From: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org (precious-things-digest) To: precious-things-digest@smoe.org Subject: precious-things-digest V12 #32 Reply-To: precious-things@smoe.org Sender: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-precious-things-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk X-To-Unsubscribe: Send mail to "precious-things-digest-request@smoe.org" X-To-Unsubscribe: with "unsubscribe" as the body. precious-things-digest Sunday, May 6 2007 Volume 12 : Number 032 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: Fw: [pt] american doll posse [handal@r2d2.reverse.net (Richard Handal] Re: Fw: [pt] american doll posse [e m ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Fri, 4 May 2007 23:06:59 -0400 (EDT) From: handal@r2d2.reverse.net (Richard Handal) Subject: Re: Fw: [pt] american doll posse Tony wonders, along with the rest of us, about guitar parts on the tour: > I've been thinking ever since Caton left that there's been a HUGE hole > in her live performances between the Bosendorfer, drums and bass. All three of them--Tori, Jon, and Matt--have made disparaging comments about the guitar occupying the same part of the sonic spectrum as the piano, or some such complete nonsense. (Ref Piece By Piece and various interviews.) I agree with you, Tony: the band concerts to me have been lacking since Caton hasn't been with them. He was *never* in the way. That was part of his genius. He would play textural things underneath the piano, and then when appropriate, he played parts *against* the piano in the most wonderfully engaging, conversational manner. He would switch back and forth between the two all the time, and it was always spot on. His guitar sounds never had the same timbre as the piano, nor any other keyboard. Just because some of the same frequencies are played by the piano and guitar simultaneously doesn't mean they occupy the same sonic *space*. It don't work that way. (I'm not gonna teach a class on this here. You're welcome. Anyone interested in more can read Auditory Scene Analysis [Cambridge, MA:MIT Press. 1990.] by A. S. Bregman. It's 800 pages long. And good luck to ya.) I think it's clear that all bridges between Tori and Caton have been burned, and I can't imagine him coming back. And the idiot and disparaging comments about the guitar occupying the same portion of the audio spectrum as the piano apply to every guitar, not just Caton's. So if they really believe that crap, any guitarist would be in the way. If they hire another guitarist, they've as much as admitted they were full of it when they complained about Caton's guitar being in the way. Tori mentioned in a recent interview the Mick Ronson-like guitar part in Digital Ghost, and a review of ADP compared some of the guitar sound to Brian May. Both were major influences on Caton's guitar style, and with all of that along with the bent of a few songs, including Digital Ghost, I feel that Caton has been ripped-off, mocked, and generally dissed. I also find the Mac Aladdin thing in general to be vewwy kweepy. Last night on Letterman and this morning on Regis, Jon stopped playing bass long enough to play guitar breaks on a small pedal steel setup on a high stand to his left. Tori said in an interview not many weeks ago that they were still trying to figure out what to do about this on the tour. If Jon not playing bass long enough to play short guitar breaks on a pedal steel is how they end up doing the whole tour, I find that to be lacking in the extreme. One hopes they manage to figure out a better fix for this before hitting the concert stage. Quite bizarre. They seem to me likely to be haunted by the digital ghost of their own making. > A guitar would be a very welcome addition in my opinion. I agree, on a theoretical basis, but what about the specifics? They've been using a lot of Caton's guitar sound, especially that edgy Schecter Tele, in Mac Aladdin's parts since they've been doing it (him?), and they're getting better at it. So who do they hire to play guitar with them on the road? Someone who *also* sounds a lot like Caton? Digital Ghost was one of the first songs I heard from this album, and my instant reaction was that it sounded--not just the guitar part, but the overall sound of the song, the phrasing, and the vocal delivery--one hell of a lot like the wonderful Memory Burn album Caton played on a few years ago, particularly the first track, Time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Life_Of_Its_Own Color me incredulous and upset. (TBoneCop? You inspect meat, Tony?) Be seeing you, Richard Handal, H.G. (But how do I *really* feel?) ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 5 May 2007 09:46:26 -0700 (PDT) From: e m Subject: Re: Fw: [pt] american doll posse i thought that jon was gonna do both bass & guitar stuff and matt may help out with some computer programmed bass stuff or something...but i could be wrong... Tony F wrote: Tom xxxxx wrote: "Have we confirmed that she is touring without a guitar player? If ever one of her tours needed one this would be it. Also, she said something in the WNYC Soundcheck interview today that made me think she might have a guitar player on board." Gosh I hope so!!! I've been thinking ever since Caton left that there's been a HUGE hole in her live performances between the Bosendorfer, drums and bass. A guitar would be a very welcome addition in my opinion. It just might help me get really excited to see her in concert again, considering my level of disappointment has risen steadily over the last several tours. Tony What's more likely? That an all-powerful mysterious god created the universe and then decided not to give any proof of his existence? Or, that he simply doesn't exist at all? And that we created him so that we wouldn't have to feel so small and alone. - Jodie Foster, Contact Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com - --------------------------------- Ahhh...imagining that irresistible "new car" smell? Check outnew cars at Yahoo! Autos. ------------------------------ End of precious-things-digest V12 #32 *************************************