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Per wrote:
" I'd like to chime in and say that I really liked it the first time I
heard drummer Charlie Watts
playing at a slightly different tempo then Brian Jones and the boys
in the band."
Bill Wyman was interviewed years ago about the 'sloppy' rhythmic machine
that the Rolling Stones
are. He said a fascinating thing (and I'm paraphrasing because I read
this somewhere 30 years ago).
He said that unlike many other rhythm sections that Keith Richards led the
rhythm section.
He said the Richards frequently sped up and slowed down the rhythm and even,
occasionally, would completely
lose a beat forcing one odd time measure (though that's not how he described
it).
He said that he listened to an followed Richards religiously and that
Charlie Watts listened and followed him
religiously.
This is why the Stones have a rhythm section that is really loose and
swinging (don't forget the Watts was a jazz drummer
before he was a rock drummer) in a way that I've never heard a cover band be
able to cop their rhythmic feel.
And it's true, you can never get this kind of feel with a static loop (or
probably not with a slightly drifting loop).
By the same token, I did a demonstration where I purposefully made a very
lumpy beat box loop at PASIC and then demonstrated
how one , with the judicious use of stretched time and long enveloped
sounds, make a very crummy lumpy loop actually have a
really cool musical groove to it.
You can't get this kind of feel with two human
beings..........................so there's a tradeoff.
Since we are on the subject of live looping (and to me, I agree with
everything that Andy says in his reply to my initial posting when
looping is not anywhere in the picture), I think it is really advantageous
to learn how to use our humanness and ability to
warp time by speeding up and slowing down judiciously so that we can make
the stasis of non-stretched loops actually have
a very human feel to it.
By the way, Andy, if you have that post I made about learning how to play
in front, back and right on a click track, to you mind reposting it for me?
I'm not sure I know where it is.
Per also said,
" Another funny thing I noticed is that whenever he (the morphing reggae
rhythm guitarist he played with)
smoked grass he completely lost this his delicate sense of timing (although
himself, he thought
he was playing great then ;-)
Well this is certainly the topic of another fascinating off topic thread
(Drugs and Live Looping)
but I have to say that I have played with really fantastic musicians who
were pot smokers all of my life.
I have found almost 100% of the time that when they get high (usually on the
first or second break in a multiple set night)
that there tempi gets very loose. I agree with Per, a lot of pot
smoking musicians think they have good time
when they are high, but I find that marijuana has a strongly debilitating
effect on the acuteness of rhythmic playing.
Now, frequently, it's the lead guitarists and horn players who get away
with it the most because they aren't saddled with
playing really tight rhythmic figures. If a sax player or singer drifts
while playing, it's called expression...............lol.
Fascinatingly, the premier Reggae rhythm drum and bass section, Sly and
Robbie were asked why they had
not been seen smoking ganja the whole time the reporter had followed them
around for a profile article.
Sly said that they just realized that they couldn't get enough done if they
smoked pot like all the Reggae singers that
they did records and tours for. He said they played better straight so
they completely gave it up.
I got to hear that rhythm section backing Black Uhuru's first American tour
("Guess Who's Coming to Dinner" gets my vote
as the best roots/dub record there is). Man they were
murderous................as they would say.................and that's no
bumba clot, mon!
Per said,
"This thing with "elastic tempo", as in multiple drifting tempi, is
also the reason for my big crush on the OS X modular sequencing
application Numerology. I think I'll stop here before the Off Topic
Intelligence guys come to bring me in..."
Oh, heck, Per, we've already blown the off topic thing with this thread
already and all these tools can be used in conjunction
with live looping techniques......................pray continue on about why
you like Numerology so well.
********
By the way, Lots of fun topics and a lot of cool philosophy being thrown
around...............much ammunition for new thinking.
I'm really loving this list again..........thanks everyone! And , as
always, thanks to Kim Flint for providing this amazing forum for all of us.
rick walker