Dood! The Bill Frisell Trio is playing in Denton!
Hells yeah! Called tonight and got two tickets for next Tuesday. There's this typical college town dive that attracts some big names every so often; place called Dan's Silver Leaf. Even got Allan Holdsworth here once not too long ago.
I just hope he brings his '69 Thinline Telecaster.
I'll try to see about grabbing a phone-pic or something.
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
I look forward to your review.
He has a number of Teles, among other things.
It'll be interesting to see what kind of amp(s) he uses.
His new disc, Floratone, is really cool. I'm not sure if he's considered the main artist on it, or if "Floratone" is a name they gave to the unit working on it. Sort of like the Intercontinentals.
Matt Chamberlain gets top billing on the cover.
I see he's doing Denton,TX with Tony Scherr and Kenny Wollesen.
Then it's a different band in March, and a different lineup still in April. Pretty cool.
A quartet with Greg Leisz. I'd love to see that.
"Well, I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused..."
Elvis Costello
Last I heard he was using a pair of BF Reverbs...Supers I think. I'll be sure to let you know for sure.
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
For the concert he's using MY amp. Pretty sweet in that giddy school girl way...
DRRI's. He requested two of them. If I'm correct, Tony and Kenny are from East/West.
Your exact amp? Or the same model?!!
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
Mine. With the silly little green light.
Cool. He might leave some of his mojo on it!
"I haven't slept for ten days...because that would be too long." -- Mitch Hedberg
Ha, yeah. I'm hoping.
Okay! Let me first say the show was nothing short of amazing. Everything I expected and then some. Thanks to iShawn for sneaking a few shots of the event on his iPhone. I touched them up a bit to reduce color noise.
The evening sound test:
The gear right before the show:
I was in heaven, he only had the '69 Thinline Tele I wanted to see so badly. Also note he played through two DRRIs in stereo, the one on the floor leaning on the monitor was iShawn's amp...Bill is travelling to performances using only borrowed Fender tube amps; how's that for confidence in your abilities?! He made that guitar sound like a hollowbody, or a twangy blues Fender just with his hands...I've got to get a Tele soon!
He used pedals like a painter uses paints. I saw a Line6 DL4 Delay Modeler, Boss Delay of some kind, Ibanez Tube Screamer, and his compressor/preamp/stereo rig controller (on a pedestal). There were a couple more pedals I didn't recognize...but man, could he use them!
There was a point in the set where he was layering sound upon sound upon sound in some crazy R2D2-on-acid sort of thing, and as far out as it was, he so gracefully moved into a straght-ahead jazz tune that we were all cheering at the transition.
What a show. One thing that made this special was that this trio was so intent on each other and what they were doing. The last pic was the way Bill played all night...eyes fixed on the bass player and rarely looking away. Usually only to tweak a pedal. That bass player was amazing and laid down solid grooves and awesome solos. The drummer was as good. One tune got so quiet, that the drummer put down his sticks and finished it out with his bare hands and then fingers on the drums.
When they were goin' straight ahead, there was so much interplay it was frightening. I was 12 feet away, the band members were all within 6 feet of each other, and the crowd was standing room only around the stage. What an experience! We watched the musicians looking at each other smiling and taking clues from one another the whole night, speaking through the music, and all of us in the audience just soaked it in. The atmosphere was amazing...something you could only get from a small venue like this with a trio like this.
There was one break only between sets. There was no talking other than Bill thanking us at the break and introducing the band members. Each song led into the next with no stops...and it was done effortlessly and fluidly, regardless of the stylistic differences of each tune.
This was definitely a rare treat! What a musical opportunity!
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
Wow, very cool. Liked to have heard/seen that show.
Nice.
I gotta see him one of these days.
That's a MIM Thinline, isn't it. He has a yellowish 69' Tele, but I'm almost certain he mentioned in an interview that the blue (surf green?) one was a new MIM, a few years ago.
Two rented amps, a MIM Tele, a few effects, some skill, and a great imagination.
Too cool.
"Well, I used to be disgusted, now I try to be amused..."
Elvis Costello
Great review NT. Very cool.
Happy to share, guys...I wished a lot of y'all cold have been there. This was just one of those shows that will set some personal standards for me. I haven't listened to any music in the office at all since I still have last night's in my head and don't want to lose any of it.
I think you're right about that Tele, NeoFauve. I also read that it was the MIM Thinline he has, but I couldn't tell. I looked hard for the Serial# on the back of the headstock, but just couldn't see it. It did have the spaghetti logo and not the 70's block letters and logo that's on the current MIM RIs. It's the light blue one that's in the pic in the initial post.Originally Posted by NeoFauve
Oh, what's cool about the amps is that they weren't rented, they were borrowed from two local students. One of which is TFF'er iShawn.
If you look closely, Bill had this stuffed toy moose sitting on top of the amp that was on the riser/shelf. That student thought about painting a while line around where it sat on the cab.
Talk about adding some mojo to your amp! Just let Bill Frisell borrow it!!!
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
Just found a clip of the trio we saw with the same lineup in case anyone's interested. The atmosphere is much different, but it gives a good example of how they played.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ykMv0kfIE8
And here's a good one of him (gets good at 4:20)...using a couple of HRDlxs (maybe one's a Blues Deluxe).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jk2l6E39-NY
Last edited by NTBluesGuitar; 01-25-2008 at 01:47 PM.
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
Last word on this one, a few final pics, courtesy of the Dallas Observer:
Here's me (right) and TFF'er iShawn (left), whose amp Bill was using:
Last edited by NTBluesGuitar; 01-27-2008 at 07:42 PM.
"...pray do not imagine that those who make the noise are the only inhabitants of the field;
that, of course, they are many in number; or that, after all, they are other than the little,
shriveled, meagre, hopping, though loud and troublesome, insects of the hour."
-Edmund Burke
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