Fret Filings - (Anne's Blog)

Wednesday, May 7, 2008

BSG THEME MUSIC
Topic: Bands/Music

Yes, it's sci-geek time again! (You might recall I talked about Terminator previously.) This time it is musically related, though.

For the past month or so I've been watching my way through the DVD sets of the new "re-imagined" Battlestar Galactica. I never watched the old series, but this new one is as good as advertised. Good plot lines, smart writing, topical, great acting. I'm about five episodes into Season 3 right now.

I love the main title theme music for this show, I think this is the best opening theme for a TV show I've heard in a long time. Maybe it's because I've been hearing it so much while watching straight through seasons in a fairly short period of time, but this theme gets in your head and sticks. Here's the theme, written by Richard Gibbs:

http://www.televisiontunes.com/Battlestar_Galactica_-_Main_Title_(UK_Version).html

I know, what's the big deal, right? But maybe it's all about context. When you hear that theme while watching the title/credit images, it's just really effective. And it reflects so well both the philosophy/religion and miltary/war/action aspects of the show.

The overall scoring for the show is done by Bear McCreary, and it's every bit as good as the Gibbs main theme. (McCreary also does the music for Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles.)

As I've been watching this series, the music has really stood out for me a lot. Hmmm, maybe I should pick up a soundtrack.

Posted by planet/zerofret at 6:13 PM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, May 7, 2008 6:14 PM EDT
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Saturday, May 3, 2008

APRIL 2008 REVIEW
Topic: Website

Most-viewed tabs for the month of April 2008 (w/ view numbers):

18 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
16 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On
15 - Harlequin - Sweet Things In Life
14 - The Kings - Switchin' To Glide
13 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
10 - Coney Hatch - Hey Operator
9 - Trooper - We're Here For A Good Time
8 - Coney Hatch - First Time For Everything
8 - Harlequin - Love On the Rocks
8 - Harlequin - You Are the Light
8 - Loverboy - Working For the Weekend

Total tab views for April: 289

(By section: Canadian-218, Girlschool-38, Various-11, Chords-22)

Most-viewed tabs overall (stats date from Oct. 3/07 to Apr. 30/08):

43 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
39 - Headpins - Don't It Make Ya Feel
27 - Harlequin - Sweet Things In Life
27 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
27 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On
24 - Headpins - Turn It Loud
21 - Harlequin - Innocence
21 - The Kings - Switchin' To Glide
20 - Coney Hatch - Hey Operator
20 - Kim Mitchell - All We Are

*Only tab views made by people (excluding my own views) are counted here. Webcrawler/bot views are excluded.

Posted by planet/zerofret at 1:35 AM EDT
Updated: Saturday, May 3, 2008 1:38 AM EDT
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Friday, May 2, 2008

BOSTON
Topic: Riff-In-A-Jiff

Today's riff is taken from the title track of Boston's second album, Don't Look Back (1978). It was the biggest hit from the album, peaking at #4 on the Billboard Chart in 1978.

This is probably my favourite Boston song, a fantastically constructed number that has all kinds of things going for it: a great rhythm riff, a memorable single line lead guitar part that recurs throughout the song, eventually building to a twin leads harmonized guitar part (that signature Boston sound), and excellent vocals, both lead and backing.

Tabbed here is the Intro.

BOSTON - "Don't Look Back" (T. Scholz)

https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/annesblog/varriffs.txt

Video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KiOqHLVxZvA

(100th blog post!

)

Posted by planet/zerofret at 2:26 AM EDT
Updated: Friday, May 2, 2008 2:30 AM EDT
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Wednesday, April 30, 2008

SMALL ADDITION
Topic: Website

I made a small addition to the Chords Page on the site last night, indicating Canadian acts by adding a red asterisk under the artist/band name. With the tabs, the Canadian ones have their own section, so I decided to use an indicator for Canadian content on the Chords Page, too. Reason? Well, the fact that most months the tab views are fairly consistently about two-thirds for the Canadian tabs/chords is a pretty good reason.

I tried a couple of different ways of doing indicators. First I tried little Canadian flags beside the artist name. I didn't like the look, though, too obtrusive. And I tried red asterisks beside the artist name, but didn't like that, either. Didn't like them above the name, either. (I guess I'm hard to please. ) But putting it on the line between the artist name and the first song listed seemed to work okay. And I'll leave it that way for now, try it out for awhile, anyhow. If I think it starts to make the page look cluttered, I can always remove them again.

A follow-up to the last post. On April 23, Carl Dixon's family posted an update on his condition on his website, and the news is good. For anyone interested in checking it out:

http://www.carldixon.com/index1.htm

Posted by planet/zerofret at 1:28 AM EDT
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Friday, April 18, 2008

CARL DIXON
Topic: Bands/Music

Keep a good thought for Carl Dixon. The Canadian musician was recently injured in a serious car accident in Victoria, Australia.

Toronto Star - http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/article/414626

The Courier (Ballarat, Victoria, Australia) - http://ballarat.yourguide.com.au/articles/1224262.html?src=topstories

A statement has also been posted on his website: http://www.carldixon.com/

He's been a member of various different Canadian bands, all of whom are well represented on this website. I'd like to add my best wishes to those of the many other people who are keeping Carl in their thoughts and prayers at this time. I wish him a complete and speedy recovery.

Carl Dixon with:

Coney Hatch - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Jr5kexTFLk (vocals)

The Guess Who - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bnndfwIwFoo (vocals and guitar)

April Wine - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RajegfkYUVE (guitar, keys, backing vocals)

(Thanks to Rick for links to the two news articles.)

Posted by planet/zerofret at 4:26 PM EDT
Updated: Friday, April 18, 2008 4:28 PM EDT
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Sunday, April 13, 2008

PRISM
Topic: Riff-In-A-Jiff

I've been a bit lazy on the blog entries this past week. Have to start thinking of some stuff to write about. I was jokingly asked in an e-mail awhile back 'will the tabs keep coming when those Montreal Canadiens are in the playoffs?'.

Well, so far, so good. I've managed to watch the Montreal games and get some tab work done.

So for today, a Canriff from the band Prism. It's from their second album, See Forever Eyes (1978). The song was written by Al Harlow. According to the liner notes of Prism's Over 60 Minutes With... compilation CD, he wrote the song in a Calgary hotel room in a five minute burst of inspiration. When the song was offered to Prism, they not only accepted it, but they recruited Harlow into the band on bass and rhythm guitar, as well (replacing the departed Ab Bryant, who went on to be in both Chilliwack and the Headpins).

PRISM - "Take Me Away" (A. Harlow)

https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/annesblog/canriffs.txt

Hear it here:

http://tikasmusic.imeem.com/music/MMNFOUGb/prism_take_me_away/

Posted by planet/zerofret at 2:21 AM EDT
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Saturday, April 5, 2008

ON HOLD
Topic: Website

The tab I referred to a couple of times in the last few posts was finally finished last night, printing off to a hefty eleven pages. All that was left to do was check it over with the record. I was going to check it earlier this evening, and post it tonight. So...something had to go wrong, right?

I realized pretty quickly once I started playing the disc that my stereo was doing its temperamental bit. This isn't new, it's done it on and off for a long time. But when it does it, there are entire parts of the song I can't hear. For example, vocals and drums will come through fine, but not guitar. I'll only be able to hear guitar faintly way in the background. Or I'll be able to hear one guitar part fine, but not another. So under those circumstances, I can't use it to check the tab. Usually, it corrects itself on its own, but there's no knowing when (or if) that'll happen. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next week. Hopefully, sometime. The whole time I was actually doing the tab, the stereo worked fine. But not right now.

So instead I ended up working on a chord chart for a song I have on cassette (because I could use a different stereo to work on it). Hope I'm back in business soon.

Posted by planet/zerofret at 1:47 AM EDT
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Wednesday, April 2, 2008

MARCH 2008 REVIEW
Topic: Website

Most-viewed tabs for the month of March 2008 (w/ view numbers):

17 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
13 - Kim Mitchell - Patio Lanterns
11 - Mountain - Mississippi Queen
10 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
9 - Headpins - Turn It Loud
8 - FM - Phasors On Stun
8 - Harlequin - Innocence
8 - Max Webster - Hangover
7 - The Kings - This Beat Goes On
6 - Guess Who - Bus Rider
6 - Max Webster - Battle Scar
6 - Max Webster - Diamonds Diamonds
6 - Max Webster - Gravity

Total tab views for March: 268

(By section: Canadian-190, Girlschool-39, Various-28, Chords-11)

Most-viewed tabs overall (stats date from Oct. 3/07 to March 31/08):

32 - Headpins - Don't It Make Ya Feel
25 - Harlequin - Thinking Of You
18 - Headpins - Turn It Loud
16 - FM - Phasors On Stun
16 - Harlequin - Innocence
16 - Kim Mitchell - All We Are
15 - Max Webster - Battle Scar
15 - Trooper - Two For the Show
14 - Honeymoon Suite - Stay In the Light
14 - Max Webster - Hangover

*Only tab views made by people (excluding my own views) are counted here. Webcrawler/bot views are excluded.

Posted by planet/zerofret at 1:23 AM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, April 2, 2008 1:30 AM EDT
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Tuesday, April 1, 2008

STEVE MILLER BAND
Topic: Riff-In-A-Jiff

Today is April Fool's Day, but the joke's been on me for the past several days. In my last blog entry, I mentioned a tab I was doing that had started out as a hybrid tab (chords with some tab included), but which I had decided to make into a full tab instead. Little did I know how hard that was going to be. When I did realize just how hard it was going to be, I considered changing it back to hybrid tab status. I bounced back and forth between deciding to abandon the tab altogether and soldiering on with it.

However, I knew what would happen. Take a break from it, get a fresh outlook the next day. I knew I'd want to keep working on it, if for no other reason than that I'd already invested a lot of time and effort in it. But there are other reasons...for one, it's a great song. It won't be my most accurate tab ever, but I'll see what I can come up with. I made some decent progress on it tonight, and I think I might even be down to less than twenty bars to go. Uh, twenty tough bars. The whole song isn't hard, but the hard parts are...hard.

Anyhow, because of all that, I hadn't posted anything else in awhile. So I took a night to prepare a riff. Some good ol' Steve Miller rock'n'roll. The song is from the legendary Fly Like An Eagle album (1976).

STEVE MILLER BAND - "Rock'n Me" (S. Miller)

https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/annesblog/varriffs.txt

Hear it here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IDpM6GVw9-k

Posted by planet/zerofret at 2:44 AM EDT
Updated: Tuesday, April 1, 2008 2:48 AM EDT
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Wednesday, March 26, 2008

HYBRIDS & THE METAL QUEEN
Topic: Website

The tab posted earlier today is the first of its kind on this site. I think of them as "hybrid tabs". Basically, they're songs that are designed to go on the Chords page, but they have some tablature included in them. They're not complete tabs, so they can't be placed in one of the tab sections. Some part of the song will be tabbed, other parts will just have the chords, guitar solo parts won't be included. This is an example of what a hybrid will look like:

https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/crd/aaronlee-texasoutlaw.txt

At this point, I don't know how often songs in the Chords section will include tab. There's only one so far, of course. There was already a second one I was going to do this for, but along the way I decided I'd make a full tab of it. It will be the next full tab posted, if all goes as planned. For this first hybrid, I made a note where it's posted on the Home Page that it includes tab. I won't be making that note every time a chord chart involves tab. I'm just doing it this first time to make people aware that some songs on the Chords page will also have tab.

On the Chords page itself, though, I'm making these tabs easy to identify. All hybrid tabs will be marked with an asterisk, with a note at the top of the page explaining that this indicator means the song has tab included.

https://www.angelfire.com/planet/zerofret/page8.html

As for the song "Texas Outlaw" itself, it's an interesting case. It's a duet with Aaron and Buzz Shearman, vocalist for Moxy in the 1970's. Her debut album The Lee Aaron Project (on which this song appeared) was released in 1982 on an indie label. The album was re-released by Attic Records in 1984 under the title Lee Aaron, in the same year that Attic released Aaron's breakout album Metal Queen. By the time of the album's '84 re-release, Shearman -- who does an excellent vocal on this song -- had died in a motorcycle accident (June of 1983).

Aaron had lots of help on that original project. Triumph's Rik Emmett was involved. Her "back-up" band for the album was Santers (a pretty good back-up band to have!). Other members of Moxy were also involved. Earl Johnson (Moxy) and Rick Santers play guitar on the track "Texas Outlaw".

Posted by planet/zerofret at 4:00 PM EDT
Updated: Wednesday, March 26, 2008 4:10 PM EDT
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