An evening of enjoyable music is, for me, good enough to make my weekend. We had signed up to watch a current favorite, Ohm, in session and weren’t too dazzled by the slated opening act—a one-man show by someone who for us was till then an unknown. On stage, he looked the reinventing one-time-rocker with hair tied up and goatee still intact but once he got playing, I found myself enrapt in his fret-board gymnastics. Little did I know that a variety of alternate tunings in dexterous hands could produce such intricate syncopations which he deftly interlaced with rhythm patterns tapped out on various sections of his guitar. Tone-wise and in addition to the main piezzo pickup, he had a magnetic pickup and a mic on the bridge position for added texture. The overall effect was that by the end of the act, I still didn’t know nor did it matter who this person was. I did eventually get to speak with him over the break. He was Thomas Leeb.
The main act for the evening was Ohm with Chris Poland (ex-Megadeth) on guitars, Rob Pagliari on bass and Frank Briggs on drums. As Rob had introduced the act, the trio planned to make some noise for a little over an hour. Decibel levels were high but so also were the technical and virtuosity levels. I still haven’t got descriptions down pat but the adjectives I can think of are Jazz, fusion, and rock.
Usually scrupulous about what I buy, I came back to realize that I had got myself two of Thomas Leeb’s albums.
6 comments:
I was hoping you would say something to the likes of T.L. having inspired you to play all over again.
Maybe so, keep listening to those CD's some more and then it mighjt happen. If anything you have an acoustic conveniently located within arms reach in the closet, so it just may happen, right?
Hey PGD,
Listening to TL was more a jouissance than inspirational although i find myself hammering the guitar more! Eh! Yeah, gotta work these frozen fingers but it'll take a lot of catching up. Which is why the bass seems a better bet.
I like the Thomas Leeb style - isn't that the way they played in 'August Rush'?
That's right. In fact, Thomas wasnt really sure how to describe it except that it was a form of 'fingerstyle'. The one who did the pieces on August Rush, I was told, was a woman who Thomas is also a friend of.
Hey I was watching August Rush earlier on and I was amazed to read here that the guitar pieces were done by a woman. Just looked it up on wiki, in fact...Kaki King, that's a name to remember. Funny how most guitar or music virtuosos on the whole tend to be male. And speaking of men, the dad in AR Jonathan Rhys Meyers was hot ;)
Thanks for adding her name, an oversight that hopefully signals my ignorance of Wiki rather than an innate bias. More power to you!
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