Wow, it's been a while.

Since I only ever post about music or books, this time it's music.

Lessons have been going well. Lately, there's been a lot of struggling with ear training, especially on how to pick up on chord changes as they're coming so that I don't get out of tune with the rest of the band.

The big news, however, on the music front is that I've been playing out about once a month or so. The founder of the school where I take my lessons has put together a band to play a couple times a month out at a barbecue joint, the Cele Store. At this point I think I've played there 4 times or so.

We mostly play country, which I would have never imagined that I'd be playing, but I'm having fun doing it. Before I played with the rest of the band, I'd never even met most of them, so playing with a bunch of strangers was a challenge. But since I've been playing I've noticed a few changes for the good. The first time out I was nervous as all get out. Before our latest gig last Friday, I hardly had any nerves at all. I'm amazed that I'm not really nervous any more about playing (and potentially screwing up) in front of people. I also seem to be a bit more confident about playing with other people.

It's still not perfect. I notice screw-ups that I make, but the audience seems to be having fun and no one throws beer bottles at us, so it can't be that bad. (In fact, I think there's more and more people showing up every time we play.)

In case you hadn't seem them, I've even got a few pictures from the first show, and I only look like I'm going to puke because of stage fright in a couple of them. I'll try and remember to post here when we're playing, and maybe you could come out and see us.

While going through my mp3 collection and adding album covers, I noticed a couple of similar titles and wondered if there was a connection. Is the title of Refused's "The Shape of Punk to Come" an homage to Ornette Coleman's "The Shape of Jazz to Come"?

Well, I  finally did it. I had my Austin debut, playing with the Blues Specialists (warning: sound) at the Continental Club. It was one song that went by in a blur. I think it went ok. I didn't pass out or throw up or anything like that. So I'll have to try it again, and when I do, I'll give you all some advance notice.

Two things I learned at my lesson this week.

1. I'm really not so good at the whole 16th note funk style.
2. It's amazing how surly a mood a cruddy lesson can put me in.

OK. Here's a couple shows you should go see.

Sunday, June 15th (that's this Sunday) Terry Bowness is playing at Central Market Westgate from 12:30-3:00. I met Terry in grad school. He's an engineer and a really talented pianist. We're going to go down and see him play and you should, too.

Also, this one's a little farther out, but mark your calendars. September 12th at Stubb's is Mogwai.

UPDATE: If you're interested in hearing a preview of Terry's music, you can listen to samples of his albums Terry Bowness and Stick Figures.

For my birthday, Susan, along with input from noizehole, got me a cool little preamp which will let me rip my vinyl and tapes. I got started with it today. Combined with Audacity, ripping albums is a snap.

I got two old Glass Eye albums done today, which makes me very happy. This also means that I'll finally be able to preserve their old demo tape, which must be on the verge of death by now given how much I played it and how old it is. I'll also be able to get a bunch of old out of print stuff and stuff that was only ever released on tape into my music library. What a great present.

LibraryThing seems to have reached critical mass where lots of new features are rolling out very quickly. The newest one, series coverage, is great. This'll let me figure out which books I don't have in a series and what order they belong in.

So, if the title says "two topics" and the above is about books, this next bit has to be about music.

I recently picked up Bill Evans' "Complete Village Vanguard Recordings". Very, very good collection. I don't think I'd ever heard Scott LaFaro on bass before. (Obviously I'm going to be biased towards listening to the bass players. I have to at least act like I'm trying to learn something from these artists.) Listening to him play was, to me, worth getting the collection. Yes, Bill Evans is an excellent pianist, but LaFaro keeps the trio grooving, and when he's given the chance, he knocks out some really nice solos. That was something that also impressed me. I don't know if I could easily name another group from around that time, other than one led by Charles Mingus, that gave bass players that much room to solo and do more than just play rhythm. (I'm sure there were, I just can't think of them off the top of my head.) It was nice to hear a trio where everyone was part of creating the music and not just setting the backdrop for the piano player to solo all night long. If you haven't heard any of this trio, it's definitely worth a listen.

OK, since seeing Guitar Hero, and now Rock Band, I've been saying that those would be great if you could use a real guitar and use the game as a learning tool. It seems that I'm not the only person who had this idea.

Guitar Wizard is apparently to be debuted at CES soon, and although the info at BoingBoing is slim, it looks like Guitar Wizard could be that teaching tool. Now I just need to wait for a bass version to come out and figure out how much it would cost to get a MIDI pickup on my bass.

Barry White is much easier to play along with than Miles Davis.

This week, I butchered The Girl From Ipanema much less than last week. Instead, it was Miles Davis' turn on the butcher block tonight.