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Topic: Rob Ickes on lap steel |
Andy Volk
From:
Boston, MA
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Mike Neer
From:
NJ
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Posted 23 Sep 2010 5:43 am |
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When I was out in Port Townsend a few years ago with Don Rooke and Mike Witcher, Mike was fooling around with a lap steel. He also played the hell out of my tricone. Apparently Mike has gotten pretty serious about lap steel playing and has a Fusion band called The Blow Jays in which he plays it. Good for him, this is really cool stuff, sort of Mahavishnu meets Jeff Beck:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcF_Iwd_DS8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0h76vIwcWY
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Links to streaming music, websites, YouTube: Links |
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Andy Volk
From:
Boston, MA
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Posted 23 Sep 2010 6:43 am
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| Good stuff! Mike's a monster. But, for my money Steinar Gregertsen for tone, taste and expression and Steve Cunnigham, for fluidity, groove and overall right-in-the-pocketness are the Shiznick! for rock lap steel. |
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Doug Beaumier
From:
Northampton, MA
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Posted 23 Sep 2010 12:25 pm
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Andy, that's an interesting clip of Rob Ickes and Paul Anastasio playing Maiden's Prayer. It looks/sounds like Rob's lap steel tuning is A Major. The song is in the key of A, and he plays a lot of open string stuff over the A chord (when he's backing the fiddle), and then on fret 5 for the D. I see what you mean about his dobro-ish approach to lap steel. Excellent playing, excellent slants, but very few of the drawn-out, sustained notes that we normally hear on steel guitar. More short, punchy licks like we hear on acoustic dobro. Great picking, fun to watch and hear.
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Brad Bechtel
From:
San Francisco, CA
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Posted 24 Sep 2010 8:31 am
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This is all good to me. Thanks for sharing!
I saw Mike Witcher with Missy Raines and the New Hip last year. He did one song with lap steel that hinted at what he's doing now with the Blow Jays.
I hope Mike takes his lap steel playing as far as he has his dobro playing.
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A web site devoted to acoustic & electric lap steel guitars |
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Mark Eaton
From:
Sonoma County in The Great State Of Northern California
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Posted 24 Sep 2010 11:38 am
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I hope this link works for you guys:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6cDXJ2t9DU
It's The Jerry Douglas Band with Jerry playing lap steel - it's Jerry's take on "Don't Take Your Guns To Town." This is with Luke Bulla on the lead vocals. On the 1998 "Restless on the Farm" Jerry Douglas album, Steve Earle sings the lead, and it's one of my very favorite recordings of "Electric Jerry."
There are other examples of Rob on lap steel, but I can't track 'em down right now, but getting back to Jerry, you're right, he figured out a long time ago the difference bewteen dobro/lap steel and how to develop his own approach.
He has said a number of times that the dobro is like a hand saw and lap steel is more like a chain saw.
I try to always keep that in mind when I plug in a lap steel, which isn't very often compared to how often I play the dobro.
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Mark |
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Travis Hillis
From:
Nashville TN, USA
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Posted 24 Sep 2010 4:07 pm
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I think Rob sounded great. I love it when the lap steel is played in a dobro fashion. Seems like the best of both worlds.  |
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Joel Bloom
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Posted 2 Oct 2010 4:06 am
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That Rob Ikes Lapsteel tune has long been one of my faves of his, as I'm not a big bluegrass fan-I love the licks at the end of the jam, these being very 'steel' sounding to my ears.
Jerry has an approach to Lapsteel not unlike David Lindley (who uses the same tunings too, open D, E or equivalent), with a volume pedal and mixing open and closed positions, and, like Lindley, never going for a 'steel' 6th tuning sound.
Almost like electric bottleneck standard guitar (He's a Derek Trucks and Ry Cooder fan as it turns out). |
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