Carolan Guitar in Dutch

I'm not sure whether this has been tried before, but I just had to see whether the Carolan Guitar was versatile enough to play a quiet song in Dutch. Enough amplification for the time being.



Heel wat weken al geleden
Zei je dat je toch zo graag eens bij me langs kwam
Je had een reden ...

Op je groot geworden kinderfiets zag ik je rijden
En je straalde tussen mensen die jou niet zagen
Je slikte goeiedag.

Na al een heel lang leven heb ik eindelijk geleerd zoiets te zien.
Ik tilde heel de wereld op met mijn beide handen
En gaf hem aan jou
Maar je zei dat je zoiets niet wou.

Wie wil nu nog spelen in de oude boomgaard
Wie is nog tevreden met zijn kinderhandvol kleine dromen
Die enkel 's nachts tot leven komen.

Kleine mensen worden sneller dan ze willen
Groter voorgesteld dan ze zijn vanbinnen
Laat ze lopen - ze zullen zelf wel vallen

En groot geworden zijn

Na al een heel lang leven heb ik eindelijk geleerd zoiets te zien.
Ik tilde heel de wereld op met mijn beide handen
En gaf hem aan jou
Maar je zei dat je zoiets niet wou.

Ancient song by GDW, from his Meander days.

"Hope!" (Home-Recording)

I can already play my own 'oldies' :)
"Hope!" was written back in 1990 – more than 20 years ago! Shock horror.

It was one of the first real songs I was able to put together, and featured heavily in Meander's early repertoire. We've busked it on the streets, practised it in basement rehearsal rooms, and recorded it in radio-studios (though not on air). It's a song with a past ...
Dozens of versions of it were recorded, and this is the most recent one – done on the digital eight-track in February this year (2011).

It had a little touch of Muse in the original idea I had for this arrangement, but that quickly disappeared. That aside, it combined a neatly rising chord-sequence for the chorus with a chunky guitar-riff for the verses (based on Bruno vanden Broecke's (who was the band's co-founder) bass-riff for that song).
Ah yes, I'm afraid I had forgotten the chords of the middle bit, which here morphs into a semi-improvised new-wave coda. ... And it ends with big drum-fest on the toms.

 

"Chevrolet" (Home-Recording)

Time for a serious flashback? How about one of the old Meander songs then?

In 1989 I started my first band together with Bruno Vanden Broecke. After a few name-changes (one of them being The Knockles --- if the Bangles could rip off the Beatles by changing the first half of their name into a synonym, why couldn't we?), we decided to call ourselves Meander. This is where I learned to play the guitar, write songs, do gigs and everything. The band eventually fell apart in 1997 when I moved to the UK.

The recording I'm serving you today, is not played by Meander, but it was one of the songs we used to do – before we had the native-language-only rule. It's a funny bluesy song written by Bruno Vanden Broecke as a teenager together with his neighbour.
I recorded this off the cuff version some time in 1994 or 95, with a 1960s microphone plugged into the 1970s stereo-system in the living room. That produced a rich ever-so slightly distorted sound, which I've always liked.

I play acoustic guitar and sing, while my brother provides percussion (hitting a tambourine with two pens) and backing vocals. It's a nicely exuberant version.




PS This track is dedicated to scoop and his love for formerly Eastern-European cars :)