That One Damn Song 2.18.2011

So, I missed this last week, but I have been working...I've got three tracks in various stages of work on disk, and the three other tracks I've had in waiting, plus I've got about three other songs moving rapidly in the writing stage. Conceptually, things are really moving quickly, but (as I think I've said before) the sheer flexibility of the new equipment has got me re-arranging and re-working well past where I would ever have before.

That said, I didn't have any time this week to record any monitor feeds. No ear candy for y'all. Mea culpa.

I'm beginning to understand what happened to Axl Rose with Chinese Democracy. Especially when tinkering costs me nothing. I can cut and re-cut, and re-cut...who cares?

Not like anyone is waiting with baited breath. Although, I do have my personal deadline, which I will stick to.

"Zep" is actually in pretty good shape, at this point. I basically did what I laid out in the last entry. There's now an acoustic bed under the entire song, for the most part, and I've succeeded in cleaning up the entire performance, I think. The "riff" section is now just bass, all the guitars were taken out. (No having to slam down the faders in mixing.) At this point, I have to go back and do the vocals and the guitar solo, which are always the last steps for me, and get Paul to lay in the final bass track(s), of course.

I was trying to not lay down any bass for these songs, since I had someone who is an actual bassist willing. Problem is, I want to hear bass of some sort when I'm working on guitars. It just makes things easier for me.

"Tobacco & Lotto" is pretty far along, I even got the vocal line down. Frankly, the step up in my equipment really hit home during that process. The new Tascam simply cuts much, much cleaner tracks, and offers many, many more effects options. I put an exciter mic effect on the input, and I've never heard my voice quite like that. I'm gonna need to "dirty" it up a bit, it's just that kind of track, but I certainly got a "pop" on the vocals I never had before.

The lyrics on this track also finally came together pretty damn well. I found a nice rhyme that tied into the title, and the direction I wanted to go thematically. I think I need to work on how I'm singing the chorus, but otherwise I'm firmly convinced it'll work well. I doubt I'll ever put up a snippet with vocals, as I just don't trust my voice enough without the full mastering "fix."

"Reason," which is the oldest tune in this particular recording project, is In the shop for a re-think on a riff that shows up before the first verse and for the bridge. It was a pretty pure "metal" riff, chugging on the open E string, with a little run, or power chords thrown in every two measures. Frankly, after playing it a few times, it bored me. So, I came up with something a little different for that section. I haven't actually recorded it yet, but it's worked out in "dry run." I expect to have that done this weekend, sometime.

Like I said, some new songs are in the process of being written. Last night on the train, I got really excited because I managed to scrawl out some really nice lyrics using a turn of phrase that I've had hanging around for a long time. Since before this project started, actually. It's a line I love the sound of, but I could never really work into a catchy wordplay.

I write lyrics on the train a lot, pretty much every lyric I've ever put to paper has come to me on the Brown Line between Belmont and Damen. Now, a lot of that has been crap. As with anything you put to paper, the vast majority will not work, but I've been chasing a flow for lyrics that has really eluded me since I was writing for my fist CD, Hourglass 34.

Those acoustic numbers seemed to come a lot smoother than anything I tried to put together for Where Have All the Heroes Gone? Granted, the second disk was me trying to be a lot more simplistic in my lyrics, but I think it got away from me, and just turned dumb. What was nice last night was that the words just started to present themselves, like in the old days. Made me feel good.

If I can get it done, I may have an addendum to this post over the weekend, and put up some more monitor feed samples. Much thanks to any of you that bother to read this stuff, I know it can be a little dry (especially without samples).