Robben Ford Discussion

[nineacres]

Anybody seen this guy? I saw him live last night for the first time and was absolutely knocked out. "Chet Atkins on steriods and then some" is one way of describing his playing - although is by no means all there is to the man's playing. When he came on stage I noticed one of his guitars had a LOT of wear and tear on the front. I realized why when at one point during the first set, he whipped out a brush (drumstick-type) and proceeded to do a drum solo on his guitar. Amazing! If he's playing anywhere near you - go and see him. You'll not regret it! His publicity hand-out also stated that he's toured with Robben ...
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"Creativeness often consists of merely turning up what is already there. Did you know that right and left shoes were only thought up a little more than a century ago?" - Bernice Fitz-Gibbon 1894-1982

[PierreL]

Actually Robben played on one of his CDs ( one track only ).

[StratCat]

Being from Melbourne, I've had the pleasure of seeing Tommy a lot, although not so much in recent years as he's spent more and more time overseas. He's stunning on both acoustic and electric guitars and his Maton acoustics get a hell of a workout and sure take a beating.

He's also a real showman and some of this manifests itself through technical wizardry, but that doesn't take away from his ability to operate on an emotional level too. I mentioned him at one point in my 'lump in the throat guitar solos' thread for good reason!

I kinda wish he'd do more work in a band context though, as it's great to see him rock out as well as do the acoustic stuff. He had one lineup years ago which featured Virgil Donati on drums and that was simply an awesome band.

Highly recommended!

Chris
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because I rock, and that's important.

[nineacres]

Talking to him after the show the other night he said he was with a band called Air Supply for some time. Is this the band you were referring to, Chris?
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"Creativeness often consists of merely turning up what is already there. Did you know that right and left shoes were only thought up a little more than a century ago?" - Bernice Fitz-Gibbon 1894-1982

[StratCat]

wow - Air Supply are a bit before my time!

He's actually played with a number of big Australian bands over the years, probably Air Supply and Dragon amongst others. And his studio credits are massive - similar sort of session credits as someone like Lukather.

The band that he had going back 10+ years ago was actually his own band, started around the time of his "Dare to be different" album in about 1990 or so. They were all session guys of similar pedigree to him, but Tommy + Virgil Donati together is a classic and hard to forget. I have some really fond memories of some of those gigs.

PS - the album with RF is "Can't Get Enough". RF's on a 335 by the looks of the photos. Also has Chet Atkins, Larry Carlton, Tom Brechtlein and Nathan East on it. Hearing Tommy and Chet together is scary stuff - serious musical soul mates. Not quite as scary as a gig I saw in the late 80's with Albert Lee and Tommy (both on Teles) going head to head in a full-on blues/country/rock/chicken pickin' frenzy which I think was with Albert Lee's band and was just plain frightening.

Also - did he play "Initiation" at the gig you saw? Not sure what his set list is these days but it's an Aboriginal sounding solo acoustic number where he uses a ton of digital delay and manages to maintain seperate bassline/rhythm/melody lines, play percussion and get didgeridoo sounds out of his guitar... all at the same time of course. Great piece of music too (another one for the "lump in the throat" list and hard to forget).


Chris
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because I rock, and that's important.

[srammell]

i'm off to see him on the coming weekend - should be good from the sounds of things!