REMIX! You Can Go To Hell! (But You Don’t Have To!)

Half western swing spoof and half sobering spiritual salvation song, my hope is that through silliness, the life-giving Gospel story will get through. (Also, I wanted to give a spiritual twist to an oft used offensive phrase.)

PLEASE read the lyrics along with the song…

You Can Go To Hell (But You Don’t Have To!)

There was a Man who walked the land
With love in His heart and peace in His hand
He said He’s God, Messiah, and Christ
Before you reject Him you better think twice

He walked on the sea and raised the dead
Turned water ‘to wine, got the sick out of bed
Calmed the crazy, made the blind to see
He did these signs so we’d believe

CHORUS:
You can go to Hell, You can go to Hell
You can go to Hell but you don’t have to!
You can go to Hell, with the demons dwell
You can go to Hell but you don’t have to 

He fulfilled every prophecy
Lived a sinless life for you and me
He did so much good for all to see that
They nailed Him up between two thieves

He taught the Bible with authority
This unschooled carpenter from Galilee
He said that He’ll be coming again
So you best repent before the end
TO CHORUS

Jesus is the Savior of souls
That Gospel message never gets old
Jesus Christ, He died for you
Whether a gentile or whether a Jew

God gave us His only Son
To save our soul, to show His love
It’s up to you to trust Him or not
Or your afterlife is gonna be hot

REMIX! You Can Go To Hell (But You Don't Have To!)

“A SEQUENCE OF EVENTS” – Here is a little synth / techno / pop instrumental I wrote. I recorded it just for fun as I explored the new and amazing Nord Stage 4 keyboard. For gearheads, I used a Fender Dennis Dunaway bass and the 57 “Bonamassa Strat” and CS Tele for various guitar parts through a Kemper profiler. You will be happy to know that there are no vocals.  Thanks for listening.

SEQUENCE OF EVENTS

I am happy to share with you the latest recording from a group I have produced, the GRR band. This song is currently #498 with a bullet on the top 500 instrumental songs of all time! It echoes the best of 80s Muzak and the lauded Easy Listening elevator genre! (With an obligatory rock solo at the very end!) *The link is after the text below…

MEET GRR: ”The Geriatric Rock Review”
(GRR – Pronounced, “Grrrrr” – as in the sound you make when trying to get up from the couch.)

Larry “Loose Dentures” Davis - Drums
Mark “Midnight Prostate” Powers – Organ
Wally “Walker” Jones – Piano
Andy “Advil” Smith – Acoustic guitar
Phil “FiberCon” Carlson - Bass
“Forgetful Fred”… What’s his name – Electric guitar
Benjamin Gay – Electric piano


GEAR:
Rhythm Guitar – Gibson Murphy 335; Wildwood Spec pickups
Lead Guitar – Gibson Murphy Bigsby Les Paul 
Bass Guitar – 1969 Gibson EB-2DN
Acoustic Guitar – Rainsong WS1000N
Keyboards – Nord Stage 4
Drums – Beat Buddy

St. Augustine Breeze

One day I was just noodling with a Rickenbacker 4005V bass and JHS Punchline bass preamp and came up with this a bass line. I really liked the tone I was getting so thought I would build a song around it.

What started out as a quick and simple scratch blues shuffle to support a gear demo, it turned into this little music piece with horns and solos I call, “The Pink Panther Shuffle.” (Under 3 minutes)

For you gear heads, here is the gear list:

•	Bass: Ric 4005V through JHS Punchline preamp, direct to board. (Because it is a gear demo for the Ric, the bass sits slightly higher in the mix)
•	Rhythm Guitar: Murphy Les Paul Standard direct though Kemper Princeton Profile
•	Lead Guitar: Gibson ES-335 direct though Kemper Matchless Profile
•	Keys: I played all organ, piano and horn parts on the Nord Stage 4
•	Drums: I assembled the track in DAW using Daughter Blu Loops

Thanks for listening!

The Pink Panther Shuffle

THE GREAT EGRESS

A special musical piece by Frank Manno

This is by far the most challenging piece I have performed, recorded and mixed. Thanks in advance for listening.

Instrumentation I used:

•	Nord Stage 4 – Piano, pipe organ
•	Mellotron Micro 4000D – Flute, basso flute, viola, cello, voices
•	Gibson ES-355 – All electric guitars
•	Fender P/J Special – Bass
•	JHS Punchline Bass Preamp (Bass direct)
•	Kemper Profiler (Guitar direct)
•	Ebow

The Great Egress

I have heard songwriters say that they have written songs and just aren’t sure what to do with them. Here is mine. In line with my usual mélange scattered genres, “Higher Up” (Working title) is sort of an electronica, smoot jazz, synth pop, 80s retro kinda song. Should I solo over it? Have someone sing over it? Leave it as is and sell my synth?

It is over 3 minutes, so thanks for listening!
GEAR
“Voices:” Mellotron
Nord Stage 4: All other keys
Fender P/J Special: Bass
JHS Punchline: Bass preamp/DI
Tyler Tylerbaster: Staccato guitar
Alembic Orion: Chorused guitar
Kemper Toaster direct for guitars
Studio On software and loops
KRK Rokit 5 monitors

Higher Up (Ruff Mix)

Ever since I was a kid I loved, “A Whiter Shade of Pale.” On this recording I played all the instruments except drums. I recorded it on my computer as an instrumental because I don’t sing, so I substituted various guitar parts for the melody like. Thanks for listening, this was both fun and a learning experience.

GEAR LIST:

PRS 594 – Verse 1 melody
James Tyler Hazmat Studio - Choruses 
McPherson 4.0 – Acoustic
Fender P Bass Special – Bass
Nord Stage 4 – All keys
Neural Quad Cortex – Guitar processor
JHS Punchline – Bass DI
Neo Mini Vent II – Leslie emulator
Rode 1A – Acoustic mic



White Shade of Pale (Instrumental)

This was “just for fun.” Rocket Man was always one of my favorites by Elton and I thought that it would be fun to learn the parts and record it. I don’t sing, so I simply played the melody over the music so you could track with the song. 

I played all the instruments (piano, synth, ac gtr, elec gtr, bass) but not the drums. (Gear list below.) It was quite the learning experience. Again, it is just for fun and has some warts but thanks for listening. Link:

GEAR LIST:
•	Nord Stage 4 – piano, synth
•	Mellotron –background “vocals”
•	Fender P Bass Special – Bass via Punchline
•	MacPherson 4.5 – Acoustic via Rode mic
•	Tyler Mongoose – Electric gtr via Quad Cortex


Rocket Man (Instrumental)

PLEASE READ First: I have been smitten with Kashmir by Led Zeppelin since I was 16 or so. On this recording I played all of the “music” tracks – strings, brass and Mellotron via the Nord  Stage 4 as well as guitar and bass. As I don’t sing, I have been sharing instrumentals as of late. However, Kashmir has a rather scattered melody line and wouldn’t make for a good instrumental. But thanks to the miracle called the internet, I did find a karaoke site and was able to download a vocal track alone and inserted it in my recording. (I don’t know who the singer is!) With that said, all 18 tracks were both challenging and fun. 

GEAR HEADS

KEYS – Nord Stage 4: string, brass and Mellotron.
BASS – Fender CS P/J through a JHS Punchline preamp.
GTR – Melancon Artist through Quad Cortex.
DRUMS – Drum track via Apple EQ
VOCAL – Thanks to Al Gore who invented the Internet.

Kashmir (Led Zeppelin)

Stevie Wonder’s ditty about the silliness of superstition has intrigued me since the 70s. Between a most catchy riff, crackly clavinet and syncopated instrumentation , it is a funk tour de force. So, I thought I would try recreating it as a homage. At one point, a few of the challenges were so large, I almost gave up on the project, but after a good night’s sleep, I pushed on and learned a lot. I am playing all the instruments on this recording except the drums. Also, as I don’t sing, I played the melody out on guitar so you can follow it, making it an instrumental. Thanks as always for listening!

GEAR: The clavinet, synth bass, sax and trumpet were all from the Nord Stage 4 synth. The guitar track is my #1 Tyler Hazmat direct to the board through the Neural Quad Cortex.


SUPERSTITION (Instrumental)

AND NOW FOR SOMETHING COMPLETELY DIFFERENT!

Sanibel Sunset began it’s life as a chord/riff that grew into a Latin / smooth jazz / easy listening sort of song. 

Growing up as a kid in Brooklyn, I’d listen to everything from The Temptations to The Who. But as I went to bed, I’d tune into a station out of Patterson, New Jersey called, “93 – WPAT.” It played a mellow genre of music that is somewhat of a lost art today. Made popular by the likes of Montovani and Bert Weedon, the genre was called “Beautiful Music,” though some refer to it as elevator music. 

So, relax and chill to Sanibel Sunset…


GEEK SPEEK:

INSTRUMENTS:
All rhythm guitars – 1957 Gibson Byrdland
All lead/melody guitars – 1956 Gibson ES-295
Kemper Stage for all guitar processing (no amps)
Nord Stage 3 – all other sounds and samples

CHORDS:
Cmaj9 – Gm7 – F#m7 – B9
Fmaj9 – Bm7 – Em
Fmaj9 – Bm7 – E7
Fmaj9 – Bm7 – Em

Em – Eb7 (#11)
Dm – Db7 (#11)
Cm – B7 (#11)

Sanibel Sunset

Macon “Mac” McGregor was born in 1955 of Scottish and Welsh ancestry. Like his father, he was a professional fisherman by trade, raised in a beautiful small town in Nova Scotia called, Mahone Bay. Every other weekend, Mac and the crew would head up to the “big city,” Halifax for fun. For years they would frequent a small and somewhat seedy out of the way neighborhood pub called, The Flying Scotsman, known to the locals as, “Scotty’s.” Late one Friday night as the The Shoremen, a local four-piece band was crammed into the dimly lit wood paneled corner of the bar, they jammed on an original improvised neo traditional Irish prgression that always led Mac to put a sawbuck in the tip jar. At one point, the band recorded that jam in the studio long after their friend Mac had passed and named it after the man who loved it so much – this is Macon’s Reel…

Frank Manno

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