KickRaTT

Hello, my name is Michael and thanks for hanging out here on my music page. This page represents more of a solo endeavor rather than a band effort. I am a guitarist of over 30 years who grew up in a house of piano players. Music has always been a part of my life. I have been in a number of bands. Some that gig’d around, some that never made it out of the closet. Along with being a musician or in a band, I have built studios, worked with musicians, studio dudes and DJs and have been lucky enough to endure the effort with some great people on both the east and west coast. Whether working with guitars, computers, synthesizers or recording gear, I am somewhat of a hardware nut and have always found work helping other musicians along in various projects to keep me active in the field. So whether as a guitarist or as a mobile recording engineer, I have tackled some pretty crazy music situations. Music is the best, and now through myspace I have this outlet to present some of the various pieces of music I have composed. Again Hello & thanx for stopn here on the web.
I was formally taught by Bob Conti for about 8 years, a pretty renown jazz and classical guitarist of Florida. I have always been a student of instrument soloing, spending a lot of time listening to proficient guitarists, keyboardist, drummers and violin players. Though I am pretty good at writing a commercial type of song, progressive compositions in music have always been a driving desire and interest. I have always listened to all types of music, being pretty open minded to anything I was listening to or someone was trying to get me to hear. My first dramatic change from a kid who consumed everything to one of a more particular type. Was back in high school, a friend of mine threw all of his money into an AKAI sampler. With a 4-track recorder I had at the time, we created these huge crazy soundscapes. In the months that followed my friend and I traded the two pieces of equipment back and forth, each of us recording soundscapes & guitar solos over the soundscapes. We were young and it often just seemed more important to out soundscape solo the other. At the time he was much better than me on the guitar, so I always played with his head using hardware tricks to get more out of the 4 track than he could realize. Through trial and error we both learned a lot. The final project resulted in our first 8 track reel-to-reel studio. Modern music has a way of doing that, it is so component driven. You start out with just a six string guitar and before you know it, you own a musical equipment rental store.
Early on I was greatly influenced by the success of Joe Satriani and the way he was able to bring complicated improvisation to the masses, and equally impressed with the guitar personality that is Steve Vai. While Joe exhibits great soloing that is easy to follow, Steve's signature tone really emits a persona character that sets the man apart from the rest. The greats in my opinion are, Frank Zappa, Allan Holdsworth and Bill Frisell. To me these guys with one note set themselves apart from everybody else, let alone a journey through one of their solos. Maybe it is because they each created a style of music unto themselves that so well defines them now to us all. Joe & Steve have set themselves apart by giving us an array of tones and solo styles to identify each of them with in many different music genres. I have many times listened to Joe Satriani's "Not of this Earth" for ideas of how to take my own music to the next level. Today guitar improv must have character or it remains just soloing. The musician must get in touch with themselves and try to really get their individual personality out through the notes that they play. Way too many musicians lean on effects to express themselves. Apart from individual instrument talents, composition and the musicians choice of musical direction is now more than ever, equally as important as any direction based off of a solo. In studying music theory, I was very influenced by the book Formalized Music by Iannis Xenakis. This was a real turning point in my musical creativity and composition. Xenakis and other like composers that I read about helped to intellectually motivate my quest for a future sound in my own musical composition and a foundation for incorporating technology into my music, rather than me having to incorporate myself into it. To be more in the backbone of the AI, than hitching a ride on it's back.
To reach for the uncommon chord as Holdsworth would say. To write your compositions and let them be as individually representative as your pursuit for the perfect note is when you are soloing, it is really quite the challenge. These ideas help to keep me on track with my own music rather than the head-banging pursuit of trying to make a commercial piece of music. Creative juice has it's time and place, going in and out of the moment. Sometimes you've got it, sometimes you don't. When creativity comes at you, you usually didn't see it coming and all of a sudden you are all into something. Current life has really been a surge, the last five years a real roller coaster. My family & friends all are adding to a new vision of what I recognize & prioritize. It's these life events and visions that are spawning some pretty creative stuff. Now I seem to be searching for something new, a new sound for a new song. You have to tear everything down sometimes and look at the pieces scattered about. It is usually in this mess that you find what you have been looking for. Remembering that, if I have created something that I liked before, chances are I am still on the right path, so I shouldn't go dropping everything.
Recently, I have been rebuilding my home recording studio. Stocking it with new synthesizers, guitar equipment, pre-amps and effects, making a small investment in my own creativity for the future. Using myspace I plan to get my songs out for everyone to listen to and hopefully enjoy. Between remodeling a new house & work, I will start putting in some recording time, I don’t expect to have anything new out for a while. Please refer to the BLOG KICKRATT BASICS for descriptions to the myspace & soundclick browser player’s songs & for all of the techheads enjoy the BLOG MUSICTECH - SYNTH POWER for a surface breakdown of the various components I use in my music rig "KickRaTT", you can find pictures of my rig in the pics section of this myspace page as well. Thanks for the listen. MikeI edited my profile with Thomas Myspace Editor V4.4 (www.strikefile.com/myspace)I edited my profile with Thomas Myspace Editor V4.4 (www.strikefile.com/myspace)
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