accordion - something depressingly rustic about it. I tend to stereotype it to polkas, or some French boulevardier honking away on it.
pan-flute - jeebus christ in the 80’s my Zamfir hate-on was legendary and gigantic.
bagpipes - even with a “Mac” prefix in my surname - fuck that shit. Did you hear that, Glen Healy?
harpsicord - sure, in a Bach composition, I can deal with it, but it sure ruined the Beatles’ “For No One”, making it sound totally precious and frou-frou.
recorder - the absolute worst dipshit solos in “Wild Thing” and Eric Carmen’s “Never Gonna Fall in Love Again”. (especially the latter…holy fuck-knuckles, Batman!)
What’s wrong with the pan-flute, and what’s wrong with Zamfir? Did you know he wrote a handful of neo-classical pieces? His Concerto for pan-flute is quite good, very worthy of the classical era.
At very least, tell us why you have this energetic hatred!
For instance, I don’t like rock&roll drums, especially in the “disco” variety, with the unceasing backbeat that never changes. Drums need some variability, some syncopation. When the drumming is so extremely regular that a machine could do it, it loses any possible charm.
For me, in particular, I find some sax solos in rock and jazz recordings mixed way too loud. (much louder, proportionately, than live) Just because it’s a lead instrument does not justify it getting mixed to the point of locomoting, sometimes, over everything else, making me turn it down.
Stevie Wonder’s “Boogie On Reggae Woman” - great, uplifting tune, whose engineer mixed the tenor(?) sax solo too loud, is a good example.
gosh - no drummer? In any genre?
Not even Karen Carpenter?
I was not aware of this - point taken.
Because I always found him so saccharine and shmaltsy new-agey feel-goody-woodyness, which might explain my toxic allergy to Windam Hill stuff.
Hearing that extra wind from Zamfir’s breath grates on me in a way that makes me turn into Vic Tayback. Those blown (as in breathed, not incorrect) notes come across to this listener, anyway, as pretentious, in an easing-you-to-sleep-on-a-cloud kinda way.
Totally agree on the disco stuff. Even if it’s some session god like Hal Blaine, I’m like - ok - I guess you earned the paycheck, Hal.
Yeah variability and syncopation makes it a lot more worthwhile for me too.
But…yes, I definitely see your point about the “over-breathing.” The sort of “whistling” of the air as it goes over the tops of the tubes.
To be fair, you sometimes hear this in flute music. It’s hard to play that kind of woodwind without losing some air pressure to the environment.
And, yeah, Zamfir sort of “sold out” and went new-age pop, instead of sticking with original neo-classical compositions. (Can’t blame him: he just followed the money.)
There are some specific effects that Wendy Carlos used to get out of the Moog synthesizer that made my skin crawl. I can’t describe them – she did astonishing things, and much of her work is jolly damn fun. But some of her effects creep the hell out of me.
In 1958, Tommy Edwards had the top hit of the year, “Its All kn the Game”, which was a remix of the same song he recorded seven years earlier. Mostly, they added drums. How did drums improve your awareness of the rhythm in this:
By the way, I didn’t say “no drums”, but try for a little subtlety and modulation.
You’re doing it wrong. Bagpipes are meant to be appreciated by hearing a lone piper standing on a rugged crag, far across a misty glen. The further away you are, the better they sound, approaching a limit where you can’t hear them at all, which is perfect.
Self-absorbed brass tends to irritate me. Those jazzy flares that some bands add to a song are just grating. Brass belongs on a football field or properly blended into a symphony.
That was a fine piece, indeed.
Also, he’s playing much faster notes than he is in his later stuff, so I don’t hear that “breathing” sound as much in the Allegro.
Sure, I realise there’s loss of air pressure with flutes and piccolos, but I think there’s a sizable difference that pushes the pan-flute over the brink, especially the latter’s notes that are longer, and more sustained. A flutist flautist? ex loved it and called it velvety. We didn’t discuss him too much. In Ian Anderson’s flute at times you could hear the breathy whistle thing. (which, in itself, he surely did for intended effect, at moments)
As Walter, yeah, in “A Clockwork Orange”, his vocoder-like vocal treatment of “Ode to Joy” (from Beethoven’s 9th) was all twerpy-gross, especially as dandyishly annoying Malcolm MacDowell struts like a douche through a record store, and Kubrick uses a bothersome wide angle lens while “Ode to Joy” is going off like it was off Niel Young’s “Trans”.
As Wendy, I preferred her stuff in “The Shining”, especially her ominous, opening score.
My awareness of rhythm didn’t require any improving for the '58 version - the drumless '51 version had a perfectly fine pace - no problem following it. However, I thought the drums in the '58 version were subtle enough, and not intrusive.
It’s not the instruments that annoy me as much as some arrangements. I don’t care for, I guess they were George Martin’s arrangements, the sound of the brass in The Beatles’ “Good Morning”, “Savoy Truffle”, or “Got To Get You Into My Life”. It’s too much “In Your Face” for me. Yet, I like the brass in Wilson Pickett’s “Midnight Hour”, The Blues Brothers (with John Belushi), The David Bromberg Band, and of course, The Louisiana Gator Boys.
Yes, the recorder seems very out of place in Rock, but in a difficult to find James Taylor cover of "Johnny Has Gone For A Soldier"one sounds very nice playing a low part while a pennywhistle and violin duet around a higher part.
I don’t know how the harpsichord got involved with Rock music, but it probably was a mistake. It may have started with The Yardbird’s “For Your Love”, (which led Clapton to leave the group) but it hung around for a while especially on the bubblegum/psychedelic sides. There may have been some practical reasons for its popularity, though. They’re a lot smaller and lighter to transport than a real piano, sounded brighter than the Wurlitzer and Rhodes electric pianos available at that time, and maybe less challenging to mic than a full piano also. On the other hand, it was perfect with George Harrison’s “Piggies”.
Bagpipes? Well, they’ve got quite a limited repertoire, don’t they? It’s those drones, I think. I believe for a D set, the drones are tuned D A D. If they could add another drone pipe, tune it to G, and come up with some way to switch between the A and the G drones, they’d at least have the I and the IV chords going for them.
Respect for the fragility of both vinyl records and tone arm stylii has been so ingrained in me that hearing someone messing about and physically touching the record or the tone arm while the disc is being played sends me into a rage.
Let me give you an example. “You’ve Got it All” by The Jets – way, way over-drummed and over-saxed, spoiling a beautiful song by a very talented singer.
Yeah, the drums in there are fine, early rock and roll drums. The reverb in the newer version is what slightly bugs me. Then again, I love drums (though in this case, the drumless version works great, with a different vibe than the rock n roll one.)
