I recorded this back in 2019 after I watched Bonnie and Clyde with Faye Dunaway. Actually, the bass is from a very shit attempt at covering Jane’s Addiction’s “I Would” - it was horrible. But at least I was able to turn it into something descent by redoing most everything else. Still haven’t found a use for this.
Tell the Biden Administration to breach River Dams [in an effort to save resident orcas]
Wild Orca has an ongoing to campaign to ask that the Biden administration remove dams preventing salmon from returning to their spawning runs. The fact that salmon are deprived of historical spawning grounds in rivers like the Snake River, coupled with human competition for salmon, has inflicted a lot of harm on resident orcas by way of malnutrition, Residents consume only fish, in this case salmon, and are guided by their culture; meaning they will not deviate from foods their culture dictates due to low availability or higher availability of more prey items… You will never find a transient orca that makes a change into preying on fish and you will never find a resident that becomes transient. Anyways, if we all just want to be self-entitled and continue consuming salmon and continue to do nothing to restore salmon runs these orcas are going to disappear. Please consider chiming in on this:
https://www.wildorca.org/takeaction/biden-snake-river-dams-2023/
The Fire From Your Eyes (Hologram Microcosm clip)
Up Jumped The Devil (Nick Cave Backing Track by Eric Haugen)
Going to finally finish mixing the cos EP this week - I kept putting it off. Should have six tracks… Another cos EP will come out early winter. Will probably mix a few Wylds things to throw out there as an EP as well in between; I found the original version of “The Veil” that is like seven minutes long and a random instrumental. Will also probably throw in a few ‘covers’. Plan is to get the first cos EP’s tracks out for mastering by Friday.
Squier 40th Anniversary Jazzmaster (Vintage Edition)
Impulse bought this on sale at about half off what they initially went for. Loved how these guitars sounded but always found a reason to not like ones I’ve had (as well as Jaguars)… But now I am in love with this thing. Part of it is I know now how to dial in guitars with setups now (kills me to think I let the binding and blocks candy apple red CIJ Jazzmaster, with Novaks, go because I hated the string tension - I was an idiot). When this thing arrived I thought it looked cool but didn’t feel great. After removing a ton of relief from the neck and adjusting the bridge it’s so good I’m now itching for something like a Japanese Jazzmaster that I can throw in some Duncan Antiquities… No plans to put $240 pickups in a $300 guitar - but I do plan on dropping this off at a shop to get the pots switch to proper CTS pots and the switches and jack switched out for Switchcraft ones… As well as a fret level.
Anyways, I upgraded both my Mac and recording interface recently. Still waiting for Kush to get their plugins working native with Apple silicon. I moved from a 2012 Macbook Pro to a M2 Pro Mac Mini (1TB / 16GB)… All told it has 3TB of SSD/NVME disk space and 6TB of mechanical storage. Was having some issues with dual displays - went to mix stuff and was getting no output to my monitors. Resolved it today (I hope) and since I have to go to the DMV first thing in the morning tomorrow, and the fact that I got off work today at 3 AM and am staying up as late as possible, I decided to fuck around and try and throw something together quick using that Squier Jazzmaster…
Intro to first EP???
10/5/23: I actually put out what was to be the second EP first. So this may be the first track on the still yet to come, now, second EP.
New music coming soon...
I think I put off finishing these two cos EP’s long enough. I move to southern Oregon (from California) this Friday and once I’m over the stress of all this shit I’m going to finish editing and mixing everything. I can still get the first one out this spring which is what I wanted to do. First EP will be pretty low key while the second will be more lively. I look forward to being done with having this stuff hanging over my head and having an empty canvas again.
The version of “Inside Looking Out” above is the initial mix I did right after tracking it.
Since I've Been Hating You (Zeppelin Butchered)
Wylds - The Killing Moon (Echo & the Bunnymen)
These drums are actually Pete de Freitas - the original drum stem. When I did Will’s solo part I had to do it in two takes; one played on the g string and the other on the high e since I don’t have a 12 string. I guess you can hybrid pick it if you can keep droning the open b. I also didn’t do Les Pattinson’s tremolo picked bass part over the solo.
Soul Commodities
One day back in 2013 I got home from work to find our house cleaning people doing their thing… So I parked in the garage and began messing around with Garageband on my iPhone 4S. This is what I did.
I haven't written or recorded anything original in 13 months!
I’m washed up. Perhaps it’s over. Or maybe I’m just over it. Or maybe I just needed to stop for a while. Who knows. Here’s the last thing I “wrote” and recorded - tracked August 13, 2021:
Ryan Tate from Veterans Empowered To Protect African Wildlife on KONCRETE
This man is my personal hero. For a long time I have thought that we choose stupid things to fight for and wished that we would put ending poaching and trafficking a national priority backed by the force and teeth of our military - this is the next best thing. If I wasn’t dependent on medication for life and a bit younger I’d definitely have looked to join Ryan’s teams. Will definitely be donating to VETPAW. If you give a shit about animals in any capacity you should check this out. I’m hoping one day they can expand into Zimbabwe (which is terrible) and India.
Just Like Heaven instrumental
I’ve had Jazzmaster and Jaguars before and there was always something I didn’t like about them - one thing being both the bridge and trem. Sure you can get a Mastery for them but they’re not cheap. I’m also not a fan of curvy fretboard radius like 7.25”. I remember my Jaguar used to cramp my hand up after a while. Anyways, I always told myself that if G&L ever did their take on either a Jaguar or a Jazzmaster I’d buy it - and it happened. I am pretty firm in the G&L camp and much prefer their stuff to Fender’s. I think these hit the market back in 2017 and I just wasn’t itching for it then, and then covid happened and the fucking market went sideways. All of the sudden the hidden gems that G&L’s were weren’t so hidden anymore. I let a few really, really cool Dohenys slip through my fingers on Reverb; one was olympic white with a maple board and blocks, another was glaxy black and has an ebony board with no fret markers. Fucking bothers me that I didn’t buy either. Anyways, once prices on Reverb just started becoming stupid I told myself that should an American Doheny be at or near the $1,000 mark I’d buy it… And it happened. This one I think is from 2017, before they began doing the Fullerton Deluxe thing - such a great guitar - even with the new latest neck shape with the 9.5” board (my Fano had me already adjusted to it - but I really can hardly tell a difference between 12 and 9.5”. I love the trem on these - the same I have on my Legacy and SC-2 - they are just solid. But, while this can cop traditional JM tones, the real asset on this thing is the tone controls. G&L’s passive treble and bass (effectively one is a treble cut and the other a bass cut) are criminally overlooked… I wish they’d even put them on ASATs. Another thing this guitar did was made me a massive fan of Hipshot locking tuners. I had some on a Hagstrom (with Imperial buttons - really cool looking) which I gave my friend, but these open gear locking Hipshots I put on here, complete with more vintage looking buttons, won me over - and they have a universal mounting bracket - meaning you don’t have to drill since the mounting plate locks them into place. Anyways this thing is now one of my favorites.