We didn’t know it until a few days later, but on this date four years ago we lost Neil Peart. Easily the most painful moment of my musical life. He had such an impact on me. I’m sure if I ever told him that it would embarrass the hell out of him, so I would never have said anything even if I had the chance… but it’s true. It’s silly that some clown in a rock band that I never met could have such a huge effect on who I grew up to be… but it’s true. You know? It’s true.
Category: Music
Mental Health Break
I played guitar today. I worked on two songs. I used the direct out and cabinet sims off of two amps, which broke my amps and speakers rule for the re-recording project, but I didn’t wake Harry so that was worth it.
I played like dog shit, but I played and that’s what matters. I needed it. I have more to do so I might sneak some more playing in later today.
Sigh of relief.
Smashing Pumpkins
The Smashing Pumpkins put out a call for a new guitar player. They are asking for resumes.
Should I send one?
January Music Goals
Right then. It’s 2024. Enough of that crap that was 2023. Let’s get our shit together and make some music. In February I will dive head first back into the RPM Challenge, but until then what am I going to force upon myself to jump start creativity and make me feel like I can be a musician for a few weeks.
In other words, what are my musical goals for January 2024? There are three.
First and foremost, we are hoping to start auditioning singers for the cover band. My playing is utter shite right now so I need to get into shape. I need to find out what songs we are going to use for the audition and practice the holy hell out of them. They all used to be second nature but that was almost four years ago. I have to make them second nature again.
Second and second most, my 1979 Gibson ES-335 Pro needs to go into the shop. The same shop my Les Paul Custom spent time in a few months ago. I think it needs new frets, and I think it might need a new wiring harness as well. I need to get things going this month so that the guitar will be available for me to use on February’s RPM Challenge album.
Third and third most, it is time to get back to The Great 2015 Re-Recording Project, where I take old songs from old writing projects and clean them up, edit them, rewrite where necessary, and then record a slightly higher quality version. This project is also known as Quarantine Tunes. There are six Quarantine Tunes albums on my alonetone page. I told myself that I was stopping at six but then about a year and a half ago I started work on volume seven and also sort of started thinking about volume eight. What can I say, I am a nerd about this stuff. Last night I added two more songs to the volume seven to-do list. I plan to spend January working on volume seven and hopefully finishing it. That should put my brain into a good recording and playing space in time for February.
I am also slightly overwhelmed by a scary compulsion to go out and buy a new guitar. I need to fight that urge. I want a Les Paul Junior or a Firebird, but I don’t need them. Hopefully playing the shit out of the guitars I already own will calm me down on the online shopping front… hopefully… I think.
So there you go. Practice, get the 335 fixed up, and record. My three musical goals for January.
Bring ’em on.
Bad Song Alert
A super rough mix of a terrible performance of a really bad song. My first Record Every Month Challenge song since September. I’m back, babie! My finger tips are killing me after recording the lead guitar parts today. Yikes!
New Years Eve Music
I played some guitar today. I finished tracking two songs that could be December’s submission for the Record Every Month Challenge. Both songs really suck though… so… yeah.
New Years Eve
It’s New Years Eve again. Wasn’t it just New Years Eve a few weeks ago? 2023 is ending? How the hell did that happen?
We don’t have any solid plans for today apart from picking up some take-out Chinese food. Maybe some board games? Maybe another round of Yahtzee?
I watched Rebel Moon on Netflix. I was conflicted. I wanted to watch it but I also did not want to watch it. See the conflict? My spoiler free review is to recommend that you wait until part two comes out in April. This movie feels like two hours worth of a four hour heist movie, where generally the first half of a heist movie is assembling the team. That means the movie that is out now is really just the assembling of the team. That’s why it doesn’t have a coherent story. It’s more like a bunch of mini-movies introducing all of the characters. Hopefully part two will make sense on it’s own. So if you wait for part two to come out and then watch them both together, maybe it will be a decent movie as a whole. For now though… eh.
I have to play guitar today. I have two songs in progress for this month’s Record Every Month challenge. They both need lead guitar parts. I need to record them today and then mix the two songs and then I will have my first R.E.M. win since September. It’s a must.
Speaking of guitar, I went down a rabbit hole last week that I find myself visiting once every couple of years. If you read this page you might have noticed that I have been obsessed with the band Rush since 1981. Back then there were two bands that I was obsessed with. The other was Led Zeppelin. As I got older though, the whole unending adolescence vibe that Zeppelin had sort of got tiring for me and I moved away from them. Also, Jimmy Page is one of my guitar heroes, and he is definitely one of the reasons I NEEDED to learn to play guitar when I was a kid. When I look at my own playing objectively though (if that’s even possible) I don’t hear a lot of his style in my playing. I think as I moved away from the debauchery that Zeppelin represented, I sort of moved away from Page too.
Every once in a while though, I feel the need to really dig into the catalog and try to remind myself that there is a lot of value there. That comes up once every couple of years, and it came up for me on Thursday. I put together a playlist with all of their studio records and over the course of the work day I plowed through all of it. Did the old musical feelings I used to get when I listened to Led Zeppelin as a teenager come back? Yes. Not exactly the same, as I am no longer that kid that I used to be, but it was close enough that I felt good about the whole experience. Now I can move on to other things again until the next time I feel cosmically compelled to examine the Zeppelin again. Probably some time in 2025, I think.
Okay then, it’s almost 11:00am. I have not had anything to eat for about three hours. It’s time to have a snack to keep my stomach happy. Gastric Bypass for the win!
Happy New Years Eve, everyone. HoHoHo.
My Morning in Pictures
Here’s what I did this morning… in Hipstamatic pictures… Because… I don’t know why…
And there you have it. My morning excursion in pointless photographs.
Thread
I feel gross using the facebook/instagram owned twitter alternative app, Threads. Really gross.
That isn’t quite enough to stop me right now though. I am such a social media hypocrite/whore.
Anyway, someone asked, “what are your guitar goals for 2024” or something along those lines. I responded with a few. I figured I would port the response over to this post and maybe add a thing or two because I ran out of characters on the app. First, does the embed code work? I tried just sharing a link the other day to see if that pulled anything in, but it didn’t. I found that each post includes some embedding HTML code. Betcha a dollar it doesn’t work…
Post by @reallytallredheadView on Threads
https://www.threads.net/embed.js
Based on the preview function in the editor, it didn’t work. Oh well. Here’s the text I wrote:
I want my cover band to finally get back together after a covid-hiatus and an exiting singer.
I want to write a shit ton of songs, record listenable demoes of all of them, and maybe have one or two that don’t objectively suck.
I want to play a bar gig for the first time since Feb 1, 2020.
After getting my 1978 Les Paul refretted a couple of months ago, I want to do the same with my 1979 ES-335 along with maybe getting a new wiring harness so that all four of my guitars will be in gig shape.
Me: https://www.threads.net/@reallytallredhead/post/C1ch8b9LyTx
Yes, kids… I just quoted myself. I dun did that.
Anyway, there are a couple of things to add.
I want to replace all of my guitar straps with heavy, leather straps like the one I have on my 50th birthday present Les Paul Standard. I have amazon shipping one for my Les Paul Custom and it should arrive tomorrow.
I want to buy either a Gibson Les Paul Junior, a Gibson Firebird, a Gibson Les Paul Standard with P-90 pickups instead of humbuckers, or a Gibson Les Paul Deluxe. The order I wrote them is from most wanted to least most wanted. The chances of me buying any of these is about 0.0000001%… so there’s a chance.
With all of these goals in mind, mostly I would just settle for playing more. That’s what I really want to do.
I Played Guitar Today!
Oh thank heavens, I played some guitar today. I worked on two songs for Record Every Month. My finger tips are sore as hell, but I played my Les Paul Custom with the new frets and it felt really good. Really good.
I seriously over did the obligatory pics.
Inside the Red Head's Head 