augertime

Auger · #1 01-26-2006, 07:28 PM

I've really been enjoying lurking in this section and listening to all the great stuff people have been posting, so I thought I'd contribute!

Here's a song recorded live from a gig I played with my old band back in '02, I think, at a college in Binghamton New York. It's a jazz-y type tune called "ugly" (though I wouldn't call it jazz) and I take an extended solo that comes in near the end, and then the other band members walk back on stage to finish the tune. (thanks to Titan Sound for steering me to putfile.com)

I'll preface with a funny story - Right where the solo's *supposed* to start, i had what you could call a "brain-fart" - I just ...well ...stopped playing -and had no idea why! (that's the one measure rest you hear before the drum solo starts, haha!) Fortunately, keeping time is so hard-wired into my brain that my left foot kept playing quarters as if on auto-pilot. When I stopped, the other guys in the band all whipped their heads around like people do in a restuarunt when a waiter drops a whole tray of dishes and, while you can't hear us laughing on this recording, you can hear me flub my way through the solo's sing-sing-sing style intro because I was chuckling. You also can't hear gene krupa roll over in his grave at my attempt to imitate his style. -fortunately, I don't think anyone in the audience noticed. The rest of it's alright -pretty sloppy and full of flubs as I wasn't into the regular practice thing back then outside of gigs, but I like the vibe of it and the audience seemed to dig it.

hope you enjoy!

oh, and, since I don't play with these guys anymore, but I'm using one of our old songs here that, as far as I know, they still play, I'll plug them -you can visit their website at www.theunpronounceable.com

fiiiiiiiiinaly, here's the song:

http://media.putfile.com/Ugly-18

WeatherKing · #2 01-26-2006, 07:54 PM

One of the best I've heard here Auger!!! Fantastic! Dynamic in areas which gave it a tasty, tasty feel! You never would've known you had flubbed the intro to the solo tho. There's nothing wrong with a little sing, sing, sing style intro! Nice Bonham stuff in there, I believe starting around the 415mark. The double bass at 5minutes is just wonderful.

I think the best part about it is how little cymbals you use. I'm not a big fan of huge amounts of cymbals in solos...just a good proportion of them and you brought them in perfectly just after 6min and into the finale.

Nice, nice work Auger...I really liked this one!

NUTHA JASON · #3 01-26-2006, 08:18 PM

there is a great sense of humour here. tongue in cheek talent wins me everytime. its what i love about queen as a band, zappa as a writer and bonham as a drummer.

your drums sound superb in this recording. you must be very exciting to watch. pleeeeeeeeeze post a video some time.

and i agree about the dynamics...nice handiwork...very bonham solo.

this is class.

j

darkcherryfade · #4 01-26-2006, 08:46 PM

VERY well played. Sounded perfect for the music. The ride cymbal had a particularly nice sound.

Auger · #5 01-26-2006, 11:19 PM

Wow, thanks for the kind words!

Yeah, Bohnam is one of my big influences. I'm really flattered by the comparison! -There's a lot of pretty heavy 'borrowing' from a many players in there but, funily enough, I wasn't delibarately trying to do the Bohnam thing in this one - I think Billy Ward says how our playing is really just the sum of our influences though, and that's certainly the case with me here!

I was really happy with the sound of the drums in that recording too, Nutha, but must give credit where credit is due -I lreally love that drumset, but that tone was as much how well mic'd and recorded it was by our soundguy -unfortunately I'm not much up on how he did it. I know he actually built the digital recorder himself out of an old pc, though!

Funny you should zero in on that cymbal DCF -it's probably my single favorite piece of gear. My dad and uncle used to play drums as kids and I found the remains of their rogers drumset in my grandparent's basement back around '94. The sole useable piece I recovered, it's an old 18" Zildjian (niether my dad or uncle still plays or remembers anything about that particular cymbal.) It has rivets around the edge -some are missing- and is slightly key-holed from their old hardware, but just sounds like silk. It has no markings other than the zildjian logo stamped into the metal -you have to look closely to make it out under all the crud, but I wouldn't dare try to polish it!!!! Not really sure what year -guessing early 60s. Probably just an old A. I eventually stopped gigging with it for fear it would break and switched to a modern 18"K with rivets -which had a 'same ballpark' sort of sound but was a LOT louder -which also helped at gigs. The old one is a lot of things, but loud isn't one of them.

-anyway, time for the 'ol evening commute. Thanks for the kind words again!

DogBreath · #6 01-27-2006, 04:34 AM

Oh yeah, I really hear the Bonham influence! Great song, bro. Do you mind me asking about the hats? What size and make? They sound great.

aahznightsky · #7 01-27-2006, 04:59 AM

anyway this could be put somewhere in mp3 form? i really wanna listen to it but windows media doesnt work in my browser (only when i can save it to my computer and use it seperately, and putfile doesnt let me do that)

all this great feedback, i really wanna hear it!

NouveauCliche · #8 01-27-2006, 05:44 AM

Hey man! Nice job! Honestly, one of the most enjoyable listens on DW. Very cool song, very tasty/fun solo! Btw...the measure that you "forgot" sound a lot more like a musical decision than anything....I think it was your subconscious musicality shining through!

Very, very nice!

Edit:

I listened to it again...and man, that it a SWEET solo. I'm typically not a fan of solos...but your was TASTY and totally kept all the energy up (and most importantly..held my interest!) Great display of chops in a superbly musical context. Thanks for posting it!

#9 01-27-2006, 12:00 PM

Sweeeet! I was worried, since most putfile's are horrible.

How about some specs?

I particularly like the sound of the kick and the snare. Actually the toms too...Hell the whole thing sounds great!

Did you wing the solo and just play what licks came to mind, or is that something you structured out?

As for the brain fart..it was perfect. It totally said "Alright, my turn dudes!"

Not a fan of the china though, sorry..heh

morphe · #10 01-27-2006, 07:00 PM

Crap! The link is not working for me. Could anyone put it on rapidshare or sum?

Auger · #11 01-27-2006, 07:59 PM

geez -thanks! I'm really flattered by these responses!

As for the drumset -It's an Ayotte custom set. I'm a firm believer that you don't have to spend a lot of $$ to get a great sounding drumset ...but I did. haha. I was living at my parents' when I had that first "real job" around '99, so I had low overhead and, hence, disposable income. ahhh, those were the days (disposable income, not living with the parents, that is) :) -anyway, The toms (written depth x diameter) are: 8x10, 9x12, and a 16x16 floor. The bass drum is 18x22 and the snare is 5-1/2 x 14. I can't remember how many plies the snare is (they offered a choice) but it was the thinnest option. They've all got wood hoops.

Thanks Dogbreath, I'm quite fond of those hihats too, they're just plain 'ol Sabian AA-Regular 14" hats circa '92. They've sweetened somewhat with age and use, but I think I just kind of lucked into a perfect pair.

Moving around from the hats, back then I set up with a 10" Sabian hhx splash, a Zildjian 16" paper-thin crash with a brillant finish, the old ride described above, and a Sabian 18" AA china

Thanks so, so much for all the compliments!!!!!!!!!!

Jeroen aka aksie · #12 11-25-2006, 05:22 PM

better late than never,

great playing and I love the music =)

Latin Groover · #13 11-26-2006, 01:07 AM

That was awesome, i really like the solo. Your ideas where great, one of my favourites from members now. Any chance of downloadable mp3.

BIG_c · #14 11-26-2006, 04:41 AM

wow that was freakin awesome.

Auger · #15 12-20-2006, 06:45 PM

Thanks for the compliments!

I hadn't poked my head in this part of the forum for a while... Didn't mean to ignore.

Anyway, I'm not sure how to make a downloadable mp3 available -and I don't have my own website to put it on or anything. The band never put this one on any of our cds or released it or anything because apparently the guitar is out of tune in the intro.

There's another live version of this song with the drumsolo on i-tunes. The album was called elementary physics -but I don't like that version nearly as much. I was playing someone else's drumset that was uncomfortable for me and sounded like crap for the kind of music we used to play, IMO.

If you like the music, though, there's free stuff that's downloadable on the band's website that's in my original post above. They also have a myspace page (I think there's a link on the site somewhere) that has tunes on it, but they have someone else playing drums on a few of them. He's pretty good, though.

thanks again.