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Bill Boethius with Sammy Lips - Swamp Stealer

from Amongst Wolves by Bill Boethius and guests

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about

This a voracious piece of weird blues, at full tilt and near cacophony, or guitarophany, with its orchestra of guitar parts.
It features the harmonica playing of Sammy Lips, another discovery on Soundcloud for me.


As a blues-hound I’ve always loved the harp, which goes so well with electric guitar.

Sammy is quietly putting out great authentic blues harmonica purely for the love of it, and with a total lack of ego.
And that is real blues.

I wanted to hear how his harp would sound in an experimental free-form Boethiusesque setting, so here is an example of Sammy taking a ride in Dali’s Car for once.

Comments:

its so creepy. i love it

My, how well you folded that harp into your sonic world. There's something fittingly and apocalyptically American about hearing that harp in this context given recent events here among "the cousins"

I'm really pleased that I didn't destroy Sammy's harp sound, which is what I thought might happen. You can really hear his breath on the chambers.
I like the way you switched "typically American" to "apocalyptically American". I'm fairly stoic about politics - which is a blues attitude, like Sammy's. No matter what, it's the same ol' blues, whether there's a King or a Queen in charge, it matters little to me, in that I pay it no mind.

Loving this so much! Thanks Bill!

A good last moments of night, I wasn't sure based on "includes harp" I'd be on at the end...but good show, sirs.

The space is just about perfect, and I know how damn hard that is to work around the harp spectrum!
Wow thanks! I kept in mind the fact that the harp, or lunch wrapper, is a wind instrument: had to keep the breath around the sounds in. On Sammy's solo tracks you really hear that - in an ensemble it's easily lost. This passage it is really there. Lessons I've learnt from yourself came in, getting the differing EQ across the various tracks

Yea, I had a recent reminder of how much work it takes to get the harp to sound right mastering an album for a singer-songwriter type (not my normal stuff I do in my "If I like your music, I'll master it for free" programs, but he was referred by an existing guy I like a ton and the songs were good). Spent more time getting the songs with the harp right than the entire rest of the album (and the harp is only on a couple songs!)

I am not normally a harp fan, but this just fits.
- I obviously had to avoid the harp sounding grafted on - I didn't want to go on the incongruity trip. So the work here was getting it integrated like it was another guitar part or something, but with its own special timbre. Favourite effect on the harp is that sliding and fluttering around bunches of notes

Makes perfect sense, but I've ridden this train before!
There's gotta be a Furtkamp influence there, as I don't usually hit big chords like that!
: Sometimes you gotta remind the guitar why it has six or eight strings :)
Yeah - six strings this time, but I double tracked it a major third below - chord sounds pretty awesome to me [Dean guitar - even though I have a Paul now, I came back to this guitar, Dean are damn fine]
Yep. I had one of their Explorer-things many years ago and it more than did the job. I joke at this point I don't play midpriced guitars, it's all expensive shit or dirt cheapies!


Sammy Lips: Glad you caught him in time ! It's crazy yet it wraps its self up quite well I think !

Me: Thanks Sammy - it has a kind of weird logic to it.

lyrics

Swamp Stealer

O collector of souls and feeder on worlds,
Vanquisher of ghouls and vampyre bleeder.

Swallower of swamps and murderer of mud,
Defiler of girls and devourer of crud,

Turn your stinking visage skywards.
For even vastation has vision ...

And even this swampy morass
Gives rewards.
[Bill Boethius]

credits

from Amongst Wolves, released March 12, 2017
Bill Boethius, guitars, lap steel, bass and drums
Sammy Lips, harmonica, breath and foot-tapping

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Bill Boethius & Dali's Car London, UK

"The Dali of guitar noise".
Poetry settings, Cinematic Sounds:
Strange Blues:
Cosmic Jazz:

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