I’ve been having excellent luck lately finding old CDs by bands I used to love (bands most people have never heard of) on ebay for cheap. In some cases I am 15 or 20 years late in getting some perspective on the direction a particular artist followed (or where they came from) but who cares. Good tunes are good tunes and I am all about getting back into records again (not just singles shuffling on an ipod).
I think I’ve been working on my guitar tone more in the last 6 months than in the prior 15 years. Pedals and modelers and all kinds of little nuance elements to craft something big and brash and bold and bango. Sorry – too many Bs, I know. But there are just so many cool options these days. Sure, some of the gearheads take this stuff a little seriously, nearly braking out into fisticuffs over misstepping about the chip in a particular vintage pedal and the like. Geeks will be geeks.
Still, it’s pretty cool that a pedal can create a reasonable model of a classic like a Hiwatt or something similar. Very cool, and far more satisfying than cranking the autotune.
Every once in a while when I’m working on a tune in the home studio I think about having some fun with DJ style scratching. I’m not exactly ready for the s4 trakor or whatever, but I’ve been pretty lo-fi. Maybe something a little more credible than fingernails on a lenticular card from the cover of a Disney DVD would be cool.
Maybe.
I have a lot of instruments. Too many guitars, sure. A piano, a couple of cheap kid’s keyboards, a nice electric piano. I’ve got a dulcimer, a melodica, two ukuleles, about a dozen harmonicas, and lots of percussion. I even have a homemade bajo from a kit with a hexagonal wood body and soundboard. I’m not much of a banjo player, but then again, it’s not much of a banjo. Some days I do think it would be nice to have a good Fender fb58 banjo, or something along those lines. Really get my bluegrass on.
Some day.
In prepping for the big drum session a couple weeks ago I did some digging in the basement closet and found my drum stick bag from Musicians Friend. I misplaced this delight ages ago – even before buying the junior Ludwig kit for my budding percussionists. Finally I can whip out the nylon brushes and old school ginormo-mallets that I picked up along the way. So much fun.
Who doesn’t love banging on things after all. Right?
The new music project is under way. It has been WAY too long, so I’m pretty jacked. Sure, there have been some starts and stops, but this new piece has been bubbling and churning for a while. There are 15 songs that assemble to sort of tell a story. Tuning, key, overall mood… it all ties together. A couple of weekends ago we laid drum tracks for 10 of the songs. All 10 now have bass and I’m just starting to work on the guitar parts. We’ll probably never have a horn section or exciting cello strings or anything, but the pieces are coming together and it feels great.
I’ve actually got a few new projects. Two involve music and one is a new comic, but the one I’m thinking about right now is my custom bass. I recently picked up a decent used bass neck and plan to rebuild an old instrument I’ve had since high school. We’re talking new pain, new electronics, a new pickguard. It should be suh-weet. I might have to buy an actual bass amp. I mean, I’m not all ampeg 6×10 bas cabinet at guitar center or anything. At least not yet. But maybe someday…
Let’s face it, heroin rehab ain’t for everybody. Some people just need to overdose. Am I right?
Maybe it’s just me.
And maybe that seems harsh, but the ongoing willingness of people in this country to forgive celebrity idiocy simply because someone is on the front page of a supermarket tabloid, yet pointing the finger of condemnation at someone who is just trying to scrape by in this tough world…
People suck.
I saw the Pixies the other night. Great show. Best I’ve been to in quite a while. As with any good show, I came home inspired, and not just musically. Also hardware-ily. Or something. See, they had these cool bass pedals I have long lusted after. I wish it was as easy as shopping Moog at Musicians Friend, but unfortunately it ain’t. Yeah, Moog is the primary maker of these crazy awesome bass pedals, though I have seen one or two knockoffs. They’re just so super cool and they let a simple dude like me create his own bass lines with one agile foot while rockin’ out on the guitar and mic. The Pixies bassist used them on one song while playing a counterpoint high bassline on her actual ax, but I know I could do so much more!
In these days of Facebook and email and Google+ and even MySpace (yup, it’s still out there) it’s hard to believe how important a mailing list was for a touring band 15 years ago. Every micro-tour required mailings. Every major gig or even minor shows a distance from our home turf was preceded by a trip to the post office. I don’t know if you can even affordably print postcards in NYC or Boston or… well anywhere anymore. I mean sure, there are always the online quick print places, but the shipping alone could cripple a start up band. I miss the old days of postcards and handwritten personal messages. Those were good times.