Monday, May 30, 2005

A little drum upgrade

The time has come to do a little repair and upgrading on my drum kit. About 2 months ago I noticed my Tama Iron Cobra double pedal had been starting to slip a little. The left foot pedal, the extended pedal, connecting piece had actually wore down to a rounded shaft. Originally it was square and you screwed it in to hold the fitting, but now since it was round the screws wouldn't hold.

I took it into Guitar Center and quickly found out that not only was this a farily common problem with the Iron Cobra but the demo units in the store actually showed the same signs of wear. One of the sales guys of course recommeded that I upgrade to the latest and greatest DW 9000 series double pedals. I found out the price he thought he could give me and told him I needed to think about it.

I went back today and decided to go ahead and make the purchase as well as get some new drum heads. I decided to go with the Evans G2 coated for the toms and the sales guy recommended an Evans Double Ply Dry Coated Dry Head for the snare so I thought I'd try that out as well. They were out of the 14" G2 so I'll have to go back and get it later in the week. My $500 purchase gave me the DW 9002 pedals, 14" snare head, and 16", 12", and 10" tom heads.

I went to the studio tonight to try out the pedals. A huge difference over the Iron Cobras. Much smoother, better balance, and easier to play faster, which is always fun. I also put on the 10" and 12" heads. My drums sound brand new again and truly show off the DW sound. I'll probably pick up the 14" head from the other Guitar Center this week.

Practice this week should be fun with the band.


Thursday, May 19, 2005

Drums

My band has our first gig in nearly 6 months tomorrow. Over the past couple of weeks we've had a handful of rehearsals and it has been nice to get back into the groove of playing.

Mike V made a comment when I was talking about my playing that made a lot sense. I commented that I was playing better than I thought and I almost had the ability to play whatever I could think of playing.

He made the comment that kind of suggested I was floating or flying over the instrument. It was a pretty cool concept and one I hadn't tried to verbalize before. As you improve your playing and mastery of the instrument you'll begin to float on top of the instrument and that kind of frees you up to play some extremely creative and interesting things. I've only had this feeling a few times but now have a feeling I can assoicate and strive toward again as a play.

Sunday, May 15, 2005

crowes vid and pics

Here are some rough shots from the two crowes taken through a treo 650
using binoculars as a zoom lens. No joke.

The first is a video of Chris on stage the first night in Atlanta. Turn the sound down!
chrisvid.3g2



Monday, May 09, 2005

Jealous Again

We made it to the Black Crowes one more time on their four night stand in Atlanta. This time it was a family affair with Darian, Jacki and myself. We got to the venue early so we wouldn't be in the nose bleed seats. Once the doors opened Darian darted for the front of the stage and Jacki and I went to the second level. We settled in about 4 rows up from the front of the balcony close to the middle but off to the right side. The only downfall from our position is we couldn't see Ed at all, and viewing in between shoulders and over heads got tiresome.

The show had a very different vibe than the Thursday show. The show at times felt a little mellower although the set wasn't mellow by any means. A few more obscure tunes were played and the jams lasted a little longer. Highlights for me once again were No Speak, No Slave and My Morning Song. Jacki wanted to hear She Talks To Angels and I noticed they hadn't played the song in about a week so she had her hopes up. Sure enough she got her wish during the encore.

Chris was as animated as he was on Thursday and it seemed Rich was having more fun, grinning more than Thursday and jamming a little bit more with the rest of the band. During Jealous Again, Rich takes vocals on a couple lines in the song but actually nodded over to Sven to take the vocal on the second line. They also got in a few songs from the 3 Snakes album.

Here is Sunday's setlist.

Don't Do It
Stare It Cold
Go Tell The Congregation
Jealous Again
Seeing Things
My Morning Song
Girl From A Pawnshop
Space Captain
High Head Blues
Wiser Time
How Much For Your Wings?
Young Man, Old Man
Twice As Hard
No Speak No Slave
-encore-
She Talks To Angels
Shake Your Moneymaker

Darian got herself a Rich Robinson guitar pick and had a good time at the show. On our way home we asked if we had made her a Black Crowes fan and she said yes. Mission accomplished.

We picked up the Instant Live Recording and got home right around midnight.

Thursday, May 05, 2005

Welcome back Steve

Steve Gorman is back with the Black Crowes and Jacki and I witnessed it first hand. I got home and went to the Black Crowes website and saw they issued a press release announcing the return of Steve. I had told Jacki before the show they had a different drummer and then I was confused when I saw Steve on the drums. I had gotten a couple of bootlegs from early on the tour and found the shows difficult to listen to becaure the drum parts and the grooves weren't quite the same.

Probably as a result of Steve's return and first show back with the band this ended up being the best Crowes show I've ever seen. Chris was so animated, dancing and having fun the entire night. Jacki and I were talking about how different a show was compared to Chris' set we saw at Bonnaroo last year. The was the first time I'd ever seen the Crowes perform and actually look happy. It was a great night.

Virtue And Vice
Sting Me
Jam -> Black Moon Creeping
Cosmic Friend
Ballad In Urgency -> Wiser Time
Jam -> Thorn In My Pride
Sometimes Salvation
Peace Anyway
Soul Singing -> Jam
Jealous Again
Remedy
No Speak No Slave
-encore-
Willin'
Hard To Handle -> Jam

Chris' shirt said
"Don't buy weed from speeddealers"
Marc's shirt said
"Genuine Mustache Rides 5 cents"
and Ed was sporting a great FZ shirt.

I'll post some pictures I took with my Treo tomorrow. I even got a quick dancing video of Chris. We picked up a shirt for Jacki and a poster for me and now I'm going to listen to my instant live cds of the show!

at the black crowes

Here is the opening band, Rose Hill Drive.

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