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The organ, jam sessions, and Nilsson's revenge

August 29, 2002 ~ 9:20 p.m.

There is a musical repair shop just up the street from where we live. It never seems to be open. It is just a large empty room with a 16-track recording board at the far end and an electric organ by the front window. It is the organ that catches my eye every day as I walk to and from the station. It is a beautiful piece of craftsmanship. I'm sure it sounds even more awesome. Different instrument voices, rhythm tracks, bass pedal, two levels of keyboards, a row of chord buttons—this baby's got the works.

The room would make a great studio, come to think of it. I can imagine plugging in a few guitars and a bass, setting up a big Tama Superstar drum kit, and warming up that organ. Bring some friends in and just have a wicked jam session. Don't care what we'd play, as long as we played it well and had fun with it. I would record us on the 16-track recording unit to remember our musical extravaganza by.

My friend John back home has a large jam session every year around Thanksgiving with a group of his old high-school buddies. I've taken part several times. It is intense—in this large shed out in the (normally) quiet countryside northwest of Boston, about eight guitarists, three bassists (which on the occasions included me), two drummers and two keyboardists show up and just rock out. The sheer volume alone must be heard to be believed. The air crackles with electrical power, but once in the groove, you hardly notice. It supplies you the same way it supplies the mikes and the instruments. Fills you with a charge, so to speak. For those who like to just get down and play, it is a night to behold.

Makes me wish I was going to be home this Thanksgiving. One of these years, I must take part in the Annual Thanksgiving Wakefield Jam Session again. In the meantime, I look in at the studio room and the organ and the 16-track recording board and lose myself in daydreams.



I had the most annoying song in my head the whole day. I spent most of the morning aching to throw my headphones on and have the Ramones blast the sucker away from my consciousness.

But, unable to beat it, I joined it. The song was "Without You" by Nilsson. Anybody old enough—or have been subjected to enough soft-rock radio—to remember that one? Believe me, with enough playing around, that song can actually be made tolerable.

I began to play around with the rhythm in my head, speeding it up. Instead of the gut-splitting, self-indulgent whining that Nilsson engages in, I'd tone things down, flatten the peaks and crests of the vocals a bit and give them a gravely edge. Then I'd add drum fills at the end of every refrain. And I'd take away the sappy violins and replace them with a buzz-saw guitar and insert a bluesy organ solo at the break. Oh yeah, hard as it is to countenance, that song could actually be made to be good.

Something for consideration on a future jam session play list surely?

� M.E.M.

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