Little Fish playing Old Fashioned Morphine at the Drawingroom last night. It’s a new song (hence the music stand with lyrics!), but I think we nailed the vibe. It has a classic Velvet Underground-style feel to it, and it’s fun to play.

It’s rare (and useful for me) to hear the Hammond mixed this loud. I could hardly hear it on stage…

This is me playing Hammond with Little Fish at Reading festival. We headlined the BBC Introducing stage, and the videos are awesome! Innuendo is probably the most obviously Hammond-featuring song we play.

I’m in love with Cherry Wainer. I don’t think I’ve ever seen such a freaky performance. She rocks the Hammond, and delivers these weird grins every once in a while. Amazing.

eternautismos:

Cherry Wainer & Don Storer - Peter Gunn

I’d never heard of Cherry Wainer before, so I did a bit of research. There’s not much to go on (no Wikipedia page!), but there are a couple of other YouTube videos (from the same show by the look of it). One of them has Cherry playing a super-swung version of A Taste Of Honey. I know the Beatles version of the song from Please Please Me, because my brother and I used to think it was hilarious when we were kids and played it all the time. If you don’t know the Beatles version, listen to it first:

Then check out Cherry’s magic version. It may well blow your mind. And if you can’t hear the bass, get some headphones on. She’s playing that with her feet.

I need to find out more about this Cherry character. And I need to figure out how she gets that Hammond sound. Beautiful. ;)

Introducing the Hammond to Leeds festival. Little Fish headlined the BBC Introducing stage and we had a great gig, mostly because of the super-friendly crowd. ;)

BBC Hammond Organ 70th Birthday special (via analoghell)

A 10-minute documentary the BBC showed to celebrate 70 years of the Hammond. If you’re really into your organs, this is probably a bit lightweight for you, but I can’t get enough of Jon Lord talking about his Hammond sound.

Backstage at the Little Fish in-store gig at Rapture in Witney. Remember CDs?!

Juju had a new song she wanted to record, and all my amps and stuff were on loan to a friend, so I played the Hammond on my iPad. It’s not too difficult, and sounds pretty cool in this sort of recording setup. It’s also extremely convenient.

The app is called C3B3 Pocket Organ, and is the best thing ever. I’ll post some screenshots of the settings I used later for the geeks. ;)

Little Fish - You’d Better Tell God (acoustic kitchen version) (via JujuNez)

Sideman

I was reading Danny Barnes’ great blog post How To Make A Living Playing Music (which I recommend you read at least once a month if you’re serious about being a musician) and I picked up on the part where he talks about hiring sidemen:

you may not want to hire sidemen that get too worked up about money, it can be hard to make these folks happy. also when it comes to hiring musicians, you may have to live with them at arm’s length for a long time and be involved with them about emotional issues like money and life problems and stuff. you may want a person that’s easy to get along with even if they are a little less sharp musically. of course getting both is best, but if you have to take one or the other, take the one you get along with a little better.

It’s good advice, certainly, but that’s not what struck me. It was his use of the word sideman. Not session musician or band member. Sideman. I stopped and thought, “That’s me. I’m a sideman.”

A sideman sounds like someone who takes a certain pride in their job. A craftsperson who combines technical skill and musicianship with a willingness to play the supporting rôle, an enabler, a catalyst, a facilitator. I like the sound of that. As a Hammondista, that’s pretty much what I do musically too. I play parts that support and enhance the performance of the star players.

On the way to a recording session with Jont a couple of weeks ago, we were talking about how it’s important to accept yourself for what you are instead of always comparing yourself to others. I’m always thinking about how relatively crap I am as an artist (I can barely sing, I write silly songs, I rarely push myself to get gigs or record anything) and I ignore my ability to walk into a studio and create technically accomplished, sensitive and original piano and Hammond parts for a dozen songs I’ve barely heard before without blinking. I need to remember that I’m actually a pretty good sideman, and that it doesn’t matter that I’m not a good singer or violinist or astronaut or whatever.

It’s a fucking Hammond.

— Me (I don’t play the keyboard)

Focus - Focus 2 (Moving Waves) (via stevedr)

You’ll know Focus for their one bizarre novelty rock yodelling hit, Hocus Pocus. The rest of their stuff was more jazz-rock, but they were an insanely good live band. Thijs van Leer plays organ like a legend (you’ll also spot his flute sitting on top of the organ, just waiting for a solo…).

I want to make a video like this. It’s perfect. ;)