Restless: The Bob James Story

My late father Joe Jorgensen was Bob James’ recording engineer from 1975-1990. They had a prolific and meaningful creative partnership for 15 years recording some of the greatest musicians at the best studios in New York City.

Joe would bring me to recording sessions in NYC at Mediasound, Powerstation, Soundmixers and CBS Studios when I was around 8 years old.

This is where I discovered my love of music and music production which has had a lifelong impact.

Mikael, left, at Mediasound Studios ca. 1979

Bob James & Mikael Jorgensen, October 2022, Catalina Jazz Club, Hollywood CA

In October or 2022, Bob was playing at The Catalina Club in Hollywood, CA and on a lark I decided to go and see him after 30+ years.

On my drive home after the show I was struck that there wasn’t already book or documentary on Bob.

In a conversation with my friend and drummer Mario Calire I mentioned this glaring omission and he connected me to producer Greg Richling from the LA based production company Pfonetic. He had just finished “Immediate Family” the documentary follow-up to “The Wrecking Crew” directed by Denny Tedesco.

During our initial conversation, it didn’t take long for him to convince me that I should direct this documentary. I agreed, and here we are.

I feel fortunate and grateful to be in the position to make this film about a man whose music and presence have meant a lot to not only me and my family but the entire world.

In addition to Bob’s prolific 50+ solo records, and dozens of projects as an arranger/sideman, he’s the 2nd most sampled artist in hip-hop (James Brown being #1).

I’m looking forward to telling the story of this kid from Marshall, MO whose music mixed genres and crossed cultural boundaries in a way that could not be anticipated.

 

Bob James & Mikael Jorgensen

Photo: Janette Beckman

 

Looking forward to sharing updates as I move through this journey.


Follow @bobjamesdoc on Instagram

https://www.bobjamesdoc.com/

OJAI-FI #3 - OCT 2022

We had yet another stimulating evening listening to music as a group. There was some really great stuff in this playlist that was new to me including Russian electronic music, The Beths, Death and a deep and vexing cut from Thin Lizzy.

Join the OJAI-FI Discord group for all the playlists, discussions & more.

Listen here:

OJAI-FI #2 - SEP 2022

We had another absolutely enjoyable evening listening to music last night at The Ojai Underground Exchange. Here’s the playlist with a few songs that weren’t on streaming services linked below…

OJAI-FI #1 - JUL 2022

Last night I hosted the first open-to-the-public “OJAI-FI” at The Ojai Underground Exchange and the results were magical.

It’s quite simple really, we all just sit around and share our favorite music with each other with a laptop connected to the internet and a turntable.

Listening to recorded music as a group is a profoundly different experience than listening by yourself. It comes highly recommended.

Here is the resulting playlist of songs in the order that they were selected by those who came and had the courage to share their current favorite song.

More of these are in the works.

Scott Hirsch "Dreamer" Live In-Studio performance

My Ojai pal, songwriter, producer and 70s-phile Scott Hirsch asked me to play Wurlitzer on this tune from his forthcoming record.

Listen to "Dreamer" here: https://music.scotthirschsound.com/Dr

Follow Scott: http://instagram.com/scotthirschmusic http://twitter.com/echomagic https://www.facebook.com/blueridersongs

Directed by Brendan Willing James

Cinematography by Brendan Willing James and Marc Alt

The band: Scott Hirsch Kelly McFarling Daniel Wright Mikael Jorgensen

Recorded live and Mixed at Echo Magic An Echo Magic Production

"My Friend, My Friend" (Anne Sexton Poem)

A songwriting exercise with favorable results.

I'll be honest about my poetry consumption: it's pretty dang low as of late. However, I was given a book of poetry by Anne Sexton on tour last fall from the Young Fresh Fellows. I started looking for poems that felt like they could also be songs, and got as far as the third poem in the book.

"My Friend, My Friend" read and felt like they could be lyrics for some rhythmic, modal, muted piano type deal. What drew me to this one is how provocative and ballsy it felt. The existential dread being batted away with dry humor. That's kinda my thing as well. Not the ballsy & provocative part, but the swatting away at the dread with best dry wit one can muster, part.

I now need to go read even more Anne Sexton, who like many my age first learned about her through the song "Mercy Street" from Peter Gabriel's 1986 Masterpiece "So."

Thanks for listening.

Mikael Jorgensen's Crowd Work - Sky Blue Sky '22 Edition

Welp, I was supposed to be in Mexico with my Wilco brothers this week for the Sky Blue Sky Festival, but tested positive for Covid which prevented me from flying. One of the extracurricular activities I was going to do down there was a quasi autobiographical DJ set with commentary. I recorded this at home and I hope you’ll enjoy this odd collection of songs from Bob James, Peter Gabriel, The Art Of Noise & more…

Fast Company on SONOS + The North Face

 

https://www.fastcompany.com/90659412/why-sonos-and-the-north-face-are-putting-an-antarctic-expedition-in-your-ears

Article by Jeff Beer

What does it sound like to be the first people ever to ski down Lhotse, the fourth tallest mountain on earth? Or how about listening in on climber Alex Honnold—the subject of the Oscar-winning doc Free Solo—trekking in Antarctica?

To create each story, Sonos brought in composer and multi-instrumentalist Mikael Jorgensen of the band Wilco, who worked with his team to collaborate closely with The North Face athletes and filmmakers to translate their expeditions into a sonic experience. The North Face VP of Marketing Steve Lesnard says they wanted it to be more than a playlist, they wanted it be an audio journey to iconic locations. “Talking to our athletes and the filmmakers who worked on these projects, they were really invigorated to revisit these expeditions purely through an audio platform because stripping away the other senses allowed them to experience new details for the first time,” Lesnard says.

 

"Twin-Pole Sunshade" by Quindar

 

With all the excitement surrounding the James Webb Space Telescope, I felt a certain kinship with it when I saw a video describing how it unfolds and sits above a sun shade, which reminded me of the “Twin Pole Sunshade” used on Skylab to literally keep the astronauts cool. James sourced the audio for this moment and we chopped it up and put it through the Quindar Machine. This and nearly all the live video was constructed by me during countless hours learning Resolume Arena on the bus and in hotels on Wilco tours.

No Quindar show was ever the same twice. The goalposts are there but the details would change every show, which I always thought was a big plus. The video was the same. It would take far too much programming and fun out of it if we just made a movie and scored it. So we decided to just do it on the fly and thanks to Jeremy Roth, we made it happen on practically every show. We even played a funeral party with projections on the top of an event tent. I digress. This video is a snapshot of what would happen during our live show. It feels weird that it’s always the same now.

Please enjoy this meditation on technology, utilizing technology, I guess.

 

Mikael Jorgensen Bandcamp Selections

 

Welcome #tonegrove visitors! Here are some select albums / songs from my various projects that are available for purchase on Bandcamp. Thanks for stopping by!