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Via Crooked Timber: the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain perform David Bowie’s “Life on Mars” and, simultaneously, pretty much everything else.
For your spelling references: "ukulele." I know because I, heh, got it wrong. "Uke" is a misleading abbrev.
But yeah, so far what I've seen of the uke orch is that they never do just one thing at a time.
They've got a concert DVD titled Anarchy in the Ukulele.
Wow. They're amazing. I was even more engaged by this one: Fly Me of the Handel
This is just to say that the alien LOLcat in your sidebar has killed me ded. *happy sighz*
If you want to hear spectacular ukulele from a soloist, look up Jake Shimabukuro on YouTube. He's a Hawai'i player (website) who's amazing with that instrument. Flashy, fast and jazzy or slow and soft, he's someone to hear.
I agree about Jake Shimabukuro. I particularly recommend his cover of George Harrison's "While My Guitar Gently Weeps". I don't know what it is (tighter stringing?), but he seems to extract a lot more precision from the instrument than I'm used to hearing.
There was an excellent BBC Radio 4 documentary about them last week - it's probably still available on Listen Again. I can particularly recommend their version of Wuthering Heights.
I really, really, really needed just this kind of lift today. Thank you.
Heh. I heard them play "Silver Dream Machine" and "Smells Like Teen Spirit" at the Edinburgh Festival a few years back. By the way, there is an MP3 selection and a concert DVD at their site.
OH man. That...that was fantastic.
Thanks.
I love out of the blue arrangements of stuff ( a la the Gourds Bluegrass version of Gin and Juice--a high recommendation.) Beautiful.
Ukulele players rock.
(If you google, you can find me misspelling it, too.)
Nick Brooke at # 10 writes:
> Heh. I heard them play "Silver Dream Machine" and "Smells Like Teen Spirit" at the Edinburgh Festival a few years back.
Nick - do you perhaps mean "Silver Machine", the old Hawkwind hippie space rock classic? Or is "Silver Dream Machine" a song I don't know.
I'd heard quite a while ago that they'd covered "Silver Machine", but I've never managed to get a listen to it, by fair means or foul. I'd kill to hear it.
btw - there's heaps of UkOGB on YouTube, and they're even better to watch than to listen to. It's hard to decide whether the live version of Wuthering Heights or the cover of The Good the Bad and the Ugly is the best thing ever recorded. Or maybe "Fly Me Off The Handel". Tricky...
> Or is "Silver Dream Machine" a song I don't know.
Spelling fixed--thank you, Kip.
Steve@#13: Correct, my lyrical flub -- "Silver Machine" by Hawkwind it was.
Holy Schnikeys...
The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, = Win.
I think I love these guys...
Then you would probably enjoy the Spaghetti Western Orchestra's appropriately reverential live peformances. (They were also at Edinburgh a few years back, at the same time as the Ukes -- what culture!)
Once again ahead of the zeitgeist (scroll down).
After watching the BBC series I can't hear the song without crying.
I ♥ the Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. And like earlier commenters, I am surprised that our hosts weren't listing already. Me? Ahead of the crowd?
And Jake Shimabukuro? I like him best without a band...
And, I'm pretty sure, at least in the Central Park version of My Guitar Gently Weeps, he has his uke strung with metal strings. His undoubtedly custom instrument is setup with a very precise action, too.
Jake's opening for and playing with Jimmy Buffet this summer (again), so if you're a Parrothead you might get a double treat.
Here's a version of "Life on Mars" by the Flaming Lips— I particularly like how the vocals are sung into a guitar pickup, giving it this weird transmission quality.
By far the best cover of "Life on Mars" is the Barbara Streisand one. Just kidding, it's the Peter Noone one.
OK, just kidding again, but they did both really sing it.
Anybody who covers the Rezillos ("My Baby Does Good Sculptures") is jake with me.
I hadn't known, prior to this week, any of the tangled historical links between "Life on Mars" and "My Way". It's such a weirdly complex world.
My #25 is an embarrassing mistake. I meant "Oh! You Pretty Things", not "Life on Mars". I feel shame.
...and, as usual, correcting an embarrassing mistake has led to a new one. I meant to say that Barbara Streisand did cover "Life on Mars", but Peter Noone covered "Oh! You Pretty Things". I'm going back to bed.
Is there anyone else whose brain is irresistably compelled to mash up Bowie with the Doors? "Come on baby, life on Mars."