I spent two hours recording guitars today. I got through so much that I can’t even remember it all.
I started by adding song idea #37. I threw it together on-mic, as it goes. I recorded it as I was writing the guitar parts. It’s super simple but it exists now when it didn’t before. Cool.
I then put rhythm guitars onto three more songs. There is a twist on one of them, I’ll share it in a bit.
I put lead guitars on a bunch of songs… I actually forget how many. Let me check my trello notes… five songs. I put leads onto five songs.
Add the five songs that got vocals this morning and it’s been a pretty cool day, music-wise.
How about some gratuitous guitar pics?
So what about that twist that I mentioned? Years ago my step son was taking guitar lessons. For his birthday I bought him a very inexpensive beginner/student guitar. Given that it was me doing the shopping, I of course bought him a Les Paul. Not a Gibson, but an Epiphone package deal that came with a tiny little solid state amp.
When he moved out we cleaned out his room and I saw the guitar sitting in his closet. He doesn’t play anymore. He’s a piano guy and a percussion guy. Guitar fell off of his musical map. I told him I wanted to play his guitar on my recording project thingie and he didn’t say no so…
One of the songs that got rhythm guitars was played on Harry’s Epiphone Les Paul Special II. Gratuitous photos, of course.
What’s left to do tonight? Hopefully more lyrics and melodies. Maybe a mix or two? We’ll see.
Back in the 80’s, the English hairband Whitesnake broke through in the US in a huge way. I was pretty uninterested. Hair bands did nothing for me, even those who have lead singers who used to be in one of my favorite bands.
Whitesnake’s frontman was David Coverdale who from 1973-1975 or so was the frontman and co-lead vocalist in Deep Purple. He made three records with them. The first is an all time classic, Burn. The second is crap, mostly, other than the title song, Stormbringer, which was also the name of one of the bands I played in back in high school. The third record, Come Taste the Band is nowhere near as good as Burn, but it’s still pretty fantastic.
I don’t know the timeline following that very well, but I think David Coverdale made a couple of solo records, one of which was called White Snake… gee… what was he thinking of when he came up with that name? From there his solo career morphed into the band Whitesnake. Other ex-Purple members, John Lord and Ian Paice, played in that band. I guess they were sort of similar to Deep Purple in a bluesy rock kinda way. At some point Coverdale started firing band members (that’s how I heard it at least) and replaced them with people who were more in tune with 80’s corporate rock and eventually that lead to the self titled album that had a ton of hits on it and that was that.
Bernie Marsden was one of the guitar players in Whitesnake before the corporate shuffle happened. I knew him by reputation but I never gave the band a chance. Well, never until the pandemic when one day I found myself on Apple Music listening to Burn and saw Whitesnake as a suggested listen and I gave an old live record a spin. It sounded Purple-esque. It wasn’t bad. I didn’t take to it the way I once took to Deep Purple, but I had to give it credit. It was a good record.
There was one song in particular that I really liked. I didn’t realize it was a cover song until later, but it’s a good song so what can you do?
There were two guitar players in this band so I don’t know for sure which parts were Bernie Marsden, but they both sound pretty good to me. The thing that I really knew Marsden from was actually not his music, or his playing, but it was his guitar collection. Specifically his 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard, which has the unfortunate name “The Beast”. That guitar is one of those legendary Les Pauls, like Peter Green’s ’59 or Clapton’s ’60. The guitar’s reputation almost supersedes the guitarist’s, if you can believe it.
Bernie Marsden passed away. By all accounts he was a quality guy, a great guitar player, and the proud owner of a classic instrument. He also wrote a couple of those big Whitesnake hits. David Coverdale had a thing for taking songs from the pre-hairband period and re-recording them and releasing them as singles. Marsden co-wrote “Fool for Your Lovin'” which was a good song even to my ears in the 80’s. He also co-wrote “Here I Go Again” which was a mega-hit the second time around. Fortunately the hit version swapped out the word hobo from the chorus, though Coverdale replaced it with drifter which along with gypsy and rock and roll were words that he used over and over and over and over again, constantly.
Rest in peace, Bernie Marsden. I’ll give some of those old Whitesnake records a spin in your honor today.
I had another banger car music morning. I wrote lyrics and melodies for five songs last night and I cranked the vocals for all of them out this morning.
The studio view:
I want to play a ton of guitar today too. I think I can pull it off. Fingers crossed. I want to write more lyrics tonight as well so I can have a third straight car music morning tomorrow.
I already wrote about car music this morning. I put vocals on three songs. What have I done since then?
Well, first I added another song idea. That’s idea number 35. It’s just bass riffs for now. Later, after dinner tonight, I started writing melodies and lyrics. I got through five songs. Count ’em, five songs. They are all crap, but that gives me more than enough for another round of car music tomorrow. Hopefully I’ll follow the morning car music with a pile of guitar tracks. I am hoping to use my step son’s Epiphone beginner model Les Paul copy on at least a song or two, and hopefully that will happen tomorrow.
Plans are in place, I just have to follow through. Progress!
I recorded some vocals this morning. Three songs worth. I drove to the movie theater parking lot so no one could hear me, which is how I do things because I am such a wimp. Here’s the view:
I was only out for about half an hour and I did cut things off early. I had three songs ready to go that were written in August and two more that were written in July. I did the three August songs and was about to start one of the July songs when I opened up the GarageBand file and found there were a lot of lyrics to sing. I just didn’t have the energy and decided to save the two July songs for a weekend session.
I have changed up my workflow a little. Mostly in terms of standards. I am thinking of quick and dirty demoes now, due to flaking off for three weeks and falling so far behind the 50/90 pace. Last night when I wrote the melodies and lyrics for the three songs I recorded this morning I purposely decided to use the same parts in multiple places. Meaning I wrote one verse part and used it 2-3 times. I usually do that with chorus sections but I’m doing it more often now. I also purposely did not write a lot of harmony parts. One or two here and there but nowhere near as many as I usually write. I’m also lowering my standards for what is a useable take. That goes for vocals and guitars. I’m going to be much sloppier than usual and much less nitpicky. Is nitpicky a word?
I want finished demoes from here on out, rather than quality demoes. Know what I mean?
Anyway, here’s the obligatory downtown Methuen clock from the drive home pic:
I mentioned this morning that I put rhythm guitars on two songs and lead guitars on two other songs. Tonight after dinner, while binging season six of the original Doctor Who, I wrote lyrics and melodies for three songs.
You know what that means?
Car music in the morning.
That’s the plan at least. We’ll see if it pans out or not. Fingers crossed. I’ll let you know.
It’s 9:00am on Thursday. I am punched into work, starting the day for reals. What did I do before work? Besides my morning exercise, breakfast, a shower, and a kiss for my wife as she left for the office for the day?
I played some guitar. I put rhythm guitars onto two songs and lead guitars onto two other songs. I have a metric ton of stuff left to do by the end of next month, but we’re picking away at it and a little progress was made. Sigh of relief, babie!
Minimal progress today. I added one song (number 35) to the pipeline. It is just MIDI bass and MIDI drums for now. I’m working from home tomorrow so I am hoping to share more substantial result tomorrow.
Yesterday I had one song that was just a few bass riffs and no structure. Today I worked out a structure for that song and added two more. All three are just bass and drums for now but they are ready for rhythm guitars. I am working in the office tomorrow so I probably won’t have time to get to too much guitar playing but I am hoping I can maybe come up with a couple of lyrics/melodies and maybe be able to do some car vocals the day after tomorrow. That’s the plan at least.
I’m up to 34 songs in progress now. If the challenge runs for three months, that means I have to average 17 songs per month. With a week or so left in the second month, I am sort of on that 17 songs per month pace… sort of. Maybe. I have so much more to do though.
What do you say we try to guilt me into working on the 50/90 challenge by trying to post daily updates again? Think that will work?
Neither do I.
Here goes anyway.
I put rhythm guitars onto two songs, lead guitars onto one song, and added one new song idea. That makes 32 songs in the pipeline.
32 songs underway
1 song is just a few bass riffs without any structure
11 songs have rhythm guitars but no lyrics or melodies
2 songs have lyrics and melodies but no vocals
2 songs have vocals but no lead guitars
4 songs have lead guitars but need to be mixed down
12 songs have been mixed and are finished
And that, dear readers, is where we stand right now. 41 days left. That’s probably not enough to get me to 50 songs with mixed demoes. We’ll see how close I can get though.
Inside the Red Head's Head 