20 Feb God love the Internet

And God love Contrarian readers. When Steve Hart sent me this video of a pretty good guitar trio using a slow-idling tractor for percussion on Sweet Georgia Brown and Bye Bye Blues, I wondered it it was a known Internet chestnut that had somehow escaped me. But the earliest copy of “the Saskatchewan Philharmonic” was posted last April and had only 8,000 hits.

Turns out the video is neither philharmonic nor Saskatchewanian. It’s Sweden’s Olle Hemmingson Trio, featuring the eponymous Olle playing a Gibson Les Paul Signature guitar, with an antique Volvo tractor for percussion. Thanks to Brian Bonnar for setting me straight.

Here’s Olle aboard a 1951 Deutz playing Lover Come Back to Me:

(Those with Flash-impaired Apple devices, click here.)

Here’s Ollie, sans trio, back on the Volvo:

(Direct link here.)

Is traktor percussion a peculiarly Swedish musical genre?

(Direct link here.)

For those who want to delve further, Bottleneck John’s excellent Youtube channel features oddball antique guitars accompanied by a tractor, a hydraulic ram water pump, and a steamboat engine.