Tag: Song Writing

Three Songs

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I recorded lead guitars and mixed three songs tonight. That puts me at 11 out of the goal of 50. Why the rush? I mean, my laptop battery is down to 9%. Surely I could have pushed one song off to tomorrow.

February, March, April, May, June… all have a complete album in a month project. Also, they all were completed on the 29th day of the month.

Today is the 29th of July, and I now have a complete album in a month project for this month, even though that is not technically the challenge I’m playing with at the moment. I still did it, and I still did it by the 29th. Cool.

This one isn’t very good:

This one is okay, I guess:

This one is also okay, I guess:

And now to celebrate my goofy milestone, here are some tintype photos because it’s 1850 or so.

Back on the Floor

Jen asked for one of the little step stools back so she could use it in the kitchen, so the Bassbreaker is back to sitting on the floor. I’ll find a replacement somewhere.

I thought about playing my Les Paul tonight in memory of the great Peter Green, but the 335 is the only guitar I have with relatively fresh strings. I’ll switch back to the Les Paul soon though… even though Peter Green only really played a Les Paul for about four years worth of his career, it was the important four years, if you know what I mean.

Another Sunday Car Music

I gave the birds at the light pole a break today and moved over a bit to annoy a tree.

I wrote the lyrics for five songs over the last few days, most of them last night. This morning I recorded them all… poorly. I was out for about 90 minutes and it took me about 50 to warm up. I wish I could actually sing, you know?

50/90 has five songs finished, six songs ready for lead guitar, three songs ready for lyrics, and three songs waiting for rhythm guitar. I’m still stuck at 17. I was hoping to make a dent in the project this weekend, but with my mother in the hospital I’ve spent about 90% of my time just staring at the phone and waiting for news that isn’t coming.

As for the July album in a month mini-project, I have a shot at having 11 songs that are completely written and recorded in July. I’m not sure if I am going to have it in me for more lyrics and car vocals before the end of the month, but I should be able to finish off at least five of the six songs that have vocals already. We’ll see.

On the whole, I am hoping to be a more productive member of society today. Instead of sitting and staring at the phone waiting for news, I am going to try and do some yard work while staring at the phone and waiting for news. We’ll see how that goes.

Please please please please let them discharge her today. Please please please.

10% Done

I mixed two songs tonight while sitting here feeling like a wrung out dishrag after the events of the day.

Five songs down. 50/90 is 10% complete.

I’m still stuck at 17 songs in the pipeline. 14 have rhythm guitars. One has vocals. Everything ready to be mixed is now mixed. Today is day 19. 71 days left.

Look Kids, Another Dumb Rock Song

Yup, it’s another big dumb rocker. I kinda like this one though, I wish I could sing. That would probably helped this one out a bit.

I have two more songs ready to mix. I could probably do another one tonight but… naw, we’ll get ’em tomorrow.

Wah Pedal’s Point of View

I leaned my iPhone against my wah pedal and took this with my Apple Watch. What a world we live in, eh?

I put rhythm guitars onto songs 11 and 12, put lead guitars onto songs 3 and 4, and mixed song 1. Not bad for a day where I worked more than 10 hours and then cooked dinner and am totally ready for bed at 10 minutes to 9:00.

You old person, you.

The 2020 50/90 Challenge will not be a shut out for me this year. One song down, 49 to go.

Car Music

I did about 90 minutes of car music today over at the movie theater parking lot. I was going to do it yesterday, but I would have left the house at a little after 8:00am and that seemed really late for car music. Today I didn’t leave until 8:15, so by Saturday logic I shouldn’t have gone. Fortunately the whole area was dead as dead can be on a Sunday morning and the only issues I had were a car that drove by close, and a security car that drove by not-close. Excellent.

I parked in my usual spot, next to a light pole where two little birds have a nest. They were there today and… well… I think i caught them in a private, intimate moment…

I’m very sorry I intruded, my feathered friends, but maybe next time keep it in the nest while there’s a crowd, m’kay?

As for the vocalizing, I had five songs ready to go and I did them all. Song #3 was hard. Why did I do that to myself? I don’t know.

50/90 Day 12 Update

I suppose it’s time for a 50/90 update. Let’s do some math, shall we?

July 4th through October 1st. 90 days over three months.

90 songs in three months means 16.67 songs per month. Thanks for coming out even, stupid math. So at the minimum, two of the three months need 17 songs and one needs 16. Since July starts on the 4th instead of the 1st, July is the shortest month, therefore logically July should be the month that only needs 16 songs.

Math is hard.

As of bed time last night I have 16 songs in progress. All of them have the song form set, half of them have very badly performed guitar parts recorded, none of them have lyrics or melody yet, and all of them pretty much suck so far.

But….

I am on the minimum pace.

I want to record some guitars tonight, and I’m hoping that by the time the weekend is over there will be some vocals down too. We’ll see. That might be a tall order.

I also feel that I should warn you, faithful readers (he said like he was Stephen freakin’ King or something) that a few minutes ago I started on what could be the nerdiest project I have ever undertaken… and that’s saying something.

Jen and I have become a little weirdly obsessed with candles during our four month lock down. All through our work days we both have a candle or two (or three) burning near our desk. I don’t really know why, and I don’t think she does either, but we do.

This morning when I lit my desk candles I started taking a time lapse video of one of them. I pointed my iPad at a candle, started recording, and lit the bastard. I was planning to let it run for an hour or so out of fear that the battery wouldn’t last for much longer than that. As I was writing this though, I found a lightning cable long enough to plug my iPad in without moving it from it’s video-ing location.

It is possible that I could take a full 8-9 hour long time lapse video of this candle. Oh. My. Nerd. Hopefully I don’t accidentally knock over the iPad or something. Knowing me like I do, I’ll probably do something stupid to screw this up and spare you, faithful readers, from my epic nerdness.

We shall see.

Music Project Confusion

I know that embedded player isn’t going to work but I put it there anywhere because I think it’s nice to look at.

Eight songs for 50/90 underway but a long way from finished. My question is… do I put my focus into 50/90, into sticking with 10 songs per month and telling 50/90 to go get bent, or do I put my focus into Quarantine Tunes Volume 2?

I. Don’t. Know.

I spent some time before work looking at the songs I have marked for volume 2. Okay, back story. When I first started The Great 2015 Re-Recording Project back in (you guessed it) 2015, there were 10 songs on the list. Each year as I tried to restart the abandoned project I added a few songs. When I started this year I was at 21. None of them more recent than 2016 (I think). For some reason I wanted to go with eight songs per volume so I added in three more recent songs to bring the total up to 24. Most of those 24 haven’t been started yet. Of the eight I have planned for volume 2, three will be from scratch, the other five were started at some point along the line over the past five years.

Today, before work, the second guessing started. I was looking at the songs I have marked for volumes 3 and 4, there was one that I couldn’t remember. I dug it out of my alonetone account and liked it. It was from June 2014. I knew there was another June ’14 song on the list so I took a listen to a couple of others… and they were good. It made me question the universe.

I know that my 2013 RPM Challenge went better than most. My 2016 RPM Challenge also went better than most. The 2014 50/90 had some extra good stuff too. Apparently I should be including June 2014 in the list of good ones. So what, do I drop some songs and replace them with June 2014 songs? Do I start planning volume five? I. Don’t. Know.

I don’t want to abandon the album in a month per month thing I’ve been doing for five months now. I don’t really want to abandon 50/90 either. I don’t want to abandon the great re-recording either, but I don’t want it to dominate everything else and as it stands right now it is.

Crud.

You know what? Weekly Lizardfish practices would be better than any of this shit.

Screw you, Coronavirus.