MATTHEW NORTH MUSIC

Gigs and Stuff at the weekend This weekend was really a game of two halves. Up early on Saturday morning for a trip to London, and this time for a specific reason, I noticed on Kevin Armstrong’s website that Reeves Gabrels was doing a guitar master class in London. Well this was something I have always wanted to do , learn some tricks from the master, I have always regarded him as one of the greatest guitar players in the world, so I had to do it. So got into London ans went to Vintage And Rare guitars in Denmark St which was where it was happening. Now there were 2 other guitar students, both teenagers and both very good players. I had flashbacks to working at Bills where every Saturday you would have some kids coming in that could whiz up and down the fret board at 100 mph! Anyhow, Reeves and Kevin were both really good, and I learned a lot, specifically about making the usual ‘Standard’ solo techniques more interesting, and to adding discords etc to it. It was all over far...

40 Years of Atom Heart Mother 40 years ago my favourite album of all time was released ‘Atom Heart Mother’ by Pink Floyd. It was the bands first UK No 1 lp and it took the band to a much higher lever than before. Its beautifully produced and has some terrific elements to it, yet the band and the fans don’t really like it. The main port of the album is the title track, now Pink Floyd really worked at their material, so many bands no simple go from writing to recording then release it and tour it. Pink Floyd up to the animals album always played new material before they recorded it, Atom heart mother was first played live a good 9 months before the album was released. It was even shown on TV and played live on the Radio before it was released. The title track is a long instrumental in 6 parts, with Choir , Brass and of cores the band. The avant-garde composer Ron Geesen crafted the original piece (Known as The Amazing Pudding). It’s a stunning journey starting with a Brass drone (that so...

Exeter Picturehouse 14th October 2010 So back to the picturehouse after about a month, this show was to be a little different to normal as unlike previous picturehouse shows, Niall was playing slide guitar and not bass. Ben Tallamy went on first, years ago he was in a band called Parasol Star that supported ALF back around 2002 he also played at the Exmouth festival a few months ago, he’s a really talented singer songwriter and plays a variety of other instruments too inc. the flute. We did a not too dissimilar set to last time, with the exception to the last song. We were having a before hand strum and ended up going through Just Like Heaven by The Cure, thinking it was a good Idea, Andy the manager of the Picturehouse printed out the lyrics for me off the internet and we added it to the set. Lee-Anne joined me for this one. Fortunes Light Feel Friends Forever Drowning Love is a Spirit Broken Dream Just Like Heaven Afterwards came our pals Super Punk Muffins, who kicked off ther...