2009 January

Peter Murr (Instrumental, Rock, Blues, Power Pop)

January 26, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

This week I’m kicking back and enjoying the work of Peter Murr from Brisbane, Queensland Australia. Pete’s music reminds me of Tangerine Dream meets a tame version of Andromeda. The Andromeda band I am referring to here was a fictional instrumental space rock group featured on an episode of Buck Rogers in the 25th Century back in the late 70′s and very early 80′s. For those who may not remember the Buck Roger’s seriel, the band Andromeda played mind altering music that caused those who heard it to go crazy for a time. With a surreal landscape of synthesized mood enhancing color and a gritty electronic sounding rhythm guitar to complement the feel, Pete’s sound really does give the hearer a sort of futuristic presence. Pete has also been known to collaborate with guitar virtuoso Jonas Tamas from Budapest Hungary, which I believe is a pretty awesome sounding combination from the clip I heard on Pete’s MySpace page. So, if you are into interesting instrumental-type music, I highly recommend checking Pete’s music out for yourself.

To find out more about Peter Murr, visit:
http://www.myspace.com/petempage

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Filed Under: Band Reviews Tagged With: 25th, Andromeda, Australia, blues, Brisbane, Buck, Century, corey bray, Dream, instrumental, Jonas, landscape, Murr, Peter, pop, power, Queensland, rock, Rogers, Tamas, Tangerine, virtuoso

How Jazz Helps Your Groove

January 26, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

By Corey Bray

You are probably wondering why I am bothering you with jazz. What does jazz have to do with becoming a great shredder or even a great guitarist for that matter? In all honesty, jazz is the doorway to moving beyond the ruts and boredom of everyday repetitious playing. Some of the most exciting passages I’ve created in my rock instrumentals came from being able to add a touch of jazz to the mix to give the work that much needed spice. Though you may not want to become a full blown jazz guitarist, what jazz helps you to do is to think more coherently about how you are approaching the use of chords and notes in your playing. Here is a simple example of how to approach chords differently than in, say, a strict rock setting, which can help you to start thinking outside of the box.

JAZZ ANTICIPATION

This next video gets more into the heart of jazz and helps you to focus in on working in a walking bass line with your chord changes, which could be used as a nice break from the normal rock approach, to demonstrate that you have more to offer with your playing than just a jumble of quick notes.

WALKING JAZZ BASS

So, I hope this little introduction to jazz technique has helped you to recognize not only how jazz opens the door to greater freedom in your playing, but also how it can make a piece sound more interesting, even if used in a subtle way to enhance your songs.

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Filed Under: Intermediate Guitar Lessons Tagged With: bass, bumping, chords, door, fill, five, fresh, groove, Guitar, half, ideas, instrumental, interesting, intermediate, Jazz, lesson, one, passages, play, progression, rock, scales, Spring, step, two, videos, walking

Is there a Goldmine Sitting in Front of Your Television?

January 20, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

The time you spend in front of the television could probably be used doing more important things, but why not simply do other things while you watch television? I’m a big believer in killing two birds with one stone where I can. Some of the things I find very convenient to get out of the way while filling my brain with senseless movie mania are as follows:

1. Flaussing (makes my dentist happy)

2. Catching up on email

3. Exercising

4. Cooking

5. Balancing my checkbook

6. Tapping my foot in time with a steady beat

7. Repetitive guitar exercises

If you think about it, there are probably a whole list of tedius things you can get out of the way while you are watching television, which really don’t require a whole lot of concentration. One reason I like to spend time practicing guitar in front of the television is because my mind is not locked into play mode. I can really slow things down and work on those finger exercises that would otherwise be absolutely boring to do, if there wasn’t something else going on in the background to occupy my mind. The pay off is that I get in a good half an hour to hour’s worth of quality practice, which helps out to improve my playing tremendously. Plus, by distracting my mind from the guitar while I learn to play many of these patterns, I’ve noticed that it becomes far more natural when I go to execute the exercise in a real situation.

If it weren’t for practicing while watching television, I probably never would have put in the time to learn how to pick tap entire scales. It was one of those two handed exercises that I really wasn’t all that great at starting out. But, over the course of a month or so, working diligently in front of the television, it just began to feel more and more natural. Today, I can pick tap my way through scales and runs that are just mind blowing. And what is great is that you can do things like that too. So, instead of wasting your time just sitting in front of the television, start using that time to make subtle improvements to your abilities as a musician while you are watching your favorite show. You won’t believe how time well spent adds up to huge rewards in just a few short weeks.

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Filed Under: Band Boot Camp Tagged With: Goldmine, pick, practice, runs, scales, sitting, tapping, television, time, work

The Art of Bending

January 19, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

JEFF BECK STYLE BENDS

DOUBLE STOP BENDS

DOUBLE STOP LESSON

And since we are on the subject of bending, here is a word from Bender.

BENDER’S THOUGHTS

Is Over Saturation on popular social networking sites working against your band? To find out more, visit:

http://atomicfinger.com/category/saturation-overload/

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Filed Under: Beginning Guitar Lessons Tagged With: Beck, Bend, Bender, Double, Futurama, Guitar, Jeff, lesson, Stop, strings, Style, two

Snow Detected On Mars

January 15, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

Our economy may be in the toilet, but darn it, we have the weather channel on Mars. Today it was cold with a smattering of snow flurries on the Martian frontier. Yes, they really did detect snow on Mars. Time to break out the whip cream and wild cherry Kool-Aid and have a party. Maybe we can get congress to declare a national Mars snow day to boot. It would seem that the more excuses that we have to keep congress out of session, the safer our country and the economy tends to be. In any case, the news on Mars is far more exciting anyway.

Now that we know that there is evidence of water on Mars, I just want to know when I can pack my bags for a trip. It would be nice to get away from Earth for a while and take a vacation. They always made it look so easy to do that in Star Trek. Beam me up, Scottie! I wonder how quickly I would be tossing my cookies after lift off? And is the water there cleaner than the water in New York or Chicago? I mean, think of all the places the water on this planet has been. Do you really want to stick it in your mouth? If I didn’t have a filter on my faucet, I would be totally grossed out. There is just something about recycled city tap water that has that suspicious chemical taste to it.

Although I doubt I will ever get to see the Martian landscape up close and in person, it would be nice to at least get to see a manned mission to Mars in my lifetime. I’m a huge believer in space exploration, because I think that it is the answer to most of our global problems. I mean, just think how nice it would be to pack all our political leaders into a shuttle and send them off to Mars so that we could all start over and do it right this time? Just think of how much that would help the state of affairs on our little planet. I think there is a missing piece to the space program though. When NASA sends probes to places like Mars, they should contract with companies to get more private funding. I mean, the Cassini probe was a nice waste of a great commercial opportunity. They should have called it the Pepsi probe or the McDonalds mission. Then our kids could get more interesting toys in their Happy Meals. Thus encouraging a new generation of young people to support the space program and help us get the heck off this crazy rock.

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Filed Under: Shock Therapy

Getting Back to Basics (Artists & the Music Industry) Part 1

January 14, 2009 By derrick Leave a Comment

Well you may just be wondering, well who is this guy? Well to better understand who I am go and check out my bio under the Bio(Hazard) tab on the main page of Atomic Finger. Well enough about me for now. Lets talk about you! Whether you are an artist, band or musician you will definitely take something from this blog. I hear all the time from artists, bands and musicians that they are not getting enough people coming to their shows or their different websites. Well by know you know that your message is not being heard even though you have a lot of “friends” on your sites and even talking to people by word of mouth. I am going to give you the straight, legit, real answer right now. Saturation and lack of business education!

Yes, saturation, I said it, so lets talk about this problem first. You’re probably asking, what’s this guy talking about? Well as a matter of fact I had a business meeting yesterday with one of my music industry contacts and this very exact matter was discussed. My contact admitted that every artist, band and musician needs to get back to an intimacy level with their fans if they have not started doing so yet. Ok, you might be saying now, this guy is weird, talking about being intimate with my fans. Well it’s not that kind of intimacy if that is what you are thinking, there are some similarities, but I will explain further. What I am talking about is having a real one on one relationship with your fans, even if you are engaging them as a big group. Heres an example, lets say you are putting on a show and in between sets your band takes a break, you see some fans that were truly rocking out during your show. Go and talk to some of them, ask them what they think of the show, maybe give out a free cd or two, ask them if they filled out their information on the emailing list so they can be updated about the band. Point is, treat them like people, show them a genuine side of you and your band, build that distinct relationship with them! Here’s another example, why don’t you and your band put on an on going weekly live video blog and talk to the fans and let the fans know what you guys are doing!

The point is, is that everyone wants to feel like they are a part of something. It is up to you to find that niche with your twist and touch on it. That is also part of branding, which I will discuss in another blog. At the end of the day you want your genuine fans to talk, blog, email, whatever about what you are doing like a virus. Don’t just go on your social networking sites and get tons of people on your sites just for the numbers. Yes it may take a little longer to develop fans this way, but the overall outcome and pace you set may not be as slow as you think. Plus doesn’t it make since to build your fans locally and have a following where you are at then to barely have anyone know you here or where you trying to go distant. I have been in the music industry a while and not only does this make sense, but if your big picture is to try to make it big and have companies wanting to get at you with lots of money, then you have got to make sure that you are worth what ever the risk by showing you have fans, (who are the market), following you. Your fans are the backbone of your movement, without them you don’t exist. Remember it is about staying true to who you are, but is also all about your fans.

By: Derrick Heffner (2009)

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Filed Under: Saturation Overload Tagged With: artist, artists and the music industry, Back to basics, band, blog, fans, musician, problems within the music industry, saturation

On The Edge With Ockhams Raiser

January 13, 2009 By Corey Bray Leave a Comment

This evening we will be speaking with two of the members from Ockhams Raiser.

CB: Hello guys, I hope you are all doing well this evening.

Guy Davies: Hi Corey, yeah things are good here despite the cold, we have just
released 2 new tracks and are stoked!

CB: So, have you been playing a lot of shows lately? I saw that your
myspace page was giving you a bit of trouble with posting gig information

Guy Davies: Yes a few shows over the last month, the last one we played was a
charity gig and it was a blast, we got some radio coverage from it too,
the radio controller thought we were original and full of
passion…….a great compliment for us.

Damian Etherington: The festivals over the summer were a blast and we are finding
momentum building very well.

CB: I know a lot of bands here in the states are concerned about the
current economic situation bringing down show attendence. Is this a
major concern in the UK? Or, are fans typically pretty supportive
despite the economic trends in your part of the world?

Guy Davies: I have to say fans are generally supportive despite economic
concerns here in the UK, good music is a form of escape and freedom so
we want to keep providing good vibes no matter what! People have less
money to spend on going out, so bands can tend to suffer at ‘grass
roots’ level, it seems that big bands are still well attended though.

Damian Etherington: It does take a lot of work so people know about gigs, etc but
agree with Guy for sure, people love to feel good and love good
music.

CB: So, I read that you were in the runnings for album of the year by
Radio 6 International for 2008. Can you comment about that for the
readers?

Guy Davies: Yes we are high up in the running order to win!!! We got to 4th the
last I checked.

Damian Etherington: Yea it was a great opportunity. Radio 6 chose a number of artists
that they had played earlier throughout the year and had listeners vote.
It was cool to have a larger audience hear our track In The Evening and Radio
6 International have been great with their support. Unsigned artists really
need more things like this.

CB: Are you looking at getting back into the studio again any time soon?

Guy Davies: For sure yes, there is so much material evolving from the band and
we feel the quality of the song-writing is improving with time, the 3 of
us have been playing for a long time but we are still learning how to
get the best from our instruments!

Damian Etherington: We’ve also just won a month long radio competition which means
we received 3 days in a studio so we’re looking forward to recording
soon. We won a festival slot too!

CB: What was it like recording the first album? Were there any memorable
moments that you would like to share with your fans?

Guy Davies: Yes the first album was recorded in a stone walled pub! the drinks
were still on the wall behind the bar but somehow we resisted
temptation! It was great because we recorded live with the vocals put
down separately. We managed to churn out 6 songs in a weekend but
ideally we like more like 2-3 weeks to lay tracks. More recently we have
multi-track recorded in the studio that has recorded all the Manic
Street Preacher albums and The Automatic’s song ‘Monster’ That was
awesome……..go listen…..

Damian Etherington: There was tons of raw energy over those 2 days and it definitely
brought the band closer. The 2 new tracks are “With Me Now” & “Can’t
Force It” and we are finding people are loving the tracks.

CB: Your sound really does have an original feel about it. What I often
find to be quite interesting is that musicians tend to be more partial
to one song, but your fans will tend to be partial to another song that
ends up becoming what they use as the defining element of your signature
sound. And i know that can sometimes be a bit frustrating for artists,
because we often find out many years after the fact that the audience
really did have a different connection with the music than the artist
might have intended. So, do you feel that your fans tend to connect with
your music the same way you do?

Damian Etherington: That’s a great question Corey and what I love about music is the
limitless way it connects with people. Each member does have certain
songs they like or feel represent the band and we are always concerned
that our songs come from our heart, and they do! With respect to our
audience, we love to share our passion of music with people. This is one
of the reasons we are a band. The conversation that is created between
us and the listeners seems to be right on and we always feel the vibe of
the audience at gigs and festivals. This is a great part of music! We
have been privileged with people writing to us expressing their love for
a certain song and that’s always great, no matter the song.

So I’d say the connection is a 2 way street with lots of activity!

CB: In closing, is there anything you would like to say to your fans
that we didn’t cover earlier?

Damian Etherington: We look forward to seeing you at a gig soon and be sure to go
onto our www.myspace.com/ockhamsraiser and look us up on Facebook as we
love to chat with fans! Our 5 song EP is available on the website.

Guy Davies: We like to get as much feedback as possible so go listen and we’ll
be here to receive comments and suggestions.

CB: We’ll have to do this again sometime. Thank you for taking the time
to talk with us and I hope your album does well.

Guy Davies: Thanks Corey, take it easy…

Damian Etherington: Great Corey. We look forward to speaking again and here’s to a
fun 2009!

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