Rehearsal 25th February 2007
Another good rehearsal, getting better at all the songs – I just need to learn all the lyrics!
As usual, a good number of completely unrelated topics discussed, including petty theft, stag nights, legalisation of prostitution, and has anyone seen my wallet?
Everyone’s favourite rap artist managed to make it into the conversation again…
… after Robb was talking about a solo that included a ‘hammer-on’ and some bright spark shouted ‘Stop! Hammer-on’ and everyone else started playing the music, but we all agreed that when it comes down to it – ‘you can’t rock this’…
Dick was at the studio again and he and Adam spent about half an hour banging on (geddit?) about drums and bored the rest of us silly. I mean, how interesting can different kinds of wood and frames really be?
Rehearsal 18th Feb 2008: The Proof is in the Pudding
Mike started the evening off with the claim that he had finally learned “call me when you’re sober” off by heart. When we laughed, he said “I suppose the proof will be in the pudding”.
I’ve always been a bit interested in the origins of phrases and proverbs, partly because some of them just seem so strange. This was one of those occasions. I asked the guys if they knew what it meant and we came up with the following suggestions:
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Adam thought it was related to a court case where some kind of evidence (proof) was found in some kind of pudding
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I thought it might relate to the alcohol percentage (proof) of brandy used in a christmas pudding
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Mike thought it might somehow relate to the tradition of putting a penny in the christmas pudding
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Robb suggested that someone lost their only copy of a piece of written work (proof) in a bowl of pudding mixture
Lots of creative ideas but sadly all wrong. Typed it into google today to discover the following:
“the phrase originated as ‘the proof of the pudding is in the eating.’ It means that the true value or quality of something can only be judged when it’s put to use. The meaning is often summed up as ‘results are what count’…the phrase dates back to at least 1615 when Miguel de Cervantes published Don Quixote. In this comic novel, the phrase is stated as, ‘The proof of the pudding is the eating’.” (source)
Anyway, we did also play some music! Ran through all the songs we’ve learned so far – we now have 10 that should soon be ready to gig! Excellent news. Planning first gig for sometime in March.
Silverthorn on MySpace
Adam has set us up on MySpace, check it out on www.myspace.com/silverthornrock
Rehearsal 11th Feb 2008: Has anyone seen a wallet?
The band rehearsing in the room before us were still clearing out as we arrived. When all their stuff was out, one of them came back and asked if we had seen his wallet, which we hadn’t. He had a look round and couldn’t find it. We carried on setting up, etc, and then another guy from the band came in and asked if we had seen his mate’s wallet, we said no, he said can I look around, we said of course, and again he couldn’t find it. We carried on, and about 10 minutes later they both came back to have another look. I assured them if we found it, we would hand it in but I don’t think they believed me. After they had gone Adam said he was sure they wouldn’t be so untrusting if they knew the kind of people we were (i.e. professionals in jobs with lots of responsibility, two of us in the public sector). This just shows the kind of prejudice we rockers face on a day to day basis – being cast as untrustworthy drug users who would steal money from another band just to feed our habits. Ok, maybe I’m reading too much into it but there you go. Much amusement was had as we all ‘discovered’ wallets throughout the evening, unfortunately for the other band, they were our own wallets.
Adam was playing about on the drums and so Mike started playing some drum sounds on the keyboard, eventually triggering off some demo setting with lots of drums, to which Adam retorted that he wasn’t having a drum battle with a casio. Possibly the most insulting thing you could say to a keyboard player.
Learned some new songs – I hate everything about you (Ugly Kid Joe), I love rock and roll (Joan Jett) and Rockstar (Nickelback). May have enough soon to do a gig…
Band Rehearsal 4th Feb 2008
Sorry it’s taken me so long to post this one. Crazily busy week.
Mike has a new synth stand following last week’s near miss. The first thing he said was ‘has anyone got a hammer?’. With my mind always being on music, my first thought was this:
rather than this:
But saying that, I carry neither with me (not since the 80’s anyway) so he had to find some other way of putting up the new stand.
Conversation drifted onto gigs, which we hope we’ll be ready to do soon, and the importance of the soundcheck. This led to a bit of a freudian slip when I asked if we could practice “You only soundcheck when you’re sober” next…
Also learned “She Sells Sanctuary”. Pretty easy, except for remembering the order of things. It follows no obvious pattern at all. This was followed by a debate about whether we should announce it as “He Sells Sanctuary” with me being a girl and all. But as the lyrics don’t actually include the line “she sells sanctuary” it doesn’t really seem to matter all that much.
I don’t know what people’s thoughts are generally on changing lyrics based on the gender of the singer. Is it better to stick with the original that everyone knows, but end up leaving people confused about one’s sexuality (e.g. a girl singing “there she stood in the street” etc), or is it better to change the lyrics slightly to fit? Comments please?!
Band Meeting 30th January 2008: We have a name!
It’s only taken a month, but here we are, with a name we all agreed on. Sorry to all of you who loved ‘Roquiem’ but it was just too cheesy! So the name is
SILVERTHORN
Those of you who are fans of fantasy fiction will recognise the name as the third novel in Raymond E Feist’s Riftwar Saga, a fantastic series of books that I highly recommend.
The meeting was at Adam’s house this time, starting with a brief game of guitar hero followed by pizza and a bit of a songwriting session.
Then to the pub for discussions unhindered by pricedrop.tv (Cas and Val, you know what I’m talking about).
First line of business was obviously the name thing. Actually there was no disagreement, we all liked the idea of Roquiem but knew it was too much, and surprisingly all like Silverthorn, so here we are!
We started talking about logos and umlauts (like the ö in Mötley Crüe – Silverthörn or Sïlverthorn?), and alternative thorn related band names – Silver n Thorns, Thorn 51, Thorn Fighters, Motorthorn, Megathorn, and Metallithorn. It was hillarious at the time… We then talked about how things can be hillarious at the time but then aren’t in the retelling (spooky).
This led onto a number of Jeremy Beadle (RIP) jokes that people had heard and then somehow onto an argument between Robb and Adam about Superman. Robb thinks Superman is crap because he has too many powers. Adam thinks Superman is great for the exact same reason.
Various discussions followed about the A-Team and Mr T, South Park and German humour (you could say we got a bit sidetracked…). When I was in 6th form a German exchange student stayed with my family. On his first night, at the dinner table, we somehow got onto the topic of humour. My father asked him if he liked slapstick. Not having heard the phrase before, he said he didn’t know. Dad then proceeded to ‘pretend’ to throw his chocolate gateaux at my mother, unfortunately it actually fell out of the bowl all over her. Poor bloke must have thought he’d ended up with a load of weirdo’s for the week. We then ended up talking about Red Dwarf. I mean, how do explain the show to someone who’s never seen it and is also from another country? So it made sense to show him an episode (anyone see where this is going?). So we were about half way through the first episode when this happens:
Lister: “So what’s it like then?”
Rimmer: “Death? It’s like being on holiday with a group of Germans”
I realised it was happening too late and was getting prepared to be absolutely mortified and apologetic, when the guy just bursts in laughter, real genuine hearty laughter. What a relief! Just goes to show the stereotypes aren’t always right…
Anyway, back to the meeting. Finished evening off discussing a few more songs to learn then went home to bed. All in all, it felt like a pretty fruitful evening, despite the distractions!
Silverthorn 