Bret H. Hart - "NC maverick outsider artist"

365 HOWLS #100: Token Yankee

7-26-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
Fender ac/el guitar
BOSS BR8 digital recording platform

This instant song is an example of what I have been calling 'structured melodic improvisation', whereby I lay a foundation (pre-structure) by improvising a rhythm guitar figure (after jamming on it for a few minutes) to tape. All subsequent overdubs are unrehearsed and unedited. Bass-like sounds are drop-octaved acoustic guitar. Signal processing is courtesy of the Roland FX suite present in the recording deck.

'Token Yankee' is a favorite working of a familiar Blues/Rockabilly/Country 1-4-5 progression that hundreds of Pop songs have utilized. Over the foundational strum, you will hear nods to a host of song-oriented guitarists I have come to admire over the 40 years I've been learning the instrument: JJ Cale, Mark Knopfler, Clarence White, Vince Gill, Roy Buchanan, Billy Bremner, Dave Edmunds, and others. I guess that's why I like this piece so much, it honors my guitar heroes.

This is the last upload in the 365 HOWLS Series on podomatic. I have eaten-up all of the memory available to me. From now on, please visit my 'mop-site', https://www.facebook.com/groups/365HOWLS/ to continue hearing daily free music in this series.

365 HOWLS #95: Rick Wakeman's Last Organ Solo

7-21-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
modified Fender 'Montara' acoustic/electric guitar
chorus/reverb
tc electronics 'Ditto' 5m looper
POD 2.0 (for percussive guitar channel)
SET-UP PHOTOS: https://www.facebook.com/bretharoldhart/media_set?set=a.10200897704499805.1073741848.1080834292&type=3

I sent my modified-Fender through a short FX array [Moen 'Shaky Jimi' vibe/chorus, Behringer 'Reverb Machine', & tc electronics DITTO looper] to one channel of the recording deck; the other channel captured the fuzz'ed output of the guitar's additional K&K contact violin pickup that is located inside the guitar, attached to the soundboard in the lower bout. While it picks-up vestigial amounts of the guitar proper, what it is really for is to amplify the sonic aspects of the instrument when used percussively.

I grew up in the 1970's enjoying all manner of what we called 'progressive rock'. I liked the popular "commercial" stuff, I liked the Baroque-leaning stuff, I liked the free-jazz-y stuff, I liked the extremely outre' experimental and improvisational stuff, and I liked the music that spawned or was spawned-by it. While watching a BBC documentary on the subject the other day, I realized that Yes-keyboardist Rick Wakeman has a great sense of humor. I dedicate this piece to him.

365 HOWLS #87: Banging in South Korea

7-14-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
allsorts

This is a particularly old recording, from 1988 in South Korea where I worked as a linguist for 4 years and assembled a humble little music space in my apartment to house my Western instrument and the WILD stuff I found in the Orient. At the time I was using an original Fostex X15 4-track cassette deck for projects. This is one of my forays.

365 HOWLS #86: Amazing Trace

7-13-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
bowed acoustic guitar (2 tracks - BHH)
banjo (2 tracks - TT)

This is not a new recording, but I want to share it anyway. Several years ago during the Charlie Poole Festival, I met banjo-master Tony Trischka, who happens to be a home-boy from Syracuse, NY. TT came to my house and added two improvised banjo tracks to a song I'd been recording titled 'Daddy Only Did The Best he Knew How' for the record FINDING GRACE. First pass - perfect. The song is in Am, but I arranged it in a way that the melody of 'Amazing Grace' might be layered onto it in the key of C.
This mix is both of Tony's banjos with two tracks of my bowed guitars, with the rest of the song omitted.

365 HOWLS #75: Put My Decals Back On Baby

7-3-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
uke
Ditto looper
DR85 micro recorder

I wondered whether I could assemble a micro performing/recording rig that was suitable to my comfortable chair on the front porch where the radio is.
Not wanting to miss Alistair Begg, I chose NOT to hear the playback from the DITTO while recording... I was overdubbing on uncharted waters, unable to hear whether or not subsequent tracks were achieving any synchrony until after the recording was finished.
While listening to it for the first time through the recorder’s tiny speaker, I was a bit reminded of the splat and pointillism of the Magic Band, and of the apocryphal story of where the song 'Bat Chain Puller' came from - a rhythmic sword-fight between car radio and windshield wipers.
That's sort of how the accidental entrainment here sounds to me.

365 HOWLS #73: Timbral Timbre

7-1-2013
bret harold hart

The next rung on the tc electronics DITTO' 5m looper learning curve. This one remembers the enjoyment I got from Terje Rypdal's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terje_Rypdal) work on ECM during the 70's and 80's. He was one of a handful of guitar stylists who ushered me into the world of atmospheric playing and the intelligent use of reverb.

365 HOWLS #61: SKIN N' STEEL

6-17-2013
bret harold hart

(I worked a 13 hour day on Saturday at the Charlie Poole Festival doing stage set-ups on competition day, and Sunday was also full of work. Fell behind some with daily postings.)

gear:
guitars
drums
electronics

Back in the halcyon days of the 1960's, many bands got 'famous' working a 2-chord groove for the overly medicated. This is a 2-chord groove designed to quiet the listener's mind.

365 HOWLS #55: FROGWERK (Jamming with Karl Bartos and Some Frogs)

6-9-2013
bret harold hart

These opportunities to jump right into the spirit of John Cage and AMM don't present themselves often enough, but with the help of the radio program Sound Opinions, a Eurobeat song by Karl Bartos, and a chorus of frogs in the neighborhood, I was able to participate by adding a gut-bucket porch-jam on my Tele through a PYLE-PRO PWMA50B [Portable Waist-Band PA System with Headset Microphone & Rechargeable Batteries].

Karl Bartos was (1975-1990) an electronic percussionist in the electronic-music group Kraftwerk, which I enjoyed immensely as a college kid and helped make synthesizers interesting to me.

Frogs are a nightly musical inspiration from the comfort of my porch armchair.

365 HOWLS #51: Mementos and Fingers

6-4-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
guitar

In 1981, while helping a friend clear debris from a vacant lot beside his house, I cut my right forefinger off on a sharp piece of porcelain. My hand slipped on the morning dew and the finger travelled along about 18" of the broken edge. I bled terribly, it was sloshing on the floor of my friend's VW Rabbit as he sped me to the nearest hospital. Miraculously, a surgeon was able to reattach it and I can still play guitar and do all of the other things that having a whole hand permits.

365 HOWLS #47: 'Food of the Gods'

4-31-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
DR85 recorder
Tascam mixdown deck

Last night, Tina and I enjoyed participating in a writing & grilled chicken party at our friends the Ormond's home. I ate in a screened room and was told about the noisy cicadas that have been raising a clamor there in the mornings. Today, in the morning before work, I stopped at a number of places around town to gather recordings of North Carolina's noisy tree-orchestras. This is a mix of those ambient recordings of insects that only sing like this every 17 years or so. Cicadas seem to prefer to make their burrows in places that are not ever mowed, and have a wide range of sounds and rhythms that can be discerned in their communication.

There is a science-fiction novel, Food of the Gods by HG Wells (http://www.palomar.edu/english/versaci/images/Food%20of%20the%20Gods.jpg), that has giant insects (and other critters) in it. In the Old Testament, cicadas were called 'locusts' and were a periodic environmental scourge. In many parts of the world, insects are considered a source of protein for people.

365 HOWLS #44: Peristalsis & Diverticulitis

4-27-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
guitar
electronics

About twice a year I suffer through a week of diverticulitis, an inflammation of the intestine. The first time this hit me, I was in the hospital for a few days, radium drink, "butt-cam", high cost, the whole nine-yards. The second time it hit me I was 2 hours into a 13 hour drive to Worcester, MA for a CD release party gig. Lisa Kleman suggested chicken broth with collard greens, which cured it overnight.

365 HOWLS #42: Hammers, Nails, and a Musical Saw

4-25-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
hammers
nails
lumber
paint roller
a few seconds of a countdown at a small church
bowed saw (1.07 minute sample): Emmalee Hart

My father-in-law and I have been building a large 10'x12' garden shed out back. Using my Dictaphone, I have been snagging sound samples of floor paint being rolled on & of the framing work, and sending them into the 8-track for manipulation and arrangement. As they say in Feng Shui, "Placement is everything." To this, were added layers of my 14-year old daughter playing around on her musical saw for me. I ran her 1.7m sample through a 20 second looper and a wee sample of some friends from a small start-up church in Reidsville (The Fellowship) doing a countdown, and manipulated them into a "made-environment" with the live hammering & construction chatter of her grandfather and I.

I meant to have this done yesterday, but am finishing/posting late because it was a complicated piece (and because Tina and I went on a date last night).

365 HOWLS: #36: Popeye

5-19-2013
bret harold hart

gear: solo electric guitar

This guitar solo makes large use of volume swells, in this case created in two ways - using the volume knob on my Telecaster & using a Behringer 'Slow Motion' foot pedal interchangeably. I am thinking of the surface of the sea, the rising and falling of countless tons of mated hydrogen and oxygen.

365 HOWLS #35: The Adjacents

4-18-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
acoustic guitar
Casio MIDI guitar
voice
dog
ambient recording of digital trombone arrangement
traffic
radio

This is an audio collage composed using five different ambient recordings made today, layered, of lengths between 1m25s-3m45s. It has been cool and humid after last night's long slow rain, not much to do in the drizzle. It is my in-laws 56th wedding anniversary today and we went over there for some of the finest pork ribs I've had in a long time and a halfhour of Lawrence Welk.

365 HOWLS #34: Be Good, Sam

4-17-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
detuned 12-string guitar (4 tks)
Tascam DP01FXCD

This funky layered improvisation was executed on the wonderful Takamine 12-string Tina's cousin Lynn gave her. The underlying riff is an extended 1-4-5 Blues progression. There's a little Hedges and Fahey in here. The longer I improvise, the more I believe that music is about rhythm and that a good beat trumps a sour tuning.

365 HOWLS #33: Reintroducing The Howler

4-16-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
The Howler (home-made, electronic 1-stringed percussion instrument)
2 mallets
Digitech RP155 20s looper
Tascam recording platform

I built The Howler 30 years ago when I lived in South Korea. I don't care about appearances of things, so was able to throw this noisy badboy together in an afternoon from available parts and a $6, flat, plastic pickup (I believe it's a piezo) with the word 'FENDER' written on it that I found in a cool music store in Osan. While living over there for four years and knowing some of the language, I was able to come away with a brain-full of fascinating viewpoints toward art, music, and things that really matter that I just simply could not have gotten any other way.

The Howler is one of several instruments, not the first, that I made after hearing masters playing the koto and kayagum (they are roughly analogous instruments) in Japan and at Min-Sok-Chon (the national 'folk village' museum) in Korea. The instruments are microtonal, played by bending toward or away from desired tones by applying/releasing pressure on a string with the left hand, to the left of a central tall bridge, while percussing/plucking/frailing the string on the right side of the bridge. (At least that's how I do it.) The Howler has one bass string (salvaged from a piano) with a bass tuner mounted in a 2"x2"x27" block of hardwood and can be plugged-into an amp or mixer.

It has been played on many records over the years, as well as live with Automatic Music and the F-Art Ensemble. Still works! We've grown up together as improvisors.

365 HOWLS #32: KWYER II

5-15-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
4 voices
reverb
compact/thick delay
severe stereo panning
stereo flange

Today was so cool. I met a man on staff at our church, new to it, who has been an inspiration for the last year or so, even though we only met today. Here is an example of the upside of Facebook.

Y'know how on your homepage you periodically see a friend of your post something touching about someone else that they know but you do not? Well, last year, an FB friend posted something supportive to this man's page, regarding the loss of his teenage daughter to an illness. Because our son, Mike, was still serving in Afghanistan at the time, Death was a large presence in our lives. How often have you heard a news flash about a number of American military "killed in action in Afghanistan, names will be released pending notification of the family."? Every time Tina and I have heard one of these on the news, during each of Michael’s four tours (3 in Iraq, 1 in Afghanistan), we grind our teeth and wonder. It sucks, having that possibility, and in some instances, likelihood, in your face so much. And it's a difficult topic to bring up when we need support. The man I met today was the first person I've met in Eden, North Carolina since we moved here that let me vent a bit, and listened. I thanked him for his example of strength when things are hard.

I know this piece of stacked vocal improvisation sounds nothing like what I went through today, but it represents how I feel.

365 HOWLS #31: KWYER #1

5-14-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
four voices

Tonight was a blast! I was asked to accompany our 7th grade girls choir on the song 'Closer to the Flame' using acoustic guitar and it is always an enjoyment to play music with young people. When I got home, it occurred to me that I should have taken my micro-recorder and had it on my music stand to catch a lo-fi version of what was happening. I didn't. Rats.

This is a Gregorian Blues lamenting that oversight.

365 Howls #28: GLEICK

5-10-2013

bret harold hart

gear: Telecaster

[FROM THE PROLOGUE OF James Gleick's great book, CHAOS: MAKING A NEW SCIENCE "Now that science is looking, chaos seems to be everywhere. A rising column of cigarette smoke breaks into wild swirls. A flag snaps back and forth in the wind. A dripping faucet goes from a steady pattern to a random one. Chaos appears in the behavior of the weather, the behavior of an airplane in flight, the behavior of cars clustering on an expressway, the behavior of oil flowing in underground pipes. No matter what the medium, the behavior obeys the same newly discovered laws. That realization has begun to change the way business executives make decisions about insurance, the way astronomers look at the solar system, the way political theorists talk about the stresses leading to armed conflict."
http://www.around.com/chaos.html

bret harold hart
5-7-2013

gear:
Takamine acoustic guitar (7 adjacent tracks, heavily-panned, some in stereo) bwo Tascam + BOSS 8-track decks connected in series.

This is an instrumental extrapolation ('instant arrangement') of a song of mine from 1990 - BULLSEYE.

Several of my talented friends have engineered or contributed parts to various recordings of this song over the years... it has gone through some changes! ... from it's coffeehouse origins in Massachusetts through Psychedelia (Mark McGee's recording) into Rock (HipBone's version) down a hillbilly detour (The Cat's Pants) and back to a solo acoustic thing, but now through numerous foot-pedals.

365 HOWLS #23: Tossed in a Pit (Shunned by One's Brothers)

bret harold hart
5-6-2013

gear:
Telecaster

This 8-track howl is what has been eating my heart this week.

When I handed myself over to God, I lost a lot of secular friends.
When I committed myself to obeying God and showing the world what the truth looks like, I lost a lot of Christian friends.
It happens, it was foretold as a 'falling away', and it sucks.
Comfort-Zones win, more often than not, in both camps.
We choose friends who want us to stay the same.

365 HOWLS #21: Be Equipt
5-4-2013 [St]

gear:
firepit
conversation
RS DR85
BOSS BR-8
Tascam DP01FX-CD

Our dear family from Massachusetts, Maelee and Tommy were down visiting while en route to the North Georgia mountains. We spent the night talking, eating BBQ pork ribs, and feeding the metal firepit. I recorded 4 minutes of it and have built two audio collages from them using my studio as an instrument.

365 HOWLS #20: BirdLand
5-3-2013 [F]

gear:
firepit
conversation
RS DR85
BOSS BR-8
Tascam DP01FX-CD

Our dear family from Massachusetts, Maelee and Tommy were down visiting while en route to the North Georgia mountains. We spent the night talking, eating BBQ pork ribs, and feeding the metal firepit. I recorded 4 minutes of it and have built two audio collages from them using my studio as an instrument (365 HOWLS #'s 20-21).

5-1-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
the objects in my yard that are visible in the accompanying photograph
stairs
handrail
pipes
firewood
bamboo
drum stand
sculpture
2" x 4"
2 thick mallets

This is the first of a series of pieces which will depend upon a live percussion track recorded ambiently in some specifically defined area of 'The Well', our outdoor art gallery. I suppose I'll spread out from here in future recordings in order to most easily keep track of what zones have already been used. This evening I stuck pretty closely to a consistent cadence, deploying it across everything within my reach inside a 20' x 8' zone near the entrance to the back yard.

The first iron and steel pipe sculpture I made here on our property in 2002 is called 'Pipe Drum', still standing, and I once recorded Clang Quartet (Scotty Irving) improvising on it for our improvised duets CD.

The name, "YARDTRAPTION" comes from my reading on the origins and development of the drum kit, or 'trap set' - from tribal to ritual to parade/martial to classical and through to jazz and rock to etc. Early New Orleans jazz drummers threw-together whatever available percussion instruments they could find that interested them into practical arrangements that came to be known as their very individuated "contraptions"; this term was later truncated to "traps" or trap set.

365 HOWLS #17: THE HERALD OF THEN AND NOW

4-30-2013
bret harold hart

live & signal-processed solo percussion
electric clock
Telecaster (2 tracks)
Digitech RP155 FX/20s looper
RS DR85 micro recorder
Tascam 8-track digital platform

This piece began with noticing the sound of a guitar-shaped plastic clock ticking in the music room. For some reason (it's been there for a couple of years), I never noticed that it makes any noise until tonight. I stuck the micro-recorder up near it (lodged behind 'The Mill That Murdered Eden') and recorded about 5m of the ticking accompanied by hand claps and other random wandering percussion. This, I imported into the 8-track and added three tracks of structured instant composition: (1) percussion -w- 20s looping, and (2) duelling Telecasters.

365 HOWLS #16: The Ol' Park Slide

4-29-2013
bret harold hart

gear:
ektara (1-stringed instrument)
'Mitra's Box' (3-stringed homemade instrument by Mitra Dasa)
glass slide
Shure headset mic (ambient)
Shure SM58 (close)
Tascam recording platform

My students and I were talking about "old school playground equipment" and I reminisced about Hiawatha Park in 1969 Syracuse, New York, when my family lived in an ancient 3-decker on Colvin Ave, directly adjacent to its tennis courts. The park was about a century old then, it seemed, with a Gothic unkemptness and rotting quality that made it perfect for bored boys. All of the classic, 'dangerous' metal playground equipment was there to be exploited without supervision. Running UP the 15' steel slide without falling was an enjoyment for us.

365 HOWLS #15: Sought Daughter Got Water

4-28-2013
bret harold hart: 1950 Kay parlor guitar, live outdoor recording
Emmalee Hart: horn

Atmospheric acoustic guitar touches (open tuning D-A-D-G-C-D) amongst an ambient recording of a walk through the backyard on a rainy evening, upon hearing my daughter playing a horn in our outbuilding, followed by close-proximity drops falling on a vinyl tarp, an aluminum ladder, into a Styrofoam cooler, a walk back toward the horn melody, and finally of raindrops landing in a puddle.

4-27-2013
bret harold hart

live & signal-processed solo percussion

Listened to and enjoyed the NPR program 'Sound Opinions' today where the guest, producer Joe Boyd, discussed his work (1969-70) with songwriter Nick Drake and the host of session musicians who appeared on his 1st/2nd LPs.

I recorded this piece immediately after.

Nick Drake's unique and complex approach to finger-style acoustic guitar was as influential on my own style back in the 70's as Michael Hedges, Fred Frith, and Marc Ribot became later on.

Why I am percussing about a favorite guitarist is anybody's guess.

Digital manipulation of an ambient recording of a domestic dispute two houses away from us

4/26/2013
bret harold hart

gear:
DR85 digital memo recorder
DOD Classic Fuzz
POD 2.0 stereo multiFX/cabinet simulator
E-H QTron & NanoClone
Behringer phase shifter, delay, pitch shifter, compressor
Shure SM58
Tascam digital recording platform

This is a snapshot of the kind of baloney our police department has to deal with. Ironically, we live on a street with "Historic District" signage, despite having the same substance & domestic abuse issues as the neighborhoods in town with bad reputations.

Apparently (FYI-the same thing happened two years ago on Thanksgiving), this couple's partying got out of hand the other night and the woman found herself locked out of the house, screaming and beating on the door to be let-in. Did he push her out of the house and lock the door? or did she come outside herself and did the already locked door close behind her?

My wife and I listened to an hour of this, then three police cruisers pulled up. She told them that she'd called 911 because "he locked me out of my house and it's cold out here". It seemed to us that the guy inside was passed-out, because he wouldn't come to the door even when the cops were knocking and calling to him. The cops explained that there wasn't much they could do and said "being locked out by your boyfriend is not a 911 situation." She apologized for "bothering" them, and the cruisers drove off. Before their taillights went over the crest of the hill, she was screaming and beating on the door again. We heard glass break.

I decided to document what I was witnessing.

4/25/2013 ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear: 1950 Kay parlor guitar and glass slide
dynamic (SM58) & condenser (headset) microphones ["dual-mono ambient recording"]
DOD Classic Fuzz

This slide guitar piece was improvised using the D-A-D-A-A-D tuning with a Shure headset condenser mic & an SM58 positioned about 12" from the sound hole.

This song is an audio prayer. I have become concerned lately with many men I know in our community and my own church who are bought - body, mind, and soul - by worldly values that they have grown to collectively feel entitle them to hatred and sin toward those who do not kneel at the same altars.

In order to 'feel the love' socially with such men, it is required to passionately and publicly express one's personal commitment to & love for violent television, weapons, recreational equipment, liquor, blasphemy, 'necessary' prescription drugs, and collective gossip. [RMNS 1:29-32]

There are a host of places in both Testaments that say (I'm paraphrasing here), "Hey, YOU Philistine/Corinthian/Viper/etc (read: "MATERIALISTIC & BACKSLIDING DUMB ASS"), STOP IT! You are WRONG and God is PISSED about it! Don't be surprised if you WAKE UP IN HELL."

This instrumental piece is a harsh Blues for these unsaved believers who really like the 'Savior' part of the equation (candy), but haven't quite understood the duties that come with the 'Lord' part of the equation (vegetables) yet...and are acting like real buttheads and jerks with their self-righteousness, which ultimately puts the lie to their claims of obedience to the Great Commission. I'm worried about some souls.
.

drums and percussion
bret harold hart

4/24/2013 ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear:
sundry drums
toys
marimbas
tambourines

The Curious George toy drum exploded during this session when I inadvertently struck it on the soldered seam. You can hear it happen around 2 minutes in.

This is a "dual-mono" recording, with two mics (SM58 and condenser headset mic) feeding two channels that are panned, FX'd, and EQ'd differently.

solo dobro and conch shell
bret harold hart

4/18/2013 ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear: resonator guitar and conch shell

Epiphone 5w ValveTronic amp

dynamic (amp) & condenser (close) microphones (dual-mono ambient recording)

DOD Classic Fuzz
E-H Nano Clone
Behringer phase shifter, delay, pitch shifter, compressor
Tascam digital recording platform

This is an electro-acoustic homage to the incredible Country Blues artist and preacher, Rev. Son House.

solo dual-oscillator through four amps
bret harold hart

4/18/2013 ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear: Electro-Faustus analog synthesizer

Fender AcoustiSonic & Mini-Champ amplifiers
reverb/chorus/tremolo footswitch for AcoustiSonic
Epiphone 5w ValveTronic amp
Pignose amp (open)

dynamic & condenser microphones (dual-mono ambient recording)

DOD Classic Fuzz
POD 2.0 stereo multiFX/cabinet simulator
Digitech RP155 multiFX/20s looper
E-H QTron & Nano Clone
Behringer phase shifter, delay, pitch shifter, compressor
Tascam digital recording platform

solo synthesizer through four amps
bret harold hart

4/15/2013 ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear: Korg 770 analog synthesizer

Fender AcoustiSonic & Mini-Champ amplifiers
reverb/chorus/tremolo footswitch for AcoustiSonic
Epiphone 5w ValveTronic amp
Pignose amp (open)

DOD Classic Fuzz
POD 2.0 stereo multiFX/cabinet simulator
Digitech RP155 multiFX/20s looper
E-H QTron & Nano Clone
Behringer phase shifter, delay, pitch shifter, compressor
Tascam digital recording platform

solo electric guitar
bret harold hart

365 HOWLS #1: MIGHTY MEN...MEN OF RENOWN
4-12-2013 / 8-10PM ---> HipWorks Tone-Magnet Studio

Gear: Fender Telecaster driving four amplifiers

Fender AcoustiSonic & Mini-Champ amplifiers
reverb/chorus/tremolo footswitch for AcoustiSonic
Epiphone 5w ValveTronic amp
Pignose amp (open)

DOD Classic Fuzz
POD 2.0 stereo multiFX/cabinet simulator
Digitech RP155 multiFX/20s looper
E-H QTron & Nano Clone
Behringer phase shifter, delay, pitch shifter, compressor
Tascam digital recording platform

I recorded this stacked-improvisation on 9.1.08 at the HipWorks Mobile Tone-Magnet in Eden, NC using a Guild "Ashbory" fretless bass (with silicon rubber strings!) and a signal-processed acoustic guitar through a Boss BR-8 recording platform. All tracks were 1st-pass improvisations.

“Jaco” Pastorius' first album entitled Jaco Pastorius (1976), was a breakthrough album for the electric bass, and its influence may still be felt in Jazz, Rock, and Hip-Hop. Many believe this to be the finest bass album ever recorded. In 1976, he joined the fusion band Weather Report, and his bass-playing became an integral part of its sound, in concert and on albums such as Heavy Weather and Night Passage. As well as pulsating basslines, he played mad solos in the higher register, with a bright tone that contrasted to the tribalism of his ensemble playing. He used chords and harmonics which created a rich texture. He played both fretted and fretless bass guitars. His playing was noted for its precision and propulsive drive.

William "Bootsy" Collins Rising to prominence with James Brown in the late 1960s and with Parliament-Funkadelic in the '70s, Collins' driving bass guitar and humorous vocals established him as one of the leading names in funk. Bootsy's Rubber Band, a separate touring unit of Clinton's P-Funk collective, recorded four albums together, the first three of which are often considered to be among the quintessential P-Funk recordings. Bootsy collaborated with bluegrass legends Del McCoury, Doc Watson and Mac Wiseman to form the GrooveGrass Boyz, a fusion of bluegrass and funk. Bootsy is widely considered a pioneer in many aspects of not only funk, but also in the progression and evolution of bass playing techniques. His bass playing is driving, rhythmic and groovy, and has been very influential in the development of funk. His characteristic juicy sound, produced by envelope filters (for example the Mutron), is one of his distinguishing traits as a bass player.

Source: (adapted from)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jaco_Pastorius
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bootsy_Collins

"Herbie-Blood-Sharrock" is a wild and funky bit that was recorded with the help of my multi-talented friend in Ohio, Eric Wallack. The sax and Les Paul you hear are him. The other guitars and so forth are me, simply sitting down in the studio and thinking about three of the artists that so impacted upon how I hear and think about music.

Many folks have heard keyboardist Herbie Hancock's music (http://www.herbiehancock.com, The Headhunters) , some before MTV brought his 'Rockit' into our living rooms. Herbie's played with everyone, and brought the concept of 'jazz fusion' light years ahead.

James 'Blood' Ulmer (http://www.hyenarecords.com/james.htm) is a remarkable guitarist whose 'Tales of Captain Black' was a seminal influence on me. He played with Ornette Coleman, Joe Henderson, David Murray, and many others. Ulmer's playing can be really frenetic and pointillistically funky, like sonic fractals chipping off his guitar neck. His brand new acoustic Blues record simply kicks ass.

Sonny Sharrock (http://www.sonnysharrock.com/thepress/quotes.asp) is another guitar hero of mine, who I first heard with MATERIAL on their great 'Memory Serves' record. Then later, my pal Bob Jordan played me (on flautist Herbie Mann's 'Memphis Underground' record) Sonny executing the most mind-blistering slide solo anyone's ever waxed. To describe this recorded guitar moment cannot be done. FIND THAT RECORD, it's on side B.
Anyhow, this piece is a tribute to all the things I think about when these great jazz-cats come to mind. Enjoy!