This week's #ThisDealInHistory is taken from our April 27, 2002 concert in New Orleans, LA.
This gig was a late-night affair (3AM - 6AM) that occurred in the middle of our tour w Page McConnell and his "Vida Blue" band. We had already played an earlier set with them at the Orpheum Theater, so we were warmed up and ready to rock until sunrise, which we happily did.
The cut opens in the middle of a melodic Drum+Bass jam. Darren must have called the cue for "Self Orbit" as we change key at 0:37 while Dan immediately launches into the track's signature bass part.
At 0:56 I start a sirenesque Moog bit consisting of two notes repeated over and over, creating an almost-hypnotic groove that's broken only when i intermittently add the third note of the "Self Orbit" melody. Sirens seem to be the theme of the night, as i return to playing them at 3:03.
Interesting tidbit - in "Self Orbit" and "G-nome" i tune the the Moog to two separate tones so that i'm simultaneously playing two different notes in the melody. You can hear me detuning the synth at 2:25-2:30.
Usually when the melody is finished i retune the keyboard to play just one note at a time, but i guess i was feeling frisky in this jam and decided to keep the board in the "interval tuning", thereby creating spacier, more harmonically interesting parts. Great drum groove at 5:15 and dig that bass line from 5:25 onward.
I like the spacey section at 7:49. The ambience is enveloping, but the insistent low-end rhythm keeps the jam moving along until the drums return at 8:28.
At 8:44 i trigger the cue for "My Head, My Head" and we waste no time getting into it at 9:03 - but the thing to notice in those twenty seconds is that Dan and I are playing (again) in completely different keys. In previous weeks I've talked about how we would often try and throw caution to the wind, harmonically speaking, and not get too tied up in the rules about harmony, theory, etc. - All of us are trained musicians and our knowledge of harmonic theory is fairly advanced, but we almost never apply any of that during our performances. It's fun to talk that language, but we tend to keep it locked up when it's time to play - it's just too restricting.
For those keeping score at home, I'm banging out a D-Major chord while Dan is repeatedly playing C-sharp and D-sharp in the bass register. So wrong and so good!
We kick into "My Head, My Head" at 9:03 and at 10:20 shift into this wonderfully sparse section. I love the groove that Darren's got going alongside Dan's one-note statement. I took a cue from that and just laid down some short Rhodes chords for a while, letting everything settle before we decide to busy it up a little. Dan's hauntingly melodic bass line at 11:20 sets up the next section beautifully while i provide what feels like a funk-guitar-picking synth behind it.
13:28 introduces what was a favourite sound of mine around this time - the short blippy Juno 106 video game tone. This became immensely popular in dance music a few years later, so i probably dialed back its prominence in response to that as the years went on. Still love that sound, though. -Jamie
