Mario’s Stuff

Happy Christmas and New Year!

Wishing you all a great Christmas and New Year! Thank you for all your support and enthusiasm for my music during 2009 :-)

Very best wishes

Mario

New Guitar

Marty (Siggery Guitars CEO) sent me a photo of my new guitar’s progress a few days ago, he was working on the transparent black finish at the time:

As you can see from the photo, the finish is looking amazing, it will be even better when it’s coated with glossy nitro lacquer…! Marty has also added the dot inlays to the fingerboard.

When the guitar gets here, we’ll photograph it from all angles and I’ll write a detailed blog entry about it with a video or two of me playing it :-)

Halloween

It’s that time of year again… How time flies… (see below) I can remember writing about last year’s Halloween in the old blog.

Although it’s not officially Halloween just yet, Shawna and I took Skye to the Clark County Museum in Henderson, NV as they’re running Halloween evenings for kids. Skye had a great time, her costume this year was a fairy outfit with wings (she’s obsessed with butterflies - or ‘flurflies’ as she calls them :-).

Skye and her costume

The county museum did a great job; all the kids enjoyed themselves, especially those engrossed in trick or treating on the museum’s ‘Heritage Street’ which contains several old houses that were rescued from old Las Vegas.

They held a costume contest for the kids, so I took Skye up onto the little stage area (above) whilst Shawna took photos. And before you ask; no, I didn’t wear my ‘Jaws’ t-shirt especially for Halloween! I didn’t even think about it until we were there and hoped people didn’t think I was dressed in quite possibly the most cheesy and laziest costume Halloween had ever seen…! :-D

Along the usually peaceful nature trail were several old exhibits including this prison cage (above) and the old faded truck (below).

The corner of Heritage Street at Halloween.

The museum’s old steam train decorated for Halloween.

At the main entrance was this cool display of giant tarantula spiders with heads and skulls…

A few days before we went to the museum, we took Skye to Ethel M’s Cactus Garden for a walk. They’d started to kit out the garden with an October theme (below).

Time…

Sometimes I can’t believe how time flies… I can remember when I was twenty years old and thinking “I wonder where I’ll be/what I’ll be doing when I’m forty?” And here I am twenty years later, asking the same question again, only next time I’ll be sixty…!

I can’t believe how fast Skye has grown. It only seems like a few days ago when I was holding her in one hand at the hospital on the day she was born. And yet here she is now, no longer a baby but a growing toddler who demands mine and Shawna’s attention 24/7! We went to a friend of Skye’s birthday party last week, and I think it was there that I realized how fast she’s grown and how time really does slip us by.

One of my favourite pieces of music of all time (forgive the pun) is Ennio Morricone’s haunting musical pocket watch theme from the Sergio Leone movie ‘For A Few Dollars More’ (1965). In the last scene where Colonel Mortimer (Lee Van Cleef) has the shoot-out with ‘El Indio’ (Gian Maria Volonte), the haunting little melody from ‘El Indio’s’ pocket watch (stolen from Mortimer’s sister) starts to play and is then made even more beautiful when the string arrangement drifts in…

Ennio Morricone’s ‘Musical Pocket Watch’, kindly posted on YouTube by another fan of the theme.

I was as fascinated with this theme when I was four years old as I am now at age forty. Musically, it has a great melody and haunting quality about it, but combined with Leone’s cinematic vision, the scene from which it’s taken from (not shown in the above video) captures timelessness perfectly. (Incidentally, Ennio Morricone is one of my favourite soundtrack composers for his use of melody).

I remember growing up in Spain and seeing vast plains and agave plants, ‘For A Few Dollars More’ was filmed in Spain near Almeria in Andalucia, and the shoot-out scene also shows these simlar plains and plants. The golden Spanish sunlight in the late afternoon illuminates Leone’s canvas, and the scene itself is both melancholic yet intense. I’ve loved this movie since my early childhood, and every time I watch it (two puns!) I realize just how quickly time goes by…

New Guitar!

Marty Siggery, the main luthier at Siggery Guitars has been working hard on my new custom guitar, I’ve attached a photo below to show it’s progress.

The new guitar!

The guitar has an SG body style, and is made of solid mahogany with a very thin Koa veneer for cosmetic purposes (as shown in the image). It has a 24 fret set neck (no binding) with dot inlays, rosewood fingerboard with 16″ radius, jumbo frets and 25″ scale length, two nickel covered humbuckers (Rio Grande pickups), a ‘Barbeque Bucker’ in the bridge and a ‘Buffalobucker’ in the neck, one volume, one push/pull tone with coil tap, 3 way selector switch, jack input on side of body, locking 18:1 tuners, tunomatic bridge and strung through body. It will be sprayed transparent black by Marty at the workshop. I can’t wait… ;-)

NV & CA Wildfires

A couple of weeks ago we had some pretty severe wildfires in the Nevada/California areas. August usually produces wildfires, and this year was no exception. Sadly, several brave firefighters lost their lives struggling to bring the fire to a halt :-( The fires were eventually calmed by the Fire Departments.

The wildfires were in mostly California, but eventually crept into the Nevada border. In the evening, Las Vegas smelled like a bonfire, with the strong smell of burning wood permeating through the warm night air. The following day the roads and sidewalks were covered in a layer of ash, our front patio included.

Mount Charleston, NV

One of our favorite local places is Nevada’s Mount Charleston. When the weather gets really hot here, Mount Charleston is the perfect retreat as the weather is considerably cooler at the top of the mountain than it is in the Vegas valley. Last week was like this as we drove to the mountain and visited it’s lower and upper lodges. The weather in Vegas at the time was 105F, and as we drove higher, the weather was a stormy 56F at the Upper Lodge.

The stormy weather at Mount Charleston.

We first stopped off at the Lower Lodge with the intention of getting coffee and a snack, but the bad weather had caused a power cut, so the snack bar was closed. Skye enjoyed sitting in a carved tree in the lobby though :-D

Skye sat in the carved tree at Mt. Charleston’s Lower Lodge.

We made a quick dash back to the truck to get out of the pouring rain, and continued driving up the mountain. Just past Kyle Canyon the storm’s lightening had hit a tree causing it to fall into the road, so I had to get out and push it’s charred remains to the roadside.

When we finally arrived at the Upper Lodge, I was soaking wet and ready for a hot coffee. We shared a pizza and I played with Skye, drawing pictures on a napkin :-)

Me & Skye at Upper Lodge deciding what to order…

Me & Skye drawing.

Funny Pics

We went to a local store Shawna and I affectionately refer to as ‘the ghetto store’ a few days ago, and there in the parking section was this cholo car… I just had to photograph it with my cell phone for the blog :-D

Cholo Car!

In our local Walmart store last night, we saw a clown slowly wandering around the aisles pushing a shopping cart… It reminded me of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead so I took a (blurred) photo discretely with my cell phone :-)

Walmart Clown…!?

Bug Update

We’ve been lucky so far to have not had any further scorpion/spider incidents in or around the house, let’s hope it stays that way…

We’ve had a few of the nicer bugs visit though, a large moth and several Praying Mantis’.

This large moth was approximately 4 inches in length and had a wing span of around 8 inches.

Always alert and other-worldly, this green Praying Mantis spent the night on our front patio. We also get sand colored Mantis’ here in the desert.

R.I.P. Les Paul

It was with great sadness that I yesterday learned of the death of the legendary Les Paul. One of the electric guitar’s greatest pioneers and innovator of multitrack recording techniques, Les died yesterday due to complications from pneumonia at the age of 94. He will be missed by everyone in the guitar and music world. There’s little point in me elaborating on his life as anyone who knows anything about guitars knows who Les Paul was and what he achieved in his lifetime. A very sad loss.

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Siggery Guitars

As you may already know from the press releases and the ‘news’ page on the main website, I’m now playing Siggery Guitars made by my old friend Marty Siggery. Marty played bass on The Magician album back in 1991 and had a magic touch with guitars as far back as I can remember. He became renowned on the guitar circuit during the 80’s and 90’s for his expert set-ups and mods, and has since blossomed into a killer guitar builder… Rather than have me tell you how good his guitars are, just check out the reviews in guitar magazines… ;-)

Marty is currently building me two custom solid body electric guitars. They’re both made out of mahogany with Koa veneered tops (mostly for cosmetic purposes), with an SG syle body shape, set mahogany neck, 24 fret fingerboard and 25″ scale length. The pickups will be Rio Grande’s  ’Barbeque Bucker’ in the bridge and ‘Buffalo Bucker’ in the neck. The guitars will have one volume and one coil-tappable tone pot with a three way toggle switch. The input jack will be on the guitar’s edge rather than the face. One will be in transparent black, the other in transparent crimson. As soon as they arrive here, I’ll photograph them and post photos in the blog :-)

The reason why I’ve opted for an SG body style is for nostalgia purposes and it’s practicality. I had a Gibson SG Special when I was about 12 years old and made a big mistake in trading it in for a different guitar a couple of years later… :-/ I like the SG’s comfortable design and easy access to the upper fretboard, I have one at home that I play a lot. Marty’s hand-crafted custom version will be awesome, I can’t wait to play it…!

Passport Photo

My UK passport expired late last month, so I had the boring and tedious task of renewing it via the British Embassy in the U.S. Other than the renewal paperwork and basic instructions online through their website, the British Embassy didn’t provide much information, other than when the package was ready I had to send it to them in Washington, D.C. Here in America, U.S. passport photos are 2″ x 2″, a standard size and available just about anywhere. But for a UK passport, the photo has to be 45mm in height and 35mm in width, a format that isn’t common in this country…

So… I went to all the obvious places to try and get a photograph, I actually wasted an entire afternoon going from store to store only to be told the same thing, that they only catered for the U.S. 2″ x 2″ format. As a last resort, we passed by a Walgreens pharmacy and Shawna told me to try inside as they did passport photos there. To my surprise and joy, the guy in the Walgreens photo department knew exactly what I was talking about and showed me their photo software which has a specific ‘UK Passport’ process. He took the photo with a digital camera, and the software did the rest, producing two perfect UK passport photos!

So, for any British ex-pats living in America, when you need to renew your passport, just go straight to Walgreens for the photos! I don’t know why the British Embassy doesn’t have this information on it’s website, it would have saved me many hours of frustration… When my daughter Skye needed 2″ x 2″ photos for her first U.S. passport whilst we were living in England, the American Embassy provided several local photographer’s details on it’s website making the process very simple. Maybe the British Embassy should follow suit…

My 40th Birthday!

It was that time of year again… the 7th of August. I’ve never been too bothered about birthdays, as I’ve always believed that we’re as old as we feel. My birthday this year was spoilt by a heavy cold, all Shawna’s plans were ruined as my mild cold took a turn for the worse on the 7th… We’ll do all the things we’d planned next week, my cold is finally starting to fade…

Shadows & Light

My new solo album Shadows & Light is going well, some of the songs are now very close to completion and soundclips will be added to the main website nearer to the release date. The track listing will be announced on the main site’s News & Events page soon.

Fishman’s Aura Imaging

My main nylon string guitar (made of Koa wood) was sent off to Fishman’s Headquarters in Massachussetts last week, they’re installing their amazing Infinity Matrix undersaddle pickup into it, and also creating brand new custom Aura images from the guitar itself in their studio, they’re then installing the radical Fishman Aura Imaging Pre-Amp into the guitar with the custom auras programmed into it. The Aura technology is simply superb, and I can’t wait for the guitar to get back to MidnightCafe Studios so I can play around with it! I’ll be using this guitar for my upcoming acoustic guitar instrumental album, Distant Dreams.

Fishman’s Chris De Maria is going to photograph the guitar in it’s various stages of completion, so check back soon as I’ll show the pics here in the blog!

New Old Haircut

I was looking back at some photos of me from a few weeks ago and I decided that I didn’t like my long hair anymore, I thought it looked dated on me. I had very long hair during the 80’s and early 90’s when long hair was ‘in’ within the rock/metal scene, and couldn’t wait to cut it as I never really liked it as it was a pain to maintain, so I had it cut back to the way I’ve had it for the last few years, shorter and kind of spiky on the top.

Me, June 9th 2009 with one of my guitars and new old hairstyle!

Route 66

We drove into Nipton, CA last week via Route 66, the weather was warm and Skye enjoyed walking around the Hotel Nipton. Our walk was cut a little short as there were quite a few tarantula hawk wasps and yellow jacket wasps in the hotel’s cactus garden.

Me & Skye at the Hotel Nipton, CA.

The road surface at Route 66 near Nipton was badly affected by flash floods a couple of years ago, the tarmac became badly cracked and was recently filled in. I think they’ll resurface the entire road soon, it’s a shame as the old road looked very cool and had a vintage vibe about it. There are some photos of Route 66 from a few years ago in the main gallery.

After visiting Nipton, we did our usual drive down the Joshua Tree Highway in the Mojave National Reserve to Cottonwood Cove, NV and Lake Mohave. We stopped by my favourite joshua trees for a photo with Skye, but the sound of a large adult rattlesnake’s warning was a little too close for comfort so we quickly moved on!

Me & Skye at Cottonwood Cove, NV.

Palm at Cottonwood Cove, NV.

Lake Mead National Recreation Area

We drove out to Echo Bay a couple of days ago, the sky was stormy and brooding across the Lake Mead National Recreation Area. Shawna and I took a few photos en-route of the lake area, Lake Mead is one of our favourite places and very close to where we live.

Stormy sky over Lake Mead National Recreation Area, NV.

Dark shadows by Redstone, Lake Mead.

Rocks at Redstone lit by the sun through the dark clouds.

Rock formation, Lake Mead.

More shadows and light over the desert.

Virga in the sky as the rain evaporates in the desert heat before it hits the ground.

Cell phone photo of palm trees at Echo Bay at twilight.

Another cell phone pic as we drove away from Echo Bay and into the night…

FedEx Nigeria!

Shawna had another funny spam email from Nigeria, this time the Nigerians were claiming to be from ‘FedEx Nigeria’ (!?) and claimed they had a package waiting for us in Nigeria that contained a bank draft to the value of $800,000.00! :-D They wanted $305 as a ‘holding fee’ then they’d send the bogus package…

The email’s subject line read:  Subject: YOU HAVE A PACKAGE WITH FEDEX COURIER NIGERIA !!! We immediately started laughing… :-D Not quite as funny as the email we had from ‘Dr. Fred Mike’ in Nigeria (see the earlier blog entry), but still pretty ludicrous and amusing :-)

These people are complete fuckwits aren’t they? They didn’t even try to hide the fact that they’re notorious Nigerian conmen - FedEx Nigeria???!!!!! Hilarious! I really hope people out there don’t fall for this nonsense. It beggars belief really, but always gives us a good laugh when a particularly funny email gets through :-)

Uncle G’s Visit

Graham, Me & Skye at Lake Mead National Recreation Area, NV (5/15/09)

Uncle G (Graham Bonnet) came to visit us last week, we had a great time driving out to a few local places of interest and we also worked on some new songs for the Savage Paradise project.

“DAY-O!” Graham being Graham… ;-) Testing out the echo at Red Stone, Lake Mead (05/17/09)

Amongst other places, we visited the Lake Mead National Recreation Area (see above pics) and went to Echo Bay for lunch. Shawna had her little camera with her and took a bunch of great photos :-) On Monday the 18th I drove along the Nevada and California state line and into the Mojave Desert along the Joshua Tree Highway and showed Graham the little town of Nipton and then Cottonwood Cove on Lake Mohave (yes, it’s spelled with an ‘h’!) The temperature at Cottonwood Cove was 118 F with a warm wind.

Thirsty Skye drinking watermelon juice. Echo Bay, Lake Mead, (05/17/09)

Graham went back to L.A. yesterday, and that same evening my friend and bassist Paul ‘Pablo’ Stanney arrived in Vegas for a visit from the UK.

Shadows & Light

As well as the Savage Paradise album, I’m also hard at work on my new solo guitar instrumental album Shadows & Light and will be announcing soon the track titles and running order. I’m very pleased with the way it’s sounding so far, and it will further benefit from Pablo’s (Paul Stanney) bass lines and Kev’s (Kev Taylor) drums. There will be three special bonus tracks on the CD of vocal versions of three of the songs. Each song will have a different singer, the singers are Graham Bonnet (Rainbow/MSG/Alcatrazz), Lee Small (Shy/Phenomena/Lee Small Band) and John Pratt (Firefly). I’ll keep you posted on the album’s progress.

Bug Update

There’s actually nothing to report!! Hopefully it will stay this way… (touch wood)… we’ve already had our share of scorpions and spiders…

There are a few harmless lizards that live around our house, I managed to photograph one on the patio wall a few days ago with my cell phone (below).  They’re about 6 inches long and very fast…!

A desert lizard on our patio wall.

The weather’s getting warmer now, it was 109 F yesterday, and pretty soon the cicadas will be making their loud weird noise outside. We usually get praying mantis’ on the patio during the Summer months, but they’re harmless and good at keeping other insects at bay.

With a bit of luck, there won’t be another bug update for a while…

In the last blog entry I said I’d talk a little about technique as I’m asked a lot about the subject. I’d like to start off by saying that I don’t give guitar lessons, but if you catch up with me at a gig or clinic I’m usually more than happy to run through a few licks/ideas and offer any advice I’m able to.

Before I begin to talk about technique, I’d like it known that technique alone does nothing for me. I don’t find it remotely interesting to hear someone playing as fast as they can, nor weaving in and out of as many modes as possible. Neither of these constitutes great musicianship in my eye. Music for me is an emotional affair, I like music to stir my soul in one way or another, from an adrenaline rush to a deep spiritual high that send chills down my spine.

Speed

Whilst it’s undoubtedly great fun to play fast, speed out of context is pointless and silly. The obsession with speed seems to be peculiar to the electric guitar and the ‘shred’ genre as I don’t know of any other musicians; ie pianists, classical guitarists, saxophonists, cellists, etc. who are concerned with playing as fast as they can all the time. I know that Nicolo Paganini, the Romantic period violinist was renowned for his blinding speed, but – it was also well documented that he was capable of making his audience cry with his slower emotive playing.

Before learning to play fast, it’s very important to learn all the basics that are sadly neglected by some players. Tone, string control, vibrato, rhythm and finesse are lacking in many of the solos I get asked to listen to. I’ve heard countless solos by guitarists who can alternate pick a scale at speed and sweep arpeggio shapes, but this is then usually let down with uncontrolled vibrato, or out of pitch string bends, poor tone, bad rhythm playing on the backing track, etc. It’s always wise to learn to walk before running.

Rhythm

Often overlooked by guitarists focusing on soloing techniques, rhythm is one of the most important aspects of guitar playing and music in general for that matter. I hear many demos from aspiring instrumental guitarists who give little thought to rhythm, their rhythm guitar playing is usually surprisingly basic with just a few power chords here and there, and they have little sense of rhythm and timing whilst soloing. Practice your rhythm playing and listen to players and music with great rhythm and groove.

Style

When you reach a certain level with your ability, you should start to hear your own style and sound developing. I don’t believe style is something that can be pre-planned, it just kind of happens on its own.

Perhaps the worst thing a guitarist can do is copy note for note solos and ideas from other guitarists without adapting them slightly. There are many players out there who sound like a mish-mash of several other players, and they have no particular style of their own. It’s perfectly ok to have a favorite guitarist, but don’t copy him/her in a parrot fashion or else you’ll just end up sounding like a cheap imitation of them.

‘Neo-Classicism’

Other common questions I get asked are about the neo-classical guitar style as I’m often associated with the genre. Although my own guitar style contains some elements of neo-classicism, I would say that my style is more a hybrid of rock, blues, fusion, flamenco and neo-classical.

Harmonic minor scales played at speed and diminished arpeggios do not constitute true ‘neo-classicism’, but if this were so, then Django Reinhardt, Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin, Paco De Lucia, and many other jazz and flamenco guitarists could be regarded as pioneers of this guitar style and were playing like this way before anyone in the rock world was. The fast picking of scales and arpeggios has long existed within the jazz and flamenco genres, check out some of the albums I listed in the previous blog entry below.

Whilst there are several styles within the genre, the most common neo-classical sound and style is played by guitarists who have taken elements of Ritchie Blackmore’s and Uli John Roth’s styles (but just played faster) along with some of Bach’s more basic ideas, and who focus mostly on the Baroque sound and harmonic minor scales. I agree with many that this particular sound has now become tedious and repetitious, and I think this neo-classical style should move on.

If you’re interested in neo-classical instrumental rock guitar music, then my advice would be to listen to as many composers as you can, and not necessarily just violin based music. You don’t have to focus purely on composers from the Baroque period either, I personally prefer the late Classical and Romantic periods.

I’ve listed below some of the classical music (in no particular order of importance) that most influenced me when I was young: 

1. Paganini – Caprice 16 in G Minor
2. Paganini – Concerto No. 5 in A Minor (Finale - Andantino quasi Allegretto)
3. Schubert – Symphony No. 5 in B Flat Major (Allegro)
4. Dvorak – Serenade For Strings in E Major (Tempo Di Valse)
5. Beethoven – Concerto for Violin & Orchestra in D Major (Rondo – Allegro)
6. J.S. Bach – Double Violin Concerto in D Minor (Vivace)
7. Massanet – Meditation from Thais
8. Sibelius – Valse Triste
9. Allegri – Miserere Mei, Deus
10. Mozart – Piano Concerto 25 in C Major (1st Movement)

My last piece of advice on this subject is that if you want to develop a neo-classical style, I would recommend you experiment with classical elements and try and come up with something fresh. There are far more possibilities within the neo-classical genre than just the key of E minor, harmonic minor scales, pedal point licks and a diminished arpeggio ;-)

I’m asked a lot by learner guitarists through my website and MySpace page about guitars, amps and guitar music that influenced me when I was young, and also for advice on technique and guitar playing in general (which I’ll cover in the next blog entry).  I’ll try and answer the most commonly asked questions…

Guitars

There’s a lot of misinformation, nonsense and snobbery surrounding musical equipment in general, but especially so for guitars. Just because something costs more doesn’t necessarily mean it’s better. We all know that an expensive guitar and amp in the wrong hands will sound like shit, yet a cheaper guitar and amp in the right hands will sound fine. I’m often asked to recommend guitars and amps to players, but skill, experience, playing style and of course personal opinion are important factors to consider when buying equipment. It would be unwise for a novice player to spend $4,000 on a new guitar, as a professional grade instrument won’t magically improve someone’s playing and technique (or tone for that matter). However, I totally understand and respect the idea that it’s also nice to be the proud owner of something of value and beauty regardless of skill level.

Other than your skill level, the first thing to consider when buying a new guitar is what the guitar will be used for. It would be pointless investing in a high output dual humbucking guitar with a whammy bar if you intended playing folk music, just as it would be a bad choice to choose a guitar with single coil pickups if you planned on playing ’shred’ techniques. Think of the style of guitar that would be best suited to your requirements then go try a few.

The guitar’s build quality and wood are very important to how the guitar will play and sound. Mahogany is my preferred wood for guitars as I like it’s fat tone and singing voice, but there are guitars made from many different kinds of woods and combinations to suit. A popular combination is mahogany with a maple top, producing a brighter tone than just all mahogany (I personally prefer guitars made from all-mahogany). Some guitars are made of Alder, others from Basswood (my least preferred), there’s also Maple, Koa, Sapele, etc.

Pickups are very important too, and should usually be replaced on cheaper guitars as they will make all the difference in tone and noise levels. There are many options to choose from; higher output pickups are better suited to hard rock/metal/punk/shred, whilst medium output pickups are good for rock/blues/pop, etc. Humbuckers produce a fatter, thicker sound and are the best choice for overdriven sounds and clean jazz tones, whilst single coil pickups give a lighter and thinner sound, and are best suited to cleaner tones and pop, blues and softer rock styles. ‘Stacked’ humbuckers are available for single coil based guitars, but I personally prefer regular humbuckers to play modern rock guitar and ’shred’ techniques, plus a humbucker can easily be coil tapped to use as a single coil anyway.

I’m also often asked why I prefer set necks or thru-necks over bolt-on necks. My reasons are that I like the smooth, even sustain and resonance from set/thru-necks and the almost heeless feel to the upper frets. I also believe the theory that fewer joints and hardware produce better tone and stability. Bolt-on necks just feel cheap to me, and I don’t like some of the heel plate neck joints found on some guitars.

Guitars cost anything between $100 to thousands, obviously, a $100 guitar will play and sound in a manner to reflect it’s price tag, and very cheap guitars are a false economy as you’ll probably want to replace and upgrade almost immediately. You should shop around and try out different guitars and brands, there are some fine instruments out there around the $500 mark, add to this the cost of a pickup upgrade (if required) and you could own a pretty good guitar for around $700. However, a realistic price range for a quality, professional grade guitar is between $1,000 - $4,000, but there are bargains to be found and some great guitars are sometimes available for less. As a rule, the more you spend, the better the guitar’s wood and appointments will be.

Amplifiers

The same principle of best isn’t necessarily the most expensive with guitars also applies to amplifiers. If you’re a bedroom guitarist, you wouldn’t really need a 100W stack. Likewise, taking a 15W combo amp to a thrash metal rehearsal would be rather silly too. Again, look at your needs and style and then choose your amp carefully.

I personally use all-tube amplifiers. I’ve never liked solid-state amps and think that amp modelling/simulation technology is still very much in it’s infancy. A real tube amp behaves and reacts in a specific way to the guitar’s dynamics, and produces a distinctive warm, smooth overdriven tone.

In the studio, I usually play all my clean guitar sounds through the mixing desk, but all my overdriven guitars are played through close mic’d tube amps. My personal amp choice is relatively simple; I use a small 30W tube combo amp for recording, and larger 100W tube heads with 4 x 12 cabinets for live work. I use the amp’s overdrive gain on full, with a distortion pedal to boost the signal if required. A compressor/sustainer pedal is placed before the distortion unit to smooth out the signal.

As with guitars, amps are available in many different price ranges, the only way to choose one is to play through several until you find one you’re happy with. Other than the obvious tone, things to look for are build quality, amount of channels (two or more are best) and reliability.

Guitar Albums

I grew up listening to all kinds of music and was influenced by all kinds of styles and players. Although I was also influenced by several composers, I’ve listed below the guitar based albums that most influenced my playing when I was young:

(In no particular order):

1. Al Di Meola - Elegant Gypsy (1977)
2. Al Di Meola - Splendido Hotel (1980)
3. Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin & Paco de Lucia - Friday Night in San Francisco (1980)
4. Al Di Meola, John McLaughlin & Paco de Lucia - Passion, Grace & Fire (1983)
5. Paco de Lucia -  El Duende Flamenco de Paco de Lucia (1972)
6. Django Reinhardt - The Great Artistry of Django Reinhardt (1954)
7. Van Halen - Van Halen I (1978)
8. Van Halen - Van Halen II (1979)
9. Scorpions - Lovedrive (1979)
10. Scorpions - Blackout (1982)

Bug Update

The weather’s getting warmer here in the Nevada desert, so our bug guy came to the house last thursday and did his routine insecticide spraying inside and out. We haven’t had another scorpion incident since the last one, but we know that this doesn’t mean anything as last year proved…

I photographed a spider on our patio wall a few days ago, it looks like one similar to the spider I photographed a few weeks ago with a weird skinny abdomen, big body and long legs. I’m normally quite good at identifying the bugs but I don’t know what kind of spider this is. It was quite large, measuring approximately five inches in length.

Immediately after the bug guy’s spraying we usually get a sudden influx of insects, but this is normal as the bugs come out of their hiding places to move on.

The strange spider on our patio wall.

Echo Bay

The weather’s getting warmer, it’s been around 96F this week so we took Skye to Echo Bay again to feed the Koi carp. This time, we cunningly didn’t take popcorn for the fish, only bread; and Skye threw the bread pieces into the water without trying to eat them all like the last time :-)

Me (with the sun blinding me) & Skye at Echo Bay yesterday

Carrying Skye on my shoulders, one of her favorite things :-)

Funny Videos

I was sent the below funny video clips of British comedy duo Mitchell & Webb, and I thought I’d share them with you :-)

The Road to Echo Bay…

Not far from where we live is the Lake Mead National Reserve, a place of incredible beauty where the Colorado River meets the Hoover Dam, and then turns into Lake Mead. Lake Mead itself has 550 miles of shoreline, and the landscape is a mix of rugged mountains, smooth desert and calm waters. I’ve not been too well over the last few days, I’m still getting rid of a cold, but it always helps me to get out of the house and get some fresh air, and a drive through the Reserve is always uplifting. The weather was perfect on Sunday, it was a warm 82F with a warm breeze.

Desert Cactus in bloom, Lake Mead National Reserve

Located within the Reserve is Echo Bay, a little bay and marina at the bottom of a mountain pass, approximately 40 miles away from the Henderson side of the Lake Mead National Reserve gateway. We often drive out this way as the drive is peaceful with scenery straight out of a wild west movie, and the little nautical themed restaurant at Echo Bay has great food and a friendly atmosphere (the old blog had a few photos of the inside of the restaurant).

Echo Bay from the top of the mountain

You may remember from the old blog and gallery that we liked to visit the Las Vegas Marina at Lake Mead to feed the Koi Carp, but since the water level of Lake Mead has diminished over the past two years, the Koi have spread out further along the lake. We were pleased to see that Echo Bay has it’s own Koi population and Skye got to feed them popcorn and bread.

Skye walking along the jetty at the Echo Bay Marina holding my finger.

Having used up all the popcorn, I tried to show Skye how to throw pieces of bread into the water for the Carp…

… but she decided that whilst the popcorn was for the fish, the bread was definitely for her… ;-)

We stopped by the restaurant and had a late lunch, then drove around the lake for a while before hitting the store for groceries. In the store, Skye spotted a bright yellow Easter chick toy and was so taken with it we had to buy it for her :-) The video below shows some of the day’s events.

Bug Update

A couple of nights ago, I was in the kitchen with Shawna enjoying a glass of wine and chatting. We had the lighting low for ‘mood’ and our dog Indio was fast asleep on the floor between the refrigerator (his temple of worship) and the table where we were sat. Out of the corner of my eye I noticed something scuttling along the kitchen floor, about 8 inches away from Indio, and to my horror (and now exasperation) it was another f@#*!=g scorpion! >:-/ I jumped up, nearly knocking the table and wine everywhere and tried to move Indio away. Because he was asleep, he woke up startled and walked backwards to where the scorpion was and almost stood on it… Seriously, he missed it by millimeters… I grabbed Shawna’s flipflop off her foot and battered it (sounds like a Monty Python-esque sketch), I then realized it was another bark scorpion and very poisonous. Had it stung Indio it could have killed him as the bark scorpion’s sting can be fatal in animals, children and the elderly/infirm.

View of the scorpion from above. (I’ve cleaned up most of the gore from the battering with Photoshop).

This is the view of the damn thing I had from where I was sitting…

Those of you who read the old blog will remember that we’ve had several scorpion encounters in this house, a bark scorpion was in one of the kitchen drawers last year and missed my hand by a hair’s width as I reached in for something. This latest scorpion is now the sixth we’ve encountered in the house and adjacent patio footpath in just twelve months. We have a bug guy (as do most people in Vegas) who comes out to the house and sprays inside and out, but pesticides only remove the food source of scorpions as they’re pretty much indestructible (except when they come up against ball-pane hammers and old flipflops ;-). They’re like the armoured tanks of the insect world!

As if scorpions weren’t bad enough, I photographed a brown recluse spider on our patio wall last month. The brown recluse is also known as the ‘Violin Spider’ as it has a violin shape on it’s head where it’s legs are attached. The brown recluse is one of the most poisonous spiders in America and it’s necrotic bite can result in a huge gaping hole of rotting flesh. Nasty stuff… Some poor people have had to have limbs amputated because of it. The spiders are quite small, about the size of a penny or nickel.

The small but dangerous brown recluse spider

I photographed another spider on the patio wall a few weeks ago (shown below) but  I’m not sure what it is. It looks like a hobo spider, but I think we’re a lttle too South Westerly for the hobo. If anyone can identify it then please let me know here.

The spider I can’t identify

I think we’re getting an unusual amount of spiders and scorpions here in the Southern Las Vegas area as new houses are being built further into the desert right by us and the insects are obviously moving this way. We can’t take any more risks with scorpions in the house with the baby and pets so we’re going to move to another area of Vegas as soon as we can…

Ethel M’s Cactus Garden

One of our favourite places to go for an afternoon stroll with the baby is Ethel M’s Chocolate Factory & Cactus Garden in Henderson. The garden is home to just about every kind of cactus there is, and kids love it as it’s next to Ethel M’s Chocolate Factory. Over the Christmas period, they light the garden up with literally thousands of lights, it looks like a bizarre desert version of Santa’s Grotto. We were there last week as the sun was going down, and I took a couple of photos for the blog with my cell phone.

Part of the Cactus Garden with barrel cacti and agave plants (where tequila comes from ;-)

Backlit cacti near the Chocolate Factory

After the Cactus Garden we went to the local mall, where Skye likes walking for miles whilst waving to everyone :-D

The Nigerian Barrister

We’ve all received the spam/con emails from so-called ‘barristers’, ‘doctors’, members of ‘Royalty’, ‘diplomats’ and even ‘Presidents’, all stemming from Nigeria and the like, but yesterday Shawna recieved the funniest email yet from a Nigerian ’barrister’ claiming to be in London with the hilarious made-up name of Dr. Fred Mike…!!!!!!!!  Can you believe this shit? We laughed all day at this one! These people must read internet pages with lists of English men’s names and then randomly choose two… How else could you come up with Fred Mike!!?? DR Fred Mike from Nigeria!!!! LOL :-D He was of course emailing us to let us know (very thoughtfully) that he had $20 million dollars in a special trust fund in London and just needed $900 of our money urgently to free it up and would of course compensate us “dearly for our kindness”… Hilarious stuff… We’ve decided that we’re going to call our next pet ‘Dr. Fred Mike’ :-D