The Pirate Charles

*looks around guiltily* Okay, how about we pretend that I haven't been slacking for a couple of weeks and instead have posted some really good music, so I don't have to make up some lame excuse for not posting.  No?  Yeah, okay, I've been bad.  I'll try to do better.

So, for the real post.  Last week our friend Rock gave us an album because he knows about our love of pirate music.  The album is Conquer and the band is The Pirate Charles (warning: the page autoloads music, and I find no way to turn it off).  Now, this is not a Renaissance pirate group, like so much of my pirate music.  These guys are rock musicians.  They do have a mandolin, a couple of fiddles and a very Ian Andersonesque flutist, but they also have some good heavy guitars and drums.  The music is mostly about drinking, wenching and thievery on the high seas.  I dig them.  The appear to be from somewhere in the Northwest going by their schedule, so I'm hoping to catch them sometime if I go up to see my brother in Oregon.

Vocally, none of them have overwhelmingly awesome voices.  They sing a bit rough, which is totally acceptable for both the music genre and the theme of the group.  Now, they do harmonize very well and I think y'all are aware of my love of good harmonies.  Musically, they are very tight.  On the album, there is a good balance between the acoustic instruments and the electric instruments.  The sound on the live performances on their videos isn't very good, but it seems that they balance fairly well on stage as well.

My favorite song?  The Star Spangled Banner.  No, really.  You know how they told you in music class that Key only wrote the lyrics, the music was from an old drinking song?  And do you remember - like I do - thinking "No way are a bunch of drunks going to be able to sing this music."?  Well, TPC convinced me.  This is the Star Spangled Banner as sung by a bunch of drunk, but very patriotic lads down at the local pub.  I in no way shape or form find this in the least bit insulting.  In fact, I was very sorry that I couldn't find a YouTube video so I could share the love.

So, I'll share this one instead.  It gives you a good idea of both their harmonies and their ability to rock.  Unfortunately, the sound isn't the greatest once the guitars kick in, but its good enough that you get the idea.  And no, the lead singer isn't playing a tambourine.  He's playing his flogger.  It's THAT kind of fun. :)

They've a bunch more videos on YouTube than they do on their website.  I suggest you go have some piratical fun.

Guilty Pleasure

*looks around cautiously*

Don't tell anyone, but....I kinda dig this video

No, I'm not a Belieber or anything.  However, I'm also not a jealous adult who will give him shit for being famous.  All that fuss about his hair?  Dude, he had the same haircut that John Lennon had when the Beatles started out!  Talentless?  No, not really.  He can actually carry a tune pretty well (although there is a touch of Autotune in this song, I'm thinking it's more b) moo than lack of talent).  He's not what I'm going to regularly listen to, but I'm also not about to fuss over a reasonably clean cut kid who is an appropriately aged teen idol.  Not my generation - not my place to dis.

But the video - Steampunk and awesome breakdancing.  Hell, I might even give Ke$ha brownie points for doing that!

Slow music week...

I haven't run into any new music this week.  Granted, I haven't been looking for it, but I usually have at least one friend post or email a cool video every few days.  So, if anyone is actually reading this thing, I kindly request you post a video or music link to your favorite obscure artist's favorite obscure song.  Because I could use another artist that I now desperately need to buy all the music they've ever created including the crappy first album that they recorded in their parents' garage. :)

On another note (ha! see what I did there?) I finally broke down and bought Ukulele for Dummies and it came in this week.  I've been doing pretty well figuring out a large chunk of the chords on my own, but bar chords are kicking my butt.  I figured it was time for a little help.  They guy who wrote it - Alistair Wood - is British and right off the bat I found out something that I didn't know before.  We Americans use completely different names for the notes than the British do.  I would expect this means that any English speaking European uses different names, seeing as they get their English lessons from the source.  So, for those like me who didn't know, but want to (the rest of you can just skip) here's the run down.

We say whole, half, quarter, eighth and sixteenth notes.

They say semibreve, minim, crotchet, quaver and semiquaver notes.

He states in the introduction that he's going to use the American notes because they make more sense.  Which I'm rather glad of, because I don't know that I could wrap my set-in-its-ways brain around the other system.

Okay, to kick off (hopefully) some music sharing here is Plink Floyd, banjo virtuoso (no, that's not a typo) playing with Steamboat Willie:

And one more with Steamboat Willie himself singing:

It is time.

Okay, I've mentioned before that I'm not Christian, but I still enjoy the holiday season.  However, I've got a love/hate relationship with the music.  At the beginning of the season I really like it.  By Christmas day I'm so tired of it that I never want to hear it again.  I've 178 end of the year seasonal songs on my iTunes (and I state it that way because while most are Christmas songs, I've got a handful of Hanukkah and Yule songs as well).  The day after Thanksgiving is the day they are allowed to go onto the iPod where I might hear them regularly.  The day after Thanksgiving is also the day I stop scowling at everyone who has already started the season, either by music, decorations, or sales. 

And even though it's definitely a religious song, this is probably my absolute favorite seasonal song. 

And this arrangement is probably the best I've heard it done.  When I was singing as a professional caroler (Victorian caroler, mind, so I was singing in a corset.  I'm that badass.) one of our tenors learned David Bowie's part, so, I've actually sung something very close to this.

And with that, it's officially the {insert your preferred end of the year celebration} season in my house.

Fun, Fun, Fun

I've found that sometimes it's easier to pick up a song on the ukulele, if I silently run through the chords while listening to the song.  It's much easier to do this if I have the music on my iPod rather than haul my uke and music stand to the office to listen to them on Pandora or YouTube.  So, I'm buying the music when I think about it.  To that end, today I picked up the Beach Boys Greatest Hits.  I've found several songs of theirs with chords that I already know.  However, I've found that since it's been years (in some cases decades) since I've heard some of these songs, I definitely needed a refresher course.

I'm really enjoying listening to this music.  You can babble about nostalgia or looking back on a time of greater innocence of you like, but when you get right down to it, Beach Boy music is Fun.  I mean, really - bouncy music with tight harmonies, what's not to love?  And I'm not buying the innocence bullshit, either.  They may have been more subtle in what they were singing about, but I'm saying he wasn't wanting Rhonda to hold his hand in order to forget the girl that dumped him.  Or not dating so he doesn't leave hist best girl home on a Saturday night while he goes out in his hotrod and picks up chicks.   Because, you know, he's just going to drive them up and down the drag and then let them out of the car.  Yeah.

I do have to wonder if at any point in their career, they ever decided that they were too old to sing "Be True to Your School". 

 

I totally dig the car in the picture.  Yes, I wanted Archie's jalopy, too.

Yes, it's a tad misogynistic, but not enough to ruin the song.  And yes, he's an ass, but I did like David Lee Roth's version.

And then there is this one,which I know totally lends itself to ukulele, because The Corsairs did it with ukulele.  I was glad to hear they still had talent, but seriously wish that they'd followed up with more new stuff.  Oh, well.

I think I'll let it go with that.  After all, this music isn't going to just listen to itself, you know.

I'm slacking, I know.

I apologize for the radio silence, but I've not had a lot musical happening lately (unless you want to hear me bitch about trying to teach my fingers to do the B and Bb chords on my uke). 

I did buy a couple of good albums this last weekend - The Old 97's, The Grand Theatre Vol. 2 and Bowling for Soup, Sorry for the Partyin'. 

I first heard of the Old 97's when my friend Catt posted some music.  It was a very good song, but I never pursued finding more of their music.  Fast forward a few years and KXT starts playing them a lot.  And I really liked them a lot.  So, when we went to Best Buy this weekend and I saw their 2 albums on sale, I snagged one.  I picked the second album for their song "Perfume" which a a perky song about losing the girl.  I'm into perky dysfunctional love songs.

I first became aware of Bowling for Soup when The Edge (another D/FW radio station) started playing their "Girl All the Bad Guys Want".  (The one that got them the Grammy nomination).  I liked the song, but never got out to buy the album.  The next album, however, contained a song that hit in my 80s spot.  That would be, of course, "1985".  The Duran Duran reference clinched me having to get this album.  Turned out the whole thing was great.  Have picked up more of their music here and there, but do not have their whole collection by any means.  And I'm thinking I should change that - at least with the albums that came out in 2002 and later (some of their oldest stuff is...less than pleasing.  If you don't believe me, go listen to "Kool-Aid" from their second album).  Sorry for the Partyin' has their only dance song (which is hysterical), some of their standard dysfunctional love songs (did I mention I'm into those?), a song that puts the "b" back in subtle and a love song to Beer.  It's great.

Now THAT'S cruel

I'm on Live Journal and today's Writer's Block questions was "If you could only listen to one song for the rest of your life, what would it be?"

That is some horribly mucked up thinking, not to mention cruel.  ONE song?  Can't be done.  Even if I was only presented with one song, my brain would eventually be warping it into thousands.  Not full fledged "professional" music, by any means, but my brain does tend to mess with the songs that get stuck in my head.

First and most obvious, if I get a song in my head that Weird Al Yankovic has gotten hold of, you can guaran-damn-tee that the lyrics will eventually be waffling back and forth from the original to the parody. 

Second and not so obvious is my own brain's tendency to mess with lyrics.  Especially if I only know part of them.  I hate it when I've got a song in my head that I only know the chorus to.  I'll either just have the chorus on endless loop or I'll find myself trying to come up with lyrics that scan and match the intent.  The latter is not a good thing when I'm driving.  Fortunately, I've got a working radio/cd player in the car to keep that from happening.

And lastly is my brain's tendency to do mash-ups if I'm stuck with an internal song for too long.  I've even got a couple that would probably work really well, if I had the talent and tools to muck about in mash-up land.  (I still say that "Rubber Ducky" and "Notorious" would work.  Trust me, I'm a MBLF.)

I did answer the question, by the way.  "I Wanna Be Sedated" by The Ramones.  Because, you see, this is the reset song that I use.  If I've got something stuck in my head, I can start singing this and it will go away.  And then I can easily replace this with any song that I so choose.  It's always nice to have a reset song.