AGAs, Dirtboxes, Emergency G-strings

“The AGA, she is dead. The eggs, they will not scramble. This breakfast, she is not working. Le poopie.”

This morning, in countries all over the world, my friends of the facebook persuasion were greeted by this mournful statement. Messages of sympathy and condolence rushed in, with offers to mail scrambled eggs from near and far (mostly far, which is why I didn't go for it), expert tips on the alternatives of eating scrambled eggs (to wit, not eating scrambled eggs, which isn't an option I'm prepared to entertain) and in one case (Barra) a full and comprehensive list of links of where to buy all the things I need to make and eat scrambled eggs without the use of a static cooking apparatus. Thanks Barra. Through the tears and the heart-wrenching moans, it struck me that some of you may not understand how someone can develop such a strong symbiotic relationship with a cooker. It's very simple, but to be properly fathomed, it requires a little history lesson. Please note that, over the course of my research, there have been several areas where information has not been forthcoming, interesting, or both. I have therefore used by own common sense to fill in the blanks

AGAs. They're an interesting breed. Paleontologists have found fossil evidence to suggest that great herds of AGA once traveled the plains and grasslands of Sweden. They were briefly hunted for their horns, but man's interest in these dwindled when it was realized they don't have any, and there was much awkward shuffling of feet. Sometime between 1322 and 1911, a male and female AGA were presented to the King and Queen of England by a naturalist and confirmed hanky-pankyist. The pair promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground. Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, maybe you can hire the A-Team and slowly populated the British Isles with their progeny, and the modern AGA was born. In stark contrast to its distant ancestor, this modern AGA was a solitary and slow-moving exothermic creature. Mindful of the whole 'horn' debacle, they avoided humans (cos you just don't forget that shit), and humans, being generally a bit embarrassed about the episode in question, pretty much left them to their own devices.

This peaceful co-existence was brought to a big ol' cock of an end when scrambled eggs were invented by Sir Joshua Scramble (who also invented the popular past-time Chicken-On-A-Trampoline on the very same day... the talented scallywag). When it emerged that these great hulking gentle giants were best for scrambling eggs, they were mercilessly hunted throughout the countryside. Typically, a highly paid mercenary (known for some reason as a Matthew-Of-The-Hidden-Valley, and later, simply as an Aga-man) would spot a wild AGA and alert his employers, who would build a house around the poor creature and then move in. It's a common misconception that the house comes first and the AGA is later installed; a gross disrespect to the noble animal in question. Subscribing to the tenet of 'Location, location, location', an Aga-man, a team of builders and the eventual home-owners would sometimes follow an AGA nonstop for months until it reached a suitable south-facing location.

For the discerning cook, the AGA is an ideal pet. In exchange for a modest diet of oil or gas, the AGA will cook your food, boil your water, and heat the kitchen. They require little in the way of cleaning up and training. My efforts to take ours for a walk has, to date, been largely fruitless, but I shall persevere. The total inability to increase or decrease the amount of heat provided instigated the 'It'll Be Ready When It's Fecking Ready!' school of culinary design. Research shows that AGAs introduced into the wild has a hard time adjusting, especially the red ones. It's important to remember how dependent we are on one another, ever more so in April which, as we all know, is Hug An AGA Month. So take time out of your busy schedule to hug an AGA, then bask, as I do, in the worried faces of concerned family and friends.

... anyway...

Music is also going well. The Easter bank holiday was a finger-bruising affair of four One Horse Pony gigs unceremoniously stuffed into three days, mentioned in my last post as 'PonyFest' The final night was a bluesy marathon of two 2-hour shows played back to back; first our weekly acoustic session, followed by a midnight show in another venue. Luckily, some friends were on hand to help us out at the session, and knowing that we were very much under the gun, took over some of the singing duties to spare our lovely voices (...), and in general kept us perked up and playing well. It was well and truly a helter-skelter blast of a weekend.

The excitement didn't end with the long weekend. The Fast.Like.Fun track 'Good Girls With Bad Dreams' was played on national radio and the DJ gave us a lovely shout-out. Happy days! I'm also happy to report that all that mucking around I did with my pedalboard has paid off! Not only is my rig free from unwanted buzz and hum, I'm also happy to welcome back one of my favorite pedals back into the fold; the EHX Big Muff Pi with Tone Wicker! This particular version of the Muff is essentially the same old dirtifier used since the dawna'time, but with a switchable top boost (which can be handy sometimes) and the ability to take the tone stack out of the circuit (which is handy ALL THE TIME). Flicking that little switch brings on a huge volume boost, crystal highs and lovely tight lows. It really shows you how much a passive tone stack takes away from mids, and depending on the EQ of the amp, will make every other hatebox sound thin and/or muffled by comparison. Thing is though, I haven't been using it, as I thought the facility to power it off the mains was kaputt (and I dislike using batteries). Turns out I was using it with a power supply that wasn't giving it enough juice. A quick rearrangement of power supplies has seen me reunited with my favorite distortion pedal, causing me to do all kinds of happy dances. I must say however, that the Boss DS-1 deserves an honourable mention here, as it proved a fine substitute while the Muff and I weren't talking, and it'll stay on my board, both as a standby and as it has a significantly different texture to to the Muff.

So what else is new...? Last monday at the session, I experimented (due to necessity as much as curiosity) with using a G-string (huh huh huh shuddup) an octave higher than usual. In a moment of horror, I realized (erroneously as it happens) that I didn't have a spare G to replace the one I had just snapped. Acting purely on instinct (and alcohol), and with deftness of hand (and alcohol), I slapped on a .012 gauge, generally used as the high E, and tuned it up an octave higher than a G normally would be. The result was surprisingly excellent! It gave a lovely shimmery 12-string effect in the midrange. I encourage all you guitar players to get good and drunk and then give it a go. It makes lead work a bit pants, but it provides a lovely textural difference to chord work. I'm giving serious thoughts to re-stringing one of my acoustics and tuning it to 'Nashville tuning', which is essentially standard tuning, but raised either one or two octaves (depending on the string). Summit to fink about anyway...

Anyway, enjoy the rest of Hug An AGA Month, guys. Here's hoping it'll be the best HAAM yet. Mmmmh, ham...

More to come guys

Much love and thanks for reading :-)

R

PS Just to clear things up a bit, the AGA is fine. It just needs a service. More on this story as it develops. Here's Tom with the weather.

Reflections on Kitchens, FLF, Time Warp, PonyFest

60^th birthday last night. Not mine, o' course. Only knew a handful of people there and, as is the way of these things, I was the youngest there, bar a very young lamb (and lambs are generally pretty young to begin with) who was inexplicably to be found in the Old Kitchen. The party took place in a beautiful big old house in the country; the kind of place that warrants an Old Kitchen that everyone uses, and a New Kitchen, where nobody wants to touch anything or learn how to use the trendy new kettle. On completion of the New Kitchen however, the people who own the house (with admirable foresight) totally stripped the Old Kitchen of the trappings of Kitchenhood (probably not a word), making the New Kitchen just The Kitchen, and everyone's just going to have to come to terms with the New Kettle, hereafter The Kettle.

My musings on the subject got me through that initial 'I don't know anyone here' period, but duty called after a while, and it was time to introduce myself, not as the guy who had spent the last half hour running between the New Kitchen and the Old Kitchen, pointing at kettles and giggling uncontrollably, but instead as charming young Rob, always ready with a smile, a helping hand, and witty retorts that, on balance, would have sounded fantastic about five minutes previous, and would have made everyone laugh. Ah well.

This week is gonna be a bit crazy. Fast.Like.Fun are in action on Thursday night, supporting a really cool band called Fred. Fred also happens to be my father's nickname in school (he's one of those educator types), so he was quick to point out that, on hearing I was supporting Fred, this was a welcome change since Fred had supported me long enough. Much huh huh huh-ing ensued. After my midweek dose of rock, it'll be acoustic skullduggery all the way for the weekend. One Horse Pony are in action on Saturday and Sunday in the Franciscan Well on top of our usual Monday session, after which we'll be hightailing it across town to play the midnight show in the Crane Lane. Thank God, Buddha, Zeus and feckin Yoda we'll have a PA for Saturday and Sunday, cos if we were playing unplugged (and more importantly, unmic'ed) the normal dulcet angelic quality of my voice (huh) would be reduced to the thin reedy squawk of a primitive string bowed instrument being inexpertly played by a young yak. Yeah. That sound. Even at that, I'll have to take it easy at the Monday night session.

Thankfully, after the Jan/Feb Slump of Doom and Destruction, things are beginning to pick up. The prevailing wisdom in this part of the world is that St. Patrick's Day reminds people that having fun is nice, so gigs are beginning to trickle in, crowds are growing (and not in the gaining weight way) and people are starting to ask about guitar lessons again. Excellent stuff altogether!

Sorry, sorry sorry sorry sorry

I started writing this entry last Sunday. It is now Saturday. See, I told you it was gonna be a mental week. Fast.Like.Fun show the other night was a blast! I think we gave a pretty good account of ourselves. Among the crowd were a whole bunch of people I hadn't seen in far too fecking long, such as acoustic heartbreaker Sea Moose and former Alamo Bandit (my blues-rock 3 piece) bass players The Goose and Mowgli. Like me, they're also alumni of the Howling Dead of The Confederate Army, a shortlived blues-rock supergroup that got together in the New Bar in UCC for a jam, and were asked to be the house band after 3 songs. 

Yesterday I tried desperately to remember what I used to do for fun on a friday night before I was allowed to buy alcohol (The sale of alcohol is illegal on Good Friday... Yoda wouldn't have put up with this). If memory serves (and at this point, you're probably aware that I'm not the most cerebral of individuals) I think cartoons were involved. So that's what I did, with a side order of colouring thrown in for good measure. Staying in the lines and everything!

Another upshot of the weird time jump that occurred at the start of the last paragraph is that 'this weekend' has become 'now'. Meaning that PonyFest is upon us. For the next three nights, you'll be able to catch One Horse Pony in our regular spot in the Franciscan Well, strumming things, hitting things, blowing things (huh huh huh shuddup), singing at things, drinking things and plucking things; all to introduce some Stomp into what's already going to be a thoroughly excellent weekend. The beer festivals in the Well are legendary. For two or three days, beer connoisseurs flock (or whatever the term for the habitual locomotion for a beer connoisseur is) together to experience the bar's own award winning brews, as well as those of most of the other brewers in the country. And we'll be right in the middle of it.

I know what you're thinking Do we have the necessary self control to play three gigs in the presence of the best beer in the country and not get completely rat-arsed? Do we have the professional comportment and self respecting bearing to do our job in a clean, sober and efficient way? These are very real concerns, but put you're mind at rest. We don't. No fecking question about it. This is probably the last time I'll be able to pronounce 'connoisseur' (not to mind spelling it) for the next few days, so I might as well make the most of it; connoisseur... connoisseur... connoisseur... connoisseur...

In actual fact, the desire to do a good job, and our thorough love of playing together will keep us away from temptation (within reason of course...)

Thanks for reading, guys. Might see some of you over the weekend :-)

laters

R

OHP gig, Rory, the etiquette of peeing oneself

I always forget! I mean, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the sharpest cornflake in the toolshed, but surely something that crops up every year and lasts over two months is likely to make an impression. In my defense, it hardly happened at all last year. Still though...

I am referring of course to the January/Febuary slump that hits musicians (and everyone else) every year with the force of a hurled plaster bust of Seth McFarlane, with approximately the same comedic effect, which is to say, no comedic effect. Luckily, the early months of a fledgling 2013 have been peppered with lovely gigs that, if not keeping my pockets jingling (which reminds me, has anyone seen my keys?), are certainly keeping a smile on my face and whatever orifice the body uses to store artistic pride full of same. Last week saw Fast.Like.Fun get in the Funmobile (it's actually a red Transit van) and head to Waterford for a gig in a lovely little venue called Murphy's (just opposite the bus station if you're in the area). All and sundry had a great time. Ohio the OHP cello-meister came up to see us, in the company of his mother and sister who are over from the States visiting their no-good son/ ne'er-do-well brother. I also had a chance to catch up with some friends from college, which was long overdue, and really added to the friendly atmosphere of the gig.

Another rockin rollicking good time was had last wednesday, when One Horse Pony finally played a gig in the Crane Lane. You've heard me talking about the place many times at this stage. It's a place I've been playing for years with various different bands. Last wednesday's performance could well have been my favorite performance there to date. The difference between the youtube clips I sent the booking agent (clips which are over a year old) and the band that we have become is profound. The visual difference is as good as any to illustrate just how much we've grown. The clip featured meself, Badger, Harmonica Niall and a guest drummer dishing it out goodo. Plenty of energy, good music and much shape-throwing to get the crowd into the spirit of things. By comparison, the band that played on Wednesday featured guitars, harmonica, bodhran (the lovely Irish traditional drum made from dead animal), cello, low whistle and harmonica (courtesy of Kev, our new brother-in-arms). Seated in a horseshoe shape rather than standing, but still giving out goodo and relying solely on the music to speak for itself and get people going was the order of the day. It worked. Five-part harmonies? More or less, yeah! We were lucky to be playing to a large crowd (who wasted no time in showing off their excellent dancing abilities), and we were well-rehearsed, tight and comfortable. But you know what? Excellent performances from everyone, a great crowd, a happy venue, a few fluff-ups that made us giggle and every other facet that makes a great gig great will forever be eclipsed in my memory by what happened after the gig.

So let me set the scene. The bouncers are clearing everyone out. We're all hanging out at the back of the smoking section close to the cigarette machine and the toilets, having a well deserved cigarette and a bit of communal back-patting session (that sounds bad, but isn't). A girl, having dodged the army of eight foot bouncers, made her way towards us and started talking what can best be described as gibberish. Fair enough, we go along with it and whole-heartedly concur with all the bits we can understand, and generally agree that yes, on balance her boyfriend is a twat, her friends are an awful shower, and, all things considered, her shoes ARE very nice. She then unceremoniously pissed herself.

The tomes of social etiquette are silent on what to do in this situation. Naturally if the person in question looks justifiably mortified, you assure him/her that these things happen to the best of us, and they're among friends. If it happens to be a very pretty girl doing the peeing, I (being the chivalrous type) might even pee my own pants in solidarity and sympathy. That's not quite true, but a little giggle-inducing to think about. The girl in question however, did not look shocked or embarrassed, but instead comported herself as you would stubbing out a cigarette or checking the time; a perfectly understandable reason for briefly stopping the flow of conversation, and best done quickly and efficiently, so as not to delay the chat. I took this opportunity to make an exit, owing to a deep-seated belief that incontinence is contagious.

Fast.Like.Fun were in operation last night supporting Irish metal heavyweights Time Is A Thief. We had a great gig with a great response from the attending rawkers *devil horns rock gesture thing* but it was the second time in as many gigs I've had a glaringly bad 'pedalboard malfunction' which is a little like a wardrobe malfunction, but with marginally less nipple. At the crucial time, instead of hitting the 'makey-louder' pedal I accidentally pressed the 'mutey-poo' one. These are technical terms. Yep, still not brightest bridge in the box, but now I have an excuse to spend a few hours industriously mucking about with my pedalboard. I can positively feel the envy radiating off you.

On a slightly strange note, I just realized (mostly because facebook just told me) that it's Rory Gallagher's birthday today. Being from his hometown, and a blues-rocker at heart, I'm a tremendous fan of Rory, spent many an hour learning some of his solos note for note (or so I thought at the time... I was but a young'un) and cut my teeth in a blues bar founded in his honour. In that blues bar, I first performed in public and, especially significantly today, fronted a band for the first time, on Rory's birthday. That would have been this day six years ago. Teehee. It's coming up to 9pm at time of writing, and it doesn't take a colossal leap of imagination to think of my younger self completely shitting it, half an hour away from playing a gig with my first full blues band. It went pretty well as I recall. At some stage I'll sit down and write an entry about Rory. He's certainly a guy worth talking about. For now, happy birthday Rory! You're missed.

That's all for the moment, guys. I'm off to play a game of Hunt The Keys.

Thanks for reading. More to come :-)

R

1926, FLF show, OHP recording session, Balanced breakfast.

“Four score and seven years ago...”

When someone starts with this, you know shit just got real...

*ahem*

“Four score and seven years ago...”

Gettysburg, wasn't it?

Anyway...

“Four score and seven years ago...”

Look, being honest, I don't have bearded notion what was happening 87 years ago. This little Lincolnian device was meant to add a certain gravitas to my first buh-log of 2013, and it really hasn't panned out. So let's see what Jimmy Whales has to say about this. According to Wikipedia, 1926 began on a friday. In the proceeding twelve months, Fascism features heavily in the news, Mussolini survives two separate assassination attempts, and the average Cool factor per capita on planet Earth is substantially increased with the births of Miles Davis (with whom I share a birthday, but not THAT birthday), Marilyn Monroe and John Coltrane. Other notable births include Hugh Heffner and Mel Brooks. A Dick Dale was born. This Dick Dale, however, was not THE Dick Dale. Just A Dick Dale. Well done, 1926. Not bad at all for a small-town year that began on a Friday.

Moving on...

Four score and seven years ago, or more accurately, 11 months ago, I took to the stage in one of Cork's more prestigious venues with Keith and Barra to play a short support slot for our friends Senakah. This band had rehearsed twice, had four songs, and no name. 11 months later (that's last Wednesday), having released an EP and three videos, having garnered over 10,000 youtube views, and gained a whole heap of new friends and fans, played a bunch of shows, and with national radio-play and offers to tour internationally well and truly in the bag, Fast.Like.Fun (oh yeah, we picked up a name along the way too) returned to the Crane Lane Theatre to play our own show.

And? And??? It went wonderfully! We pulled in a massive crowd (far bigger than I expected, and it wasn't like I was being overly pessimistic), got everyone dancing, and got a great review from an online tv station (I'm not actually sure what that is, but the young people assure me it's what all the cool kids are doing). Maybe I'm being a little overly dramatic about it, and I'm not altogether sure if I can explain the way I feel about it, but it felt like a landmark gig. I suppose it just book-ends the last year (give or take) of Fast.Like.Fun-related hijinx nicely, with us returning to our first stage, this time with a full set and a full house of people who know and like (hopefully) the music. I suppose the gig last Wednesday is the end of the first chapter in the FLF story (a raunchy and exciting tale of questionable grammatical integrity) The first chapter of many, I might add :-)

The shows in the Crane run pretty late (pretty late for Ireland anyway). I was on stage for 1am, off by 2am and gratefully collapsing into my bed at 4am. A leisurely three hours later the alarm went off and out of bed I stumbled in preparation for the penultimate recording session for the One Horse Pony album. I've long been in the habit of setting my alarm clock ridiculously early in these situations, simply because I know that these early-mornings-after-late-nights are fraught with all manner of confusion and accidents of the porridge-in-hair-instead-of-gel variety. After only three minutes of methodical experimentation, I managed to unlock the front door and, benefitting greatly from the balanced breakfast trickling down the back of my neck, off I toddled into town.

We set ourselves a timetable which, at best, could be described as rigorous for the day's recording. Over the course of the ten hour session we wrapped up the last guitar parts and Badger's vocals, unleashed the Meerkat and his Low Whistle of Destiny (+5 to Dexterity, +8 to Groove) on our take on the Robert Johnson classic Last Fair Deal, kazoo'd some kazoo, laid down some seriously soulful backing vocals, and even found the time to knock out some handclaps (or 'claps' as they're commonly known...) on some of the tracks. Handshakes (and accompanying winces) ensued, and we made our way back West, thoroughly exhausted, but satisfied at a job well done. Big shout-out to Jenny Mac, a stunning singer based in San Francisco who happened to be back in Ireland. She added a lovely country vibe to the backing vocals on a song of mine called 'Blue When I Go'. There are some photos of the session to be found on the One Horse Pony facebook page (link waaaay over there on the right), so take a look, leave a comment and/or engage the Blue Thumb of Approval on anything that takes your fancy. I've got to say, the more I listen to the album, the more I love it. I can't wait for you guys to hear it! 

Life remains sweet. The Hound and I have start running again after a sedentary winter. Let the local poultry population beware! I continue to be surrounded by (and at times, propped up by) wonderful people, and 2013 promises to be a good'un. A bit late, I suppose, but I wish all of you a happy new year, and sincerely hope that it's happy, productive, and filled with love, laughter, good friends, good food and good music.

Thanks for reading guys, more to come :-)

Later

R