Where do Nerds come from?

Some kind person called me a nerd this week. Charming! It's someone who shall remain nameless but whose name can be constructed with the letters o r y n b... According to this person a 'nerd' is a computer geek who wears glasses, stares at a screen all day, drinks copious amounts of coffee and probably talks a lot of nonsensical garbage. OK, well I do fit that description.

Anyway this did get me wondering where 'nerd' comes from. And surprisingly not where I thought. It first appeared in a book written by one of my favourite authors...If I Ran The Zoo by Dr. Seuss, a story about a boy who invents a zoo with all the best animals in it..all imaginary. I have a collection of Seuss books but this is one I missed. Probably spending too much time looking at a screen to notice it was one of his most popular books. So it is Theodor Seuss Geisel who is credited with inventing the word 'nerd'.

They are first mentioned in the lines

And then, just to show them, I'll sail to Ka-Troo
And Bring Back an It-Kutch a Preep and a Proo
A Nerkle a Nerd and a Seersucker, too!

and refer to some characters wanted for the imaginary zoo. No doubt a nerd was something warped and blue with ten legs, a fluffy tail, a beard and a goofy smile judging by his other drawings. I must get a copy of this book now.

How 'nerd' migrated from the imaginary zoo to this is anyone's guess but I suppose it could be worse. Modern day nerds could have be referred to as something else from the book. A "Fizza-ma-Wizza-ma-Dill" perhaps!

(The world's biggest bird from the island of Gwark
who eats only pine trees, and spits out the bark).

I'm off to visit the second hand book store. Want to join me Robyn?...

Another good place to visit: Seussville

Next Generation Finn

Over the past few days I've been listening to this brilliant album from a guy who I'm tempted to describe as a much younger Neil Finn but with a really incredible beard! He's got the same trademark Finn family songwriter qualities too, brilliant lyrics, beautifully crafted songs, interesting chords, fantastic melodies, unusual instrumentation and most essential ingredient - intelligence. And surprise, surprise he does happen to be Neil's son. You couldn't mistake him as anyone other than himself though. Definitely a Finn but with his own distinct sound. This guy has to be one of NZ's most interesting songwriters.

I'm dying to see him play live. I heard that he can play an entire gig all by himself by using just a loop pedal and a stage full of guitars, drums and other effects he plays one at a time himself - but all together at once!!! Gig goes something like this:

Start playing as few bars of bass line through the loop pedal (using guitar through octave fx), kill bass sound, add guitar riffs over the top of the already revolving bass
line, then with new guitar layer laid over the top ditch the guitar for a stint on drums and add in a bit of singing. Instant one man band! I couldn't imagine how this could possibly work. Not for an entire song!

It's hard enough in my band with just two people to play everything! But I finally saw proof the other day on YouTube that this actually works really well! Don't know what we are grumbling about in our band after seeing this!

So if you want to see something truely entertaining check out the video links below. A one man band example which he plays in a very animated style. Never seen anyone play drums with this much enthusiasm before! And see if you can figure out how the Parnell Chapel video is done because I can't! Very clever. Did he do a lot of running around the camera or is it just clever digital effects? A bit of both maybe?

Apart from that this album is really really really good! So get out and grab a copy! It's brilliant. And if you want to read more, you can see a great Liam interview (and ahem! these photos again) in NZ Musician mag.

Example of loopy one man band gigging
Gather To The Chapel Video
NZ Musician interview

Sorry, you'll have to click the back key to come back here coz I'm feeling too lazy to make new windows.