Little Man On The Choo Choo Bob Show

Little Man does a spot on television! The Choo Choo Bob Show is a children's live action TV show that's broadcasted on Saturday mornings in the upper mid-west. There's actually a model train shop in St. Paul, not too far from my place called Choo Choo Bob's in St. Paul and it's the same people that created this show so it all has to do with trains.

The videographer called me up saying the show wanted to have some local music on the show this season and asked if I could write a song themed on trains and perform it with the band on the show. "Of course!" I said. Unique opportunity for sure.

I wrote a simple short song and set up some time to make it over to the TV studio.

It was really cool to have the band together for this one. Sean and Brian both were available to make this happen. The premise was was that Little Man would be performing at Tiny Land's Festival of Rain. They suited us in rain slickers and we performed the song on a green screen set so there will be some sort of background there on the show. We looked so goofy, it was hilarious. Brian's son was also with us so we had him push some gear in the background wearing his own rain gear. We played through the song a few times with our "happy-fun-faces" on with Choo Choo Bob helping out on acoustic guitar and vocals while the other show characters danced in the background. It was such a fun time. I even had a few lines! One in which involved me spitting out a mouthfull of water then saying, "I think your roof is leaking."

All the people working on set were terrific. I was also surprised that I had already known a couple of them as well. And just like how I've made efforts to include local businesses with Little Man, this experience with Choo Choo Bob surely furthered that sort of tie-in. Feels good to be a part of spreading the local love of talent and genuine hardworking people in the community. As far as I know the show airs on Channel 45 at 9am on a Saturday late summer or early this fall. The title of the show has something to do with rain.

Here it is!! Watch it on YouTube:  http://youtu.be/A83lhJ-7fuY

Rock For Pussy IX: David Bowie Tribute Show Recap



Photo by Ben Clark

This show is absolutely one of the most fun shows to be a part of. Every year Twin Cities musicians come together to pull off this event at the First Avenue mainroom. Created and hosted by 89.3 The Current's Mary Lucia, this show attracts tons of Bowie fans while acting as a benefit for the Humane Society's Minneapolis no-kill cat shelters. We have the all-star band led by John Eller and then special local guest singers come up and sing their favorite David Bowie songs. The tunes span all of Bowie's career and for this shows second set we played the entire Ziggy Stardust album from start to finish. It's the 40th anniversary of it's release after all! I've been helping out on guitar in the band and sang a few songs this year. Without our past guitar player Randy Casey, I played alot more also with the help of Gary Vogel. I rehearsed at home for about a month before this one wanting to give the singers the best experience possible. There are so many intricate chord changes to some of these songs. It was a truly great show. But it was a rough start for me with my gear.

Photo by Ben Clark

I set up my guitar rig, played a bit, shut it off and had a little break before all of us getting on stage for a soundcheck. Turned my amp back on...nothing. Tried different cables, plugged in directly, prayed to it, banged on it repeatedly. The band had there soundcheck while I totally missed out. Got on the phone right away to Twin Town, a reputable local guitar shop fairly close by, and told them the situation. I needed an amp ASAP!!! They said I could swap mine out but I had to get over there within the hour before they closed. I hopped in a car and stage manager Conrad's brother zipped me out of there, through traffic almost getting hit by a car that ran a red light and we made it there. Swapped amps, got back to the club. Whew!!

My view from the stage.

Photo by Charles Robinson

Photo by Steve Cohen

It took me a good while to come down from the stress of that one.
I slipped into the VIP parking lot to decompress in my van for little bit. From there I changed into my glam rock threads, hit the make-up and hair table and prepared to hit the stage. We rocked. There were many moments of blissed out rock and roll happiness going on for me (Starman and Moonage Daydream!) and so many others I'm sure. It's fun to be a part of this. And God bless David Bowie.

All That Glitters Is Gold

No I didn't sell 500,000 records yet, but I did find gold!


Play the audio, and read on! 

My wife and I found a place in Wisconsin where a big asteroid hit the Earth and a whole bunch of rock got busted up. We heard it was a good place for gold hunting. After gathering up Brigid's prospecting pans we headed over there. Upon arrival we noticed a gentleman in the parking lot loading up all his prospecting gear. My wife wasted no time introducing herself. Being beginners (I've never done this before) we had alot of questions and he was more than happy to show us the ropes. He even invited us to come pan with him. We walked through the park and found a real cool spot on the creek to set up. This man, Mark, has been prospecting here for 8 years. He let us use his gear and assigned us each a job. It was like having a private lesson in panning. He was really great.

Mark and Brigid dug up dirt and rock and put it into a classifier bucket and then I took the sand and rock from that bucket and put it through a sluice box (pronounced "sloose") It's a little, metal, waterfall-like piece of equipment with riffles along the inside of it and what was called minors moss to catch finer gold, sand and much smaller pebbles beneath that. Then all stuff that was caught in this we panned. We actually found some gold! very small specks, but still very neat to actually see.

At one time I was working the sluice when a big snapping turtle, about the size of a steering wheel, crossed my path within about a foot of me! Just working it's way down the river. That was quite a surprise.

It was a beautiful area. I enjoyed the sound of the river and the zen-like experience of circling the pan around and paying very close attention to finding shiny bits. It takes some practice with the pan and it was great to have a lesson in that. We also found the ruby red colored Garnets and clearish quarts. Real fun experience for sure. We'll be back.

Tube Dreamer

This is the OD2 Tube Screamer clone from BYOC. It comes as a kit that you build. This is the 3rd build I've done (see previus posts of my Fuzzy Face and Fat Rocket) I call my version the Tube Dreamer. I took a picture from one of my LP covers and stuck it on there and painted the enclosure green like the original Tube Screamer. This guitar effect pedal is an overdrive. It's great when used with a clean tube amp and then this bumps it up a couple notches. Stevie Ray Vaughan is probably the most notable guitar player that uses this. It's a very popular classic pedal. BYOC's pedal also has a separate boost on one side, that gives you an increase in volume and that "just right" break up tone from amp.

The build ables you to make some modifacations or "mods" as they say from the orginal TS808 Tube Screamer it's built off of. I chose to (and here's the tech talk if you want to skip ahead) replace the final 470 ohm for a 220 for a little more gain. Added Mosfet B5170 clipping. Replaced the .22uf Tantalum capacitor for a .15 for better tone knobe frequency responce. I did some research on the mods to learn about them and figure out which ones I wanted to do. It even has three trim pots inside that you can adjust for Louder, Min and Max drive. I also added the blue LED's.

I had just gotten a new record player and a whole mess of albums from a friend so it was really cool to put on an LP and work on this project. The build was fairly easy but a little more difficult then the others I built.

I tried this pedal with my little Silvertone tube amp. Playing the amp at half volume gives a nice clean tone, a little dark, that's just the character of this amp. Using the boost of the pedal I can make it sound like it's up all the way breaking up nicely. With just the "tube screamer" side on, it gives a great overdriven distortion brightening up my amp and giving it a little more of a Vox amp sound. Both sides on lurches out a ripping tight zip tone kind of similar to a low batteried Fuzz Face.

Listen to the demo:

Here is "Seekers of  Space" a demonstration of the Korg Monotron Space Delay I just got. It's a really cool little analog synth that sounds oh so spacey. Added with some of my favorite space girls and LP covers.

The Perricelli's go to Sicily

Sicily!!! My gosh what an adventure. My wife and I traveled to the Mediterranean to visit the Italian island with my mother, father and sister for 8 days to celebrate my folks 40th wedding anniversary. Some of my family is from Naples on the mainland but most of my lineage is from Cattania, Caltenassetta and San Cataldo, Sicily. We got to visit these towns and literally feet the magic. We saw my mothers maiden name on a nearby shop and enjoyed some pizza from a local bakery which was very similar to to they style of pizza my grandfather, father and I make. It was really fun to see that and have a taste. Buonissimo!

Sicily is totally beautiful and blew my expectations away. We flew to Palermo, met up with our guide Alfie and headed straight out after an 8 hour flight from New York's JFK (got up at 4 am to catch our flight from Minneapolis). Being in the airport I could practically feel Italy and got excited as we were surrounded by Italians and the sound of the language. It seemed like we were at a big family reunion with distant cousins.

Sicily is very mountainous, there are towns in valleys, sides and on the very top of mountains. Lots of palm trees and cactus. Very similar to California and Mexico. Quite hot in the mid 90's this September. All sorts of hazel nut, almond, pistachio, fig, peach, orange and olive trees. Plenty of wine vineyards. We zoomed around the city in a private passenger van, caught the sights in the historical area including beautiful church, a catacomb full of hanging skeletons and had our first taste of Sicilian food at a trattoria on Mondello Beach. Straight away we did it up with a Prosecco, pasta, aracini (a delicious large fried rice ball with meat, sauce, onions and peas), seafood and local wine. Stray Sicilian cats crept by once and awhile and we saw them throughout our visit. This was a great first meal.

From there we traveled east to Castel De Tusa and the medieval town of Tusa up above. Strolled through town as we seemed to be the only tourists around and hung out at a little deli for a panini and a beer. Then it was off to Cefalu near the water for another walk through town and a swim in the Tirreanean Sea.

Our guide Alfie Orlando

Day 3 found us in the port of Messina, from where you can see Italy's mainland, to watch an amazing clock turn noon with a Negroni cocktail, antipasta and an excellent pepper pasta in the town square, then over for a cannoli at a nearby bakery.

We drove up and up and up, winding and zig zaging to the little town of Savoca where some of the movie The Godfather was filmed. They shot the wedding scene here, as well as a scene at Bar Vitelli that we took a little break at. Again, we were the only tourists up here, it was totally peaceful and beautiful and got to hang out with some of the people that were actually in the movie. Another plus to having a guide was that not only do we travel to places not very many people visit but also that he's there to tell us the history, help with the language and have conversations with locals.

Taormina is a beautiful seaside resort town. We enjoyed a cocktail at the famous Wunderbar, had pizza for dinner, people watched and walked through town at night. Toaromina, Messina, Caltanassetta and Cattania were notably hip on fashion. There's clothes shops everywhere and people especially like to get dressed up in the evenings for a stroll. Italians love there shoes and it showed. Mostly high heels and wedges, short skirts and dresses on women. The men donned high collared polo's and thin pants often colored solid red, purple, light blue or white. Also the Sicilian football team's colors are black and pink, so a man in a pink shirt was frequently seen.

We visited Mount Etna, Europe's most active volcano and had the most delicious lunch way up there that seemed like it was in the middle of nowhere. Stripped bare trees and crumbly volcanic rock surrounded the place where we ate and just next door they were rebuilding from where the lava had totally engulfed the previous structure from a recent eruption. This was the best meal ever. I exclaimed that I was in "gastronomic ecstasy" with a truly wonderful tomato sauce macaroni and a BBQ dish with a delightful red wine.

The typical day was breakfast at the hotel, then a hop in the van for fast windy road traveling to our first destination. A walk about town with a cocktail or espresso at a little bar, back to the van for more travel and another walk through town or a swim in the sea. We saw many Norman castles and strongholds (1100's) and visited very old churches and Greek ruins dating as far back as 585bc. Lunches were around 2 or 3pm and we ate dinner at about 8:30, 9pm usually. These were big events. Dinners finished with lemoncello's, the popular lemon liquor, often on the house.

We were in such awe by the sheer beauty of Sicily and how delicious and fresh the food was. Everywhere we looked was good enough for a postcard. Every little narrow ally with hung clothes, smells of Parmesan cheese, flowerpots and cobbled streets was SO Italian. Most of all it was fun to be together as a family and to actually be in the towns where my relatives lived. I think we'll be back.

The plane trip home was exhausting. We flew from Palermo to Naples (45minutes), then sat in the plane, on the tarmac for 3 and a half hours(!!) before taking of tho New York. This time it took 10 hours and Air Meridiana was not the greatest. Lot's of the amenities on the plane didn't work, like my seat that wouldn't stay in the upright position or the tv screen built into the seat that flickered. The flight attendants and everyone on the plane spoke Italian. We got back to the USA as everone applauded at touchdown. Coming in 5 hours late we missed our connecting flight to Minneapolis so we had to grab a hotel room and catch the first flight back to Minnesota in the late morning. Whew, what trip and well worth it!!

Fat Rocket!

I finished building an effects box for my guitar. I call it the Fat Rocket. It's the BYOC Large Beaver, a clone of the classic Big Muff. This distortion pedal has been around since the early 70's made by ElectroHarmonix. You'd be familiar with it if you've heard Pink Floyd, Dinosaur Jr and The White Stripes among countless others. It's a very thick and heavy guitar tone with lots of sustain. My first build was the BYOC Fuzz Face clone (see earlier blog post) and loved not only the sound of it but the experience of building it as well. I haven't had a hobby like this since I was a kid building lots of airplane models. It's great to get back into something so detailed. Something my mind can be present with. To be focused on something, to zen with.

Although easy to lots of builders, this one was just a step more complicated than my previous build. I started with preparing and painting the case first. I had never done this before. My other one I covered in fuzzy fabric, this one I spray painted red layers on, over and over again. Then I figured out a design and got some stickers of a fat looking rocket and some gold stars to put on there and hand panted the name I came up with. Very steady hands!! I had the words painted on there so nicely until I tried to make one final touch with one of the letters and a big drop of paint fell from my paint pen onto it. I was so upset!! Why did I have to perfect something that was already good! Ugh. I quickly had to wipe it down and spray paint over it. In my rush I completely sprayed my hand that was holding the case. Even after trying to wash it off, my hand looked like it had been bloodied after a killing for a day or two.

While this stuff dried I started soldering the components to the board and then added the pots and jacks. You can build this to the Ram's Head or Triangle versions of the Big Muff. I went for the Ram's Head. The trickiest part was wiring this thing. It took a little while to get my soldering skills up to speed too. Some of my first soldering attempts were pretty sketchy and I knew that if this thing didn't work, that was probably the problem to be looked at. I worked on the pedal on and of and in bits over a couple of months.

And then I finished it. ooohhh ... will it work?...what will it sound like?...what's going to happen? I got all excited to plug it in and step on it! Plugged it in. Turned on the amp. With it off, I got clean signal going through it. That's good. Then, the moment of truth, I strummed a chord and hit the switch and POW!! We have lift off!! It worked!! What a great feeling. It really sounds good.