The Top Ten Videos I watched on Youtube in 2012

I wanted to compile a list of my favorite videos from 2012.  In these times we and utterly and completely overloaded with data and information.  That is why, for my own memories sake, I wanted to compile a list of watching history of Youtube for 2012.  Here it is:

St. Vincent- I dig a pony
Eric from The Pinks introduced me to St. Vincent through this video.  Oh boy, he hit it out of the park with this selection. I have searched and searched other videos online of St. Vincent, but in my opinion nothing compares to this gripping rendition of a Beatles classic.  The tones generated from her Harmony Bobcat guitar along with the watery effects processor on her other mic during the chorus makes this tune her own.  Then there is her guitar playing....shit, I wish I had the touch she has.   A simple and amazing cover tune.


Nilsson with Keith moon
Nilsson schmillson was a staple in the record rotation growing up as a kid.  I knew I always liked the guy but it wasn't until I became a musician that I really appreciated the talent behind this guy. Like many tortured souls, he was his own worst enemy.  He sure did give the world something to remember him by.  This tune is one of my favorite rhythmic tribal chants.  Then I came across this rare footage of him jamming with Keith Moon.  Boy, I wonder what was in their system while making this video.  Probably a lot illegal contraband and I will place money on it that it was probably shot somewhere between the hours of 3 and 5 am.

   

Pujol - Reverse Vampire

So, Pujol...yes, he is one of my favorite finds of the year. Such a talented young musician.  I wrote about his new album earlier this year.  It is a really great piece of work. However, in this acoustic version of the song on the record, Reverse Vasmpire, really highlights this singer songwriters talent. All in a sterile office environment.  The young Bob Dylan really comes through in this video.  The question I have to ask myself is, "who is Ben Todd?"



Bo Diddley - Live 1973
When I watch this video, it inspires me.  Bo is in the top of his show man game, just working the crowd like a man on a mission.  When he goes up for the pants splitting leg apart jump it also informs me of who inspired David Lee Roth. We all can benefit from the joy of live music.  Especially Bo's audience, just lapping up what the man is giving.  A thing of beauty.

 

The Shock of the New (series) - Robert Hughes
I found out about this series through a Time obituary.  The author of the book and the series, , passed away in 2012.  The piece in Time intrigued me.  It spoke of a compre.hensive history of modern art in the 20th century so compelling that the BBC wanted to turn it into an educational series.  Class starts now....
 

Bill Withers - Use Me 1972
This song is a mastery of live production.  It truly demonstrates the genius of a Bill Withers song.  The instrument inteplay is amazing and sounds like nothing before it and nothing after it.  It is just a wonderful live performance.  I also might plug watching his documentary "Still Bill" here.  I caught it this winter and it's a very uplifting story.


36 seconds of my past
This is a video I took last year on a walk i did with my buddy, Joe Izzo and my daughter.  Joe passed away in January of this year.  We new he was dying but it always sucks when you lose somebody who has been such an inspiration in your life among many others.  He was dying in this video, still check out the positivity in his voice.  A funny lovable character Joe was...and one person who actually got me writing.  I love watching this video.  I am sure half the view count is mine.


Nirvana - Practicing and the Novoselic house circa '88
Just watch this video. Pure genius at such a young age.  This video puts your there.

 

The Gories "There by the Grace of God" Homemade Music Video
This is soul.  I don't know what else to say besides thanking the person who captured this video.  Plus it is a Kid Creole and the Coconuts song.  How cool is that?


Geraldine Fibbers - Dragon Lady
I sought out this band after seeing Nels Cline earlier in the year.  He put me on a major movational surge toward good sounding guitar.  He was in this band, but not at the time of this video.  I believe that this is an earlier video.  Carla's voice is so beautifully haunting...then guitar.  Huge hook at the chorus.  How can a sucker for a huge hook not love this video?

Human Race 1, Pinks 0 || Thank you Joseph Izzo, Jr || Oct. 21, 1950 - Jan. 5, 2012

Strike it up as a victory for all mankind.  Joe Izzo walked this earth and left an indelible mark that will stay with me and I am sure many others for all of our entire lives.  He was a true individual that saw the world in a unique perspective and passed that view unto others.  It's known as being a teacher who is also an artist.  He was one that could surprise the hell out of you, still if you had the opportunity to hang out with him more and more, one began to crave the surprise.  You never were really quite sure what you were going to get but that was the true beauty behind Joe.  Let me tell you how Joe and I came about to be friends.

The first time I met Joe was at a dinner party at my venerable Uncle Craig's house around 1995.  Him and his lovely wife Lisa were in attendance and the first thing that struck me about Joe was not him, but Lisa.  She had brought her Banjo and strummed it along to passing guitar chords assisted by my uncle all the time singing  protest songs that she learned many years before while marching with Cesar Chavez for immigrant worker rights.  This fascinated me.  The look on Joe's face was pride mixed in with some subtle concern.  Who were these people?  My freshly marked "educated" brain was just entering the work-a-day world and interesting people have always perked my curiosity.  Joe and Lisa fit this mold.

Our next occasion for really hanging out came to be known as "Tuesday's with Izzo" between me and my uncle.  At 6am I would wake up and out in front of my little apartment in Los Gatos would be the surf sled with Joe behind the wheel and Craig riding shot-gun there to pick me up.  Always a smile glued to both of their faces.  We were going surfing.  I always sat in back and they would usually just ramble on about anything that was on either of their minds.  We'd roll up to the point, suit up and jump off the mothership and paddle out into the deep blue spacious swells generated by mother nature.  Such a good way to start your day.  Joe and I would usually do most of our talking out in the ocean waiting for sets.  This is where I learned about the legend of J.J. Moon.  Joe turns to me one morning amongst chit-chat and says, "Chad, you wanna know why I love surfing so much?  Because just like J.J. Moon said, if they want you, they gotta come out and get you."  Surfing is a time where we could really leave all of the worlds problems on the shoreline and just focus on living.

The most memorable car ride to go surfing can easily be pinpointed out as the time where I learned about the Mai Tai.  We were headed to Santa Cruz early one morning. For some reason, be it possibly the kentucky derby, Joe was discussing Mint Julip's with my uncle and the topic quickly changed to a Mai Tai.  I woke up from the back seat blurted out how I had never had a Mai Tai.  Joe turned his whole body squarely facing me all the while still behind the wheel on the 17 and said, "You have never had a Mai Tai?  Well, we're going to fix that!"  A plan was quickly hatched about how we were all going to review the Thai restaurant around the corner from my apartment.  When the evening arrived so did Mr. Izzo with a box of ingredients.  He showed me exact instructions of a personalized recipe all his own, then left the box of delictable juices and told me to practice.  Which I did.  And from that spawned the annual Mai Tai parties.  I had to pass on this great treat.  And I still do.

Another thing that I learned about Joe was the true beauty behind a good meal.  The guy was a food critic.  A job he took seriously.  It may have been the passion in his soul that made it so much fun.  Whatever it was, it was always a good time meeting him out at a restaurant and reviewing it for the benefit of others.  Though it was I who lucked out the most.  I gave my input on many a review but, easily, the funnest was when Joe, Birk McCandless and myself all went to Michi Sushi for a review.  See, this was a favor.  I had a good friend, Randy, who had just started as a sushi chef and was really doing some good work behind the bar.  Joe said, "Let's review it!"  We went down there one evening and sat in the tatime room and were treated like royalty.  We ate until our hearts were content, drank with the owner and were rewarded with shirts for our good behavior.  Laughs, gags and giggles were exclimated through the night.  I don't believe I have ever eaten sushi like that before.  Needless to say the review was glowing.

How Joe and I really grew close was through writing.  As many of you know, Joe always loved a good rant and was always prepared with one (or ten) in his back pocket ready to light up at a moments notice.  When we first started surfing together an email relationship developed.  Joe and I would exchange thoughts, ideas, concepts back and forth, but the real bread and butter were the rants.  I still have many of these emails, because I hold them dear to my heart.  Here is a little sampling of the goods that Joe would spew out:

  "I heard that you and the Friar were making music on
Sunday. I cannot reveal my source for this person
remains underground and lost to common hearing
devices. This could be good, or not, depending on what
preceded the session. I expect a full report on all
activities. so does Bob, and your parole officer, who,
by the way, is becoming very suspicious of all
activities in and around your domicile. Friar Leiker
is under the closest scrutiny for his continued
transgressions against the color pink. You could be
soon, but so far, have avoided coming under the eye of
the dead fish." 

They were true rants & uniquely Joe.  I loved them.  Joe was a storyteller.  He encourage that in others.  He was one of the first persons that heard me play an original tune on the guitar and fell over backwards letting me know that I need to "keep it up."  He was a teacher that could light a fire of encouragement to anyone that needed it.  In the end he really encouraged himself.  Which in my opinion is living.  He did this by following through on a life long dream of writing, editing & producing an entire feature length movie with some friends.  This kept his mind focused and his soul going.

Uncle Louie was a gift to all of us.  Probably three or four edited versions into the movie is when what I realized that Joe was giving us all a gift of Joe.  It is filmed at his house, in his town.  We journey with him to some of his favorite spots.  We see his cars and his friends and his family.  We hear his stories and experiences.  And if you look really close, you even see a cameo.  This is a true gift to anyone who wants to know Joe better.  Upon discovering this, I balled like a baby in the middle of my living room.  I had discovered what he had done and I was overcome with happiness.  It truly is a beautiful thing.  And to be a part of it was a real treat.

The Majestic Scribes

The past 365 days were special.  We knew by now that he wasn't going to get any better.  Joe knew it too and preached it.  But he would keep on living.  He got heavy into his Mandala's and I cherished our weekday walks for coffee with my daughter, Makenzie.  We would shoot the bull and talk about all the great art and aspects of life out there.  The trip to Buffalo, New York was the best.  I got to see him with his other comrades, the majestic scribes, in which I proudly became their chauffer.  Oh the anitcs!  They're all individuals that spawned a commmon bond of looking out at that world in a unique way, all the while giving a polite bird to all that were dressed in the color "Pink".  This not only let me grow closer to Joe, but the other majestic scribes, Joe Mangelli and R. Allen Russell.

The last time I saw Joe was on December 20, 2011.  Two weeks before his journey into the great beyond.  He was still trying to work hard on his new screenplay, Peter Knorll.  I kept encouraging him (and myself) by asking to get a copy of the script.  I told him that I was going to take a first pass at writing some tunes for his new movie.  On that day I delivered him a 5 song CD that were the first demo's for the new movie.  I figured it was what I could do to show that I was still 100% behind him and his new project even though we all knew that his walk from this earth was near.  To quote Joe upon receiving the CD he said, "Chad , you do not know what this does to me.  This is like a shot of adreline straight into my arm."  It was the least I could do.  Along with that he asked for one more favor.  I told him the story about my prior visit talking with his wife Lisa upon leaving.  She told me about how her Dad used to play the ukulele and she had always wanted to learn.  Joe asked if I could get Lisa a Ukulele.  I did.  And I dropped it off on their doorstep Christmas eve.

Joe will never be forgotten.  He was a catalyst of a higher power whom walked this earth with the one intention to make people better people.  Who could not love a guy like that?


A morning walk with Joe

In Buffalo, April 2011

Joe & the writer, April 2011 - Buffalo, NY

Grenadine as life.....

Do you ever think of yourself as the grenadine in the infamous concoction entitled the Mai Tai-? 
I do. 
No matter when you are put into the arena of the barreled glass, you slowly but surely sink to the bottom. 
As your soul filters through the layers of premium juices, you gasp, trying to take in their promised enjoyment.  However, to no avail, you sink past the opportunity. 
Finally resting on the bottom of the barreled glass. 
Here, it is your turn to wait, suffering the tortures of some other rum dum at the opposite end of where you lie, enjoying the premium juices. 
Taking them all in as his head gets lighter and lighter with thought and surely fills with slack.
You watch this process, gulp by gulp, at the bottom of the glass. 
However you are not stagnant in this procedure. 
As the surrounding air temperature heats up the glass, the cold chill of the ice cubes gradually melt diluting your existence. 
You are the last to go. 
As half your soul gets swallowed, the other half usually gets dumped down the drain taking place amongst a pineapple core and stems of the eaten maraschino cherries. 
You are now utterly worthless as someone else has drained your slack.

                                                             -Written in an email to Joe Izzo, January 17, 2001

The Ukulele, Me and The Making of Uncle Louie

I have had a longtime relationship with the Ukulele. Sometimes it just sat in the corner of the room collecting dust while getting the occasional strum from a guest.  Other times it assisted in serenading my future wife by asking for her hand in marriage.  Either way, it has always been there for me and my heartfelt love for the flea-sized instrument only continues to grow.
The first time I got my hands on a uke was during my college years.  I was driving away from Scott Guild's house on a summer visit and his mother yells to me, "we need to get rid of some of this junk for our move.  Do you want any of these instruments?" I took an old, beat up uke and a violin.  The uke was cracked but it still worked.  I gave it to my brother for a short while.  After college I noted it was just sitting on the shelf at his house, so I decided to fix it and learn to play a few songs.  Taking it into the shop, I discovered it was a Martin Soprano Ukulele from the early 50s and was worth some money.  I spent about $70 to have it repaired and I also bought a nice case for it.  I learned to strum it a bit, still just a minimal ditty was the only life it saw.  I decided it would be better fit in a collectors hands and I sold it (something to this day I regret. pic below).

A few years passed before my next encounter.  This happened when I met Paul Berry.  He is a longtime friend of my Uncle Craig’s.  His family is from the Islands.  In 1969, Paul and my uncle went to Waikiki to visit Paul’s family.  At the end of the trip, one of Paul’s cousins raided another relative’s trinket shop and gave the young men a bunch of souvenirs to take back to the mainland.  Among the booty were two very nice Kamaka ukuleles that my uncle still owns.  Paul borrowed the Tenor Kamaka for 20 years and became really, really good on it.  He learned all the hawaiian classic songs.  When I moved down to the south bay area I was considered “family” and now the invitation was extended to me to join in on all of Paul’s families Luau’s and Pig Roast.  This is where I saw first hand how two corporate businessmen could capture the hearts of an audience with these tiny little instruments.  From that initial experience, I started to learn to play the ukulele.  It became a lot easier to learn when my Mom and Dad picked one up in Hawaii as a birthday gift.  I finally had my own ukulele, again. 

(Uncle Craig's pair of Vintage Kamaka Ukuleles)

As we grow older, we have to learn to go with our strengths and rocking all night in a dive bar can take a toll on the body.  Needless to say, the ukulele is a great instrument to have lying around, pick up every once in a while and strum a tune.  But it has done more to me.  It captured my soul on the day my daughter way born.  I left the hospital early morning to run home for supplies.  It was a beautiful day in May of 2009.  I flipped on the radio and the IZ version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” had come on the radio.  Tears instantly came to my eyes as I heard the strumming of those short nylon strings.  I told myself I was going to pick up that uke my parents bought me a few years back and learn that song.
I did learn that song and several others.  Having a newborn baby sleeping in the other room inhibits your ability to pick up a guitar but not your ability to pick up a ukulele.  I used this time to learn several renditions of my favorite songs on Ukulele.  One day, in the fall of 2009, I was working out an arrangement of the Dean Martin classic, “That’s Amore”.  A good friend had called and asked if I would do some music for an independent feature length movie him and his friends were making.  Of course I would.  When he told me he wanted something soft, dark and moody but with a little Italian flair I knew I had the right song for him.  Below is a video of That’s Amore for the Film Uncle Louie.  I was able to sneak one other uke song into the movie too.  It is a version of Guy Lombardo’s “Enjoy Yourself (it’s later than you think)”.  I continue to strum the ukulele.  It’s cheap, portable and always brings a smile to my face.

Here is a video of "That's Amore" on Ukukele


The end