Last post of the year. Tonight's writing marks 2 years in a row that I've posted every single day. I sat down tonight and set musical goals for 2014. Here's what I came up with: 1a) Finish writing & recording at least an EP (while holding out hope for a full record). 1b) Either FAWM (February Album Writing Month) or the RPM Challenge. 2) Build on my recent theory studies. 3) Take (at least a few) lessons again. 4) Look into expanding my teaching. 5) Build a set list & play live. 6) Finish the last bit of studio organizing. 7) Do better with playing both acoustic and electric. 8) Focus more on genre studies (acoustic, blues, country, etc). 9) Finish off the lesson binder. 10) Take more time for listening. That seems like a pretty hefty list. The other thing I did tonight was take a look back at the last few posts of last year . At that point, my two main goals were to: 1) Write & Record one song/month and 2) Use a particular set of arti
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Second to last post of the year. In my head, that seems dramatic, but in comparison to tomorrow's post, where I'm going to lay out all of my musical goals for 2014, tonight feels like somewhat of a false front. On some level, tonight could be a time of reflection. Of sorting out the highlights from a year that just felt busy from beginning to end. If I had to slow it down for just a second, I'd say the following would make my year-end list of highs: 1) The START Experiment. The first round of it, in particular. It showed me that (aside from lyrics, which are still hard for me), I can put together a demo in 8 days that sounds pretty good. It forced me to step back from the bigger picture, which can sometimes be overwhelming, and focus on the little things, the individual steps that take one from the beginning of something all the way through to a finished product. It never asked you to try and do it all at once (as I know I have a tendency to do), but held you ac
Today was a good day. I got to spend time with a guitar in my hands, and I started the If You Like The Beatles... book that I got as a Christmas present. I spent a little bit of my practice time today working on a little bit of "Take Five" by Dave Brubeck. My brother was playing a little bit of it in A minor while he was here, and he showed me a bit of what he was doing. It's cool, but it's not in the original key. What I really want to learn is the saxophone line, my thought being that, if I can learn the lead part, then the two of us can jam out on it when he comes back down for his visit in January. I found a tab of it that seems thorough, and is in the original key, and then I found a lesson online that covers Chet Atkins' version of it from 1973. I think I'm going to play around with both of them in the next few weeks, and see what happens. This book on the Beatles is fun so far, chronicling their rise in a few different ways. First, it discuss
My brother and I went over to Uncle Ike's this morning before they left town. I had hoped to either: 1) Find something I simply couldn't live without or 2) Talk to someone about taking a few lessons. Unfortunately, I failed on both counts. There wasn't anything book or accessory-wise that I needed urgently, and by the time we were done looking around, there wasn't anyone around to ask about lessons. Oh well, it's not like I won't be back in at some point in the near future. Taking at least a few lessons is something I want to do when 2014 rolls around, but I want to be picky about who teaches them, so I'm not going to rush into it without doing my research first. Also, I know I've talked about it a lot lately, but I broke down and bought that iTunes card today, just so I could finish off my "100 Riffs" playlist. Now that I've got all of the songs, here's what's even more amazing about that video: he takes what is almo
Took my brother to Moondog Music tonight. He found some jazz by Louis Armstrong, Herbie Hancock, and Duke Ellington (which I will get copies of before he leaves), and I picked up All Hail, West Texas by the Mountain Goats. They were playing it when I was in the other day doing some last minute Christmas shopping, and it was one of those moments where the music in the room is so striking that you just have to stop and ask what they're playing. Then, tonight, we did family Christmas with the in-laws on my wife's side, and I scored $60 in gift cards from Uncle Ike's Music & Sound, the local instrument shop where I got my ukulele. I'm not sure if I want to use that money to take a few lessons, or if I'll find something in the shop that I can't live without, but yeah, my brother and I are definitely going over there tomorrow before they leave town. Might head out tomorrow and pick up an iTunes card, too. I'm close enough to the end of that "100
Family Christmas this morning with my Dad, my Step-Mom, and my Brother. I got a bunch of really awesome classical music from my brother. I've been meaning to expand the classical part of my music collection for a while now, and what I added today was a nice step in doing just that. He got me 5 records. They are: Paganini: 24 Caprices - Midori Tchaikovsky: Symphonies 4-6 - London Symphony Orchestra Sonatas For Guitar: J.S. Bach - Nicholas Glouses Debussy Solo Piano Music, Vol. 1 - Peter Frankl Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Symphonies 40 & 41 - Mozart Festival Orchestra I also raided his laptop for more songs that are on the "100 Riffs" list, and came up with five more, bringing my total up to 71. Tonight, we hung out in the studio for an hour and a half or so, acoustic guitars in hand, riffing on a blues progression and trying to write a song. We were somewhat successful. We've got the music down, and a couple of lines of lyric, but we got hung up on
Merry Christmas, all! Family got here tonight. My brother brought a guitar, some music theory stuff, and a laptop with a bunch of music on it. Seems like it's going to be a pretty epic couple of days. Today was mostly relaxing, but I finally managed to get some of the new music uploaded into iTunes. The 100 Riffs playlist is up to 66 songs (and 4.5 hours of music). I'm almost 100% certain that, if all of my music were actually here with me, I'd have it up over 70, and probably closer to 80. I'll have to raid all of my burned CDs sometime soon and see what all I can come up with. It was nice to have a day that had some downtime in it, but here it is quarter to midnight where I am, and I'm itching to pick up a guitar again. Not sure how much serious study time will happen tonight, but I know I'll do some more playing before I finally pass out. That said, tomorrow and the weekend will probably be the big days. Got a couple of music books for Christma
Made it into the studio at a decent hour today. Got the rest of the CDs organized, and the remaining cases safely stashed out of the way, which maximizes (or at the very least almost maximizes) my floor space. Didn't get anything imported tonight, music-wise but I suspect that will happen tomorrow. Importing new music just feels like a Christmas Day sort of activity for some reason. I did, however, pick up the guitar for a little while, which was good. Went through a couple of the guitar-related emails that have been waiting for my attention, as well. Watched a really cool lesson on this idea of partial capoing that I've heard a lot of buzz about, but never actually seen in action (until tonight). It presented some cool ideas, and has definitely given me a few things to think about, so I'll take that as a win. Can't believe that I got done with work at 12:30 today, and we've still got almost an entire day until family gets here. Time went by slowly toni
Got into the studio late tonight. Did a little bit more sorting of CDs, and, in turn, did a bit of condensing of that which remains CD-wise. I'm really looking forward to tomorrow afternoon & evening, when I'll have a really good chunk of time to finish up the organizing, and then make the switch from maintenance back to playing on a more regular basis. I'm also hoping to get some listening and uploading done tomorrow. Not only are there random songs that need to be added to the "100 Riffs" playlist, but there is also a lot of new music that I'd like to get loaded onto the iPod. I'm really looking forward to getting back into the theory & scale studies tomorrow. I've done a bit of playing this week, but it feels very haphazard in nature, and I could really use a good, solid session of learning and improving tomorrow. I've got busy days ahead of me if I want everything to be in good shape when my brother gets here, but I'm tota
Got into the studio a couple of different times today. Did some playing, and some sorting of CDs today. I found a decent number of discs for the empty cases that have piled up underneath the work table. There's another container full of empty cases (I think) over by the rest of the music, so I'll try and wade through those tomorrow night, to see if I can't match up a few more discs. I'm starting to see the progress in the studio. When we moved in, I was more concerned about getting things squared away enough that the room was useable. Now that we've been here a while, I'm thinking not only about getting a few of those glossed over areas cleaned up for when family comes over the holidays, but also for the ability to start the year off with a clean slate in the studio. Other stuff that happened today included: 1) Finding a few more songs on the "100 Riffs" list in the process of sorting CDs. 2) A bit of listening. 3) Some time with the elect
Well, I made some progress today on getting the leftovers from the studio organized and put away. In the process, I found a large pile of CDs that I knew we had, but didn't know where they had ended up after the move. I also got the new books from the WI trip put on the shelves in the studio. I printed off a list of the 100 riffs today, too. I've got the 61 songs that I've already got crossed off, and the other 9 that I've got here are marked as well. I'm pretty sure that I've got some of the instrumentals from the early part of the list as well, but the CDs they're on are back in Wisconsin. I'd also be willing to guess that there are a couple more songs on some random burned CDs I have from college. I got some practicing in today, as well, but I'll admit that more of my day was spent on getting things organized than it was on rocking out. Tomorrow needs to be a day filled with practicing and learning,as opposed to sorting and organizing.
You know, it's taken me all week to finally get back in the swing of things at home. The not so cool part of that is that it leaves me feeling like I could've gotten a whole lot more done this week (in reality, I've been so exhausted that this likely isn't true). The cool part of it is that I've got the next two days off, so I can try and cram as much music stuff into 48 hours as I possibly can. Seriously, on the list for the weekend is: 1) Lots of listening 2) Getting the rest of the WI stuff organized 3) Clearing out and putting away the stuff that has accumulated underneath the work table 4) Going through some of the guitar-related emails I've gotten of late 5) Studying and practice. Started reading a book on the final days of John Lennon. Not that far into it, but it's interesting so far. That's really all I've got for today. More tomorrow, and better. Much better.
Finally stumbled upon the other bag of books and CDs from the trip to WI tonight. I know I listed everything out as I found it, but in looking at it I'm struck again how big of a pile it is. I started listening at the bottom of the pile, with Waxahatchee's Cerulean Salt. I'm only a few tracks into it, but it's great so far. Picked up the acoustic again tonight. Ran through the chords for "Let Her Go" again. I really like that song. I also sat down at the recording console tonight, and took a listen to the ideas that I had set aside as possibles for the power pop record I've talked about forever. I came away with things I'd adjust, but feeling hopeful over all. I've started thinking, in a vague way, about 2014, and some of the things I'd like to accomplish. The first thing that came to mind is songwriting. I know I've said it at various points the last 6 months or so, but I really need to write more songs in 2014. I know I'
I feel like I got back into the flow of things in the studio a little bit tonight, and I did it with the acoustic in my hands for a change. It was nice to sit down with one of those, and not feel the pressure to try and write something new. I'll admit something (again) in this space: I don't play enough acoustic. It felt good to open up my calluses a little bit. To do so in an initial effort to figure out some songs that might make it into a set list sometime next year made it even more fun. "Let Her Go," by Passenger got learned tonight. The first place I heard that song was on an episode of The Voice this season, and it's a wonderful, subtle song. The two things about it that were cool to me tonight were the fact that it's capoed high up the neck (7th fret), and that it uses a simple, repeating chord progression. Once again, the song proves that, with all of the time and effort we put into finding fancy sounding chords for our writing efforts, somet
I got back into the studio tonight, and while it was good, with everything new that has been added in, it's a little bit overwhelming knowing all of the listening and reading that's coming up. Actually, overwhelming is probably the wrong word. In reality, it's more of a "wow, I didn't really think I brought home that much " sort of reaction. So, yeah, needless to say, tonight was more of a night to unpack the guitar and sift through everything that came home from WI in an attempt to make sense of it all, than it was a night for hardcore practicing and nose to the grindstone improvement. Most of that stems from the fact that it was just an incredibly long day. The Mrs. works til 11 tomorrow night, though, so when I get home from work, it will be entirely about grabbing a bite to eat and falling immediately into the studio to get to work. If nothing else, stepping back into the studio has my brain thinking music full speed again, which is a welcome dis
Okay, so today is the last of my "list" postings for a while. We just got home from the trip up north for Grandma's funeral. It was a long, snow-filled drive home, and while it was good to be there for the weekend, it's also really nice to be home. Knowing full-well that I'm excited to get back into the studio this coming week and actually get some playing done , here's what I found at Exclusive: Cerulean Salt - Waxahatchee G.P./Grievous Angel - Gram Parsons Too Far To Care (Deluxe Edition) - Old 97's Gold - The Allman Brothers The Complete Hit Singles - Three Dog Night and then I found Pete Townsend's bio from last year, Who I Am . Grabbed the latest issue of Guitar World , too. Somehow, that took forever to find this month. Then, on the way home, we stopped at Half Price Books, just to get out of the snow. Found a few cool things there, as well, all books: The Guitar Player's Songwriting Bible How The Beatles Destroyed Rock &
So, tonight's post feels a bit on the random side, but here goes nothing. I've been working with this 100 riffs thing on and off for the last few weeks, learning one here and there as the mood strikes me. The other day, before we left for WI, it crossed my mind that it might be cool to go through my music collection and see just how many of the songs in that list I've actually got. I started in the most obvious of places: iTunes. Just going through that part of the collection, I found 61 (give or take a few) of the 100 songs. I know for a fact that I've got some of the others in the studio on CD, and I'm also pretty sure that there are some of them here at my Mom's place, on CDs that haven't necessarily made the trip with me from move to move. If I had to put a number on it, I'd guess I have at least 70 out of the 100, if not a few more. I don't know, I think a playlist with all of the songs sounds pretty cool. Whatever I don't end up
Tonight after all of the family stuff, Mom, The Mrs., and I went out shopping for a little bit. We hit Barnes & Noble, the local Half Price Books, and a few other places. I found some cool music stuff again today, and I won't even make it to Exclusive Company until Monday. Today's finds included the following: Best of Bowie - David Bowie (2 CD Set) Chronicles - Rush (2 CD Set) There were also 2 disc sets by Chet Atkins and The Everly Brothers. The coolest part of the Everly's collection is that the second disc has a lot of the songs from the Billie Joe + Norah record. It's going to be really cool to hear the originals, and then compare them to the new stuff. There were 3 books, too. The Songwriting Sourcebook by Rikky Rooksby, and then a book on the last days of John Lennon, and a book on the rise of Mumford & Sons. The Rooksby book was a given: I've got a few of the other books in his series, the Lennon book seemed cool, and the book on the
So, we made it up to WI. Stopped at Half Price Books in Madison on our way up. I hadn't been to one of those in ages , so it was great fun to look around and see what I could find. They had a LOT of cool music. I came home with the following: Drag It Up - Old 97's Blame It On Gravity - Old 97's Legends Of The 20th Century - Eddie Cochran Fox Confessor Brings The Flood - Neko Case Red House - Jimi Hendrix We Walked In Song - The Innocence Mission Now The Day Is Over - The Innocence Mission Birds Of My Neighborhood - The Innocence Mission Puddle Dive - Ani DiFranco Ever since I bought Satellite Rides , I've wanted to pick up more Old 97's stuff, so that was a cool find. The only thing I know about The Innocence Mission is from their appearance on the Empire Records Soundtrack, but I enjoyed what they had on that compilation, so three records by them should be an adventure in listening. Brought the electric with me. I know there probably wo
Sat with the guitar tonight, and stumbled across a chord progression that I really liked. The last thing I expected at the end of the day was to work on anything with songwriting, but there it was, so I took it and ran with it. I ended up with a verse progression that I think is really cool, and I'm hearing something a little bit more straight-forward for the chorus, but I haven't sat down and figured out exactly what form that will take yet. Headed up to WI tomorrow for Grandma's funeral, and I know for sure that I'll be bringing something along with me, instrument-wise, if only for distractionary purposes. Not sure yet whether that will be a guitar or the ukulele, but those decisions are better made tomorrow before we leave than they are tonight, when I'm at the end of the week and exhausted. Either way, there will be theory of some sort going along with me. And, I'm also secretly hoping that I can sneak in an Exclusive Company visit while we're u
Got home late from my meeting, but still decided to try and make the most of the time I had tonight. Having been away from any real serious studying for the last couple of days, tonight I waded back into the scale lesson I've been poking my way through, and focused on using the "scale pieces at different points on the neck" aspect of it as a way to come up with a few different melodies and play them in different keys. Most of it was major scale-based, and some of it was riff-based, but it was good to explore them using the same patterns in different keys. It not only helps reinforce note identification, but it also helped with the idea that there are so many ways to play things in different places. After that, I ran through all of the pentatonic patterns in the key of G. I know the patterns pretty well on their own at this point, but when it comes to tying them all together, I'm still not where I'd like to be. Getting closer, but still not where I'd
Started to get back into things a little bit today, after having yesterday's musical output somewhat stunted by sad family news. Getting back into the studio tonight was good, and immediately my eye was drawn to the pile of materials currently residing on the desk chair in the music room: it's all of the scale stuff, composition stuff, and other assorted bits of theory that have been (or attempted to be) a focal point the last few weeks. I went back to the fretboard knowledge lesson from the book of stuff re-printed from Guitar One , and tried to pick up somewhere near where I was the last time I looked at it. Wound up working on the part of that lesson that focuses in on learning scalar runs from each of the different C's (or D's or E's, etc) on the fretboard. That aspect of things seemed to be getting a little bit easier tonight, at least when it comes to putting the pieces together. Considering that I didn't spend all that much time with it, I'm fe
We lost my Grandma this morning at 2:30, so, again, I needed the studio as a method of healing today. There were 4 things on my list from yesterday. They were: 1) Finish getting things cleaned up in the studio. 2) Put together the pieces of theory I was working with last week with the stuff I've added this week. 3) Do more listening. 4) Clear up the spots that I've pushed to the side in order to make room for work to get done. I got a lot of the piles cleaned up and squared away. The studio floor is now cleared off of the many piles of books and notebooks and the like. I did a lot of listening today. That part was easy to cross off of my list. I was less focused on some of the more recent things I've picked up than I was on hearing things that felt familiar today. I took a brief look at some of the theory stuff, but didn't get far enough into it today to start tying things together in quite the way I would have liked to. And as for the random stuff t
Today was... interesting. Some distressing family news today. Seems like my Grandma, who we just visited at Thanksgiving, isn't doing well. That news coming in when it did, I used most of my time in the studio tonight for listening. Music has always been the one thing that can help me process the more difficult moments in life, and it helped me through yet again tonight. Still, when I did get into the studio late tonight, I took a moment to take a look around, and realized (again), just how messy and frantic everything has gotten. I started to try and clean things up a bit, and in the process, I came across the scale & fretboard study materials I took along with me on our holiday trip last week. I only took a moment or two to glance over them, but what I looked at makes more sense today than it did when I put it in the bag last week. As I told my brother yesterday, the pieces seem to be coming together, they are just doing it at a slower pace than I'd like them to
Early post tonight, I know, but the rest of the night will be busy, so I wanted to get out ahead of the game a little bit. We were out doing a little bit of Christmas shopping today, and I ran across the Idiots Guide to music composition. Given my transition issues from yesterday, I picked it up. I've been reading through the first couple of chapters today, up through the chapter on composing with chords. That's usually the way songwriting starts with me. It's so second nature to pick up a guitar and strum chords until something catches your ear. So many people (my brother and Wynton Marsalis included) talk about composition needing to be melody driven first, but somehow it has never worked out that way for me. Still, just doing a bit of studying, and talking with my brother for half an hour, got me to a point where I could get the transition from verse to chorus down. In that respect, it has been a good and productive day for me. I'll be honest, it feels l
All I had really hoped to get done tonight, studio-wise, was to finish off the chorus progression for that song I've been tinkering with. It's clear to me that I just don't write enough songs. I can get a verse progression that I really like, and/or a chorus progression that sounds really cool, but I always (and I mean always ) seem to struggle with getting the transitions right, so that they flow from one to the other, and back again. When I am successful at putting the pieces together, it's more often than not because I'm not thinking about it, and it just drops into my lap. Looks like it's time to revisit all the books on songwriting that I bought in my early 20's, because I'm certain to get more out of them at this point, right? At that time, so much of the theory went over my head, but I'm certain that, with time and focus, I'd get more out of them now than I ever did then. I'm also going to talk with my brother about transition
With the afternoon off, I was able to sneak in two practice sessions today. The first one, this afternoon, was focused on some of the daily routine stuff that's been going on of late: scale work, the Guitar Aerobics lick of the day, a little bit of reading (the magazines I picked up the other day). I also found the chord progression my brother had written last winter when he was visiting. The whole thing is written in bass clef I also finished up a book on the rivalry between The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. It was a fun and interesting read, but a little bit too short, if you ask me. Then again, I could never really get enough when it comes to reading about those two bands, so I'm probably severely biased. With the routine stuff out of the way, tonight's session was more focused on songwriting, which was awesome, in part, because it was successful. I worked on the song idea that I've been kicking around (and talking with my brother about) for the last cou
Tonight was another good night in the studio. I finally sat down and hashed out the second half of Johnny B. Goode from the 100 riffs video. I still keep wishing I could find a printable version of the tab that's up on SoundSlice, but no such luck as of yet. Talked to my brother again tonight. They're coming down over the holidays, and S. offered to bring along a lot of his music theory stuff so that we can both nerd out over theory for at least some of the time they are here. After that, I asked him to throw out some chord progressions at me, so that I could translate them to guitar. He had some crazy ideas, so I wrote them down and messed around with them for a bit after we got done talking. Cool stuff. Not all of it is pop/rock material in the slightest, but I can see how some of it could be adapted to popular song forms. It makes me want to go back and find this three page chord progression he wrote out off the top of his head when he was visiting us in Northwes
Tonight was the first night in about a week that felt like a "normal" night in the studio for me. I may have only spent an hour or so in there tonight, but here's what I got done: 1) I got back to starting my practice sessions with the lick of the day from Guitar Aerobics . Not only does that provide me a bit of continuity at the start of my studio time, but, as I've mentioned before, it also serves as a good way to loosen up my fingers, and get my mind right for practicing. That done, I 2) Spent some quality time with the new looping pedal. This thing is incredible. I had said last night that I could see the potential in it, and tonight I started to realize that potential. I don't have the timing down perfectly yet, but I'm getting closer. The infinite number of loops means that I can add in as many crazy things as I want, and the one tap undo/redo means that I can dismiss something at the drop of a hat if I don't like it. The biggest
Oh, this looping pedal is going to be fun ! Got into the studio tonight and started playing about with the Ditto pedal. Didn't get anything too earth-shattering laid down, but I can definitely see the potential in this wonderful little piece of equipment. Once I get the timing straightened out, things are going to get very interesting indeed. Stopped off at BAM! tonight as well. Found the latest issues of Guitar Techniques and Acoustic Guitar . I also picked up an "acoustic rock" book of ukulele songs, and a book on the history of MTV. Found a couple of cool Christmas presents while I was at it, too. Both musical in nature, one for my brother, and one for my step-mom. Can't say much more than that, as my brother reads my blog, and I don't want to give anything away. Suffice it to say that I hope they let me read them both once they've finished with them. That's really all for today. Tomorrow needs to have some more time with the looping pedal
I should have known better than to think I could get a lot accomplished on a Holiday weekend with family in town. I made it into the studio for a very short time rather late tonight, and wanted to pick up the guitar and just play for a few minutes, if only so I could say, definitively, that I did make it in there tonight. I ran through the Guitar Aerobics lick of the day, spent a few minutes working with the first three of the pentatonic scale patterns, and got everything in place to set up my looping pedal. Heck, I even downloaded the manual from the internet. The only thing I didn't do is plug it in and start using it. Mostly because I knew that, if I started in on that tonight, I wouldn't be able to stop playing around with it, and would never get to sleep. Tomorrow night offers a pretty good window right after work. I'm pretty sure I'll be headed straight home and straight into the studio for a couple of hours before the Mrs. gets home from work, so yes, t