Music

Euclid James Sherwood 1942 – 2011

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Motorhead died on Christmas day.  A teenage schoolfriend of [wikipop search=”Frank Zappa”]Zappa[/wikipop] in the late 1950s, swapping records and performing in early bands such as The BlackOuts and The Omens. He moved into Zappa’s studio with Zappa living there for six months in the early 1960s and became a musician/roadie with The Mothers.

Here he is (in sunglasses) blowing up a storm and shaking his tambourine with The Mothers in 1968:

http://youtu.be/7p6yUvQBXSY

And briefly reminiscing in a BBC documentary.

Obituary in The Guardian

 

 

Banging on a bike

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The iPad has created a whole range of new ways for music making from recreating traditional instruments:

to rethinking the way instruments work:

http://youtu.be/cad2iWNop9A

and Smule have a range of apps that cover both ends of the spectrum. The latest is the MadPad with which you record sound & video samples of any objects you happen upon. These are then laid out in a grid for you to drum on to create your masterpiece.

One of the default sets is a range of bicycle sounds. So following in the footsteps of a young [wikipop]Frank Zappa[/wikipop] on a 1963 edition of the [wikipop]Steve Allen Show[/wikipop]

and our very own Levenshulme Bicycle Orchestra:

I banged away…

I ❤ Daphne

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Alas I will probably not be able to get to the Science Museum for the Daphne Oram exhibition and marvel at the Oramics Machine…

Having set up the [wikipop]BBC Radiophonic Workshop[/wikipop] Daphne left because they were not being adventurous enough fast enough for her liking. It is a wonderful quirk that she should have been followed into the workshop by the equally delightful [wikipop]Delia Derbyshire[/wikipop]…

Daphne struggled on to build the Oramics Machine which could “read” squiggles painted onto [wikipop]film stock[/wikipop] and converted them to sound. [wikipop]Norman McLaren[/wikipop] had experimented with such ideas for some of his animations…

Meanwhile over the Atlantic [wikipop]Raymond Scott[/wikipop] was experimenting with electronic circuits to generate sound (and employing the young [wikipop]Robert Moog[/wikipop] to build some for him)…

You can download a Software Oramics Machine from the Daphne Oram website. It always seemed to me to be something that would make a great iOS app…

Others seem to have had the same thought 🙂

Handsome Cabin Boy – Mothers at the Fillmore

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A splendid selection of 1966 – 1968 [wikipop search=”The Fillmore”]Fillmore[/wikipop] recordings from Wolfgang’s Vault today.

On the 24th June 1966 [wikipop search=”The Mothers of Invention”]The Mothers[/wikipop] were supporting [wikipop]Lenny Bruce[/wikipop]. Bruce was not on his best form and would be dead by August. In 1969 [wikipop search=”Frank Zappa”]Zappa[/wikipop] would release an unedited recording of Bruce at the December 1965 Berkeley Concert (This has subsequently been reissued several times and can be found on [wikipop]Spotify[/wikipop]). Zappa was a fan of [wikipop]Sea Shanties[/wikipop] and had owned [wikipop]A.L. Lloyd[/wikipop] and [wikipop]Ewan MacColl[/wikipop]’s Blow Boys Blow (another Spotify link). He had given the record to [wikipop]Captain Beefheart[/wikipop] which led to a long running dispute between the two as to whether it was a gift or a loan. The record included the song The Handsome Cabin Boy

which Zappa often used in concerts as the theme for an improvisation: