I told myself I was going to restrict myself to two pedals for the November music. That lasted through six songs and part way into the seventh. First I swapped out an overdrive for a fuzz so I could do some noisy bits. Then I dropped both pedals and went back to my regular pedal board. I just like it better, and it’s got the digital delay that I wanted to use.
Oh well, sometimes plans change, right?
Went out for some car music today. Decided to drive home via the ugly clock down town. Took this pic blindly, over my shoulder, while turning onto route 28.
Skills. Mad skills.
The obligatory cat pic for today. A day without a Patches pic is like a day without… something or other.
In case you were waiting for the final word.
I put vocals on five songs this morning. Two new ones and three re-recordings. This afternoon I put lead guitars on four of them. I decided a few days ago that I was going to stop using my ES-335 and use my SG instead. The 335 (and the Les Paul) is over 40 years old and best I can tell it’s never had a fret replacement. The SG is two years old. It’s all original. What’s that mean?
The frets on the 335 are old and worn. I’m going to have to have them replaced… soon… as well as all of the wiring and all of the pots. I’ve written about that a few times before. The frets on the SG aren’t worn at all, not even a little bit. What’s that mean?
Ouch, is what it means. Worn frets are lower and closer to the fretboard then non-worn frets. That means they are a lot easier on the fingers when you’re sliding around like a madman. Today, on the non-worn SG’s frets, I was sliding around like a madman for an hour and a half. What I thought were pretty decent sized calluses on my left hand turned out to not be that thick after all. A couple more rounds of me ripping my finger tips to shreds like I did today will fix that.
Ouch.
Today was the first November car music day. I accomplished two things.
First, I totally made a fan. This cat stayed there through an entire song worth of three part harmonies.
Second, I played a brutal cut throat game of sabac and somehow won a starship. Crazy.
Patches looks like she’s waiting for something. Could it be a trump concession announcement?
It’s like Lion King except it’s Cat Queen.
I’m not a very good guitar player. If you had any doubts, then there’s me coming right out and admitting it.
All of these songs that I am re-recording… Whenever in the past I wrote them and recorded the original demo, I blew through them like they were simple. Now that I’m doing them again, they are suddenly insanely, brutally, unimaginably difficult. I screw up constantly. Like, oh my god, could you please do something right?
I was trying to play arpeggios on one song and I fat fingered them over and over. I finally got through it and moved on to the next song and… more arpeggios. Bite me, past self. Take after take after take of me fat fingering and I finally threw a temper tantrum and ripped off the ends of my finger nails. It actually helped a little.
Seven out of 10 re-recordings are ready for vocals. Eight out of eight (but hopefully 10, eventually) November songs are ready for lyrics. Maybe some car singing in the morning? We’ll see.
