Tingly's News Thread

[Tingly]

BILLY JOEL & ELTON JOHN POSTPONE ANOTHER CONCERT

Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Billy Joel and Elton John have postponed yet another Bay Area date on their "Face 2 Face" tour: a concert originally scheduled for Tuesday at the HP Pavilion in San Jose. They had previously bailed out of a gig set for this past Saturday at the Oracle Arena in Oakland.

Organizers are working to set make-up dates for the two concerts. All ticket-holders are being asked to hold on to their tickets until more information is available regarding the proposed rescheduled engagements.

The Oakland date was postponed due to concerns over John's health — he's been battling a serious case of e-coli bacterial infection and influenza and was advised by his doctor to postpone this Oakland concert, according to promoter Live Nation. This time around, it's Joel who isn't feeling well enough to play San Jose. According to another press release from Live Nation, Joel is unable to tour due to undisclosed "medical reasons."

-insidebayarea.com

[Tingly]

RUMOR: THE WHO WILL PLAY SUPER BOWL!

The parade of classic rockers amping up halftime at the Super Bowl will continue this year with one of the biggest names in the game. According to SI.com, sources say British legends the Who will take the stage at Superbowl XLIV in Miami on February 7, marking their first trip to the big show for the band's first North American gig in two years.

If the rumor is true, the Who — which now consists of only two original members, main songwriter/guitarist/singer Pete Townshend and singer Roger Daltrey — would follow in the footsteps of such recent rock luminaries as Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Paul McCartney and Prince, who have played the coveted gig in recent years.

The Who's U.K. spokesperson Julian Stockton neither confirmed nor denied the booking to MTV News, writing in an e-mail, "Am afraid at this point we know nothing about it." And the NFL told Sports Illustrated, "When we have something to announce, we'll announce it."

Traditionally the most-watched TV event of the year, the Super Bowl halftime gig is considered one of the most coveted in all of entertainment, with a variety of A-list acts filling the spot in the past, from Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers to the Rolling Stones and U2, Aerosmith, Britney Spears and, famously, Justin Timberlake and Janet Jackson in 2004.

According to Billboard.com, Townshend and Daltrey are working on new material for the follow-up to the band's 2006 album, Endless Wire. Townshend has also discussed another parallel project he's working on, a new concept album/musical called Floss. Neither project currently has a release date.

-MTV

[Tingly]

PHOTOJOURNALIST DOCUMENTS UNDERGROUND MUSIC SCENE IN CHINA

For Americans, the days of extreme cultural revolution have arguably subsided. The heyday of rock has come and gone, as have new wave and punk -- even post-punk -- and grunge. So it seems like we've gotten a lot of musical subversion out of our system. But, spin to the Earth's other hemisphere, and the musical revolution has only just begun. According to photographer Matthew Niederhauser, simply listening to rock constitutes rebellion in China.

Niederhauser, a freelance photojournalist based in Beijing, first stumbled into a dive bar called D-22 in 2007. It was there that he happened upon Beijing's underground music scene, and he has been documenting it ever since. His new book, Sound Kapital, shows this burgeoning scene in photos.

As he writes, "For now, China remains in a liminal state between the socialist idealism of old and a calamitous drive for wealth spurred by free-market reforms." And the rockers are rejecting both. It may be a small scene, but it's exploding. NPR's Zoe Chace went to see one of Beijing's rock bands in Brooklyn, and the line wrapped around the door. Tune in to All Things Considered today to hear the story, and check out Niederhauser's Web site to view more of his work.

-NPR

[Tingly]

NEXT EXPORT FROM CHINA: ROCK AND ROLL!

Beijing, China (CNN) -- Two of China's hottest up-and-coming rock bands -- Carsick Cars and P.K. 14 -- are taking their first steps on a whirlwind American music tour to showcase the Asian giant's latest export: rock 'n' roll.

The bands, along with a gaggle of other musical outfits, will hit nine cities -- from New York to Chapel Hill, North Carolina -- as they embark on their first official tour of the United States.

The bands, led by Maybe Mars music label co-founders Charles Saliba and Michael Pettis, want to expand their fan base and make waves with Chinese rock. More importantly, they hope to change the reputation of the Chinese music scene, transforming it from purely experimental to the capital of the "next big thing."

Yan Haisong, P.K.14's frontman, was excited and nervous before the group departed on the two-week tour. He rattled off a list of sites he hoped to see in New York, including several record shops to pick up a few LPs. As he arranged his luggage for check-in at Beijing Capital Airport last week, Yan said P.K.14's music was heavily influenced by what the New York scene has produced and hopes his band can bring a bit of Beijing to the Big Apple.

"We're going to play to a different audience and we don't know if they can accept us, especially as we will sing in Chinese, so we don't know," he said.

If buzz is any indication, Yan Haisong has nothing to worry about. The bands' arrival has generated healthy anticipatory chatter on popular American music blogs and in the media, from Time Out New York to the Village Voice. Reporters and music junkies heaped on pre-show praise, with Time Out calling the tour a "roster of artists" that is "currently at the forefront of a national movement, pushing contemporary Chinese rock toward international acclaim."

Considered to be largely underground and experimental, the Chinese rock 'n' roll scene has come a long way and is expanding fast. Just five decades ago, popular Chinese music was constricted to revolutionary songs and ballads approved by the government. Today, the scene has opened dramatically, welcoming in a variety of genres ranging from classical to heavy metal.

In fact, young Chinese flock to Beijing with dreams of making it big at small but influential clubs like D-22, the sister club of record label Maybe Mars. Run by Pettis and Saliba, D-22 is Beijing's hottest venue for up-and-coming Chinese bands, nestled in the northwest university district. This is where music lovers come to find fresh talent and where young Chinese rock 'n' roll is born.

Ricky Sixx, a young Chinese rocker sporting lace-up leather pants and teased out long hair, moved to Beijing from a small town in Hebei Province in search of a thriving rock scene.

"In my hometown, we just have one bar. It's so small, and so little people would come," he said.

When he stepped into Beijing's D-22, Sixx felt like he found a place to live the dream. Of the Beijing scene, Sixx said: "Rock 'n' roll music is not just rock 'n' roll music. It's a spirit of rock 'n' roll."

Just a few months after his arrival, Sixx is considered one of talents to watch at the club -- perhaps the next generation's version of the Carsick Cars, a group considered to be the most successful band from D-22, having captured international fans and toured with Sonic Youth in Europe.
Video: China exports rock 'n' roll

Only two years after the band's first album debuted, Carsick Cars today serves a gateway band by which many Americans appreciate Chinese rock 'n' roll. Back in China, Carsick Cars performs what label Maybe Mars says is "the anthem of Chinese countercultural youth" for its juxtaposition of catchy pop and lightly politicized social commentary.

Sixx is also reaching for the stars, telling CNN he and his band recently played in the finals of the Pepsi Battle of the Bands in Shanghai, angling for a spot to perform in Hong Kong and win a recording contract. Saliba, of Maybe Mars, is also developing the young rocker, calling him one of the freshest new talents in Beijing.

"There is a lot of amazing music being made. I'd say probably more exciting than most cities in the world," Saliba said.

However, there are also stereotypes to combat in the rapidly growing rock scene in Beijing. China has long been known for imitating Western trends from handbags to cars and even pop stars. Mainland pop music has been derided as uninventive and uninspiring, fraught with lip-synching and intense focus on image rather than music.

Nowadays though, innocuous Mandarin pop (or "Mandopop") and popular karaoke bars are no longer the only sounds in town. The rock scene is heating up, and it is fiercely original.

"We learned a lot by imitating," said Cui Jian, one of China's most famous rock stars. "But we have our own problems, our own feelings to express, so we've started making our own music."

Cui Jian is widely considered the father of Chinese rock and roll. More than 20 years since he launched his own ground-breaking career, he is trying to encourage today's young bands to be innovative and experimental with their music.

Leading a musical counterculture that is redefining what it means to be "Made in China," Cui is headlining a new show on MTV China to promote higher standards in the music industry by discouraging lip-synching and promoting his favorite up-and-coming bands.

Back across town at D-22, Charles Saliba and Michael Pettis are doing the same. To date, their record label Maybe Mars has signed 24 bands that they believe have real potential in the Chinese rock-and-roll market.

"You're looking for something that to you at least sounds new and is not a copy or a photocopy, and that's really hard," Saliba said. "I mean it's like discovering a color."

Whether China's new "color" of rock and roll will make it big in the U.S. during this tour remains to be seen, but there is no doubt that Chinese rock 'n' roll is here to stay.

[Tingly]

BUDDY HOLLY GUITAR UP FOR AUCTION

NEW YORK (AP) -- The guitar that Buddy Holly customized himself as a tribute to Elvis Presley is going to be auctioned. Christie's auction house will sell Holly's Gibson J-45 guitar.

Holly did leatherwork as a hobby and he covered the guitar in leather because
he had seen Presley play a leather-covered guitar in 1955. It's expected to sell for $450,000 to $550,000. Holly's tweed stage jacket will also be sold, and it's expected to go for at least $3,000.

Original 78's of Presley's first five singles for Sun Records will also be on the block. The auction will take place in New York on December 3.

[Tingly]

FENDER STILL MAKING THE BIG BUCKS

By Michael Hiltzik

Los Angeles Times

The sound of California business success came to my ears the moment I stepped through the door of Fender Musical Instruments Corp.'s 3-acre manufacturing plant in Corona, 70 miles east of downtown Los Angeles.

It reached me as riffs and scales on electric guitar, audible over the thud of metal stamping and the grind of band saws that one might customarily hear on a factory floor.

But this is no ordinary plant. The last step in Fender's quality-control process requires an experienced musician to play every note on a finished guitar, listening for a stray vibration or tuning flaw to be corrected before any model, including the American Standard Stratocaster that is the plant's bread and butter, reaches a dealer.

Fender's Corona shop is a testament to how U.S. manufacturing -- California manufacturing, especially -- can survive in a world where even complex products such as microprocessors can be turned out by the millions by unskilled laborers overseas.

The secret is to marry assembly-line efficiency and hand-tooled precision. Much of Fender's manufacturing process, including the rough cutting of the guitar body and the stamping of the metal parts (some still based on dies cut personally by Leo Fender, the company's founder), is at least partially automated. But there's no substitute for the hand-finishing, polishing and tuning of the hundreds of American Standard Stratocasters and Telecasters, along with other high-end guitars, produced each day by a workforce of 600 in Corona.

It's rare for a week to pass without some other state trying to lure a California manufacturer with cheap real estate, tax incentives or other blandishments that this state can't, or won't, match. Fire extinguishers, sportsmen's knives, fabricated plastics and electronic components are all products once made in California and now made elsewhere.

Not even Fender is a California-only manufacturer: The firm makes most of its amplifiers and entry-level Fender-brand guitars in Ensenada, Mexico. But its executives say their core manufacturing is in California to stay.

"California is hewn into Fender's DNA," says Justin Norvell, director of marketing for the electric-guitar lines. "Leaving would never happen."

In part, that's because of its experienced workforce, which can't be casually relocated, much less replicated, somewhere else. The average tenure of a Fender employee is 15 years, and turnover is less than 1 percent, says David Maddux, the firm's senior quality-assurance technician and a 35-year employee.

Guitar-making in California also helps preserve the company's link to its late founder, Clarence Leonidas Fender, who opened a Fullerton radio shop during the Depression and tinkered with amps and electric guitars on the side. The first Fender-built guitars appeared on the market in the mid-1940s.

Fender guitars have long been identified with the California car-and-surf culture -- Leo personally gave Dick "King of the Surf Guitar" Dale one of the first Fender Stratocasters, with the directive to "beat it to death." Dale worked Fender's amps so hard that some burst into flame, according to legend.

So it's no accident that Fender's $1,590 American Standard Stratocaster, the heart of the catalog, is made in Corona. And that's not to speak of the models produced by Fender's eight master builders, elite craftsmen who can spend anywhere from several days to several months building a guitar in the Custom Shop.

Collectors commonly demand the products of particular master builders, and artists sit down with their favorite builders to extract just the right sound from the hand-tweaked electronics and build of a signature guitar.

Ask him about his work, and a master builder will respond not with an engineer's precision but an artist's subjectivity. "There's a sound in my head I'm trying to chase and yet remain true to what Fender's all about," Mark Kendrick, 51, told me. Kendrick has worked at Fender since he was 18. He struggled to put his goal into words, then said, "It's really tough to describe the tonal quality of a Fender. ... It's the very definition of rock 'n' roll."

Kendrick has made instruments for Eric Clapton and Merle Haggard. To meet a customer's specifications, he'll do everything -- hand-wind copper wire around the pickup magnets as well as select the wood of the guitar body.

"I can water the tree if I have to," he said.

A few cubicles down, John Cruz showed me the replica he fashioned from Swedish guitar-virtuoso Yngwie Malmsteen's 1971 Stratocaster. It's a heroic reproduction, down to the original's cigarette burns and tooth marks, not to mention its strip of tape with the words "Play Loud" and electronics that achieve what Cruz called a "1-to-1 match" sonically.

Fender then turned out 100 replicas, sold for a list price of $12,500, to Malmsteen devotees -- plainly a group that puts the "fan" into "fanatic."

Yet you don't have to follow any individual artist to admire Fender guitars. Like its nearest rival, Gibson Musical Instruments in Nashville, Fender is part of every rock fan's heritage. Fenders have been the instruments of choice for Clapton, Steve Miller and Stevie Ray Vaughan.

I remember the great blues guitarist Roy Buchanan making his Fender Telecaster wail like a heartbroken lover on "Sweet Dreams" during a New York appearance in the early '70s. That's a white Strat that Jimi Hendrix seemed to stretch to its physical limits in his unforgettable battlefield rendition of "The Star-Spangled Banner" at Woodstock in 1969. If you're looking for "a definitively sublime Strat moment," guitar historian Tony Bacon says in "The Fender Electric Guitar Book," you could do worse than David Gilmour's operatic solo on Pink Floyd's "Comfortably Numb."

Collectors of Strats can be as particular as collectors of Strads, endlessly debating the relative quality of those manufactured during Fender's three historical periods -- the Leo Fender years (1946-65), the period following its 1965 acquisition by CBS and its renaissance after a 1985 buyout by its CBS management, led by William Schultz, who established a corporate headquarters in Scottsdale, Ariz., but opened the Corona manufacturing facility and launched the Custom Shop there. (The instruments produced under cost-conscious CBS have long been scorned by experts but have lately begun a modest rise in collector esteem.)

Many guitar experts believe Fender is today experiencing its golden age, but that doesn't mean the firm is immune from economic woes. It cut back to one shift from two about a year ago, when the recession made $1,000-plus guitars look like dispensable luxuries. Executives say dealers have finally begun to report hazy indications of resurgent demand.

More important, it's facing more rapid technological change than anything the innovative Leo Fender ever saw. Aware that young musicians aren't shy about enhancing their guitar work through software, Fender brought out the VG Stratocaster, with on-board digital sonic modeling, in 2006. It didn't address a large market, however, and is now out of production, possibly to be supplanted by a second-generation version in 2011.

But to aficionados, some things never change.

"They've always been able to maintain a passionate corporate culture," says Tom Watson, a former Stratocaster trader who contributes market analysis to the Web site StratCollector.com. Norvell and other executives say the firm's history keeps that passion alive.

"Every day, we're aware that we're stewards of a legacy," Norvell says.

[Tingly]

ROBERT JOHNSON BIRTHPLACE TO BE TOURIST DESTINATION

Robert Johnson's birthplace in Hazlehurst, MS, may soon become a tourist destination for fans of the late blues guitarist who--as legend tells it--sold his soul to the Devil in exchange for his guitar prowess, according to a New York Times report.

Johnson's half-sister reportedly has verified that her brother was born in 1911 in a Copiah County home built by his stepfather. The cultural affairs office of Copiah County is seeking to raise $250,000 to restore the home as a place for music fans to come pay respects and honor the influential artist.

The fabled crossroads where Johnson is supposed to have sold his soul has never been definitively located.

-livedaily.com

[Tingly]

FRESHMAN GUITARS: QUALITY AND PLAYABILITY

Freshman is well known for manufacturing acoustic guitars with good build quality and great playability.

Consistently delivering well setup guitars not only creates a good reputation, but it also creates high expectations for guitars across the Freshman range.

It goes without saying that when it comes to top end electro-acoustics and 12-string guitars, Freshman have a lot to live up to.

This month, Acoustic Magazine has been taking a look at two models within the top-end of the Freshman range – the Grand Auditorium FA400GAC, and the FA400DCE12/S.

These guitars have a very similar build which immediately impressed Acoustic Magazine's reviewer.

The high standard of wood used in these guitars, not only helps to create a good feel, but also creates a great tone.

Acoustic Magazine noted that the "solid AAA-graded Engelmann shimmering spruce top, which is key in getting their sound nice and bright."

Acoustic Magazine's reviewer was particularly keen on the metallic timbre of the FA400GAC which is "well suited to stomping riffs and desperation blues."

Strong build quality, high standard materials, impressive tones and good playability place these two models right at the top of your Christmas list if you're hunting for a high-end acoustic guitar.

"If you've had the misfortune to have missed out on playing one, then these two models in particular could be your chance to find a new stripped-down acoustic rig".

Gear4music have recently become a regional specialist of Freshman guitars, and have over 40 different models available including acoustic and electro-acoustic guitars.

As Acoustic Magazine's reviewer commented, "There are clearly some common traits among Freshman guitars with very intelligent and experienced minds getting hands-on in the production."

-gear4music.com