For those of you who really love music, I bring you Christian Hand

[Kragar]

I had never heard of this guy until I heard him on the radio down here a couple years ago.  He was brought in regularly on my favorite (sadly now defunct) music station to do his thing, and it was awesome.

 

He picks a song, and takes it apart by track and talks through the genius involved.  When listening to a song, most people miss many of the subtleties that he calls out in his "breakdowns", but often once you hear it, you can't miss it when you hear the song as a whole.

 

Hearing Freddie Mercury's voice or Neil Peart's drums isolated from the rest of the song is chilling sometimes, and bass lines that are buried beneath everything else come to light and you can feel what they add to the song as a whole.

 

Here are two links to podcasts from sessions he has done on two stations here.  There appear to be some overlap. the first one is more classic rock oriented, but the other one has more, with songs with a wide range in genres and decades running from the 60's through the 2010's.  Between the two, there are about 150 songs examined so far.  The second link is still adding shows as he now works with that station.  Anyhow, if you like the shows, there's lots of listening available, as each show is about 20 mins long.  Enjoy.

 

These are free, and as far as I know there is no benefit to me or anyone I know from any added traffic to these sites.  There may well be other sites with his stuff on there... I haven't searched that hard.

 

https://podfanatic.com/podcast/christian-hand-song-breakdowns?page=1

https://soundcloud.com/theklossessions

 

tagging some of you who I suspect will be interested (apologies to anyone I have missed):

@falcon45ca @luckylager @Timbermen (posting a lot of music appreciation threads lately!!) @RUPERTKBD (good amount of Rush here!) @Baer. @Alain Vigneault @Ceres

[Gurn]

Check out this guy on youtube if you have the time. A musician for 25 years, singer, guitarist drummer.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCEHCXnggyvkw1uaTChZ_kuA      home page

 

One of his many analysis vids

 

 

This guy was the first to tell me the "big yellow taxi" was actually a police car as that was the color of the cop cars in her home town.

[Tre Mac]

I like Rick Beato on YT, he does some good breakdowns on "What makes this song Great.'  It adds another level when these guys isolate tracks and you get to hear things that are practically unaudible, ex. there's a clean guitar track in the intro of Rush's Limelight that I never noticed.  I'll check this out when I get home, thanks.  

Edited February 14, 2020 by Tre Mac

[riffraff]

Ima nerd out to this heavy.

[zimmy]

2 hours ago, Tre Mac said:

I like Rick Beato on YT, he does some good breakdowns on "What makes this song Great.'  It adds another level when these guys isolate tracks and you get to hear things that are practically unaudible, ex. there's a clean guitar track in the intro of Rush's Limelight that I never noticed.  I'll check this out when I get home, thanks.  

I’ve watched both of these guys and no offence to Christian Hand, but Rick Beato’s long running YouTube series is sheer absolute brilliance in its detail and analysis while Hand sounds like he’s delivering a podcast in his extra bedroom. And this is not to disparage Hand’s passion and expertise! It’s just that when you experience Beato’s break downs, topical discussions, guest hosts/players, and little kid like joy in hearing and sharing the songs you’ll be hooked forever! (And he’s a kick ass player to boot). The last two songs he has hi lighted in the past month are Superstition by Stevie Wonder and Carry On Wayward Son by Kansas. Start with those two and then try not to binge watch the rest of his catalogue of casts. 

[AV.]

Rich Beato, David Bennett Piano, Holistic Songwriting, Paul Davids just some of the few names on YT who do a decent job of helping to deconstruct music

[Timbermen]

Thank you. i'm going to check it out tonight. Reminds me of Brave New Waves on CBC radio. I don't know if that show is still going but i used to listen to it regularly 20-25 years ago when Patti Schmidt was the host, they had a team of researchers and had an hour long profile of an artist or band mid way through the show. At the end of the show they played an entire album. She would do interviews now and then too. This show came on at midnight and played mostly non-commercial underground music, hip hop, jazz, improvisational and electro. You'd hear things like Ennio Morricone (Legendary Composer that scored hundreds of movies including the Spaghetti westerns with Clint Eastwood.) in the Italian Improvisers Group. You'd hear things like Sun Ra, John Zorn, Bill Laswell and some great hip hop like Jungle Bros and De La Soul. That was an educational show like this one. Definately going to check this out tonight.

Edited February 15, 2020 by Timbermen

[Kragar]

I never knew this was a thing.  Cool to know that others do this, too.  will need to check out Rich Beato... thanks @zimmy

 @Alain Vigneault

[Kragar]

^^ sorry, was unable to add you in too, @Tre Mac

 my phone gives me trouble when tagging ppl

[zimmy]

19 minutes ago, Kragar said:

I never knew this was a thing.  Cool to know that others do this, too.  will need to check out Rich Beato... thanks @zimmy

 @Alain Vigneault

It's definitely a thing and Beato is definitely ground zero. Refreshing, revealing and reafirming. If you love music you will love Beato.