Alembic Guitars Club
Connecting => Miscellaneous => Topic started by: jazzyvee on August 11, 2016, 06:16:28 PM
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Just thought I'd share this experience. This evening a punter at a gig I was playing a told me after the gig that he was disappointed in me because i'm a black guy and don't know the bass lines for all the reggae records......!!!!!
Since when has it been a requirement of a black bass player playing at a jam session to know every reggae record that has ever been recorded and have the bass line committed to memory? Oh yeah this person also earlier wanted to sing specific songs and didn't even know the words himself nor could he hum the bass line for me to reproduce, so I just accompanied him by playing something that fit with what words he knew and the other musicians played chords to suit.
Thankfully I value my basses more than my desire to show him how far a 34" bass guitar neck can be inserted into the part of the body where the sun doesn't shine. I was armed with my Europa 5 with comfort taper, not that it would have been comfortable for him.
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Well, what the hell: I'm a white guy and I don't know every line for every country song, maybe we can form some sort of Society of Racially-Challenged Bassists !!
I always thought 'jam session' was a fairly ancient term ( I always favored 'wannabes trying too hard session' ), until more than a few moments as described above made me realize that something indeed needed to be jammed into a handy bodily part.
As if . . . . . indeed this fool hadn't already shown himself to be a no talent, no class, no respect moron, it is just pitiful to bring race into it. I totally agree with Smokey Robinson: I am proof that Motown and all of the emerging black music of the 60's did more to end a lot of racism and segregation in this country than the gov't or anything else ever did. My mother raised me that we were all the same, and it quickly became self-evident that it was impossible for me to be crazy for Stevie Wonder or Marvin or the Temps and so many more, and somehow not like the 'other' kids I grew up with, just impossible. If anything, I felt challenged that as a 'square white boy' would I ever learn the funk, would I have any green-eyed soul, could I really hit it and get it?
Well, I'm still trying !! Good onya, JV, for not punching that moron, and I feel for ya. Been there.
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Doesn't sound like this chap was qualified to dispense any criticism of your playing Jazzy... I'd just blow it off.
Take it from this Appalachian-American, having seen some real honest-to-goodness racism in my 47 years, one constant I count on is that music is a universal language, albeit with many dialects. It transcends all these little categories the world seems determined to stuff each us into.This guy is obviously illiterate in that sense. Bass on. 8)
ps- I had to look up the English-to-English translation for "punter"... ;D
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Hey guys thanks for your inputs. I wasn't mad or anything like that, takes far more than that to ruffle my feathers. I don't see any benefit to me from arguing with people who make stupid comments. I was just surprised that anyone would even think that was a rational viewpoint to hold. Incidentally whilst packing the gear away I found out from the band leader that the guitarist quit at the end of the session last week after a tirade of heckling from the same guy over a period of weeks. The music continues.
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And they try and pretend that racism is on the way out - I bet he voted to leave Europe.
I guess he was just jealous of your ability.
Glynn
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I took the Dick Grove music course, and something he said in the introduction sorta branded itself on my frontal lobe; "there's nothing wrong with knowing what you're doing. The vast majority of musicians spend all their time trying to hide what they don't know. Fortunately it's easy to spot them: they criticize others for things they cannot do themselves."
That had a profound effect on me, because at the time I heard that it described me to T. Never again though, and that was three decades ago. What I learned from the experience is that heckling or "band ego traumas" are from jealousy, period, and that comes from trying to hide deficiencies.
That's why I have none. 8)
From a practical viewpoint, I've always used humor to deal with hecklers, because here's something hecklers are totally unaware of: the audience WANTS to laugh at them. You'd be surprised how easy it is, because the audience is already on your side. Something like; "I recognize you from when you were here last night. I don't mean your face. But I never forget an ugly shirt." (One of Mark Twain's favorites.)
As far as racism is concerned, I watched a documentary about the discovery in a South African cave of thousands of bodies from a previously unknown hominid species that lived over two million years ago (http://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/09/10/437249183/south-african-cave-yields-strange-bones-of-early-human-like-species). Consider that everything we knew about that branch of our family tree where we developed the hip-sockets that allowed us to stand upright (not counting drummers, of course), one of the defining characteristics of the distinction "hominid," is based on twenty seven bone fragments, and that'll give you an idea of how amazing this is.
The first thing they did was test DNA, of course, and were able to solve the mystery of: "what happened to the Neanderthals (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal_genome_project)?" Turns out that anthropologists had always assumed Neanderthals (who lived 60-90,000 years ago) were a separate species who were supplanted by Homo sapiens, but they weren't. We absorbed them through interbreeding, along with umpteen other groups, in the usual way (wink, nudge) and now that DNA analysis is so readily available, along with progress in genetic research into inherited traits and behaviors, scientists are able to map the genes for aggressive behaviors to the same genes we got from our Neanderthal kin.
What does this mean? Well, for one thing, melatonin has Jack to do with anything, because the real problem is in the genomes of lunkheads who got a little too much DNA from some Neanderthal lurking near the roots of their particular branch. Two, racism is stupid because it's based on the mistaken belief that anyone could pick their parents, and so far nobody ever has. There's also the fact that the newly-discovered ancestors were so highly evolved that they carried their dead two miles through one of the roughest cave systems ever found, and arranged them in a circle in a "star chamber." They, like Lucy and our other earliest ancestors discovered by the Leakey family, were African. Neanderthals were from Europe (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neanderthal).
Anybody who believes humans and Neanderthals never mated hasn't met my cousin Ricky, believe me.
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Two, racism is stupid because it's based on the mistaken belief that anyone could pick their parents, and so far nobody ever has.
It is also stupid because it is based on the mistaken belief that race exists; it is, in fact, fiction.
Peter (who has to get up early and will not now expound on the reasoning - but it's sound. No race.)
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Hi, my name is Bill, I'm Jewish, and I have never played Hava Nagila. There, I admitted it.
Bill, tgo
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Hi, my name is Tony, I'm Scottish and I've never played Bagpipes...
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Hi, I'm Paul, I'm a mutt American transposed from a French Canadian and Czechoslovakian background and I agree with Peter. I don't understand ignorance. I have played the Star Spangled Banner.
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Hi, My name is Keith, I'm not Polish yet I've played a polka (I'm not Czech either for those polka purists out there ;D ).
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Hi, my name is Peter; I'm a hillbilly of German/Irish/Scottish extraction - but I've worn polka dots.
Peter (who would, none-the-less, tell Buddy Guy to his face that putting them on a guitar is Just Wrong)
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I would tell Buddy Guy to his face that putting polka dots on a guitar is Just Wrong)
I don't know, Peter; if I picked up a polka dot guitar and could suddenly play like Buddy Guy, I'd be thinking polka dots on a guitar might be pretty okay with me. ;)
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Hi, My name is Kris..I don't have a job :'( ,
...but I have two Alembics ! :D :D
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my name is David and i'm a old fat guy, and if the money is good, i'll work it up
there are only two kind of people in this world, Alembic owners and the rest
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I guess I should take some comfort in the fact that he didn't notice I was playing an alembic otherwise he might have complained about, why I was using it to play things other than the the baselines of Stanley Clarke!
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I know it's easier said than done but to me you just have to do your best to ignore the jerks. There are to many other things in life that are so much more important.
I guess I should take some comfort in the fact that he didn't notice I was playing an alembic otherwise he might have complained about, why I was using it to play things other than the the baselines of Stanley Clarke!
With the Alembics going on in Rio shouldn't that be him recognizing your Olympic?
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I'm hammer (Brian) though I've never really weilded one and love both Druha Trava and the Malina Brothers who are Czech bluegrass bands (even though I'm not Czech). Racism is based on engendering fear of "others," the opposite of what music does.
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There's a darn fine bluegrass band around here who for several years had an amazing Czech bassist (saw him kill it in jazz gigs, too; he was a grad student in Bass at the local university). I always thought it was a tad incongrous - I was unaware there was an actual Czech bluegrass scene!
And he had the most beautiful doghouse I've ever seen - I'm talking Alembic-grade figuring.
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Although I'm much less plugged-in these days, back in the 80's and 90's there used to be a vibrant bluegrass music scene in Europe as well as Japan. In fact upon thinking about it, almost all of my international exposure has come through music. We toured for a short while with some Germans and Austrians. Even with a language barrier it was easy to see how they'd mastered the styles. It was remarkable to watch.
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It is what it is. I usually try to just smile and roll with it. Except for real actual jazz/bebop, I can generally roll with it well enough in most situations. It is more than a little bit consistent that the players with the most limited ability and/or understanding of music are the ones complaining about what other players are playing.
I once was a regular at an open-mic thing and would back up whoever asked. There was another regular who did a Beatles schtick every week, just with acoustic guitar and a couple of girl singers, and it was okay. He asked me if I'd be interested in playing the next week with them, and I of course said yes, that would be great. Then he told me I'd need to audition first. I couldn't help but laugh at the absurdity of being asked to play then immediately being told that I might not be good enough for the three song set with a guy who played simplified versions of songs everybody in the room knew by heart.
On the other hand, I have to say that I've met some of my favorite musicians through playing those free open-mic nights and jam sessions.
John
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Hi, my name is Tyler and I play Alembic basses. In the '90's I was the token white dude in a Roots Reggae band from Jamaica touring the West coast. In the '80's I was the token white due playing Guittaron in a mariachi band in Texas. In the reggae band I would stand, literally, behind the drummer, wearing a variety of big hats pulled down low (at the band leader's request). But, the Rastas treated me well and made sure I got paid, not to mention having my back should there be some tribulation. Playing guittaron with the Mariachis I was asked to get more of a tan and grow a mustache. In this case I grew a beard, and the tan came easy. I was also fluent in Spanish. Eventually one of the trumpet players tried to set me up with his georgeous niece. Whew, that was a close one.
There was a heckler one night while I was with the reggae band. The set seemed to end quickly and then the Rastas introduced themselves to the heckler behind the club- problem solved! Cultural differences are often a blessing, and there wasn't too much blood. No stitches required, and the band invited him back inside. I think the heckler was then moved by the power of Jah!
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I'm of German ancestry and I've done the hokey pokey.
It truly amazes me the level of ignorance in some people.
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Well the same guy came to the Jam session last week but placed himself and his friends right up the back out of the way and would not come onto the stage to do a song.
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I'm of German ancestry and I've done the hokey pokey.
It truly amazes me the level of ignorance in some people.
I was addicted to the hokey pokey, but I turned myself around.
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It's a weird coincidence that the subject of the Hokey Pokey has come up. I recently heard that Larry LaPrise, the man who wrote "The Hokey Pokey", died peacefully at age 93. The most traumatic part for his family was getting him into the coffin. They put his left leg in. And then the trouble started.
Hehehehe
Bill, tgo