard at Backline!!) I think I need to make a plaque in its honor.

Roland Cube 60 (old white one). One of the best little amps ever. My old one was one of the orange ones and Darren Radtke installed a push button on/off switch on it when I needed to replace the old toggle type. We just thought it'd be funny. This replacement one that I have actually used to be Dave Sikula's although I bought it through a consignment at NJAMS through the guy HE sold it to.

Roland Jazz Chorus 120. This was the first real professional guitar amp I ever saw.....ever! When my cousin Gwen got married, the wedding band guitarist had one of these and I've held it on a pedestal ever since. I use this in my studio and for the occassional gig. It gets the cleanest clean of any amp.

Peavey Stereo Chorus 212. My second amp ever. The first being a Peavey backstage plus that I loved and kinda wished I still had. I've thought about selling this amp a few times, but nostaglia is good sometimes isn't it?

Pedals:

Because I play so wide a variety of music, including a few cover bands where "nailing the sound" is crucial, I found that I can pretty much cop any tone with these although the Clyde McCoy Vox Wah and the Lexicon LXP 1 are still on the wish list:

Boss TU 2 tuner.

Dunlop Hendrix Wah. Wah is obviously a big part of the funking that I do and I love the gnarlyness of this pedal although the throw takes a little getting used to.

Boss Compressor/Sustainer. I love John Frusciante's (Red Hot Chili Peppers) really compressed poppy sound on Blood Sugar Sex Magic. I pretty much leave this on always.

Boss Super Chorus. I bought this after the Police concert. No further explanation required.

Ibanez Tube Screamer TS 808. $250 worth of overdrive and worth every penny.

Marshall Guv'Nor. The best distortion and a total steal for $70 (helps ease the pain of the TS808).

MXR Zakk Wylde Overdrive. You can never have enough overdrive/distortion options.

Boss Mega Distortion. I NEVER run this pedal separately - on its own, this pedal sounds like ass but if I run the ZW before the Mega in the chain it totally browns the tone. I keep the settings of the ZW at about 3 for each knob and the only thing I turn up on the MD is the level to about 9 and the the tone and bass I keep at 7. If I want it to feed, I turn the drive on the ZW to 8.

Boss EQ pedal for boost and/tone tweaks for the room or backline amp provided. I can pretty much get "my sound" out of any amp with a few tweaks of this pedal.

MXR Phase 90. I don't use this too much but it's good to have on board for things like some of the disco stuff like Car Wash or rock stuff like the 2nd solo in Hotel California or Unchained by Van Halen. Also if there's a flanger part I need to cop like Are You Gonna Go My Way, the phaser doesn't usually create any disappointing looks from the band leader and saves me from having to have yet another pedal.

Ernie Ball volume pedal....obvious, but this is probably the most important pedal in the chain. I ride it at 80% for almost everything, 90% to bring out a specific part and 100% for solos. I'll kick the EQ boost if I need to go any more, but I usually set the amp pretty loud.

Boss DD - 20 giga delay....this thing's pretty awesome. I MUST have a tap tempo delay unit and this thing is one of the best that I've found although I've heard great things about the Line 6 one. I keep it on the analog delay patch for everything but I preprogram all of the settings for different rhythms, effect level, and feedback. I run this AFTER the volume so I can do swells and still have it go eniff-eniff-eniff.....but I'm sure you're all down with the eniff-eniffs. This baby comes in real handy for the obligitory producer request of ".....hey, for this section I was thinking of a U2ish/Coldplay kinda thing here, do you got that type of thing????....."

Roland GR-33 guitar synth. This is fun for screwing around and inputing stuff into Siballius on my laptop.

I still have my old Boss GT-5 and used it for years and listening to it now, I'm also embarrassed I ever used one. There's something about those stompboxes that are irreplaceable live.

Lastly is my newly aquired Lexicon LXP - 5. I'm still figuring this out, but essentially it's a reverb/delay/harmonizer. I really want an LXP-1 if anybody knows where I might get one, lemme know!!!!

So that's it. Rock on.

Cream, Sh-Boogie Bop

First off....OK, we got creamed. There was nothing pretty about the Calgary/Detroit game last night. Detroit made Calgary look like the Charlestown Chiefs without the hitting. I still firmly believe that Calgary is the better team and just need to settle into it. Let's leave this topic for now.

I would like to extend my hellos to my Scandinavian readers. It seems that a significant portion of the hits to my blog here come from Sweden, Norway, and Denmark; partly because of my travels there and journals about it and partly because the Hamar music festival has a link to this site on their homepage (http://www.musicfest.no). I guess they read about some of my time there with Soulstream last summer and included me on their site. So hei to everyone in Norway.

In music news, I been having fun with a few books lately. One of my favorites for harmony and chord scale theory is The Chord Scale Theory by Barrie Nettles. Barrie wrote a lot of the harmony and theory textbooks while I was at Berklee and I loved the way he organized things. I have obsessed over chord scales all of my life and I'm sure for any non-geek, this would be the driest book in the universe, but I love this stuff and Barrie has left no stone unturned. Another book that I've been enjoying is Up The Neck by Janet Davis, which is a banjo book that explores doing "breaks" and improvising up the neck. Banjo has always been a fun hobby and this book is revealing a little of the mystery of the second chorus in bluegrass playing. Beware though, banjo will take points off of your IQ and make you attracted to family members. I'm also going nuts with the Kurt Rosenwinkel book and my transcription book of the Pat Metheny Trio Live album.

Speaking of which....

I saw Metheny live two weeks ago with Brad Mehldau, Larry Grenedier, and Jeff Ballard at the Orpheum. I've heard a lot of mixed reviews from people about this show. First of all, I thought it was awesome. Everyone played their asses off and it was cool to hear Metheny outside of the Pat Metheny Group. You could tell it was still early in the tour as it seemed like the soundman was still working out some bugs in the volume of the instruments, but eventually everything settled in. Brad Mehldau really played the snot out of the piano in a situation that would have been easy for Metheny to railroad him a bit. Pat is such a strong force that even though it was Brad's working trio, it was definitely Metheny's show. There was a point in a blues of Pat's that I'm convinced that the whole band was lost during Brad's solo.....except Brad. And he just egged them on, going deeper and deeper into rhythmic abyss with absolute confidence and at the end threw them all a bone so that they could find their place with him. Pretty sweet.

I have also recently bought "Fearless Leader: John Coltrane on Prestige 1957 - 1958". 6 discs of Coltrane's albums as a leader in the period after those classic Miles Quintet albums (Workin', Cookin', Steamin', etc) and before things like Kind of Blue, Blue Train, and Giant Steps. I love these albums like I love those Miles albums. They played such a part in my formative years. They essentially taught me what jazz is: how to play standards, tone, etiquette, swing, etc. Listening to these albums I now realize what a crucial part of my development that they were. Red Garland, Arthur Taylor, and Paul Chambers were such an amazing team of musicians and provided such a great backdrop to what Coltrane was doing. These sessions were so cool too because they were more based on quantity rather than quality. I think Trane pumped out 8 albums of standards on Prestige in a year. That's unheard of now and although the playing and intros and ending could have probably been more polished, it's fun to hear them "wing it".

I also recently aquired a bunch of the Paul Motian Electric Bebop albums which I totally digging. Some with Kurt, Brad Schoeppach, Ben Monder, and/or Steve Cardenas. These are so much fun. I'm now waiting on Amazon to deliver me Mark Turner's Yam Yam and Joe Pass' classic Intercontinental. Both are huge classics that I've been looking for forever.

The pedal board is now under construction and perhaps the next blog will be for geeks only and I'll discuss all of my gear. I'm almost genuinely happy about my set up now that I have the Vox AC-30 and I'm finally satisfied with my distortion sound. Boy that took a long time....I think the last piece of the tone puzzle is a Lexicon LXP-1 reverb and a Vox Clyde McCoy wah. If anybody is looking to unload either/or, let me know.

OK I'll shut up with the geek talk for now.