John Hendow

On Saturday August 2, BowieVision performed at the Nectar Lounge in Fremont. This show continues our run of 100% sold out shows since the band’s first performance. Opening the show was local tribute band “Purple Main”, performing the hits of the man in purple himself. It was fun to hear that music. I’ve always loved Prince’s music and been moved by his incredible guitar playing.

We hit the stage ready to rock, starting the show with “Fame”. This show also marked the debut of “Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)”, which we had only introduced at rehearsal the previous Tuesday. It went very well during soundcheck so we decided to include it in the show. I was delighted at how well it was received. I had spent quite a bit of time working up the transcription for this song. The studio version of this song appears on “Scary Monsters” and the entire album includes some fantastic guitar work from Robert Fripp. Recreating his sound and phrasing is pretty challenging for me, and it requires close attention to detail. The song has three solos (1) guitar synth solo of ten bars (yes, I know… it’s Fripp… you just let him do ten bars if that’s what he feels) (2) a 16 bar solo in the middle of the song which alternates between D and B (a deliberate tribute to David Bowie himself) and finally (3) a 16 bar solo during the refrain / outtro. For our rendition of this song, I take the first solo on guitar synth, then perform the second solo using a Fripp patch I built on the AxeFX. The third solo is performed by our saxophone player Brian Bermudez, which gives him a nice opportunity to deliver a good sax freakout.

This show was also the first performance at the Nectar where I had my AxeFX system. The house engineer was intrigued when I set it up, and after sound check he was very pleased with its sound. During load-out he approached me and said that the tone of my rig was incredible and made the mix super easy to manage. That is kind of feedback that you want to hear! I have noticed that my EA speakers are not terribly efficient. This was noted when I bought them from their previous owner, but I decided it was probably going to be enough volume for most stages. I’m starting to wonder if I should add a powered 12″ monitor wedge to the front of the stage. For smaller stages and rehearsals, this would also give me the option to go with just the monitor for quick setup. Decisions decisions…

I’m already working on new songs for the next shows. The band is sounding amazingly good, and I’m really enjoying the challenge of performing this music.

Set list for 8/2/2014

• Fame
• Ziggy Stardust
• Changes
• China Girl
• Jean Genie
• Starman
• The Man Who Sold The World
• Life On Mars?
• Rebel Rebel
• Suffragette City
• Fashion
• Absolute Beginners
• Space Oddity
• Golden Years
• Ashes To Ashes
• Blue Jean
• Scary Monsters
• Young Americans
• Let’s Dance
• Under Pressure
• Heroes

On Tuesday 7/29 we held a full-band rehearsal in preparation for the upcoming BowieVision shows. When I recently upgraded my Fractal Audio AxeFX II XL to the most current firmware, I also updated the amp models in all of the presets I use for this show. It took me a bit of adjustment to get the tones back to where I wanted them, but it also meant I could do a bit of tweaking based on my experiences at the most recent shows.

For this rehearsal, I brought along my laptop so I could run Axe-Edit and make edits on the fly. It allowed me to dial in some quick changes for added punch and clarity. One new addition for the upcoming show is the song “Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)”, which has some wonderful guitar work by Robert Fripp. I put together a patch with multiple scenes for rehearsal, but in reviewing the playback afterward I decided my solo tone was not ominous enough. So I completely rebuilt the patch, making sure I have a sufficiently warped guitar tone for the solo sections.

This rehearsal also marked the debut of my expansion switch accessory for my MFC-101. It adds four additional switches to the board, and will allow me to call up some additional functions during our set.

Our rehearsal space is a big room with high ceilings and hard surfaces. The sound splatters around a lot, and that space could sure use some aggressive sound control. If we owned it, there would be corner traps, sound panels, and clouds. But it does have the benefit of being a live room, which lets us practice working in a challenging environment. If we can sound good, and play in time in that space, we can do it anywhere.

The next show will be Saturday 8/2 at Nectar Lounge in Fremont. I’m really looking forward to debuting some new material, and meeting fans in a new venue.

This coming Saturday, my band BowieVision is performing at Nectar in Seattle. We are working on a few new songs for this performance, including “Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)”, from the Scary Monsters album. It’s another time I have to recreate the frenetic 1980s guitar sound of Robert Fripp. On this track, I believe he is using a Watkins Electric Music (WEM) Project V fuzz pedal, an extraordinarily rare guitar effect that he also used on the Brian Eno recordings of the same period. This pedal can produce a classic buzz-saw fuzz effect (think “Satisfaction” by the Stones) and also has a primitive bit-crusher effect that deconstructs the sound into almost a ring-modulation tone.

It’s an interesting challenge replicating this tone in the AxeFX. For the guitar parts in “Fashion”, I use a complex stacked tone with two separate effects chains, with dedicated amps and cabinets for each part of the overall tone. During the two solo sections I switch to separate scenes with additional gain and modulation intensities.

Without question, Robert Fripp’s guitar parts are the most challenging aspect of this band to recreate. His sound and playing is unique and idiomatic unto itself. I have listened to mister Fripp’s playing in many settings, and appreciate how he approaches music. It’s a fun puzzle to work out his parts and play them live. After our recent Triple Door performance, an audience member complimented me on having navigated those difficult solos in “Fashion” with an authentic tone. That really means a lot to me, since those parts total less sixty seconds of music and took several days to work out.

On Saturday 7/16, I performed at the Bite of Seattle with two of my bands: The Dudley Manlove Quartet, and BowieVision. We had the opportunity for both bands to perform on the same stage, in adjacent time slots, so it was actually very easy from a logistic standpoint. The Bite of Seattle is a food and arts festival held every year at Seattle Center, and I have often performed at this event over the past thirty years. The stage crews have been all be around for that length of time, so I get to work with the same bunch of great engineers and stage managers who have made these shows successful and easy.

I arrived at about 11:30 AM with the few items that I actually needed for this gig: my guitar, my pedalboard, and a bag with a few cables and change of clothes. Each stage at this event is equipped with rented backline equipment including a drum set, bass amp, guitar amp, keyboard stand and amp, and so on. It makes the changeover between bands very easy, and allows us to travel pretty light. My equipment was driven to the stage in a Gator (basically a 4WD golf cart with a small pickup bed), and I got to ride along, doing my best parade queen wave as we wove through the crowd.

The Dudley Manlove Quartet performed first, charging through a high-energy set. I was particularly delighted that we played “Night Fever” by the Bee Gees, as it got everyone up and dancing. Disco music allows people to pretend they’re making fun of disco dancing, when in fact they are enjoying themselves doing it. We also delivered some classic rock hits to keep the crowd moving. Following a short break and wardrobe change, we returned to the stage as BowieVision and played another 45 minutes. We definitely had some Bowie fans in the crowd, as there were several people singing along who knew all the words.

The overall experience of working at these events is always fun. It’s a big festival with happy people enjoying food, beer, and fun energy. I did spot a booth selling elk burgers, which sounded really good, except it was so hot that day and I was already pretty overheated from playing two sets in the sun. Maybe I’ll get that elk burger next year.

On Saturday 5/24, BowieVision performed at the Triple Door in Seattle. This was our first run of new shows at this venue, and it was a great opportunity to show off our full production.

This was also my first big stage performance with my Fractal Audio AxeFX II XL system. About a month before this show I purchased the AxeFX unit along with its dedicated MFC-101 Mk III controller. It took me about a week to program my tones for the BowieVision show, and I was glad to have a few opportunities to make tweaks at rehearsals before we embarked on this performance. The AxeFX does a beautiful job of delivering the tones from a myriad of amps / cabinets, plus has very deep effect chain management. I was able to dial in very accurate recreations of the classic guitar sounds in Bowie’s catalog, which left me with the equally daunting task of playing those great parts accurately!

Managing my guitar rig during this performance was amazingly simple, which is a big change from the complexity of my previous system. I was able to move easily between the sections of the songs, recalling appropriate tones for each part. It was also much simpler switching presets than ever before. I’m very pleased with the Fractal Audio system and already looking ahead at programming bigger / deeper patches.

The show was very satisfying on many levels. It was a sold-out house, with some familiar faces present. The Triple Door has perhaps the best light and sound system in the state, which let us show off both the sonic and visual quality of the band. Overall,I thought it was one of our best performances to date. The band was very prepared and delivered a polished show.

Here is the set list that we performed for the Triple Door show:

• Changes
• China Girl
• Suffragette City
• Starman
• The Man Who Sold The World
• Life On Mars?
• Jean Genie
• Ashes To Ashes
• Space Oddity
• Absolute Beginners
• Blue Jean
• Rebel Rebel
• Fashion
• Golden Years
• Ziggy Stardust
• Fame
• Young Americans
• Let’s Dance
• Under Pressure
• Heroes

Over the past few weeks I’ve radically changed my guitar rig, replacing my pedals / pedalboard and amplifier with a Fractal Audio AxeFX system. The preamp / processor is the new AxeFX II XL, which handles all of the amp and cabinet modeling, along with signal routing and effects. I’m using the dedicated Fractal Audio MFC-101 Mk III control pedal, which connects to the AxeFX using a standard XLR cable. The AxeFX also has an editing software system called Axe-Edit, which makes the creation and management of patches quite easy. The system is powerful enough to recreate a myriad of amp and effect models, and in the process of creating my patches for BowieVision and the Dudley Manlove Quartet, I am already sold on how powerful it is.
For the power amp section I am using a Carvin DCM2000LX. This is a Class D amp, weighing 10 pounds, and provides 350 watts into 8 ohms. That’s plenty of oomph for my multi-instrument rig. It also has its own software-based management tool called X-Drive, allowing management of EQ response curves, crossover points, and delay tuning.

For speakers I am using a pair of Euphonic VL110 full-range cabinets. This allows me to run my rig in stereo onstage, and send my signal to front of house via the connections on the back of the AxeFX. This means there are no microphones involved in my rig anymore; in fact, the AxeFX models the mic and its placement as part of the overall patch, so that variable is removed from the stage. It’s also interesting to be using a FRFR (Full Range Flat Response) speaker system; essentially this is my on-stage guitar monitor, and it differs substantially from conventional guitar amps, which have a limited frequency response plus a “personality” in terms of tonal signature. The Euphonic cabs are designed to be high-fidelity neutral monitors.

My new setup is amazing. The clarity and transparency is akin to a studio recording experience. I’m really looking forward to our first shows with this system, especially the upcoming BowieVision performance at the Triple Door. That will be a great opportunity to fully exercise the capabilities of the full rig.

In upcoming posts I’ll show the full physical setup of the system, along with the rack and flight cases. It’s compact and very powerful.

Over the past few months I’ve been exploring the possibility of moving from my traditional effects / tub amp setup to a more flexible system based around the Fractal Audio AxeFX. I made the decision to proceed with ordering the system.

I’ve received all of the elements of my new guitar rig, and have already assembled it for a test run in the music room. It’s going to be an amazing journey. I’ll be posting a complete rig rundown with pictures in the next few days.

Well, it’s that time of the year… I’m taking a long look at my music rig(s) and pondering some significant changes. In the context of my bands I have the need for two basic configurations.

THE BIG RIG

This is the setup for multi-instruments (guitar, bass, Warr guitar) and for use on larger stages (Triple Door, Crocodile, Neumos, Showbox).

Requirements 

• All components must fit on my cart for a single load into the club. Everything needs to be be small enough to fit inside my vehicle.
• Very reliable operation. All connections rated for repeated connect / disconnect cycles. All components road-rated.
• Full range, stereo sound on stage driven by solid-state amplification (preferably Class D).
• Easy and quick to set up. Components need to all fit is a compact rack. All interconnect cables need to be locking (Speakon, PowerCON, XLR for control cables).
• Very flexible signal routing and processing. I need to have separate banks of presets for The Dudley Manlove Quartet, BowieVision and other projects. I need to be able to stack multiple amp models with parallel routing.
• Plenty of control onstage. I need a well-organized foot pedal with expression controllers and programmability.

What I have in mind is a rig based around the Fractal Audio Axe FX, with the dedicated Fractal Audio foot controller. This will feed into a solid state power amp, into a pair of compact full-range speaker cabinets.

THE SMALL RIG

This will be the setup for guitar and baritone guitar, for performances where portability and size are considerations.

Requirements 

• The effect pedalboard must be small enough to be carried onto a plane. Ideally it should fit into an Anvil briefcase.
• The amp must be at least 60 watts, capable of producing a loud clean tone, and should be solid state. The power amp section might be Class D for light weight. I don’t want to be dependent on the guitar amp for tone shaping, so I can use commonly backline / rented equipment on tour or at festivals. This would allow me to take only my small pedalboard and instrument for fly dates.
• The entire rig needs to be carryable for short distances in a single load without the use of a hand truck.

I’m thinking of using a Quilter Aviator amp, likely the 2×10 speaker configuration.

What this means is that I would likely overhaul my entire setup, and therefore sell pretty much everything I’m currently using. If this occurs I’ll be posting a long list of pedals, amps, instruments, cases, rack equipment, and so on. Stand by…

Over the past few weeks the members of BowieVision have been working hard to polish our arrangements for the upcoming shows. We have a number of new songs being added for these performances and I’ve continued to refine my tones as I pay tribute to Bowie’s very talented guitarists.

For most of the songs I’m still using the black stratocaster, but the Les Paul goldtop is also being called into action. The combination of the P90 pickups and chambered body gives me a nicely balanced tone for Mick Ronson’s guitar parts. The strat provides a tighter sound that helps situate it in the more dense mixes for songs like “Fame”. Overall, my signal path is pretty simple: Pork Loin + 168 ms delay + reverb. The most complex signal chain for any song in our current set list is “Fashion”, where I am recreating Robert Fripp’s huge guitar sound with the Wampler Sovereign + pitch change (for solos) + delay + Strymon Lex + reverb. Mr. Fripp produces a frantic, angular sound and it’s challenging for me to fill those big shoes!

I’m looking forward to the show on Friday 1/24 in Tacoma, at the Swiss Tavern. In my years with Jumbalassy we performed there regularly and it always was a great venue for us. We’ll also be performing on Friday 2/14 in Seattle at the Crocodile. Come on out to one of these shows and join us!

This year for the New Year’s Eve we were hired to perform at a wedding reception. It’s unusual for us to take a private booking for this night as it’s usually the biggest public event of our year. The client for this event was a friend of the band’s and she wanted to throw a fantastic, memorable party to follow her wedding. The event was very enjoyable and we performed a large set list comprising many of our favorite songs, along with a number of requests from the wedding party. Fortunately, the bride’s family is friends with my wife as well, so she was able to attend the event and we spent our New Year’s Eve together.

As part of the wedding ceremony itself I played classical guitar while guests were being seated. For the family’s processional Chris Joss (DMQ keyboardist) and I performed “Unchained Melody” as a duet for jazz guitar and accordion. And for the bride’s entrance, her brother and I performed a guitar duet of “Seabreeze” by Tyrone Wells. After the wedding was over I had the opportunity to join my wife for dinner.

The reception party was in full swing from the first song, with the dance floor full and plenty of great energy all around. At the stroke of midnight, the balloons dropped from the ceiling and champagne flowed. It was a fantastic event, and one that we were honored to be a part of. We’ll look forward to seeing our fans at the next public show. Many thanks to the bride and groom for throwing a great party and for inviting us to be a part of the fun.