Music Composed and played by Al B. and his bands
This song gets back to some of my roots back in the late 70″s early 80’s Punk, New Wave era. A little like Iggy Pop (but not exactly), I think you’ll here some of the early influences from Max’s Kansas City and Mudd club Days.
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Back in my punk days, this is a hard driving tune that keeps moving from beginning to end. Heavy guitar and a steady 4/4 drum beat with a short lead burst in the middle of the song. Well it’s cleaner then The Ramones but similar in it’s simplicity. It only take a little under 3 minutes from start to finish.
I think I have some aspirations to make a video, so keep checking back as I have some idea’s what to film and how it should look.
Figure we give it one last shot, or should we say “WAVE” while the weather is still hot and the water is even hotter!
Surfing was a song that was written in collaboration from my first band, The Lampshades. I came up with the bass riff and the band joined in and contributed to make the basics of the song. I wrote the lyrics and sung the song. This version still has the basic’s and lyrics intact, although it was re-imagined with some new twists to the song.
Back in my punk days, this is a hard driving tune that keeps moving from beginning to end. Heavy guitar and a steady 4/4 drum beat with a short lead burst in the middle of the song. Well it’s cleaner then The Ramones but similar in it’s simplicity. It only take a little under 3 minutes from start to finish.
I think I have some aspirations to make a video, so keep checking back as I have some idea’s what to film and how it should look.
Working On It has an up tempo tune with some nice hi hat cymbal action. The beat is like a machine shop beat, let’s call it a pile driver as this beat repeats throughout the song. The lyric theme is i’m working to get you to be with me, as i’m working on it. Catchy and rhythmic, a nice song to play anywhere at anytime.
Heavy guitar licks and repetitive vocal lines leads this song as an anthem to the fight. The struggle of the every day that can be overcome if you fight through it. The every man’s mantra to persevere in all life’s adversities. Listen and get inspired to drive on and fight the fight to the end.
Not just another broken heart love song. Strong guitar licks and a interesting guitar lead makes this song unique. I started writing this song almost 2 years ago and came back to it numerous times but just couldn’t get it the way I wanted it. Then one night I started flipping through my library of unfinished songs and came upon this lead guitar riff that struck me, “This will fit in this song”. The next few hours I worked it into the melody and worked out the basic lyrics – It took me another 3 months from that time to get to the finished song, “Stolen Away”. Hope you enjoy it!
I Know you’re going away – My love you’re throwing away – I can’t convince you to stay – My heart you’ve stolen away
Knowledge is Power is one of my favorite songs on the album. The heavy guitar riff leading into the vocals just works so well. The lyrics are interesting as the main guitar riff lends itself to the key vocal line, “knowledge is power”. The full lyric verses were a little more difficult to come up with. I knew what I wanted to convey and say but I could not come up with the words to convey it. Thus, let’s go to google and put in the phrase, “Knowledge is Power”. So many different idea’s started to form around that phrase. The actual phrase was formulated by philosopher Francis Bacon during the time of Enlightenment. I was immersed in many different ways to convey “Knowledge is Power” but now I had to make the words fit into the song and for it to make sense (at least to me). After I got the first verse down and the phrasing to the music, it all clicked and fit in. One of my favorite lines in the song is, “Putting our knowledge we know, In the hands of machines”. The guitar lead comes after the 3rd verse, it follows the acoustic guitar and then comes in heavy and eclectic. Listen to the words as the meanings are profound.
As many of the songs on Eclectic Collaborations were written and performed by both Kimo and I, these song writing collaborations brought out the best in him and I. Kimo added many instrumental touches & textures to songs that I wrote, that absolutely gave some new dimensions to my songs that I really enjoyed. We became, over the last 8 months close when working together on this album. We would play off of each others idea’s and develop them into cohesive flowing songs. I would say adding the lyric’s was the most fun as we would come up with a name for the song and then just run with the lyric’s. Take the song “Hanky Panky” for instance, as we were writing this song Kimo said to me, ” it’s sounds like Hanky Panky”. The next night I was alone listening to the playback and the words for Hanky Panky just started to flow. The New York vibe and the feel of the city and looking to ,”Get me some” played in my mind. The next session I said to Kimo, “your voice is perfect for this song”, and I stuck a mic in front of his face and gave him the lyric’s. The first take was great, although a few of the lines didn’t mesh exactly as we wanted. A few tweaks here and there and Kimo’s gravely voice was perfect -Up on 96th Street, Good God!
Enjoy a Taste of “Hanky Panky” on You Tube Music
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