Re: [Harp-L] Morphine

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

pdxharpdog@xxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
<I am currently enamored with the sax and the bass line parts in The Cure For Pain album from this great band! Anyone out there have any harmonica <recordings of Morphine songs from this album? 

Morphine is one of my favorite bands of all time, not least because they demonstrated that you can make killer rock n/ roll with nothing more than sax, bass, and drums (and if that's all it takes, why not HARP, bass and drums?).  

I recorded a live looped version of Morphine's "Early to Bed" at a performance in  Victor, Idaho a couple of years ago.  I started with a pre-recorded drum loop, and over that I layered a bass line in two octaves, one at a time, using the Digitech RP355's pitch shifter to supply the big bass tones.  The result was dark and deep--not Morphine's sound per se, but in the same emotional zone.  You can see the video here:
http://www.hunterharp.com/video-of-the-day-9-july-2012-richard-hunter-performs-morphines-early-to-bed/

Ross, I know you've got an RP with my patches in your kit.  Use one of the octave- or two-octave down patches in my set to put you in the Morphine zone (MA816D, matchless amp model with pitch shifter, is a good place to start); if you really want to kill it, add a wah-wah to the patch so you can modulate the tone in real time.  Harps and saxes are both reed instruments, and the results can be very convincing.

LOVE that band.  Their music is as original as you can get, and a lot of it works very, very well on harp, pitch shifted or otherwise.

Regards, Richard Hunter