Robin D. G. Kelly's Thelonious Monk: The Life & Times of an American Original---to me one of the truly stellar jazz biogs.
Anything by David Hajdu; especially Billy Strayhorn: Lush Life and his biog on Nat Cole. (I've also corresponded w/him and he seems truly nice).
Frank Buchman-Moller's You Just Fight for Your Life---the Story of Lester Young. (All the Pres biogs are worth reading).
Art Pepper's autobiog (written with Laurie Pepper); and Miles (written with Quincy Troupe) are self-gratifying and hampered by loads of BS, but I've read them both numerous times. Pepper is a spellbinding raconteur, and his insight into other musicians' work is interesting to read (if his comments about his own 'genius' are slightly delusional). Miles talking about music has been great food for thought.
The Benson book was mentioned. One thing that cracked me up: some poetic justice. I knew Eddie Diehl for years, and he had a bug up his ass about Kenny Burrell. It had to do with a record date where he was sent home and replaced by Kenny b/c the company wanted a 'name'. He neither ever forgot nor stopped bad-mouthing Kenny's playing til it came out of your ears. I guess it's SOMEWHAT understandable. Eddie WAS one of the best, and a truly good-hearted guy underneath it all. We're all sensitive, and rejection---perceived or real---can really hurt.
Anyway, in George's book when he got the call to go with McDuff he was to replace Eddie. His comments---and they were respectful---were (paraphrasing): '(Eddie) was a formidable musician----not on the level of Kenny Burrell...., but he definitely could play'. Eddie was still alive when that came out. I hope he read it---it MAY have shut his mouth. I doubt it though---shutting Eddie's mouth about ANYTHING, especially guitar players he was jealous of (their stature in the biz, not their playing), was a tall order. But I had quite a chuckle over that one...
Hot pickups sound much better when the volume is rolled down, preferably way down. At least that's been my experience. But I have zero experience with either Jaguars or those pickups.
You can sometimes hear a slight difference between capacitors, but it's because they have slightly different values. No two capacitors of the same nominal value will have exactly the same...
It only has a couple of chords (the fancy part haha) and a break which is free (lol). It's been a while since I played along with that one (not a lot you can do here...not a lot of space to fill up....
I never thought about that, certainly a benefit playing jazz on solidbodies. I couldn't imagine playing without sustain, unless I was doing a strictly Charlie Christian/T-Bone Walker thing.
I have swapped magnets in a few pickups. First, it must be understood that there's more to a pickup than just the magnet. And there's more to a magnet than just the alloy, for example if the magnet...
I recently switched from A5/8.9k (both neck and bridge) to A2/7.2k (N) A2/8.3k (B) in my semi-hollow. The A5 pickups had a spikier/harder attach and a more scooped (i.e., more bottom and top, less...
Yeah Alnico 2 is usually warmer and creamier i.e "syrupy" and more mellow on the top end. Alnico 5 is usually a little more aggressive with more bite, but don't overthink it. The pickup design itself...
Interesting, though maybe trivial thing I just noticed, if you play with voicings a bit you can voice lead nearly an entire octave chromatic scale through the A section:
E-9/Bb7#5 (F#)
Eb-9 (F)...
Couple of reasons.... on my jazz box.... single notes just don't sustain that long. They fade and somewhat loose the feel, both harmonically and rhythmically of what I'm trying to play.
I've never compared them side to side but I was looking for a mellow Telecaster neck pickup a few years back, I settled on SD Alnico 2 pro. The alnico 2's had the reputation of having a softer treble...
Rag... most avoid notes are just labeled that way because that tend to destabilize or interfere with the Chord sound. They are not wrong.... they require different guidelines for basic vanilla usage.
that is pretty much what i play, except i go em9 a7 in the first bar. and Bb7b13 in bar10. the C7+ i sometimes treat as Ab7+ or quite often as Dbo. also instead of Dbmaj for 2 bars i again like Dbo...
Alnico 2 vs Alnico 5 tone
Today, 11:11 AM in Guitar, Amps & Gizmos