The Day The Music Died

63 years ago on this date, a a single-engined Noorduyn Norseman UC-64 bearing the United States Army Air Force Tail Number 44-70285 took off from the runway at Royal Air Force Twinwood Farm on a flight to Paris. On board was Major Glenn Miller, on his way to entertain troops who had liberated the French capitol. The aircraft and Glenn Miller were never seen again. The world lost a great talent.

Led Zeppelin Or Lead Balloon?

Dueling reviews this morning from two papers about the Led Zeppelin reunion concert in London last night. The Washington Post carries a review by Erik Huey, a lawyer from the US, who praises it to the moon and back:

I'm an attorney now, staring down the barrel of 40. But think of the person you were decades ago — adolescent, unshackled by cynicism and Weltschmerz, full of youthful abandon and an unblinking belief in the sheer possibility of things. And if you grew up in the '60s, '70s and '80s, Zeppelin may well have been the soundtrack to your adolescence.

As they launch into the opening chords of "Good Times Bad Times," the band seems to acknowledge the limitations brought on by the passage of time. "In the days of my youth/I was told what it means to be a man,/Now I've reached that age/I've tried to do all those things the best I can." Indeed, they're doing pretty well, for old guys.

By the time they finish their second and third songs — "Ramble On" and "Black Dog" — it is becoming clear that, even if they are not gods who walk the Earth as men, these are no mere mortals before us. And this is going to be no mere rock show. We are witnessing history.

Meanwhile, The Daily Mail has a review by James Delingpole that is somewhat less than enthused:

No matter how proficient Robert Plant, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones, the three survivors of the Seventies' heyday, played, no matter how good it is to see them back on stage still breathing and vaguely compos mentis, there is something deeply sad and unedifying about rockers who go on rocking past their natural sell-by date…..

….Ah yes, Led Zeppelin's Stairway To Heaven. Let us suppose, as many think, that it really is the greatest rock song ever written.

Is that sufficient justification for its three surviving originators – one now looking like an accountant, one like a Muppet in a white fright wig, one like the Cowardly Lion from The Wizard Of Oz – to creak back on stage and play it not quite as excitingly as they could in 1971, 1972 or 1973 for an audience of mostly staid, pot-bellied, middle-aged men in a smokeless environment named after a mobile phone company?

And if they insist on doing so, shouldn't it be renamed Stannah Stairlift To Heaven?

Stairlift to Heaven. I like that. That's even better than Stairway to Freebird. Which review is right? Well, they probably both are, at least to some extent. A lot depend on what you expect from these performances by old bands that reunite. If you expect them to sound exactly as they used to, you will likely be disappointed. To a younger audience, these guys would seem hopelessly dated and well past their prime. But doubtless some people will be thrilled – and would pay big bucks for tickets, even to see a Muppet in a fright wig.

Call Any Vegetable

Call any vegetable Call it by name
Call one today When you get off the train
Call any vegetable And the chances are good
Aw, The vegetable will respond to you

(Some people don't go for prunes…I
don't know, I've always found that if they…)
Call any vegetable Pick up your phone
Think of a vegetable Lonely at home
Call any vegetable And the chances are good
That a vegetable will *respond* to you
(Frank Zappa, Call Any Vegetable)

I suspect that Frank Zappa would have got this group. The Vienna Vegetable Orchestra is making vegetables respond to them. It's edgy, it's avant garde, it's high in fiber and contains no cholesterol and it takes the term playing with your food to a new level.

I think maybe this guy is a fan. Or auditioning.

Attack Of The Robot Guitars

Gibson Guitars is releasing a new, robotic guitar that keeps itself in tune all by itself – even after a string change. It will also retune itself into six different preset non-standard tunings at the push of a button.

Help is at hand from what is described as the world's first robot guitar — an electric guitar that not only keeps itself in tune even after string changes but also allows players to access six non-standard tunings at the push of a button.

After 15 years of research, Gibson Guitar is launching a limited edition Les Paul Robot Guitar next month that has set players abuzz with both enthusiasm and scepticism.

"It will not make you a better guitar player but it will allow the average player to access some very sophisticated tunings," Gibson Guitar Chief Executive Henry Juszkiewicz told Reuters on Tuesday.

The six non-standard preset tunings were used on hits ranging from "Honky Tonk Women" by The Rolling Stones and Hendrix's "Voodoo Child" to Led Zeppelin's "Going to California" and Joni Mitchell's "The Circle Game."

Gibson says the robot guitar is aimed at amateurs who have a hard time keeping their guitars in tune, as well as professionals who now use technicians during concerts to keep about 100 guitars tuned to different keys.

Next up: a guitar that simply plays itself, relieving budding artistes from having to actually learn how to play! No more of that mundane, repetitious 'practice.' No, sirree.

Seriously, I rather suspect that these will prove to be somewhat less than robust in actual use. I'm guessing that in 20 or 30 years (or less) none will still be functional, while my old, run of the mill Les Paul Standard will still be chugging along.

*Sniff* Tiny Tim Would Be So Proud…

The ukulele is experiencing (another) revival. This time Britain is seeing a resurgence in the popularity of the little four-stringed wonder.

Music shops report a roaring trade in the tiny guitar-shaped instruments while some schools are abandoning recorders to set up their own ukulele orchestras.

A reputation for being easy to pick up and play, coupled with its resemblance to the guitar are said to be driving the classroom revival.

Ane Larsen, director of the Kitchen School of Music, teaches school children in Devon and in east London where her lessons have replaced long-running recorder work.

She said unlike the recorder, the ukulele left mouths free for singing and taught children both rhythm and melody. She said "It's definitely becoming more and more popular."

The little, guitar-shaped ukulele lets little kids make music really quickly. My own youngest son picked one up and figured out how to play well enough to perform publicly in two weeks. And they can be used for an amazingly wide range of music styles. Led Zeppelin for example. Then there's the late Israel Kamakawiwo Ole. He's in a class by himself. Over the rainbow, Iz.

UPDATE: Sam sent this link via comments. Jake Shimabukuro does George Harrison.

Smoke On The Gorilla

You will never, ever hear Deep Purple's Smoke on the Water in the same way. Never.

The Daily Mail has even more. Lord help us.

Into The Night

The Times of London has posted a chance for you to listen to the newest single from Santana, a collaboration with Nickelback’s Chad Kroeger titled Into the Night. It is one of two new songs on a retrospective of Santana's greatest hits, Ultimate Santana. It's pretty good.

It Don’t Cost No Money, You Got To Pay With Your Heart

I've mentioned before that David Bromberg is one of my favorite musicians. Well, another video clip from him has surfaced on YouTube (it looks to have been posted by the video's producer). It is from 1984, a high energy performance of Oh, Sharon. Enjoy. (No embedding on this one, you'll have to hop over to YouTube to see it.)

Take Five

Had enough nattering nabobs for today? One of the reasons I try to inject – with varying degrees of success – some humor on this site is that too much dwelling on the days events can be really bad for one's sanity. Or one's soul, depending on the day's news. So let's take a break. How about a complete change of subject. Let's talk about Dave Brubeck. He's been one of the jazz greats for more than 50 years now. And he's been married to the same woman for 65 of his 86 years. He just played at the 50th annual Monterey Jazz Festival. He played at the very first one, too.

The Wilton, Connecticut, resident still performs about 50 to 60 concerts a year, such as in Monterey where he also played at the first festival in 1958. He has slowed his pace from about 80-100 concerts a year a decade ago and 200 concerts in the 1980s, said producer Russell Gloyd.

"Until I stop going," is the time Brubeck said he plans to end performing and recording. He was already a big star in the 1950s and appeared on the cover of Time Magazine in 1954.

His return to Monterey this weekend coincided with his 65th wedding anniversary on Friday to Iola, to whom he proposed on their very first date at a fraternity dance. "It is weird," Iola Brubeck said. "Sometimes your intuition is right."

Soon Brubeck took her to a black San Francisco night club for an important test. "I wanted my wife to see the environment I wanted to live in … which was black night clubs," he told Reuters in a 90-minute interview. "She was right at home being the only white face."

JAZZ AMBASSADOR

With his 1950s preppy appearance of khaki pants, jacket and tie and horn-rimmed glasses, Brubeck has long served as a jazz ambassador, popularizing concerts on college campuses but also playing black clubs in the then-segregated South.

"I had a following that accepted me regardless of their race, my race," said the composer of standards such as "In Your Own Sweet Way" and "The Duke."

Myself, I am not much of a fan of jazz. Some I like, a lot I don't understand. But there are a few songs that are transcendental. It does not matter if you are a fan of a certain genre or not. So it is with Take Five, from the 1959 album Time Out. Enjoy.

Do You Like My New Street?

Three Dog Night?!!
Yeah…
Oh! I love them! They're my favorite band!.. ow gawd.. oh, do you like my new car? I'm ah.. my Dad just gave it to me for graduation..
Ah yeaah?!! I'ts a … it's a Fillmore, isn't it? Real futuristic, ah.. I dig the fins… listen: do you know how to get to the ah Hollywood Inn from here?
(Frank Zappa, Do You Like My New Car?)

Officials in Berlin have just named a street after the late Frank Zappa. The street, now called Frank-Zappa-Strasse, is home to a former communist film factory that now houses practice space for musicians. The musicians from Orwo Haus campaigned for two years to get the street renamed in honor of Zappa.

Zappa's brother, Bobby Zappa, said the Grammy-winning rocker, who died in 1993, would have been pleased, in a letter of thanks.

Frank-Zappa-Strasse or Frank Zappa Street — formerly Street 13 — lies on the eastern outskirts of Berlin amid empty industrial buildings in what was communist East Germany.

The street is home to Orwo Haus, a former Communist-era film factory that now provides practice studios for more than 160 bands.

I'd be very careful there now. Remember to watch out where the huskies go. Nanook, a-no-no.

Bad Review

The Times of London has released its review of the British leg of the Live Earth concert. Their judgment: tedious.

It did what it said on the poster – but no more. The British leg of Live Earth started at 1.30 pm sharp with a thunderous five-minute drum fanfare by a 20-odd troupe of flailing percussionists, battering a miscellany of ethnic skinned instruments.

Led by Roger Taylor, formerly drummer with Queen, and Chad Smith of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, their SOS pattern, hammered out in morse code, was a cute way of flagging up the Live Earth message: environmental calamity ahoy. But it couldn’t disguise the problem that regularly threatened to becalm this Wembley show.

As a concert, Live Earth was not the repeat of Live Aid/Live 8 it clearly wanted to be. Unlike the events organised by the charismatic Sir Bob Geldof – upon which this one modelled itself closely, right down to its choice of name – the acts who answered the call from Al Gore’s people to play at Wembley Stadium were a bit short on superstar clout.

It was Geldof’s legendarily persuasive powers which got Pink Floyd to abandon a 20-year feud and re-form for Live 8 in Hyde Park in 2005. There was nothing on the Live Earth London bill to command that level of anticipation and potential drama.

With the exception of the closing act Madonna – who played next door at Wembley Arena only last summer – there was nobody on the Stadium bill with the cross-generational appeal, and catalogue of monster hits, to supply the great unifying moments which event gigs need to make their message stick in the mind.

Queen singing We Will Rock You at Live Aid, or Robbie Williams leading the 80,000 Live 8 crowd through a giant karaoke session of Angels, are worth far more in this context than the 20 minutes per hour of worthy exhortations dished out on screen or by guest celebs at Live Earth.

Genesis were the first band to take the stage, playing a four-song sample from the set they performed in its entirety later in the day at Manchester as part of their current British tour. The middle-aged-male contingent in the crowd were delighted to welcome back Phil Collins’ recently reformed band of pop-rock veterans. An element of surprise entered an otherwise solid performance when Collins appeared to let out a rare ‘f **k’ during Invisible Touch. But with latecomers still trickling into the stadium, Genesis landed a few punches – notably with the environmentally incorrect Turn It On Again – without knocking anybody out.

Read it – almost universally negative with a few bright spots. But the review indicates that most people who attended were not exactly knocked out by the performances. Does it make a big difference in the media hype? No. But the British press, long a champion of the entire global warming hype, is not overly enthusiastic about the goregasm in general. Worth the huge waste of energy and the massive carbon emissions? Not likely.

“You Don’t Really Want To Know Just How Far It’s Gone.”

Paris Hilton. The mainstream media. Don Henley says it all. Enough said.

A Preview

The Rolling Stones opening of their latest world tour gives a preview of what to expect at the upcoming Live Earth Cconcerts. Screaming fans, lots of music, a festive event.

And a 30-mile long traffic jam.

Some 33,000 fans showed up for the show in the town of Werchter, but when Mick Jagger started off with "Start Me Up," some fans were still shuffling for position on the grounds after being stuck for hours in a 30-mile traffic jam caused by the concert and made worse by a nearby accident.

"Stones roll over Werchter," headlined De Standaard. "Stones triumph in Werchter," added De Morgen.

The "A Bigger Bang" tour will feature 30 shows across Europe, including performances in Belgrade, Serbia, and in St. Petersburg, Russia, which the band has never visited.

Matt Belamy's words describing Live Earth are absolutely perfect: Private jets for climate change.

Well, It Could Have Been Worse

1,683 guitarists came out to a Kansas City ballpark to try to shatter the Guinness Book world record for the most people playing the same song. They appear to have done so. The song? Deep Purple's Smoke on the Water.

Some came from as far away as California and Germany on Sunday to take part in a Kansas City radio station's effort to break a Guinness world record for the most people playing the same song simultaneously. The record had been 1,323 people playing the same song in Vancouver, British Columbia, in 1994.

"It was cool to see little kids playing, people who had been playing for their whole lives, like older people, and then I'm sure there were people like me who just picked up the song a couple days before," said Autumn McPherson, of Winfield, a senior at the University of Kansas.

Preliminary numbers show 1,683 people played the popular early '70s guitar riff on Sunday at CommunityAmerica Ballpark.

"I thought it was going to be kind of cheesy," said Hannah Koch, of Prairie Village, who came clad in an elf costume. "But after I got here, I got caught up in the excitement of it."

A local DJ, Tanna Guthrie, came up with the idea. Now, frankly, Smoke on the Water is a very simple song to play – I think every beginning guitar player can learn how to do that song in a very short time. Heck, I did when I was learning. And the cardinal rule of beginning guitar players is also important: distortion makes everything sound better also applies. But we salute Ms. Guthrie for choosing the old Deep Purple song.

Because if it had been Stairway to Heaven, we would have tracked you down.

Things They Do Look Awful C-C-Cold

Talkin' 'bout my generation. This is too good not to pass along. A British – er – rock group – with a combined age totaling over 3,000 years has just had their first single break into the British top 30. The song? A cover of the Who classic My Generation. The lead singer is one Alf Carretta, who is a sprightly 90 years young.

Their charity cover of The Who's rock anthem "My Generation", with lead vocals by 90-year-old Alf Carretta, hit number 26 in the chart.

The oldest band member is 100-year-old Buster Martin, who is the oldest employee in Britain.

Named after Zimmer frames, the 40-strong group was formed as part of a BBC television documentary about the isolation felt among Britain's elderly folk.

Their video has been viewed more than 2.3 million times on the Internet video-sharing site YouTube.

The Zimmers also include Peter Oakley, better known as geriatric1927, whose video musings on life once made him the YouTube poster with the most subscribers.

His video "first try" was watched nearly 2.6 million times and he is still the 10th most subscribed user ever.

The single is available from the iTunes store with all proceeds going to charity. And the video is a hoot – do not miss the part where they re-enact the classic Beatles' Abbey Road album cover. With a real twist. They also have a – what else – MySpace page.

Just seeing this made me think about my grandmother. When she retired from the Sunmount state hospital where she had helped people with Downs Syndrome, she began her next careers – advocate for the aged, writer and a whole lot of other things. She was instrumental in getting a community center for the elderly in Saranac Lake, New York, one of the prime movers in getting housing built for older residents and she started (and wrote regularly for) the community center's newsletter. And at age 95 she took up learning conversational German (she was born in Norway). She passed away at age 103. I still miss her.