Visualsssssssssssssss

Real quick post, though there isn't much one needs to say about these guys: 2010 DCI (Drum Corps International, for ya'll newcomers) champs the Blue Devils of Concord, CA. Have a look at their awards list; basically they win everything, a lot. This is a neat camera view of the drumline warming up in the lot with some tremendously cool stick tricks, and call me a nerd but I'm diggin' the uniforms:

Geeking out on drumlines

Alright I missed a post yesterday, but that was really because I spent most of the day doing what the title of this post suggests. So now I'm ready to unload several videos for the nerd drummer in you.

First one is the Santa Clara Vanguard from 2004 doing what the Internet tells me is Murray Gusseck's version of a popular cadence, pre-show warm-up thing they do called Double Beat. It's pretty much water-tight.



MP3 of the full thing from 2004

And here's the 2009 Santa Clara Vanguard doing a slightly different version:



Annnnnd the 2009 Cadets looking really cocky but, you know, being incredible so sure why not? Be cocksure. (If you're not familiar, there's a whole kind of messy and convoluted underbelly to the drum corps world, and sometimes drumming in general. Certain stereotypes do exist for a reason. It's hard to even really begin to describe. I'm not trying to say these Cadets are jerks or anything; that would be stupid, I've never met them. It's really just one or two guys that look the part; there's always that one guy.

But there is definitely pressure from day 1 of drumline camp to basically be a cocky asshole. It's weird, and I don't feel like getting knee deep in it right now, possibly sometime later. I've been fortunate enough to have some phenomenal percussion instructors, two in particular from elementary through high school. But I've played in drumlines with some interesting people, people you sometimes want to shake or slap their foreheads and explain the reality that most of the world could care less that you can play like 240+ hybrid rudiments and thinks you're a complete nerd for thinking that's cool.)

But, yeah, the video - the Cadets really are incredible here (and so are the equipment dudes in the background in matching "uniforms" of bare chest and blue shorts):



And finally this one's fantastic for two tiny things. The center snare drops his stick at 00:10, and the judge picks it up and throws it back to him! But while you're watching that happen, you're likely missing the poor horn player who face plants at 00:19.

ODaD: "the percussion just raped my mind"

The above youtube comment sounds violent and unpleasant, but I promise you Chris Ward's drumming is definitely not the latter. Though I suppose if you'd stood where this cameraperson was standing you'd probably feel like yer mind had just been R'd:



Chris Ward is the bespectacled, bearded man in Pattern Is Movement and is probably tired of being referred to as such, but it's Tuesday and my own personal mind has been getting R'd all day with end of the month work stuff so...alright you don't care, I don't care, I'll stop.

Chris is a phenomenal, powerhouse drummer with the feel of a gazelle in its prime. Or maybe an impala, I think I saw one of those on a Planet Earth re-run the other night. It didn't get away from the lion. And Chris was the lion. Wait. Ok, another video!



That most youtube comments about these guys fall somewhere along the lines of "drummer is sick" or "man, drummer is a beast" should not be a surprise.

One drummer a day: Antonio Sanchez

So...this next drummer...Antonio Sanchez. I'm really not even sure how to articulate, other than to say that he's so good it hurts. I've been fortunate enough to see him live with Pat Metheny four times. The first time I had this grand idea of interviewing Antonio after the show for my college newspaper, but couldn't come up with anything but "What planet are you from?" and so I never mustered up the courage to approach him. In the vid below there's a point where the camera focuses on Metheny waiting in the wings during the drum solo and even he can't believe what he's watching. That's how good Mr. Sanchez is.

One drummer a day: Frankie Dunlop

In an effort to make sure I keep posting stuff and writing, I'm going to try to post a little video or audio clip of some of my favorite drummers, one a day if at all possible (on weekends all bets are off, but you never know).

So let's get going with the man behind the kit for Thelonious Monk: Frankie Dunlop. Though Dunlop also played with Duke Ellington, Sonny Rollins, Lionel Hampton, Maynard Ferguson, and by the time he retired in 1984 he'd played on about 100 or more albums. Check out this solo from a Monk set in Belgium, would have been sometime between 1960-64 I think:



So awesomely musical, and tells a solid story in that solo. And don't you get the impression, watching him play with such joy, that he's just a genuinely nice and approachable guy?

Good Eats, Good People: Highland Kitchen, Somerville, MA

A few years ago my friend Andrew and I played a very small, very empty show at a brand new place on Highland Ave in Somerville called Madison's on the Ave. This show is memorable for a few reasons: one being that it was pretty much completely empty except for our very patient, very kind lady-friends (yet the manager of the place still paid us something like $100), and another reason being that the aforementioned manager was not exactly a nice person. I particularly remember him giving me a ridiculously hard time about needing some kind of rug on which to place my drums or else I was going to tear up his nice new hardwood floor with my drums sliding all over creation. There were several rugs in other areas of the very empty restaurant.

Anyway, Madison's didn't last more than a year at best and I wasn't surprised. Running a restaurant on bad vibes and mediocre food isn't going to get you very far. Fast-forward to the present and Madison's is now the Highland Kitchen and, presumably, under new management. Last week my lady and I walked up and the place was packed. Somehow we stole some seats at the bar while we waited for a table (and didn't wait more than 20 mins) and ordered the Devils on Horseback, which -- just please get up and go there now and eat them, stop reading. If you're not familiar, Devils on Horseback are giant dates, stuffed with some real gnarly (aka great) blue cheese and probably lots of other cool things, wrapped in bacon. See the very dark photo above taken by candlelight at our table . I believe they get baked, though maybe they were grilled? I don't know and I don't think I really care; they were in my belly in a heartbeat. My friends Amy & Bryan made these once filled with goat cheese, which was also incredible.

So for dinner I had the buttermilk friend pork chops with garlic mashed potatoes, a ham hoc gravy, and smoky collards. All delicious and buttermilky (mmm), really my only complaint was that the pork chops were a tiny bit too dry, though honestly it wasn't that big of a deal because they were still delicious. Julie had the special, which was a grilled Sea Bass that was just a tiny bit over-blackened for our tastes, but the inside was lush and perfectly cooked .

But here comes the best part. We're kind of slow eaters, and as our dinner went on several tables on either side of us opened up. We'd just finished up dinner and had ordered a banana bread pudding with vanilla ice cream to split for dessert when the manager gently touched my shoulder and asked, with a pained expression, if we wouldn't mind moving two tables over so they could push a couple other tables together for a bigger party. I said sure thing, no problemo, and then he offered to buy our dessert. "But of course," I said, though he really didn't need to. And so while we were eating the dessert (about which I think I really only need to say man oh man oh man, but I really love banana bread, reminds me of mom's cookin' oh man!) our waitress brought over two glasses of sherry on the house, still apologizing for the table swap thing. The only thing that sort of concerns me about this is whether I was correctly projecting my inner feelings, which were that it was no big deal to have moved tables. Did I scowl or something? I don't think I did.

Anyway, really good people, really good food, everybody wins. Check out the Highland Kitchen.

Good Reads: J. Robert Lennon

J. Robert Lennon is relatively new to me; the first thing I read was this excellent short story in the Paris Review this past Spring. So I was hooked after that and did the most logical thing I could think of, which was to devour two of his books this Summer. Literally eat them. I hang-glided to the Porter Sq Book Store and picked up his 2004 novel Mailman, and also his most recent novel Castle. Both books are well-crafted with unique (uniquenewyork) characters, yet they're written in such drastically distinct voices that you wouldn't be a complete moron for assuming they were written by two different authors.

I am not at all a fan of book reviews giving away plot details, so I'm not going to tell you anything. Besides, I think people can tend to trust other people's opinions too often. In fact this isn't really even a review, it's more of a demand. I demand of you to read either of these books, preferably both. And I'd humbly suggest opening Mailman first, but you're an adult - you can do whatever you want.