so, I'm this one man banjo guy....
it's kinda weird, but I've been really passionate about it & I've gotten pretty good in the 3 years I've been playing around the bay area. the thing is, I started getting my shtick together & I thought it was the greatest, or at least had the potential to really rock so I really went for it. I was a one man band who played the banjo. I carved my own style out of sloppy rhythm. my feet do the basics & I sing my heart out. there you have it, the part that gets me though is the tradtion that I have enterd. the banjo has it's connotations & a cultural style which accompanies it. I was never bluegrass, nor am I (though I've been working on my bluegrass medely). singing came the first in my life , along with the allure of rhythm followed later by song craft with the stringed instrument, at first a guitar and then as soon as I obatined one, the banjo. the banjo, the banjo. I've tied my destiny to these five strings. I played it with my nails until the frequency of shows lead to bleeding fingertips & then I made my way into fingerpicks. I sat behind my trashy black drum kit playing the banjo, working out the foot work. the tamborine was a logical choice for me, for it's portability, it posesses a sleek & streamlined quality to my senses. I decided that this was what I was going to do, I grabbed a name, generic though it be, it is self explanitory, I use the number 1 though many prefer the o-n-e, It's pretty much the same to me, & by the way, I would have used my name (sean lee) but it was taken. so, this is how I constructed the pigeon hole, my musical comfort zone, high seat of the monkey band as I have called it in song, mr good foot on the drum, lefty on the tamborine, banjolismo mysterioso & m.c. witchdoctor microphone jazz jam singing lead. an idea I must thank esmerelda strange for. you see, in esmerelda's one woman band, there is a girl who plays the drums, the accordion player & the singer. so, spun the idea into my "bandmates" & that all just part of the structure. I play a funky mix of tunes, a style music I call zig zag blues, banjo funk, souped up old timey tunes, spooky, cooky, gobbelin music, and a patchwork assortment of tunes from all over. My gratitude to the hobo gobbelins & especially dylan mc puke for his hard work and producing the hobo gobbelin song book, a gate way to a legacy songs from the ages. I take them in & transmit my own version. that's where I'm at & you, you are a part of my tribe, you joined this, maybe I asked you or maybe you came here on your own, perhaps to keep up with my activity (if that's the case, you should key in to my myspace page where I keep my active calendar). otherwise, give me some sense of why you are here, what you seek, the nature of your interest or merely a few good words.