Tag: Guitar

Sleepy Monday

It’s Monday. Back to work today. I’ll punch in about 30 minutes from now. How will the new work week feel? Last week was weird. It simultaneously felt like I never left and like I was completely out of touch and clueless.

Will I feel more like myself and less like an imposter this week? I don’t know. I assume whatever weirdness was happening last week will cease eventually, but when?

I don’t know.

What I do know is that I am trying to have a little chicken for breakfast and I think I went too fast or didn’t chew a bite thoroughly enough because my stomach is acting unhappily. It feels like a little pressure in my digestive track. Almost like there’s a bite of food sitting outside of the stomach, waiting for the bouncer to let him in. I may have used that analogy before. Have I? I can’t recall for sure. I think I’ll wait five minutes or so before the next bite. How exciting is this?

Speaking of post-op recovery. One of the restrictions they put on me was not lifting anything heavy for six weeks. 25 pounds was the limit. I’ve been wanting to swap the amp out of my music nook, but both amps are over 40 pounds. Fortunately my six weeks are up on Wednesday. Vox out/Fender in, the day after tomorrow.

Last night was the first night since before the surgery that I failed to get six hours of sleep. Five hours and 40 minutes. I’m feeling sleepy right now. My sleeping hart rate dip was 21%, and my restful sleep time was four hours and five minutes. Those numbers are pretty good. The total though… early to bed tonight?

Okay. I think I will punch in now.

Remix

You know how each of the last two nights I wrote a post about how I mixed a song? Neither of the audio embeds will work anymore. I deleted the uploads and replaced them with remixed versions of the songs. I changed the reverbs on all tracks on both songs from plates to rooms. I feel a tiny bit better about the universe now.

ADDENDUM: Scratch that. I went back and fixed the two previous posts. I linked to the remixed versions of both songs. That’s better.

Volume Seven Lives!

Quarantine Tunes was going to end at volume six, but here we are with the first song from volume seven! It’s like when Kiss goes on a farewell tour and then a year later goes on a comeback tour! WOOHOO

This is my favorite song from February’s RPM Challenge. It’s a little faster, has a couple of new sections, some really awful lead guitar playing, and everything is tuned down a half step.

Volume seven lives!

Better but Still Bad

I worked on guitars for two songs tonight. Rhythm on one and lead on the other. Just like last night the rhythm went okay but the leads sucked. My sense of timing is all out of whack. I’m just not feeling it. Practice! I need to practice!

I swapped out the Keeley D&M drive for the Wampler Plexi Drive Mini. That pedal wasn’t doing it for me before but I tweaked the settings and finally got it to play nicely with the Klon KTR in front of it. It might stay on the board for a while.

Pedal board Tetris Fail

Last night I mentioned that I was going to add another overdrive pedal to my big pedal board. Well, not today.

I took it out of the case and looked it over to see if I could fit that extra pedal. It’s a mini pedal, so yay? I can’t fit it into the spot it will go in the signal chain. If I am going to use it I will have to put it somewhere else and then wire it in the proper order with some longer patch cables.

There is a spot where it should fit easily. Unfortunately, the only cables I have that will reach from where it should be to where it is and back are not right angle connections and with those plugged in on each side it won’t fit. Not even close.

So the moral of the story is, don’t forget the importance of having the right kind of cables. Now I want to rewire the whole kit and caboodle (did I spell that right?) with the thinnest pancake connections I can get my mitts on. Oh well.

Quick Musical Thoughts

Just jotting down a couple of quick music thoughts.

Car music tomorrow? I have three songs ready for vocals so why not? It’s the last day of my sick leave too so again, why not?

The day after tomorrow is the day I go back to work. I think it’s also the day I reach out to the guys in the band and tell them I’m feeling ready to get together. I mean that from both a recovery stand point and a Covid standpoint. I just think it’s time.

If a practice is in our future, I think I’ve changed my mind on what gear to bring. I was going to bring the new pedal board but now I think I’m going to bring the old one. I might add an extra dirt pedal or two as well. We shall see.

Okay, it’s time for bed. I need to get some sleep if I want to car music in the morning. G’night, folks.

I Am Just Awful (on guitar)

I worked on four songs today! Woohoo!

I put rhythm parts on two songs and it went okay. Certainly not good, but okay.

I put leads on two songs and oh my god was it awful! Just atrocious! Train wreck-esque. Wow. I might have to redo it all but I’ll probably just live with it.

What fun!

Tube Amps are Heavy

There was some talk between a couple of us in the band of trying to get everyone together sometime in June and seeing if we can have a band practice or something. I’m really hoping we can make that happen.

I started figuring out what to use for gear for this hypothetical jam. My new Les Paul is a given. The new pedal board I put together a few weeks ago is a given too. For the amplifier I was going to bring my AC15. There’s a problem with that though.

I’m under doctors orders to not lift anything heavy. I’m maxed at 25 pounds. That continues at the minimum through mid-June. Unfortunately tube amps, even little ones, are freaking heavy. My AC15 weighs about 50 pounds. Okay, so that’s out. I’m now planning on taking my MV50 and my Fender 1×12 cab. That’ll work.

Once we get into July I’ll bring the AC15. I want to bring my Deluxe Reverb home from the rehearsal room so I can use it on home demo goofiness. That amp is even heavier, so it’s going to stay where it is for now. I could use that at the first practice, but I’m afraid something might have happened during the 2+ years it’s been sitting and I don’t want to rely on it.

So NuTubes it is.

Lester Lives

I played my new Les Paul today. First time in over two months. I had two songs to work on and I only got to one, but it was awesome. I love that guitar. I celebrated a wedding anniversary with the woman who bought me that guitar for my 50th birthday last year and somehow that makes it all that much cooler.