herbie on no sleep

one of those times when i ended writing all my reports in one night & getting no sleep & going to work the next day...

actaully not quite true, i still had one or two to complete but the main issue here is the staying up all night part...

at around 5am i took a break and walked up the disused to watch the sunrise... once i'd realised i was going to do it this way i really settled into it and liked it...

i was also downloading episodes of 24 via bittorrent which i'd only just optimised and was amazed at how fast they were downloading...

anyway, after work the next day (yesterday) i went over to the barbican for a pregig talk between julian joseph & herbie hancock... nice, particularly resonated with herbie when he said he was no longer interested in being a virtuoso pianist, he just wanted to express humanity in his playing...

now herbie hancock is already a virtuoso, but still, i saw myself right there in that statement...

the gig itself started a little late and i was intrigued to see three of the four musicians were using some kind of technology to give them more sounds... herbie himself used a few different sounds during the gig, including one sampled voice (on a doo) which rubbed me up the wrong way, except when he was using it to play chords... then it was heaven itself, herbie hancock playing chords.....

he also used a clavinet sound and a string sound that were just like classic herbie / headhunters sounds... but really it was all about the piano for me,

the guitarist had some interesting effects going on and the drummer also had some digital interface right there next to his regular kit and his tabla's,

the other musicians were all quite a bit younger than herbie (who was celebrating his 65th birthday) and it reminded me of the period when he joined miles davis's band back in the 60's, all the band were much younger than miles, and they did some fantastic, challenging albums...

as they started playing i found myself almost falling asleep in the first tune, but as the gig progressed i shook off my tiredness and really enjoyed it..

it got better and better, (as jazz gigs often do) and by the end i was really bowled over by them...

as an encore they did maiden voyage... a killer, beautiful version of it...

then i came home and slept..

x