Tag: Guitar

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 81/90

Yesterday was the first day of Autumn so of course here in New England I am sitting in my home office freezing my rotund ass off. Winter is here, kids. Last week I was dipping in the Pacific Ocean on an 80 degree San Diego, CA day and today I’m sitting here shivering with the heat cranked up. Life is so unfair sometimes.

That’s not what I came here to write about though. I came here to write about the 50 Songs in 90 Days Challenge that has just over a week left. The end is almost in site and I am not stressing out at all because I’ve already finished 50 songs. Everything is gravy now. Can I get to 60 songs?

What did I accomplish on day 81, yesterday? I started the morning with 51 songs complete, five ready to mix, one waiting for me to write lyrics, and two waiting for me to record rhythm guitars. That adds up to 59 songs. The first thing I did was crank out the two songs worth of rhythm guitars. I did that before work. Later, just before bed, I added two more songs. My unofficial goal was to get to 60. I was up to 50 songs in progress on July 31st so I figured 10 songs in August would give me an album-in-a-month by RPM Challenge rules so that would be a nice round 60 songs for this challenge. Adding two more songs last night brings the total number of songs in progress up to 61… I am such a dork. Seriously.

Both songs are a little gimmicky. I figured why not, I’m already over the 50 song goal so there’s no reason not to be a little goofy. One of the newbies is in 7/8 time and the verse and the chorus are the same riff just in different keys. I think I’ll keep the rhythm guitars clean(ish) on the verses and nice and fuzzy on the choruses too. The other song is a 12-bar blues riff in 5/8 time because why not?

So the current to-do list includes five songs ready to mix, three ready for lyrics, and two ready for rhythm guitars. One of those last two has a melody already.

Nine days to go. I am feeling pretty good. I just wish more of the songs were good. I think of the 61 I have, one is good. The rest are somewhere between meh and god awful. That’s a pretty common percentage for me though.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 80/90

And just like that, we’re back babie!

After a few days of not making any progress at all, I finally got something done yesterday. Day 80 was spent getting back to work and dealing with a stomach bug (or something) that has been seriously kicking my fat ass. No clue, but it was not successful in stopping me from being silly, musically, though it was a close call.

I didn’t start thinking about 50 songs in 90 days stuff until after 10:00pm last night. At that point I sat up in bed with my laptop and my goofy little USB piano keyboard and I started another song… and then another song. Two new songs, numbers 58 and 59 if you’re keeping track.

One of them is in straight 4/4 time and isn’t very interesting. The other is a math problem. I’ve been messing with weird time signatures all throughout this challenge. I’ve done more work in 5/8 time than I had done in the previous 55 years combined. I also did one song in 9/8, which I treated like 4/4 with an extra eighth note. Last night I thought to myself what if I did 4/4 but only added an extra eighth note on every other bar? Next thing I know I’m trying to write riffs in 17/8 time. Yup. Song number 58 is in 17/8 time.

It’s not good. Not even close. It’s overly simple because I was afraid if I did anything even minutely complicated on top of the weird time signature then I would never, ever be able to play the guitar part. Nope. I kept it simple as well as rhythmically silly.

Oh, and spoiler alert for tomorrow:

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 79/90

On day 79 (yesterday) we had plans to fly from Cleveland to Boston and then to take an Uber home. We did not do that. The weather was supposed to be shitty and we were worried about flight delays (which did in fact happen) so we rented a car and drove home… from Cleveland… it took 11-12 hours. Also, I got sick.

So no, I did not get any work done on the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. Sorry. I was busy… and sick.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 78/90

Day 78 had no progress at all. Again.

I did, however, see Rush again and it was glorious, again.

There will be no progress on day 79 either. We were supposed to fly home from Cleveland today but the weather forecast is a tad unsettling. We are going to drive it instead. That is about 10 hours, conservatively. No time for homemade rock and roll for me.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 77/90

Day 77’s update is the same as day 76. Nothing. We drove 2656382755 miles going from San Diego, CA to Phoenix, AZ via the moon or something. Today we are flying to Cleveland, OH and tomorrow we fly home.

We are travelin’ folks.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 75/90

Day 75’s progress was the same as day 74’s just without the hoopla. I mixed one song. The project was already technically complete with day 74’s one song, but having 51 songs done and having the project 102% complete is also pretty cool.

Days 76 through 79 are likely going to be shut out. As insanely busy as our trip to California has been this far, it is about to get much busier. I might not get anything more done on this project before I get home. Just as a heads up.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 74/90

Day 74 (yesterday) was super busy moving my step daughter into her new place. There wasn’t much time for anything else, but I did sneak in a few minutes worth of music… now let me think back… what did I do exactly… hmmmm…

Oh yeah, I finished my 50th song! Challenge Complete, kids! I wrote and demoed 50 songs in less than 90 days! Success!

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 73/90

Yesterday was another crazy busy day on our trip out west to help my step daughter move from New England to Southern California. There wasn’t much time for bad music, but I managed.

On day 73 I mixed one song. Not a terribly good song, but it exists and that’s the goal. Well, one of the goals. The primary goal is to write 50 songs in 90 days and yesterday’s mix down brings my finished songs count up to 49. One more to go!

As busy as yesterday was, today is going to be a lot busier. I might get shut out on day 73. We’ll see.

2026 50/90 Challenge Day 72/90

Day 72 (yesterday) was ridiculously busy out here in sunny, gorgeous, Southern California. I have made a command decision: I am never leaving this place.

There wasn’t a lot of time for anything musically related (though we did go to a concert at the massively huge pipe organ in Balboa Park) but I did manage to sneak in a mix for one song. Unlike all of my usual stuff, I actually like this one. I’ve been trying to make 5/8 time a thing and with this song I feel like it worked. I really like this one. I never like my own songs, but I really like this one.

The 50 songs in 90 days challenge has 48 songs finished. That’s 96% complete. Hopefully I’ll be able to eek out some time for another mix today (day 73) but its going to be another busy one. We’ll see.