Hello Substackers. This is my first message directly to subscribers and I’ll try to be brief. First, of all, I just want to say how completely knocked out I am by the response to “Goodbye Porkpie Strat” here and elsewhere. Thank for the kind words and, in a most appropriate pun, feedback.
Of course, that post was unplanned, churned out in the aftermath of an unforeseen event. Yet it has completely lit up traffic flow and subscriptions to this page. I suppose it should be no surprise, that this was not the case with my premier post, “Gravity’s Rainbow Revisited,” about a novel best described by Daniel Craig’s character in Knives Out:
“I haven’t read it either. Nobody has. But I like the title.”
Which brings us to the initial idea behind launching a Substack: A home for my writing, with an assumption that, to quote another film This is Spinal Tap: “The audience has gotten more selective.” Yet here we are with hundreds of new subscribers in such a short time.
Another interesting development concerns this page and my podcast, Moods & Modes - The podcast is already available on all platforms and produced in association with Osiris Media and ACast (and thus already has a “host”). Being new to Substack and the “podcast” function, I thought I’d simply link to Moods & Modes here. But then a strange thing happened: All the podcast episodes instantly showed up as prior Substack “posts,” despite never being posted here before. My first instinct was to just delete all these podcast posts; “clean up” the page, so to speak.
Now here’s where it gets interesting…It seems many who’ve come here for the Jeff Beck tribute are discovering Moods & Moods for the first time, listening and subscribing. Therefore, I’m not going to remove those accidental, pre-Substack podcast posts for the time being. Whenever there is an additional episode, such as today, I’ll do a new post, which Subscribers will receive in their inboxes.
Clearly, I’m very new to Substack (like most of you) and still figuring things out as I go. This is also the case with subscriptions. My plan was to give the option for paid and free subscribers. However, it appears that once the “paid” option is turned on, new posts become locked behind a temporary paywall. Therefore, I’m going to stick with free subscriptions for now, since the page is still new and growing. At some point, if this turns into a regular source of exclusive content, I may turn “paid” on but you’ll still be able to access everything other than the brand new content, at least right away. And the podcast is always free and available at the links below.
Anyhow, without further ado here’s the latest podcast episode: It’s one I’ve wanted to do for quite some time. As mentioned in the episode, it was already complete when word of Jeff Beck’s departure became breaking news (You probably don’t have to guess hard what the next episode is about). It was so much fun to tour the Sadowsky NYC Custom Shop with two of my favorite bass pals, Nathan Peck & Tanya O’callaghan. In the 2nd half, I sit down with the man himself, we focus on guitars and I try a few on display. More info below.
Thanks for reading and subscribing (whether free or paid, both greatly appreciated). More Soon AS
APPLE: apple.co/3HcQ7Le
SPOTIFY: spoti.fi/3wbDMAG
WEB: bit.ly/3IXkGpG
“This week, Alex visits Roger Sadowsky of Sadowsky Guitars, one of the preeminent names in handmade guitars and basses. As they walk the shop floor, Roger shares stories of some of his famous customers, explains the challenge of using endangered woods in the process of instrument building, and discusses the moment when he decided to make the shift from repairing guitars to building his own. Bassists Tanya O’Callaghan and Nathan Peck also drop into the episode, to talk about the instruments that Roger has created for them.
Roger Sadowsky is one of the most highly respected instrument makers in the world. His instruments are played by many of the world’s greatest artists including guitarists Jim Hall, John Abercrombie, Pat Metheny, Lee Ritenour, Chuck Loeb and bass players Marcus Miller, Will Lee, Rickey Minor, Michael Rhodes, Verdine White and Jason Newsted.
Moods & Modes is presented by Osiris Media. Hosted and Produced by Alex Skolnick. Osiris Production by Kirsten Cluthe and Matt Dwyer. Editing and mixing by Justin Thomas. Music by Alex Skolnick. Artwork by Mark Dowd.”
I'm afraid my comment won't be about your new podcast (I'm about to listen to it in a moment) but I'd like to let you know that you've inspired me to read "Gravity's Rainbow" 😊