Himeronik's Blog

Born in East L.A

himeronik — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 23:49:31 +0000

Step biggest selection aside, Seth Rogen and James Franco, theMark Ruffalo
original stoner-comedy duo, cheech and Chong,squashed their long-running feud to re-unite for the Light Up America and Riffs, Arpeggios & Speed RunsCanada Tour – their first in 27 years. “We went from Nixon to Bush, and that’s about all that’s changed,” says Tommy Chong. TheBlack Sabbath shows, which run through January, mix new and classic comedy bits with tunes like “Born in East L.A.” and “Up in Smoke.” And, yes, the dudes still get baked on the road – but they don’t need to tote their own stash any¬more. “It’s like bringing coal to Newcastle,” says Chong. “if you need weed, you can get weed faster than a pizza almost anywhere.”
When we hit the road with Panic at the Disco
nearly two years ago, they still had the exclamation point and a no-drugs-or-alcohol policy. But when they embark on the first Rock Band Live Tour next month with Dashboard Con¬fessional, the Cab and Plain White T’s, the guys predict that things will be way more debauched. (The tour kicks off on October 5th in San Diego.) “We’re all finally 21,” says guitarist Ryan Ross. “Now that we can actually get into our own afterparties, things might get crazy.”

Beatles’Apple Records

himeronik — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 23:45:49 +0000

“I should’ve died Affiliatesabout five times. So I’ve used up all of my chances.”Support Tickets away from the traditional record industry. For the first time since he signed his first deal with the Beatles’Apple Records, back in 1968, he has no record contract -and no plans DNS Hostingto get one, instead striking album-by-album distri¬bution agreements. (Covers will be released by Starbucks’ Hear Music.) “It’s a changing sort of landscape,” Taylor says. “From the time I started off in this en¬terprise, it was all about trying to get a long-term contract with the record houses. And that’s just not the case anymore.” Taylor has sketched out the next 10 or so years of his career – and other than the occasional tour, it doesn’t seem like there will be much cause to leave his woodsy compound, which he, Kim and their seven-year-old twins, Rufus and Henry, share with wandering bears, coyotes, turkeys and hawks. “I grew up in the woods in North Carolina, so this feels good to me,” says Tay¬lor. The barn – built from scratch to Taylor’s specifications, with modular soundproofing walls -allows him to record on his own time, at his own pace. There may be more covers records -he’s discussed bringing his band together each winter for these sessions. He wants to make an orchestral album, too, combin¬ing standards and rearranged versions of his own songs – the barn is big enough to record a full symphony orchestra. And then there’s an album of original songs, which will be his first since 2002′s platinum

Not Fade Away

himeronik — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 23:39:43 +0000

I didn’t ViewPointend up with any of the diseases thatDownload Joomla my behavior should’ve given me. Or any of the other pitfalls – I should’ve died about five times. I was dead five times. So I’ve used up all of my chances. I have to take it easySocial Community now and keep fit, keep healthy.”
In the shiny-new barn, a few yards from his surprisingly modest two-story house, Taylor and his band of ultra-elite ses¬sion vets (including drummer Steve Gadd and original Satur¬day A[ight Live sax player Lou Marini) are in the midst of a 10-day session that will yield 21 songs, from Buddy Holly’s “Not Fade Away” to the Dixie Chicks’ “Some Days You Gotta Dance.” Twelve of them will end up on Covers, due September 30th. “Most of them are things that we played in concert for years,” says Taylor, who has had many hits with other people’s songs, begin¬ning with Carole King’s “You’ve Got a Friend” in 1971. “We had these arrangements that we’d worked up over the years. The way I feel about the songs I write is that they deserve to be record¬ed, and I feel the same way about these covers — we’ve got ‘em, we know ‘em, we ought to make a record of them.”
Taylor planned and funded this project on his own: Like an increasing number of musicians of his generation, he has stepped

National Public Radio

himeronik — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 23:36:10 +0000

OR SOME REASON,Name Brands James Taylor is stand¬ing on his head. On a snow-dusted sounded differentJanu¬ary afternoon in Massachu¬setts’ Berkshires, Taylor and his n-member band are taking a brief break from recording a new album of cover songs – they’reOther Product gathered in a barn-turned-studio on his hilltop property, at the end of an icy, mile-long drive¬way. He’s cheating in this feat of strength, leaning his feet against the wall of his vocal booth, but it’s still an impressive sight: With minimal effort, he supports his wiry six-foot-four frame on his hands for a good 15 seconds, until coins start falling out of the pockets of his jeans. “Gravity is making me poor,” he says, land¬ing on his feet.
Gravity and time have oth¬erwise been kind. Taylor is 60 years old, and despite a nearly two-decade-long heroin addic¬tion that he kicked for good in the Eighties, he’s in fantastic shape -an avid rollerblader and skier, in constant motion. (And he does a lot of those handstands, which he believes are a key to longevity, according to his wife, Kim.) He’s dressed as if a ski vacation might break out any second: moisture-resistant mock turtleneck, a comfy-looking performance-fleece jacket, black Camper boots with brown laces. “God knows, for a long time I treated this body bad,” Taylor says later, sitting in sunshine at his kitchen table.
He talks in professorial para¬graphs, with a voice resonant and soothing enough to suggest that had the singer-songwriter thing not worked out, he could have read news for National Public Radio. “David Crosby always called his body his meat suit,” he says with a laugh. “I always thought that that was how he treated it, too. But, you know, what kind of meat suit you get, and how it holds together -that’s just luck of the draw. By
Hear James Taylor’s big hits and read the definitive H guide to his albums at rollingstone.com/issuel062

The Covers sessions

himeronik — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 23:32:37 +0000

The Covers sessionsGreat MP3 stretched to include “Oh What a Beauti¬ful Morning,” from the musical Oklahoma – a song Double musicthat goes back to Taylor’s early childhood. “The first music I grew up with was show tunes and folk music,” says Taylor. “My folks played Lead Belly, the Weavers, and a lot of Rodgers and Hammer-stein and tracks Cole Porter.” When Taylor was seven years old, his grandmother caught him sing¬ing “Morning” over and over at the top of his lungs. “I thought I was by myself and no one could hear me, and I was really dig¬ging myself,” he says, laughing. “That was the first time I let it run away with me.”
Taylor admires unconventional sing¬ers like Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Lead Belly and Kurt Cobain, but he always knew his own strengths were elsewhere. “I am a musical singer – that’s my paradigm,” he says. “I want to be in tune. I want to sing pretty. I want to sing sweet. It’s only a relatively recent development that it was
“I want to be in tune, to sing pretty. It’s a recent development that it was appealing to sound bad.”
appealing to sound bad, you know.” And his folk-music background pushed him in a certain direction: “When a solo person sits down and plays and sings, the chances are it’s gonna have that kind of mellow feel,” he says. “It’s not gonna come out like Tenacious D each time. Or like Huddie Ledbetter – although he was probably try¬ing to sound as sweet as he could.”
Wrapping their latest “Road Runner,” Taylor summons the band members – or all of them who can fit – into the control room to check out a playback. “Let’s take a listen and see if it’s alive on arrival,” he says. The track blasts over the speak¬ers, and Taylor closes his eyes, fingering chords on an imaginary guitar. His now-bald head suits his patrician features – in profile, it’s a face that should be on U.S. currency. As the song ends with Gadd’s big cymbal crashes, Taylor opens his eyes and nods. “It sounds good,” he says. “Which is important in our line of work.”