Crazy drummer

Not sure who to laugh at - the drummer or the MC…

Vic Chesnutt - dead at 45

Shocking news from the New York Times in the obituaries.

Vic Chesnutt, who I saw perform at the San Francisco Bathhouse last July died of an overdose of muscle relaxants.

According to the notice he had attempted suicide several times and failed. The day before Christmas in 2009 he succeeded.

Vic Chesnutt was a great singer songwriter. Confined to a wheelchair since the age of 18 when a car accident left him paralysed he relearnt the guitar by playing only the easy chords. His simple melodies wrapped themselves around witty and sometimes complex lyrics - often with an apparent sense of humour.

His songs have been performed by many big acts: REM, Madonna, The Indigo Girls and Smashing Pumpkins.

The financial burden of having to pay for his medical treatment seemed to have played a part in his depression. This prolific songwriter will be sadly missed.

Justin Townes Earle at Bar Bodega

From not wanting to go, to dragging my sorry arse out of the house I was glad I did - Justin Townes Earle was fantastic.

He played a huge range of musical styles, alone, just him and his guitar. From swampbilly rock, to western swing, to hillbilly there were shades of his father’s voice, and even particular mannerisms - that “bending over and holding his head on the side” thing that he does.

He’s a prolific performer. Malcolm Gladwell has that Outlier theory that people need to do 10,000 hours to get really really good at whatever they do well. With the number of gigs that Earle has done Malcolm Gladwell’s hypothesis stacks up beautifully.

Here’s a video that I shot of Justin’s second to last song. Enjoy.

United breaks guitars

While I’m in the mood for revealing bad customer service here’s a doozy that slipped by me. (Thanks G forpointing it out.)

Dave Carroll, a musician from Halifax flew United Airlines to Nebraska where his band, Sons of Maxwell were playing gigs all week.

After the plane landed Dave looked out his window to see the baggage handlers tossing their instruments round like confetti. When Dave collected his guitar off the carousel his worst fears were realised - his handmade Taylor guitar (worth US$3,500) was broken.

To cut a long story short - he complained, and complained - for nine months until finally he had had enough. United Airlines were not going to play ball. So, Dave told United that he would write three songs about his experience and release them one after the other as a warning to others not to fly United.

The ensuing video has gone viral. According to Visible Measures (a company that is in the business of measuring the impact of viral campaigns) the YouTube video has amassed more than 3 million hits in ten days, and over 14,000 comments across various blogs and news outlets. A previously little-known country band from Halifax, Nova Scotia now has a world-wide audience.

United Airlines has also had amazing press coverage, far more air time than they could ever have possibly bought for $3,500 - unfortunately it’s all bad press.

As Dave Carroll puts it on his blog:

I should thank United. They’ve given me a creative outlet that has brought people together from around the world…So, thanks United! If my guitar had to be smashed due to extreme negligence I’m glad it was you that did it. Now sit back and enjoy the show.

Indeed. Here’s the first video.

Victoria Williams and Vic Chesnutt, SFBH, Wellington

I had the greatest pleasure of seeing Victoria Williams and Vic Chesnutt perform at the San Francisco Bath-house last night. What a joy!

The first few notes are sung by Victoria and tears well up in my eyes. It’s going to be a great concert.

I have known her music since the early 1990’s - and Vic Chesnutt’s since the turn of the century. I confess, I was there to see her and not him, but Vic was a bit like an added bonus.

Victoria Williams has the most beautiful voice - at times a mezzo soprano (just) and at others sounding like a screeching six year old girl. As a solo artist (there was no-one else on stage other than Chesnutt) her piano accompaniement is spartan but perfectly balanced, playing notes only when required, allowing the listener to fill the gaps. Her prowess on guitar was similar. Beautifully haunting and melodic. She swept the small crowd along with her charm and her beguiling sense of humour and graciousness.

Is it obvious I’m more of a fan now than I was when I went?

Miss Williams had not long hopped off the plane - she admitted she was jet-lagged. But there was no evidence of a lack of energy. In her self-confessed muddled state she had forgotten her notebook of songs. So she interspersed each song she played with humming and strumming, while she played with the audience deciding what to offer us next. Long silences were not embarrassing, far from it. Instead they raised the level of expectation as to what was coming next.

Her lyrics are very conversational and rambling, but there seems to always be a definite purpose -  “Happy” is a perfect case in point. After fourteen albums (seven as part of the Creekdippers and seven as a solo artist) she had a lot of material to draw from. It seemed like she would never stop. Every ‘this-will-be-my-last-song’ led to another, and another, or so it seemed. That was OK by me.

Vic Chesnutt took over as ‘lead’ while Victoria remained on stage enamoured with his performance and his music. Vic started the set with a little impromptu ditty about New Zealand and our ‘giant calamari’ - a running joke between the audience and both performers in the latter stages of the night.

He started his set with “The Gravity of the Situation”, one of the few songs I was familiar with. Like Victoria his lyrics are conversational and rambling (in a good way). “Florida” was a request from the crowd, and what a great song. In fact his set was pretty well made up of audience requests. We were only denied a few times, usually because the song was so far back in his repertoire that he didn’t feel confident doing it justice.

This was an inspirational concert.

Internet blackout

Just watched on my ‘copy’ of the TV3 6 o’clock news the protest that took place in the grounds of Parliament today lunchtime.

Protesters were concerned about Section 92a of the Copyright Act. This section says if a user is accused of downloading material (such as video’s and music) that they don’t hold the rights to (in other words illegal downloads) then their ISP can cut off their internet connection.

Now, there is something to be said about ‘innocent until proven guilty’ - and in this case it seems that your privileges can be removed before you have been tried and found guilty.

But, I would say to the protesters, if you don’t want your connection cut then don’t illegally download music and videos that aren’t yours to download. Haven’t you seen the ads? Illegal downloading is stealing. Simple as that.

On the other hand, being punished before being found guilty doesn’t seem fair either.

In saying all of that - copyright laws in New Zealand need some serious work. As an ex-photographer the fact that a commissioner of a photographer owned the copyright before the image had even been taken riled me. As far as I know this section of the act has not been repealed, and we continue to lag behind the rest of the world in protecting the rights of those that make the work.

So, perhaps Section 92a is trying to right some of those wrongs. As Arthur Baysting from APRA pointed out on the TV3 item, incomes of performers and artists has reduced drastically from illegal downloading. But is Section 92a the best way to fix the problem?