Mwaka mpya mwema!

It's nice when our local Rocky gives us something pretty with our morning coffee...


MOG Post: 12/31/2007
Artist: Electric Flag
Album: The Best Of Electric Flag
Track: Sunny
1971 Columbia 30422

Thanks MOG for making 2007 a memorable year for me. I'm looking forward to 2008 and more great interactions happening here. I'm grateful for this place and all of you here - sharing some great music that ease the days many times over. In a mere five months I've found many new things to listen to and I've more affections for neglected music I already have. My ears are happy.
Another resolute resolution (loving hint to the lovely Mrs) - I intend to discipline my time around all this with some much-improved temperance (like the 'no-media' days devoid of TV. Key word: moderation. Health.
I celebrated the big 'for oh' this year. : sigh : I still pick up my Stratocastor like I was seventeen - but getting older sucks pipe! Remember it's only the body that changes: we get vexed that we still feel the same - just that we can't do it the same! I'm glad to have some fellow 45rpm oldies to share with up here. I'm also glad there are some hip young folks here keeping me in tune. Music and the feelings they give are ageless - music KEEPS us all young!
One of these days I'll sit down and share with you one of my favorite moments from '07. Being the Hendrix fan that I am, you could only imagine how I felt when I met Buddy Miles. I have his signature now, right under Jimi's guitar on my Band Of Gypsies album. I'll have some indelible memories of that evening, as will my good friend who brought this Electric Flag album for a signature. He's a great audiophile (and music aficionado, and fellow Beatles scruff) - you will definitely be privy this 2008 to some of our vinyl 'rips' that are on the block (like these cut here). I thank him very much for some sincerely great times this 2007. I look forward to more (Guinness)!
I chose this tune for a another reason. ZeppoNoir, a friend whom I've shared music with since meeting him in 1979, is the friend who sent me the invite to this MOG . He wisely convinced me and MasonJar to join; we all share some choice record-pedaling days back in the 90's together and this place feels a lot like it did then. Our frequent iChats keep the distance between Seattle and Denver bearable. Zepp was able to come out here to Colorado for our birthday celebrations - it was great to have his company. A lot of things happened that week - a lot of good meetings and shared times and convivial imbibing. For me - in the few remaining hours before driving him to the airport for the flight back - it was sharing this tune. "I'm really likin' this track" he said. Indeed. :-)
This song is for all of those people in my life that make my days musical. This would most definitely include the furry creatures taking shelter here in our homes. They're always kind to us despite our being so dumb sometimes. You know how it is - always more to the stories than can be typed with these little keys. I think I'll let Barry Goldberg say it with his keys. ;-)



THANKS
Peace in the New Year. Be Safe. Be Well.

What are the deepest rhythms in your ears?

MOG Post: 12/30/2007
Artist: Blind Willie Johnson
Album: Murmurs of Earth
Track: Dark Was The Night
Commemorative Edition



harvard.edu/iau/Orbits

Solar Synchronizations and Interplanetary Vagabonds. I think this song is about the perfect speed for my Cosmos. It's a fine human example to be chosen for the gold record placed on the Voyager spacecraft (should 'they' be so cool as to spin it).




Just to wonder what it 'sounds' like way out there...dipping your Pharaoh in the Solar Seas and finding yourself in some new Chichen Itza in the Vega system.

Watching this following video made me think of the SOHO spacecraft: soho.nascom.nasa.gov

I thought of these sounds as well: voyager.jpl.nasa.gov
...Click on the Music of The Spheres link there. Johannes Kepler made a musical readout of the tones reflecting the motions of the Sun's planets in their orbits. It's called Harmonica Mundi.

mog.com

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~
Mathematical frequencies indeed ...this video is definitely fascinating. Just where are we in this 'post-modern' world? Would you say a paradigm (or more) has shifted and we are on to a new label of thinking? Past thoughts on a new time. So what are your plans these next 4 years? Talk about warp-factors Scotty! Beam me up indeed. ....Incedentely, I can't quite fathom the symbolism represented in our DIA (New World Airport) here - the murals of Quetzalcoatl are overwhelming. Things to make you think.
postmoderntimes.com

Just in case you missed what I SAID!

MOG Post: 12/29/2007
Artist: Buffalo Daughter
Album: I
Track: Earth Punk Rockers
2002 Emperor Norton

!! YOU DAMN WELL BETTER HAVE GIVEN SOMETHING TO SOMETHING CHARITABLE THIS 2007 !!

Taking the political year end edge off with some PUNK RAWK ! I really can't believe no one is discussing this group. My brain needs some release sometimes (like the crazy stress that comes with this last week of the year). Space and cabin fever and people horkin' up their figgy pudding with over-tapped liqueurs. These are the sounds and scenes that go through my head when I suffer the ILLS of all this joyousness! Seriously - make the donations! If you don't - well, we'll just have to sick the Gojira on your ass!
Like I said in the last post - WTF ! This is also for all those Evel Knievel toys I used to have- grrrrrrr I wish I knew what happened to them. (I had the perfect kid to give them to this year) R.I.P Evel - YOU ROCKED !!

Will we survive indeed. Give and forgive. Get Gojira on those who do not!!



OH YEAH - speaking of the best EARTH PUNK ROCKERS of ALL TIME :
After a 13.6 year absence, Comet 8P/Tuttle is once again traveling through the inner solar system. On Jan. 1 and 2, 2008, it makes its closest approach to Earth--only 24 million miles away. The emerald-colored comet will brighten to a predicted magnitude of 5.8, visible to the unaided eye from dark-sky sites and a fine target for backyard telescopes anywhere.
Two nights before closest approach, on Dec. 30th and 31st, something extraordinary will happen: Comet 8P/Tuttle has a beautiful close encounter with spiral galaxy M33. The comet and the galaxy may even overlap! This is a can't-miss opportunity for astro-photographers around the world.
Visit spaceweather.com for sky maps, photos and more information

Merry MOGGing whistleto mixing under the covers!

MOG Post: 12/29/2007
Artist: Buffalo Daughter
Album: New Rock
Track: Great Five Lakes
1998 Grand Royal Records

"Discover people through music
...and music through people"
'Tis the season. Some posts come quicker than others. Some come as quick as a mogmail. Here's a piece from one I just sent to another favorite artist here on MOG :
>> If this place is about hooking up, well ... I have a thought. I came across a great artist last year and I have been avidly listening to him since (it was listening to Buffalo Daughter and finding this remixes EP). Cornelius is on my - you should be listening to - widget. I did a few clicks on MOG last month and I (joy) noticed he joined here: mog.com/Cornelius (artist site: mog.com/music/Cornelius)
>
> I also noticed that he's coming over here from Japan. Certainly sad that he'll not get to Denver - but he will be at The Fillmore in San Francisco on January 18th, 2008.
>>
...and some other cities here in the states :-) x10
(More to come later - bet)! Check him out moggers - and if you're anywhere near those cities go get your tix!
(Check out contra's latest waxing ecstatic here) :)


...So then a few more clicks on this ear and a wink and I realize there are no Buffalo Daughter posts on our MOG . WTF. There's been no affection here for this great acumen of sound?! Such a great privilege and a pleasure then to bring you something from my jpop juke to yours - something good that I know Cornelius is listening to. He has a great remix EP CD full of goodies, including a nice mix of the Buffalo Daughter tune "Great Five Lakes", from their 1998 album New Rock.
There's lots of tonal variety on this album - it's all so good it's difficult to pick just one for you from the variety and scope of the fourteen. Hmmm, something to take the mind off the overly tasty glutton of chocolate, spruce needles, bay leaves, and snow. Speaking of bays and my knowledge of the Great Lakes area - Green Bay has snowmobiles on it about now. Nice to think about summer things in all this frigid air and snow. With nice funky drum, I really love the changes this tune takes us through (and frogs are just cool to hear when its 15 degrees outside). Warm tidings to wherever you may be traveling this holiday season O MOGgies. Best 2U & URs. :-)
幸せなクリスマス!
明けましておめでとう

Fab Yourself a Happy Crimble and a Merry Goo Year!

MOG Post: 12/23/2007
Artist: The Beatles
Album: Artifacts II
Track: Christmas Time (Is Here Again)!
1967 EMI Christmas EP

We Beatle scruffs are familiar with the series of Christmas E.P.s that were released to the fan club from 1963-1969. Well-documenting their changes through the seven years, the club received a choice holiday glimpse of the Fabs around the mic(s) for a tune and yule-giggle. Dermahrk has kindly posted the lovely 1963 recording on his MOG . It's merry contrast to the (almost solely produced Lennono) later recorded Beatlecheer of 1969. Each sounds as you would expect the boys to sound in them - from cloistered crimblygiggle in 1963 to ... I'll Mail You the funny papers.
OK, so 1967 was still a good year. Their merry new banter centered more on their own comps than the (copyrighted) ones (hear 1965). '67 brought us a tune called "Christmas Time (Is Here Again)". The song was chopped over for the lovely, odd skits and bits on the Christmas record, which was, eh, highly creative and bespoke the time. Let us CUT the rug here sans "Plenty of Jam Jars" by The Ravelers, with a little present for your 40th anniversary gathering of gear little packages.
Question for mog: Hmm..were they perhaps hinting to the Tim Leary phrase of the day? Turn On, Tune In, and drop O-U-T.
Grimble maybe, Jolly whoop, and may your festive bells jingle.
Goo tidings to yours (and all the boys in BOR245thhine783).

Disseminated Penguins

MOG Post: 12/10/2007
Artist: Raymond Scott Quintette
Album: Microphone Music
Track: The Penguin
2002 Basta Audio-Visuals

Brrr it's cold here - I'm glad this long-backordered CD arrived just before the snow hit - it's been a cozy weekend of delightful listening. Ten years ago I taped a CD I borrowed from a coworker. Irresistible Bliss by Soul Coughing became a cassette I constantly played in the dash on commutes and road trips. I finally got the iTunes download just a couple of years ago and I still enjoy the album (still on road trips now with a much-used iPod). Initially hearing the track "Disseminated", I was confounded as to the sample they set the tune around. (I've never had the CD to look at any credits and never researched it). I have a penchant for old, foundational jazz. I also have a fetish for old cartoons with old music. This particular Soul Coughing sample contained these elements and was definitely ingrained in my brain somehow ... somewhere.

So years later I'm pondering my second Carl Stalling anthology CD. Carl was the musical genius behind the fabulous Warner Bros. cartoons (or was he entirely?). 'Digging' it, I came across (and yes I did remember his name from my first Stalling liner notes) .. Raymond Scott.

Simply explained: Raymond Scott started recording with studio brilliance back in the 1930s and everyone has used the man's ideas ever since. His compositions and sound are so ingrained in the beginnings that we've forgotten his name. (Please listen to contrabandwidth's fantastic post about the Amen Break for the idea here). (And, no, Also sprach Zarathustra was not written in 1968). I digress.

Good music is a requisite for Good cartoons. To wit, you hear pure Raymond Scott compositions in most of the Ren & Stimpy classics (John K's Spumco creation is a study in art on many levels). And you undoubtedly heard these Scott musings through Stalling's vast Warner Bros. repertoire of flutes, violas, clinks, and whirlygigs. 'Twas the Scott CD I chose that day, and I will definitely be sharing some more of this, the indubitable Raymond Scott Quintette (his spelling). Cool thing is ... Raymond never wrote his "descriptive jazz" with a cartoon in mind. He was tinkering with sound and electronics.
Click on this for a very good read about him.
To THE TUNES man! :p

Just for the Record .. Introductions and Thanks :-)

MOG Post: 12/6/2007
Artist: Van Morrison
Album: Moondance
Track: Into The Mystic
1970 Warner Bros.

I do have my reasons.
My Zen is attaining a sense of vertical in such a horizontal place (even though I am a member of TMDR 's flatearthsociety < winks ear >). This would lately have to include this great MOG sphere (my only true surf time anymore). Music really has molded my life since 33 1/3 (a slow vinyl kid); this particular global place gives me aural solace in such a huge chaos of electrons. From its meager beginnings and my meddling work in and around it, I have grown jaded from the (not ironic) 'disconnectedness' of people on this Internet. This MOG sphere makes me feel good about it all again. I have learned since July 2007 a true nature of the sense of community here. I've found real people and emotions behind these musical postings and I've been humbled by many things I've never had the courage to even comment on. Comments or no, we truly communicate - tempered with discerning minds and some very nice prose. Sharing a musical stage that already sets us apart, we are all testament and proof that people still actually listen.
My wonderful wife couldn't initially understand why some new friends on my 'trusted' list have become so important to me. It's difficult in this sightless internet to define trust. I remind her that I've come across a place where some real quality folks have 'come together' in an honest way. I just can't explain how I feel sometimes - yet that's precisely it. The music that binds us all here bridges many of those unseen feelings. If you're already a member of this troupe of renegades I'm sure you know what I mean. We really give of ourselves here and as a consequence we boldly enrich each other. That's exactly what music does in its best moments. I Thank You, and send accolades to the people who make this MOG brain synapse such silky threads on this ominous web. (The users here sure spin some great yarns). Kudos indeed (and plenty of glorious Java) (I prefer Folgers with .5/.5) ;-)
So, Mrs. FastRMacR has graciously let me entertain (and detain) my brain here for some months now. I need to officially thank her. "Thank You, sweetheart"..for reading all of my posts, letting me display my guitars in the house, and generally supporting a life that spends every breath with music (and doesn't make a dime from it save my sanity). Let me also thank you for sharing - and giving reason to - the great mountain drives with the dogs and listening to Croce, Denver, Dylan, and Foo. I think you know why I am here and why I'm writing this post - I believe it was English and Led Zeppelin. :D
Circles are good.
Babes, this tune is for you.
An incredible thanks to everyone here for 'making' this great MOG space.
Demographics and time? PAH !
GREAT people? √√√!
We should thank our lucky stars, eh?
Peace and good tidings to you and yours.
-Steve (FastRMacR)