Rambling the musical streets of Canberra....

Gone are the days when I planned trips to Sydney and Melbourne, organised accommodation, and generally forked out an extra bucket load to see one of my favourite muso's!!! Canberra is bringing it home :-)

Recent ramblings have seen us at the gallery for a brilliant outdoor Tim Rogers gig - the man is a genius - throw in some rather well known paintings and we're regular "Manuka" gals... The Whitlams also came to town, harking back to their uni roots, and enthusing us all with their tales of love, loss and laughter. Then there was The Rockwiz Tour, bringing Tim Rogers, Claire Bowditch, Adalita Srsen (Magic Dirt), and John Paul Young to ANU (mind you Dougald got all the attention and I may have bought an I Heart Dougald singlet along with every other woman there....)

and if it couldn't get any better.....

This Thusday night the one and only Michael Fielding (yes, Noel's brother who plays Naboo in The Mighty Boosh) is doing a set at Meche $33.30.

Thursday 20th May Tim Rogers (his frequent Canberra gigs are obviously a reflection of the calibre of fans....) at Transit - $20 at the door

Saturday 22nd May Dan Sultan and his brilliant 6 piece band will be at UC - $20 through ticketek (I have gone up to Sydney twice to see him this year - the whole band is sublime - check him out on Rockwiz doing "With A Little Help From My Friends" with Ella Hooper, or in the recent comedy "Bran Nue Dae").

July 1st and 2nd - Tex perkins is The Man in Black - The Johnny Cash Story. I went up to Sydney to see this at the beginning of the year and it was incredible - Tex's voice is spot on, as is the swagger....

My fellow rambler is currently at Groovin' the Moo - so check back soon for her review!

Ukes not Nukes

I should apologise for my complete lack of input here at Midnight Ramblas but Galaxy Quest taught me a very important lesson, to test alien technology on ugly monsters before using it on Tim Allen. It also taught me that Alan Rickman really is great, despite his being Snape. Two important life lessons! So you see I have good reasons not to apologise. Plus I know Ruby will forgive me anyway :)

So hello internet folk, let's try this again.

I bought a ukulele about a month ago. It was a beautiful beautiful experience. I'd done my internet research on the best beginners ukes and emailed stacks of interweb sellers to see all my options. And of course I ended up going out to Better Music anyway.

My sister's and my hearts were sent all a'flutter when we realised that the chap walking towards us as we lumped around the ukulele/ banjo/ ludicrous instrument section was the lead singer of Ivoj Nob (who I know you have heard about already)... So yes my friends, a Bon Jovi sold me a ukulele. And played the opening of Smoke on the Water on it too!!!!!!!!! It was So. Very. Awesome.

I'm imagining that someone out there is interested in why I'd want to buy a ukulele in the first place. Thanks for caring guys! Actually it came about due to a confluence of events. Well two, maybe three, confluencing events.

Reason 1) I learned about the Wellington International Ukulele Orchestra. They rock so hard! Plus Bret from Flight of the Conchords was in it. Here are some a links so you can see their genuis for yourselves -

*  Hey Ya by Outcast
*  I Can Never Take the Place of Your Man by Prince
*  The Bucket by Kings of Leon
*  It's a Heartache by Bonnie Tyler - someone's also made a cool video for it on YouTube :)
So I saw these, bought their EP and thought not only do I want to do this but I probably could as well.
Reason 2) I learned that Eddie Vedder, George Harrison and Bette Midler can all play the ukulele. Also the frontman of that swell band Beirut trots it out quite frequently. Watch their song Elephant Gun here, you won't regret it. You may even want to get married to it it's so nice.
Reason 3) Ukuleles are cheaper and smaller than guitars and they're often painted like fruit and made in brilliant yet acoustically impractical shapes. Plus they only have four strings so SURELY they'll be easier to play??? Yes and No - I'll tell you how I get on.

I probably convinced you of the value, nay necessity, of the ukulele to the whole wide world and I'm sure you're all gagging to rush out to buy one since those first clips I put up of WIUO so here are some online resources I found very helpful in the peliminary stages of Uke obsession -

* http://ukuleleunderground.com/ This is a great site including online tutorials for beginners all the way through to crazy flamenco finger picking insaneo stuff that's really depressing to watch when you're still trying to figure out chords like me. Another dreamboat at Better Music recommended this site while selling me a pitch pipe.
* http://ukulelehunt.com/ Also good, the dude who runs this site has also put together a free pdf book about getting started on the uke which is really useful. Both sites also link to other good sites with tab, chord charts etc.

Hooray! Let's all play ukuleles! Except maybe one of you should play double bass, it sounded grand when WIUO did it... Every town needs an International Orchestra, an army or an after dinner trio of uke players to play in the streets. Let's make it happen :)