Surprise

I'm really pleased with how I can surprise myself. Today's surprise was, not surprisingly (I know, I know, I'm too clever) about music.

I had a house guest the last several days and he was lovely and amazing and we hung out with each other and a lot of mutual friends and that was all wonderful. Including playing an American Idol-based karaoke game on a friend's Wii in which I did fairly well at singing stuff like "In The Air Tonight" and "Tainted Love" and didn't feel TOO bad at wishing I'd done even better.

Lovely as it was, I was sort of chomping at the bit to get back to my regular routine. Problem is, I also wore myself out having a nice time (we were all up especially late the night of Wii karaoke because we also watched a Harry Potter flick until nearly 1:30 a.m.)

So I ended up cancelling tonight's rehearsal with Eric, my bass player.

But tired as I was ... and a bit depressed today, what with poor weather and lingering tiredness, which always affects my mood .... I still wanted to write.

I hacked around with some simple ideas in C and spouted some lyrics and ended up writing a quick ditty. I've been meaning to try writing a little more simply, I-IV-V progressions, not move all over the place, which in one sense is a sign of my increasing sophistication and in another sense is about me not knowing how to take full advantage of any single chord I've got.

Anyway. Came home tonight and worked it out a little more on acoustic guitar. Which we know I still don't play all that well. But it was sounding okayish.

Laid down a rough track on my MacBook--no metronome, keeping my own tempo. The microphone in this thing is still surprisingly awesome for quick-and-dirties. Guitar and voice. Sounded pretty decent.

I decided to figure out the tempo. Found a rhythm pattern that kind of fits. Re-cut the guitar, no voice. Added a synth bass line. Added the vocals again (first two verses and choruses. Put in a little piano. Put in a bit of backing vocal harmony.

Um .... suddenly I have half a song? With acoustic guitar cut in one take? That sounds halfway okay .... you know, nothing that would be totally out of place in a Robert Pollard "I hacked this together kind of fast" way.

Like I say: surprise.

I sort of need a vacation from hanging out with fun people, which is my usual vacation from work. I had been thinking it would be neat to go away totally by myself for a week, with only a guitar and a laptop, not hang out online so much, and spew forth as many songs as I was/wasn't feeling like writing real fast.

As a dry run for something like that, this evening was WAY fabulous.

Who knew I was getting so quick at knocking things out? Boy, if my old Berkeley classmates could hear me now. Actually, I should point Aoife at some stuff. Maybe this is something I should let her hear. I suspect she'll agree I've come a LONG way.

Cyberspace

Reach me while you can
Oh you lonely man
I'll give you something to believe
Meet me up in space
I'll help you find your place
If you can live on what we breathe

I know you're looking for
A way to be much more
And I'm the net to break your fall
You'll find your brothers here
They'll hold you fast and dear
If they find time to take your calls

Millions flock to me
Longing to be free
Trying to forget the past
They talk for hours and hours
Like they've got super powers
And maybe some of it will last

But deep inside my webs
The tide still flows and ebbs
A star still flickers out and fades
So let me take you up
I'll fill your every cup
And maybe someday we'll upgrade ...
To a better dream
A better dream
To a better dream
A better dream

Rehearsal

Huh. No sooner do I consider updating here than I notice that my last post was about how far to go with a song that, indeed, I rehearsed just last night.

The big change in my work recently is that I've picked up a bass player, whom I've rehearsed with several times, and last night "auditioned" an old guitarist friend ... and we played the song I discussed in my previous post, the political one.

Among other things.

My focus lately is not on the politics of that song, but on the fact that in the second verse (which is eight couplets rather than four like the first and third verses, for extra drama) I'm trying to jump up several steps (an octave, maybe??) halfway through the verse for EXTRA extra drama. And I'm consistently not in voice to sing it very well up there.

So there I am struggling with my vocals while also trying to hear whether the guitarist is doing something I want him to do.

Being a band leader is .... interesting. My bass player and I have good rapport, but I don't think it's giving away state secrets to say that having to teach him and work on things is sometimes, not frustrating so much, but ... dunno. Tests my limits a bit. I have to say things like "that was good but it doesn't work for me." When part of what I'm feeling is "OMG someone wants to play my songs, I shouldn't criticize ANYTHING they do."

The guitarist hauled out some nice licks last night that were COMPLETELY wrong for the song. Thank God he asked me, to my face, immediately afterward, "that was too western sounding, wasn't it?"

If I'd written a country song I would have fucking loved the part. It was good. It just didn't fit at all.

And I hate saying "no" to people, apparently.

But I'm learning.

And then he did some different stuff the next time and it was better.

And the bass parts are coming along nicely. A lot of it is about rehearsal now, for him.

Still. My god, what an effort sometimes. It's like I'm "on" all the time. I'm the boss. Nothing happens unless I make it happen.

It's not more difficult than doing it all myself. It's just DIFFERENTLY difficult.

Rewarding too, of course. The work with the guitarist was ... ragged .... if I think about the parts that need work or that I have to decide about. But he hauled out some things that a) I would never have thought of and b) that were like YAY when I heard them. I mean, I've worked with this guy before, I had a clue about what I was getting. Some of what he brings won't fit. Other stuff will be brilliant. I just have to see if I can get him to substitute anything that isn't brilliant right away with something else.

And I really need to figure out how to hit those high notes. They're within the range of my falsetto .... but I need to be able to figure out how to come up to them from the earlier lines that are down below them, and still project with power, without busting my throat.

Skills building .....