Tag: guitar playing

RPM is Coming – Continued

I was sitting in the basement with my step son last night, watching Mythbusters, playing a little wii u, flying his remote controlled helicopter (which he got for his birthday [I think] a couple of years ago and completely forgot about it without even ever opening the box… the downside of living in two houses, methinks) when I took out my new 12-string and noodled for a bit before snapping a couple of camera+ pics. When I posted them here I wrote that RPM is coming soon. 32 days.

I have also said not long ago that I was going to make a mini project out of four old songs. I have expanded that a little. Three nights ago, my step son was in bed and my step daughter was enjoying the 30 minutes she gets to stay up after he went to bed. I was exhausted. I couldn’t keep my eyes open, but I wanted to make sure she got to bed at the right time so I forced myself to stay awake.

How did I do it?

Garageband for iPad. I came up with a bass riff and a drum groove. Just like I’m going to be doing ad nauseum come February. So I decided to make a project out of it. This was Friday night, so there were five days left in 2013. I decided I would come up with a riff or two (or three) a day for the last five days of the year, and then while working on the four old songs during the month of January, I would also finish off the five new songs. the difference is that the old songs need to be 100% Garageband for Mac, while the five new songs will be 100% Garageband for iPad.

What do you think the chances of me finishing any of this are?

0%? Sounds plausible.

Crazy

This has been the craziest busy day ever. Everyone seems to be cramming a full weeks worth of crazy into one day.

I started mixing another song last night but decided I would be better served by sleeping. Good thinking on my part.

So The Walking Dead… I knew they were working on a spin off, but I thought it would be all new characters somewhere else in the world. I didn’t think it would be just about The Governor, and I didn’t think it was replacing the original show. Did the main cast need a vacation or something? Two weeks in a row of side story. I’m ready for the main story arc to come back now. Hell, I was ready seven days ago. That being said, the crazier that character gets the more fun he is.. and he’s getting pretty crazy again.

The Bruins play the Penguins tonight in a happy playoff rematch. Remember how the Penguins were heavily favored and then got swept by the Bruins? Remember that? Do you think his Bruins teammates let Jarome Iginla forget that for even a second? Tonight is a match up between the two top teams in the East. I probably won’t watch much, but I might catch some on the radio. There are just so many things going on right now.

I had planned to finish up the last two or three songs worth of guitar parts today but I watched zombie television instead. The whole project this month is completely disorganized. I don’t even know how many songs are left to finish. After the big chunk of work I did on Friday, I expect it to get finished on time. I just don’t feel very good about the whole thing. My guitar playing has been so bad it’s painful. It’s painful to listen to, and it’s painful to play. My finger tips are still burning from Friday. My playing has been bad enough to take a lot of the fun out of this. If I don’t keep practicing between now and February I might not do RPM. I mean, I know I suck but at least when I’m at my best I can fool myself into thinking I don’t suck too bad. I can’t do that right now.

A New/Old Song Called Thoughts

This was written at the same time as Laughing. The plan was to try writing songs that I could sing while playing the guitar. I think I played my first bedroom recording of this (with me playing my brother’s drums, gasp!) to Mike the bass player but he passed on it. This song should be brand new to everyone else on Earth. I always liked it, but never pushed anyone to play it. I don’t know why. As for the meaning of the lyrics? I have no idea at all.

A New/Old Song Called Laughing

I don’t remember a whole lot about this one. I wrote it along with two others in my bedroom at my parents’ house, probably in 1993 or 94. I know the idea was to write stuff that I might be able to sing and play at the same time. This was played by at least one of the short lived, unnamed bands I was in during the mid 90’s, but never to an audience. As for what the lyrics are about? I haven’t a clue.

What I Learned Today

Here are a couple of little things that I learned about myself today.

From about 6:30am through about 1:30pm I pretended I was a musician.  I took the four remaining unfinished songs from my 2007 RPM failure and worked them over good.  Three of the songs had rhythm guitar/bass/drums finished.  The one remaining only had drums and bass finished.

So what did I get done today?  Wrote and recorded lyrics and melodies for all four, finished the one missing rhythm guitar part, and recorded the lead guitar on three of the four songs. 

So you’re still wondering what it was I learned about myself today, right?  Well here goes.

I learned that for me, practice is wicked important.  I am way out of practice both as a guitar player and a singer.  It shows most clearly in my pathetic sense of rhythm.  My timing has been just the tiniest bit off all day long.  At a casual listen it sounds almost all right, but when I am paying attention everything just feels sloppy.  It’s… off. 

I’ve always had a problem keeping myself in phase, as it were, but lack of practice seriously exacerbates the issue.  (Yes, I just used exacerbates in a sentence that wasn’t referring to Shaun of the Dead.  100 points for me!)

I also re-learned just how important calluses are when playing guitar.  I needed about 10000000 takes to get the leads right on one of these terrible songs today and I now have the searing agony in my finger tips to prove it.  The blisters are forming.

The good news is, I am close to having four (4) more songs finished.  Bad timing and crappy soloing aside, that’s not bad for a random Tuesday, eh?

Now What

I probably wrote this exact same post last March, but it needs to be stated again.

I have finished the RPM Challenge and FAWM. I’m very proud of my goofy self, despite the fact that the music I made isn’t very good. I wrote and recorded 14 songs in less than 28 days. It feels like a nice accomplishment.

Now what?

Last year I made a list of a big batch of unfinished songs I’d started in 2007 and 2008, as well as a few newer songs that needed to either be re-recorded or re-written and decided that I’d pick them off one at a time over the course of March and April or so in order to keep the happy RPM vibe alive for a while.

I finished recording 2/6 remaining 2007 left overs, and started tracking the other four, which are all at various stages of incompletion. I re-recorded one song, and re-wrote another. In November I started writing two new songs and have finished one of them.

For 2013 I have two little ideas on what to do next. One is to continue picking off the unfinished songs. There are eight of them, including the one from this past November. I also recently found a cd full of random songs I had written and played along with Mike and Maria back in the late 90’s. some of those songs might deserve a long awaited recording. I’ve picked two to start with, maybe three… or four.

So that’s the plan going forward. Finish more of the left overs, record some more ancient artifacts, and once in a while actually write something from scratch.

Lets see how long it takes me to run out of steam this year.

RPM Day 26

I know it’s late for this, but I’ve had a busy day.  Deal, okay?

I added the final lead guitar parts to four of the remaining six songs.  I haven’t made a final mix of any of them yet.  I might do that tonight, or I might wait until tomorrow.  I’m so close to finishing that I can almost taste it.  I should probably start thinking of a cover, and maybe a title.  What do you think of Rock Music for Old People?

Two More

I’m up to eight songs completed now.  I just finished both of the songs that I had to go back and rerecord the vocals for.  Both songs have really been frustrating to me.  I thought I had the vocals done a week ago, but after a later listen I just couldn’t live with them… and give how bad most of the crap I leave in can be, that is really saying something.

This one needed the most work of the two.  It’s kind of a snooze.  I didn’t do a 12-bar blues this year, so this sort of takes the place of a slow blues tune.  I guess.

This next song was titled “So Frustrating” before it became a frustrating mess.  Sort of prophetic of me, eh?  Almost like I knew what was come.  I didn’t, but it seems that way now.  This is one of a couple of attempts this year to make 6/8 time rock.  I like this one, except for all the clipping.  Urgh.

I’m packing up for now.  It’s 5:22, I’ve been at this since about 7:00 or so.  My head is pounding, possibly from the headphones, and just as possibly from the fact that I have not had any caffeine today, and my fingers won’t play the guitar the way I want them to anymore.  I might sneak in another one later tonight, and I will definitely try to get one or two done tomorrow before work.  Only three days left.

I’m cautiously optimistic.

RPM Day 23

It’s almost 8:00pm here and I haven’t done my stupid daily update that is boring all of you to tears.  Never fear.  In the words of the Yardbirds, Here’s ‘Tis.

Earlier this week I had announced that this particular song:

was complete and done and finished.  Today I changed my mind.  I remixed it.  It’s not much different, just a little more care was taken with it.  Oh, and I put some seriously retarded goofiness into it as well.  Gotta love idiots who put flangers onto drums, right?  Am I right?

This little song:

Was not finished, but now it is.  I used a fuzz box.  How have I made it this far into life without owning a real fuzz box?  Fuzz boxes and Phasers are the big overused stomp box gimmicks for this year’s project.

This particular little ditty:

Was also not finished, but now it is.  This holds the distinction of being the only song in the batch of 14 that did not have any work done on an iOS device.  This was all done on the full GarageBand on my MacBook Pro.  I think you can hear the difference.  I am a little sad that I didn’t do the whole thing on a computer now.  The iPad and the iPhone are just so damn convenient   I mean it would have been tough to have written a song in the car in a parking lot waiting for a take out order to be ready if I had to do it all on an actual computer, right?  Am I right?

So that’s three songs that are finished, finished, finished.  There is one other that used to be finished but I have decided it will get a new vocal take on Monday.  There are two other songs that have vocals that I want to re-record, at least in part, that still need lead guitar parts.  Then there are seven (7) more that don’t have any vocals yet.  RPM requires 10 songs.  FAWM requires 14.  I have 14 in progress, I could call FAWM done now but I won’t.  Finishing the vocals for a total of 10 songs on Monday is definitely doable.  Getting up to a total of 14?  That’s a little more difficult.

We shall see.

RPM Day 20

February 20th and the heat is on.

I have two songs completed, or as completed as they are going to get.  The first one really needs to have the vocals re-recorded.  If I get a chance before the 28th I’ll do it.  It also needs to be mixed a little better.  I don’t consider what I am doing here to be anything more than demos, so I am not going to freak out if the lead guitar is a little too loud (I am a lead guitarist, so the lead guitar is ALWAYS going to be a little too loud, but I digress) but in the case of the first song I think it might be a little too, too loud.  Oh well.

This morning I took 25 minutes before leaving for work to come up with a chorus and two verses worth of bad lyrics for another song.  I recorded them quickly and I think they sound okay, but they don’t really fit the gloomy mood of the music.  That’s kind of a normal problem with the rush job that is RPM.  I had that song’s master file up in GarageBand, and I had a couple of lines worth of lyrics in my head, so the lyrics went with the music regardless of how well they actually go together.  If I were not on a deadline I might have found a better fit, but as it is I just don’t care.

I may have a little time for more lyrics/vocals this evening, but I said that last night too and it didn’t happen.  I telecommute tomorrow, so maybe I can squeeze in more than one song with the extra time I will have before work.

Thinking positive, but also looking at the calendar and starting to worry a little.