I began to learn guitar ten years ago, with the aim of playing just one tune - the Ventures’ 1960 version of “Walk Don’t Run.” I bought a cheap Gibson SG with thin strings and a small local amplifier and couldn’t understand why I didn’t sound like Bob Bogle at all. I was really quite ignorant.
Over the years, I was able to play a bit better. I realized too that my goal had changed and that what I really wanted to do was reproduce The Shadows’ recorded sound LIVE. My friends and I put together a non-gigging band called “Walking Shadow,” from a line in Macbeth that referenced my limited playing skills:-
“Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more.”
We tried to sound like The Shadows on stage-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5UnP8mG1sY
The name of the show “Music As You’ve Heard it Before” stated our musical goal. In a more ambitious move, we produced new shows with an expanded repertoire, covering hits from 1958-1963 (the pre-Burns Shadows’ and pre-Mossrite Ventures era):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nU4DfWQBiUo
The name of the ad-hoc musical company was taken from Marcel Proust’s book “Remembrances of Things Past,” in which the hero visits his old home town, bites into a madeleine cookie and is immediately flooded with involuntary memories. We wanted to invoke the same experience from the audience by playing old pieces in the original style and with the same sound. And also to recreate the feeling I felt as a kid, looking at the shiny, new guitars the bands had on stage. Our guitars had to look new! No relics!
I was quite brave and didn’t let little things like my lack of talent get in the way.
But playing on a stage, while satisfying, required some compromise. The amps were mic’d, etc., and it was really hard for a player to appreciate how the band really sounded. I thought it would be great to play live in a more controlled environment, not to record or perform, but just to play and enjoy the sound. That meant playing at home with a live band.
Luckily, there is a garage beneath our kitchen in which I worked on old cars. I thought I could squeeze a band in there.