Songs Along the Way

Incisioni Di Modena

2010-11-22T16:11:00.000-08:00

It's been a while since I listened back to these recordings I made in '99 at Giorgio Buttazzo's studio in Modena, Italy. Giorgio plays a mean guitar in The Bermuda Acoustic Trio, an incredible cover band that has toured Italy constantly since before I met them. I was living in Bologna when I wrote the songs, listening to a lot of Fabrizio De Andre, Francesco Guccini, Lucio Dalla, and Lucio Battisti. Here are the recordings with translations underneath.

SOTTO LA LUNA

The sun threw its light on me
but I could think only of you
I saw a smile in your eyes
but my thoughts were regrettably few

I have to tell you that ever since the first time
Under the moon our souls were burning
When I touch you I feel almost empty
And everything else slowly disappears

I walked alone on the clouds
Looking for the sky below me
Instead I found the profound truth
It was blown in the wind
Followed closely by the lie

I have to tell you that ever since the first time
Under the moon our souls were screaming
When I touch you I feel almost empty
And everything else slowly disappears

I was descending, flying, never shedding a tear
I was falling, singing, my voice strong as ever
When at last I landed I saw you
You need not ask, you already know the answer

I have to tell you that ever since the first time
Under the moon our souls were glowing
When I touch you I feel almost empty
And everything else slowly disappears

SE VIENI CON ME

Come with me
the world isn't watching
Tell me who you are
but don't come out from the shadow
Don't be afraid of me
even if you can't see me
Let the world go
until you don't do only what it tells you

CHORUS
You'll feel me in the wind
I'll touch your hand
Don't lose yourself staring at the thought
You'll understand the feeling
I'll hold your body
If you come with me

CHORUS

When you leave me in the morning I don't follow
I wait for you to return but you go
I wait, but you don't look back
You're looking for a place you'll never find
But if you find it

CHORUS

You still don't know if you'll lose
the memory that I gave you
Maybe when you think of it you'll see me
Maybe when you see me you won't want me
You're afraid you won't dream when you sleep
and if you don't dream

CHORUS

LA VOCE

I tried to acknowledge the voice that was calling me
I wished that it would sing, but all it did was ask me
What do you want from life? Do you believe in god?
Don't you know that love only hurts your heart?

I smiled and said
It would take too many hours
to understand my thoughts
when I make love
I look toward the sky and sing the song
of the lover whose heart does not ache

CHORUS
The voice is mistaken
it does not speak my truth
It will never understand my reality
It has closed its mind and will not open it

I followed the words as they grew
Unsure of what they meant
It explained the song but did not sing it
I long for silence

The night was listening in and could not understand
Why the voice was speaking aimlessly
I explained that it was trying to get inside me
and that it was unable to

CHORUS

songwriting class

2010-06-13T22:28:00.000-07:00

Since moving back to the Bay Area two years ago I've been helping elementary school kids write and record their own songs in an after school program at a San Francisco public school. It's the greatest job I've ever had. At the beginning of class we listen to popular songs that I think are important for them to know and we talk about song structure, different genres, melody, rhythm, and lyrics. The kids then write their song ideas in their journals and we make rough recordings using a microphone attached to my ipod. Usually I accompany them on the guitar, sometimes they perform a cappella. Once their songs are complete I bring in my computer, a microphone, some headphones, and my portable Pro Tools hardware and we record their albums.

So far they've written about four hundred songs. Not all of them have gotten the full studio production because of time and space constraints. Here's a small collection of some of their work:

Saoirse's as talented a ten year old songwriter as I've met. On this recording she plays guitar and sings live in the studio. I added some electric guitar overdubs.
Click here to listen to "Look For You."

Fourth graders Tyler, Chinwendu, Vanessa, and Rashidah wrote this song about freedom together. It moves me every time I listen.
Click here to listen to "Freedom."

Jessica and Jennifer, fifth graders, collaborated on this song called "Bandieros." It's about gangsters fighting in the streets in their neighborhood.
Click here to listen to "Bandieros."

Cora was in the first class I ever taught last year. This song is about her fourth grade teacher who had moved away. With this song she proved what a young songwriter is capable of creating.
Click here to listen to "Last Year."

Edgar wrote this when he was in third grade. I sing it on this rough recording and some day hope to get him in the studio to lay down a vocal track. These lyrics are amazing.
Click here to listen to "While I'm Away."

Carlos is a die hard Michael Jackson fan. The king of pop had just died when Carlos wrote this letter to him and sang it into my ipod.
Click here to listen to "Dear Michael Jackson."

Tristan found this beat on my ipod and wrote these rhymes to rap over it calling himself MC Echo. He had his friend Tyler sing back up vocals.
Click here to listen to "MC Echo."

June was in second grade when she wrote and recorded "I'm Songs."She spent about two months refining the verses until she got it just right, and she drew detailed illustrations of all the emotions she mentions in the song.
Click here to listen to "I'm Songs."

El Profe

2010-05-17T19:03:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I learned of the passing of my good friend, teacher and collaborator, Roberto Fuentes. I first met Roberto when I was helping some friends make a short film in Germantown, NY in 2004. The production was in a massive converted farmhouse by the train tracks next to the Hudson River, home of the Station House Studio where I had recently recorded Palestine Hotel and an early version of Bay to Maples. It was a silent film, Roberto played an old carney in a top hat and cane.

A couple years later when I was living in Brooklyn Roberto took me on as a pupil, helping me learn to breathe, sing, write and perform. We used to meet up after hours at the music school in Tribeca where I used to work, or at my apartment in Greenpoint, sometimes for three or four hours at a time. He would get carried away telling stories of his years touring Venezuela with his troupe and the success they had before he moved to New York. He was as humble and extravagant a man as I've known, and more talented than anyone I've had the pleasure to meet.

At the time he said he no longer performed with his students, but there was one song of mine he said he wanted to play live with me. The gig was at 11pm on a Monday at Rockwood Music Hall, as safe a time as any to try out a new arrangement. We had Yair Evnine on cello and Elijah Tucker on drums. Roberto fingerpicks his quatro (it's like a ukulele) in the beginning then blasts into a rapid fire strum in the second part of the song.

LISTEN TO THE RECORDING HERE

I think of Roberto and the things he taught me every time I get myself ready to sing.

Berkeley. November 4, 2008

2008-11-06T22:28:00.001-08:00

I had my recorder rolling at a few different points on Tuesday night when Obama won the election. The six clips with this entry are chronological starting at around 9:30pm.

Ramona and I were driving toward the Starry Plough for the open mic victory party. We came on a mob of people dancing in the street outside Guerrilla Cafe and parked the car to get in on the celebration. People had spilled off the sidewalk and blocked one of the two lanes on Shattuck, others were standing on the grassy median dancing and shouting. Cars were able to pass through slowly, blowing their horns.

Listen to the crowd

We got back in the car and drove a half a mile an hour through the crowd. I was leaning out the window slapping hands with the folks on the median, caught up in the shouting and laughter.

Listen to it here

When we got to the Starry Plough it was Girl George's turn to perform. I took my recorder on stage when I went to sing backup for her. We were three backup singers, three conga players (including Tony Mayfield who George gloats is Curtis Mayfield’s son, and Jack who used to be a bartender at the Plough), and Guy Michelle on guitar. Girl George’s act is unrehearsed, abrasive and poignant. She’s a sixty four year old punk rock radical with a million stories that she’ll tell you without you asking.

Listen to Girl George celebrate

Next up was Tony Mayfield. He spoke a few words about the momentous occasion of Obama's election and shared some of his memories as a long time Berkeley resident. In the clip I posted below he introduces a song that he and D'Wayne Wiggins recently released called Be Thankful for What You Got. I cut off the clip before he launches into the song but Tony's warm up is a nice taste of his sound.

Listen to Tony Mayfield on conga

It was my honor to close the show after midnight when hardly anyone was left in the venue except for Guy Michelle talking about the bass player in his band and a handful of other stragglers. I played a song I'd started writing earlier that day when it looked like Obama was going to win and Prop 8 was going to pass. Highs and lows. Girl George held my lyric sheet for me and Tony played the congas. The recorder was on Guy's table.

Listen to my song, partly written partly improvised

When they finally locked the front door at the Plough I was walking to my car when this fellow named Victor walked up and started talking to me about the open mic. He told me that he was living in his truck and had just moved to Berkeley from Delaware. I asked him if he'd play a song right there on the street. He started spouting some good old radical left wing politics soon as I got the recorder rolling, criticizing Joe Biden for the credit card industry in Delaware in a monologue about corporate America. Then he sang a song his brother wrote. It was the right amount of far left skepticism to end a night of liberal euphoria.

Listen to Victor

Oh please pass the cheese

2008-09-25T15:18:00.000-07:00

This recording is from the same night as the one in my last post. It's Aaron Garber-Maikovska singing whatever comes to his mind and me playing the guitar part of one of my new songs. Greg Peters plays the surprise solo part way through.

My favorite line is when Aaron says:

"If we move fast enough
He won't know we're there
like the devil may care
with the Doc Marten's on
and my punk rock stare.
Look at the dogs, look at the geese
look at the apples and the cheese"

Aaron is a multi-media artist living in LA, raised in Berkeley and Petaluma. Music is featured in a lot of his work, check out the Youtube link below for a wild performance art piece filmed in a gallery. Whenever we hang out there are usually more harmonicas than inhibitions and the hours pass hysterically.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO AARON IN THE WEE HOURS

Aaron's piece on Youtube

Bio and info on gallery's website

more info

My Baby Don't Wear the Gas Mask

2008-09-22T12:23:00.000-07:00

This is the kind of ridiculous freestyle session that can only happen around four in the morning when you're chilling with friends you haven't seen in a few months. After our good friend Greg Mullan's wedding on Saturday a group of us ended up back in Petaluma with a couple guitars, some cold cuts and no intention of going to sleep.

Gabe Griffith kicks off the session spraying his metaphorical mace, Greg Peters and I pick up on the guitars and drop the backup vocals on the first chorus. The second MC is Aaron Garber who always brings a killer stream of consciousness. You don't hear Greg Peters sing very often but he lays into a funky falsetto in third verse and almost hits most of the notes.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE FREESTYLE SESSION

Surf and Saddle

2008-08-12T10:41:00.008-07:00

The first leg of our California tour brought me down to San Diego where I holed up with Greg Peters for two weeks. The day after I arrived we threw a party in Peters' backyard where four bands played from sunset until around midnight. Peters is the head brewer at the Solana Beach Port Brewing Company so we had the tastiest beers this side of the Rockies on tap that night. Plenty of people came out to the party. We like to think it was because of the music but the reality is that there are a lot of tasty beers this side of the Rockies and when the best among them are on tap for no charge people are bound to show up.

We spent the next week rehearsing in a garage in Carlsbad, getting ready for our Thursday night show at the Surf and Saddle, a sweet dive bar in Solana Beach. For John, Greg and Kyle (three of the four members of the band Guns of Avalon) the rehearsals were double since all three were playing in my band as well. The bill at the Surf and Saddle had The Minor Keys kicking off the show (a group of youngsters from Ocean Beach who wore neck ties and colorful rimmed sunglasses) followed by the Guns of Avalon with my band, the Doghouse Brewer, finishing out the night.

By the time the Guns of Avalon took the stage the room was packed. Our good friend Gabe took the mic to introduce the band and they eased into their rocking opening number, Quite One Universe. Peters laid into the introductory riff and John built it up with heavy distortion on his Epiphone. It was a dramatic and haunting opener to a killer set. Listen to the song below.

The next day Peters and I drove up to Hollywood to play a set at Room 5, a slick little club with a great sound system and some of the best Italian food I've had in a while.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THE GUNS OF AVALON PLAYING "QUITE ONE UNIVERSE"

KOA

2008-08-11T17:44:00.001-07:00

It was the last stop before driving back up to Berkeley and we hadn't had any coffee yet. Ramona, my brother Marshall, his girlfriend Janie, Greg Peters and I were in two cars: one filled with guitars, amps, tents and backpacks, the other with mountain bikes. We pulled up in front of Zachary's restaurant in Santa Cruz where a few of us had eaten in the past, hopped out of the cars and stretched our legs before going inside.

While we were loitering out front a man walked by carrying a guitar in his left hand and a milk crate in his right. It was nine o'clock on Sunday morning, not a time you would expect to find a busker playing for change on the street. But this guy had the look and equipment of a seasoned busker. I called out to him as he walked determinedly past the restaurant, asked him if he was going to play. He said he would if there was a dollar in it. I got a dollar for you, I told him, but he kept walking and disappeared around the corner.

We'd been camping at a KOA (Kampground of America) for two nights near La Selva Beach between Santa Cruz and Monterey. It was the tail end of our tour, me and the Doghouse Brewer, and the KOA had left us under-rested and wondering what the hell "kamping" was. The experience staying there was such a far cry from any camping any of us had done that I imagine they had legal problems calling their grounds "camps" and had to exchange the "c" for a "k" so as not to fool people into thinking they were actually camping. They jam as many people as they can into as small a space as possible. Driving through the place it looks like dirt stalls packed with humans and their oversized cars; tenements for people who are mildly interested in being outdoors. Babies crying all night, grumpy neighbors and horrible music piped through the speakers in the bathrooms.

Kamping aside, the trip down the coast was the perfect end to our first California tour. This was the northern stretch of shows: first at the Starry Plough in my hometown Berkeley, then down to the Firefly in Santa Cruz and finally the East Village Lounge in Monterey. We spent our days doing a live studio performance at KUSP in Santa Cruz, napping on the beach and busking on the wharf. The shows got better and better as we traveled down the coast.

The climax was in Monterey at the East Village Lounge where we played a tight set in their intimate backroom and then got asked to stick around and play another set at the after party of a fundraiser benefiting the town of Big Sur. The town had recently fallen victim to the terrible fires that burned much of the central region of the state and many of the area's most well-endowed patrons had come out to support the firefighters and victims. I was told they raised $250,000 that night. The wine they served was phenomenal and the folks that came to the after party were ready to get down with me and the Doghouse Brewer.

We didn't get back to kamp until around three in the morning. Ramona, Marshall and Janie were already asleep when Peters and I rolled up to our stall so we tiptoed as quietly as we could to bed. Me to the my tent and Peters to his bag in the fog.

The next morning, Sunday, we woke up to huge drops of condensed fog falling on our tent shell. Next thing we knew Peters was banging on the tent soaking wet and insisting that we strike kamp. Any hope we had of sleeping in was shattered by Peters' exposure to the elements. So we set our sights on Zachary's and drove the half hour up to Santa Cruz where we could finally have a cup of coffee and a few pancakes.

I ordered the pancake breakfast with chicken apple sausage then went outside of the restaurant with Peters to get something from the car. There, sitting on his milk crate, was the man I'd seen walking past with his guitar. He was playing slide guitar with an actual sanded down bottle neck on his ring finger. We dropped three bills in his guitar case and hit record on my ipod microphone...

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO SATCHEL PLAYING SLIDE ON HIS MILK CRATE OUTSIDE ZACHARY'S IN SANTA CRUZ

funding the tour

2008-07-15T14:41:00.003-07:00

I've put together a short coastal tour for the next three weeks. Shows with Greg Peters and our band, the Dog House Brewer, in San Diego, LA, Monterey, Santa Cruz and Berkeley. It's not cheap, all this traveling, especially when riding a bike from town to town won't get us in time to where we need to be.

Like my brothers and I have done many summers when it's time to earn some cash, I picked up a hammer as soon as I got back to Berkeley and went to work with my dad. He's a contractor who does mostly private residential work, though a while back we did some projects in the Co-Op dormitories at UC Berkeley and at my old elementary school in Oakland.

We've been building a deck for a family in Orinda, just the other side of the Caldecott Tunnel where the marine layer fog doesn't reach. The temperature has been up in the hundreds out there while it's cool and foggy two miles away on the Berkeley/Oakland side of the hill. The swimming pool on the property is tempting but we're far too dirty to jump in at the end of the day.

No song attached to this entry, just this picture of my dad and me building this deck. Him with his mullet hat and me grunting to fund this tour.

Back By the Bay

2008-06-25T11:08:00.004-07:00

Six days after pulling out of Brooklyn we're back in Berkeley. Day two on the road I decided to challenge myself to drive the entire length of I-80 though Ramona was more than happy to spend some hours behind the wheel. 2,901 miles later we made a victory lap around the Bay: through Berkeley and Oakland, down to Palo Alto to see some friends, up to San Francisco for dinner with my grandma then on to San Anselmo for a barbecue.

The show at Matchless on June 12 was the best way I've ever left town. The Elephant Army played a hell of a set to open the night then Philipp, Elijah, Bill, Drew and I closed it out with a cover of Woody Guthrie/Jeff Tweedy's California Stars off the Mermaid Avenue record. Drew and I sang it as a duet, he was on keys, Bill on mandolin and, of course, Philipp on drums with Elijah on bass. The recording is linked below.

It was an emotional night, but instead of feeling like the end of an era I had the strong feeling that it was a new beginning. I'll be back in New York at least a few times a year and now my friends back there have a reason to come out to the west coast.

First thing I did when we crossed the state line near Truckee, CA was text Drew that I was resting my weary bones underneath California Stars that night.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO OUR VERSION OF CALIFORNIA STARS

digging back

2008-06-08T21:23:00.006-07:00

We spent the day outside on Greenpoint Avenue in the ninety five degree humidity with a few friends helping us sell our stuff. Inside boxes have piled above our heads and the shower has no hot water. I'd be all right if I chose to take a cold shower and could control how cold it got, but the water was the kind of cold that burns the back of your head and makes you breathe in sobs.

Tonight I'm listening back over recordings I've made in the last five years since moving out to New York. I wrote the instrumental posted here two years ago when I was living in Tivoli with my friends Michael, Melissa and Giovanni on Route 9G. One night I wasn't sleeping so I loaded Garageband and let her rip. I named the song daddad oped because the guitar was tuned to d-a-d-d-a-d, an open d tuning.

It's not a sound I've messed with too much. I was listening to a lot of Bad Religion and Rage at the time and Michael had played in a bunch of rock bands. I played daddad oped on my Larrivee acoustic guitar so as not to wake up Giovanni, though the sound I heard in the headphones as I played was the distorted metal sound you hear in the recording.

LISTEN TO DADDAD OPED

catch you soon, dog

2008-06-05T11:59:00.007-07:00

Ramona and I are gearing up to drive across the country in a week and a half. Reality's beginning to set in as more and more boxes pile up in the apartment and we slowly say goodbye to friends we won't see between now and June 15. Leaving is one of the hardest things we've ever done, though we'll be back about a half a dozen times a year. Picking up and putting distance between ourselves and a life we've grown to love is just as hard this time around as it was when we left the Bay five years ago.

On Thursday, June 12 we're throwing a party called Catch You Soon, Dog at Matchless in Brooklyn. It was at Matchless a year ago where I played my first Brooklyn show with Elijah (on drums) and Yair (on bass). Two Matchless shows to bookend this year in Brooklyn. This time around Philipp Gutbrod will be on the drums, Elijah on bass, Bill Bell on keys and mandolin, and Daniel Bieber sitting in on cello.

The Elephant Army is joining me on the bill on Thursday, a great band whose members I have featured a time or two before on this blog. Drew Nix sings, writes and plays acoustic guitar; Elijah Tucker plays mandolin and drums and writes; and Olentangy John normally plays banjo and writes songs but he won't be there for the Matchless show. Mark Wixom will be on the upright bass.

We played a gig all together this past Monday at Rockwood Music Hall to warm up for the show next week. Our sets were at 11 and midnight so we felt free to let loose and try some new ideas. For Drew and Elijah letting loose meant shots of whiskey and renaming the band Cannibal Apocalypse for one night only.

As a preview of our show at Matchless, below are two recordings from our Rockwood show. The first track is one of my new songs, for new we'll call it "Too Long to Remember." Elijah's on drums, Bill's at the piano and Yair's playing cello. Roberto Fuentes is playing the quatro, a Venezuelan instrument that's easy to confuse with a ukulele. I met Roberto up in Tivoli a few years back when he was acting in a film I was helping some friends produce. He's a phenomenal voice teacher and collaborator with a life that brought him stardom in Venezuela and a contagiously whimsical passion for performing.

The second track is Drew, Elijah, Mark and Bill (Cannibal Apocolypse) rocking Arthur Crudup's "That's All Right Mama," better known as Elvis' first hit single. At first it looked like Elijah was going to play the mandolin, but with some convincing from his bandmates on stage and Yair in the audience he grabbed his sticks and jumped behind the drums.

You can also check out a short clip of our performance of New Paltz Waltz, shot by my old friend, Rebecca Letz, on her cell phone.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO MY NEW SONG, TOO LONG TO REMEMBER

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO CANNIBAL APOCOLYPSE ROCKING ARTHUR CRUDUP'S CLASSIC

Indy, Indie

2008-05-16T11:56:00.004-07:00

My good friend Elijah spent last summer in Northern California trying to dig up whatever work he could find. Craigslist is a good place to start when you're a damn good drummer, guitarist, bassist (in my band), mandolin player and songwriter, so he spent his first weeks checking posts on a daily basis.

One day he came across a post by a man named Bret looking for someone to help arrange and record a song he'd been working on. Bret was not a musician and had never written a song in his life, but with Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull coming out he'd been touched by the muse. An Indiana Jones die hard, Bret had memorized all the lines from the first three films and counted himself among the members of a variety of Indie fan groups.

He had the song all worked out in his head. Every harmony, background vocal, lyric, and rhythm change was clear in his mind, he just didn't know how to put it all together.

In stepped Elijah. Unaware of how absorbed he would become in this project Elijah agreed to arrange and record the song for a small fee. They decided that the best approach was to have Bret call on the phone and leave a message on Elijah's answering machine in which he sang his musical ideas for the song. After being cut off by the machine six or seven times because of the length of his messages Bret had finally communicated to Elijah every detail of the song.

Elijah set to work and spent all waking hours for three weeks working on the tune. He recorded all the vocal parts, the bass lines, percussion and guitar solo one track at a time on Protools through an Mbox. Bret was thrilled with the result and doubled his payment to Elijah in appreciation of his work.

Those one hundred dollars were the only income Elijah earned that month. He's still never met Bret in person.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO "OH INDIANA JONES" BY BRET MOSELY AND ELIJAH TUCKER

Bret made a video once the song was done. Here it is on Youtube. Some of the comments by Youtube users about the video are unappreciative at best. As for me...looks like a nice bike ride.

(I posted the mp3 version of the song separate from the video because the sound quality in the video is low. I think the cameraperson had positioned a stereo playing the song near the camera while they were filming to capture the audio.)

All in a Week

2008-05-09T10:28:00.002-07:00

It's springtime in NYC and you can't walk or ride a block without coming across someone making music. These days I've been hearing all kinds of different sounds around town, both above and below ground. As soon as I duck down into the subway I walk the length of the platform listening for anyone with an instrument, then once I'm on the train I'll take out my notebook and write out notes for my own new song ideas. Here are five recordings I made over the week at different places around New York City.

1) I'll Take Your Time
My friend Greg Peters was in town last week. He's on my record playing slide guitar on "Around My Thoughts" and "Blue River" and had flown out from San Diego to kick it and play a show with me in Brooklyn. One night we went over to Drew's apartment in Brooklyn and got to jamming over this riff I've been messing with lately. It's part of a new song I'm working on and I was lucky to capture this improvised session on my recorder. I'm playing the riff on acoustic guitar, Greg's playing slide and Drew's on the other acoustic guitar.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO OUR SESSION IN WILLIAMSBURG

2) Gebron Soul loving you down
One day I was passing through Union Square on my way to catch the L back to Brooklyn when I spotted Gebron Soul playing on the steps facing 14th Ave. He was dressed all in black with dark shades and a top hat pulled down low on his forehead. He wasn't busking, just playing his music for anyone who wanted to listen. We got to chatting and he played this tune as an ambulance sped by heading east.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO GEBRON SOUL IN UNION SQUARE

3) Chen Cong plays Fiacco
The next day Ramona and I got off of the E train at 53rd and Lexington and came across Chen Cong playing violin by the tracks. He had a small cart next to him with a tape player attached to a speaker pumping out a piano accompaniment. He played this piece, "Allegro" by Arthur Fiacco, to a crowd that had converged from both ends of the platform to listen. 53rd and Lexington has been a reliable place to hear eclectic music since I started carrying my recorder. This is the same station where I heard Juba playing the hammer dulcimer back in November '07.
CLICK HEAR TO LISTEN TO CHEN CONG PLAY FIACCO

4) Ramon Ayala?
I don't remember where I was going, all I know is that it was the middle of the day and the train was heading uptown. Before getting on the train I saw these two guys walking determinedly with their instruments down the platform as the train arrived. I followed them into the subway car at the end of the train and found a seat where I could hear them clearly. They stood in the open space by the doors with their guitar and accordian and launched into this Ramon Ayala sounding corridos tune. When they finished they took off their ten gallon hats and we dropped in our dollar bills.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THIS CORRIDOS TUNE

5) Earth's Cry Heaven's Smile Afrocussion Style
To top off one of the greatest weeks of public music encounters in my life, here's a recording of a group called Afrocussion playing a samba version of Santana's Europa (Earth's Cry Heaven's Smile). They were playing on the platform at 23rd St. and I was waiting for a train to take me down to Rockwood Music Hall where I was meeting some friends. When I got on the train I forgot to turn the recorder off as we sat in the station for a few moments. I like how the music fades as the doors close and re-emerges when the doors open again with the delayed departure.
CLICK HERE TO HEAR AFROCUSSION PLAY SANTANA

Songwriter's Beat

2008-04-18T11:39:00.004-07:00

Wednesday night we played the Songwriter's Beat at the Cornelia Street Cafe in Greenwich Village. Val Ghent is the host and a phenomenal singer and songwriter with an impressive resume and vocal range. There have been about two hundred fifty performers there over the years at the Songwriter's Beat, each playing as many brand new tunes as they can muster. There were four of us on the bill on Wednesday, afterward we took the group photo. The fellas and I debuted a couple of new tunes, one that might be called "Two in Return" and another that could be "Sake of Believing." Once I get a decent recording I'll post them here so's you can check them out.

In the photo, left to right:
Billy Masters- accompanied Susan Kane on guitar and dobro.
Susan Kane- opened the show with some beautiful folk songs.
Val Ghent- if you've read this far you already know a little something about Val.
Elijah Tucker- my man on the bass and vocals.
Dave Tutin- great stories and a full set of brand new tunes in some funky tunings.
Philipp Gutbrod- the legend.
Me- no link here cuz you're already there.

Bootleg at the Knit

2008-04-04T20:25:00.003-07:00

I bootlegged my own show at the Knitting Factory the other day for a couple of reasons. One, the fellas in the band and I wanted to hear what we sound like live at this point in our collaboration. Two, I thought I'd post it on this here blog so that other people could hear what the fellas and I sound like at this point in our collaboration. The quality of the recording isn't great, but it's enough to get a sense of our show. What sounds like an empty room in the beginning was in fact more or less just that. It filled out by the end of the set as friends straggled in from wherever it was there were. You can hear them talking near the voice recorder as they arrive. By the end there were maybe twenty five in the room. All right for a 10:00 gig downtown on a Wednesday. Most of them got there after the doorman had abandoned his post so they got a free half a show (...we didn't get paid more than about a half a falafel's worth each).

Philipp Gutbrod is on the drums.
Elijah Tucker playing bass and singing harmonies.
Bill Bell on the keyboard and mandolin.

Here they are in chronological order. Click on the song title to listen:

Red Sand- hello Tribeca
Straniero- one from the archives, circa 2002.
Band Introductions- some bull shit about Elijah's hat choice.
Blue River- I think I prefer this one on the acoustic guitar, but here it is on the electric.
New Paltz Waltz- Bill switches from the mandolin to the piano toward the end and it couldn't sound sweeter.
Treat Pam right tonight- tuning to open d is a good time to remind folks to tip the bartender.
Ya Sabia- Elijah's bass isn't quite tuned to the same d as mine.
Tectonic Plates- click here to check out the elephant painting an elephant on Youtube.
Around My Thoughts- we tried out a different ending...
You Won't Burn Me- man, that piano kills me.
Jesse on the sound- he had to be out of there by 11, kind of him to let us keep playing.
Where We've Been- I'm partial to this one.
Camera Shot the Truth- a good one to close on.
Amongst the Ranunculas- one time I bought a bunch of ranunculas for Ramona and sent her on a scavenger hunt around the apartment to find them in their hiding places.

Don Torre

2008-03-24T16:54:00.000-07:00

I was digging back through some recordings I made on the street a while back and came across this pearl. Last September I was walking to the 4 train in the Bronx after a Yankees game when I paused to listen to this saxophone player's rendition of the Godfather theme song. You can hear partly discernible fragments of anonymous conversations between fans leaving the stadium, just enough to get an idea of their age and accents. I didn't catch the musician's name, I suppose he's as anonymous as the passing voices. Only we know exactly what he's talking about.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO THIS TRIBUTE TO DON TORRE

cuomo

2008-02-28T12:16:00.001-08:00

Cuomo was tending bar at the Lucky Cat the other night, contemplating the extent to which he, an anarchist, had violated his ideals by voting for Obama in the primary. I didn't catch his set at the open mic but I had a chance to play a couple songs with Drew and John before Mikey packed up the microphones and cleared the stage.

A few of us stepped outside for air and smoke and to listen to part of Drew's life story. When we came back inside the place was mostly cleared out except for a few tuesday night stragglers. Cuomo picked up Drew's new guitar, a 1930's Kay arch top, and slammed into a song standing on the edge of the circle the rest of us were sitting in. He was bearded and grinning, his eyes connecting with Emma's when she sang harmony. She was standing to his right and my left, their voices in registers high above my head. "I am no one, I know nothing, I have nowhere to be, no one's expecting me" his song started. I had somewhere to be and Ramona was expecting me there, but for eight minutes I sat where I was with my eyes shut.

At the end of the first tune, Drew was quick to request one of Cuomo's new songs. He'd played it the tuesday before and Drew said it was one of his favorite songs ever written ever. Could have been written by Neil Young or Bob Dylan he claimed. "Every lyric in this song is a fuckin jewel from heaven." The first song had justified Drew's enthusiasm, "Poor Robin" blew us all away too.

It wouldn't have surprised me if I'd opened my eyes and seen Phil Ochs standing in front of me singing one of his own songs. Cuomo's voice was so familiar and his lyrics so resonant that I couldn't shake the image of the late folk singer songwriter from an earlier New York decade. Cuomo has more rock in him than Phil Ochs did, but either one could have been singing "Poor Robin" after hours at the Lucky Cat.

CLICK HERE TO HEAR CUOMO AFTER HOURS AT THE LUCKY CAT

One Leg Chuck

2008-02-20T08:44:00.002-08:00

He was playing at Union Square down by the L train late Friday night. We didn't have a chance to talk for long because my train pulled up at the end of his song, but he sang this killer reggae tune before I had to go. The lead guitar and vocals are live, the bass and rhythm guitar are recorded.

On his myspace page (here) he talks about driving out to New York from California and playing around Alphabet City. He hooked up with his bandmates down at Otto's Shrunken Head, a tiki bar on East 14th where the cocktails are unnatural colors and the music's loud. I played there with Philipp and Elijah a few months back on a weeknight.

This song's called "Prison" by One Leg Chuck.
CLICK HERE TO LISTEN

super bowl parade

2008-02-12T19:32:00.000-08:00

Last week I headed down to City Hall to see if I could get in on the Giants' Super Bowl parade. It was madness downtown. The city had lost its mind over its team's unlikely championship and there were more people out in the streets than I've ever seen in my life. It wasn't until the parade had ended and the speeches were wrapping up that I finally got close enough to see what was going on.

I was standing at a fence looking at the side of City Hall as the players walked back to the buses. From where I was standing it was hard to make out who was who as the players passed by about two hundred feet away. My recorder was running when this woman stopped next to me, grabbed hold of the fence and shouted, "OH MY GOD!!!! WHO IS THAT? WHO IS THAT?" When the man next to her said he thought it was Kareem McKenzie (Giants tackle), she responded, "WHAT?!?!?! I LOVE YOU...and my mother...and god...I love them, too." Her enthusiasm was not directed anywhere in particular other than the general direction of the team. How sane or sober she was I can't say, but at one point she laughs at herself as if acknowledging the absurdity of her excited outbursts.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO MY CONVERSATION WITH THIS WOMAN AFTER THE SUPER BOWL PARADE

bouncing on this ball

2008-01-31T15:21:00.000-08:00

As I have for the last four winters I'm spending a good amount of time everyday reading college applications. For someone who likes hearing people's stories it's a great way to pass the hours during the cold months. When it starts getting monotonous I have to take a break which usually means picking up the guitar and fooling with it for a while.

I have a few different places I like to read and a number of chairs to accommodate my demanding comfort. A lot of the time I sit on a big green ball like you see in the gym. Yesterday on one of my breaks I hit record and bounced to the rhythm of this blues number I'd been picking on my new guitar. It's an electric G&L ASAT Classic, just like a Fender Telecaster only made by Leo Fender's newer company.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO ME KILL TIME PLAYING GUITAR ON A BOUNCING BALL

Letter to my mom

2008-01-15T12:09:00.000-08:00

I was driving my friends Olentangy John and his girlfriend Liz back to their place in Bedford-Stuyvesant on the night of the New Hampshire primary last week. We'd been at an open mic at the Lucky Cat in Williamsburg. About half way to their place Obama took the mic to give his concession speech. By the time we pulled up outside the apartment his speech was only half way through, so I cut the engine and we sat there until he ended.

John and Liz are both about twenty three, from Ohio. He plays banjo and mandolin and guitar, writes songs and plays in a band with the guys I work with in Tribeca. At one point during the speech, as Liz tells me they easily do, John's eyes teared up. We were all fired up when the speech ended, talking about "yes we can."

At one point I thought I'd vote for Dennis Kucinich but then two things happened. First, he said that down the line he'll be supporting Barack. For many years Kucinich has consistently been forthright in his articulation of my beliefs and concerns. Then, in his concession of the New Hampshire primary to Clinton the other day, Obama's warmth and optimism, his determination to confront a scroll of challenges and to represent the nation thoughtfully had my blood pumping and my back straight. In my life time only his speech at the 2004 democratic convention has been as moving.

Sober Enough

2007-12-03T15:17:00.001-08:00

Friday night ended at the crack of dawn. It started at Elijah's in Fort Green where there were just about as many stringed instruments as people kicking back on the couches. It ended with a long walk through Williamsburg back up to Greenpoint just before the sun came up. At Elijah's we were drinking whiskey and jugs of wine to celebrate his birthday, passing the guitars, basses and mandolins around to anyone who was feeling a song. Drew Nix and Elijah are in a band called Elephant Army, they got an album coming out soon that they recorded down at Sun Studios. Drew wrote this song, and, like he tells me at the end of the recording, it's the first track on their upcoming album.

Click here to listen to "EVERYBODY HERE'S TOO DRUNK TO SING"

Juba and his hammer dulcimer

2007-11-26T13:31:00.001-08:00

There's a winding passageway that separates the platforms for the 6 and E trains at the 53rd and Lexington subway station. The Thursday I met Juba the crowd was hustling with typical impatience down the long corridor and I was in the middle of it getting my shoulders bumped and my heels kicked. With a few hours to kill between work up in Harlem and a gig at Matchless in Brooklyn I was neither in a rush nor bothered by the clumsy mass of people surrounding me.

His music was barely audible from the far end of the passageway, but as we came closer it grew louder than the White Stripes song rattling on my ipod. I turned off the rock and roll and let the mysterious reverberating sound guide me along the last yards of my transfer. When Juba finally came into sight it looked like he had created an eddy in a river of commuters. The passageway ended, the walls drew apart and off to the left there were people wandering casually in the area where he had set up his hammer dulcimer. Some were gazing at the tile mosaic on the wall and listening to his music, others stood in front of him watching the mallets bounce off the strings on his unfamiliar instrument. I got the feeling that somehow the complexity of his music and the intrigue of his unique instrument allowed them to discover for the first time the detail in these walls which they had hurried past so many times.

He had a recorded percussion track piped through a speaker at his feet. The percussion, I learned when I spoke with him between songs, was actually a recording of the percussionist from his band, Mecca Bodega. So I attached the microphone to my ipod and asked if he wouldn't mind my recording his next song.

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO JUBA AND HIS HAMMER DULCIMER AT 53RD AND LEXINGTON

Learn to See

2007-11-14T06:22:00.000-08:00

This is a recording I made sitting in Peters' backyard in San Diego a couple months back. We're playing a tune we came up with a couple moments before hitting record on the ipod microphone, he's playing bottle neck guitar and I'm on my Santa Cruz. The sound gets blown out by the wind from time to time and there's a little dissonance in our tuning and in my freestyle lyrics, but you get a good sense of how we work together when we have an idea for a new song.

Click here to listen to hear Peters and me write this song

song of the wha?

2007-11-08T08:02:00.000-08:00

Today my song Around My Thoughts is Garageband.com's acoustic Song of the Day and what that means for my career I haven't yet figured out. It does make me want to write about what my career is though. Maybe this Garageband thing is a small milestone that gives me a chance to look back down the path I've been blazing over the last year. A singer songwriter in a city of singer songwriters with a couple jobs to piece together a living.

Since putting out the "Bay to Maples" I spend more time on the computer trying to get the music in the ears of bloggers than I expected to. I read music blogs to learn about new artists, why not see if the writers feel mine? Since the music industry has ripped apart its own foundation, bloggers give music fans better access to new independent music than anyone else. So far a handful of writers have reviewed my record, you can read the reviews here. It's an admirable hobby, writing about music you dig.

CD sales are climbing slowly, not as quickly as the downloads, rips and burns I'm sure. I sell them out of my apartment in Brooklyn (though there is a stack at CD Baby as well) and on iTunes. Otherwise I play for kids a few hours a week in Tribeca at a slick little joint called Minimasters. We write catchy tunes and butcher classics like Hound Dog to suit our childish purposes (you sound just like a hound dog/howling all the time). They say it's healthy to smile, this job keeps me healthy.

For the last few years I've worked for Bard College up in the Hudson Valley. I've done a number of things there, from coaching the volleyball teams to working in admissions and teaching a rap songwriting class. Not so much teaching as facilitating freestyle sessions. Now I'm working for the admissions office from my apartment in Brooklyn. I talk to kids in public high schools around NYC about opportunities to study at Bard and what they might expect when they're there. To think, write, create, innovate...what better way to spend some formative years?

I'm a singer songwriter in a city of singer songwriters paving my path and paying my bills. Small or large as today's milestone may be it gives me the chance to reorient myself on this indie road I've chosen.

this decade in Austin

2007-10-04T12:35:00.000-07:00

...and we look to the Texan capital, an unlikely place for our generation's great pariah to incubate. The good people of the great town of Austin have responded to their former governor's follies with pervasive music. Feels like San Francisco might have felt in the 60's. Music is everywhere, it's cheap and damn good. I wandered in to the Continental Club on a random wednesday night around midnight and caught James McMurtry rocking the shop, then back at the venue on friday it was Charanga Cakewalk. I hadn't heard of them and walked out dancing all the way back to my hotel. From what I gathered accordianist/keyboardist/trumpeter/vocalist Michael Ramos is the backbone of the band, but the guys playing with him were kicking. I spent the rest of my cash on Bass and couldn't afford a cd so I bought the most recent one, Chicano Zen, on iTunes soon as I got back to Brooklyn.

This was right after Austin City Limits, one of the biggest weekends in music anywhere, and still mobs of people were out on wednesday, thursday nights listening and dancing. Here's to the good people of Austin for setting a stage on which the rest of the country can soon rebound along with them.

San Diego

2007-07-25T15:26:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I flew back to Brooklyn after a week down in San Diego where I stayed with my old friend Greg Peters. Peters plays slide on Around My Thoughts and Blue River. He only picked up the guitar a few years back but he's the type of guy that won't begin learning a new skill unless he's willing to commit himself to to it entirely. He mastered karate, surfing and beer brewing (Pizza Port Brewing Company) with the same dedication.

Our first gig was in San Clemente at the northern-most Pizza Port. Serious Sam Barrett played before us and loosened up the crowd of beer guzzlers and marines. He barely made it off the road for the gig after a day long trip down the coast from San Francisco where he'd played a show the night before. He stormed in like a wired Woody Guthrie with a British accent and 12-string guitar. I half expected him to jump on a freight train after the gig and head off to whatever came next.

Instead Sam and a group of good people came back to Peters' house for another beer, a smoke and late night jam in the backyard. Sam's from Yorkshire and played us a medley of local and Scottish folk songs which I dutifully recorded. Blew us away. Although his influences appear to be traditional Enlgish folk singers, Woody Guthrie, etc, turns out Sam's one of Too $hort and NWA's biggest fans. Unfortunately he had to take off back to England the next day, but I'm sure he'll reappear unexpectedly somewhere sometime telling stories like Utah Philips.

Click here to hear the recording of Sam in the backyard.

Saturday Peters and I started the day off with a set at the Listen Local picnic. Cathryn Beeks, the organizer and host, was kind enough to include me in the lineup even though I live about as far from San Diego as possible on this continent. The venue was right on Mission Bay at the Boat and Ski Club, a beautiful spot to spend an afternoon listening to great music. Unfortunately, Peters and I had to cut out pretty quick after our set to get ready for the party we were throwing that night at his house.

With the PA set up we stoked the barbecue and tapped the freshly brewed libations. Around 9 we played a sweet sounding set to a crowd of friends and strangers who quickly became friends before the night ended. We played all night. It was one of those epic guitar passing nights where everyone that touches the instrument had crazy talent and different styles of playing: rock and roll, talking blues, freestyle, jammy. Some people kicked it until the sun came up and we were still playing, if not very coherently. In college we hosted a bunch of "Nights of Entertainment" where Gabe and I would play music, Peters would break boards with his fist and Mullan would carefully insult everyone in the audience with his stand up. This party was among the best of them down in the salty San Diego air.

With nothing else scheduled Peters and I headed down to Old Town monday evening to busk for dinner money. We set up on a square in a pedestrian only street and played for about an hour, earning enough to pick up some tasty fajitas de camarones down the road.

I remember hoping that Serious Sam Barrett would miss his plane and be able to come play at the party Saturday. He didn't, and maybe because of my wishes I just about missed my flight on tuesday morning and ended up stuck in a middle seat that wouldn't recline next to a big guy whose arm hung too far into my hemisphere. Small price to pay for a week of music, good beer, surfing and sunshine.