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Jul 20 2020

TO WHERE I AM NOW

Today I spoke with a jackdaw. Olivia and I were taking the daily 100 tons of recycling down to the bins by the sea, walking by the construction fence that stretches the length of the promenade and there, inquisitive and not at all scared was this smart and charismatic creature. He/she was definitely listening although I’m not so sure it appreciated me asking if it spoke parrot? When you can get a bird’s attention without tempting them with food and can see a reaction, a curiosity, it makes you wonder how an animal might see us. One wonders why aren’t they scared, they should be, I’m sick to death of people letting their kids terrorise pigeons instead of admiring them when they’re likely smarter than their dog.

I tried out the mask I had in a shop today and glad I did because it was too thick and hard to breathe, so I bought two mask packages that had two masks each inside. So, question – are you supposed to wear them and then throw them away? Has anybody seen any instructions about the life of a mask? It doesn’t seem like it would take too long for a mask to get grungy if you are wearing it all the time but if you are just popping it on for the shops perhaps one mask will suffice for a while. I guess there’s a thousand different kinds of masks, too. I discovered today that if you are wearing glasses or sunglasses and a mask, when you breathe your glasses steam up, not such a problem in a shop I suppose although I’ve been in stores where you need sunglasses. But if you wear glasses I guess it’s a problem. The government guidelines never deal with the real day to day issues, do they?

But on to serious matters, today I went to pick up my pasty and they had forgotten to save it for me so they gave me a free spicy pasty to try (they are so nice, the people not the pasty). It was good but it had something in it that my body doesn’t like, something to do with bell peppers/capsicum, no doubt. Then I was thinking about allergies and those people who have died because of a peanut! Can you imagine? Dare is allergic to apricots. I am allergic to penicillin.

When I was a young child at school the idiot teachers had us cutting blocks of balsa wood with Stanley knives. And yes, of course, the inevitable happened, I sliced the side of my thumb off. I was taken to hospital where the first thing they did was pump me full with penicillin. The story goes, although it’s mostly lost in the mists of time that I fell into a coma. I was allergic. I don’t know how long I was out or the details but for years afterwards, I wore a medical bracelet. It became too heavy and awkward when I began to play the guitar, so there’s no indication that I shouldn’t be given penicillin should I be in an accident and my nearest and dearest isn’t there to inform the doctors. I could wear something around my neck but I don’t really like things around my neck, a tattoo on my forehead perhaps? The trauma of the actual accident is still quite vivid in my memory and next time you see me, ask me to show you the scar, I had stitches, I can still remember them and I can still remember the pain of having them removed. I get a shiver thinking about it. I think that I am quite susceptible to pain and if the baddies wanted to know where the base was (or even where the bass was) it wouldn’t take much torture to get the info out of me. They wouldn’t need to slice me with knives either, they could just recite Dream Theater lyrics, put the guitar solos on loops or just play Wonderwall, I would spill immediately.

For those of you that are waiting, I’m working on the Handwritten Lyrics, I wrote Dancing With Death today and Olivia is conceptualising the actual illustrations. She’s so good, I could write stories about Martian gnome families travelling throughout the galaxy picnicking and she could illustrate them. Hm, I wonder if there’s an audience for that?

Andy Jossi sent us the new The Churchhill Garden album today which I’m sure will sound as sumptuous as it looks but I also received the new Ray LaMontagne album Monovision and Mercury Rev’s Delta Sweete tribute. The latter I know but with the LaMontagne album I’m hoping for the side I Iike, he has a side I really like and a side I don’t really care for. I’m looking forward to catching up with all these new releases including old new releases and records friends have sent me. Send me time.

Music today comes in the shape of If. And if you don’t know who they are then I wouldn’t be surprised because they fall through all the cracks of hip, Jazz, Progressive, Rock. They are odd and accessible at the same time. It’s as if there’s a reason not to follow them from every genre’s point of view. They could be seen as easy listening, mainstream even, but then they are also Jazz Rock. They have a singer that could have been in Blood Sweat And Tears or Boz Scaggs so they don’t appeal to moodier tastes and they’re not jazzy enough to be loved by the Jazz fraternity. You could imagine them on tour with Steely Dan. In the period between 1970 and 1975, they released 8 albums and toured a lot in Europe and America, so someone liked them somewhere.

Apart from their singer, J.W. Hodkinson, they were led by two sax and flute players, the late Dick Morrissey on tenor and soprano sax and flute and Dave Quincy on tenor and alto sax and flute. Morrissey was best known as a session man (he died in 2000) who played on everyone’s record from Stiff Little Fingers to Demis Roussos and Roy Harper to Gary Numan via Paul McCartney and there was his post If band, Morrissey-Mullen. Quincy played on the two odd Manfred Mann Chapter Three albums I was talking about some weeks ago and after If formed Zzebra (with a double Zz). More jazzers, John Mealing on keyboards, Terry Smith on guitar and Jim Richardson on bass with drummer Dennis Elliot completing the lineup. Somehow he went from this band to join Foreigner, playing on all their hit albums. He also played on the first two Ian Hunter solo albums and in the sixties was a member of The Ferris Wheel with Linda Lewis, bassist George Ford and guitarist Jim Cregan whose names are on records you either have or have sung along to if you were born at that special time.

So the albums went like this with this lineup: If 1 (1970), If 2 (1970), If 3 (1971). By the time of If 4/Waterfall (1972) it was live tracks and a transition, the lineup was changing and by Double Diamond (1973) only Dick Morrissey was left and from there to Tea Break Over, Back On Your Heads (1974) and Not Just Another Bunch Of Pretty Faces (1974) there were different members and the band was over.

The point with these albums is (and there’s no point singling one out over the others) that they are that lovely mixture of many things. For me, I like records that have songs but within those songs, there’s lots of instrumental passages, the songs are real and so is the music. I don’t have the very first If album (1970) but do have all the other seventies releases (the US version of If 4/Waterfall has some different tracks). What I love about music is how it seems to inspire or have absolutely no effect at all. It’s how I feel about Oasis and Dream Theater, bands that people love, two extremes of music styles that I generally like but not in the case of these two bands, I guess they don’t love my records either. If you’re interested, with Oasis it’s the music, the lyrics and the guitars and with Dream Theater it’s the music, the lyrics and the guitars.

So with If I would absolutely not recommend this band to you but it is a band I like that released eight albums in the seventies – for somebody. It’s like a band with no home and that might be its appeal to me but I can see how they would easily be disliked by all kinds of music lovers, and it’s not exactly that it’s specialised, it’s more that it’s brilliantly faceless. There’s no real point recommending Yes to a Clash fan unless they have a wide and special appreciation of different genres, different approaches and can listen to AC/DC and Ella Fitzgerald in the same sesh, so consequently, unless you like Angus Fitzgerald and Joe Wakeman stay clear, I just listen to all types of records, that’s all.

Song Of The Day is Forgotten Roads by If from Beat Club, Bremen, Germany 1971:

Written by Marty Willson-Piper · Categorized: Blog

Missing

This is my stolen 1965 Rickenbacker 12-string, serial number EB157. If there's any chance of this guitar coming back to me before I go to meet my maker, then that would be wonderful. Please contact me if you have any information.

11209512_1669022976719710_7288437867089763325_n

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You usually don’t spend the day in the studio an You usually don’t spend the day in the studio and the night at a gig but if you put the studio next to the gig then there’s a greater chance. So @salimnourallah did just that, he put the gig and the studio next to each other and made it possible for me to spend the day recording and the evening playing live 🎵

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TO WHERE I AM NOW A visit in the studio today fro TO WHERE I AM NOW

A visit in the studio today from old mate Mark Burgess from The Chameleons who has been hanging in Texas recently. I was thinking about the two of us growing up in the northwest of England and all these years later finding ourselves in such an unlikely spot together. We fixed a few issues in the universe and I carried on recording some guitars until Mark had to leave. Mark had played at the Galactic Headquarters next to the studio this year as Olivia and I had four years ago and this reminded me to remind myself to remind everyone to remind their friends that we will be playing there with Salim on Saturday, New Year’s Eve, for the ultimate in intimate performance. You can get tickets here (follow link below).

CONTINUE READING: https://martywillson-piper.com/2022/12/to-where-i-am-now-1045

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📷 @argirgirl 📷 @argirgirl
TO WHERE I AM NOW Sadness manifested in a buildin TO WHERE I AM NOW

Sadness manifested in a building, today we went to visit Paisley Park. Prince built Paisley Park in Chanhassen, about twenty minutes southwest of Minneapolis. It opened in 1987 and he recorded his later albums there. Apart from Prince, REM also recorded and mixed Out Of Time there, recording Kate Pearson’s vocal on Shiny Happy People vocal. Madonna had Prince play guitar on three songs from Like A Prayer and the two co-wrote Love Song, finishing it remotely due to Madonna not being able to stand the cold weather and the rather desolate location of the studio. Of course, there are things around but it’s not in the city and it’s not in the countryside, it’s in a suburb, no distractions, just what Prince wanted.

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"These are awesome sessions that I highly recommend for guitar players of all levels. Very informative, frank discussions on everything related to guitar and music in general. Definitely a must for anyone pursuing songwriting."
(Stephen G., VA, USA)

"Marty knows how to bypass scales and get to the heart of feel and timing. His musical knowledge spans multiple cultures and genres. Perhaps most importantly, Marty is a cool dude. I highly recommend his guitar guidance." (Jed B., MN, USA)

"Ok, so you’re sitting in your home and Marty is across the world but is actually right here teaching you how to play guitar and write songs. He is a delight to talk to and he is your teacher, meaning he wants to see you get something out of his lessons. You know he’s paying attention and wants to steer you in the right direction. I am so grateful and humbled that he offers his time in this manner. This is an amazing opportunity for anyone who admires anything from his enormous body of work. How often do you get to learn from somebody that inspired you in the first place? Amazing." (Ann S., CA, USA)

Missing

This is my stolen 1965 Rickenbacker 12-string, serial number EB157. If there’s any chance of this guitar coming back to me before I go to meet my maker, then that would be wonderful. Please contact me if you have any information.

11209512_1669022976719710_7288437867089763325_n

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