by quarantoons | Oct 8, 2020 | Uncategorized
When Tommy Dolan and I did ‘Strawberry Fields Forever’ a few weeks ago, he raised the idea of doing the other side of that double-A Side single, so here it is. We got a little help on this one from Rich Forman on keyboards and Robert Sole on vocals. This...
by quarantoons | Sep 27, 2020 | Music
After doing ‘Better Man Than I’ with Scott Bittner, I got the idea in my head to do another Yardbirds song – the only question was which one? They had so many cool hits. I finally opted for one from the 1966 album Roger The Engineer that featured...
by quarantoons | Sep 20, 2020 | Music
My band Nurse Diesel is known for taking certain, umm, chances with our choices of material – we’re a three piece band, but we often do material that’s a lot more complex than guitar, bass and drums. So when Diesel bassist Tommy Dolan and I decided...
by quarantoons | Sep 17, 2020 | Uncategorized
My friend Chris Antos has been known as the voice of AC/DC in the Northeast for over 20 years with his tribute bands Live Wire and Shoot2Thrill, so when I asked him what song he wanted to do with me, he immediately stepped outside his comfort zone and suggested this...
by quarantoons | Sep 16, 2020 | Uncategorized
This one was a surprise. Bill Haney sent me this track yesterday, where he took one of The Beatles’ early rockers and turned it into a gentle ballad. After listening to it a couple of times, I got the idea for a simple string arrangement, and after about an hour...
by quarantoons | Sep 14, 2020 | Music
While updating my drum software a couple of weeks ago, I noticed that the update included a new drum kit they called ‘Levee.’ And that reminded me of a mashup that my band Nurse Diesel used to do, using the music from ‘When The Levee Breaks’...
by quarantoons | Sep 13, 2020 | Music
Here’s a song from one of my favorite bands – the title track from Mountain’s third album, 1971’s Nantucket Sleighride. This one was suggested a while ago by my long-time guitar tech Rodney ‘Rocky’ Arnhold, so i decided to finally...
by quarantoons | Aug 16, 2020 | Music
After Mike Tirelli and I did ‘It’s No Good,’ we started talking about another song to do. We were talking about doing a song by INXS, and this one from the Kick album was what we landed on – but with a slight twist. It turns out that...
by quarantoons | Aug 3, 2020 | Music
When I posted that Yardbirds tune last week, I struck up a conversation with Bill Hafener (Finn & His Rustkickers) about doing a song. Bill suggested that he bring in the band and do a revved-up take on Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Nebraska,’ done in...
by quarantoons | Jul 31, 2020 | Uncategorized
New Jersey Power Pop pioneers The Smithereens are one of the most overlooked American bands ever for my money, and this song from their debut album is one of their best. This track has been sitting around for a while, mainly because I was a little skittish about...
by quarantoons | Jul 29, 2020 | Uncategorized
Here’s another quick track, because this site needs a little country! This track from The Byrds’ 1966 album Fifth Dimension is arguably the very first country-rock song. I kept the arrangement pretty bare-bones to match the original, although I did allow...
by quarantoons | Jul 25, 2020 | Music
This one was a lot of fun to put together. This was the hit single from Michael Penn’s 1989 debut album March, and you can classify this one as a guilty pleasure. There is so much detail in this song, and I tried to do as much of it as I could. It took 6 guitar...
by quarantoons | Jul 23, 2020 | Music
Scott Bittner suggested doing this 1965 track by The Yardbirds, but upon listening to it I thought the arrangement could use a little freshening up. I suggested styling it after 80s Power Pop, specifically a song called ‘A Million Miles Away’ by the Los...
by quarantoons | Jul 18, 2020 | Music
Sure, ZZ Top went global in the Eliminator – Afterburner – Recycler era, but this song is from the Antenna album, one of the later records before they went back to more of the old school sound. This has always been one of my favorite Top tunes –...
by quarantoons | Jul 6, 2020 | Music
Confucius once said ‘Many hands make light work.’ Sounds about right for this 1974 Paul McCartney & Wings tune – this one breaks the record for the sheer number of people involved! I approached Tom Collier (formerly of Grimm Jack, presently a...
by quarantoons | Jun 30, 2020 | Music
Some debut singles are a shot across the bow, and this one from Everclear’s 1995 major-label debut Sparkle and Fade is exactly that – it goes from zero to ‘punch in the throat’ in the first 10 seconds and does not let up. This song has been on...
by quarantoons | Jun 24, 2020 | Uncategorized
I’m waiting for tracks to complete a few more songs, so I figured why not do a Kinks song? This was one of a string of hits for The Kinks from the 1965 (’66 in the States) Kink Kontroversy album. I recorded and mixed this in one night and had a blast doing...
by quarantoons | Jun 18, 2020 | Music
This deep cut from Aerosmith’s Rocks album came about when I asked Joey Sykes (The Babys) to do a song. After briefly flirting with doing a Pink Floyd tune, we reconsidered and decided on this one instead. And when I mentioned that we were doing this tune to...
by quarantoons | Jun 15, 2020 | Uncategorized
When Danny Calvagna and I did ‘No Matter What’ by Badfinger a couple of weeks ago, we were talking about doing another Badfinger song pretty much immediately. And rather than just do another one of their radio hits, we decided to go with a deeper cut off...
by quarantoons | Jun 12, 2020 | Music
Anyone who has spoken to me about music in the past few years is well aware of my love for Scottish trio Biffy Clyro. For my money, there are few bands on Earth who rock harder and still maintain a great sense of melody and humanity in their lyrics. This song is from...
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