Will Maranto's World

Rumors of my death...

...have been greatly exaggerated.  

In all seriousness, I've been biding my time and playing a few things here and there.  

A couple weeks ago Kenny, Mike, Bryan and I played a party with Mr. Rich Kelham of the Moulin Dudes playing guitar and singing harmony.  I have to say that it was a good experience and, though not without a few hiccups, a good performance.  These isolated shows remind me of just how good the musicians are that I play with.  

In an only-mildly-related note, I recently read a strangely-coherent interview with David Lee Roth in "Classic Rock" magazine.  Though Mr. Roth is not one of my usual points of musical reference, I was both impressed and surprised by the points he made about the newly-ressurected Van Halen.

First, he hammered home the fact that he and the band practiced exhaustively before recording and later touring.  I believe he said they rehearsed 42 times before recording the new songs.  That speaks volumes.  And it's an approach I miss badly.  

Next DLR mentions that despite the considerable prowess of his band, a lot of what propels them is the experience and feel they've accrued over 30+ years.  That's also a valid point.  He mentions Johnny Cash in passing, but I have always loved that about Cash's voice: it's the undeniable authority that references YEARS of experience.  

But even the most experience needs regular polish.  To extend the JC analogy, why else would the Man In Black have worked with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers as his backing band on American II?  Even a legend wants the tightness of a good and practiced unit behind him.

I'm not feeling the need to say more about that, but suffice it to say this: I'm ready to really do this thing.

A few quick Vegas pics

Molly and I on the bridge in front of Hoover Dam:

The Dam:

Communism comes to Capitalism:

A Really good Beer:

A Few Random Thoughts

It's been a busy week. Last week we played a great show at the Revel. I'm currently on unassigned call & hating life.

Revel Time Again

Hey everyone,

I'm sorry I've been MIA for the last couple months.  I've been steadily plugging away with various projects: firming up my batch of newer songs, playing guitar on Bryan Copeland's Skulks project, working as hard as ever and writing RPG material with my main man, Jim Ed Brewer (in case anyone reading this blog doubted that I am a big nerd).  I'm itching to get down to recording my new batch of songs, but that will probably have to wait until at least December.  

But tomorrow I'll be playing the Revel with the Usual Suspects.  This year the Suspects' ranks are going to going to be more numerous than ever before.  Kenny, Travis, Bryan, Mike and even Wes will be joining me, so we ought to sound full, especially in the vocal department.  The weather looks to be perfect and I'm glad to be playing on a weekend day.  I hope everyone comes out to hear us, because I have a very good feeling about this show...

Kerry has made a cool flier, as usual, which I'll post below!

Oh What A Night

Yesterday was filled thoroughly with music. Myself and the Usual Suspects (Bryan Shelby, Mike Gauthier and Kenny Brown) played an afternoon show at Mudbug Madness. After we finished our set at Festival Plaza, we packed up and headed to Muddy Waters where we played an evening show.

Mudbug was nice, if extremely hot. Though I love to blab on and on about the limitations of playing without a dedicated lead guitar player, I have to say that deficiency has felt smaller and smaller over the last year. This is mainly due to Mike's wonderful organ and piano and Kenny's -presence- (Mr. Brown really fills up space and still never overplays). I suppose I've gotten a bit more relaxed in my role as the band's lone guitarist.

Mudbug's audience was great with lots of friends and tons of new faces in attendance. One of the comments I love the most is, "Where are you guys FROM?!?". Almost like we fell to Shreveport on a meteor. What I love mist about it, though, is that it implies that we're a professional touring act. I've long believed my musical coconspirators are top-notch; it's nice to hear it from others too.

One funny Willism from Saturday: I'm leaving Mudbug, hot and dehydrated. I'm happy but tired. A nice young woman comes up to me and says, "Hi Will, how are you? Have you talked to my dad lately?". I recognize this person but my tired brain just can't bring this knowledge to where it needs to be. So I filibuster as best I can: No, I haven't talked to him lately. How are you, etc. What I remembered about an hour later was that this was Charlie Dempsey's (lead guitarist from Retroverb) daughter. The last timeI had seen Robin was three years ago and she was in high school, but nonetheless, I totally managed to misplace her identity. Ugh!

So we roll out to Muddy Waters to sound check. This show was a stretch, not just because we'd already played an earlier show. Kenny's daughter graduated from high school yesterday so he understandably had other things to do. I asked the one and only Wes McKinney to fill in on bass. It has been just at a year since Wes and I have played music together and a mere seven years since he'd played bass (rather than guitar) at a show. So how did it go?

I think we gave one of the best performances we've ever given. Wes dropped in on bass just like he'd been playing it all along (Shelby and Mike played like gold too - there was one really nice guy wanting to get Bryan's autograph all night too. How cool!). Maybe most wonderful of all was that the Gypsy Mountain harmonies were back with a vengeance. Just like the Olson-Louris "one voice" of our beloved Jayhawks, Wes and I locked in tight. I was in heaven. We had a good crowd all night and they liked the sound we were making. I don't know if they realized we were really just playing for each other.

What I got out of May 28th is that I'm literally blessed with great friends who are ridiculously talented (and, yes, even the little aside tipping the hat indirectly to the indispensible help Charles Dempsey gave me a few years ago supports that thought.  Don't assume your unwise and folly-prone son misses all your prompts, Lord). We make beautiful music together and all past drama aside, we really should keep doing so. I think that feeling was shared by all. So what might the future hold?

What's Goin' On

I'm getting a nice break with the family. Since I have a little downtime, I thought I'd pop in and ruminate.

Last week, I played at Harley's with the Usual Suspects & I think we gave a pretty darn good show. Playing with only me on guitar is becoming less of a hindrance, though my strummy musical brain would love another guitarist in the mix. It is a good thing there were only four of us last week, though. A large stage is not something Harley's has.

I've spent too much time fighting with my iMac, Protools and my ProFire recording interface over the last six weeks. Finally things appear to be resolved with a simple FireWire adapter. This is good, but I never would have thought FW 400 to 800 conversion could cause weird problems like intermittent non-recognition and recording channel distortion. But anyway...

Next up for the Suspects is Mudbug Madness and Muddy Waters, both on 5/28/11. I'm looking forward to both, and I think we'll be delivering some nicely varied performances at each.

One last note: I got the new Bob Schneider album "A Perfect Day". It's interesting, as I find almost all his stuff to be. I'm not sure about all of it yet, but I have to say there are some really fun parts on it. "Peaches" and "Yeah, I'll Do That" particularly entertain me. Other songs have yet to win me over, like the aptly-titled "Am I Missing Something". This song sounds way more Michael Jackson/Lionel Ritchie circa 1983 than Bob Schneider. But that's still something I love about this artist: even when I'm not entirely charmed by the work, I can't be entirely sure if it's just because he's too clever for his own good.

Will Maranto & the Usual Suspects Live @ Harley's

OK, so I'll be the first to admit that we are a strange fit for a biker bar.   While Harley's probably is more "weekend rider" than "Hell's Angels," I'm really looking forward to an unfamiliar crowd. That's partially because I'm feeling like a good challenge and partially because I know just how good my bandmates are.   I sometimes take it for granted, but the guys in the Usual Suspects and I have been playing together for a long time. Heck, in the case of Bryan Shelby, we first played together at Semolina's in 2002.   That's many miles!

So we're ready to tear it up Saturday. Come join the fun...

End of an Era/The Road Ahead

I had a conversation with my good friend Bryan Shelby this afternoon (as I was herding two tired and hungry boys) about the fate of our band.  I suppose this is something of a foregone conclusion, but apparently Gypsy Mountain is on "permanent hiatus."  That's a shame as this was one great band.  The nucleus of the band was always the interplay of Bryan, Wes McKinney and me.  

This post is not an overt (or subtle) shot at my friend Wes, but over the last year Wes has become increasingly distracted and distant.  I understand part of that wholeheartedly.  With Bryan living in Connecticut and he working one week on, one week off in California, it has been a real feat to keep the band functioning (even as a part-time venture).  Still we could have done a much better job of organizing our activity, and try as I might it just wasn't happening.

I'm not going to go into a blow-by-blow of how this thing finally fell apart, but I will say that just as in 2006, I have made every attempt to keep the band alive and I think Bryan has done just as much work in this direction.  And yet, we've spent the last nine months asking ourselves, "Where's Wes?"  Hopefully, we all meet again when things are more normal and the band picks up where it left off.  The things is though, after five years of off-again-on-again crap from Wes, it would take one hell of a gesture to convince me his heart is in the game.  

But all is not lost.  Gypsy Mountain or not, I'm ready to make the proverbial next record.  I guess that makes "the Usual Suspects" my main project too.  How strange.  

In real world terms the Usual Suspects has always worn two hats.  First, it's acted as a side project to the implied "main project" that I always tried to let GM be.  On the other hand, it was simply a way of saying "all the wonderful musicians I've always played with" when Wes wasn't around or wasn't choosing to make himself functional or available.  You know it's pretty funny that almost EVERY one of my musical co-collaborators has appeared at a solo or Usual Suspect gig...  Even Joe Tynes, who I have so very rarely played with in the last 6-7 years.  

If there's a silver lining to all this I suppose it's that I no longer feel the least bit of guilt about moving forward with new projects.  That may sound kind of strange, but consider this: as a songwriter building up a stable of new material, I have to pick and choose where and with whom to use it.  That's not to say that I'm really restrained in the live arena (all my musical co-conspiritors, certainly including Wes, have always been open to my original material, regardless of origin).  But as someone who wants to maintain a workable and working live band and who wants to continually put out new output, I must have a name to work under, whether that's Gypsy Mountain, Retroverb or my own and at some point you have to have songs to put on records under those names.  Make no mistake though, no one is served by continually changing the band's name (and it now looks like one of the main obstacles to that has removed itself).

So I guess this "permanent hiatus" has made my musical direction simpler.  I know I'm blessed with a lot of really talented musical friends, too.  I'm always so thankful for this, because, to quote Keith Horton, "without them, I'm just an ass with a guitar."  

At this point the only thing I'm missing musically is a lead guitarist.  As a guitarist myself, that seems such an ironic thing: when I was younger, it seemed like every musician I knew was a guitar player.  Now I'm surrounded by all these really talented drummers, bass players, harmonica monsters (yes, Leigh James, I'm talking about you) and one long-haired keys player.  

When I was in college, I saw this poster in Brough Commons (the main dining hall at the University of Arkansas) saying "Johnny Marr Where Are You?"  I don't know why I'm still thinking about that fifteen years later, but it was an interesting way to advertise for a guitarist (and that's exactly what the band or musicians in question were doing, and they made no bones about saying they liked the Smiths).  So [Mike Campbell, Peter Buck, Joe Perry, Duane Allman, George Harrison, Billy Harvey, Dave Stewart, Luther Perkins, Keith Richards, David Evans, Nels Cline] Where Are You?

 

Back at it

A quick note to say we're back at The Naked Bean on Friday @ 8 pm.  I've been preoccupied with prepping for recording and getting us ready to play in the Krewe of Centaur parade.  The wintery weather we've had this year makes me worry about the prospect of playing outside in the afternoon/evening in late February.  We shall see.  

I'm really looking forward to hitting the new material.  I'd like to write a couple new songs, but the crop I have is really strong.  And I'm inspired to take some new approaches on this batch that I've never taken.  More on that later.

I had an interesting conversation with my old friend Jim Lyles about the album as an art form.  Essentially we talked about how people view collections of songs less and less a necessity in the world of online sales of individual songs.  I agree this makes the "album" less important, but I still think of songs in the context of albums.  I guess I'm old school.  Surprise, surprise...

Random Notes: January

I'm bored out of my mind in clinic today.  It's been a busy week but this afternoon is slow.  So I was moved to get on and put some new things on the old blog. 

• Progress on the recording front continues.  I now have all my acoustic panels/bass traps up in the recording space.  We're finally getting ready to do what I thought I was on the verge of doing when I started this blog: propperly treating the songs from That Great Connection.  I'm hoping we can embark upon this endeavor in February, though live music engagements may interupt this.
• Molly and I are marveling at the leaps and bounds our youngest, James, is making.  He's walking!  This is a cool thing to watch, though it adds another level of complexity to watching him, especially with Ben running rampant too!
• I'm listening to the Monsters of Folk on the iPod player right now.  "In The Right Place" is a really great song.
• My nurse is still as crazy as ever.  Really.
• Me and the band (now known as "the Usual Suspects") are embarking on another Mardi Gras parade.  Weather permitting, we'll be playing our asses off in the Centaur parade on 2/26/11.