Andric Severance blogs

The Prohibition of Music

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 16:39:57 -0400

Here’s news of the anti-music movement in America:
Last night at a gig in Montgomery, Vermont, the liquor contol people show up. They decide that there are too many drunk people in the bar, and they tell the bartenders that they have to stop serving alchohol. The place empties. One patron, when confronted by the cops about his drunkenness, replied that he lived right across the street, and was walking. No matter; it is actually illegal to be drunk, period. A local said that there had been an increase in funding for such law enforcement activities under the aegis of “Homeland Security”.

Music Recommendations

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 16:58:36 -0500

2/16/08
I spend a tremendous amount of time looking for new music. Time that might be better spent practicing, I know. So let me share some of my better finds with you, in hopes of increasing the value of that time spent.

First, this guy’s phrasing is my main inspiration lately:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2g753Sv9sUM&feature=related

Meshell Ndegeocello - The World Made Me the Man of My Dreams
I’m not sure if Meshell is crazy, or if she’s toying with her listeners’ minds, or if she’s just writing songs that don’t quite make sense. There are strange religious themes, and futuristic scifi lovemaking. I can’t quite tell what the messages of her songs are— if they have messages— but they manage to be provocative, slightly disturbing, and soothing at the same time. There are incomprehensible languages sung over incredible grooves. Some of the grooves flirt with incomprehensibility, but remain potent and sensual. Her bass playing is goooood. Beautiful synthesizer parts. Incredible musicianship all around. This is Future Music.

Pulse Prophets' tour of Hawaii is confirmed. Percussion.

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 12:20:13 -0500

1/29/08
I’m still feeling overwhelmingly positive about the Pulse Prophets, our new CD “Breathe”, and about music in general. We have a good media buzz happening, and people are thrilled about the CD. Our new publicist has started working for us, and I think the timing is perfect. Higher Ground called us and offered us a headlining gig on a weekend, but we had to turn it down because of vacations. Last Saturday’s gig in Montgomery was to a full house, and we brought the energy higher than ever before.

We’ve been playing more percussion at our shows, and we usually go into an all-percussion section. I’ve been bringing a cheap set of bongos and playing them with sticks, but they broke (cheap hardware). So I’m looking for another option, with more oomph. Possibly timbales. Possibly bigger bongos. Anyone have any ideas? Got some old drums for sale?

Pulse Prophets "Breathe", CD release.

Sat, 16 Feb 2008 12:18:07 -0500

1/20/08
The Pulse Prophets’ CD release party for “Breathe” was great! Maddub opened up for us. I hadn’t heard them in over a year. They’re playing less of the reggae vibe these days, and more live techno… it was a rave, y’all! Then we played to a full house, and tore the roof off!

People seem to like the CD alot, too. I think I do, too. Yeah, I think It might be really good.

Seven Days has a review of it, which says a few nice things, but misses the point completely:
http://www.7dvt.com/2008/pulse-prophets-breathe

“Breathe” is available on CDBaby as a download or CD.
http://cdbaby.com/cd/pulseprophets2

December '07 took a break. "Hadestown" was great.

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 12:00:24 -0500

12/11/07
For the last month I have taken a break from playing the piano. No gigs, no rehearsal, not even my own practice. I played the drums daily.
Back on the piano, now. I recently got together with the trio. Very pleasant, relaxed, and creative, and adventurous. I am renewed and inspired.

12/01/07
I saw Hadestown at the Barre Opera House two nights ago. Go see it while you can. Seriously.
It’s playing in Johnson on 12/6. In a really nice room, Dibden Center for the arts.
http://www.highergroundmusic.com/calendar/show/2727/
there are a couple other dates too, but you have

november music

Sat, 01 Dec 2007 22:21:27 -0500

11/6/27
October was an intense month. It was packed with gigs and driving, not to mention alot of new students. Both the performing and teaching brought me much joy. But man am I glad to have the next two months (moslty) free of gigs.

Here’s the music you should hear in the meantime:

Sat, Nov 10: Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings. They’re at Higher Ground, in the small room. I think it’s going to be exceptional. And possibly under-attended, unless we show up with the love. The music is funk and soul, and the band has an old-school sound. The same band backs up Amy Winehouse. $14 in advance— cheaper than a CD, and infinitely better.

Oink is gone.

Tue, 06 Nov 2007 19:45:45 -0500

10/28/06
With the demise of Oink, I have been searching for new sources of music. The problems that face me are three:
1. it’s difficult to find good music amidst the preponderance of crap that is pushed by the big record labels.

2. I have resolved not to support RIAA member labels, which is almost all of them (most smaller lables are owned by one of the “Big Four”), by buying from them.

3. The bitrate (quality) of commercially available MP3’s on the internet is very low compared to what one could get for free on Oink (and to a lesser extent, can still get elsewhere).

Here is a helpful site for solving problem #2, whereby it is possible to determine if a given album was released by a RIAA member.

Trends in mastering CD's. Also, Love and Humility.

Thu, 18 Oct 2007 19:44:00 -0400

10/3/07
I still haven’t found anything worthy of replacing the last entry on the first page: Love and humility. Not only is everyone happier if we act out of love and humility, but I believe it is also the best way to get what we want out of almost any given interaction. I’m not pretending to be enlightened in this sense— I still find myself getting angry for no good reason when I’m driving my car, but it helps to remind myself of this.

Ok, Back To the Music:
I have recently gotten the latest albums from three bands that I always look forward to hearing: Michael Franti and Spearhead, Zap Mama, and Jill Scott. I’m noticing a disturbing trend in the production and the mastering— in the overall sound of the cd’s. I’m not talking about the songs themselves, or the perfomance, but in the things that are done to them after all is recorded. In a nutshell, all three sound like they could be played on 95 triple-x (the local top-40 station). Jill Scott sounded kind of like Britney Spears— she’s been Britnified by the automatic harmonizer and pitch correcter. This is particularly disturbing because Jill is the exact opposite of Britney in every sense— a very large black woman with musical skills, soul, post-feminist awareness, and a real live band.

Trends in mastering CD's. Also, Love and Humility.

Thu, 18 Oct 2007 19:44:00 -0400

The new Pulse Prophets CD "Breathe" is back from the mastering house.

Wed, 29 Aug 2007 00:24:40 -0400

8/23/07
The Pulse Prophets’ new CD just came back from the mastering house! Mastering is a somewhat arcane process. I’m not exactly sure what they did to it, but it sounds really good. Knowing what an important step it is, we shelled out big bucks for a fancy New York mastering house, Scott Hull. We originally found his name just by looking at albums we liked, and then our recording engineer coincidentally recommended him.

So far I’m pleased with the CD, though I already feel that the tunes and our playing have evolved drastically since we recorded. And of course, nothing matches the energy of live performance. Still, I think we succeeded with this one (I’m still not so sure about our first CD “Madhouse”).

Excellent CD's that don't feed the RIAA

Wed, 11 Jul 2007 01:52:17 -0400

Excellent CD’s that don’t feed the RIAA
If you’ve read through any of my past posts, you’ve probably noticed that I’m hoping the internet will put the big record companies out of business, and that I suggest we all stop buying from major lables. To that end, here are some good independently released CD’s:

The Eames Brothers “Open Road”. This is one of my favorites. Mellow, soulful blues. They are joined by Ron Rost on Rhodes piano and Hammond organ.
http://cdbaby.com/cd/eamesbrothers

Guagua “Pan Frito”. Latin Jazz, but on the mellow side. Its a pretty big band, with horns and lots of percussion and all the goodies.

The Restaurantification of Jazz

Thu, 05 Jul 2007 17:19:06 -0400

6/28/07
The Restaurantification of Jazz
In case you’re wondering, I’ve gotten over my cynical mood. But I promised this would be my next subject, so here we go, briefly:

At some point, for some reason, people started to get it into their heads that Jazz was mellow, relaxing music suitable as a background for civilized conversation. How this happened is a mystery to me— when was Jazz ever mellow? Sure, jazz musicians play ballads once in a while. And there were some West Coast “cool jazz” guys who played kind of mellow (for the record, I can’t stand “Birth of the Cool”). But really, jazz has always been raucous and rowdy.

Jazz Piano in Vermont... and everywhere else that isn't New York City

Wed, 20 Jun 2007 14:48:53 -0400

As far as I know, there are currently no paying gigs in Burlington that involve an acoustic piano. A couple of years ago, we had Wine Works, Opus, and Parima all hiring piano players (me, that is) regularly. Ever since Parima got rid of their Samick upright, the only place in town with a piano is the Radio Bean, which is a wonderful place and a beacon for the local Jazz scene… But it’s tiny and there are no paying gigs. Well, the Flynn Space has a piano, and one of these years I’ll probably land one of their commissions and play there, but for regular gigs, there’s nothing.

You’ve heard me rave in these pages about how wonderful Parima is, and I still think they are, though my enthusiasm is slightly diminished in the absence of the piano. But I can’t blame them for getting rid of it. I have a bone to pick about this one. The blame lies with the piano players. I was the only guy to ever play that piano; everyone else brought a keyboard to play there. I’ve run into that before, but usually it was in a venue with a REALLY bad piano. Parima’s was pretty good. When I’ve asked these pianistic traitors why they did it, they would say that the piano was out of tune, or that it wasn’t loud enough, or even that it had too bright a tone.

Internet Radio, the damn RIAA again

Mon, 14 May 2007 21:57:28 -0400

Hello and welcome to my website. I’m a pianist, keyboardist, composer, and music teacher in Burlington, VT.

4/30/07
UPDATE: Legislation to stop this latest of underhanded grabs by the RIAA was just introduced in the house. Please visit this site and click ‘act now’:
http://www.savenetradio.org

4/29/07

I’m getting tired of ranting about the RIAA (Recording Industry Association of America), and I had resolved to stop, but a couple of recent items so infuriate me that I can’t resist.

The slimy weasels have managed to raise the royalties paid to them by internet radio stations to the point where it will be impossible for such a radio station to be solvent. A station with 1000 listeners will be forced to pony up $134,000 for 2007, PLUS $98,000 in back payments for 2006. The result is that only giant corporations can afford to run internet radio stations.

Recording with Pulse Prophets

Wed, 18 Apr 2007 18:58:37 -0400

4/9/07
That was the most pleasant recording experience I’ve had. The band was well prepared, the pace was relaxed, and Noteworthy was a good choice— a comfortable studio with a warm sound. And a fine engineer, Roger Stauss.

It remains to mix and master it.

Tomorrow and the next day, we’ll mix it… you know, tweak the volume levels, maybe take some stuff out.
Then we send it to be mastered. Mastering seems kind of arcane to me— somehow it has a huge effect on the final sound and feeling. We’re sending it to Scott Hull, in NYC. We first thought of him because he mastered Spearhead’s “Stay Human”, which sounds great. Turns out he did a couple others that I like, too. Like “A Ma Zone” by Zap Mama, which sounds so good you don’t notice that the songs are weak. Herbie Hancock’s “New Standard” aint bad, either.