Fishing for Metaphors!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2391 Views 15 Replies 11 Participants Last post by potiphar, Aug 16, 2007

Robert Dubrul

Discussion Starter · Aug 13, 2007

I am hoping to understand more aspects of sax playing. I am asking if you are familiar with metaphors and if you will help me build a simple dictionary of sorts. I remember Grandpa had one on colloquialism of the south. For example,

Riding the groove: playing in between notes.

Your time and effort will be apreciated. Thanks!!!

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Dog Pants

· #2 · Aug 13, 2007 (Edited)

A few from Down Under:

"Flat out like a lizard drinking." --- A very fast tune.

"Too slow to keep worms in a tin." ---- A very slow tune.

"The world's only living brain donor." ---- The drummer.

"About as useful as tits on a bull." ---- High F# keys, Perfect Pitch
courses, reed humidifiers, sax mutes, etc

"May your ears turn into ***holes and s*** on your shoulders." --response to hecklers.

"Sticks out like a dog's ****." --- a wrong note, playing out of tune, playing a Dukoff, playing a "Larruping Pink" Chinese saxophone.

"Lower than a snake's bum." --- either the Bass Saxophone, or the person that steals your Mk VI.

"Tighter than a fish's bum." ---a horn section that starts and stops together. The JB horns. T.O.P horn section, etc.

"Up and down like a working girl's undies." --- Those ridiculous etudes that have you going from bell note to altissimo and back, in 16th notes.

"Stiff as a Saturday night *****." --- A band that doesn't swing.

"Fatter than a choir boy's ***hole." --- describing a player's sound. Also used in advertising, to sell overpriced, custom, mouthpieces.

"Flatter than a **** carter's hat."--- to play flat.

These are all very common, everyday sayings, down here, but because some of you lot have about as much sense of humour as an undertaker with scabies, I'll happily delete any and all of the above just to keep the peace.

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RootyTootoot

· #3 · Aug 13, 2007

Dog Pants said:
"Flatter than a **** carter's hat."--- to play flat.

These are all very common, everyday sayings, down here..

Thnks, DP. The above made me laugh the most, even though i'm not totally sure i know what it means. A favourite expression of mine (of Australian origin) is "As flash as a rat with a gold tooth" which i suppose would apply nicely to someone with very expensive equipment but very few playing skills.

Dog Pants

· #4 · Aug 13, 2007

"Flatter than a poo carter's hat."

Refers to the hats worn by the blokes who used to come around and collect the can, back before people had inside toilets. The "poo"carter would come around in his truck, grab an emty can and run out to the dunny. He'd grab the full can, whack in an empty one, and then lob the full one on his head and back to the truck.

Thus, the very flat (and smelly) hat.

Robert Dubrul

Discussion Starter · #5 · Aug 13, 2007

That' pretty flashy!

RootyTootoot said:
Thnks, DP. The above made me laugh the most, even though i'm not totally sure i know what it means. A favourite expression of mine (of Australian origin) is "As flash as a rat with a gold tooth" which i suppose would apply nicely to someone with very expensive equipment but very few playing skills.

Thanks Guys those are very funny!! I needed a good laugh! By the way DOG PANTS is that Robert Tilton???

Bluesblaster

· #6 · Aug 13, 2007

Shining like a diamond in a goats ***: Refers to a very extravagant waste of money.

Morry

· #7 · Aug 13, 2007

Not exactly a metaphor, but funny (and helpful):

In a session recording his CD at my friend's studio, Lou Marini told the horn section who was having trouble with a particularly difficult passage he had arranged:

"It's not as fast as you think it is, but it's faster than you're playing it".

saxphil

· #8 · Aug 14, 2007

Howse about a simile?

Stupid as a bag o' hammers - pretty dense

Alexk

· #9 · Aug 15, 2007

playing a "Larruping Pink" Chinese saxophone.

Dogpants, are you referring to a certain aussie sax player/singer here?

Reedsplinter

· #10 · Aug 15, 2007

Bluesblaster said:
Shining like a diamond in a goats ***: Refers to a very extravagant waste of money.

Or: like a t*rd in a punchbowl: same notion. I felt that way about a silver-plated Guardala I owned years ago when it was brand new. Very, very shiny. Couldn't quite decide whether it was the t*urd or the punchbowl. So I sold it and bought a great old Chu.

Sam

· #11 · Aug 16, 2007

"Like the 13th chime of the clock, it calls into question the validity of all that preceded it."

Reedsplinter

· #12 · Aug 16, 2007

We all forgot: these metaphors were supposed to be about MUSIC!

A metaphor (the word means "carry over" in its greek root) is rhetorically the equating of two unlike things. So here's one: I play like John Coltrane.

(not)

And of course technically that's a simile. Which is a subset of metaphor.

I'll never get it right.

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potiphar

· #13 · Aug 16, 2007

Again not a metaphor, but my dad used to say his second alto player had a stovepipe tone. Said it all really.

saxophrenic

· #14 · Aug 16, 2007

Mel Torme was known as the "Velvet Fog".

Reedsplinter

· #15 · Aug 16, 2007

potiphar said:
Again not a metaphor, but my dad used to say his second alto player had a stovepipe tone. Said it all really.

Not to quibble, but actually that IS a metaphor. Another way to put it would be to say, "My dad had a tone like a stovepipe"; that's the subset of metaphor that's called simile. Metaphor as such makes the "like" or "as" implicit rather than explicit, which is exactly what your post did in the first place. So you're right on the money, my friend. :smilebox:

potiphar

· #16 · Aug 16, 2007

Reedsplinter said:
Not to quibble, but actually that IS a metaphor. Another way to put it would be to say, "My dad had a tone like a stovepipe"; that's the subset of metaphor that's called simile. Metaphor as such makes the "like" or "as" implicit rather than explicit, which is exactly what your post did in the first place. So you're right on the money, my friend.

No, another way of saying it would be "My dad's second alto player had a tone like a stovepipe." My dad's tone was like honey. Step outside and we'll settle this man to man...

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