Archive for the ‘Music’ Category

Thoughts On The 8/11 Dudley Manlove Performance

August 12, 2012 by John No Comments »

On Saturday 8/11 The Dudley Manlove Quartet performed at the Kirkland Summer Festival. I have played hundreds of festival shows over the past thirty years or so, and they usually involve some surprises. One of the absolute given facets of festival events is they will run behind schedule. The band before you will almost certainly start late and therefore they will run late. Fifteen minutes into what should have been our soundcheck we were still waiting for the previous band to leave the stage.

Still, we managed to set up pretty quickly and got ready for line checks. Naturally, when you’re in a hurry things will go wrong. One of my guitar cables, which has performed perfectly to date, decided to retire last night. I always carry spares, so it was a quick matter to switch it out. By the time we finally got to rocking the first song it was already getting toward dusk. Fortunately we have a supportive bunch of friends and fans, and it made for a great beginning for the night. We wound up skipping a couple of songs in the second set due to time constraints. Also, we had a few minor trainwrecks getting songs started… Jeff tried to count off “Summer of 69” when we were supposed to be starting “Power of Love”, and I followed up by biffing the beginning of “Summer of 69” thinking we were playing another song.  I’m pretty sure nobody noticed, except that we did announce it in both cases and make fun of each other. Other than that I’m certain we got away with it.

Our set list was:

Set 1
Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You
It’s Not Unusual
Copacabana
Dancing Queen
Let’s Stay Together
Right Back Where We Started From
Always Something There To Remind Me
Venus
Sweet Caroline
I Wish
September
Suspicious Minds
Brown Eyed Girl

Set 2
Evil Woman (skipped)
Don’t You Forget About Me
Let’s Go
Power Of Love
Summer Of ’69
Melt With You
More Than This
Let’s Dance
Rio
Never Gonna Give You Up (skipped)
Little Red Corvette
Take On Me
Video Killed The Radio Star
Don’t Stop Believin’
My Life (encore)

A beautiful evening and always a joy to spend time with my bandmates. On to another show!

 

Pedalboard Rebuild – May 2012

May 8, 2012 by John 6 Comments »

Over the past week I’ve completed another full rebuild of my guitar pedalboard. This seems to be a once-every-18-months activity for me. Like Sisyphus, I have an endless repetitive task, all in the eternal quest for tone. I’ve been planning for this rebuild for a few months, and have been purchasing some new pedals. Given that I had a week without gigs, this seemed like an opportune time to commence the project and it gave me incentive to have it completed before beginning a new week of rehearsals.

Materials
PedalTrain PT-3 pedalboard with flight case. I have been using PedalTrain boards for a number of years. They are well-designed, lighweight and very road-worthy.
VoodooLab PedalPower 2+ power supply. This power supply has eight isolated circuits that provide power to pedals. It is an industry standard. PedalTrain supplies brackets with each of their boards, making it very easy to mount this power supply underneath. I actually needed more than eight power feeds, so I soldered up a little splitter to provide 9v to two pedals from one of the circuits; ordinarily I’d be concerned about interference between the audio circuits. In this case there isn’t audio involved; the split circuit is feeding switch / control boxes with LED indicators.
Mission Engineering VM1 (version 2) volume pedal. I have a few pedals from Mission Engineering. This one is really pretty straight-forward as a volume pedal, but it also includes a tuner output and a switch (in toe-down position) that mutes the primary output for silent tuning. I don’t use the tuner output because this volume pedal is placed last in my signal chain; my tuner is actually at the front of my signal chain so I can tune without having to turn off effects.

    • Sonic Research ST-200 strobe tuner. This was a recommendation from a friend. It’s a small and well-designed strobe tuner pedal that fits nicely on my board. I also have a Peterson StroboStromp2 tuner pedal but it’s quite a bit larger so it now resides in my music room.
    • TC Electronic Trinity reverb pedal. TC Electronic reverb is beautiful and hugely dimensional. This little pedal is based on their “Hall of Fame” reverb, but has 2 additional presets. It is exclusively available via ProGuitarShop in Portland. This is a great store and I recommend you visit them online or in person.
    • Xotic Effects EP booster pedal. This pedal emulates the preamp section of the Echoplex EP-3.
    • Line6 G50 wireless receiver
    • Line6 M9 multi effects pedal
    • Dunlop Crybaby wah pedal – modified by Robert Keeley with the “Mello Wah / all mods” options.
    • Way Huge Pork Loin overdrive pedal. This pedal falls into the same family of overdrives as the Tube Screamer or Sparkle Drive. It adds the right amount of grit and has a very useful blend function that dials in some of the clean tone for balance.
    • Zvez Box of Rock distortion pedal. This pedal is designed to emulate the one of a cranked Marshall stack. It has a separate boost section that can be kicked in, which I rarely use.
    • Keeley 4-knob compressor. This compressor pedal is so clean and transparent that it’s difficult to detect in use. It can be dialed in for a very dramatic “squish” tone if desired, but I use the optical compressor model in the M9 to get that heavy compression setting. The Keeley compressor is something I tap for a little more body in single-note bluesy solos.
    • Switch Doctor channel switch for my Mesa/Boogie Lonestar. This is smaller than the stock Boogie footswitch and fits on my board much more easily. The two-button switch allows channel and boost selection. The Lonestar has two channels and I usually set up the lead channel with a little bit of drive, using the “tweed” option for the channel voice. The amp also has a built-in solo boost that can be remotely activated; I rarely use it, but occasionally it’s helpful to have a little extra wallop.
    • Expression pedal switch box. This is a pedal that I designed and built myself. I purchased the components from Pedal Parts Plus and did the wiring myself. The Line6 M9 and M13 effect processors have two inputs for expression pedals. These inputs accept continuous controller pedals that provide a swept range from infinite resistance to 10K ohms. I wanted to have the functionality of switching between two parameter settings on a single effect, so I designed this simple circuit with a 3PDT footswitch to alternate between a dead short (ground and tip are directly connected) and 10K (provided by a 10K resistor), while turning on an LED for the 10K setting to indicate which position the switch is in. I built two of these circuits side by side in a small pedal enclosure. One of the footswitches is a momentary switch, handy for effects like my Leslie emulator; the rotation speed defaults to the slower setting but when I step down on this switch it speeds up to the higher setting, and releasing the switch spins it back down. Because the switch is momentary it’s much easier to manage effect settings that are frequently changed (I don’t need to click it down, let up, then click it again to reset to the original setting). I also use it for special effects that only are necessary for short phrases.

 

  • Interface box. Another one I designed and built this one myself, using parts purchased from Pedal Parts Plus. The drilling and wiring was a challenge on this one because I wanted to use a small enclosure for it. It has a total of ten holes drilled in it: seven 1/4″ jacks, a DC input jack, a 3PDT footswitch and an LED. More information on this box in a moment…

 

The Build Process

BARE BOARD

The first step was to remove everything from the existing pedalboard. I’m reusing my trusty PT-3 so this project began by pulling off all the effects pedals, clipping the ties that bundled all the cables, and separating everything into little piles. My previous pedalboard configuration was largely dominated by my Line6 M13. In this new setup I’ll be using more individual effects, and it’ll also require a different power supply for all those pedals (see below for more specifics).

I always do a total de-lousing process when the pedalboard is stripped like this, so after some time with the shop vac I wipe down the entire board with alcohol to thoroughly clean it. Remember: pedalboards live on bar stages, which are infested with disgusting infectious things, such as musicians. Also, it seems like about once a year someone leans over onto the stage to tell me something and in the process gives my pedalboard a sip of their drink. Removing the sticky residue helps keep my toys clean.

 

POWER

Step two is mounting the new power supply. There are many choices for a pedal power supply, but I’m partial to the VoodooLab Pedal Power 2+ since it has eight isolated power feeds for stable, regulated 9v output. Mounting the power supply under a PedalTrain board is very easy because the board ships with special brackets for this purpose. Once you mount the brackets on the power supply, it requires drilling four small holes into the pedalboard frame, and using the supplied self-tapping screws to finish the job. On the PT-3 board there isn’t a specific place along the back of the board where you are required to mount the power supply, so I moved it all the way to one side to leave space for the power strip which was necessary because two of my devices (Line6 M9 and Line6 G50 wireless receiver) have their own special transformers. The power strip acts as the main AC supply for the entire pedalboard, so the only thing shown plugged into it here is the Pedal Power 2+. However, it’ll have other things plugged into it once I start mounting pedals.

INTERFACE BOX

I like to have a single interface box where my pedalboard can be patched to the wired guitar input and various connections to the amp. It’s much easier to have these jacks in a box at the edge of the board, and saves wear on the effects jacks from repeated insertion and removal. For the rebuild of this board I had more connection points than before, so I took the opportunity to make a new interface pedal. It started with a blank enclosure and some very careful planning to get the jacks, switches, and LED all in places where they were on the correct sides of the box and still wouldn’t interfere with each other. Once it was all marked up, it took about 20 minutes with the drill press to get the holes drilled. I gave it a quick coat of enamel paint then did the assembly and soldering. It was a very tight fit, but everything works! The footswitch serves a simple purpose: switching between the wired and wireless guitar input signals. The LED is illuminated with the wireless feed is active. This might seem unnecessary, but it’s very helpful to know which signal is being fed downstream in the event something else isn’t working as expected.

SETUP

Attaching the pedals to the board with velcro is pretty easy once you figure out where to put them. I usually start with Pedalboard Planner, a useful free online tool that can help you plan the layout of your board. It’s a handy tool but leaves out two important aspects of your board: the pedal height and the distance between pedals required for connectors. Because I use George L cables and connectors I know how much clearance to provide. When laying out this configuration I knew the two wah-shaped controllers would need slim-profile phone plugs in order to fit, so I soldered up four cables using slim connectors, attaching them to lengths of George L cable that I could trim and terminate once the board was laid out. In my initial plan for the board, I had intended to have the M9 at the front, with the Box of Rock and channel switch above it. But once I started to lay out the pedals I realized those two would be difficult to access given their height relative to the M9. As a result I switched the layout to put the Box of Rock and channel switch in front.

 

UNDERSIDE

Here is a shot of the underside of the board with everything in place and wired. I’m a bit of a neat freak when wiring things up, bundling cables together and using cable ties to keep things tidy. I don’t want any cables to get snagged or nicked, and wherever possible I keep the audio and power connections apart. One important piece of equipment that isn’t shown here is a butane BBQ lighter that I keep handy when using plastic cable ties… when you clip the long tail off a cable tie, it leaves sharp corners that will inevitably find a way to poke your fingers when you pick up the board; I use that BBQ lighter to melt the end of the clipped cable tie.

Also visible in this picture are the two power supplies for the Line6 devices. I had to leave space along the power strip for the inline transformer that powers the M9, which is attached next to the power strip with a couple of cable ties.

BOARD FROM ABOVE

This is a shot showing the top of the board with everything in place. This shot is very nearly top-down so it’s difficult to discern the relative heights of the objects on the board.

Note how the wires are neatly bundled and out of harm’s way. I also make sure to leave a little extra space near the edges so the plugs are somewhat protected. When the board is inside its flight case, I don’t want any of the connectors to be damaged in transit. Troubleshooting a problematic pedalboard onstage is a nightmarish proposition, so I always put a lot of effort into testing every cable, plug and connection before assembly. Once the board is wired up, I do some jostle-testing on each connector to ensure everything is really solid and noise-free.

On first power-up I was rewarded with something beautiful: silence. The amp wasn’t producing any buzzing or humming of any kind. Once I started playing and stomping on pedals it was plenty louder in my music room 🙂 But it’s very satisfying to have the board generating zero background noise of its own.

ID GUIDE

Here’s a handy guide to the items on top of the board:
(1) Interface box (2) Sonic Research ST-200 (3) Xotic Effects EP Booster (4) Line6 G50 receiver (5) Mission Engineering VM1 (6) Dunlop Crybaby (7) Line6 M9 (8) Way Huge Pork Loin (9) Zvex Box of Rock (10) Switch Doctor amp channel switch (11) Expression pedal (12) Keeley compressor (13) TC Electronic Trinity.

The signal chain goes thusly: guitar (either via wired or wireless input) -> interface box -> Sonic Research ST-200 -> Xotic Effects EP booster -> Keeley Compressor -> Dunlop Crybaby -> Way Huge Pork Loin -> Zvex Box of Rock  -> Line6 M9 -> TC Electronic Trinity -> interface box ->amp

Update: Once I had a chance to run the board through its paces at rehearsals and a gig, I realized that the placement of the Line6 M9 was problematic in the sense that the pedals in front of it were taller than the front of the M9. It meant for some awkward gymnastics to access that device. The solution was pretty simple. My pedalboard is manufactured by PedalTrain, and they have an accessory called a “pedal booster” that adds a little extra height to make pedals easier to access. The M9 fits perfectly on the large version of the pedal booster, and neatly solved the problem.



 

The World’s Foremost Five-Member Quartet

March 22, 2012 by John No Comments »

The Dudley Manlove Quartet is preparing for a few very nice public shows this year. We’ll be playing at the Tractor Tavern on Saturday 5/26 for our annual 80s extravaganza, and we’re also booked for New Year’s Eve at the Triple Door. More shows are coming soon!

 

Thoughts On The 3/10 Dudley Manlove Quartet Performance

March 19, 2012 by John No Comments »

On Saturday 3/10 The Dudley Manlove Quartet performed at the Triple Door in Seattle. The band usually performs at the Triple Door at least one per year. This particular show was a celebration of our 17th anniversary as a band. The show was sold out weeks in advance, and we really had  strong sense of expectation and excitement leading up to it. The set list for the evening was as follows:

SET 1

  • It’s Not Unusual
  • Dancing Queen
  • Copacabana
  • More More More
  • Young Girl
  • Can’t Take My Eyes Off Of You
  • Love Is In The Air
  • Right Back Where
  • Kung Fu Fighting
  • Piano Man
  • Ride Like The Wind
  • I Will Survive
  • Sweet Caroline
SET 2
  • Evil Woman
  • Suspicious Minds
  • Always Something There To Remind
  • Let’s Dance
  • Waterloo -> Call Me
  • More Than This
  • Rio
  • Little Red Corvette
  • Melt With You
  • American Girl
  • Video Killed The Radio Star
  • Take On Me
  • Don’t Stop Believin
  • ENCORE: Don’t You Forget About Me

Another fantastic night with many friends and family in attendance. The band huddled after the show in our dressing room to talk about the night; all of agreed it was among our finest shows, and that we have such a strong sense of appreciation for playing together. Another nice surprise from this show was being asked to confirm another booking at the Triple Door for NEW YEAR’S EVE! We’ll be playing two shows that night. Look for details to follow soon!

 

Thoughts On The 3/15 1 Uppers Performance

March 16, 2012 by John No Comments »

On Thursday March 15 the 1 Uppers kicked off our “Third Thursday Twang Royale” at the Royale Room in Columbia City. This will be a recurring monthly event in which we will host a night of great country music with special guests joining us for the middle set. For this first occurrence our special guests were Liam Fitzgerald, Johnny 7, and Susan McIntire; all are familiar musicians in the local country / rockabilly scene. We went with the theme of “A Salute To George Jones” for these cover songs, which gave us a wealth of music from which to select.

Set list for 3/15:

SET 1
Punch It In
Maybe Probably
Ophelia
It’s Late, I’m Tired
All Over
Semi-Truck
Costa Brava
Halfway Home
Cadillac Truck
Your New Friends
Motel Time
Bottle, Bottle
The Rest
3 Picks
Said I Would
Nothing Can Stop Me
How Soon Is Now?
SET 2
Relief Is Just A Swallow Away
Tall Tall Trees
Just A Little Boy Blue
Mister Fool
Golden Ring
‘Til I Get It Right
Rootbeer
Why Baby Why
Ragged But Right
Race Is On
What Am I Worth
White Lightnin’
Just One More
SET 3
Lookin’ At The World Thru A Windshield
Silver Drawer
Just Destroyed The World
1 Uppers Stomp
The Path Not Taken
There Stands The Glass
What Made Milwaukee Famous
Waymore’s Blues
Sunday Morning
Buck’s Polka
Fall Back
Let Her Go
Always Seem To Get Things Wrong
Luxury Liner

I played the doubleneck Gretsch for the entire first set, then switched to the Danelectro baritone for the rest of the night. That doubleneck guitar is seriously heavy but a lot of fun to play.  I think I prefer the tone of the Danelectro, and it is a lot more comfortable to wear onstage as it probably weighs about 30% as the Gretsch. Because the Royale Room has an all-ages policy, there were a lot of young people in the audience. Several of them told me how much they liked the crazy silver doubleneck guitar. Always good to have the younger scene give you the official seal of approval 🙂 Oddly, I still cannot find a case for that guitar, despite searching online and asking people on the Gretsch forums. It’s good to have a quest I suppose… We had a great time with this first event and look forward to the next one!

 

Practice and Performance

March 9, 2012 by John No Comments »

Over the past few months I’ve been practicing fairly intensely for 1 Uppers and Dudley Manlove Quartet performances. Both bands hold regular practices together (more so with the 1 Uppers) but I’ve also been putting in a lot of time on my own, memorizing material and working to improve the accuracy of my execution. I have been noticing the dividends in live performances with both bands; ideas area moving more easily from mind to fingers, and I’m much faster at recognizing / improvising as the music evolves.

One of my objectives for regimented practice has been to increase my picking and fingering accuracy, especially at speed. I don’t do very much shredding in either of my bands but  I do get a few moments in DMQ where I can cut loose with a big solo, and it’s fun to have those chops available. I have been working on economical sweep picking and tapping exercises on my own, which seems to be improving my general picking technique. It’s very satisfying to have this investment of time bearing fruit. I’m looking forward to spending more time on jazz chord study, and on developing a stronger command over melodic minor playing.

 

Double The Fun

December 28, 2011 by John No Comments »

In the 1 Uppers I frequently switch between my stratocaster and my Danelectro baritone guitar. Our set lists seem to always be perfectly arranged to maximize the number of times I have to switch 🙂 After a recent gig at the newly opened Royal Room, I was lamenting the inconvenience of the repeated switching. I said (half jokingly) that I really needed a double neck guitar that had both a baritone and a regular neck. One of my bandmates immediately pointed out that Gretsch actually makes such an instrument. I did some hunting online and discovered the Guitar Center in Little Rock, Arkansas had one in stock that was used, with a very attractive price! After a few calls to the store I decided to have them ship it over to Seattle so I could give it a whirl.

It’s likely I’ll bring it along with me to the New Year’s Eve show at The Sunset, just because it seems like a perfect opportunity to try it out on stage. The overall tone is classic Gretsch, and you just gotta love that silver sparkle finish with the TWO Bigsby tremolo bridges! It’s pretty heavy so I don’t see myself playing marathon gigs with it, but I love its visual vibe. This will be a fun addition to the guitar arsenal!

 

Thoughts On The 12/17 1 Uppers Performance

December 20, 2011 by John No Comments »

On Saturday 12/17 the 1 Uppers performed at The Royal Room, a new venue recently opened in Columbia City. It’s a very music-friendly room with excellent sight lines and a great sound system. Local jazz keyboardist Wayne Horvitz is one of the founders of the club, and he deliberately established it with musicians in mind. The stage has a permanent backline of equipment including guitar amps, a bass amp, a drum set, a grand piano and a Hammond B3.

I arrived to discover that one of the guitar amps was broken. Fortunately our singer David hadn’t left home yet, so he graciously brought along an amp for me to use… a Dr. Z head and cabinet! It rivaled my Boogie Lonestar for clear dimensionality and blues voicing. Definitely made my guitars sound very nice.

We performed on the opening weekend along with several local jazz luminaries, which made for some remarkable collaborations throughout the evening. Wayne sat in with us for a song, as did guitarist Tim Young. Throughout our performance I was struck by how fortunate I am to be in such great musical company. Another fantastic performance with my great friends in the 1 Uppers. Can’t wait for the next one!

 

Thoughts On The 12/16 1 Uppers Performance

December 19, 2011 by John No Comments »

On Friday 12/16 the 1 Uppers performed at Darrell’s Tavern in Shoreline. We’ve played there before and it’s always a great time. The crowd there is very supportive of live music, and they seem to appreciate just about every possible style. We often are part of a country-themed night there, and it seems to bring out the true believers in this style of music. The stage occupies about 25% of the floor space in the bar and we’re very close to the audience, which makes for an especially interactive and fun show. This weekend I performed both gigs as the only electric guitarist in the band; 1 Upper Kris Geren was out of the country so it meant I had more territory to cover in our songs.

I’ve been playing more baritone guitar in this band lately, which I’m really enjoying. For these shows where we are playing as a five-piece band, it’s been interesting to hear the texture of the mix with acoustic guitar being the sole instrument in the “regular” guitar range. I switch back to the strat for a number of songs where those parts are more crucial to the mix.

One of the interesting interactions I had in Friday was chatting with someone in the bar who is a guitarist and is interested in understanding country guitar playing styles such as Travis Picking and “chicken pickin’ “. I always feel a little sheepish discussing the technical details of country guitar playing since I’m sort of figuring it out as I go! So in this case I was able to make a semi-intelligent observation about those styles despite offering a disclaimer up front.

A great night of music with great friends!

 

Dudley Manlove Quartet NYE at the Sunset 12/31

December 8, 2011 by John No Comments »

On Saturday 12/31 The Dudley Manlove Quartet will be performing our annual New Year’s Rockin’ Eve show at the Sunset in Ballard. Advance tickets are available now and are strongly recommended as this event will sell out.  We’ll be pulling out the stops for another great show with new music and surprises. Come on out and ring in 2012 with the band and 200 of our closest friends.

This is the best NYE value in town, hands down: Twenty bucks gets you a champagne toast at midnight and all the Dudley you can handle. This will sell out fast, so get an early start on that “no procrastinating” resolution and buy your tickets now!