Kick out the jams....

All right, we may never be as cool as these guys (the MC5) or their classic Kick Out the Jams. Yet you can hear the influence of them on us...(like on our tunes "Ten Dollar Bill" and "Mascara Death"... coming as posts soon).

Anyhow, in the meantime, here are three jams that we slapped together at recent practices...

How About Some Hammond

Welcomed Wanderer

Livid Harmonium

plink plink

Here's one that Brad and I did a couple of weeks back.... has a bit of synth and piano and of course, Brad on gitfiddle...

Plink Plink

Daffodil in Snow....

click the daffodil twice

a little rough of a recording

more tunes to come soon

Hold On...

A new song made up on the spot... did the mics a bit differently... a very rough mix today... but interesting.... check it out:

Hold On

Soul Amp-bience.... A New Tune...

Here's an instrumental ambient/rock tune Brad and I came up with last week at rehearsal. M2 couldn't make it, so no percussion this time. We are in our just "make up things" on the spot mode.... we just hit record and this is what we came up with. We have a couple of condenser mics at the other end of the basement.... picked up a lot of stuff including Brad tapping his foot (sounds like a metronome) and me clicking a foot switch to speed up/slow down the rotorary speakers on the motion sound (so yep, there's a bit of Hammon B3 in there.... not just piano). This tune is part of 15 minute jam... I may take something from the second half later.

We also have a 25 minute jam from the same night... I think I'll mine that one for tunes as well... so look for another tune or two in the next few days.

I named this one Silver Lamp cause I was looking at the silver lamp on table that my best friend gave me for Christmas. It also seems appropriate because lots of people think we are "Soul Lamp". So to be confusing here's "Sliver Lamp" by Soul Amp:

Silver Lamp

a thought...

progress is painful
regress more so

Baseball.... and Soul Amp?

so I wrote this lyric last autumn while watching a baseball game....

took all the inspiration from the commentary on the game and kind of turned it into something else....(the chorus came from somewhere else... but seems to fit)...

Until she gets bored, and you get the cooties

With the rain falling
Going to be a delay
Digging in and waithing
When there's nothing you can do
Can't go by the book, all of the time
Forget the book
Try to fill up the bucket

Then you'll pop up, going after people
Love to do the boogie all night long
Until she gets bored, and you get the cooties
Then there's gonna be a down-thing for a while

You don't care about truth or anything
A little bit of this, a little bit of that
You just wants some happy big moments
Drive them all in, when you get the chance

Dealing with the elements and mad at yourself
So gut wrenching but good for your health
Letting it hang, letting them down
Without shoving nobody around

Chorus

Hopelessly
Content
With the dried up words

Futures
All been spent
On the way up

by Soul Amp... copyright 2007

Bernie and Slider...

A couple more pics from the Indians vs Angels at Miller Park in Milwaukee, April 2007:

Bernie and Slider hanging out during "Roll Out the Barrel"....



Hanging out in Bernie's Dugout.....

Indians vs Angels at Miller Park April 2007...Snowed out Jacobs field.... Snow at Miller Park.... Indians Opening Day in Milwaukee.... Soul Amp Fan

I was able to get to Miller Park here in Milwaukee for a couple of the Indians vs Angels games. Cleveland was snowed out for the Indians' home opener, so it got played here in Milwaukee....

And they brought the snow with them....

So going to the baseball game in the snow looks like this:

Pic of Miller Park in the snow while in line to park...



Walking into Miller Park in the snow....



Heading toward the Home Plate entrance....



The sausage race.... I picked Chorizo to win... but Hot Dog won instead....



It's never "root, root, root, for the home team" at Miller Park except this one time....Here in Milwaukee it's "root, root, root, for the Brewers"...

Catch the top ten soul amp songs here.

Make it up as we go (May 11)... And avoiding Train Wrecks =)

We're going to be making up stuff on the spot at the HOG gig on May 11th. You'll be hearing stuff you've never heard before and stuff you'll never hear again (unless we decide to record the gig which we probably won't because we're really lazy).

So surprises are in store, but we might throw in an old Soul Amp tune or two.

We've been writing stuff on the spot since the inception of this band. We have found that the more we think about what we're doing, the less real things are.

Lately, our jamming has gone beyond stuff we've done before....



Train wrecks are always risk with improvisation...... we haven't had one in a while... on the flip side, amazing things can happen.

There's also a chance to get some free CDs including Strip Mall Heaven if you happen to make it out to the gig....

Hope to see you there!!!

Tulips....

We are getting a lot of hits because of this search:

http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&resnum=0&q=tulips&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wi

Guess spring time has people looking for Tulips and we happened to link to a pic of tulips for Brad's song:

Pushing Tulips 5.5 mb mp3

in this blog entry (2nd entry):

http://soul-amp.blogspot.com/2006_05_01_soul-amp_archive.html

It was written when we thought the end was nearing for Soul Amp.... but the Amp is alive and well and we'll be playing a mind blowing gig at the HOG on Friday May 11th....

Hope you can check us out if you get a chance......

Dixie Mine Trail...Fountain Hills...Rattlesnake, Gila Monster, cool dips, and Brewers Cactus League...

Just got back from AZ hanging with friends and checking out the Brewers at spring training (Cactus League). It was cold (50s/60s) and raining when we arrived and the first game we attended got hailed out... imagine that in AZ. But it was a very nice trip.

We took a hike on the last day and my friend almost stepped on this rattlesnake:

We were hiking to this spot (the Dixie Mine Trail):

http://www.fountainhillsguide.com/rec_hike_mcdmtn_dix.html

Very interesting....

The AZ trip inspired me to jot down some lyrics that might be a song someday:

you're snoring
you got to leave
I'm going to get some sleep
Going to eat some just desserts

Second in the pool
For the first time this season
Freezing cold in the afternoon
Trickle water splashing on toes

Reptillian stories
On the dusty slopes
Looking for precious metals
To smelt

Trash accumulates
Through the slowth growth forest
You cry out in fear
At the shape on the ground

oh... here's a Gila Monster we saw on the same walk....

Talk at you later.....

Top Ten Soul Amp Songs Here.

An essay entitled,"The Reality of Guerilla Warfare"....from M2

The USA invades Iraq. It is called an invasion because we were not invited. We have heard several "reasons" for this invasion...

1.) To defend ourselves against a terrorist supporting government
2.) To liberate the Iraqi citizens from a tyranical government
3.)To protect American interests on foreign soil (drop the s, and it spells oil)...

Although completely and sickly corrupt, Saddam's Bathist regime did provide a sort of organized chaos to its citizens. They ruled by intimidation/fear. Standing on his flaccid pulpit, he did shake his ugly fist and threaten the world with his Napoleanic dreams. He was isolated, awaiting his inevitable demise by a civil war that broiled under society's surface...trapped in the stranglehold of a dominant allied airforce. The Iraqis couldn't let out a military fart without being precision bombed...Then we erred. We sent thousands of men and women in uniform into a theater of militant guerrillas. Even if we were able to squash the ongoing insurgency...rid the entire nation of "improvised explosive devices"...we would STILL be embroiled in a guerilla war. The ubiquitus AK-47 would be replaced by [original editted here] sabre..masked men leaping from doorways with kitchen knives. NEVER will our troops be safe to roam the streets of Baghdad without fear of a blindsided attack. Have we not learned from history? Here are some fairly recent examples of our forgetfulness: Viet Nam. Providing Iraq with CIA support against Iran. Providing Iran with missles in exchange for hostages. Providing CIA assistance to Osama bin Laden and the Taliban in Afghanistan in a guerilla war against the Soviets...or how about this?...remember how the Nazis rolled into Paris? Not much of a challenge to defeat the French military. BUT...the French Resistance fighters (guerillas) made their stay on French soil a daily hell. It didn't matter that the Resistance wasn't able to chase the Nazis out, they would have fought forever...as WE would if the USA was invaded. This war in Iraq..this whole debacle..was based on half truth's, lies, deceit, and an arrogant misconception of a realistic outcome. When will we learn? When?...When there is no one in uniform left on our home soil to defend the Motherland of America?..When the National Guard is too busy guarding someone else's nation to help out with the next Katrina? When we can't care properly for our Vets?..My cousin Patrick, an Army Ranger stationed in Baghdad, watched two of his buddy's burned alive in a roadside attack. There wasn't a damned thing any of them could have done to prevent this.

Yes, WAR IS HELL. It's to bad that the Cheif Warmongers don't understand..PEACE CANNOT BE FOUND IN HELL.It's time for True Patriots...for us...to stand up for those in uniform and GET THEM THE F*** OUT OF THERE!!!!...M

M2 and Russ Feingold

Hey here's our very own M2 hanging out with Senator Feingold with his other band squarewavetrio :

http://www.squarewavetrio.com/pics.html


M2 (aka Michael Netteshiem) is the one on the far left. They were playing at Russ' birthday party. He was reported as saying that squarewave would get to play at the White House if Russ ever gets to be prez.... Maybe Soul Amp could warm up for them!... =)

Fisking.....

Ran across this today....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fisking


yep, I was ego-surfing...

let's see what brad and M2 come up with on that....

working late

So here I am working late again (at work work.... not working on music). I seem to do that a lot now. I have my brain on music much of the time though. I've worked on some new tunes and we got together last week and just made shit up. We have done that for the last couple of practices. And guess what? We have a gig at the HOG http://www.houseofguinness.com/ in Waukesha on Friday, April 27. We'll probably make shit up there as well... =)

It sometimes gets discouraging having so much work stuff hanging over my head... but music is definitely one of the thing that gets me through it all... in fact I'm lucky in that I can listen to music for much of the day (looking at it that way and I'm doing the ol' comparison thing of why should I complain when things are so good for me). Anyhow, some stuff I've been digging (and well listened to today) includes: Midlake "The Trials of Van Occupanther", GrizzlyBear "Yellow House", the Shins "Wincing the Night Away" (of course), Beirut "Gulag Orkestar", Bert Jansch "The Black Swan", My Bloody Valentine, Cat Power and just a bunch of other stuff...

I also listened to some of our scratch tunes we made last year... you know, some have potential like:

http://www.soul-amp.com/freebies/RipplesFromTheStone.mp3
http://www.soul-amp.com/freebies/FineThinLine.mp3
http://www.soul-amp.com/freebies/SettingTraps.mp3
http://www.soul-amp.com/freebies/TrappedInUrClothes.mp3

not sure these tunes will ever amount to anything and they are kind of rough as they were all recorded pretty much right as they were written... but having not listened to them for a long while and now checking them out again... I think there's some stuff there that might be all right to keep...

Anyhow, I would have to say that Soul Amp is still alive and kicking and we're going to get more material out there and hope that people like some of it. By the way, check out M2's been up to:

http://www.squarewavetrio.com

oh and here's a poem that M2 wrote that I though just rocked and fit on the day I read it:

sparkling silver swirls in an eddy of powdery snow_ hiding a dingy salted yesterday beneath it's squeeky crunch_ the evergreens, majestic, with white laden sagging limbs_ wise old men standing strong against the wind_ a squall so thick the earth becomes sky becomes earth becomes sky_ I am enamoured by it's beauty...and at peace with it's challenge

well that's it for now.... if you happen to read this, say hi....

talk at you later
-M1

OktoberFest in Lake Geneva

Yeah SWITZERLAND!

Soul Amp's fall house party tour added a second date. The infamous
Oktoberfest Party in the Lake Geneva Region of Switzerland! Yeah right
off Williams Bay...Lake Geneva...Wisconsin. I am such a huge liar.
Private party...if you were invited see you there.

We're not dead....

well we booked gig in September...so we aren't hanging it all up yet...still on summer break...stop by our homepage and grab our recent tunes

Hannah and The Fray

So Hannah and her buddy Joey got to meet The Fray at Summerfest. Hannah gave them a gift bag with bubbles and one of her CD's "Lets All Get An F in Chemistry"

Hannah is in the studio now laying down tracks for her next demo and EP...

So I have been helping her to learn the ins and outs of MOTU AudioDesk...like any modern techno kid she is picking it up rather fast.

I saw The Fray with Hannah at the Rave and I was quite impressed by them. One of the best shows I have seen in a long time. So many great songs.

Hannah in obvious teen idol heaven.

Here she hands them the gift bag...they said "Wow...no one has ever given us a gift bag before!"

Hannah's music

Be sure to check out Hannah's music on her myspace page:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=30545986

Quite the chip off the old block... so to speak... or is that "blockhead"? =)

Seriously, Hannah's got some great music... be sure to take a listen.

You can get more free music of the soul amp variety by going here: Free MP3 Index for Soul Amp