Music and Lyrics
Songs from First Thing Smoking are starting to filter in, watch the blog on the front page for releases. Older releases will follow.
We want this music heard, shared, and enjoyed. For this reason, we’re using a Creative Commons License. Below are the ‘albums’ that GRS has done so far, or is working on. Expect this site to grow and change as our bag of tunes expands.
First Thing Smoking
First Thing Smoking is the newest ‘release’ from Good Rocking Sam. This is the first time we’ve thought about going direct to the web, dispensing with the whole CD concept. It’s cheaper, nobody cares about CD’s anymore, and it allows us to do what we really want to do, which is continuously write and record, versus save things up for a big push. There are about 14 tunes in this package, and they’ll start trickling out first on this site. After all of these songs are done, we’ll go more towards ‘EP’ style releases of 3-4 songs at a time, at least unless we conceive of some sort of ‘Blues Opera’.
Jack of Diamonds - A swampy Texas/Louisiana style blues written by Chuck that was then mangled by the rest of the band.
Chuck Says –
A friend of mine has a copy of Adobe Soundbooth CS4 that I used to finalize this mix. It’s a really cool GUI that combines some of the best elements of Cool Edit and Sound Forge. Doing basic tasks like trimming heads and tails, minor processing like EQ and compression is a snap.
The song was written around the time when you couldn’t turn on the TV without seeing an ad for a TV poker show. Most of the lyrics while exercising my dog Coda at Lake Jordan. I had just enough time between stick throws to jot down a line or two. The original concept was to make it into a Doc Watson type blues. When I showed it to Mike, he saw that at the heart of it, it really was a Texas blues. It’s been a standard in our repertoire ever since.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Luxury Life
Luxury Life was the last release by Good Rocking Sam, and it’s the cd we have available at shows. This was recorded, as usual, by the band using Sonar. Like everything else, it’s all original. Dig the ‘voodoo wall’ cover art that was put together by Walter. This was a bone-fide gris-gris shrine, and was impressive to see.
Lefty Lucy - More swampy blues!
Mike says –
A staple of our sets, still today! This is based on the old ‘Lefty-loosey, righty-tighty’ saying of mechanics, turned around to talk about two women. When we play live, Walter really turns on the juice with the harp.
Mike says –
I think this song started the tradition of having a barking dog buried in the record. It’s not Strawberry Fields or anything, but you’ll hear it in spots. This was inspired by hearing T-Model Ford at Local 506, but you’d never know it, because it changed so much after the initial inspiration. We don’t play this often anymore, but it’s still fun to hear.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 Unported License.
Try to Hold On
Try to Hold On was the first ‘official’ project that launched the ban. Honestly, at the time it was really the Ravens, we just retroactively changed the name of the band. This band is really a songwriting collective, and the songs and recording of Try to Hold On came before any live shows we did. It’s really a challenge to go out there and play your own tunes, especially in the blues genre, but we have all played in tons of bar bands, and we wanted a change. We feel that folks do ‘get it’, and we’re always happy and grateful to find an audience that wants to hear something that isn’t ‘Got My Mojo Working’, as great as that tune is. Especially gratifying is the fact that we count lots of local musicians as friends and supporters. We may not be the best ever, but we are the best at being Good Rocking Sam (and we’re no slouches, don’t get me wrong). The blurry picture is of a building on Dave’s property that has become our ‘Big Pink’. We’re out there every Wednesday night writing new music.
Is the Chicken Done Yet? - Swinging Jump Blues
A fine tune from Walter. This used to be a live staple, and it’s bound to get resurrected in our set list.
…I got the Ring, I got the photograph, I got the shaft, and he got you…
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Live Recordings
Come on be my Girl - Recorded live in June, 09 at a private party, originally on ‘First Thing Smoking’.
The New Thing - Recorded live in September, 09 at the Blue Bayou Club, originally on ‘First Thing Smoking’.
On the Run - A new tune, rough edges evident! This is an answer to the call to play something ‘Hendrixy’, so it has something of a Band of Gypsies feel, along with the requisite rotary and wah guitar tones. This one is one we are trotting out for occasional live shows (when folks are really drunk in the audience and will tolerate such indulgence), but is coming along as we work it out in front of the bar crowd.
