Marco Rodi

Yesterday I came home around 9:30 pm after work and school and I practiced my solo bass set. I did the set list i’ve written and the set is 35 minutes long. not bad.

3 years ago, I was at a music store with my old guitarist and we were both really really high. It was the time of my life I was hanging out with all the pot-heads at my school and with all the crazy buzzed punk metal heads musicians ( The time I had a local for band practice). Anyways, So I was at the music store really high and decided to go into the weirdest musical category of the store. It was FLUTE. I’m not kiding. there was a FLUTE section. So I picked up a random cd and went to listen to it. The cd was Ron Korb Live by the incredible flutist Ron Korb.

It was amazing. I never listened to something like this. So i bought the cd, and the dvd, and 2 more cd’s and I came addicted to that flutist. 3 years ago. So now, I remembered that and decided to cover one of his song at my show this friday. It’s weird. A solo bassist covering a solo flutist song… haha.

Thats when I learned that you have to open your mind to the fullest, you never know what you can come up with speaking of inspirations.

I think it’s the first time I write 2 blog entries in one day. I wan’t to start writing more. I’m going to soon update my website, a GENERAL update. As you know, you can all write comments on my blog entries. Simply click on the link under my blog entries.

I’m reading the book The Heroin Diaries written by Motley Crue’s bassist Nikki Sixx.

It’s really really good. The book contains the Diary of Nikki while he was using heavy drugs on his Motley Crue biggest tour. So he talks about the shows, parties, girls, etc etc.

I realize that the majority of musicians who didin’t make it yet, all dream about fame and money and rockstar life and girls. But I read alot of books on a typical Rockstar life and none of them seemed really happy about it. They were all depressive and drug addicts. ( Anthony Kiedis, Jim Morisson, Bob Dylan, Nikki Sixx, Kurt Cobain, Jimi Hendrix etc etc etc).

In our point of view, their life seemed cool but when you really know what happened, it may a really suffering life.

But it dosen’t stop the fact that we ( musicians) all dream of THAT rockstar life.

”When you’re talking to a fan, you’re talking to somebody who’s not talking to you. They’re talking to a photograph, they’re talking to their image of you, they’re talking to a walking poster. And if you make the mistake of thinking, that they’re talking to you… When they tell you that you’re a genius, or that you’re so fucking cool… Or whatever their fucking image is of you… Then if you believe it… Then you, the real human being dies.” – John Frusciante

I won the local final so I had to go to the national final of this University Artistic Competition. Univers-Cite en spectacle. The competition was 1 hour and a half from my home. So I went there, Saturday morning. I arrived late because I got lost. At 12:30, I was there for sound check. It went well, the sound was great, it was in a huge theatre. After, I met all the other artists. Really cool, down to earth people. Humorists, Musicians, Poets, Actors, many many great talented people. We had to wait 5 hours before the show. I slept, practiced bass, eat, warmed up, chilled outside. So the show arrived. I went backstage and I had to wait for the other artist to leave the stage. When he was done, the sound technicians told me to go on stage to set up my amp and pedals. The lights were all open and the crowd was there. So I went. It was awkward because everybody was looking at me setting up my stuff and I was really nervous. After I finished, all the lights just shutted down. I tought it was the cue for me to start playing. So I started but it was NOT the cue. There was a video that was presenting my performance. But I didint stop playing haha.

I started my solo bass set with a cool idea I had at the beginning of my 2008 jam video. It was going good. The crowd was into it, people got in the groove. I finished this jam and I continued with my solo bass song Nascosto Sole. I started to realise that the sound was weird so I was always turning my head to try to check the volume of my amp. So I said F*ck It and turned the volume REALLY high. I finished the song and people were screaming and going nuts. I couldnt find the microphone on stage so i screamed: THANK YOU. And I continued with a sick Slap Fiesta. Up to there, it went well. but AFTER, I wanted to finish the show with a really soft melodic improvisation using my loop pedal to record a slow bass part and do a little solo over it. I tried to record the main bass part, but my LOOP PEDAL STOPPED WORKING. In this competition, we have 10 minutes. If we go over that time, we will be disqualified. So I didint have the time to figure out what went wrong and I got really nervous I didint know what to do. So I had to finish the show right there. So I turned on my distorsion and did a little outro and Detuned my low string at the end. My performance was 8 minutes long and I had 10 minutes. I got a standing ovation, people really liked my show but I wasent satisfied and was really mad. People didint stop coming to me saying: Dude it was crazy, ur amazing, I never saw a bass doing that stuff before” And ALl I kept saying was: MY LOOP PEDAL DIDINT WORK AT THE END.

It is really frustrating. You practice like crazy everyday to do the best performance you can. And you get ruined by a stupid technical problem.

At the end, it was time to give the prizes. Judges were all actors in weird theatrical shows and directors of dramatic drama schools… no musicians… so I had NO chance to win.

I Lost.

I was really happy for the 1st prize winner, he diserved it, he did a really cool piano performance with some funny theatrical stuff.

But I was mad that people didin’t see my 100%. The show was filmed professionaly. When I will get it, I will post it on youtube and I will share it with all of you.

Experiences like that makes you better. Right now, I only want to play bass to express my rage. Each time I’m mad, I want to play bass.

April 25th I’m going to do an interesting show. I will be playing with a professional DJ and percussionist. It will be 1 hour of improvisation. I can’t wait.

Anyways, Im going to finish my coffee.

Have a nice day everybody!

Ps. I really cant get over this beautiful guitar solo by John Frusciante when they were in Montreal last year:

I would like to be discovered like Jimi Hendrix did. Jimi was playing each night at a bar with some stuff nobody had seen on the guitar yet. One night, The Animal’s bass player Chas Chandler
saw him and told him to come to Europe with him so he will form him a band and promote him to show his creativity to people. Chas found musicians and said to Jimi: Just play and they will follow you. So that’s how The Jimi Hendrix Experience was born.

I would like to start like that. If I wan’t to be famous, I need a band. I need a band who follow my bass playing. I will be the band’s leader. I can’t sing, but I still want to be the leader. But man, I don’t have time. I don’t wan’t to put little adds here and there to jam with musicians, I hate that. I don’t need talented people, I only want chemistry and frienship with my musicians. It’s hard to find. Even if you have a cool chemistry with some dudes, you always want more. Well I’m like that. I’m never satisfied with stuff like that. That’s why I quited my 2 old bands. I wanted more more more chemistry.

Bah, just make the time to it’s thing. Sure we have to force ourselves to get what we want, but on that situtation, I can’t do more.

Each Sunday I go write some music with my 2 rapper friends Les Zonards and we are really starting to create something new and fresh and original.

I would love to do alot of shows with them because our shows are really special. They rap, I do a solo bass set and I go on stage with them to jam. Nobody has done that before: Solo bass Set + Rappers?

Anways I’m off. Ciaooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Morca Rido