Category: Music

One Track (Musical) Mind

This morning as I was starting the work day I made a playlist of David Gilmour solo records. First the five studio records in reverse order of release, then the two live records also in reverse order.

I have spent the entire work day listening to this playlist. I am on the 4th from last song on the first of the two live records (the Pompeii one). As I type this, David is wailing on Sorrow. It’s just friggin’ epic.

Listening to this guy play makes me want to play more. It makes me want to play better. It doesn’t quite make me feel young, but it’s weirdly in that ball park.

All of this and I haven’t listened to a single Pink Floyd record. Imagine how inspired I’d feel today if I was actually listening to the band that he’s famous for. Maybe I’ll do that tomorrow.

He is touring to support his new record. Sort of. There are US shows in Los Angeles and in New York. I looked into tickets for some of the Madison Square Garden shows. The best I saw were a smidge under $900 a ticket. Yikes! There are tickets for Hollywood Bowl shows for $99 a pop, but they would involve actually traveling from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and that will jack up the total price.

I think Mr Gilmour and I are going to miss each other on this trip. Sorry, David. I’ve seen him twice before. Both with post-Roger Waters Pink Floyd. The first of the two shows was the night of my Junior Prom. Yeah, I will never, ever regret skipping that prom experience to go and see Floyd. I mean, talk about no brainers.

I tell you what, if I hit the lottery this weekend I’ll take Jen and the kids (Harry is a big Pink Floyd fan) to shows at both Madison Square Garden in New York and The Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles. You know, to celebrate winning the lottery and stuff. Yeah, that’s the ticket.

Volume: Lots of It

I played some guitar this morning. Judging by the above screen shot from my Apple Watch, I may have changed up the recording workflow a smidge.

Oh yes, yes I did.

I played through a speaker. Instead of using my Fender Bassbreaker 15 and my Vox MV50 Clean amps with their direct line outputs and speaker cabinet emulation functionality, I plugged into my Fender Deluxe Reverb. In the next photo you can see that the power light is on and it is glorious.

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I then did the craziest thing ever. I took the volume knob and turned it up. Way up. It wasn’t full blast, but it was close enough for a Thursday morning. In the next photo you will see proof.

12/365

The volume was a smidge under nine. Again, glorious. Spectacular. I had an overdrive pedal boosting the input signal as well and it was distorting nicely. Tube amps are just the best things ever. I should have actually brought the volume down a little as the signal was over compressing to the point of being a squashed, squirely mess, but that’s okay. I’m just making demoes, right?

I played my SG because it was out of the case and sitting on the stand next to my desk. I probably should have played my Les Paul Custom, but this was fine with me. I ended up adding rhythm guitars to one song and leads to another. Oh, and I also added vocals to two songs. Fun. I probably could have snuck in a little more 50/90 challenge work, but I had to get ready for work and didn’t want to risk being late.

The one question that remains to be asked: Are my ears still ringing (about an hour after I stopped playing)?

Why yes, yes they are.

Glorious

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2024 50/90 Challenge Day 70/90

70 days feels like a milestone. It also feels like THE END IS NIGH!

I’m so far ahead of things this year that I shouldn’t panic, but I also wouldn’t be me if I weren’t panicked over something stupid, right?

Yesterday I added two new song forms. Just bass and drums (both MIDI) and that puts the pipeline over 50. 51 to be exact. I also wrote lyrics and melodies for two songs. Progress was adequate for a work-in-the-office day.

Goal Within Goal Within Goal

So I am doing this 50 songs in 90 days challenge thing. If you have spent more than two seconds on this little pagey page you might have seen me post something about it.

July 4 through October 1. 90 days. Three calendar months. I also have a personal sub-goal along with the 50 songs thing. It’s to do an RPM Challenge style album in each of the three months. That’s either 10 songs written entirely within the calendar month, or 35 minutes of music. In July I somehow, magically, ended up with 20 songs. In August I only managed 14. Those combined with a few songs that were started in one month and finished in another had me at 42 songs on September 1st. That means that in order to finish the album in a month for September I have to get to 52 songs. Okay. I can do that.

I have a third goal now. It’s a mini-goal based on the three times in the past that I have completed the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. The first time was 2014. I ended the 90 days with exactly 50 songs finished. There was a 51st song but I never finished it. I still haven’t. The next time I completed the challenge was in 2020. I finished with 51 songs. Suck it, 2014! I beat you by one! The next time I pulled it off was 2021. I finished with 52 songs. Victory is mine, once again! 2021 rules, 2020 drools!

That leads me to this year’s goal within a goal within a goal. This year I want to get to 53. 50 songs completes the main challenge. 52 will give me the secondary challenge. 53 will give me the third challenge. I have 40 songs complete right now and nine more in progress. I have to finish those nine and then add four more.

I can do it. I think. Yeah, I can do it.

But first… it’s bed time.

PS: Still not watching the debate, but social media (which I know is an echo chamber based on my personal political beliefs and all) is hinting that Vice President Harris is effectively mopping the floor with the fascist fucker’s Nixon-esque flop sweat. Sounds epic.

Finally Finished Listening

To my tiny little music obsessed brain, new music from David Gilmour is practically a religious experience. It had been almost exactly nine years since last he gave us an album of new material (2015’s Rattle that Lock) and the expectations for last Friday’s (four days ago) release of Luck and Strange were exceptionally high.

I started listening to it on Friday morning but it wasn’t until just a few minutes ago (on Tuesday afternoon) that I managed to listen to the whole record in one sitting. Mr. Gilmour* claims that it’s the best record he’s made since Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. I mean… I love you, David but no one is going to mistake this for Dark Side. Having said that though, it is really fantastic.

There isn’t a whole hell of a lot of variety here, but that’s okay. Basically it’s a collection of moody, groovy, mid-tempo, mezzo piano songs with excellent vocals and stupendous melodic guitar playing. Basically what you expect from David Gilmour: an excellent singer and a phenomenal guitar soloist. There is also a bit of a family band vibe here. Normally when my aging rock heroes start hiring their kids to play in their bands it sort of rubs me the wrong way. Guys like Steve Howe and Jack Bruce had their kids in their bands and while they were all incredibly talented people I just didn’t want that. There were exceptions, of course, Teddy Thompson singing duets with Richard Thompson sounds incredible but might that be because his mother, Linda, was in Richard’s band at the beginning and he was just filling the gap that was left when she exited? Who knows.

In this case though, I am actually digging it. His wife has been co-writing songs with him for decades, going all the way back to Pink Floyd’s The Division Bell, so maybe that’s why the vibe is different here. One of his kids sings lead on one song and I guess also plays the harp. Like… a real harp, not a harmonica. I think a couple of kids sing backups on another song, and one kid also contributed some lyrics. Like I said, a bit of a family band thing. I am not put off by it at all this time. Maybe it’s because I have a family of my own now? I don’t know.

What I will say about this album though is that Gilmour hasn’t lost a speck of magic in the guitar soloing category. He was never the technical guy. He’s basically just a blues guitarist playing in a very non-blues setting. All pentatonics and bend notes and things like that. He’s not going to shred like Steve Howe. He’s not going to redefine technique like Robert Fripp. He’s not going to invent entirely new styles of playing like Steve Hackett. Nope, he’s just Dave Gilmour improvising perfect melodic passages and nailing them to staggering, passionate, perfection. This album is flooded with such playing. It’s everywhere. From the first note of the record to the last. It is littered with signature moments. Allow me to give particular notice to the song Scattered which literally gave me chills the first time I heard it. I was in the car driving home from the grocery store yesterday and I thought I was going to have to pull over and wait for the feeling to pass.

So there you have it. My fanboy review of one of my all time favorite musician’s new album. Go give it a spin. Luck and Strange by David Gilmour. Enjoy.

Hey, King Charles. Don’t you think it’s time Mr. Gilmour became Sir David? Let’s get on that, pretty please.

Still No Window Folks

We are scheduled to have some folks stop over today to check on our new windows. Well… they were new a year and a half ago. They were supposed to come out a few weeks after the installation. What’s a few hours more?

Insert very frustrated sighs here.

I have a couple of errands to run that I can’t do until they leave… and it’s almost 11:00 and they still aren’t here. Soon enough I will graduate from frustrated to full on pissed off.

It gave me time to mix a song though. This is song number 40 for the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. I’m 80% finished now.

https://hearthis.at/musical.blathering.idiot12/so-much-to-give-1/

Oh good. The new song’s player from hearthis.at doesn’t want to embed into this post. Yippee.

2024 50/90 Challenge Day 67/90

I put rhythm guitars onto three songs. I really wanted to find the time to do more, but time was not my friend.

I am off work today. We have someone coming to check on our new windows from about a year and a half ago. If he comes early and I have time to do a bunch of errands that I put off all weekend then maybe I’ll be more productive today. Maybe.

2024 50/90 Challenge Day 66/90

I made a little progress yesterday (on day 66). I had one song idea that was just a couple of simple bass riffs. I worked that into a full song form. After that I added two more songs. All three have (fake) bass and (fake) drums finished and are ready for rhythm guitars.