From: owner-grand-funk To: grand-funk-digest Subject: grand-funk V1 #3 Reply-To: Errors-To: owner-grand-funk Precedence: bulk grand-funk Saturday, 8 February 1997 Volume 01 : Number 003 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- From: einar@rfci.net Date: Thu, 06 Feb 1997 19:32:45 -0500 Subject: Re: We're An American Band > Who wrote the chords to > We're an American Band? There is only (Brewer) written behind it, other > than Shinin'On (Farner/Brewer)? > > Nico. Interesting......... This is in direct contrast to Farners statement in 1978 the "Brewer couldn't write music per se" - -Could have been that some lesser know pal of Brewer's wrote the music per Brewers instructions of the sound he was looking for. - -Could also be that Farner helped but took no credit because this was to be Brews song. - -Or since the chords to American Band are simple enough Brewski did the whole thing. I don't really know and your guess is as good a mine. Possibly the great lyricist Bill will clean up this ugly mess for us. JC ------------------------------ From: "Robert Bodily" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 00:47:37 -0500 Subject: Hello Just thought I'd drop a note to introduce myself to everyone, especially since the mailing list is so short right now. (I saw from a previous e-mail that there are 12 members - not sure if that includes me yet or not). I first found Bill's website about 3 months ago and just recently found the invitation to join the mailing list, so here I am. First, let me say congrats to Bill on an excellent website (I meant to send these remarks directly when I first discovered your site 3 months ago, but...). I went searching for a GFR website early last year when I first heard about the reunion tour and didn't find anything. I was surprised to find such a well organized site just a short time later. I don't really have any exciting GFR stories to tell (at least nothing to match those on Bill's site). Unfortunately, I missed their early heyday because of a health problem (born too late :) ). I got turned onto GFR by an older cousin in my early college years (early 80's) and they quickly became my favorite group. I did manage to see Mark Farner twice in the '82-'86 period in Tulsa. Those concerts were in small venues and made for quite an enjoyable show. My greatest GFR thrill came last summer - I'm in Raleigh, NC now and had 2nd row center seats for the opening show of their reunion tour. It was an event I thought I'd never see and the only complaint I had about the show was that they didn't play all their albums from cover to cover. Kinda makes up for missing the earlier '70s shows, since I doubt I would've had 2nd row seats at Shea Stadium (or paid $7.50 for them either :)). Anyway, I'm very interested in touring information for this year. Also, does anyone have any information on the release of the Survivor and Phoenix CDs? I've been checking since early last year; my CD store says the CDs are planned but the release dates are To Be Announced. The last I checked, the situation hadn't changed. Those are the last two disks I need to replace my album collection. Robert ------------------------------ From: "William A. Parrette" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 07:49:31 -0500 (EST) Subject: Growing but list problems? Hi all, Just a quick note first thing this morning from your list-own- er. The list is almost a week old and we're still growing -- 14 subscribers! I've had a couple of messages now about folks who have had trouble subscribing to the list. The two I know about are now subscribed but if anybody saved their rejection-return-mail, I'd like to see it so I could try to find out what went wrong. Any- body that is having problems with the list, or knows of someone else having problems subscribing to the list, can contact me with personal e-mail at wap@one.net. Hey! The discussions that have been coming through are great! Keep it up!! Do any of you folks on AOL want to contact your friends that frequent the Grand Funk chat room over there and tell them about this list? I have heard that, at times, you folks have some interesting conversations and it might be kind of neat to share them here with a wider audience. "Do you feel alright? I said do you feel alright? Well al- right. Everybody, come on, clap your hands. Yeah, let's get this whole damn place in the groove." Keep it up, take care, and may you always grok in fullness ... Bill-- ...who defines a Man Year as 730 people working feverishly until noon. +--------------------------+--------------------------+------ ______ --+ |William A. (Bill) Parrette|7177 Heritage Drive | ______//__][_\__ | |wap@one.net |Westchester, OH 45069-4012|/o _ 42| -| _ \| | *** http://w3.one.net/~wap/ *** |`-(_)-------(_)---' +------------------- 513-779-0780 --------------------+------------------+ ------------------------------ From: einar@rfci.net Date: Fri, 07 Feb 1997 08:52:32 -0500 Subject: petition Both Nico and Phil paid their brothers to sign the petition so we are now up to 24. Thanks to both of you and your kin! Bill and Greg (if he is on the list) be sure and send me an email stating support for the petition. If you already have, sorry I missed it. I'll try not to wear you guys out with petition info in the future. Have any of you ever seen a pic of GFR and Zappa together? I've got one and it's gonna be in the Photo Shop on my site. Also press kits from GSGP and another released prior to the CD reissues. A survival press kit is on the way with 8 pics including Terry Knight. I have stack of stuff about 4 inches high waiting to be scanned. Just received my new scanner yesterday so give a day or two to figure it out and things will be happening over the weekend, I pray! Bill: I really want to put the B/W pic that came from your unkown source on my site. Any problems with that? Just say the word and I won't. Our buddyship is more important than some pic. Someone said the Auburn Hills concert is for real, any comments? JCFunky ------------------------------ From: "William A. Parrette" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 12:01:57 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: We're An American Band Hi all, The great lyricist, Bill, here typin' atcha' On Thu, 6 Feb 1997 einar@rfci.net wrote: > > Who wrote the chords to > > We're an American Band? There is only (Brewer) written behind it ... > > Interesting......... This is in direct contrast to Farners statement in > 1978 the "Brewer couldn't write music per se" ... Well, I don't know if I have any factual input for you here ... I have it from a "reliable source" (who is also a list-member in hiding :-) ) that the published sheet music for this song credits Brewer for both the lyrics and the music. With that in mind, let me throw in a little insight from an ex-musician -- me! I know that the bands I was in rarely "wrote" music. Most of the time, we would just be jamming on some particular beat, groove, or chord progression when someone would do something dif- ferent and interesting. Upon discussion, someone would note that it was pretty cool and that we should try to build on it and try to come up with something. Once things started solidifying, we would slap an intro on the beginning, some type of ending on the end, and we would have a new song. Someone would write some lyrics and we would start performing it. On occasion, someone would come up with some lyrics first, and we would try to jam around them to come up with something inter- esting. I will not say that "our boys" are not song-writers, just based on my experience and their beginning musical style, much of their stuff probably came from jamming. Obviously the American Band lyrics came first and I would have guessed that they just jammed around the lyrics until something sounded good. But, it's all a guess on my part. Does anybody else have some input? Welcome to all the new recent list members. I'd like to in- vite you all to join in on the chat. And, as always, may you grok in fullness ... Bill-- ...who heard that armadillo means to provide weapons to a Spanish pickle. (42?) (__==__) +--------------------------+--------------------------+---- \ -- (oo) ---+ |William A. (Bill) Parrette|7177 Heritage Drive | /-------\/ | |wap@one.net |Westchester, OH 45069-4012| / | || | | *** http://w3.one.net/~wap/ *** | * ||----|| | +------------------- 513-779-0780 --------------------+--- ^^ -- ^^ -----+ ------------------------------ From: "William A. Parrette" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 13:28:19 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: Hello Hi Robert and all of the other grand-funk list members, Welcome to the list and thanks for the great introduction post. On Fri, 7 Feb 1997, you wrote: > ... (I saw from a previous > e-mail that there are 12 members ... Yep! There are 14 of us now!! And, interestingly enough you were the 11th subscriber. Pretty close, if you ask me! > ... > First, let me say congrats to Bill on an excellent website ... Awww, gee <*blush*> ... shucks. I was just tryin' to help out. Of course, you've been to Jeff Cochran's (another sub- scriber, here) site and Donna Wightman's (soon to be another sub- scriber -- I hope?!? Oh Donna ... where are you Donna?) site? I do, after all, have links to them off of my main page. > ... I went searching for a GFR website early last year when I first > heard about the reunion tour and didn't find anything ... Yeah, I know what you mean. I've told a couple of other folks about my thoughts, work, and efforts -- I can repeat it here for you and some of the others. I've put a lot of effort and hard work into my Grand Funk pages -- trying to make them the best and most complete source of information about the band. It is sort of tough competing ;-) against Jeff and Donna though -- they too have great sites. It's not a competition really, we have all managed (I think) to pro- vide complimentary information and have all sort have provided our own unique perspectives on the band. I'm a huge fan as well and have been since the beginning back in 1969. Back then I even seem to remember (the grey hairs are sort of fogging this old 43-year old mind :-) ) seeing "the boys," before they hit the big time, as a warm-up act for another band at a club here in Cincinnati. I tried to follow most every thing the band did for a number of years. When the reunion rumors started surfacing a couple of years ago, I searched the 'Net, far and near, for any source of infor- mation about the band. I found nothing. Okay, okay ... i found almost nothing. What was out there was little more than a couple of rock album-type sites and a few (bad) lyric transcriptions. When the rumors started solidifying earlier this year, I told myself that if no one else was going to put Grand Funk on the have been trying to make it better and more complete with each passing week. And, wouldn't you know it? ... as soon as my pages come up, two other sites appear at almost the same time. > ... > I don't really have any exciting GFR stories to tell ... > ... I'm in Raleigh, NC now and had > 2nd row center seats for the opening show of their reunion tour ... I thought you said you didn't have any exciting stories to tell? ;-) Come on now, 'fess up! :-) > ... the only complaint I had about the show > was that they didn't play all their albums from cover to cover ... Seems like a valid complaint to me. Anybody want to run it past the band and see what they can do about it? :-) I saw the Traverse City show. It was the first one I had heard about and the only one I knew about at the time. I was in San Diego teaching a class at the time. I woke up a 5 a.m. to make the call the first day the tickets went on sale to make the purchase. I got in the 5th row, left side and couldn't wait for the show. It upset me a little to find out that more shows were being scheduled and several of them were at venues that would be closer to me than Traverse City. But when I finally got to see the band -- after nine hours of driving one way, almost 500 miles -- I never regretted the decision. I will have to admit that the 5th row isn't the best place to enjoy the music. It was pretty loud and a little distorted. But when the band launched into the opening chords of Are You Ready, the entire crowd was on their feet and didn't sit back down until after the closing chords of the encore -- We're An American Band. A truly wonderful and memorable experience! And now you know some of the whys and wherefores of all the work behind my Web pages. > ... > Anyway, I'm very interested in touring information for this year ... As we all are. :-) I'm sure this will be one of the first fo- rums for the dates to be publicized in ... stay tuned! > ... Also, > does anyone have any information on the release of the Survivor and Phoenix > CDs? ... Maybe Jay Siekierski would like to jump in on this one. He's been posting into the log books on Jeff and Donna's sites with some information he was able to obtain from Capitol Records re- release department. Personally, I'm still waiting for a reply to my snail-mail to Punch Enterprises on the subject. Again Robert, thanks for the post and thanks for prompting me to write another "book." It doesn't take much prompting to get me going. I thought I was restraining myself on-list until now -- sorry folks. I hope I haven't bored anybody too much. To all, take care and, as always, may you grok in fullness ... Bill-- ...who defines Adult as one who is old enough to know better. |\/\/\/| +--------------------------+--------------------------+ | | (42,man)+ |William A. (Bill) Parrette|7177 Heritage Drive | | (o)(o) / | |wap@one.net |Westchester, OH 45069-4012| c _) / | | *** http://w3.one.net/~wap/ *** | | '___| | +------------------- 513-779-0780 --------------------+- | / ----------+ /____\ ------------------------------ From: "NH Borger" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 21:01:26 +0100 Subject: Music > I know that the bands I was in rarely "wrote" music. Most of > the time, we would just be jamming.... Bill, what instrument do you play, drums right? I play guitar, I played in a few band myself, but I could never find a band that clicked. Nobody wanted to do GFR covers. So what I did was note for note copy Mark's solo's and sqeezed them in somewhere. And surprise, surprise one day during a concert pause someone stepped up to me and said: Your solo sounded a bit like GFR. I haven't played in a band for 10 years now. If I find the band wanting to do GFR I'll get back into it for sure, doing guitar, bass or sing, whatever. Nico. ------------------------------ From: "William A. Parrette" Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 17:23:12 -0500 (EST) Subject: Re: Music Hi all, I don't know about the rest of you folks, but I'm really en- joying the heck out of this list. I just wish I could have found the host four months ago! If any of you run into Andy Burnett in your 'Net wanderings, please be sure to give him a big Thank You for hosting the list. On Fri, 7 Feb 1997, Nico wrote: > > I know that the bands I was in rarely "wrote" music. Most of > > the time, we would just be jamming.... > Bill, what instrument do you play, drums right? ... Yep, I'm a drummer. I had a buddy in high school who let me attend one of his band's rehersals. I still remember looking around the room and how fascinated I was with it all. This was at a time where I was just "getting into" music -- around 1968. As I scanned the room it seemed that the easiest thing to learn to play was the drums. I have a little story about this along with a recent picture on my personal page at my Web site. > ... > Nobody wanted to do GFR covers ... I know that. At the time, most people that were in bands con- sidered themselves musicians only. And, just like the popular press of the time, most "real" musicians wouldn't have anything to do with that simple Grand Funk music. It was too "simple," too much of a "formula." Luckily, my second band -- at age 17 in 1970 -- had a guitar player that really admired Mark Farner's work. Now he liked a lot of other guitarists too -- in fact, he had the Hendrix Star Spangled Banner down to a note! -- but he liked Farner just as much as all those other, more musician-like, artists. We covered almost every song on the first four GFR albums! There were a couple we couldn't do from lack of a keyboard (like Mean Mistreater), but almost every other tune from On Time through Closer To Home was on our song list. We didn't get many gigs, but, boy, did we have fun! > ... So what I did was note for note copy Mark's > solo's and sqeezed them in somewhere ... I did the same with Brewer's Live Album solo. It took me a while to figure out that he was doing a lot of triplets, and a while longer to figure out how to do a triplet, but I was fairly proud of myself for being able to copy to solo almost exactly -- even down to the head-banging! There are still a couple of parts I'm not real sure about: In the beginning, after the rolls through the snare and the toms, Don goes into a floor-tom thing that sounds pretty easy -- just a little roll -- but he throws some triplet things in on the floor toms about every eighth measure that I've never been able to copy exactly. Then, right after the speed-up from the head-banging, he goes into what sounds like a sort of roll on the bass and the mounted tom with a straight snare smack on each count in the beat. I *think* I know what he's doing but I've never been able to replicate it very well. And, until I can watch his foot while he's playing it, I may never be able to. Any other drummers on-list? Any idea of what I'm talking about? My current desire is to be able to replicate Don's work on I Come Tumblin' ... Yeah, right! In *my* dreams. :-) > ... > a concert pause someone stepped up to me and said: Your solo sounded a bit > like GFR ... As much as I may have liked something like that, it never hap- pened to me. :-( > ... > I haven't played in a band for 10 years now ... It's been about 15 years for me. But, like you, it wouldn't take too much convincing To Get Back In to the swing if I could play a little Grand Funk. Ooppps! Here I am with another one of those books. Oh well -- stuff happens. Thanks for reading, take care, and may you al- ways grok in fullness ... Bill-- ...who "borrows" ASCII clip-art whenever he sees something interesting. /\___/\ (42?) +--------------------------+--------------------------+-- / ~ ~ ~ \ / --+ |William A. (Bill) Parrette|7177 Heritage Drive | / (o) (o) \ | |wap@one.net |Westchester, OH 45069-4012| / `' \ | | *** http://w3.one.net/~wap/ *** | \ ( ( (( / | +------------------- 513-779-0780 --------------------+-- \ )( ) (/ -----+ \m<->m/ ------------------------------ From: "NH Borger" Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 09:13:44 +0100 Subject: American Band Jim E-mailed me about the We're An American Band question: > Mark Farner wrote the chords as well as the drum intro and the "whoooo > whoooo" at the end of the song. He didn't ask for song writting credits > though. He told me this personally over dinner one evening. > a concert pause someone stepped up to me and said: Your solo sounded a bit > like GFR ... It was the Nothing is the same intro melody that did it. I was played around it. To all: What is your opinion about a GFR Tribute album? Nico. ------------------------------ From: "NH Borger" Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 16:45:53 +0100 Subject: Tour '96 Today in the mailbox I found the cassette from CrashTestChris the '96 Milwaukee WS recording. The quality is better than I expected. Great to listen to the Feeling. Yeah, the feeling of Mel's bass reverberating, resounding, pounding through your body. Nico. ------------------------------ From: "NH Borger" Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 19:02:17 +0100 Subject: Re: Tour '96 To Kenny: > Could you please direct me to where I could get a copy of the '96 Milwaukee show? HCRRock@aol.com, Crash Test Chris has the Milwaukee 7/2/96 and Chicago 6/20/96 concerts on music cassette. $10 for 1 tape $17 for both of them. Good quality for an audience recording. Chris said that the music quality on the Milwaukee tape is better than the one from Chicago, but Chicago is more exciting, because the crowd sometimes overwhelm the band. Nico. ------------------------------ From: Phil Catalano Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 13:22:35 -0700 (MST) Subject: Re: New email address (fwd) Hey guys, I received this from who I believe is David Fishof, or at least a representative. So let's keep our shirts on while they do their thing. I'm sure they're going totally nuts over there and are doing their best to get things rolling. Just thought I'd update you... Phil If you've got somebody You can trust to the very end (Go!) I said, if you do I want to be like you Cause you sho' got a real good friend (Friend!) friend (Friend!) friend (Go!) friend (Yes!) Whoa...Partners - --==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--= Phil Catalano phil.catalano@mci.com - --==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--= - ---------- Forwarded message ---------- Date: Fri, 7 Feb 1997 17:41:34 -0500 (EST) From: QBERT50@aol.com To: catalano@medusa.cs.mci.com Subject: Re: New email address Dear Phil, Thanks for all your help with the new e-mail address. It has been so hechtic here, but I want you to know I appreciate it. Shortly, I will be changing the address to GFR, however, it will be a little while, so I will let you know asap. I think people are a little weary about sending their GFR mail to an address like this! Don't you think? Thanks again, we'll be sure to keep you updated!! DFP, Inc. ------------------------------ From: Phil Catalano Date: Sat, 8 Feb 1997 13:28:21 -0700 (MST) Subject: Re: Music Hey, this is Phil, My brother Mick is a drummer and I'm not sure if he's subscribed to this list yet. But he will know EXACTLY what you're talking about. He used to play that solo just about note for note, or should I say beat for beat. So hopefully he'll read this and respond.... I got hip to her yeah right away boys... - --==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--= Phil Catalano phil.catalano@mci.com - --==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--==--= On Fri, 7 Feb 1997, William A. Parrette wrote: > Hi all, > > I don't know about the rest of you folks, but I'm really en- > joying the heck out of this list. I just wish I could have found > the host four months ago! If any of you run into Andy Burnett in > your 'Net wanderings, please be sure to give him a big Thank You > for hosting the list. > > On Fri, 7 Feb 1997, Nico wrote: > > > > I know that the bands I was in rarely "wrote" music. Most of > > > the time, we would just be jamming.... > > Bill, what instrument do you play, drums right? ... > > Yep, I'm a drummer. I had a buddy in high school who let me > attend one of his band's rehersals. I still remember looking > around the room and how fascinated I was with it all. This was > at a time where I was just "getting into" music -- around 1968. > As I scanned the room it seemed that the easiest thing to learn > to play was the drums. > > I have a little story about this along with a recent picture > on my personal page at my Web site. > > > ... > > Nobody wanted to do GFR covers ... > > I know that. At the time, most people that were in bands con- > sidered themselves musicians only. And, just like the popular > press of the time, most "real" musicians wouldn't have anything > to do with that simple Grand Funk music. It was too "simple," > too much of a "formula." > > Luckily, my second band -- at age 17 in 1970 -- had a guitar > player that really admired Mark Farner's work. Now he liked a > lot of other guitarists too -- in fact, he had the Hendrix Star > Spangled Banner down to a note! -- but he liked Farner just as > much as all those other, more musician-like, artists. > > We covered almost every song on the first four GFR albums! > There were a couple we couldn't do from lack of a keyboard (like > Mean Mistreater), but almost every other tune from On Time > through Closer To Home was on our song list. We didn't get many > gigs, but, boy, did we have fun! > > > ... So what I did was note for note copy Mark's > > solo's and sqeezed them in somewhere ... > > I did the same with Brewer's Live Album solo. It took me a > while to figure out that he was doing a lot of triplets, and a > while longer to figure out how to do a triplet, but I was fairly > proud of myself for being able to copy to solo almost exactly -- > even down to the head-banging! > > There are still a couple of parts I'm not real sure about: In > the beginning, after the rolls through the snare and the toms, > Don goes into a floor-tom thing that sounds pretty easy -- just a > little roll -- but he throws some triplet things in on the floor > toms about every eighth measure that I've never been able to copy > exactly. Then, right after the speed-up from the head-banging, > he goes into what sounds like a sort of roll on the bass and the > mounted tom with a straight snare smack on each count in the > beat. I *think* I know what he's doing but I've never been able > to replicate it very well. And, until I can watch his foot while > he's playing it, I may never be able to. > > Any other drummers on-list? Any idea of what I'm talking > about? > > My current desire is to be able to replicate Don's work on I > Come Tumblin' ... Yeah, right! In *my* dreams. :-) > > > ... > > a concert pause someone stepped up to me and said: Your solo sounded a bit > > like GFR ... > > As much as I may have liked something like that, it never hap- > pened to me. :-( > > > ... > > I haven't played in a band for 10 years now ... > > It's been about 15 years for me. But, like you, it wouldn't > take too much convincing To Get Back In to the swing if I could > play a little Grand Funk. > > Ooppps! Here I am with another one of those books. Oh well > -- stuff happens. Thanks for reading, take care, and may you al- > ways grok in fullness ... > > Bill-- > ...who "borrows" ASCII clip-art whenever he sees something interesting. > /\___/\ (42?) > +--------------------------+--------------------------+-- / ~ ~ ~ \ / --+ > |William A. (Bill) Parrette|7177 Heritage Drive | / (o) (o) \ | > |wap@one.net |Westchester, OH 45069-4012| / `' \ | > | *** http://w3.one.net/~wap/ *** | \ ( ( (( / | > +------------------- 513-779-0780 --------------------+-- \ )( ) (/ -----+ > \m<->m/ > > ------------------------------ End of grand-funk V1 #3 ***********************