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Sain baina uu! 

(That's Mongolian Hello)

Bukhu, a traditional Mongolian 'Khoomei' style singer and horse fiddle player joined us last night for a variation of a song called  'Everywhere feels like home'

We've been working on a series of variants of songs from the last tour.

I had the madcap idea of adding Cello to Rosies piece 'the river song' (aka 'morning rain song').

As previously mentioned, Mr Wizard considered me to be going through a phase that all muso's go through. Everything sounds better with Cello.

True.

Rosie was willing to try it. We did. It was great. Finished.

Nope.

Geoff (the cellist) said he thought it sounded better with Harp.

Great. Ok.

Harp is too dominant,  obnoxious brassy little pest that it is (love it as I do) but I like the Cello mix. 

Ok, now we have 2 versions.

Then a new name for the song turned up. 'Everywhere feels like home' - it finally put to rest the 'which name' discussion and the concept started to grow. 

Theo said we should try something outrageous.

Heh.

No need to ask twice.

I'm calling it the Ecstatic Yeti mix. Have a listen to someof the ideas in it.

More to come.

Howdy folks.

I read the news today, oh boy.

Meanwhile, in our own safe harbours, our best defense against the dark is for the show to go on.

Bukhu and Rosie jammed on 'Everywhere Feels Like Home' yesterday and I got to sit in between them and just listen.

We go on.

Tonight we'll record and celebrate joy in times of sadness.

Some days are better than others. We share the feelings of the rest of the locals here. Few people expected the outcome. Tragedy isn't scalable, each instance is it's own sadness. Law enforcement here showed remarkable restraint and cool headedness. Peace.

Howdy Folks. BTW I never say that phrase IRL. I just realised that. I am more likely to say 'hi'.

I digress.

Someone in the band has a real ping on for Kargyraa and Khoomei styles of singing and Mongolian Beats.

Who might that be you say? 

Really? 

So anyway, there I was, listening to Huun Huur

(pronunciation of these names is hard. I have been giggled at by several Mongolian speakers who think my attempts at climbing their words are cute)

As I was saying, there I was, listening to Huun Huur and wondering why it sounded so familiar.

As a horse culture, their beats are Horse rhythms. Trots. Canters. Whinnies.

That links up to Country and Western. Horse rhythms. 

For example, here's a little Three Amigos.

And some kick ass Huun Huur.

Can you hear the horse rhythms?

Face it, what other blog you read is going to make these kinds of comparisons eh?

If you've been following the blogs from recent studios sessions you will notice we seem to have been in there quite a bit. 

In post production now are two versions of The Flood and 2 versions of an instrumental newly named 'Everywhere feels like home' featuring Rosie on Acoustic Guitar, Geoff Gartner on Cello and in one version, yours truly here on Harp.

I think we have four very nice tracks in this lot, we're in final tweak mixing now and there you have it. 

But while we're here....Theo had said to me a while back, 'hey lets do something really weird'.

I have just the ticket.

What I'm calling the 'Ecstatic Yeti' mix.

'Rosie will plotz' was the cry. 'You can't add mongolian thoat singing to this track' said another.

'Sounds interesting' said Rosie. And he meant interesting 'Good' as opposed to its other colloquial Australian usage of interesting such as 'oh little johnny, you've made me a present out of canned dog food. that's very...interesting'

Kudos to Rosie.

My favourite moment was when I was asked -'Where the heck did you find a Traditional Mongolian Singer in Sydney?'

Well it turns out that local Australian World Music group EQUUS features a traditional Tuvan style singer, Bukhu.

I googled, I called, I asked, I sent a copy of the song, Bukhu laughed at my Mongolian pronunciation (That's okay, I'm getting it now) and we're recording together mid week.

WOOT.

What on earth will all this sound like?

Have we completely lost our marbles?

Should I mention I'm also trying to add some Bhangra beats to this?

Hey we've already got Rock River in Berlin getting remixed :-)

Meanwhile, songs are pouring out of the woodwork and we're already scheduling the next two recordings including some classic Kansas City Style Blues, courtesy of Ron Teamer.

As the year winds down, we're winding up.

Atypical Stormcellar weather:

What a knockout day of music and good vibes in the sun and clear blue.

We always enjoy playing at the Catho, but when you get the perfect combo of a cool sunny day, it's just brilliant.

  I am kind of relaxed after being in this enviroment all day. The music helped too.

 We weren't the only folks appreciating a good weather day for travelling.

It's been a while since we played there and the foliage has all grown back after the bushfires. Wow.

Shout outs to Mary, Steve and Bernie and all the folks who spent a long afternoon with us.

Good times, good times.

That's it for our shows until NYE, but we're back in the studio again this week.

Stay tuned!