Tag: Music

Two Fun Monday Things

I just want to add a quick post to mention two things that just happened because they are funny and weird and worth mentioning on a pointless blog like this.

I’ve mentioned before that I like to listen to podcasts while I work. I play them through the Apple HomePod Minis in the bedroom. Today when I tried to connect to them via Airplay they weren’t available. I asked Siri to tell me the weather and it came back saying it wasn’t connected to the internet. Our HomePods are setup through Jen’s Home app so I told her and when she gets a chance she’ll look at it.

A few minutes later, I am sitting at my desk working and suddenly, seemingly at random, Deep Purple’s Space Truckin’ comes roaring out of the HomePods. Oh yeah, it does! Come on, let’s go space truckin’ babie!

I know why it happened, but it’s just really funny that it did. Once the song was over it started playing some horrid Aerosmith song and I couldn’t get that bastard shut off fast enough. The Purple song though, that was a treat.

A few minutes after that I decided to water the plants. Literally, that’s not a urination reference. I literally watered the plants. I have a candle burning on the same table the plants sit on. As I was watering one particular plant I smelled smoke. I then saw smoke. Huh? Oh, it’s just my arm. It was over the candle and my arm hairs were singeing off. That’s all. Nothing major. No damage done… except to a few arm hairs. I can still sort of smell it though.

All of this before 10:00am

Lazy Sunday

It’s Sunday and Jen and I are just hanging out in the office. We’re in the midst of a grande experiment to improve one facet of our existence. It’s something incredibly important that everyone deals with every day……..

Pillows.

We’re trying to up our pillow game, big time. Jen ordered some pillows the other day and we used them last night. They were very firm. Much firmer than we’ve ever used before. Jen didn’t like them. I haven’t really decided yet. Too firm? Maybe. Too firm to use? I don’t know. We are trying another set of pillows next that are a little squishier. I expect they will be Goldilox: just right.

What else is going on? I am going to have a painful week at work this week, so I’m enjoying the calm today. I’ll pay for it later. I have another day off this week too. Wednesday. That’s three consecutive Wednesdays I’ve been out of work. The other two had actual reasons. This week is just because I had to burn eight hours of vacation time in order to avoid maxing out at the end of the month. I will likely have to do a couple of days in February too, but at least I can use the RPM Challenge as my excuse.

I am a little sad today. A few weeks ago I ordered a pile of new clothes. Two t-shirts didn’t come quickly, but they finally came at the end of last week. The two shirts came from the Rush Backstage store. Yup. I’m wearing my fav band on a t-shirt. Unfortunately, the first of the two that I’ve tried on is really small. It has made me sad. I guess I am going to have to go through a weight loss surgery process in order to get smaller so the shirt will fit. I’m guessing the second band shirt is going to be small too, but I haven’t tried it on yet.

I can’t think of anything else to write about. Jen picked up a copy of NHL ’22 and I started playing it yesterday. Maybe I’ll sneak in another game tonight. I’m playing through the Spengler Cup. I have no idea how that tournament works, but I haven’t lost a game yet. I have it on the lowest difficulty level though, so if I lose a game it means I royally suck.

Okay. Ms Patches just came into the room and she’s meowing for attention. I think I’ll post this and go pet her. Bye for now.

Scraping the Bottom of the Barrel

Right, so I did four rounds of re-recording old songs, then a round of re-recording recent songs, and now one more round of old songs. I am absolutely scraping the bottom of the barrel here, and the barrel isn’t exactly what you’d call deep.

This one comes from the failed 2010 RPM Challenge, which wasn’t finished until late summer 2011, along with the failed 2011 RPM Challenge. It’s slow, it’s dumb, and it’s ridiculously simple, but it’s got a lot of fuzz on it so it’s okay in my book.

Guitar Playing is Fun

I chased this morning’s car vocals with some guitar playing. Bad guitar playing, but better than my usual crap. Well… maybe not that much better. Whatever.

I put leads on three songs. Volume six of the Great 2015 Re-Recording Project now has four songs ready to mix and only two more in the pipeline that aren’t ready to mix. Maybe I’ll mix a song tonight. That’d be fun, wouldn’t it?

Pictures!

Another Frosty Morning

Compared to the last two days, this morning was a downright balmy 17 degrees when I went outside for some singing in the car. Just like yesterday I managed two songs. That leaves two for tomorrow. One song was a mellow guy in a register that’s really easy for me to sing. The other was very shouty and a smidge too high for comfort. Fortunately it only had one part.

I did the mellow song first to warm up. It went pretty simple. Two part harmony, but nothing too taxing. Then on to the harder song where I did the thing I keep doing. I only had one part to sing, right? So I added a harmony part that runs all the way through. That means I doubled the amount of shouty stuff I had to do. Dumb ass.

By the time I was done I was done. It was still early, I still had battery, I still had an empty bladder. It was my voice that sent me home. Hoping for some more guitar tonight… or maybe within the next few minutes or so, then some more vocal fun tomorrow? One of the two songs that remain has a lot of three part harmony. That should be painful and awkward as hell.

Rock on!

The secret to a successful car music turns out to be my glasses. Who knew?

I thought I’d switch things up on the drive home pics too and show you my town’s gigantic city hall.

…then I took a clock pic anyway, just because.

Wah Wah

I played some guitar tonight. I wasn’t going to but I did and it made me happy.

I redid a couple of rhythm guitar tracks that I didn’t like the sound of and then I put leads on one of the songs that got vocals this morning. I used my new wah pedal a lot. It’s a Real McCoy Custom RMC10 and it is killer. The sweep on it is gigantic. It starts on Monday and ends on Thursday. That’s how gigantic the sweep is. It’s actually so much wider than I’m used to that I think it is going to take some time to adjust my brain to it. It sounds great though.

I started putting leads on the other song that got vocals this morning but I had to stop before I finished. I used my Fuzz Face again but this time I stuck a Klon copy after it as a boost and it was gnarly and bitchin and mean and nasty and wonderful.

Fuzz Face pedals and wah-wahs are notorious for not working well together. I haven’t tried the combo yet with the new wah, but I will.

I hope to get in some more car music tomorrow. We’ll see. For now though, I am feeling pretty good about the little bit that I accomplished tonight.

It’s Cold Out There

Yesterday I skipped a car music opportunity because it was seven degrees out. Today when the question of to car music or not to car music arose I checked the temperature again. It was eight degrees out. Okay, that’s warm enough. Off we go!

I had six songs queued up to record vocals. I did two. I worked on one, and then ran the heater in the car for a few minutes and worked on the second. My voice was still feeling okay after two songs. The battery on the laptop was still good. I hadn’t been outside for very long so the clock was in good shape. Why did I stop after two? Because sometimes sitting out in the cold has a negative effect on the old bladder. I had to pee. If not for that I might still be out there yelling.

I’m hoping to go out again tomorrow and pick off another couple, and then wrap it up next week. Monday if possible, but I am off work again on Wednesday so maybe wait until then.

Now the obligatory drive-home-through-the-center-of-town pic!

As a bonus, there’s also this picture that was snapped accidentally while trying to open up the camera app.

It’s Bloody Cold Out!

I did it. I got up early and showered and got dressed and was all ready to grab my lappytop and jump into the car and do some effin’ car music!

“Hey Siri, how’s the weather?” he asked.

“The current temperature is seven degrees. The high today will be 19 degrees and the low will be seven degrees,” Siri replied.

Well screw that! It’s bloody cold out there! I wonder how the forecast for tomorrow morning is looking. I just looked… it’s pretty much the same as today. Crap.

On a not quite related note, the RPM Challenge website used to have a blog section and a forum and it was all replaced by a Discord channel. Discord makes me feel old. You know the stereotype about the old people who are unable or unwilling to embrace new technology? It’s not that I don’t get it, it’s just that I don’t want to. I used to use those ICR boards back in the stone age, and I used the AOL chatrooms before that. Discord feels exactly like them. So it’s not a matter of failing to embrace a new technology, it’s more a matter of not having any interest in re-embracing an ancient one. I guess. I’m trying though.

On a totally unrelated note, Rest in Peace Meat Loaf. My sister had Bat Out of Hell when it was actually current, if you can imagine a world that far in the past. I would occasionally take it for a spin when she wasn’t around.