Tag: Guitar

Musical Notes for This Week

This is a to do list… read the title… it is a pun, my friends. Get it? I made a pun! It’s punny. It’s puntastic.

Ugh.

The current home recording music project is to take 10 songs from the 2020 Fifty Songs in 90 Days Challenge, edit them, rearrange them, rewrite them, and completely re-record them. When I punched out of work last night I had the 10 songs picked out. One is mixed and finished. Five are completely recorded but still need to be mixed. The other four hadn’t been touched.

Last night while sitting up in bed I took one of them and got as far as finishing the MIDI music bed. Bass, drums, arrangement, song form changes, all done. This morning after I finished today’s errands I cranked out the other three. Now I have four songs ready for rhythm guitars.

Best case scenario is that I track all of the rhythm guitars tomorrow. I work in the office on Monday so nothing is happening then. Tuesday morning before work should be car music where I track all of the vocals. Wednesday is back in the office. Thursday is lead guitars before work. At that point I will have all tracking done for all 10 songs before we leave for Florida.

Yeah. Let’s see if we can pull this off.

Note: It is 99% certain that I will not pull this off. When it comes to the musical planning stage, Robert is not terribly reliable.

Unrelated musical note… one of the reasons my band’s singer quit was because he moved to Maine. He told us yesterday that he’s moved back to the Merrimack Valley. He also mentioned getting “the itch.” Now is that an itch to just have one band practice just for fun, or is it an itch to get back into the band? I don’t know but I am thinking about maybe being hopeful that our singer search could be over. It’s probably not, but if I can’t be optimistic about the Bruins anymore this year, then I’ll be optimistic about this.

Sneaky Guitar

I managed to sneak in some guitar playing today in between my doctors appointment and punching in to work. The recording project I am trying to work through right now had three songs that needed lead guitar tracks. I finished off all three of them. My playing was poor at best, but who cares. Bad playing is better than no playing, right?

Here’s where things get super nerdy. I had three songs that needed work… and I used a different guitar on each song. My only regret is that I didn’t have a forth song to work on so I didn’t get to use all four of my guitars. Oh well. In further nerd news, I took a picture of each guitar with my Nikon Z5 and… well… nerd… I took a selfie with my iPhone of me playing each guitar too. Thanks, camera app on my Apple Watch that has a timer built into it.

DSC_2361
Gibson ES-335 Pro
Nerd playing a Gibson ES-335 Pro
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Gibson Les Paul Standard 50’s
Nerd playing a Gibson Les Paul Standard 50’s
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Gibson Les Paul Custom
Nerd playing a Gibson Les Paul Custom

Not Today, Maybe Tomorrow

No guitar playing today. It’s an office day and I didn’t have time.

Tomorrow though? Maybe? Not at 100 decibels like on Wednesday, but maybe? We’ll see. There’s stuff on the to do list that has to come first, but maybe…

253/365
253/365

Also, unrelated… cats… in silhouette.

Thanks for Nothing, Bruins

6-1? They lost 6-1? On my fucking birthday? Thanks for nothing, Bruins. Way to kick a red head when he’s down. Damn it!

As the hockey world was imploding all over the state of Florida, I tried to ease my pain by mixing a song. I think it sounds okay. It probably doesn’t, but I am trying to be nicer to myself now that I am 53 years old and shit.

This is the first of probably 10 songs that will make up the eighth round of The Great 2015 Re-Recording Project, aka Quarantine Tunes Volume Eight, aka the Best of the 2020 50/90 Challenge (as all 10 songs are from that project, similar to how Quarantine Tunes Volume Five was all songs from the 2021 50/90 Challenge… which was WAY better than 2020).

Friggin’ Bruins ruining my friggin’ birthday. Jerks.

My Ears are Killing Me

I said I was going to celebrate my 53rd birthday with a work-on-music day and that’s just what I’ve done.

I have worked on new recordings of five old songs. Two songs got lead guitar tracks. Two songs got rhythm guitar tracks and vocals. One final song got bass, drums, rhythm guitars, and vocals. I don’t know if the clock is going to cooperate or not, but the three songs that did not get lead guitars today might still get lead guitars today.

I was home alone for all of this guitar playing… so I played through my Fender Deluxe Reverb… the best amp I’ve ever owned… and I played loud. Very loud. The decibel meter on my Apple Watch topped 100 db once. Yeah. My ears are killing me. Oh glorious noise!

251/365

Robin seems pretty sad about the news about Steve Albini but she agrees that playing the guitar at a disturbing volume is as good a way to honor his memory as any.

Cheer Me Up, Cat

I’m in the office today and I am struggling a little. It’s my stomach again, but this time I don’t think it has anything to do with gastric bypass. Not directly. When things went bad last week I changed my diet out of fear of a relapse. That has lead to a lingering issue that I would explain further, but we’re already deep, deep into TMI territory so I will shut up.

Suffice to say, am I feeling things because of these lingering issues, or because I need to eat something soon, or is there some other reason I haven’t considered yet? The analysis nerd that lives in my head is fascinated by all of this. The rest of me just feels uncomfortable. I really am weird, aren’t I?

Anyhoo, as is usually the case when I work from the office I managed to snag a quick photo for today’s photo a day challenge entry before I left the house. This one is a classic. Robin was on the living room bay window. The curtains were closed, but I saw her jump up there and I pulled the curtain open just enough to slip my iPhone inside and snap one.

250/365
250/365

Look at that mug, would ya? Just look at it! Think she noticed me? Good kitty was totally busted. HA!

Changing the subject, tomorrow is my birthday and I took a vacation day because hells yes I did. I need to go back to Lens Crafters to see if they can adjust my new glasses. They are really tight along the side of my head and they hurt. I like them tight, just not that tight. I also plan to play my guitar at an absurd volume. It’s a celebration day after all, or something like that. I’m going to turn 53. That’s too old to still be celebrating birthdays, but I need an excuse to crank my amp and this is as good as any. I’m hoping the questions my non-human digestive system are asking will be answered by then. If they are… then I could be visiting that sugar free bakery again.

Those are questions for tomorrow though. For today we just need to decide if we want to do a normal lunch or a meal replacement/protein bar work around. I’m leaning toward a real lunch, but that back fired on me four days ago. I’m sure I’ll let you know, what with me being the King of TMI Posts and all.

More Guitar

Two days in a row. It is silly how sneaking in 20-30 minutes of guitar playing before work in the morning can just brighten up the whole day. Silly and a little weird, maybe.

I mentioned last night that I started working on a new song for the re-recording project thing. I put rhythm guitars on it this morning after I did my daily exercise and had a quick breakfast. Done and done. I used direct outs from two of my amps again. That’s the norm now. Oh well. It sounded pretty good today. It sounded pretty good yesterday too, I think.

Here’s the obligatory guitar pic. Let’s use it for today’s photo a day project as well. Day 243 of 365. Actually… 366, but we won’t worry about that until the end of the line.

243/365

Another Song Ready

While sitting in the living room tonight being totally annoyed that there was neither a Bruins game nor a Red Sox game (WTF?) I took my frustrations out on another song for the re-recording project. Now I have a song that is ready to get some rhythm guitar tracks tomorrow… assuming I get up early enough and have time to play some guitar before work. We’ll see.

Stupid NHL and MLB both scheduling a night off for their Boston teams on the same night. Jerks. Also, for the record, I don’t care about the Celtics so if they are playing tonight don’t bother trying to cheer me up by mentioning them. If they are playing tonight it will probably annoy me even more.

Pre-Work Guitars

I mentioned last night that I was hoping to get some guitar playing in before work.

This morning? I got some guitar playing in before work.

I put rhythm guitars on the song I worked on last night, and lead guitars on the only other song I had in progress. I think I might have a little time to add vocals on Thursday morning, so I’m hoping to start another song tonight and put rhythm guitars onto it before work tomorrow. Wednesday is an in the office day so there’s no time for anything there. If I apply myself (HA! Fat chance of that!) I might be able to get to three songs ready to mix by early next week. That would be cool.

The current project is updating, editing, rewriting, and rerecording songs that were originally written for the 2021 Fifty Songs in Ninety Days challenge. I picked 10 songs to focus on. I might decide along the way that some of them are unworthy, but as of now we’re going with 10. Two songs in progress. Many more to mess around with.

242/365
242/365