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Canada’s Streetheart

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I never knew this, but the band Streetheart was Canadian band! Hum, something else for us to be proud of!

These guys were the first big rock concert that I saw at Ivor Wynne Stadium (originally Civic Stadium) in Hamilton! This was when Under my thumb was huge back when I was younger!

The band had so many hits over the years that they just seemed to be one of those bands that stood the test of time.

They weren’t always in your face, but were there politely sitting in the background, waiting for their turn.

Songs that stick out in my mind were Action, Hollywood, Here comes the night and Snow White.

Anyone else heard of these guys? I’m not sure if they were just big in Canada, but remained mainly obscure in the rest of the world.

Keep on Jammin’




Guitar players finger nails

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If you look at the picking fingers of a guitar player, don’t be surprised if you see long finer nails. So the next time you see a guy with long finger nails on one hand only, ask him if he’s a guitar player before jumping to any conclusions, ok?

I am a guitar player who plays many different styles of music. From classical, folk to SOME country and blues. I use a pick for the most part, I use a pick in combination with my fingers and I also use straight forward finger nails.

When I started playing classical guitar seriously, my nails were great. I took gelatin capsules and some nail hardener that my aunt, and beauty salon owner, told me to use. Maybe when your young, you have stronger nails? Anyone aware of this stat?

So I don’t have fake nails on all the time. I tend to put them on only when I know I will need them to play live somewhere OR if I’m working on perfecting a piece of music that I am working on at that time. Your finger nails, like your skin, need to breath.

If you have them on all the time, it can do some serious damage to them. They will become brittle and break like crazy. Aesthetically, it can make your nails, and even you, look like your some kind of weird person who lives on the fringes of society. If your into that sort of look, then look no further.

When I have them off, I do a light buff and apply a nail moisturizer to them once in a while. I can’t stress this enough.

I’ve tried things like Ecrnal, Triple Strong Gel and even crazy glue. Bruce Cockburn uses crazy glue, but it just doesn’t work for me. I’ve talked to countless people and there seems to be no other solution out there for me. Does anyone out there have the magic bullet that I am searching for?

Keep on Jammin’

Journey Concert in Toronto

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This super group of the from late 1978 to the present, played in Toronto last night at the Molson Amphitheater. This also happens to be the band’s new lead singer’s, Arnel Pineda’s, birthday. I bet he put on a fabulous show this night!

I have been a fan of Journey for some time now. I remember figuring out how to play Don’t Stop Believing on the piano when I was attending St. John’s High School in Brantford and I played it all the time. The vocalist Steve Perry range was unforgettable and some of the guitar work was just so in your face.

I only regret that I did not get the opportunity to have played any of their songs with Pylis. Now that was tragic indeed. Anyway your want it, would have been the best fit in mind!

The former lead singer Jeff Scott Soto is replaced by Arnel Pineda. Arnel is from Quezon City in the Philippines. While looking for a replacement for Jeff, Guitarist Neal Schon, located Arnel on youtube singing many tunes with his band The Zoo. He got a hold of him through youtube and the rest is history.

This show also had Heart and Cheap Trick on the billing. This would of been one hell of a show to see, I wish that we could have been there for this one!

Keep on Jammin’

So how was your summer of 2008

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Ours was uneventful, but we all had a ball just hanging out together! It rained like it’s never had before, but we hung in there.

IMG_4908 copy Our area rec’d the most rainfall ever and we’re expecting an early winter, at least we’re not receiving any of that nasty hurricane weather like our neighbors to the south, hang in there gang!. We don’t mind the fall at all, but this last winter we had record snow fall. It could have been worst!

We went swimming in Lake Ontario multiple times, went walking through some neat streams in our immediate area and had a beer on a really nice, high end patio with midnight at Woofstock 2008!

It was our first summer with Midnight, since she was a puppy when we first got her, and I wouldn’t have traded it for the world! The pictures that midnight will remind both of us of the fun we had during those cold winter months. IMG_4893

So let’s sit back, enjoy and savor these last warm summer evenings in the lawn chairs and have a light refreshing beverage (that’s code for wobbly pop) like we are with midnight, as we speak! No, she has her own seat at the backyard table, it wasn’t mine.

What did you guys do over the summer?

Until we drink again!


Aja from Steely Dan

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The name of the song/album from Steely Dan titled Aja, is from a Korean women.

I’m not sure if I told you all before but some of my earliest exposure to Jazz guitar influences was from this fabulous band, Steely Dan and I owe a lot to this band in terms of my playing style. This is a little bit of music trivia that I found out while viewing youtube searching for Jackie Blue from the Ozark Mountain Daredevils.

First of all, my wife and I were watching this new show called Swingtown (go tot he bottom right for music samples). It’s about these couples from the 70’s, who were swingers, in the Chicago area. The music for this series is top notch, in our eyes! So while viewing the show, this song from the Ozark Mountain Daredevils (viewed by some to be a country version of Steely Dan) entitled Jackie Blue was playing. This song, like most of the songs on this show, just blew me right back to the 70’s during my childhood.

I remember this song as a comforting song, regardless of it’s content. During this part of the show, I picked up my acoustic and tried figuring it out. I was leaning towards a unplugged version of it and I soon nailed it very promptly.

Never perfectly happy in how I play songs, always looking for multiple ways to it, I looked in youtube to see if there was someone else who plays it in an unplugged style with no luck. Then in the Related Video section I found a video called Steely Dan – “Aja” The Making Of:

It was an interview with Walter Becker and Donald Fagen talking about their album Aja. As a kid, I was always interested in who that was on the front cover of it, this is when I found out who it finally was!

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Donald Fagen said that a high school friends older brother brother had went off to Korea and married this women, and her name was Aja. The couple later on moved back to the US. Donald Fagen thought that it was a very romantic image with a feeling of tranquility that comes with the name. Now after writing this particular song, he put her name to it, neat eh? AND she is the one on the front cover!

Another musical mystery solved!

Keep on Jammin’ everybody

Wanna see a masterpiece up close

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I’m not sure if I told you all, but I’ve been on my holidays for 2 weeks and I’ve been having a blast! I’m really doing anything and I recommend it to everyone!

One of my side interests is about the history of religion. I like to understand what the hell happened a long, long, long time ago and why is everyone so pissed off at each other? I wasn’t around way back in 75 A.D., and I’m sure I would of just tried to get everybody to sit down and have a drink and mule over the things that are making everyone mad! It’s not that hard now is it?

Anyways, I’ve just about finished this book called “The Secret History of Christianity” by Malcolm Brocklehurst. It’s basically it’s about how the church has exploited the Myth of Christ, or so that is the idea that the author is trying to convey. It kinda ties things together and fills in the holes about the bible itself and gives over views of the ancient meaning behind things that are in the bible.

Anyways, while reading the book, I came across this website that is about the Last Supper” from you know who, Leonardo buddy. The author talks about some of the hidden meanings behind some aspect of the wall painting and by using this site you can zoom into the painting like you’ve never thought possible and see for yourself. Boy, he wasn’t kidding! So I’ve been checking it out for the past … dare I say hours!

The company is called haltadefinizione and they honestly out did themselves with their super interactive HD pics on their site. If your an art lover and love to look at the finer details of master pieces that you can only get by going there and looking really close … then you may never go and see this wondrous creations in person after your significant other literally pulls your head from monitor! That’s what just happened to me!

I realize this is not what my blog is about, but the pics on this site is just out of this world. Check it out THOROUGHLY!! It’s time not well wasted!

Keep on Jammin’

Max Webster coming off the moon

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Just in case you have not heard of these guys, here is a little ditty and my old band Pylis played way back in the day.

It has everything you want in a tune to play live! It’s fun, difficult to play and most of all IT’S A CANADIAN BAND!!!!!

Enjoy!

Keep on Jammin’
Max Webster R.I.P.

Canada’s second National Anthem

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The theme song from CBC’s Hockey Night in Canada (HNIC) has recently made the news and created a major debate both socially and politically in this country that I call home!

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This theme is something that we all grew up with. Every time this song was played on a Saturday night on CBC, it meant the begging of something that we all waited for, for a whole week! It was like the ringing of a triangle that told the cowboys that dinner was on the table. We all knew that it was the start of something special and that something was known as HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA!

I know that most of my readers may be from another country and you may have a tough time wrapping your head around this one, but this is not just a simple song that unites us all under the same cloth, it’s about a way of life.

I decided to write this post a little bit after the emotional tidal wave of patriotism had past. If you are in the eye of the hurricane, trying to gauge and reason what to do first is overwhelming in the initial stages.

The negative train of thought is to say, What the hell are you doing at the CBC?, This is a nasty travesty of justice, a shaking of ones society’s core values or better yet, a single event that portrays a betrayal of ones country’s essence in the way of Biblical proportions!

hockey.jpgThe positive is to acknowledge that yes, the sun will come up tomorrow and we will continue on with life! What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger …

I’m going out on a limb here folks, but I am leaning towards the positive aspects of this event. I know that I’m in good company to boot, here’s just a few!

Johnny Bower, as long as the song is played somewhere, that’s the main thing. That’s the key, the song will still have something to do with hockey.

Paul Henderson, Things have changed, and things change. They dropped the song. Get over it. Let’s move on.

The song was sold to TSN (The sports Network) and CBC decided not to pick it up. Ok, let’s remember this day and in the words of the hockey great Paul Henderson, Let’s get over it!

Keep on Jammin’

Woofstock

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Woofstock is North America’s Largest festival for dogs. It’s held in Toronto on June 7th – 8th in the downtown core. “The summer of canine Love” is a good way to describe it! 140,000 people can’t be wrong!

My wife, Midnight our black lab and myself just came back from this crazy event and what a blast it was! They blocked off a fairly large area of streets in Toronto and it was informative and tons of fun!

There were so many people and their dogs all over the place.

The vendors had great freebees and the products were top shelf stuff! There was even this company called Happy Tails that have a Pet Resort & Pet Camp in the very popular Muskoka area.

Our guests have the freedom to come and go as they please between open pet-sized bedrooms or cabins, fireplace lounge and one of many large dog parks segregated by size and temperament. They can run and play all day, chasing chipmunk and dragonflies, hunting frogs, swimming, and umpteen other things dogs being dogs like to do.

There is also a human equivalent called the Deerhurst Resort not too far away as well. There is no connection between the two but it’s nice to have the best of both worlds right next to each other. If we had more dollars then sense, then I think we’d be there!

The best thing I we took out of this event was the ability to bring our dog right inside a very respectable pub for a couple of Guinesses! Cheers, a little hair of the dog won’t kill ya! Hope to see you there next year, drop me a line and we’ll buy the first round, really!

Keep on Jammin’

Is Disco really Back

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Well maybe it’s time to pull out the old sequined hot pants, 12-inch records, mirror balls and platform shoes from where ever you saw them last? Is Disco really back or is it just a pipe dream?

The record labels and the so-called people in the know and says it is back! Should we listen and be very afraid OR should we embrace this as a long lost, more then mis-understood cousin? I have mixed feelings.

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Ever since disco started up, I kept listening for some crazy guitarist to jump in and blow me away. but I was just left hanging … for quite a while! Being as nieve back then as I was, I sorta was looking for a different style to come out of no where to bring to my arsenal of techniques to use when I was playing with different bands. The Rolling Stones started to jump on this bandwagon with their disco version of “Miss You”, but they fell far too short of my expectations.

I realize that the point of music is to sooth the savage beast in all of us. Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, or so they say. But the most important thing that we have to recognize and acknowledge about any genre of music that it has the proper end result, is someone actually enjoying it?

Way back in the day, (back when I got hit by a school bus, true story here kidz) I had a buddy of mine whose parents had more dollars then sense and they gave their kids basically anything they wanted. Now this is where it gets scary, disco was all the rage and my buddy asked his parents to get a dance floor like Saturday Night Fever and guess what … they did! This thing was 1/4 the size of the dance floor of the above mentioned movie with the lights under the floor, attached to this light organ thingy with 1000 watt speakers to boot! It was really impressive and yes, I did the line thing at least once or twice … I think?

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The matriarchs of disco and both crowned “Queen of Disco”, Donna Summers and Gloria Gaynor are both coming out with new disco music for June and I guess that will help get the ball, or should I say disco ball rolling!

So tell us if you are FOR or AGAINST the return of DISCO into our lives. Was once enough or is it something old is something new?

Keep on Jammin’

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