Fuzz...

I know guys that have gone through a midlife crisis. Usually not pretty. I remind my wife all the time how lucky she is that my mid life crisis is cheap fuzz pedals for the guitar. She says she knows she is lucky. Bad thing about it is sometimes the fuzz pedal thing is not pretty either. 

Here is a fuzz pedal I could not resist. If you can make out the graphics it's three bears going fishing and is called "Fishing is as Fun as Fuzz." When I saw that name I wanted it and with a little internet shopping I soon found it for 15% off the MSRP and I needed it. I usually limit myself to the cheaper Chinese made pedals but this is made in Japan by a company called Animal Pedals. 

You can shop pedals all day and there is really not much new under the sun since things like this started being made in the mid 60s or so. So while it's possible to make things to get really far out unusual sounds most pedals are tried and true copies of existing circuits that work well and sound musical in a varity of settings. This pedal is a copy of the Electro-Harmonix Big Muff fuzz circuit. There have been a lot of different Big Muff desigins since the late 60s early 70s and this is more specifically a copy of what is known as the Russian made Civil War Big Muff of the early 90s. It was called that because it came in grey or blue enclosures. 

You have heard this circuit's sound. It's the fuzz used on Pink Floyd's Division Bell album by guitarist David Gilmour, a deadicated Big Muff user. It's used on the early albums by low fi blues rockers the Black Keys and the noise rock/no wave/experimental band Sonic Youth.    

It's not the only fuzz pedal I have but it's a favorite right now. Please, have a crisis, get a fuzz pedal. Get it now. 

More Grandkid Action...

After playing music at church for Holy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Vigil and a Good Friday Easter rumble with Ezra we set out to visit the southern grand kids in Houston and Lake Jackson. 

Parker sits up real nice for the Easter bunny. We had a real nice Easter dinner with Ali's parents Nick and Kim at their home in Porter.  

Here you see Morgan and Ali ease Parker into the complicated mythology of rabbit, resurrection, colored eggs and candy. It's been a time for them lately with Parker growing, Morgan traveling to Italy for two months of work and Ali having her gall bladder out. I hope all that stuff does not happen to me but one day they will look on a rich journey of experiences and say what a life! 

We left the Easter dinner and continued on to Lake Jackson for a visit with Rose, Tim, Coraline and Warren. In this photo Warren looks stocky and if Coraline grows into those feet the Earth will shake when then walk and stalk. 

We did outdoor things and here's a photo taken on Buffalo Camp Bayou. Warren points and says, "See that stick up over there? That's called a stick up."  

Walking the trails at the Gulf Coast Bird Observatory. 

Don't look now but I think there is a lizard back there behind you. A big lizard. 

The After Work Canoeist...

Hey it's Friday for me. I celebrated by getting home from work and tossing the canoe into the truck and heading for the lake. There was a bit more wind than I expected from the look of conditions on leaving the house but I was able to find a nice sheltered spot, very shallow that held some nice bream. 

I really wanted to fish one of those plastic frog baits for bass. I got one strike on the frog and then fell back on the thing that always works for me. 

This small spinner bait was designed by a Cajun down south of I-10 to fit just exactly into a breams mouth. 

Now I know this guy could have got a whole sporting goods store shelf of these baits down with one swallow but he delicately picked up on this little bait and I horsed him in with a much muscle as I could manage in the shallow, brushy water with 8 pound test line. 

I think I ended with about 10 bream and the one bass, all fish CPR (caught photoed and released) to fight another day. It really was a quick trip and there was about a 20 minute period in this little spot where no cast went unchallenged. 

Live Hungarian Music in Chicago...

If you follow this little blog you may know it was named after a Gypsy Punk band from the Ukraine that Cathy was following. With a little bit of success, $100 rock and roll haircuts and Coca-Cola commercials they lost some of the original attraction but a window to Eastern European music had been opened and a steady collection of Gypsy music, European Brass Band music, Jewish music and of course the punk stuff had taken up a large share of the self space in the music room. This past weekend at the Old Town School of Folk Music in Chicago we got to see the Hungarian Folk Group Sondrogon. 

Sondrogon plays tambruitza music. It's Southern Slavic music in the Serbian tradition. It has what I would call an "Eastern" sound. The name of the country is associated with the Huns who migrated to the area from central Asia. Lots of harmonic minor scales, an instrument that around here we call the "blow for the snake" and djembe/ Turkish style drum. Here's there instruments set up before the gig. I have been accused of bring too many instruments to the show before. Each man here played at least 2 and sometimes 4 different things. I'm not taking that crap anymore.        

Great little concert hall. Totally acoustic with a mic only used for speaking between songs. It was a 4pm in the afternoon show, a perfect time to bring Wallace our grandson who is 19 months. He sat enthralled by the music for a solid hour before he got a bit squirmy.  

The group is three brothers, a cousin and their best friend. Here is a shot of the blow for the snake player. The instrument like this I own is Indian with some unusual to Western ears dissonances. This was more melodic and this guy also played a flute type whistle thing that with the bands furious tempos required circular breathing and red faces from the woodwind players. Never having seen this style of music in person we had only listened on cd and the brisk tempos often led us to wonder if they were electronically sped up. They are not. These guys play fast.    

As I say a lot of instrument switching, sometimes in the same song. 

The stringed instruments other than the string bass seemed to have 6, 5 or 4 strings and they looked like they had some kind of picks quite different than what we see on an average Saturday night at the VFW dance in East Texas. 

I think you can see his pick stuck in the strings. I'd like to know more as we are atypical around here, mostly using thumb picks and I have sometimes used a felt uke pick on bass. 

Loved the drumming. 

Need new music? Check out Sondrogon. 

Chicago April 2019...

We have made it home from a trip to Chicago to visit Peter, Katie and of course the most distant grandson, Wallace. I took a lot of photos, had a lot of fun and somehow I'll have to balance out all these social media/blogging posts that are at least for a few days are going to tilt in Wallace's favor till I get caught up with the other grandchildren. For now here's a few photos to get started and I'll add more detail as I have time to reflect of our travel experiences. 

Katie, Wallace and Cathy wait for a train. I have a lot of photos of us waiting at this station to head downtown. The overcast day blocks out the sight of the city in the back ground. Weather was good for our trip with temps 45-65 roughly, an occasional rain spatter and a good bit of sun. It fact it was probably better here than at home where it was rainy and stormy. Other than green bulb shoots poking up in the Tulloch front yard East Texas is way ahead of Chicago in the race to summer. Spring is not there yet.  

Peter gives Wallace a pig back ride. 

Here at a museum visit an interactive display is set up so you lay in a bun and get made into a hot dog. Everybody seemed to think that Pop Pop should be made into a hot dog by Wallace. I don't think I have ever eaten a Chicago hot dog, in Chicago anyway. I cook hot dogs at home. In the big city you will find me sampling something more exotic as the human hot dog. 

Wallace will be two in October. 

Grandma pushes the stroller. 

Wallace takes a good photo for sure. 

This brief summery gets you the main idea, the trip was fun. More later.