Waking up in another state (haha) is always exciting, Minnesota in the spring is no exception. Even more exciting is knowing that we are on the way to Terrarium Studios today in southeast Minneapolis where I will be playing guitar on Fred Argir’s record. We drove through a network of freeways, past both lakes and city buildings to find ourselves circling an orange building and looking for a parking spot. Through the front door, you came to a long corridor lined with various vintage amps, Fenders, Gibsons, Vox, and names you’ve never heard. We were greeted by Jason the owner who told me that he was at the video recording of Reptile at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis in the eighties, small world.

We met Todd, the engineer for these sessions, and Braedyn his assistant and found ourselves in a beautiful studio with acoustically designed rooms, a Neve desk, and a whole range of drums, guitars, effects pedals, and even an original Mellotron. An array of microphones and a control room full of outboard gear, now all we need is talent, haha. Luckily we have it with Fred’s songwriting and singing and we recorded backing tracks in Texas in January with that great band of musicians, that included John Dufilho on drums, David DeShazo on bass, Rich Martin on organ, me on electric guitar and Olivia on violin.

Some of these songs needed electric guitars, some are already recorded so we are starting with finishing electric guitars, trying some more violin ideas, and getting to some vocals before I have to leave next week to get back to Dallas to start the Space Summit project with Jed (from Minneapolis). Today I was playing Fred’s 1966 Fender Jazzmaster and his 1966 Rickenbacker 360/6. Also, Jason has a newer Gretsch 6120 that I used. I was using two 1964 Vox AC30s, one a Top Boost, the other a pre-Top Boost but with the tone controls in the back, beautiful.

Got home late and by midnight, I was collapsing, long days, short periods to write, Spanish lesson, goodnight.

Music today was Os Mutantes in sad remembrance of the death of Rita Lee. You don’t know them? Then you must. RIP Rita.

Music Of The Daze

I actually went to bed before midnight last night, but I simply couldn’t stay awake any longer, the sleep drones were dragging me down, they had ropes around my ears and ankles, I was being dragged onto the floor, into the mousehole, behind the panels in the walls, drawn into the darkness, I could no longer stay awake and I was gone. I woke up earlyish around 8 and got ready for today’s trip to Minneapolis, this time without the 10 feet of snow.

Sarah picked us up at the house and kindly drove us to the airport. There was of course a traffic jam with a truck broken down in a tunnel under a freeway but we were soon moving again and arrived in good time. I gave my unopened can of Coke Zero to a guy before I went through security, I couldn’t bring myself to just throw it away, I heard him open it as I walked away, result. I love these uneventful trips as we sail through the air high in the sky in a silver machine that to my non-scientific mind has no chance of staying up there. Olivia and I were not sitting together, I was behind her in the middle seat, she was between two women, me between two men. The plane had a queasy landing and a slow disembark but we made it to the baggage claim where sessioneer Fred met us.

Suddenly we were in Minneapolis, isn’t it amazing that we can find ourselves across the country in the blink of an eye or in my case in as long as it takes to listen to two albums. Minneapolis has always been kind to the music that I have been involved with and now with Jed and Space Summit and Fred’s project I am actively involved with making records with the locals. I will be here till next Wednesday playing electric guitar on Fred’s record and helping him complete an album. When I get back to Dallas, Jed will be arriving two days later as we start work on Space Summit II.

We drove through Minneapolis (through more traffic) to Fred’s house in St. Paul where this time green grass replaced the snow of Christmas. Fred’s wife Gerri Ann was there with one of the baby grandkids and Mum and we settled into watching the birds, woodpecker, cardinal, finch, chatting, and making plans for the studio tomorrow. So now, it’s bedtime again, it keeps on happening!

Music today has been Wilco’s A Ghost Is Born (2004), the band’s fifth album. It was a time when singer-guitarist Jeff Tweedy went nuts on the guitar with dramatic arrangements that had thoughtful songs suddenly surprised by often long angular noisy guitar explosions. Somehow it works but it wasn’t long before Nels Cline arrived to continue the idea with a little less abandon but with strikingly good results. Somehow the last ten years of Wilco have passed me by, I have some catching up to do.

Thank you for the continued support for the In Deep Music Archive project and the GoFundMe campaign, more on that as it advances.

Music Of The Daze

The rain came down so fast that the gutters exploded, unable to cope with the amount of water pouring from the sky. We stood by the open studio door marvelling at the deluge, the drama of torrential rain, flooding the pathways and drenching the lawn and the cacti. It’s Texas so it won’t be wet for long, the heat will roll back in, although today it was slower in returning, a welcome respite from the dense heat. We retreated inside to the air conditioning and the music, different to where we live in Portugal, no heating, no AC but a climate of fewer extremes, thankfully generally warmer than where we grew up in Northern Europe and for me thankfully cooler than living in Australia.

Inside we continued working on the mystery album, I tuned up the Seagull 12-string and broke the octave G doing so. I had it tuned down for the flight and it didn’t like it, rebelling by breaking a string. I played engineer Kevin’s Epiphone El Capitan acoustic bass, a great big chunky instrument that oddly needed a light touch to get the best out of it. The previous day I’d been playing his Gibson Eb 2 sixties bass which was remarkably heavy for a semi-acoustic instrument. We’ve been mic-ing them up rather than amping them or using a direct line. It gives a unique stand but you have to keep quite still and no loud breathing.

Our friend and local music nerd Paul Averitt came in with his voice and did some great high melodic harmonies as well as some raunchy ones. John Dufilho played some soft drums and tambourine and tag-teamed with Kevin in the engineering chair, Sarah jumped in if either were indisposed. Salim contributed ideas and Olivia wondered about the violin parts that were needed. We will have Tess in again next week with her cello, teaming up with Olivia in the string section. Otherwise, the rest of the day was listening to recorded songs and making notes about what they needed. We will continue with this for a day and a half next week but tomorrow we fly to Minneapolis where I will be playing electric guitar on Fred’s project.

Music today has been Ozzy Osbourne’s cartoon metal and the album Patient Number 9, featuring Jeff Beck on the title track, I still can’t believe he died so suddenly. But whilst we are on the subject of musical losses (the ones I haven’t mentioned), the great Ian Bairnson left us too. He played that memorable riff on Pilot’s January and was on Top Of The Pops with his double-neck Gibson SG. He also played on the early Kate Bush albums and with the Alan Parsons Project. Gordon Lightfoot has also gone with his 12-string acoustic, his evocative voice, and meaningful songs. But the list goes on in guitarist land, Mudcrutch’s Tom Leadon, Skynyrd’s Gary Rossington, Yardbirds‘ Top Topham, and last but not least the nicest man, David Lindley who played on Starfish. RIP.

Music Of The Daze

Thanks to everyone who has contributed to the In Deep Music Archive – Phase 2 GoFundMe campaign so far. I hope you will all be coming over for a special private viewing when we are set up and ready to go. In the meantime, we’ll be working on renovations and collecting records whilst travelling and working on all kinds of projects. A thank you to Thomas Matthews who has sent me Ian McCulloch’s RSD album Slideling (2003) as well as the Faith and Healing EP (1989) and the September Song EP (1984). Plus a Jack White 7-inch, Lazaretto, from 2014. In return, I’ll be autographing the RSD Noctorum album Offer The Light which he sent me with a silver pen. If anybody wants to send me something to be autographed please do. Also here in Texas, we have a few In Deep Music Archive T-shirts, let us know if you would like to have one.

Today was cello day in the studio and Tess who we have worked with before on sessioneer NJ Brian’s Valley of Salt project came to weave her magic. She played on two songs, blending with Olivia’s violin lines and adding great parts to the songs. We will be seeing her again in early June. I love working with strings and string players when they have all the discipline that it takes to play instruments like this, and yet all the freedom to step out of the rules and into ideas.

It’s hot here, an awful humid heat that is interrupted by thunderstorms and rain, an hour later everything is dry again and you’d never know that any water had fallen from the sky. So far I haven’t seen the evil army of mosquitos but I imagine they are on their way. Yesterday there was a raccoon in the garden, it froze when it saw us and was completely still until it figured that we weren’t a threat, just nature tourists, it turned its back to us and casually shuttled off into the hedge. Then there were the fireflies, nature’s wonders.

Music today has been CAN’s Flow Motion (1976), their seventh album. It was odd in that it was an album by an experimental German group that had a hit single. I Want More found itself at No. 26 in the UK chart, quite a feat, but then it’s a rather catchy ditty. Lyrically, greed didn’t seem to bother the pop audience, I’m quite sure the album sales didn’t reflect the single’s success, or if they did, there would certainly have been some raised eyebrows outside the disco.

Music Of The Daze

Thanks to everyone for all the lovely birthday wishes and contributions to the In Deep dream through the GoFundMe campaign. It was quite a busy day yesterday (as birthdays can be) of writing, listening, and even seshing. We had lunch at Denny’s the great American 24-hour diner with Olivia, Sarah, Salim, Miette, and Gavin. Miette and Gavin are Salim’s kids and Sarah and Salim are mainly responsible for making these trips to Dallas happen. A place where I can work with an amazing crew on Salim’s or my projects and multiple sessioneer projects at a great studio with talented musicians and engineers. When I tell people I’m going to Texas, images appear in their brains of macho men, cattle, pick-up trucks, cowboy hats and spurs, and conservative philosophies that range from women’s rights to guns, well, not the people I know. Having said that this Texan trip started with an uncomfortable reality.

We arrived on the day of another mass shooting, nine people were killed, and another fellow with an AR-15. It’s so common that I even know what an AR-15 is, I shouldn’t know that. As I looked out of the window in the morning, across the alleyway, in the backyard of the house opposite, a man with a rifle. He was staring up at the tree obviously trying to silence a possum or a scratchy squirrel. He stood there silently for quite a while looking up. He was back again an hour later wearing fewer clothes (haha) but still sporting the rifle. I didn’t see him use it, or hear it but just to see it was disconcerting, not a typical scene where I live.

Although today is another day, and yesterday takes up a lot of today’s blog, today has been a continuation of yesterday evening’s listening and working on the mystery project, which I will be concentrating on for three days this week. Having said that with the remains of a cough and a razor-blade throat, the day may have to be steered appropriately. But I have been in the studio all day, as I was last night with Kevin and John, and Sarah. Salim will hopefully be there today, yesterday post-Denny’s he disappeared to rest after having pulled a painful muscle in his back.

So as today was a longer version of yesterday evening of which more details will appear as we make progress and my throat heals, I do have to mention another of yesterday’s events which was going to the mega and badly named Half Price Books. A huge and extremely well-organised warehouse with a cafe and a zillion books and records, not a dump but everything is properly labelled and organised, although I did find The Ramones under ‘Easy Listening’. I bought a reissue of Mickey Jupp’s Legend, the first album before the legendary Bill Fifield aka Bill Legend joined on drums. So named by Marc Bolan before he joined T. Rex. I picked up an American copy of Deep Purple’s The Book of Taliesyn (1968), an American copy of The Bonzo’s Let’s Make Up and Be Friendly (1972), three Doris Day albums (I’m a secret Doris Day fan – not anymore), Day Dreams (1955), Cuttin’ Capers (1959) and Wonderful Day (1961). I also got a hard-to-find album by The Tear Garden, Tired Eyes Slowly Burning (1987), Edward Ka-Spel’s other project outside The Legendary Pink Dots. Last but not least the Monique van Vooren album Mink In Hi-Fi (1958), irresistible. Paul, our resident multi-instrumentalist and “long-hair”, gave me an album by a band called Daniel Amos, a self-titled album released in 1976…a religious history and apparently an amazing record.

Music today has been Hawkwind’s new album The Future Never Waits (2023). They never stop.

Music Of The Daze