Posts by Backdrifter

  • The Beatles

    A twitter exchange this morning has led me into a hunt for female-voiced Beatles covers. I've always loved the Banshees' Dear Prudence but I didn't previously know most of these:


    Fanny (early 70s) doing Hey Bulldog - their obvious enjoyment is so good to see


    Less keen on this, Charlotte Dada version of Don't Let Me Down but it's interesting if rather unvarying.


    I had seen this before, the Carpenters performing Help - I love that they got their trademark "aaaaaaaaaaah" in there


    I was really pleased to find Throwing Muses doing Cry Baby Cry as I love them and love the song but had never heard this. It's ok but I'm still pleased to hear them doing it, shame they didn't incorporate that slightly creepy "Brother can you take me back" segment though.

  • The Beatles

    Good stuff there (though I'm not keen on the Harrison ones), agree with Dr. John about Happiness and its metrically labyrinthine structure so yes quite a challenge, vocally too along with Oh Darling so you must have a hell of a singer. In Happiness Lennon goes through virtually his entire range - terrific song.

    Quote from Dr. John

    Another one I have always found trickier than it seems initially is She Said, She Said. The switch to the bridge section particularly can mess me up.

    Again, that classic thing where Beatles songs turn out to be far more complex than you'd think. They were pretty damn good weren't they? This is a real favourite of mine on an album that's packed with strong songs. Like so many Lennon songs, based on a real incident - Lennon getting angry with Peter Fonda going on about a supposed near-death experience to the extent he had Fonda thrown out. The final track recorded for Revolver, as a trio as McCartney had stormed out following an argument (Harrison's on bass).

  • What's Your Weather Like?

    Been snowing most of the day - had to spend an hour in it loading a wood delivery into the woodstore. Freezing cold wet work, but all done now and I can't whinge about it - it falls into the First World Problems category foxfeeder accused me of the other day, though in this case it'd be a tad more justified. Just after wood-loading I was back indoors in the warm, tucking into a bowl of hearty fish soup and am now frittering away the afternoon on a non-work day. Life is good.


    Meanwhile, I enjoyed this video from London. You have to assume the sandwich (or wrap) was worth it. I like him being blown into a sitting position, then nonchalantly acting like he was goling to do that all along anyway.

  • Which GENESIS tours did you see?

    Quote from thewatcher

    If I had been in Genesis I would have gone on stage and told the crowd that if one more object was thrown at my support act, I would not be taking the stage myself. Bullying enrages me.

    Ditto. Also ditto re Mr.Farmer about still feeling angry about that today.


    Bizarre as it sounds I do think there kind of was a 'bottling-off era', at least in that it was something that I remember happening but that you don't see now - partly I suppose as they don't tend to allow bottles into arenas now. It roughly coincided with the era of seeing Jesus down the front at gigs - anyone else remember him?


    My brother was at the 78 Knebworth gig and was right near a woman in the audience who got hit by a bottle thrown by someone elsewhere in the crowd. It split her nose open, blood everywhere and she had to be helped from the arena. That too still enrages me when I think about it now. In the case of that thrower and every other one who's done that, doubtless they just melted into the crowd and were never collared. Someone drained their bottle, thought - what do I do with this now? I know, I'll just randomly lob it - then thought no more about it and carried on enjoying themselves. Meanwhile that woman was messed up, in horrendous pain, needed urgent medical attention (and of course missed an epic show) and almost certainly still has scars.


    I'm not exaggerating when I say, I wish there was a Simon Weisenthal type figure who relentlessly hunted down scumbags like that. Well, maybe Weisenthal crossed with Batman. Seriously though, it's the worst kind of crime - random, spontaneous, uncaring, done as a 'laugh'. I must stop now as my BP will hit the ceiling.

  • What's Your Weather Like?

    ^ I presume Dudley is now upon us as we're currently battered by heavy rain and high wind. I managed to get out for a walk and very satisfyingly got back mere minutes before the rain started.

  • The Beatles

    Quote from Schrottrocker

    Listening to a lot of Beatles songs since I joined a Beatles cover band a few weeks ago. This far every song gives me this: "Oh I know that one from memory...Wait, what? That's what they play in the backing track???" Beatles songs aren't as easy as memory tries to make them 8o

    Quote from Dr. John

    Agree that they can be trickier than one might think. It is one thing to strum one casually hanging out with friends. It is more challenging to try to replicate them in a faithful way.

    Plus of course, depending on which phase of their work, some of it wasn't designed to be played live. Once they became studio-bound and started getting more innovative with their sounds and production they made music that was too far ahead of the then-currrent live capabilities. Their layering, bouncing-down, tape-looping etc gave weight, colour, substance to their work that was near impossible to reproduce live. So when we come to play the songs we're so familiar with that are embedded in our minds we're wrong-footed by what's actually going on in those originals!


    Schrottrocker what's in your cover band's setlist currently?

  • What's Your Weather Like?

    We have a weather warning in Scotland for rain and high winds later today as Storm Dudley arrives. Scotrail are suspending most train services from 4pm today. I just hope we don't have another power outage as we did a couple of weeks ago during the last storm. Although luckily it was late evening through to about 10am so we were able to sleep through most of it! Better than some neighbouring areas which had no power for quite some time after.


    On a tangent re Storm Dudley. Others in or familiar with the UK might get this: I always want to say 'Dudley' in a West Midlands accent as Dood-lay. (There is of course a town in the West Midlands called Dudley).

  • Happy Valentines everyone !

    😂


    Excellent stuff, especially the bit about not speaking for all of us. I suppose I could from now on put a THIS IS MY OPINION disclaimer on every post I make if that'd help.

    Quote from thewatcher

    Fwiw: the joke might have been optimized by having bags of several different types of flour.

    Yes, for example bags of stoneground, self-raising, spelt, gram - right there, you've got some flours and a joke that now just about works. As I'm sure we ALL agree.


    Excellent. Job done!