Music – Page 11 – The Bald Heretic – Short, bald dude with a goofy beard

Early warning

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My band, The Flying Fish Sailors, has some shows scheduled for March!

Friday, March 2nd

Fitgerald’s
Doors open at 8:00

We’re opening up for our friends, The Blaggards.
This should be a GREAT show.

Saturday, March 17th (St. Paddy’s Day!)

Bryan O’Neill’s from 8am to noon

Goose’s Acre Bistro & Irish Pub in The Woodlands from 2pm to 6pm.

We’re finishing the day with a FREE show at The Big Top that evening.

Hope to see you there!

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DJ Amanda Robinson – Rent 42

Amanda Robinson

Turntable

The El Orbits

Click to see full size image

The El Orbits line-up has changed for 2007.

David Beebe has taken a hiatus from the band to have surgery on his throat and will be spending the next few months recuperating. After that he’s off to Marfa, TX to work on another project.

Thomas Escalante, front man for Clouseaux and lead singer for the Houston based ska phenomenon, The Suspects, has stepped into the role.

Other changes include guitar sensation Jim Henkel (The Musical Find of the 90’s) hanging up his ax and moving into the role of keyboardist while Allen “King of the Oldies” Hill picks up the bass and Allison Fisher take over as lead guitarist and also lends her unique vocal stylings to the mix.

Steve Begnoche and Eric Hughes stay in their role of alternating drummers and I’m not sure where Landis Armstrong fits into this new mix. Probably still the pickup guitarist when the band plays Austin and other outlying areas.

The El Orbits have always been one of my favorite bands. Beyond that, they have been Cynthia’s all time favorite local band. She even likes them more than MY band, The Flying Fish Sailors!

Cynthia had not seen the new El Orbits and therefore had not rendered a verdict on the new line-up. That changed a few Fridays back when the band played a rare Friday night public gig at The Big Top. I say rare because The El Orbits are a wedding and private party machine, only breaking this pattern every Monday night at the Continental Club from 9-Midnight and I we’re just not a go out on Monday night kinda couple.

The show was really good. Even though the band had not played in public very many times in this configuration, you could hardly tell it by the way it sounded. This new incarnation of the band is strong, stong, STRONG.

If you’re a get out on Monday night kinda person, I strongly recommend checking ’em out!

Clouseaux

NYE – 2006

No big surprise, last night Cynthia and I spent NYE at the Continental Club.
Last appearance of David Beebe with the El Orbits for the foreseeable future.
It was a good show and a good time with good people.

Jim Henkel
Click for full size

David Beebe
Click for full size

The hero of 3700 Main

In my time I have saved the computer at the Continental Club on a few occasions and bailed out Thomas over at Sig’s Lagoon. It’s my contribution to the “scene”, I suppose.

This week I got a call from the proprietress of Taco’s-A-Go-Go. Seems their PC was misbehaving and needed some tender loving nerd care. I was surprised to get the call since I had never given them my number. I assume it was acquired via my friend Nick or someone else who had access to my digits. I said I would have a look the next time I was in the area.

With the new 9/80 schedule I had this Friday off and felt I could afford the lack of sleep and headed off to go see Beetle perform their usual Thursday night happy hour gig at the Continental. Since Taco’s-A-Go-Go is right next door I popped in to have a look at their ailing PC. Turns out the wireless adapter driver was in need of a re-install. I had it up and running in about 10-15 minutes. No big deal.

Enjoyed the Beetle show, as always. After they were done playing I was talking to Jim and he suggested heading over to a party at “Bongo” Jane’s place.

I was of a mixed mind about the whole thing. I know Jane and I knew I would know some of the people there and Jim was just so darn insistent about it I headed on over. Glad I did. I saw some old friends I had not seen in over 15 or so years and just enjoyed hanging out.

Jane’s place is quite interesting. She has the best entertainment center you can imagine. It’s a sound stage right in the main living room. Jane has a lot of musician friends and they were coming and going from the stage all night.

click for full size

Sorry to say, I don’t know this singer’s name. She was performing with Steve Candelari on the drums and Aaron Loesch of Jug O’ Lighnin fame on guitar.

Wide and fast

Since I have begun to dangle off the deep in when it comes to photography, I have found myself frequenting the camera stores more and more.

Always on the prowl for the right accessory and taking every opportunity to pic the brains of other photographers so I can better educate myself and improve my technique.

It’s very reminiscent of when I first took a sincere interest in computers. Who knows, maybe I will have the same success if I am lucky. I have already started to ponder working in a segment on digital photography into the radio show. The idea is quite nascent but I am pondering it sincerely.

As I was poking around the Camera Exchange and talking with Charlie the subject of used lenses came up. One of the things that did not occur to me when determining which camera to buy was the second hand market. It’s obvious now that I think of it. The two most popular brands of digital SLR cameras are Nikon and Canon. Regardless of whether they are superior or inferior to any other brand is not the point. The point is that since there are so many on the market there tends to be more used lenses for these cameras than any of the others.

What this means to me is that there are practically NO used Sony lenses and relatively few used Minolta or Minolta mount third party lenses available. This is something I would encourage anyone looking to purchase a camera to consider. Being able to buy a used lens can save you a bit of money when you want something maybe a bit more specialized and you don’t want to plunk down the full price for it.

Of course I can buy anything I need brand new and heaven knows there are some damn fine lenses available for this platform. I hungrily lust for the just released Sony Carl ZeissÂ® SonnarÂ® T* 135mm f/1.8 Telephoto Lens and when and if I can ever justify the $1500 price tag I’ll just run down to the camera store and pick one up. Then I’ll show you all! Muahahahahaha!

Ahem, but I digress.

As I was saying, second hand lenses. Not many interesting lenses to be had on the second hand market (yet). None at the Camera Co-Op and a very limited number at The Houston Camera Exchange, and the ones they had were not terribly exciting with the exception of one that caught my eye. It was the Sigma 20mm f/1.8 EX ASP DG RF prime lens. What I found interesting was the high speed and the wide angle.

The Sony 50mm 1.4 has been my go-to lens and my favorite by far of any of my lenses. That being said, the limitations of the 50mm lens really reveal themselves in a small space or when trying to get a good group shot of a band or similar.

The idea of having a fast wide angle lens was very appealing and the price of this one used was way more affordable than buying it new in the box so after contemplating it for a week I went back and purchased it.

I’ve not taken the definitive photo yet. Most of the pics from the last few blog entries are using that lens and I did take it to the Big Top for the Light Rock Express show and the debut of Disco Expressions. If you’ve ever been to the Big Top you’ll know what a photographer is up against in this space. Very dim lighting and what lighting there is tends to be red. Thank heaven for good custom white balance settings.

I like it. I can get up close and personal and still capture a lot of what is going on. And not having to use a flash makes me far less irritating to the performers.

Of course now it’s going to be a more difficult decision when I trying to determine which lenses I will travel with to any given destination.

Zappa plays Zappa

I attended the Zappa Plays Zappa show at the Verizon Wireless Theater on Sunday night.
In all honesty, I was apprehensive about the show and had some doubts about how it might be.
I’ve seen Frank Zappa in concert twice so I know what a Zappa concert sounds like.

The idea that his son, Dweezil, would put together a band and try to perform his father’s music filled me with an understandable amount of apprehension and trepidation.

The fact that this band was touring with Napoleon Murphy Brock, Terry Bozzio and Steve Vai did lend the concept a certain amount of legitimacy in my mind and was intriguing.

When I got to the Verizon Wireless Theater it was pretty plain that the Houston Zappa fans were out in force. I saw many old faces and old friends as we got ready for the show.

The concert lasted for well over 3 hours and I gotta say…I was completely blown away.

I didn’t commit the set list to memory, but Joe found someone who did a nice job of documenting the show. This is how it went down last night:

Conducted improvisation – Andy – Call any vegetable (“Band From LA” arrangement) – Tell Me You Love Me

Who Are The Brain Police?

Florentine Pogen (Dweezil Zappa solo)

Pygmy Twylyte – The Idiot Bastard Son (’74 band arrangement) – Cheepnis

I’m The Slime (“Saturday Night Live” 1976 arrangement) (Billy Hulting – Don Pardo vocals) (Dweezil Zappa solo) – A Pound For A Brown On The Bus (Billy Hulting mallets/Scheila Gonzalez sax/Dweezil Zappa conducted improv only horns/Napoleon Murphy Brown sax/Dweezil Zappa conducted improv/Dweezil Zappa conducted audience improv/Aaron Arntz keyboard/Jamie Kime guitar/Pete Griffin bass/Dweezil Zappa conducted improv only horns/back to head of piece)

Don’t Eat The Yellow Snow – St. Alfonzo’s Pancake Breakfast – Father O’blivion – Joe Travers/Pete Griffin duet

Inca Roads (Dweezil Zappa solo/Aaron Arntz solo)

Exit Napoleon Murphy Brock – Enter Terry Bozzio

I’m So Cute

Tryin’ To Grow A Chin – Punky’s Whips (Dweezil Zappa solo)

Black Page Drum Solo (done as a trio – Terry/Joe/Billy) – (Enter Steve Vai) Black Page #2

Exit Terry Bozzio- Enter Napoleon Murphy Brock

Peaches En Regalia – Montana (Dweezil Zappa/Steve Vai guitar duet) – Village Of The Sun – Echidna’s Arf (Of You)

Zomby Woof (Steve Vai solo)

Black Napkins (Dweezil Zappa and Steve Vai solos)

Encore:
(core band + Napoleon)

Oh No – Son Of Orange County (“Roxy” arrangement) (Dweezil Zappa solo) – (Enter Terry Bozzio and Steve Vai) More Trouble Every Day (“Roxy” arrangement – Steve Vai solo/Dweezil Zappa-Steve Vai duet/Dweezil Zappa-Jamie Kimeduet/Dweezil Zappa-Scheila Gonzalez-Steve Vai trio/Terry Bozzio solo/Joe Travers solo/Terry Bozzio-Joe Travers duet) – A Token Of My Extreme (chord vamp only with Dweezil band introductions) – Sofa (“Zappa In New York” arrangement)

There’s every indication that this band will tour again performing Frank’s music. If you get the chance to see this live I heartily recommend it.