The Last Act

‘Dated’ versus ‘Old Skool’

// February 18th, 2011 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Jeff and Megadeth 2006!

This topic is pretty confusing for a lot of people, and rightly so as these terms are often used interchangeably…but according to us (TLA) they shouldn’t be! Therefore I wanted to give you all my (our) viewpoint on it and hopefully add some definition to this area because people sometimes get confused as to what we are doing here with TLA. So here we go a defining dated versus ‘old skool’…

First, let’s define what TLA means by ‘old skool’. By ‘old skool’ we mean REAL hard rock. The kind of hard rock that has no era. The kind that could be dropped in today and would fit. Granted it would probably be a little different than it was when it was released given the influencing forces in music at any given time, but all in all it would be the same.  Bands like Black Sabbath, Led Zepplin, the Who, old Rush, etc. In other words the kind of hard rock that was being created when hard rock and heavy metal meant pretty much the same thing: hard, heavy, and timeless.

We look at dated versus ‘old skool’ when writing. The main features we are looking for when defining whether or not something is dated versus whether it’s ‘old skool’ are a few of these kinds of items:

• Are there new/modern elements in the song? These must exist, and be quite prevalent. Otherwise the song will be dated.
• Could the song be dropped into an era (80’s, 90’s, 70’s, etc)  and fit perfectly?  Does it sound just like the music of that time? If so, it’s not ‘old skool’ but clearly dated.
• Is the song off doing something new and exciting to the point of experimental? If so, it’s probably not rooted in ‘old skool’ rock. Could even be jazz…you never know…
• Is it heavy?  If so (and we wrote it), it’s probably hard rock. It may even be metal or have metal tendencies (think ‘Habitat for Insanity’), which is awesome!
• There’s probably more…but that’s all I got for now =P  And it’s good enough to make a quick distinction.

TLA’s philosophy when writing is to hit the target of ‘real’ rock. We strive (very hard, I might add) to add the newer elements of rock, try to define our sound to be as unique as possible, and to keep the songs fresh and with a good deal of “TLA flavor”.

We are not trying to recreate or do what has been done before; not at all. We are trying to stay true to the hard rock genre, keeping the songs as close to what we define as the genre’s true nature as we can. So when people say that TLA has an ‘old skool’ sound,  we feel these kinds of comments are pointing at that…the ‘trueness to form’ as mentioned…albeit painting everything we do with the same brush.  So in the end, TLA can probably be described in a sentence or less as:

‘old skool’ Canadian Hard Rock that’s original, new and fresh, with a ton of great melody.

There. That was easy right?  Anyways, I hope this week’s installment helped clear things up for some folks. If not, well, we’ll have more tunes coming soon so you can probably figure out what we are doing for yourself.

Keep it heavy…and Up Yur Act!

–JL

CD Easter Egg Contest

// February 17th, 2011 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

And we don’t mean the kind you get at Easter!

On the CD artwork there are 3 hidden items, aka Easter Eggs (version 2 of the disc only…version 1 — aka the Collector’s Edition — only has 1). These were “funnies” or oddities that were intentionally put in to provide some entertainment for those fans who wanted to take the time to hunt for these things.

So we’ve made a contest out of this!

The first 3 people to correctly find the 3 Easter Eggs and email what they are to info@thelastact.com will win an “Ultimate TLA Fan Kit“!

This kit includes:

Basically every product that TLA currently has. All valued at over $120.00!

BUT in order to get in on this you need a CD! You can get one easily through the main TLA website by clicking here or you can get one from CD Baby by clicking here. If you don’t have a credit card or paypal account, you can always walk into your local CD store and ask them to order it from their catalog (a service provided by CD baby…Bless their hearts)!

Contest will run until April 1, 2011 (or until we have 3 winners)

Jeff’s Take on the Guitar Part II

// February 11th, 2011 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

This is part II of the article started last week by Jeff Larsen of “the Last Act” (again, what other band would it be? =P):

The next step was adding guitars to my collection. And I must admit, I am seriously picky about what guitars I want in my collection. At that time, I had no idea what I was looking for. This was in the latter part of the 90’s. At that time I had heard that Jackson had a good rep and I wanted to check it out. I went to the store and I found a flat black Jackson designed by Marty Friedman, formerly of Megadeth (he was still in the band at the time). This guitar had a real Floyd Rose, played like a dream, and it was built for speed. I got that guitar 30 minutes after I tried it.  I have added a couple of more Jackson’s to my collection since then, but I also added another Dean. I went back to the same guitar store that I bought my first Jackson from in 2007 and was just in there to fool around on the guitars and see what was there. I saw a Dean Razorback, Dimebag Darrell edition. I thought “ok, whatever. Just another hyped up guitar. I’ll try it”. I tried it and immediately I discovered that this guitar was going to introduce a new playing style to me and it also played just awesome.  Welp, the decision was made and 24 hours later I had that guitar. And based on the crunch and drive of the sound, I use that guitar mostly now, although I still love the Jackson’s for the ease of play, and the beauty of the play of the Gibson (which honestly, I don’t play as much as I should anymore).

My configurations and settings for things have changed a bit over the years, but I finally settled in on D’Adario .10’s for my strings (on all guitars) and .46mm Jim Dunlop vinyl picks. I like my floating bridges a hair ‘loose’ to remove space between the strings and the fret board (improve the action)…but not enough to make the strings buzz. I use my Peavy head for distortion…such a fuller, more real, overall better sound than a pedal (WAY better sound). All EQ’ing is done on the head, and the Transtube setting is turned way up. I use the onboard switch from the Peavy head to turn on and off the distortion when playing live. The guitar I used on that disc was the Dean Razorback…nice and crunchy.  A good example of the resulting sound is off the last CD “Still Standing”. The sound of the guitar on that disc is almost completely unchanged from the way it sounds live. The Boss ME-8 pedal is used for effects such as flanger, harmonizer (live), and delays.  In the past year I have added a Sennheiser ew 172 G3 Instrument Wireless System, and this thing is incredible!  I love how it’s easy on batteries, and I also like the onboard sensitivity settings, cable length emulation, and tuner!  Great stuff! And last, but not least, a ‘Steve Vai’ passive volume pedal with a stopper (actually a rubber door stop) glued in so it won’t go more than ½ way down to zero. I use it for when I need that extra “punch” during leads and such.

Maybe some of this will help someone in their quest to find the perfect setup. All I can say is, try, try again until you get it sounding just the way you want it to!  I always thought “real” is better than “processed” (i.e. pedals and preamps), but that certainly doesn’t mean I’m right. It’s one big experiment! So good luck and I hope you all that are searching for the “grail” find it!

–JL

Jeff’s Take on the Guitar

// February 5th, 2011 // No Comments » // Uncategorized

Jeff Larsen from ‘the Last Act’ here (what other band would it be I guess?  haha) to explain a little bit about the guitars I use, have used, tips and techniques that I have found that work with gear and setup, and stuff like that. Let’s start at the beginning to provide some background:

When I was a 13 year old kid, I was handed my first real guitar as a gift (and what a nice gift!!). It was a 1980 Fender Stratocaster. This was after 2 years of playing on a Univox guitar that was borrowed from someone else. The Univox wonder wouldn’t stay in tune for more than 10 mins at a time and the action was terrible…strings were an inch off of the fret board. So, as I said, the Stratocaster was a huge step up for me. The only issue was the intonation was out on one string and no one seemed to be able to fix it. So after 4 years of playing it, I started looking around for something new.

One of the first mistakes I made when looking to get a new guitar was ‘pretty’ or cool looking over functional. I got a Dean Z, but it was unlike the Haymer ‘Explorer’ kind of shape that Dean says they are today. It looked like a Stratocaster, but with a great lock system (good ol’ real Floyd Rose!)  and a mirror pick guard (the selling point for little Jeffie!).  The only problem with this thing was it would constantly break strings. Suffice it to say I got really good at tuning up a guitar really fast as I couldn’t afford another guitar. I discovered much later on that it was most likely a combination of thin strings and heavy picks I was using that was causing the issue…c’est la vie. But by the time I found out, I had sold the guitar (for next to nothing…which I am still kicking myself for) and bought a Gibson Les Paul – Studio…which I still have today.  Awesome guitar, incredible action and ease of play. I was wary of the lock system as I thought at that time the lock system was causing my issues (although it wasn’t) so I went with this guitar. I have never regretted that decision.

I used the Gibson for several years (it turned from white to a creamy white/yellow from playing in smoky rooms!) with a custom cabinet/amp that was made by a friend of mine and a combination of pedals. A Boss Delay (not Digital), Tube Distortion (by some company…can’t remember the name), a Next Flanger, a Next Chorus, and a cheap ol’ Cry Baby Wah which I think was a $20.00 wonder from the music store…but it lasted a loooong time, like 15 years or something! Before I replaced it with a Vox.

Then the time came in the mid-90’s where I figured it was time to finally upgrade my gear. After much contemplation and trying different things, I got a Peavy TransTube Supreme head (really, there is no identification on this thing!) and  Peavy cabinet…at least the mid-grade/pro model at the time and a Boss ME-8 (discontinued 2000).  It’s really too bad they don’t make the ME-8 anymore as it was exactly what every guitar player needs and nothing more, nothing less. I don’t know what I will do if the thing breaks because I love it so much and have no idea what I could possibly replace it with (ME-50!?!?)!  And I have looked at the latest ME series by Boss:  seems like it’s either just short of enough ‘stuff’ for live performance or waaaay too much (i.e. almost have a small recording studio on stage with you). Ahh well…I will cross that bridge when I get to it.

:: Part II coming in a week! Stay Tuned! ::