Strategy by Strategy Arizona Prog

Strategy is an prog instrumental trio based out of Scottsdale AZ, bass, drums, guitar. They don't hang much in 4 and I like that. Here are the tracks:

Ice Crisis - 11/8, 7/8, 5/4, 4/4
Phase Shift - 10/8, 6/4
Stream of Consciousness - 7/8, 6/8, 10/8
(that my kind of consciousness with some 13 added of course)
Back to the Cafe Collapso - 10/8, 7/8, 11/4, 9/4
Sliding Backwards - 11/8, 7/8, 10/8
Parallel Universe - 7/8, 10/8, 9/8, 9/4, 6/8
(one part Rhythm in 9/4 and melody in 9/8 very parallel indeed)
Odd Meter Mayhem - 15/8, 7/4
Clean Up on Aisle 6 - 6/8 15/8
Track Rabbit - 5/4, 4/4
(play along with this groove, its a good one to learn 5 in)

I really dig how they use these meters and never bore the ear with constantly changing grooves. This reminds me of the yesteryears of YES sans that Rick-o-sound (that I am so partial to), meets King Crimson but is missing a very expensive producer and many many hours of playing/touring together. This is a good CD and they have the potential to be great. So don't stop and keep the music coming Strategy and one in 13 next time please.

You can check them out at MySpace.com/bandstrategy

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BetZe13
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Electronic Black Dog in Straight Four

A while back, I bought this CD in the hopes that I could hear just a bit of electronic oddness. I know I should turn to 'Intelligent Dance Music' but I just wanted a wee bit of smarts... Nope, didn't get it on this one. Thanks to ISSA, this version has none of that silly 7/8 drum beat. Although its a pretty cool mix, I was mad I actually bought this.

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Looking for odd meter in the wrong places...

Just a little FYI - in case you happen to run into these CDs, they don't have any odd meter on them, at all. No mind over common meter and no 3,3,3,2,2 in the slightest.

I can hope eh???

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Y'all like 7-8 eh?

And the winner is...

Yup, 7-8 it is... Is it that circular feeling you get when you play it or the skipped ahead to something better OCD feeling that gets ya? or maybe its because its July or you still have that Traci Lords song in your head... or something else totally different... oh do tell

Haha Thank you everyone for voting... and perhaps next time I will have a cool prize.

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Celebrate 7-8 with Traci Lords

Happy 7/8!

One of my favorite songs totally in 7/8 is titled "Good N Evil" on Traci Lords "1000 Fires" electronica CD. Here is a sample of the whole album and this oddness is located 1:00 - 1:27.

Cool CD cover eh?

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Omen - The Axeman, old skool power metal with a bit of 5

This spring I had the great honor of playing some dates (bass) in Europe with Leather Leone's new project SledgeLeather. We played with many old skool power metal bands almost everything was in 4, but it prompted me to dig some more.
And this is what I found:

Right on Omen! with some 5 in the verse. They are still kickin' it live in Europe too. Old Skool power metal is not known for odd meter use, but one slips in every now and then and when it does... its time to bow down to the axeman!

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Jeff Beck - A Blast From the East

What Jeff Beck playing odd meters? Just when I though he would never do a thing to win my heart, or get off my nerves, Gijs Verhijke, an astute odd meter listener, helped to change my disdain. He alerted me to a Beck oddmeterism 'Blast From the East' that he actually did not write (Tony Hymas did), but grooves it. Come to find out, he has some other ones too that go out of four, but that is for a different discussion.

This is what Gijs had to say:

"Spotted this one on his live DVD (live @ Ronnie Scott). If you ask me it's one bar of 7/8, two bars of 8/8 and then one bar of 7/8 again. Or you could argue that it's 15/8 alternatively but it clearly alternates between 7/8 and 8/8 if you ask me."

Well thank you Mr. Beck for chosing to playing this number, Tony Hymas for writing it, Jennifer Batten for cool effects and technique and the taken for granted rhythm section for making this groove appear to be easy to play.

But more importantly, thank you Gijs for spotting this one for us, I am grooving on it and I do believe you are totally correct on your 7/8 8/8 hypothosis.



Keep spottin' the odd ones for us,

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BetZe13
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