Category: Music

Super Frustrating Day

Ugh, what a day.

The two hour drive to work made me half an hour late so I stayed an extra half an hour to make up for it. That got me on the road a little after 6:00pm. The drive home took an hour and 15 minutes. That’s not uncommon, but on top of the two hours and 10 minutes this morning was just painful. Sitting there stopped in traffic on route 93 North at 7:00pm? What the fuck.

That, on top of my beloved dad rock cover band officially coming apart today just made a suck day suck more.

Here’s some rehearsal recordings from a few tapes I made over the years. I’ve posted this playlist before, probably a few times. I don’t care. The three of us who remain in the band are going to start over from scratch. New singer, new songs, new name. All of that. I guess I am just feeling a little overwhelmed by stupid shit tonight.

Again I say, ugh.

End of an Era

When was it, two days ago? The Daily Prompt asked about things you were hoping to do for the first time and I (slightly sarcastically) said I was hoping for the first post-pandemic band practice with all four band members present?

We had something on the books for tomorrow (Thursday) night but I was nervous because our facebook messenger chat had been silent. I sent out a message, are we still on? The drummer and the bass player responded. The three of us have been able to get together to play a few times since lock downs started easing up. It was our singer who was never able to join us.

Well, our singer responded to the chat today and told us that he’s sorry but he feels it’s time to leave the band. I don’t think any of us are surprised, but we’re all a little disappointed. He’s good people and playing music with him, and just hanging around with him was always good fun. I am going to miss it all.

Now we have to start looking for a new singer. I’m not looking forward to the search, but I am looking forward to the end result. Does that make sense?

Thanks for the good times, Greg. It’s been a pleasure.

Things to Do Tomorrow

I talked it over with my boss and I am not going into the office this week. For the second week in a row Covid is making me work from home for the full week. Even if I test negative I am still working from home this week. Wednesday is the in the office day, and the rest of my staff (with the exception of the guy who is on vacation) is going in, but I am staying home. We’re all in agreement that it’s just not worth the risk and we’re all more comfortable with me staying away, even though the CDC tells me I am not contagious.

So that’s good.

What about music? I’m feeling better so I should get back to that, right? The 50 songs in 90 days challenge ended on October 1st, two days ago, and I was very far from finished. I have a bunch of unfinished songs in the works that I plan on finishing, but I am sort of thinking that 50/90 should become 66/121 this year and I should just keep going through October. Either that or I will just add a 10 songs or 35 minutes of music album in a month on top of finishing off what’s still in the works from 50/90. Something like that. I just watched a bunch of Mahavishnu Orchestra concert videos on YouTube and watching John McLaughlin tear a 12-string guitar a new asshole (figuratively speaking) is making me want to put the focus on any October songs onto my acoustic 12-string… which really would be as far removed from anything McLaughlin did on his electric 12-string as humanly possible, but really the idea of me and John McLaughlin being mentioned in the same paragraph is utterly absurd given that he is possibly the most talented guitarist in history and I am a complete and utter hack. Whatever.

I’m on season 16 of the original Doctor Who. That binge watch continues at a break neck pace. There is also a concurrent binge watch of Good Omens 2, Futurama, Archer, Daryl Dixon, and Ahsoka (which is going to be over before I sleep tonight) with binges of Severance, Silo, and Foundation all being finished within the last few days. There is so much TV out there that needs to be watched. Also, Jen and I are about to finish 90210, which is amazing given how many thousands of episodes of that show there are. Unfortunately, Amazon Prime Video’s license of the show is dreadfully incomplete and nearly half of the episodes of the last few seasons, including the series finale, are missing. Something to do with not being able to secure the music rights? I don’t know. All I know for sure is that the writers and actors strikes are going to push all new shows back for a long time which means we have to enjoy what we have while we have it. Oh yeah, and Loki season 2 kicks off later this week, so that’s yet another show to add to the list. There is so much TV!

Okay, time to hit publish and watch the last episode of Ahsoka. I bet I am going to love it. How can I not love an episode of a Star Wars show?

Right then, see you tomorrow while I work from home and dig my 12-string out of the cellar closet. Good night, friends and neighbors and kind readers.

Get the Band Back Together

We’re trying again. We’re trying to get the band back together for a rehearsal. We’re trying to make it a regular thing again and to set goals for gigs in the coming year. Will Thursday October 12th be the first time all four of us play together since pre-Covid? My fingers are emphatically crossed.

What Comes Next

I was really hoping that Covid would be behind me by today. Nope. I’m still dealing with it. I do feel a lot better though. I feel well enough that I can start thinking of what comes next.

I haven’t exercised in over a week. I haven’t closed my calorie ring on the activity app once in over a week. Do I start tomorrow? I am planning to work a full day so maybe I should skip the exercising in the morning for a few more days. I don’t want to wear myself out before the work day even starts. That’s not ideal, but it is safe.

What about music? There are six days left in the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. There is no way I will finish 50 songs, but I could get myself a whole lot closer than I am. I was looking at my Trello board and I think I could get into the low 40s without killing myself. Do I want to record some guitar parts in the morning? I could probably manage that. I don’t want to do a car vocals until I test negative. I know I wouldn’t run into any human creatures, but why risk it? I will stay home until I test negative and then after that I will mask up if I do anything out of the house. That also means no photography fun outside of the house for at least a few more days.

As for tonight, my water goal is done, my vitamins are done, my protein goal is… almost done. Five grams or so still to go. I can get that easily. I am a bit full now but in 30 minutes or so I’ll be ready to finish that off. I am hoping I will catch the new episode of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon tonight before I go to sleep. If I can sneak in a little more Doctor Who before I sleep that would be nice too. I think I’ve blown through more than three seasons (or was it four?) during my quarantine. So very much Who.

Next weekend the plan is to clean the house from top to bottom. I want the house to be covid-residue free before we invite anyone over. Safety first, right? After that I want to push to travel again. Maybe just a road trip, or possibly an overnight somewhere. I don’t want us to lose our covid nerve. We’ve fallen off the horse and I want to make sure we get back on as soon as possible. Does that make sense? We locked down so hard that feeling up to leaving the house took a lot of effort. Then to have us catch the plague for the first time during a vacation? I don’t want us to be afraid to travel again. I want us to go somewhere as soon as possible. It’s Fall now, so maybe in a few weeks it will be time for leaf peeping. Maybe an overnight to Manhattan would be a good destination too. I also want us to rebook our long weekend in Disney World. The trip that went bust on us was an experiment to see if it was worth it to fly all the way there for a 3-4 day visit. The answer to that question is still up in the air and we definitely have to do the research. The question is, when? Maybe around Christmas? We’ll have to look into the options.

So there are a few things I am thinking about for the near future. The real question is, do I set my alarm clock for 5:00am tomorrow, or 6:00am. I won’t have an answer until I actually lay down to sleep. Until then…

Three New Mixes

I have mixed three songs today. I’m hoping to do a couple more but I think I am out of energy thanks to Covid and possibly because a migraine is coming. Not sure on the migraine yet, but I think it might be happening. I am going to try and make some lunch and see how it goes.

The first of the three songs I’ve finished would have been one of the album in a day things if not for the aforementioned Covid. The song isn’t very good but I don’t care.

The second song was started earlier in September and also isn’t very good.

The third song was started in August and finished in September and also isn’t very good.

Covid Tunes

You thought I forgot about the music project, didn’t ya? Well, I have been a little preoccupied the last week or so.

This would have been the first song for the album in a day challenge thing I was going to work on during our first full day home after the Disney World fail. That project, along with the larger 50 songs in 90 days challenge that enveloped it came to a pretty clear fail that same day when the covid symptoms started. I felt up to trying to mix something after lunch today, thinking that maybe I could get one song in before I was completely worn out. I was right. I got one mix in and now I am completely worn out.

I like this song. I don’t like the performance or the mix or the recording and the vocals are utterly atrocious even by my non-existent standards. Like I said though, the song itself is okay.

Bed Time

I’m going to bed, but watching this first because it’s freakin’ amazing. As usual, Steve Hackett is criminally too low in the mix… as usual. Also interesting that Peter and Mrs Gabriel wore pretty much the same dress size.*

*The red dress Peter Gabriel used to wear during The Musical Box belonged to his wife. That’s the story that I heard at least.

Musical Morning

I think I have zero chance of pulling off an album in a day today. I might be able to pull off an album in two days, or maybe even an album in a day and a half. I have two songs finished apart from a mix down and two songs that will be finished this afternoon. I don’t know the full running time but I think it’s about 16-17 minutes.

I wrote three songs last night including MIDI guide tracks and melodies and lyrics. I did a car music this morning and recorded the vocals for all four. Since then I have put lead and rhythm guitars onto two of them and came up with a chord change for a fifth song.

Obligatory Hipstamatic pictures……

18/365

Zombies and Music

I’m still thinking about an album in a day challenge for tomorrow. I started working on the first song idea at 9:45 this evening. That means I have until 9:45 tomorrow night to finish about half an hour worth of music. It’s already feeling like a failure. I started too late to have enough ready to go for a car music in the morning. that means I’ll probably have to do a late morning car music and maybe an afternoon as well. That doesn’t seem likely.

Another roadblock was having to watch tonight’s new episode of The Walking Dead Daryl Dixon show. Did anyone else notice that the woman who played the nun who sets Daryl on his mission is the same woman who played Fleur Delacour in the Harry Potter movies? I guess there are only so many French actresses around but still, she fought the Death Eaters so I bet she can take out zombies with the best of them.

Another impediment to the album in a day thing is the Doctor Who binge watch. I started season 12 tonight. That means I have finally reached the Tom Baker 4th Doctor era. He’s the Doctor I used to see on reruns on PBS back in the 80’s. He’s more or less the reason I wanted to binge watch the original show in the first place.

So I probably won’t finish a full album in a day, but I will add a lot of new stuff for the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. So it’s all good.