Motus Mentis

3 Comments

1. LH says

   Just looking at this scared me. I think instead of eggs frying in a pan(“this is your brain on drugs”)you could just show slideshow stills of rockers like this. Makes me want to “just say no”.

   Posted March 12, 2012 at 1:10 pm | Permalink
2. Malcolm says

   Yes, Ginger Baker stood out as a prodigious self-medicator even in the drug-addled 60’s.

   A friend of mine told me a story about mixing a record for Mr. Baker, who spent most of the sessions conked out on a couch in the back of the control room. Every time the fellow at the console would “solo” one of the instruments (which means to mute all the other tracks so you can concentrate on the sound of the instrument being soloed), Mr. Baker would sit bolt upright, eyes wild and staring, and start yelling “WHERE ARE THE DRUMS?? YOU’VE ERASED THE FUCKING DRUMS!!!”

   The engineer would say “No, Ginger, I’ve just soloed the bass for a second, that’s all,” and switch all the other tracks back on. Mollifed, Mr. Baker would lie back down and nod off again, until the next time.

   But gods, what a drummer! When I was just learning to play, back in the heyday of Cream, he was my idol. Still is, kinda.

   Posted March 12, 2012 at 1:35 pm | Permalink
3. Ron D says

   Great story, Mal.

   Your explanation of the solo button on the mixing board reminded me of the first time I was ever in a recording studio. I think I was back in high school, playing drums on a low budget demo of some kind. It was the first time I had ever seen a large format mixing board and the only button I could see that made any kind of sense to me was the “solo” button.

   I was surprised to see the “solo” button on every single channel of the mixing board, and I couldn’t figure out why each track would be “labeled” that way. Being the jazz fan that I am, I reasoned, oh, that must be where they record the solo – but where do the rest of the instruments go???

   True story.

   Posted March 13, 2012 at 9:26 am | Permalink