My Guitar Music

‘The best’ singers. Singer’s post, part ONE.

First of all I think you can’t say someone’s the best at anything you do musically. Of course knowing musical theory doesn’t hurt but it doesn’t guarantee that we are going to produce great music. In my ears good singer is someone that has a natural rough, heavy tone (find this kind of tone the most interesting and appealing especially with guitar rock music) but also wide range pitch (to add more dynamics to the songs), good ear (to hit all the notes) and the least but still very important stage presence!

Few of my favorite rock singers

Bringing subject of vocals I am honored to bring 3 absolutely world’s class vocalists. The bar get high as it gets and here they are:

#1 Piotr Cugowski

Singer of one of my favorite Polish bands and not only as they already have few albums in English. Heavier but very interesting band to check. Here’s very challenging track by Queen – “Bohemian Rhapsody” with the main and backup vocals by Piotr Cugowski. Judge it yourself.

#2 Ian Thornley

Recently discovered few very interesting tracks and I have to say I’m very impressed with Ian Thornley’s vocal but also interesting song writing. Here’s one of my favorite tracks.

#3 Troy Reid

Number THREE on the list is actually a good friend of mine, who’s gifted with a voice that get me goose bumps. He sings here in Vancouver and every time I see him performing live it’s just phenomenal. Attached video is NHL hockey game and my friend TROY REID singing both Canadian and United States national anthems. Definitely check it out!

GUITARIST WARM UP by STEVE MORSE

Steve Morse is definitely one of the best players in the planet. When asked what is the most important thing about playing guitar? Answered: “Accuracy”. Being more accurate obviously you save yourself time and become more efficient musician, being way more productive in the studio and playing better live gigs.

Today I’d like to bring I think very important aspect and quite often missing element of playing guitar: warm up. Before recording in the studio or playing live, I like to spend at least 1-2hrs of exercises covering running through few scales (different positions, whole fretboard), arpeggios, legato, stretch but also picking exercises. I think bringing Mr. Steve Morse again to the subject of picking is very appropriate as he is a master of this technique, especially alternate picking and string skipping. I highly recommend to watch following Steve Morse clinic.

Black Powder Toys MADE IN CHINA album available now.

I am for sure the first in the World to announce new ‘MADE IN CHINA’ CD Black Powder Toys album officially RELEASED! We’ve been thrilled to work with some great people on this one including: producer Paul Baker (to whom this album is dedicated), Paul Hyde, Megan Metcalfe, David Steele and others but also happy to start another journey to hype about it. As of today ‘MADE IN CHINA’ is available to the public from official Black Powder Toys website. Enjoy!

I wanted to share some of the art work concept for the upcoming (April 1st) Black Powder Toys album – “Roadblocks and traffic lights“. None of the following is the final design but I thought concepts are great and should be mentioned.

Album graphic design concept 1

Album graphic design concept 1

Album graphic design concept 3

A Hand Up - A Benefit Concert

Artists for the Harvest Project presents A Hand Up – A Benefit Concert

Black Powder Toys has just gone through another photo shoot with wonderful Lori Miles (‘Sweat Pea Photography’) as there were two occasions to do that. First: April 1st we are going to play benefit concert as a part of the Harvest Project. It’s gonna be a great occasion to raise some money but also share the stage with Asha Diaz and Kate Morgan in a beautiful Centennial Theatre. It’s one of my favorite BC stages as far as acoustics. For more information about tickets visit Centenntial Theatre’s website.

Upcoming Black Powder Toys CD

Second reason: we are finally in the cover design & print stage of the upcoming (April 1st!!!) first Black Powder Toys CD. My band mates and myself we are very excited as this is accumulation of the last 4 years (or something around) playing together but also people worked with.

Stay tuned!

Instrumental Jam with 2nd Floor Suicide

This post has been in my “Draft” folder and I guess I’m pretty late but what the heck. I’ve been recently jamming a lot with my friend’s but also awesome musicians grouped as 2nd Floor Suicide. Very interesting, theatrical music with wide variety of styles, anywhere from: rock, ska, punk, ambient to musical, definitely worth checking out!

Guys invited me to play few guest shows giving me freedom to explore their music “my way” and adding some new guitar layers or just emphasizing the mood. As an addition we ended up jamming together few times luckily capturing some of the ideas using awesome ZOOM H4 recorder. Today I’d like to share one instrumental called: LongJamXmas .

I have to admit, we live in awesome times for creative individuals. All the gear is easy to access, however most importantly there’s a lot of free software that’s changed how recording looks these days. You don’t need to spend thousands of dollars to get great sound quality straight from your computer without breaking a bank. As from guitarist point I’d like to walk you through 3 of interesting alternatives I found when it comes to Virtual Amp Simulator software.

Amplitube 3 by IK Multimedia

#1 on my list Amplitube 3 by IK Multimedia. I’ve used all previous versions (1 and 2) and have to say 3 takes the sound to the totally new level, it just blows my mind. The amount of available amps, effects, mics, cabs gives you full flexibility shaping your sound. What’s cool about Amplitube 3 is that you can run two sets of gear simultaneously, blending both signals the way you want  to. Did you know that Nickelback started using Amplitube on their albums?

Digidesign Eleven

#2 Digidesign Eleven comes in both as plug-in but also as a rack hardware where you can connect your guitar in combination with your real amp, using only Eleven’s effects or cab or set it so the signal goes through Amp Simulator, your pedals and virtual cab.

Logic 9 Amp Designer

I was actually looking to check what’s new with new Logic 9 and guys from Apple surprised me again. New Logic 9 Amp Designer has much smaller amount of amps than previous two competitors, but boy the sound awesome, especially clean, british, vintage sounds. Anything under Orange, Marshall, Vox, Fender tags sounds very real, good dynamics too.

Although I’m not the fan of today’s fast spinning, technical world I have to say that it applications like these give a chance to a lot of artist who can’t afford going to the studio and pay for every hour of your time. Based on the thought that as an artist you want to mainly focus on writing new material today’s technology makes me think we live in totally incredible times!

Unison Festival

After few weeks break from playing any live shows and concentrating on finishing first Black Powder Toys album, we’re ready to hit again! Next Friday Nov. 26 we’ll be sharing the stage with some awesome bands in North Vancouver at Unison festival. Come check us out on Nov 26 at the Eagles hall to hear Black Powder Toys in half acoustic, half electric set.

Other bands also playing on that night include: Gonch Messiah, Ten Suns, Baked Potato and Laura Smith. Looking forward to see you!

Finally after 3 days of hard work shooting and another month of editing I’m happy to announce that our first music video has been launched!!! We’re very excited to promote “The Afterlife” single of our first CD and hopefully we can kick back on the road again to play it live. Hope you like it:

Chilliwack, Shari Ulrich, Paul Hyde (The Payolas), the Odds and Black Powder Toys Oct 20 – Paul Baker Memorial

I was just informed that we’re gonna play October 20th at the Vancouver’s Chapel recently passed away Paul Baker memorial. It was a big pleasure to work with Paul at Bakerstreet on our first and sadly one of his last albums. He was an exceptional person to work with, great song arranger/producer with tons of experience. Through he long career he recorded and played live with bands like: The Odds, The Payolas, Chilliwack, Chris Isaak and many others. I am very excited and looking forward to play Oct 20th event as we’re gonna share the same stage with: Chilliwack, Shari Ulrich, Paul Hyde (The Payolas) and the Odds. Here’s a link to one of Paul’s last interviews. RIP.