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I listen to your music every day.
Eddie Van Halen, guitarist extraordinaire and now Rock & Roll legend has passed on at the age of 65. In a class by himself, Eddie is considered one of the most influential guitarists of our time.
His techniques and style was unique. Eddie and his older brother Alex founded the band Van Halen and skyrocketed to stardom performing to sellout arenas around the world.

Diagnosed with throat cancer more than a decade ago, he traveled as far as Germany seeking treatment. Sadly, he gave up the fight this morning.

All the rock stations in my travels are playing Van Halen songs and I caught a tribute show on Satellite radio this evening.

Eddie, playing inspired a million guitarists... may your music live on!

Two decades ago I decided to study Traditional Irish Music by way of the Uilleann Pipes. It was difficult as I had two obstacles. The music and the pipes!
I had a few websites with music as well as books, videos and private lessons to help me along the way. I attempted to play along with folks who were immersed in Irish music since they were children. Had I stayed with guitar, my chances would have been better, but no... I wanted to play pipes.
So much for a brief background to my Trad background.
One of the players that I sometimes listened to was an Irish woman Emer Mayock.
Her piping was flawless. Actually, her main instrument was wooden flute and she's been on lots of videos and albums including a few of her own. One claim to fame of hers was touring/recording with the musical group Afro Celt Sound system.
I saw a few videos but lost interest because there were so many players in the band her solo attempts always got covered up in the percussion section.

My car comes with a trial subscription of satellite radio and yesterday, I happened on a tune (songs have singing and tunes don't) by Afro Celts.

Yeah, Emer Mayock came to mind.

Here's a video featuring Emer Mayock & Dónal Siggins with Emer on flute.

Something funny?

As another file for me (and you) to find a collection of music.
This one is for music performed by Simply Red and/or the lead vocalist of the band, Mick Hucknall.

Simply Red is on the cusp of jazz with strong influences of soul, pop and to a lessor degree rock.
Mick is one of the best male vocalists, of his time. His band contained proficient musicians in tight performances. My guess is the name of the band was inspired by Mick's (originally long) red hair.
In addition from a couple of his songs, it seems his nickname may have been Red, when he was younger, due to the same hair.

Apparently, I wasn't too far off;


Perhaps the following somber song of lament of times past,
was his most popular, featuring Mick's voice and a subtle muted trumpet. It was inspired by Mick's childhood. His mother & father broke up, when Mick was only 3 years old;

50 years ago today... at the age of 27, Jimi Hendrix died.
Some say he was the greatest rock guitarist of all time.

Just a playlist of some real good blues for all to enjoy

STYX released a new video this month in response to the Frontline Workers.

These Are the Times.

I first heard about the heavy-metal band QUIET RIOT in the 1980's from lots of MTV play with their version of the SLADE hit Cûm On Feel the Noize. They were one of the first bands to put metal on the map and like most, breaking up and reforming was in their DNA as members came and went like a revolving door.

Through the famed years singer Kevin DuBrow and drummer Frankie Banali were the common elements to hold the band together. Sadly, DuBrow passed away from a cocaine overdose in 2007.
If I recall, DuBrow owned the rights to the name Quiet Riot and it wasn't until years later his family allowed Banali to use the name and reform the group.

I've seen a few live performances and they always gave a good show, including acknowledgement for guitarist Randy Rhoads who founded the band with DuBrow and later joining with Ozzy Osbourne of Black Sabbath fame to find his own stardom until his untimely death in 1982.

In 2019, Banali, was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer and not expected to live out the year. He went through chemotherapy, dropping some 60 pounds and appeared to recover enough to return to drumming for a few gigs including one in Japan with the legendary Led Zeppelin tribute guitarist Mr. Jimmy. Success rate of recovery from this form of cancer is very rare. Three weeks ago, I heard that Quiet Riot was booked to play at the Sturgis Rally and thought Frankie (after more than 20 treatments) must have beat the disease. Could this be possible?

Friday afternoon, I received a call from a drummer friend. Frankie passed away Thursday evening, August 20, 2020.

I've heard there's a musicians gig in the sky where they all go to perform. Frankie, Kevin and Randy must be rehearsing right now!


Frankie in Japan with Mr. Jimmy and his tribute band:

I was in 7th grade when my father bought a Wollensak reel-to-reel tape recorder. It used 1/4" tape and normally played mono recordings. A mechanical control on the head allowed the user to convert it to stereo by connecting an add-on speaker box. Wattage was low and everything had tube circuitry.
These machines were built solid, probably 40 pounds, so much the school board used them in Audio Visual presentations.
Me, my dad and my brother all took turns using this tape recorder. My brother used to record single songs from 45's and make a 'party mix' for his friends. I recorded my rock band rehearsals for evaluation and my dad often recorded audio tracks from TV shows.

The way 1/4" recording tape is designed, you had 4 spaces for record/playback. 2 channel stereo used tracks 1 and 3. When the tape ended, you could flip the reels and play back the other side that was adjusted for tracks 2 and 4. There was enough separation that the head would only play the intended tracks. Since there was a stereo/mono switch, if you played a stereo recording in mono, there was a really good chance the 'cross talk' of the other tracks would come through the playback... in reverse.
Eventually something that sounded like: Moisuah, ska chipp chip dursennn ya bolumaga snit bosha, would come from the speakers.

In the world of Beatlemania, it was said The Beatles had recorded cryptic clues about the untimely death of Paul McCartney and his identical look-alike replacement, Billy Shears. In order to hear the messages, you needed to hear the record played backwards!
Piece of cake... right? Just break out the Wollensak and record the song, flip the tape, move the playback head to stereo and adjust the alignment to catch the opposite track running backwards.

"Turn me on dead man... Turn me on dead man.."



That Wollensak was in my shed for more than 20 years. When I tried to use it, all the belts and rubber wheels had gummed out and rotted. Unless, you needed a really cool door stop, It was useless to keep it around.

I read the other day that many years later, McCartney publicity acknowledged the stunt about his passing was totally frabricated.