Nilsguitar – Nils

The drama of the sick cat and the iPhone scare – part 6

nilsmusic — Tue, 19 Apr 2016 16:13:24 +0000

I was supposed to meet my wife at London Heathrow this morning. We were supposed to fly to Berlin together from there. But as it turned out, one of our old cats had taken a turn for the worse. My wife had delayed her original planned departure already for a week, to tend to the needs of our 3 old friends. Now one of them is doing really bad and I am afraid it might not last much longer.

Knodd

Those of you, who are part of my mailing list, might remember that my studio buddy Knodd was very sick. He still is, although he is stable at the moment, but his Dad Mittens is not.

Mittens likes watching TV

Our daughter was away at Coachella. So my wife did not want to leave that on her to deal with when she came home and decided to put her flight on hold. So I had to cancel her flight again (LAX to London). Every time we do this, the airline charges an additional $340, bastards… Her flight from London to Berlin is a pure throw-away. It was a cheaper airline. There is no refund.
The promoter in Amsterdam also got really ill, and we had to cancel the show there. So I will be flying from Berlin directly to Munich.
All this got handled in a few hours of phone calls, which brings me to my next subject the iPhone scare.
I never pay much attention to my iPhone usage, since I was grandfathered in to an unlimited data, text and call plan. However when traveling abroad all that changes. I had purchased a silver international package for my phone, which included unlimited text, 200 MB cellular data and calls for $0.50 / min. That seemed to be sufficient and I tried to keep an eye on my usage. So I checked my data usage after 3 days and discovered that somehow my phone had devoured 8GB of data. Don’t ask me for what, I have no idea. According to my plan the overage fees for the first 3 days alone would come to about $900. I almost had a nervous breakdown and called AT&T to see what happened. It turned out that the phone counter included data from way before my trip started, and the actual usage since I left was less than 100 MB. What a relief! Still a lot, considering the 200MB have to last for 3 more weeks. So I learned to turn off all the unnecessary services while travelling. Otherwise the iPhone will download e-mails and such in the background, which should better be done manually while on Wi-Fi in a hotel or hot spot.
I also was told that I get a courtesy message from AT&T once my limits are reached.

Then I installed an app called Viber, which allows to call over Wi-Fi. So while in the hotel on a Wi-Fi network, I could talk to my wife for two hours without occurring any call charges, once she had installed the same app on her phone.

As I am trying to upload this to my blog, I was kicked out of my Wi-Fi from the hotel. I had purchased the option for 72 hrs and I think my time just ran out. I’ll try to connect later. Hopefully one day we will have ever present internet access and look back at these primitive times thinking how ridiculous and unnecessary complicated things were. Just like we look back now at a time before we had cell phones.

read on to part 7

London – On the road part 5

nilsmusic — Sun, 17 Apr 2016 10:44:14 +0000

This is the third day in London. The show yesterday was already quite a bit better than the first day. The room was pretty much packed to full capacity. And it feels more comfortable to play with the fellows after a few shows. I told Michael (Lington) “by Sunday we will be so tight, that we can take it on the road” He laughed in agreement knowing that after Sunday we would all go our separate ways.

Tonight’s show is sold out and I am really looking forward to it. I dialed in my guitar tone and I feel at ease with the set. Several people came up to me after each show, and noted that it is no small feat to get this room up and dancing, which is exactly what we did. I never leave the stage before I get everybody up and dancing. And I make no exception for the crowd here in London. They might seem a bit more reserved at first, but once you get them going, they are really good party crowd.

Nils & Michael Lington at the Pizza Express

The hotel is just a short 3 min walk from the club. And it feels great walking through London. The small streets, old buildings, double decker busses.

There are crowds around the pubs at night, people just hanging out, talking and having a beer. The city is just buzzing like a bees nest. It feels so much more crowded than LA, mainly because the roads are smaller. Crossing the road at rush hour is like a game of jousting with two opposing parties trying to cross over to the other side. It’s fun for sure.

I am getting a lot of use out of the warm coat my mom got me last Christmas in Germany. After a little sunshine in honor of my arriving, the skies returned to standard issue London weather: cloudy with some rain. I looked at some umbrellas today and realized that I haven’t owned one in almost 30 years. I’m tempted to buy one, but that will just add another item for me to “shlep” around when its time to catch the plane to Berlin on Monday.

I found a laundry. They wanted 13.5 GBP (20 bucks) to do one load of laundry. I opted for buying some more underwear and socks for 10 bucks to hold me over until I get to my parents house in Munich. Problem solved.
read part 6

What to expect at a NAMM show

nilsmusic — Mon, 26 Jan 2015 21:22:06 +0000

The 2015 NAMM show was this weekend. For those of you who have never been. It’s the convention of music manufacturers, where companies introduce their newest instruments, software, improvements etc..
For musicians it’s the biggest toy store on earth.

I have been attending almost every year since I was a young adult in Germany. It is usually closed to the public, so you have to be invited, be registered by a company or sneak in, which gets harder every year. In the old days there was one day for the public, but not anymore. I guess too many people figured out how to get in anyways to turn the event into a zoo. And a Zoo it still is. 100’s of musician dressed as if they were ready to go on stage along with their groupies are crowding the isles. In between are business men trying to take orders and closing deals. There are lines of people cueing up to shake hands of well known musicians signing autographs at a booth of whatever company they are endorsing. All of a sudden a procession of body guards is clearing the way. It’s Stevie Wonder. I wave to him, but he doesn’t see me. :0)
The show is setup in several halls at the Anaheim convention center. One hall is mostly for software, one is mostly for recording equipment, one for guitars and basses and one is for drums and percussion. Unless you are a drummer you probably want to avoid this one. It is the nuttiest and loudest. Imagine 100 drummers banging on things to their own beat at the same time. Around the convention center there are now a lot of stages and bands perform to showcase their talents. Most of them are unknown. It’s not a paying gig. But there are also concerts sponsored by companies that feature world class musicians.

Nils and Reinhold Bogner

NAMM changed over the years, but mainly I think that my expectations changed.
Where I used to go just out of curiosity and to maybe catch a performance, I now go for business relations and to be up on the latest developments. I rate the show by the “WOW factor” and the “Accomplishment factor”.
The “WOW factor” scale rises when there are some truly exciting new items to see. I remember the day Melodyne was introduced, a software that let’s you manipulate audio recordings in radical new ways. We can now change a single note within a chord in an audio file without affecting the other notes around it, effectively fixing a bad chord or changing it from minor to major for instance. Before that, you could have paid me to hold a lecture why this is not possible, but those mad German scientists did it. Don’t ask me how, but audio editing was forever changed. – WOW!
The “accomplishment factor” comes into play when I can secure an endorsement (free gear) or a memo loan (free gear, which I eventually have to give back) from a manufacturer. Also (re)- establishing personal relationships with others from the industry.

On those scales, this years show did quite well. I am excited about the new upcoming Omnisphere 2 synth, which is one of my favorite tools. It got a major overhaul. Also Bogner has two new guitar amps, that I now need to have. The Goldfinger with one of the best clean tones I have ever heard and the Alma which is just soooo small and portable, while still sounding amazing. I am starting my Christmas wish list early.

Then I had some face time with Tim Godwin from Taylor guitars. I have a Taylor acoustic guitar and love it. He agreed to let me use one of their guitars for the recording on my upcoming acoustic album. More tonal variety -great.

I also met several of my peers and talked shop and updated contact infos. I was happy to run into Ndugu Chancellor, who I had not seen in years.

Nils and Ndugu Chancellor at NAMM 2015

The Year End Rush 2012 and 2013

nilsmusic — Mon, 08 Dec 2014 23:53:22 +0000

I looked through my old blogs today and found “The Year End Rush 2011“. I posted it up again so you guys could read it.
It made me very sad to see the picture of my friend Ricky Lawson, who passed away a year ago. And I was in the same situation: The Year End Rush. We had a session booked for Monday to have him record drums for 5 songs. And then on Saturday I get the call, that he was in the hospital. First we thought it was not that bad. I called the other musicians and planned to postpone the session until after the New Year. Then in midweek, I was told Ricky had passed away. You can’t imagine the shock I felt. We just talked a few days before. He was in great spirits, just had gotten an award in Germany. He seemed in good health, and wasn’t complaining about any ailments. But then this happened, a brain enurism!
I’m still speechless and sad because I lost not only the best drummer I’ve know, but also a friend and a wonderful, warm hearted human being. I have a few tracks left that we recorded together, and will be on my next couple of albums. But after that I won;t be able to have him on my productions again. I really miss him.

Last year’s Rush was further extreme, because Kathryn ( Bostic) came in with two movies at the same time. She scored, I played, guitar, mixed and helped produce the score tracks. The movies were “Dear White People” which created quite a buzz, and a documentary about August Wilson.

This year I am again involved with a movie with Kathryn, which has to be done before the 23rd. So I am happy to see her doing so well.

I am also working on productions for 4 clients. Fortunately the deadline is not as brutal and it’s just ongoing work.

But mainly I am pushing myself to get my own project up to the next level, before Christmas. I want my record label to hear it and vibe on it over the holidays. I am working on an acoustic album and I still have two more songs to write, besides recording all my main guitars. I have been contacting different companies and friends, to get my hands on different instruments for a tonal variety. My friend and engineer Wolfgang “Amadeus” Aichholz agreed to help me with some of the engineering. Wolfi has killer mics and preamps, so I am excited to hear what my guitars sound like through some old vintage tube mics.

So why do I always feel a rush this time of the year?

Is it a curse of them self-employed? Do people working a 9-5 job feel the same? Or is it just me?
It seems to be a constant occurrence every year. The frenzy starts the first week of Dec and doesn’t end until Christmas. I think it has to do with the finality of the year coming to an end, and also with the business mostly shutting down over Christmas. So there is a break in my work flow. I want to step aside, concentrate on my family and not care about the music business for a few days. Then when I look back of what I have accomplished this year, it just feels better having all these things done and checked off.

Over the years I learned how to deal with THE YEAR END RUSH a lot better. It doesn’t stress me out anymore. I just plan my days and divide them for different projects.
Mondays I deal with my business affairs, Tuesdays and Wednesdays I record guitars for my CD, Thursdays I work on productions, Fridays and Saturdays I work with Kathryn, Sundays I try to catch up with anything that did not get done during the week. That means no break until Christmas, but I know that all the projects are covered. And this takes the anxiety and panic away.
At least it does for me. I realize everybody is different.
I’d be interested to hear if you, the reader, experience something similar or is it totally different? Feel free to leave comments and let me know.
In the meantime Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and all that Good Stuff

NILS

Nils Christmas deals

nilsmusic — Fri, 05 Dec 2014 08:22:56 +0000

pick any album for $6.99 download or 9.99 hard copy

2013 Jazz Gems – The Best of Nils

15 Billboard Top 20 Hits on one CD

2012 City Groove

feat. Darryl Jones, Simon Phillips, Ricky Lawson, Jeff Golub, Mitch Forman and more…

2011 What the Funk

feat. Alex Al, Ricky Lawson, Reggie McBride and more…

2009 Up Close and Personal

feat. Larry Dunn, Shilts, Clydene Jackson, Oliver Brown and more

2007 Ready to Play

feat. Dwayne ‘Smitty’ Smith, Leon Bisquera, Carmen Twillie, , Terry Lynn Wood and more…

2005 Pacific Coast Highway

feat. song of the Decade “Pacific Coast Highway”

1998 Blue Planet

feat. George Benson, Carl Anderson, Bobby Lyle, Chanté Moore and more