The Soulpass Project

I was looking for a chord chart for the “Bare Necessities” song from the Jungle Book soundtrack (used to think it was called “Bear Necessities,” but apparently it’s not). It turns out that the only charts I could find on the net seem a little incomplete and inaccurate. I put one together based on those, and I think it’s more useful and accurate:

The Bare Necessities, by Terry Gilkyson

Oh yeah, if you want to play along with the soundtrack, capo the 5th fret… it’s actually in the key of C; I think it’s easier to use the G formations, and that’s what the charts on the net use.

I think that this formation sounds best for the Cm:

e||---|---|-o-|---|
B||-o-|---|---|---|
G||---|---|---|---|
D||-o-|---|---|---|
A||---|---|-o-|---|
E|x---|---|---|---|

…it seems that it could be a cumbersome transition from Cmaj at first, so barring it sounds nice as well (just doesn’t have the open string sound). A barred C7 sounds nice too.

UPDATE: I’ve recorded it!

Patrick Carwile (on guitar) and I (mandolin) were able to get some jamming done last week. He kept a solid groove, and I tried to hack out some chops and improv. It’s just shy of 7 minutes, so to listen to the whole thing might require an appreciation for instrumental jamming. Otherwise, it might make some nice background music for 6 minutes and 57 seconds

UPDATE: Added bass track

Louis’ bodybuilding competition is coming up soon. The contestants are supposed to have a music clip to play while they do their poses, and he asked me to help him make an original recording for this year. He has choreographed a tribal routine, so I used the djembe and mixed in some lion roars using Audacity. Here is the story that he will be telling through his poses and the music: The spear bearer walks in. He hears a lion. He motions for the lion to come and fight! He wrestles the lion, and wins. He celebrates! He puts the lion on his back, but drops it. He picks it back up, and walks off stage.

The other day I dusted off the electric guitar… And an old reverb pedal. As it turns out, if you take a reverb pedal and turn it up as high as it will go, it can provide entertainment for a long time. So I made a recording, but I don’t know how many people are into this sort of thing. It’s around 18 minutes long Only 8.3MB though, which is good for that long a recording. For most people it might make better background music rather than trying to sit and listen to the whole thing. But I think some interesting things came out of it, including some weird rhythms in a couple parts.

Recently, I’ve started playing the guitar a little more often. This semester I had only been playing on occasion. So I need to make more time to do that. I might as well be somewhat constructive while wasting away the hours.

Anyway, I’ve been experimenting with some grooves and ideas for the past couple days. They’ll probably never be finished, but I decided to record what I’ve got. There are two of them, and they are short and sweet so they shouldn’t take long to download. If you have a broadband connection, you can try streaming them if you’d prefer to do it that way.

Unfinished #1 (1:14; 0.99MB)
DOWNLOAD or STREAM

Unfinished #2 (0:40; 550KB)
DOWNLOAD or STREAM

UPDATE: The site is back down, and the mirror is back up.

Dave’s Comprehensive Guitar Chord Calculator is really neat resource for guitarists. It is a “reverse chord calcultor.” When you have found a great-sounding chord, but are not sure what it’s called, this is where you would turn. You supply the finger positions on the fretboard, and it tells you what the name of the chord is! I used to use this a lot, but when I went to use it recently, I found that it has disappeard from the net! Luckily, I had saved a copy of the file. Remember, this is NOT my work, I am simply providing it here so that it can still be used. It is copyright 2001 d@vidwest.net. If I see that Dave has put the page back online, I will take this link down from the net and provide a link to his. One final note: Unfortunately, his script was designed with Internet Explorer in mind. Since I know you must be browsing with Firefox, I figured I should note that you might have to fire up Explorer for this one. Sorry bout that.

The original URL (down):
http://vidwest.net/chords/chords.htm

Here’s the link to the mirror copy:
http://soulpass.com/mirror/vidwest.net/chords/chords.htm

Thank you Dave, whoever you are, for this excellent resource!

Non Plus Ultra has changed their name to Hep Kat… Check out their new site @ http://www.hepkatonline.com/!! I went to the Virginia Chicken Festival today, and they were one of the featured bands. Needless to say, they were very tight and sounded great. It was good to see them again!

Well, I’ve hated “nu rock” (or pop rock, nu metal, whatever… the crap they are trying to pass off as “rock music” these days) since I first heard it. It just all sounds the same, it is annoying, it tries too hard, it fits into a box, it is made of plastic… Same goes for a lot of other new music that comes out today. Anyway, so a while back I found a website that illustrates how much it sucks. It contained an MP3 with two Nickelback songs meshed together; one in the left channel, and the other in the right channel. I just found the link again:

http://www.nintendorks.com/brandon/archives/000475.php (update: original page no longer online)

I saved a local copy of the MP3 for you to download… check it out!!! Alternatively, you can try streaming it.

When listening to it, you can play with the balance. Try moving the sound from the left channel to the right channel, and then back to the center

Charlie Page, Billy Waddell, and myself are havin a lil jam session. Charlie on guitar, Billy on “string” :-), and me on drum kit… I’ll be postin’ some more mp3s soon! Also, I wrote a little PHP/.htaccess script that dynamically generates a playlist file to allow an MP3 to stream to the browser… Hopefully no one comes by here that actually knows how easy that actually is when it comes down to it … So, this post is doubling as the testing ground for the new script! The files won’t play for you? Leave a comment, lemmie know!

the first rehearsal: check it.
roadhouse blues!!: check it.
(i actually added a little singin track, it’s really quiet and crappy… but it’s mostly there as a feeble attempt to keep people interested that aren’t so much into instrumental music)

Hey i found some more MP3s! These are in less stream-friendly bitrates than the first ones, so they may not be for the faint-of-bandwidth. Then again, they might work fine! Only one way to find out, do it do it do it!!!

Marcus Pendergrass on keys, myself on kit (”yesyou” is not the real name of the song, I don’t even know if it is a real song… We were messing around): check it.

I have had the privilege of working with the community theater in town on a few productions. One that I participated in is called “Murder at Rutherford House.” It was a fun dinner theater and most of the cast got to do a radio spot! check it.

Original jazz, blues, and standards

Performing live:
Monday, February 14, 2005 @ 7:00 pm

Mulligan’s Bar and Grill
202 High Street
Farmville, VA
434- 315-8787

Click here to see the flyer!!
(PDF - Requires Adobe Acrobat)

Non Plus Ultra is:
Jeff Clements - Drum kit; Brenda Neller - Vocals, guitar, keyboard;
Rick Neller - Trumpet; Marcus Pendergrass - Keyboard, guitar;
Danny Short - Bass; Daniel Upshaw - Percussion

Band website