Message To A Friend

What can I say about "Message to a Friend. Wow I felt stringly about it. It was a message to my brother Lucas originally to give him some uplifting vibes when he needed it. Then I decided to make it a bit more universal and add images about walking on hot coals. I was inspired by some of the 1960's sound in the pan and wanted very bad to make some distortion to match the energy but could find no really good pedal to match the impedence on the steel drums at the time. (That has since changed). What can I say I wanted it to be raw and unteathered and I think this is what was attained.

RAJAH

RAJAH
SUN RA AND OTHER
Rather Funky Oddities
By Gregory Boyd


Around 1994 a very peculiar and fantastic thing happened that would change my musical out look forever. I met with a guy named Michael Ray. Talk about guys that one listened to he is definatly one of them. Basically everyone from Blue Magic, to Kool and Gang and Beyond he's played with. What was wierd was the guy is so chalant about performing with all of these people and at the time I was just inspired like a crazy man. I was invited to his house at the time which sat on the outside of what I used to call early uptown. "Early" because it was the area where the first americans moved after not being allowed to live in the French Quarter of New Orleans. The area was all industrial buildings and a few houses. We started working on this project called the "Neon Sound Performance" we would perform the music of Avant garde Jazz musician "Sun Ra". Michael performed in his band as a player then as music director for many years then decided to move to New Orleans and make a new band. I was curious and decided to make a leap of faith and try to perform some of the music. It was some of the most difficult and free music I have ever attempted. The music basically gave me chops I did not realize I had.
One Day I decided to write some kind of a funk Jazz song. It took me a minute but I came up with a bass line that I liked and decided to run with it and came up with this song that was aptly name by a friend "RAJAH" for the semi obvious Indian tones. My interpretation can be heard and is somewhat apparent in the melody being in 3 as the rhythm and beat is in 4. I started playing the song live and got a pretty good response as long as I did not play it too long. I've been guilty of this from time to time.

Peace GB

Is The Pan in the Mix?

I was sitting in my work room in New Orleans around 1998 and wondering what to write. I just played in Austin and moved recently from there back to New Orleans for some much needed regrouping. I was really in need of somekind of funk dance anthem at the time and was indeed onto an idea when suddenly I remembered a rather difficult exsperience I had with a sound man at one of my dates in New Orleans at the time. This sound guy for some reason had it out for Steel drums, steel drummers and just about anything or anybody that produced sound. I played and played during a sound check and could not hear anything in my monitor. I asked the guy who's name will be kept silent to protect the innocent "Is the Pan in MIX!!???" and he kept saying....NO!!! So I was like wait a minute everything is plugged in and I don't understand what the .....is going on. The unruly sound man who later became a good freind told me he wasn't hearing a thing and chatted to some friends without even as so much noticing what I was doing on stage. Sometimes being on stage in a position like that can do one of two things to a person; make one go peaceful and try to be a bit psyschoanylitical to a person or walk up and get real ghetto on a cat instead after rectifying the situation, I decided to go home and write this song to say basically that it is hard to do things differently many people seem to not want that to happen only because many do not want new things to happen on their "watch" at least that is what I felt at the time but you just have to wipe to the dust from your shoes and keep on truckin' as my father used to tell me as a child.

Sound wise the song was inspired by some of the greats of music that i heard constantly through my my life. James Brown, Little Richard to name several. I was most moved at the time to be able to actually exspress myself finally on my instrument and play the songs that I have always loved in another voice. That voice is of course is my own. I am so glad that I have no words for all of this. There are so many times in my life that make me realize that I was born to do this. I think part of it was being born in a time where music was king and the makers of music where like super men and woman. For example in my neighbohood in Milwaukee as a child the guys who were supermen were Quincy Jones, Muhammad Ali and Kareem Abdul Jabbar and of course Michael Jackson. These were the people that shaped not only musical sounds and the sounds of my life but also, a certain "never give up" kind of attitude. This is a hard business and even though I have had some absolutely brilliant times and great chances and chance encounters, one can say that I have not made the "big time". I keep striving and inviting my friends in on this love and asking for thier support in this endeavor and am lucky because many of my new freinds and fans must see something in my continued strivance because the support does continue. Feel free to download this song and comment it is one of my favorites due to the emergency of need with respect to writing it and what went into doing it. The instrumentation is just four instrumets which was my band at the time. It consists of Drums, Bass, Steel Drums/Vocals and Percussion. Keep buying it, keep in touch and keep the love warm and strong!



Peace



Greg