Mario’s Stuff

We’ve had a few thunderstorms here in Vegas over the last couple of days, and a lot of bugs have left their homes to go walkabouts around the perimeter of my house…

This amazing large moth was on our front patio last night just before the rain came. He must have measured at least five inches in length and stayed on the patio until the first raindrops appeared. I ran inside for the camera and photographed him before he flew away.

This large spider was just inside the door of our outdoor utility room yesterday afternoon. I opened the door to get the hose pipe and it was right in front of me on the door frame. It measured approximately four inches in length and was eating another (smaller) spider…

We’d just got back from the store earlier today, I was unloading the groceries from the truck when I heard Shawna exclaim “What the f**k is that?!? It looks like something from the Amazon!!” I ran over to her, thinking she’d found a large spider, and saw the strangest insect on the stucco wall. I’m not sure what it is, it looks a little like a beetle, if anyone out there can identify it, please let me know at info@marioparga.com This bug measured approximately 2.5 inches in length and was still there several hours later.

Another view of the strange bug…

Swimming with Skye

Me with Skye at home, Las Vegas, NV.

The weather’s getting warmer here in Vegas so we’ve started swimming with Skye more often as she likes the water. She has her own little sunglasses and swimming diapers, and we use plenty of sunblock on her. Her favourite trick is to try and drink the water!

The Mojave Desert

The Mojave Desert Gateway

Over the July 4th weekend we went out into the Mojave Desert, one of my favourite places. We took our large cooler full of water, soda and snacks along with the video and stills cameras, both the video footage and photos are in the gallery.

Hotel Nipton, Nipton, CA

One of our favourite places on the way to the desert is the little town of Nipton, CA. The drive is very scenic, we do part of it on the old Route 66, then after visiting Nipton sometimes get on the Joshua Tree Highway and head out to the water at Cottonwood Cove.

The Oasis Restautant, Nipton, CA

We usually stop off at the local store in Nipton for refreshments, and on this trip we decided to try a burger at ‘The Oasis Restaurant’. We’d passed through Nipton countless times, yet never been into the little restaurant. The sign outside reads ‘Best Burger Around, Coldest Beer’. We went inside and were greeted by the friendly owner and chef, Bill. I ordered a Swiss Burger and a root beer (sasparilla) as I was driving, and Shawna ordered a Blue Cheese Burger with a beer. We thought we’d tried every burger, but Bill’s burgers lived up to the claims of his sign - they were the best we’d ever tried! Instead of being sandwiched in a bun, the burgers were wrapped in a kind of flatbread, like a Native American Indian bread. And yes, Shawna’s beer was just about as cold as you could drink it!

San Pedro bound freight train, Nipton, CA

The San Pedro bound freight train was passing through Nipton just as we were leaving, the train was very long yet looked so small in the vastness of the desolate landscape.

Our next port of call was the Mojave Desert. We headed out towards the old mining town of Cima, and on the way stopped a few times to take photos of Joshua Trees as the lighting in the desert was particularly good on this day.

Mining Houses, Goodsprings, NV

As we left the Mojave Desert, we drove home via Goodsprings, NV. Goodsprings is a little mining town in the Nevada desert that’s very picturesque in an American West way.

The little Post Office at Goodsprings, NV.

Video Editing

I’ve been busy over the last couple of days with video editing, and I’ve added some stuff to the galleries. I get a lot of mail from those of you who regularly read the blog telling me how much you enjoy it, so I’m going to try and update it more often and add more ‘every day’ kind of video to the galleries.

The video I’ve added to the galleries today is mostly footage from a couple of years ago whilst visiting the Valley of Fire, NV, and the Scottish Highlands. Both these trips inspired me to finish off material from Entranced (2007). There’s also a video of Shawna and I driving down Las Vegas Boulevard (The Vegas Strip) and I’ve included a video clip of our Mojave Desert outing a few days ago - hope you like them!

A squashed scorpion!

As the weather’s getting warmer in the desert (114°F here today) the bugs are coming out to play… especially in the evening when the temperatures are still around 95°F. After my last bug update I thought we’d seen the last of the scorpions, but this wasn’t to be… A couple of nights ago we’d just got back from the store and I was carrying groceries along the footpath by our front door when I stood on something hard. Shawna saw it at the last second and shouted out that I’d just stood on a scorpion, fortunately, I was wearing training shoes instead of flipflops! I took a photo of it with my cell phone for the blog (see above), it was approximately six inches long. A scorpion tail can still sting even after it’s dead, so I carefully moved it away from the house.

Yesterday, the bug guy came over to the house again as we have everywhere sprayed with insecticide every three months. In the warmer months, he uses a stronger dilution of the stuff and sprayed in all the usual places. Later last night, the insecticide was obviously working by clearing the bugs out of their homes, I stood on another hard object on the footpath ( a cockroach this time!) and then later saw a scorpion on our patio wall and a praying mantis on the patio ground. I rushed inside for my camera and took the below two pics

The praying mantis was a beautiful leaf green colour, and as they always are, seemed very aware of me and curious. I moved him away from the patio and into a safe area away from the insecticide.

The scorpion on the wall looked like a very poisonous Bark Scorpion, it was about four inches long. The flash from the camera didn’t bother it at all.

Hopefully, the bugs will clear out and move away over the next few days. I’ll let you know of any more sightings!

The new single ‘Spirit of Night’ is due for release soon (June 27th), a soundclip will be available over the next couple of days on the main website www.MarioParga.com It took a while to edit and add to, I added five new keyboard pads (including a small choir on the fade choruses) and another nylon string guitar to play occassional ‘flurries’ and a fingerstyle picking pattern on the third verse. The mixing and mastering will be completed today and tomorrow. Tony’s voice sounds awesome, I think he’s going to surprise quite a few people…

MidnightCafe Studios is now fully up and running, and I’m busy already with several projects. Yesterday the air-con broke down, it was 100 F here at the top of the Las Vegas valley… I was sweating buckets whilst trying to work on ‘Spirit of Night’, 100 F outside combined with the heat from the studio equipment inside felt like I was working in an oven! Fortunately, later in the evening the air-con tech showed up and replaced the motor. The MidnightCafe is now cool and breezy again…

Shawna busy at the computer with emails and pre-orders…

Thank you to those of you who’ve placed pre-orders for the new single ‘Spirit of Night’ with Tony Martin, and a reminder to those of you who haven’t yet that pre-orders will only be taken up until June 14th. Pre-order-ers will receive signed CDs by myself and Tony, autographed copies will not be available after this date due to logistics and Tony’s and my differing schedules. My wife Shawna takes care of the pre-orders for MidnightCafe Music and tells me that there has been a lot of very positive feedback regarding the single and the collaboration with Tony. Thank you!

For those of you who’ve recently enquired about signed copies of Entranced, there are some available from the Store (please specify in the PayPal ‘notes’ field when ordering), Japanese fans can also buy signed copies of the album from their local Disk Heaven record stores.

I’ve had several emails recently regarding again The Magician, an album I recorded back in 1991 for President Records. I don’t sell this album, and never have; but I know it’s now only available as a download through President Records from several online stores such as Amazon.com, LastFM, etc. The only available CD versions of the album I know of are occassional imports.

Graham Bonnet Official MySpace page

Rock singer extraordinaire Graham Bonnet has today launched his official MySpace Music page, I hope you’ll all add him to your ‘Friend’s’ list A very special ‘thank you’ to Bert & Wilma Wildenberg for coming up with the idea and for creating and moderating the new site.

I’ve been friends with Graham for over twenty years, during which time we’ve been through good and bad times both personally and professionally, often at the same time in our lives! He’s one of the sweetest, most good-hearted and genuine people I’ve ever known and also one of the most incredible musicians on the planet…

The beetle with the Beatles…

Since the recent scorpion incidents followed by the ’scorpion proofing’ of the house, we’ve had no further problems (touch wood)… At our old house a couple of miles away we had a few big spider scares, but we never had a scorpion in the house :-/ A couple of days ago, a workman was replacing a concrete slab on the sidewalk just a few feet away from our place, I warned him about our scorpion escapades and he told me that when he removed the old concrete slab he found a few scorpions underneath it. I think that this might have been where they were living and maybe the sound and vibration of the workman’s jackhammer moved them all on…

Speaking of bugs… when I was visiting Uncle G. in L.A. last month, he gave me the new Beatles CD called ‘Love’. Yesterday, Shawna began packing some of our CDs in a cardboard box (we digitize everything for our MP3 library) but only packed the Beatles album as we had to go out shortly after. When we returned, bizarrely enough, there was a dead beetle on top of the CD! Aside from the obvious irony, this was unusual as we don’t get many beetles in the house. I photographed it (see above) exactly as we found it, I have no idea what kind of beetle it is, nor how it got into the box then suddenly died?? I can only assume that the bug guy’s spray did it’s job…

More bug updates soon

Sleepy Skye with her Daddy at the baby dept., WalMart.

The new single ‘Spirit of Night’ with Tony Martin is now available as a pre-order, the release date is June 27th. All pre-orders between now and June 14th will receive signed CDs by Tony and I. The CDs are very cool, they have a retro-look black vinyl finish, similar to an old-fashioned 7″ single There will soon be a sound sample of the new song on the main website, Tony sounds awesome (as always) and has done a stellar job on the song! ‘Spirit of Night’ is an instrumental song from Entranced, the new single’s track listing comprises of 1. Spirit of Night (vocal version), 2. Spirit of Night (original instrumental version) and 3. Spirit of Night (chill-out solo version).

Baby Skye is growing so fast, I can’t believe she’s four months old today! She likes to travel around in a baby harness (see the above photo taken yesterday) and often falls asleep in it

I’ve had a few run-ins with scorpions since being back in Vegas… We’ve had two in our home and one just outside :-/ The first scorpion was under the dishwasher, it was a desert scorpion and we were alerted to it by the cat. Desert scorpions are fairly harmless but give a painful sting. Whilst I hate killing any creatures, I had to kill it with a hammer. I can’t take any risks with the baby in the house. It still tried to sting the hammer as it was crushed… The second scorpion was on the outside wall by our front door. Again, it was a desert scorpion and fairly easy to get rid of. But the third scorpion incident was only a few days ago, I’d reached into a kitchen drawer to get out a battery when a small scorpion ran out from under a napkin and missed my fingers by about a centimeter. This scorpion was a very poisonous bark scorpion, usually found in neighboring Arizona, but sometimes found here in Nevada. This scorpion is capable of killing animals, children, the elderly and the infirm, and some healthy adults who are allergic to it’s venom… The hammer did it’s job again. The bug guy came out to the house a couple of weeks ago and sprayed the inside and out with bug stuff, but because they’re doing some building work on the edge of the desert, the scorpions are obviously moving this way. I went around the house and sealed every visible hole/cracked plaster with steel wool and duct tape (recommended as a scorpion deterrent), and put down scorpion glue-boards. Hopefully, this will sort out the problem, I’ll let you know of any more incidents…

‘Hammer’ (1992) from left: Cozy Powell, Me, Neil Murray, Tony Martin.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of the death of rock drummer, legend and my friend Cozy Powell. I can’t believe it’s been ten years already, how time flies. It only feels like a little while ago when I last spoke to him.

Cozy died in a car crash on this date back in 1998, his death shocked everyone who knew him. I can remember the date and time vividly, I was then living in England and had recently got back from L.A. having worked on Graham Bonnet’s The Day I Went Mad album. I can remember reading of his untimely death through the local teletext pages on the TV. At first I couldn’t believe my eyes, I thought that perhaps there had been some kind of mistake; this was followed by a sickness to my stomach and a terrible sadness. I called Neil Murray who sadly confirmed the news story, then I spoke with Don Airey and later Graham Bonnet. I can remember that evening very well.

I was introduced to Cozy in an indirect way through Graham Bonnet. Graham had asked me to play on the Forcefield album ‘Let the Wild Run Free’ back in 1990, on which Cozy had played the drums. When Cozy reformed his band ‘Hammer’ in 1992, I was recommended as guitarist by Don Airey. Cozy knew of me from the Forcefield album.

I’ve met many people in the music industry during my career, and I can honestly say that Cozy was one of the kindest, sweetest people I ever knew. He had a reputation for being volatile and fiery, yet the man I knew was quite different. During the ‘Hammer’ days, Cozy lived in Lambourn Woodlands, Berkshire and I lived just outside of Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire. Cozy would pick me up in his car and we’d drive to rehearsals at the Rich Bitch Studios in Birmingham. Cozy had been a prolific racing driver in his younger years, and his driving didn’t differ much from the racetrack to the regular roads! He was very intuitive, and had a heart of gold. I can remember talking to Cozy on the phone one afternoon, at the time I was short of money, although I never mentioned this to him or even hinted at it. A little while after our conversation, there was a knock on my front door, and there stood Cozy. He’d driven up to me on his motorcycle, and had come to give me a £50 note… Cozy had a soft spot for animals, and they instinctively loved him. He kept horses on the grounds of his home, and I can remember him driving down his driveway extra slowly at night and dawn to avoid running over the many rabbits that lived nearby. He sometimes visited me en-route to visit his mother in Cirencester, popping in for his cup of tea and a chat. Always thoughtful, Cozy sent me a very kind card when I moved home to the South Coast.

Musically, Cozy was a great musician who knew what he was talking about and what he was playing. I can remember jamming with him several times in the converted barn in the grounds of his home where he had a drum kit set up, we played all kinds of stuff from jazz fusion to crazy double bass drum metal. He often displayed incredible technique, particularly when playing jazzier music, although he’s renowned the world over for his formidable rock drum style with his wonderful ‘Cozy’ timing. He was also the loudest drummer I’ve ever worked with. Cozy hit his drums very hard, making up his unique sound.

Tha last time I saw Cozy was when the Brian May Band played at the Bournemouth International Centre (I think around late 1994). He played drums for Brian at the time, and I went along to the show and caught up with Cozy at the post-gig party. We left the party together, and Cozy gave me a lift home as I lived fairly locally to the Bournemouth area.

Over the years we still kept in touch by phone, and I remember talking to Cozy just days before he died. We chatted about music, what we were both up to, etc., and discussed a get-together. I’ll never forget Cozy as a person and musician, and I’m sure he’ll rightly be remembered forever amongst music fans and all who knew him. I hope that wherever he is now he’s at peace and still playing his legendary drums to a big audience…

Graham & me, Los Angeles, March 6th 2008.

The new ‘Spirit of Night’ single is almost ready, Tony Martin (Black Sabbath/Tony Martin Band) has finished all the vocals and the track will soon be mixed and mastered here at my studio in Las Vegas. There were a couple of unforeseen delays from both Tony and I, but we’re back on track and the song will be available soon As soon as it’s been mastered I’ll get an MP3 sample on the main site.

I’m currently writing material for the follow up to Entranced and I’m pleased to inform you that I’ve almost finished… The new album will be another all-instrumental affair and I’ll start recording this Spring. The track listing and album title will be announced soon on the main site. Also scheduled for recording soon is the EP Somewhere at the Midnight Cafe.

I’ve just got back from Los Angeles having been to visit my old friend, singer Graham Bonnet (Rainbow/Alcatrazz/MSG/Marbles) (see the above photo). We had a great time, reminiscing about years gone by and playing guitars with Graham (who’s affectionately known to me as ‘Uncle G’) singing in his usual awesome way. He played and sang me some of his new song ideas, and they sounded great! Alcatrazz bassist Tim Luce popped in for a visit on one of the days, he’s a really nice guy and very talented musician who also plays a mean guitar as well as the bass! I drove to L.A. from Vegas as I like the scenic drive, the weather was great and the traffic was good. There was a lot of visible snow on the San Gabriel mountain peaks, and the Pearblossom Highway was picturesque at this time of year.

More entries will follow soon; until then, thanks for visiting the blog!