13 January 2013
Keep Going (As You Will)
01/16/13 23:28
So I played an open mic last night, first one in about eighteen months. I haven’t listened to it yet, so I don’t know if it’s worth posting. It was interesting, in that the venue is owned by a famous guy with whom I’m really not at all familiar. He’s doing some rather wonderful things for communities, so I’m not going to complain that my drink was served in a jelly jar. Anyway, it was not at all a painful experience, and I’m pretty sure I’ll do it at least once more, so thank you to Andrea for suggesting we meet at his club.
I have a new pedal. It’s in the bottom right of the picture below. For those of you who want to tell me how I’m doing it wrong but would like a simplified flow chart, here it is:
Guitar
v
Visual Sound Visual Volume > Boss TU-3 Tuner
v
Electro-Harmonix Pulsar Tremolo
v
VOX V847 Wah
v
Xotic Effects EP Booster
v
MI Audio Blues Pro Overdrive (now extinct, apparently)
v
MXR Custom Badass (Bidet) ’78 Distortion
v
Boss RE-20 Space Echo
v
Boss RC-2 Loop Station
v
Amp
(Powered by BBE Supa Charger)
Hint: it’ll change tomorrow. One pedal, at least. In the meanwhile, I rewired the board, stuck the Supa Charger underneath the board, and jammed for a while this evening, the recording of which is now in the Jams section. It’s a long one, and it goes through a few styles, and I really like the Visual Volume (thanks, Andy!). More on this new setup soon.
I haven’t decided whether or not to put the Guitar Center acoustic room jam up on this site. It might be audible, just squeaky. We shall continue to see...
I have a new pedal. It’s in the bottom right of the picture below. For those of you who want to tell me how I’m doing it wrong but would like a simplified flow chart, here it is:
Guitar
v
Visual Sound Visual Volume > Boss TU-3 Tuner
v
Electro-Harmonix Pulsar Tremolo
v
VOX V847 Wah
v
Xotic Effects EP Booster
v
MI Audio Blues Pro Overdrive (now extinct, apparently)
v
MXR Custom Badass (Bidet) ’78 Distortion
v
Boss RE-20 Space Echo
v
Boss RC-2 Loop Station
v
Amp
(Powered by BBE Supa Charger)
Hint: it’ll change tomorrow. One pedal, at least. In the meanwhile, I rewired the board, stuck the Supa Charger underneath the board, and jammed for a while this evening, the recording of which is now in the Jams section. It’s a long one, and it goes through a few styles, and I really like the Visual Volume (thanks, Andy!). More on this new setup soon.
I haven’t decided whether or not to put the Guitar Center acoustic room jam up on this site. It might be audible, just squeaky. We shall continue to see...
Round Two
01/15/13 01:20
That’s two, for those of you keeping count.
I’m a day late again. The important thing is I’m keeping some sort of schedule, right?
See the Light is a new kind of song for me, or some kind of departure. In the first place, I’m using a capo. Get the smelling salts, because most of my guitar-playing friends are passing out. It kind of happened that way, and I figured I’d try something new. After all, I have two of these things, so I might as well put one of them to use every couple of hundred songs.
Another new thing is the beat. I’m still using drum loops, and these are some I’ve never even looked at before. Anyone have a set of drums they want to dump off in my basement? I promise to play responsibly.
Also, since I’m trying new things, I don’t have a guitar solo on this. Not that it’s a new concept for me, but for a song with a heavy rhythm guitar part, it’s a little peculiar. Instead, I went a little nuts in the middle with keyboards. Again, not so new, but a lot of fun.
I read an interview with Tony Viscounti recently. He said for his new album, David Bowie referred to studio time as experimenting. I feel pretty good about this. Vindicated, even. This new song, like most of them, was written as I put the guitar in hand and hit record. All the fiddly bits were a result of experimenting, not preconceived. I know some people have a clear idea of where they’re going as they record a song, but any path I start with typically goes into the deep, dark forest moments after I’ve started recording. Go where the music takes you, I suppose.
I might post something else tomorrow, if I make some time to listen to it. I went to Guitar Center this past Sunday, and auditioned a few acoustics. Guitar Center is not my favorite place to go… something about all those guitars looking at you from their high perches yet there’s still not a lot of interesting stuff in the store. But they do have those acoustic auditioning rooms that mostly block out the noise of some guy honking on every acoustic bass in the main room. Mostly. It’ll go in the Jams section, if it sounds good enough to post. I’ll let you know here. If not, pretend this paragraph never happened.
More soon...
I’m a day late again. The important thing is I’m keeping some sort of schedule, right?
See the Light is a new kind of song for me, or some kind of departure. In the first place, I’m using a capo. Get the smelling salts, because most of my guitar-playing friends are passing out. It kind of happened that way, and I figured I’d try something new. After all, I have two of these things, so I might as well put one of them to use every couple of hundred songs.
Another new thing is the beat. I’m still using drum loops, and these are some I’ve never even looked at before. Anyone have a set of drums they want to dump off in my basement? I promise to play responsibly.
Also, since I’m trying new things, I don’t have a guitar solo on this. Not that it’s a new concept for me, but for a song with a heavy rhythm guitar part, it’s a little peculiar. Instead, I went a little nuts in the middle with keyboards. Again, not so new, but a lot of fun.
I read an interview with Tony Viscounti recently. He said for his new album, David Bowie referred to studio time as experimenting. I feel pretty good about this. Vindicated, even. This new song, like most of them, was written as I put the guitar in hand and hit record. All the fiddly bits were a result of experimenting, not preconceived. I know some people have a clear idea of where they’re going as they record a song, but any path I start with typically goes into the deep, dark forest moments after I’ve started recording. Go where the music takes you, I suppose.
I might post something else tomorrow, if I make some time to listen to it. I went to Guitar Center this past Sunday, and auditioned a few acoustics. Guitar Center is not my favorite place to go… something about all those guitars looking at you from their high perches yet there’s still not a lot of interesting stuff in the store. But they do have those acoustic auditioning rooms that mostly block out the noise of some guy honking on every acoustic bass in the main room. Mostly. It’ll go in the Jams section, if it sounds good enough to post. I’ll let you know here. If not, pretend this paragraph never happened.
More soon...