I finished recording all of the guitar tracks I wanted to do yesterday but didn’t end up having time for. Hooray!
I played through a speaker again, but unlike yesterday I had to lower the volume to a tolerable level. I had the house to myself yesterday so I could approach ear-bleeding volume. Today my wife, the love of my life Jen, is home so I had to tone it down a lot. That’s okay. It’s still more fun playing through a speaker than playing direct into the computer.
I put rhythm guitars onto one song for the Record Every Month Challenge, and lead guitars onto three songs for my re-recording old songs project, aka The Great 2015 Re-Recording Project, or also aka Quarantine Tunes.
My leads weren’t good, but they were better than most of the stuff I’ve recorded of late.
Okay, so how much music did I work on today? I already mentioned in a previous post that I put vocals onto three songs and bass guitar (MIDI) onto one. After posting that update, I added bass and drums (both MIDI) to one song and rhythm guitars to three.
That’s not even close to what I was hoping to get to today, but I’ll take it. The guitar tracks I recorded used my Fender Deluxe Reverb at a slightly, borderline absurd volume. It was louder than my usual gig volume… and it was awesome.
When I pick up where I left off I will have to go back to direct signal out of the amps into the USB interface. It’s still fun and it still sounds good, but it’s not as fun. It’s not as epic. It’s not as awesome.
Maybe more tomorrow? Maybe some car vocals? We’ll see.
I woke up this morning with every intention of working in the office. Now it’s 9:07am though and I am sitting at my desk at home.
I woke up a touch later than I wanted to, and that was the first issue. By the time I finished my morning exercise (jogging [pronounced yogging] in place for 45 minutes) I just couldn’t bring myself to drive into the office. Instead of packing up my stuff I just ate breakfast and finished the episode of The X-Files that I was watching (the one where the baseball player in the ’40’s is an alien in disguise… not the best episode).
I am still planning on making tomorrow (Saturday) a major musical day. Jen is going to be at a conference all day so I am on my own. The to-do list includes getting a haircut (which I desperately need) and an oil change for one of the cars. Other than that, it’s music. The Record Every Month Challenge and Quarantine Tunes Volume Seven… and maybe a start on Volume Eight too.
I promise you, owe internets, that there will be guitar playing, song writing, and recording done on Saturday. Unless I change my mind and just sleep and watch TV all day, of course.
Anyway, here’s today’s photo a day challenge masterpiece.
I am going to work in the office today and tomorrow. There won’t be any time for morning music. There isn’t even time to post this world-shattering blog entry.
Saturday… I will play guitar on Saturday. I’ll setup some GarageBand files tonight and tomorrow. Maybe a couple of re-recording things and an entry or two for the Record Every Month challenge that I haven’t even given a single thought to yet even though it’s March 21st.
Check it out, I said I was going to mix a song and here I am with a second mix! It’s bonus song time!
This was the title song from an RPM Challenge a couple of years ago. It’s okay. It was probably borderline worthy of re-recording, but now that it’s done I am all right with it. It’s not a disaster, though the goofy panning tricks I did at the beginning and end are probably mistakes.
I mixed a song, just like I said I might in my last post. I guess I am just the kind of guy who keeps his promises to himself and his blog.
This one was written and originally recorded last summer (June, I think) for the Record Every Month challenge thing that I haven’t even thought about this month. I should probably come up with something new soon seeing as the month is half over. Anyway. I liked it a lot right away and immediately added it to the Quarantine Tunes list. Now it’s done and I still like it. I can’t say if I like this new take better than the old one, but I do think it’s all right.
First, allow me to let the great Jeff Beck answer this question (with some help from Rod Stewart and Ron Wood):
No, I am not superstitious. Sorry to let you down. Didn’t we just have to answer something about whether or not we believed in fate? Was that here or was that one of the 1000000 lame ass polls I’ve seen on Threads? I don’t recall.
Nope, I don’t believe in superstitions. I don’t believe in astrology. I don’t believe in fairy tales, especially ones about dudes who claim to be their own fathers. I don’t believe that walking under a ladder is going to cause me to have a bad day. I don’t believe in any of that stuff.
I do believe in Stevie Wonder though, and even more hero-worshipfully, I believe in Jeff Beck. I also believe that Jeff Beck did a session for a Stevie Wonder record and in payment Stevie wrote Jeff a song that he could use with his new metal band, Beck Bogert Appice. I believe that song was freakin’ epic.
While I believe in the epic nature of that song, I do not believe that the BB&A version was better than the Stevie Wonder version that Mr Wonder was asked to record by his label because they were afraid he had given away a potential classic… which of course he did. As big a fan as I am of the legendary Mr Jeff Beck, Stevie’s version is way better.
Both of those versions, however, are better than the version my band, Lizardfish, recorded at a rehearsal one day. Yeah, we played Superstition too.
So no, I am not superstitious, but I do know a couple of killer songs when I hear them.
I mixed a song for The Great 2015 Re-Recording Project, aka Quarantine Tunes (Volume Seven). I should really wait until tomorrow to share it anywhere because I am so freakin’ tired that I can’t tell if this sounds anywhere near decent or not.
I actually finished recording this song in June of 2022. Coming up on two years ago. Why did I wait so long to mix it? Because I fear that I actually freakin’ love this song. The chorus just slaps. Well, at least to my ears it does. The rest of the song is okay, but the chorus just makes me want to bang my head and scream. It is very rare for me to feel that way about one of my own songs. So rare that when it happens, the idea of screwing up a mix really scares the shit out of the tiny little creative portion of my tiny little brain.
I don’t want to screw up a good song, dig?
Anyway, here’s the good song that I probably screwed up. I’ll listen to it tomorrow after I’ve slept and see if I still find the mix acceptable. I doubt I will, and if I don’t then I’ll remix it.
Today is Robin Trower’s 79th birthday. Happy Birthday!
He is unusual for a guitarist of his generation in that he hasn’t seemed to have lost a step at all. Most guys who are pushing 80 years old are not playing as well today as they did a couple of decades ago. Not Robin Trower. He’s as good, if not better, than he was 20 or 30 or even 40 years ago. I wonder what his secret is. Probably something lame like taking care of himself and practicing a lot.
Okay, it’s March 9th which means this post is about nine days late. Here’s my final mention of the 2024 RPM Challenge.
Two playlists. One is the “album” I submitted to the RPM Challenge website. The album is called The Potato Situation, after something Jen said to me about making dinner that was really funny and I decided would live on forever in album title form. 10 songs. One or two might be better than crap. The rest are meh at best.
The second playlist is also 10 songs and officially qualifies as an RPM Challenge win in it’s own right, but I did not submit it to the website. Why? Because these are the 10 songs that weren’t good enough to make the final cut. As meh as the official album is, these are worse. There are some really boring stinkers in this pile, but the point of the challenge is to ignore your internal censor and just make stuff happen. In that respect, this playlist is a winner.
And there you have it, folks. Two, 10 song playlists representing two sides of the same project coin… or something like that. Another successful February. I wish the quality were a little better, but I’m happy with the win. I’ll take it.
Now I can get back to the Quarantine Tunes Volume Seven that I’ve been picking away at for a couple of years. Maybe I’ll mix a song or two this weekend. We’ll see.
