desert diary page 2

mostly i wear plain t-shirts…either black or white…

i have mixed feelings about band t-shirts cause they kind of over define you…

they send out such a strong signal ..

still….i was thinking that out here in the desert they might just come in handy…

y’see the trouble is, like anywhere, you’re often surrounded by interesting people with a story,but you’d never know unless conversation strikes up…

so i figured a few of my lou reed/leonard cohen t-shirts might just do the work of a good fridge magnet .

so i’m walking through the thursday night market, stocking up on bananas and am wearing my lou reed ‘sally can’t dance’

ten yards out of the market on my way back up palm canyon,and this cool looking fat cat with a black hat goes ‘hey!…lou reed…that’s interesting’

and i  pause and say,’yeah…great lyric writer’

he goes..’yeah that’s right….dark,like leonard cohen’,

i say ‘you look like a musician’

he goes ‘yeah,trumpet..i’m playin in that restaurant, and i’m on my break’

i goes’i love trumpet..i love chet baker’s round warm tone..love how when he lost his teeth, he had to relearn his horn,and came up with that warm  flugal tone’

he goes’yeah,i know all about chet..used to hang with him in paris decades ago’…±!@£$%^???!!!

and so it gradually rolls out i’m talking to a trumpet player on stevie wonders superstition……sir duke…

earth wind and fires ‘september’…dylan…

and this is the great thing about the desert…you meet older folk who’ll talk with no needy agenda..

they’ve done the work,and they’re just groovin along now…

and i’m getting a little payback for my own small amount of musical history by being able to relate…

i’m quizzing this chap about living in greenwich village/woodstock in the 50’s / 60’s…

and he’s wondering how i know so much,

and i’m able to tell him i recorded in woodstock at dylans managers place,and i’m completely tripped out on 50’s/60’s new york anyway…

then we’re talking about recording processes,so i’m asking him about prince,and he’s telling me,those records that i  love were never mixed…

prince would just take the rough working mix  he used during recording on the day,and that  was that…

suddenly i realised why ‘sign o the times’ and ‘purple rain’ sound so raw….many of his big hits are rough mixes!…

later when i got home,this really made me think..

i’ve always loathed the mixing process..the engineers get all pompous, and spend hours fiddling with a fucking bass drum…

and often just generally suck  the life out of things,and it costs a fortune…..just so you can be right and proper for some shiddy gassy radio station…

steve had to go inside to do his set, and i sat on the street listening to him play to an almost empty restaurant…

it’s over a hundred degrees here through the day,so it won’t busy up till it gets cooler in october…

it was a balmy evening,and his gorgeous trumpet playing drifted out on to palm canyon drive…

and i sat there flipped out….looking forward to spending time talking with him next thursday on his breaks…

earlier on in the day,i  went for a gin martini in this old school hotel called ‘melvyns’,where i  sat talking to an old smartly dressed bartender who used to be the butler for president ford…the one that took over after nixon fucked up….that  was cool..but nothing compares with the company of sweet musicians who’ve been round the block like steve madaio…

what a cool sweet cat of a man.

check  the records this man  has played on

http://www.spotlightheroes.com/SteveMadaio/

and steve also was in the brass section for this tour….typical jagger live performance where he puts showmanship at the expense of the singing.

so funny to watch.