Centro-Matic covers: Flashes and Cables, Triggers and Trash Heaps

Centro-Matic, late of Denton, TX. What can I say, other than that they've consistently been one of my favorite bands of the last 20-ish years?  Beautiful, gentle, obscure and impressionistic tunes as well as unbelievable overdriven and compressed shouters.  A real artistic collaboration between the four members and often just alchemic magic.

Never had taken any of their tunes out for a spin but was feeling this past Sunday like I'd knock out a couple quick ones.  Super fun to chew on and warble.  Tried to keep it simple, recording the vocal and guitar live (Epiphone Casino with a touch of delay, phase type of things) and overdubbing harmonies and a shaky egg.

JK

Flashes and Cables:

https://app.box.com/s/ly0qgnceajnafbam5pf54g83iukmdeke

 

Triggers and Trash Heaps: 

https://app.box.com/s/fq7efdg490w0xmbzb2c9r5qt5v6vqpad

Neil Young covers

What can I say?  I'm not the only one for whom Neil is perennially and indisputably the central musical figure.  Man, I could just cover his songs forever.  His songwriting and playing and artistic vision in general... His particular guitar tone and style, lyrical wit and sincerity, simultaneous looseness and unswerving focus.  There is nothing more to be added.  So I've added some covers!  At least these are of a couple deep cuts/ stone cold classics.  These versions have been sitting around literally for years:

"Emperor of Wyoming".  Secret instrumental greatness from that first, weird, good-not-great, first solo LP.  I realize Neil is THE Les Paul guy but, all respect to Old Black, it's always fun to bust out the Gretsch and twang away.  Having the Bigsby tremolo to play with really suits my limited guitar skills!  This one also benefits from the baritone and some nice sounding "pianner", and apparently dates from a time when I still knew how to play a little pedal steel...

"Winterlong".  Semi-secret pop greatness, for many years available only on the "Decade" collection (still the best "best of" compilation out there, from then 'til now)... 

https://app.box.com/s/csu5w2c3fqgaduk8dxq7jryvq5y0y2vk

https://app.box.com/s/hudgs2v9fbuv5kk76y319ytdh41dvjyy

Woodpile: Son Volt’s “Wide Swing Tremolo”

More Woodpile songs here, as I continue to work out the new(ish) Mac/ interface/ software and re-learn those neglected instruments.

By the time of Son Volt’s 1998 “Wide Swing Tremolo” release, the band was heading into the wilderness.  By all accounts they “won” the first round of LP releases after the breakup of Uncle Tupelo.  But the attention and, yeah, surprising popularity dissipated quickly (with Wilco seeing the inverse, exponentially; a story for another time). The second Son Volt album, the as-good “Straightaways”, garnered mostly shrugs and the third LP even less, though in this case the response was pretty much deserved.  “Wide Swing Tremolo” at minimum just felt off somehow, and it honestly was not so good.  It did turn out to be the end of that first, best lineup featuring the stop-start drumming of Mike Heidorn, the bass and letter perfect harmonies of Jim Boquist and the crunchy guitar and other instrumental textures from his brother Dave.  But “Wide Swing Tremolo” contained a handful of full-on classics that I’ve gone back to again and again for two decades, as much or more so than the rest of the catalog. Figured I take a stab at a few....

JK

Medicine Hat:
https://app.box.com/s/9x77ghucquaywvofa0l7820nn6sj1miy

Hanging Blue Side:
https://app.box.com/s/l772jatpmr2vsqx2lews0682lz8j560c

Driving the View:
https://app.box.com/s/5liheyvqclf85euoi3isu66gccxdfu7u

Woodpile: The Byrds’ country rock

Ah, the Byrds: Criminally underrated and one of my all-time faves.  Perhaps unusually, I dunno, my gateway was the country era rather than the chart-topping chiming-Rickenbacker jangle-pop era.  I still recall picking up that “Sweetheart of the Rodeo” CD from Record & Tape Traders in Towson, MD, taking it back to my summer squat at the DU house and, upon firing it up, quickly shutting the door and thinking, “Uh... This is WAY more country than I was picturing, but.. still... I think this may totally be my thing....”.  Sent me down a Gram Parsons rabbit hole and then a Clarence White one, and there I remain to this day.

Anyway, back here in modern times, I fairly recently was looking to upgrade the recording hardware and software at home, scored a MacBook refurb, began goofing around with GarageBand and thought I’d do another set of “Woodpile” songs to help me work things out.  Figured it’d also be a good opportunity to goof around on the acoustic instruments again and re-learn some things after years I the overwork wilderness.  So...

“You Ain’t Going Nowhere” kicked off the Byrds’ Gram Parsons-initiated country rock era, leading off that legendary “Sweethearts of the Rodeo” from 1968.  Yet another Bob Dylan cover of course.

“Tulsa County” is another cover, non-Dylan, off 1969’s “Ballad of Easy Rider “.  Parson’s exceedingly short stay was done by then and the band was already deep into the Clarence White era.  Best thing yet to come out of Lewiston, ME.  King of the Telecaster and father of the pedal-steel-mimicking B-bender apparatus.  Killed by a drunk driver in LA, 1973 while loading out his gear from a bluegrass gig with his brother.  Just goddamn.

Also peak Clarence, and sung by him on the record, “Truck Stop Girl” is a Little Feat cover from 1970’s “Untitled”.

JK

You Ain’t Going Nowhere
https://app.box.com/s/u6so4to3p2i6cgp75d3tsf1v95eqdzsk

Tulsa County
https://app.box.com/s/uu0vh0s9er00d95msq5axxkbclpq5ipx

Truck Stop Girl
https://app.box.com/s/57o2tt3kbm5f5rjcht15tnms0944h0fs

Cure & Smiths & Pogues covers

Still clearing out the cobwebs, this batch of songs had been in the stalled-out production line since the 2015, partly as an attempt to live inside some songs for the Buttsteaks to possibly cover.  I prefer working on songs in pairs, probably out of ingrained A side/ B side bias, so there are three 45's here, to my thinking anyway...

Out of these, we ended up picking up only "Friday I'm in Love" and doing a nice job of it (including the bridge section that I've never taken a shine to, and left out of this basement laboratory version).  We'd covered the other Cure song, "Push", and the Smiths' "What Difference Does It Make" WAAAAaaayy back in the pre-Buttsteak days of '87 (along with some other still-neglected hits) but likewise left those in the dustbin of history.  "Please, Please, Please..." was recorded just because it's one of my favorite Smiths' songs and I'm still convinced it could work in the right format.

The other "single" is, in my mind, done in the style of the underestimated, late-era, Joe Strummer-fronted Pogues. "If I Should Fall from Grace With God" I did as a St. Patrick's thing.  Was hoping to pick up  "London Calling" for the Buttsteaks, thinking it a no-brainer but we ended up leaving it on the slag heap. It may yet rise again. 

JK

Back up and running: Zevon and Stones covers

Relieved to see that this dumb Blogger deal was still up and running after so many months and years of disuse on my part....  Long and short is the the corona has coincided with an already scheduled work slowdown on my part, so at last there may be an opportunity to take care of business that's been neglected far too long.

As a start here's a pair of covers that Roady and I quickly blasted out in the (then newly re-done and subsequently largely abandoned until recently) basement rock zone in 2015.  For those of you doing the math, that's five goddarned years ago.  Nuthin' fancy.

JK

Mohammed's Radio (Warren Zevon cover)
https://app.box.com/s/d3y06nev5fnfpmcpgh7j0xawji905m95

Torn and Frayed (Rolling Stones cover):
https://app.box.com/s/a689xy49c4iounxhxj4osj083dj7mmri

Re-posted: Echo & the Bunnymen, Psychedelic Furs covers

Goes to show how far in the weeds I am that this promised re-post is months and months overdue....  Recorded by me and Mike down in Baltimore in late 2012, predating the 1st floor renovations at the Roadkill Estate.  Considering that I barely remember the house in it's divided, tenancy days, that's a LONG time!  Funny enough, though, I can still see the horror of the abandoned fridge and smell the yeast and Siberian husky hair encrusted in that carpeting...

JK

The Killing Moon (Echo & the Bunnymen cover):
https://app.box.com/s/guteahq16x5vljw9z7ph



The Ghost In You (Psychedelic Furs cover):
https://app.box.com/s/i37log22lz83tjbno0lb

Steely Dan deep cover: "Barrytown"

Hey all-

A quick shout-out from the dusty temporary grave of RKBS industries.  I have little great thoughts about the passing of Walter Becker over the weekend, and initially I had almost no reaction other than a "what can ya do" shrug.  After thinking about things, though, I realized that he and the various Steely Dan incarnations made more of an impression on me than my inner Americana/ pop rock/ punk/ etc aficionado would like to admit.  I can get particularly stinky about late '70s Steely Dan but had forgotten how much I loved "Pretzel Logic", and that "Steely Dan Greatest Hits" tape ('72-'77 so no "Gaucho"!) that Dillo and I used to play on the commute to New Rochelle during our senior year in high school. 

So, pouring one out, here's a re-posting of a recording from the 2012 Harpswell Hootenanny (another brief tradition that's also hopefully in only a temporary grave): "Barrytown" from 1974's "Pretzel Logic", which was and is my go-to album from those crusty bastards.  Paul B sings lead and plays the Wurlitzer and the close-out guitar lick.  Paul C on bass, Roady on drums, me on the Gretsch and tambourine and some singing.

JK

https://app.box.com/s/ylkqjl5vvrzksvlkrxym

Thanksgiving leftovers: The Band covered a few times

Hey strangers-- Turns out another Thanksgiving just rolled by, didja know, and now has only receded further into the past as I've dawdled?  But before every last good intention slid into history, I wanted to post a couple cover songs.  This is partly brought on my a pre-holiday trip to see the great Chris Robinson Brotherhood down at the Capitol Theater back in my NY metro homeland.  It was as good as hoped, but I was sad to have to miss the upcoming 2016 version of their Thanksgiving-time celebration of the Band's "Last Waltz".  So I had the Band on the brain, and it turns out they were on quite a few other folks' minds as well, so I figured I'd go back out to the well. 

Though most of the famed West Saugerties, NY "Basement Tapes" sessions were actually in the spring and summer of 1967, the vibe of the audio record is so autmnal and I've been spinning the beautiful recent completist vinyl box set a lot, as is typical this time of year.  Maybe the autumn association is cemented in my mind because of the full-on band recordings made after Levon' arrived in October, and I have no doubt it's partly because of the dusty, wistful, timeless quality to the songs.  Certainly that their Thanksgiving farewell celebration became cultural semi-touchstone "The Last Waltz" don't hurt.

So here are a few songs for you: First is a group electric, sloppy and semi-raucus version of "Odds and Ends" from the 2011 Harpswell Hootenanny.  That one's got the Pauls Bonanos and Cardillo on guitars, Roadkill on drums and me on bass and overdubbed keys.  Also you've got here some more austere lonely home studio versions of their beautiful late-era (1975) final masterpiece "It Makes No Difference" and another Saugerties tune, "Katie's Been Gone".  Hope you enjoy.

Link to the original post, with some background, discussion, etc is here:

http://roadkillbuttsteak.blogspot.com/2013/01/the-band-covered-acoustically.html


Songs are here:

Odds and Ends (Band cover):  
 https://app.box.com/s/jfz4nmqhfmm20tyoyog2


It Makes No Difference (Band cover):  
https://app.box.com/s/jwn3nd9ztf731mw9uxuahxp9oth68tvh

Katie's Been Gone (Band cover):      
https://app.box.com/s/iz6mhsz6ee0yqgwe1ebuyldkejo7ikok

"Up Above My Head" rebroadcast, part 5 of 5

This trio wraps up the rebroadcast in fine aeronautical fashion: Disconnected, demoralized, dashed to the ground, strewn in pieces and still full of wonder, hope and anticipation.  Just like goddarned life, huh?

"Amidships" looks at the drudgery and isolation behind the glamour of flight, "...Wreckage..." at the straightfaced equality of mortality, and "Wingwalkers" at a beautiful horizon of clouds and sun. 

Playing spot-our-own-influences, I'd say (in order): mid-era Cracker, late-era Pink Floyd and not-otherwise-specified Americana (...OK.. maybe some Paul Burch in there...).   More importantly, playing spot-the-incidental-background-noise, that's an enthusiastic poodle with a squeaky toy at about 1:55 in "...Wreckage...".

Peace/ out

jk

"Amidships":
https://app.box.com/s/1b747xk8ewqi2oy5gigi8qghxj9nc3mz

"The Wreckage Looks the Same":
https://app.box.com/s/lpen8nx4p2x10ssne2v3d9h1if94yt87

"Wingwalkers":
https://app.box.com/s/hmsvgwk5kbsh3g9ihwwzxdgd9diybi2f

"Up Above My Head" rebroadcast, part 4 of 5

Too darned busy ovah heah.  Nearly abandoned even the re-posting/ filler project out of pure neglect...  Thanks to Ted for the reminder to get my crap back in order, or at least to try and do so.... 

This portion of the program constitutes tributes to each of the US Navy's dirigible fleet back between the wars, and these puppies were the germ from which the whole airship-themed bunch of rock songs sprung:

• The Shenandoah was the first, commissioned in 1923 and going down over Ohio in a fierce storm.  Fourteen men died but, amazingly, 29 others lived, as the airship literally broke into several sections, some of which were subsequently piloted by airmen and guided to the ground by controlled venting of the helium cells (i.e., they literally slashed them with knives).  Absolutely nuts.

• Also after two years in service, the Akron crashed off New Jersey in 1933, with the loss of 73 (of 76) lives, mostly to drowning.

• The Akron's sister ship, the Macon, also went down over the ocean, off Big Sur, CA in 1935, after a similar 2 year lifespan, but with the loss of only 2 men (as life rafts and flotation devices had been instituted).

• The Los Angeles was actually acquired as war reparation from Germany in 1924 and was decommissioned in 1932 (without actually crashing!) and dismantled in 1939, having outlived all her peers.

"Akron (Queen of the Skies)":
https://app.box.com/s/0umwkt3bv86knuqurhqc4i9q95eibw31

"Macon (The Happiest Ship)":
https://app.box.com/s/y5zxxsrwj9ncj5rhsj6ez0etx6och0jf

"Los Angeles":
https://app.box.com/s/43o0248l57dzn43cb7knly9msrur78qq

"Shenandoah (Daughter of the Stars)":
https://app.box.com/s/l2exjd9yn4uny4pdkp3xj4coh3n3ltt9

"Up Above My Head" rebroadcast, part 3 of 5

First two here are about Otto Lilienthal, third is about the Big Daddy himself- Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin.  Hit your Wikipedia, friends!

JK

 Lilienthal #1: https://app.box.com/s/ucooxe6mjdd96hnmt71dpusehvzen0pq
 

 Lilienthal #2:    https://app.box.com/s/y6vpzeqh2w91aicthc65lr022aozs080


Pheonix at Echterdingen: https://app.box.com/s/a4t9457l56890c900ll5wzknk6imxg9z

"Up Above My Head" rebroadcast, part 2 of 5

So, having some generally thematic pop hits out of the way, this is the part of the record where actual "rock opera" could have launched off.  That is, had I the ability to actually get a libretto together.  You know, some dialogue/ plot/ etc.  Instead, we went the "photo album" route, which enabled us to cover a lot more ground (no pun intended).   

A reminder that the whole batch of songs is also up at the  Roadkill-Buttsteak SoundCloud page. Please follow/ subscribe to either /or if you'd like, which saves me some mental wear and tear on the emails.  Or just tell me to bugger off.  No offense taken.

Today's examination material:

Alberto Santos-Dumont (1873-1932) was the unlikely aeronautic mega-hero of both Brazil and France, having emigrated from the former to the latter as a young man.  He was a designer and pilot of lighter than air balloons and then dirigibles, and made his fame in 1901 when he earned the Deutsch prize for flying from the Parc Saint Cloud, around a bend on the Seine about 4 miles southwest of Paris, to the Eiffel Tower and back in under 30 minutes.

Otto Lilienthal (1848-1896) was the German pioneer in glider design.  An obsessive about avian aerodynamics, he applied much of that knowledge to his devices, some of which he tested from his own man-made, 50-foot hill.  Predictably, after a couple thousand flights, he suffered severe injuries in a crash in 1896, breaking his neck and dying the next day.  His last words were reported to be "Sacrifices must be made".

JK


"Santos-Dumont of Brazil":
https://app.box.com/s/xix9l7xod8x9gxftbyinmpm7h61r31o2

"Lilienthal #1":    https://app.box.com/s/ucooxe6mjdd96hnmt71dpusehvzen0pq

"Lilienthal #2":  https://app.box.com/s/y6vpzeqh2w91aicthc65lr022aozs080

"Up Above My Head" rebroadcast, part 1 of 5

Hey peoples.  What do they say on the medias?  "Stay tuned for a very special encore episode from RKBS studios.  No callers, please."

That said, this here "Up Above My Head" song cycle/ album-ish thing is indeed very near and extremely dear to Mike and me and our conjoined musical heart.  It's the bunch of tunes that sprung, in 2010, from my love of lighter-than-air rigid frame dirigible airships and their (often literal) rise and fall at the start of the 20th century.  Recapping, much of the details were copped from John Toland's The Great Dirigibles, Their Triumphs and Disasters, which is still well worth a read if you're of a mind.  There remain a ton of other things in the cooker on this end but we've been meaning for a long while to get this back out to your digital selves.  We honestly do love it that much.

I've broken the thing down into five easily digestible individual posts for your comfort, with songs also up at the  Roadkill-Buttsteak SoundCloud page.

These first three cuts are pretty straightforward and non-historical.  Just trying to set the pop/ rock table with the usual themes of technological advancement and engineering marvels, love and longing and separation and all that jazz. First cut, "Up Above My Head" is a cover of the Jayhawks' cover of Sister Rosetta Tharpe's great gospel song, with obligatory Gibson SG on board. Then the Rickenbacker 12 string steps up into the co-pilot seat, with "Gravity" about one's relation with the grand forces in life, and "Lighter Than Air" just a metaphorical chiming pop song.  From here on out things get more historical...

JK

Up Above My Head:
https://app.box.com/s/7zd5w5slsgze10yh8uaylehi4sxkddrf
Gravity:
https://app.box.com/s/9oprdzrs51x6hy1wsv7j4s2zq3nw5x4o

Lighter Than Air:
https://app.box.com/s/cycow9i54hdbdmbpl65eyqj0ujqpqpz6

David Bowie, "Moonage Daydream"

I've gotta thank Dillo for the reminder that, duh, a bunch of Harpswell Hootenanniers cut a fine David Bowie cover just about 3 years ago!   Extra dunce points to me, as "Moonage Daydream", off the 1971 "Hunky Dory" album, was actually the first song that I put on my "to cover" list for the gathering that year.  It's a song that blasts out of the gate with a fistful of classic Bowie styling in the LP version: super-cleanly produced, dry crunching rock chords followed by delicate 12-string acoustic and piano and strings; drums pushed way up front of melodic bass; yelped rollercoaster vocal melodies with layered harmonies; lyrical-sequiturs with tons of space imagery and overtones of ambiguous love/ lust/ devotion; a weirdo sax-flute solo; a take-off guitar excursion from Mick Ronson.  The whole darn enchilada.

With everybody else doing the heavy lifting, I think we pulled our version off OK.  That's Dillo on the Trevor Bolder style bass and Roady on the "Woody" Woodmansey drums.  Paul B is on the Wurlitzer and Roger on the lead vocals and lead guitar.  I played rhythm guitar and overdubbed the other stuff.

Moonage Daydream (David Bowie cover):
https://app.box.com/s/lbqrnjfxdzvpqtuljv15dby89hxfsgsb

David Bowie, "Ashes to Ashes"

Well, if anything qualifies as "unnecessary and half-assed" cover, it's this one, but I figured I'd share.  I believe it was the start of 2013 that Roady and I took a stab at "Ashes to Ashes" off Bowie's "Scary Monsters" album from 1980.  The song has been a fave for a long time, since my sister brought a copy home (insert old man voice) "back in the WLIR days, when you had to ask the store clerk to unlock the cabinet and retrieve the golddang cassette tape for you".  That album was confusing and intimidating and mysterious and I just didn't get most of it for decades, but parts of it lodged in the ol' brainpan, and this was obviously the hit.

Anyway, my appreciation for Bowie is bottomless, and when I love a record of his (or, more typically, individual cuts off a record) that love is strong indeed.  I honestly wish we had more covers in the vaults, but perhaps in the future...

JK


"Ashes to Ashes" (David Bowie cover):  
https://app.box.com/s/273lqmozxapmuap8p9rm

Happy Christmas '15

Hey all!  Man, I do hope things are good with every last body out there.  It's been Crazy Go Nuts on this end, but hope springs eternal for peace, love, and downtime.  Hopefully we'll be seeing one another very soon, each and all.

In the meantime, head over to SoundCloud for a smooth stream of the accumulated (and, yeah, in need of some remixing) holiday hits.  Christmas this and Christmas that!:
           https://soundcloud.com/johnk-rkbs

Or deal with things via individual Box links:
     Christmas Parties:                
           https://app.box.com/s/t6ft5otduha7h09pul7byzcini5gu92s
     Christmas Ain't for Family:
           https://app.box.com/s/7yxnvgzu77w5artg0ezb4oj8fg2esuz6
     Time for Christmas:          
          https://app.box.com/s/ttjzioccw17zqd74wh4r
     Old Fashioned Christmas:  
          https://app.box.com/s/ttjzioccw17zqd74wh4r
     Everyday Christmas:          
          https://app.box.com/s/mvendmdnbfdzejhpamjm44vm6vhypv8j


Or stream here on the widgets below:




 

Tollstock '15, part 4

Figured I'd start this Tollstock '15 segment off with the anarchic drums/ space portion of the program that the kids dove into while the rest of us were finishing the post-Sautrday-supper clean up.  So commenced the general slide into the late-night portion of program when, as Levon Helm said, "the songs would get a little bit juicier and the jokes'd get a little funnier, and the prettiest dancer would really get down and shake it a few times."  Well, I dunno about all that, but the heading for the ditch can be darned fun.

The Expanded Honcho (i.e., with Charlie on actual lead guitar) then dove into a version of "I've Changed" that we probably could've stretched out quite a bit longer.  It was sounding pretty good in the afternoon but definitely improved after the sun went down, as usually happens when everybody's lost all self-regard and is pulling in the same direction.   After that follows an extremely loose version of Taj Mahal's "She Caught the Katy" (a song I actually learned about via the Blues Brothers, for what that's worth, and which Roady may not have previously heard at all).  Anyway, Roger was on board and in fine hollerin' form, and the song probably could also have gone on for a bit more.  Ah well... next time, I guess.  The only question is where's that horn section when we need it!?

jk

Children's Time:
https://app.box.com/s/f2v7hbrudxdccmt3kvyeq7m7f4fs55cb


I've Changed:
https://app.box.com/s/lbbuuip7182wllgr8bs3g7f7i8yy43nq


She Caught the Katy:
https://app.box.com/s/dnwdm6flt8yfbp1j90envgz0ksukd2ng

Tollstock '15, part 3

Now THAT is getting to be one alluring barnspace, no?  Somewhere I'm sure we have actual pics of it being populated and rockulated, so maybe those'll surface at some point.  Lordy, I was too busy just trying to hold my musical parts together, and maybe get some stuff on audio "tape", to take any photos. Living in the moment, wasn't live-tweeting nothin'.

So these next few posts occupy Saturday afternoon.  You've got three Keating and Co. originals plus a cover of the Byrds-via-Little-Feat-and-a-touch-of-Son-Volt "Truck Stop Girl".  Charlie comes along for the rocky runs through the Honcho tunes with me and Roady and Adam, and takes the wheel on the tragic tale of truckstop love gone wrong.

After this we decamped "up yonder" to the pond for some sitting around and social time and acoustic picking, then got down to suppertime, red wine and the evening part of the program.

JK
  
She's Lighting Up:
https://app.box.com/s/g7jtq1hbg097y464gcnqgxaul8bn6mvg



Truck Stop Girl:
https://app.box.com/s/qhohhete7778zmm28vz9kepvusqiaf22



Angie's Emerald Eyes:
https://app.box.com/s/5dw5923t1g5pej0lxfcx9fj1v4qymxg3



Dreaming I'm Fine:
https://app.box.com/s/mg8hcixzzhaojv9728428z97womna6hp

Tollstock '15, part 2

So that's the inside of the barn.  The set-up was incomplete at that point, lovers of cymbals and cables and mic stands and all that jazz, but you get the picture.  Also, it's the inside of the barn by daylight, you lovers of twinkly lights.  And it's a bit of a close-up, lovers of all the space to left and right and up and (on the right anyway) down.

Anyhoo, this batch of songs rounds out the cream of the crop from Friday, which was a short go of things to begin with.   We've got other stuff on "tape" but it's strictly for the professional archivists and humble self-flagellators.  The cuts below, though, are for public consumption, so long as you listen with gentle ears and kind hearts.

The major upside, evident upon dropping needle into groove, is that Charlie and Roger had arrived, thus kicking us up out of the gutter and bringing some focus and, y'know, quality and actually planned "notes" and such.  Witness a really quickly thrown-together "Drive My Car".  As for all these, Roady is on drums and Charlie on guitar.  For this one, I can only guess that it's Adam on tambourine, possibly Dirtbike Richard on guitar, Roger on bass, and me on some rudimentary piano

Next is a solid stab at the blues classic "Key to the Highway" (which I learned from Eric Clapton's Derek and the Dominoes, but which dates back electrically to Little Walter and further back acoustically to Big Bill Broonzy).  Man, but we need to do this more often! That's Roger on second guitar and me on the bass. 

From there we backslide into Honcho-plus-one-town with a run-through of our own "Jenny Everyday", with Charlie gamely along for the ride and making things so much better and kind of Chris Isaak-y now that I listen to it again.  Then it was time for young Oliver Sorkin to head to bed or wherever hisself had to go, so out came a hot-rodded "She'll Be Coming 'Round the Mountain" and Roger sang and danced around.

Thus was Friday, as far as the Tiny Robot was concerned.

jk


Drive My Car:
https://app.box.com/s/b61d9jigbjj6h3m77rbpsgw6zdgy1mct



Key to the Highway:
https://app.box.com/s/sfjijzywem3gsw3nvrgg18s47zy79vx4



Jenny Everyday:
https://app.box.com/s/vtrmqo5z3svrhb6r4tnp9j7tcc6f9l6o



She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain:
https://app.box.com/s/04convflcq5ldjw2v8xtgf26jbfhe6kc