"Muse" - ings on Rock & Life

Sometimes I feel like all I've been doing of late is move things in and out of the studio. We got back into town at a decent hour today, and so that gave me a little bit of time to play with in the studio. I got some work in with the lessons that I brought along with me on the trip, and then I called it good for the day. Tomorrow, though, is the day that I am really looking forward to. I see no reason why I shouldn't be able to get into the studio on the early side of the day. Hopefully that will lead to a productive day.

Another Friday night means another night on the road for us. Fortunately for me, this time I have the electric along with me. I grabbed the Strat and the two Guitar Techniques lessons that I have been trying to focus on the last few weeks. For good measure, I also have the book on the Replacements that I started on vacation. Hopefully the rest of tonight can be a bit relaxing.

Mostly quiet night tonight. I got in a bit of listening, but spent more time thinking about everything that I would like to get done over the weekend. There was a small bit of work on things tonight, but most of the evening was taken up by other things. We're going out of town yet again tomorrow night, but I am definitely going to be bringing a guitar with me, and I am bound and determined to get more done than I have been able to the last few days. I really need a good weekend.

Made it through the rest of the new Sturgill Simpson record today on my way to and from work. While I haven't gotten around to listening to all 3 records in a row yet, I am still hoping to get to that this week sometime. I would also be a fan of having enough energy at the end of the day to get more work done in the studio than I have so far this week. As we wind our way toward Friday, I'm not sure what the weekend will hold, but I am hoping that whatever it is, there is a lot of studio time involved.

Today was another okay, but not spectacular, day. In spite of having the day off, I didn't get into the studio until late, and as a result I didn't get as much done as I wanted to today. There was a bit of playing surrounded by a bit of progress in this biography I'm reading on the Replacements. Even with the day going somewhat sideways, I am still feeling like I will be able to get a lot done this week, which is good, but still doesn't have me feeling better about how the day ended up today.

Well, I was right in thinking that the highlight of the day was going to be listening to the new Sturgill Simpson record in the car on the way to and from work. It's a definite difference from his earlier work, but not so much of a departure from it that one doesn't know who they are listening to. Tomorrow I will have to bring it in the house and drop it in the CD player next to the others to get the full effect. Not a lot of time to play tonight, but I was able to get a few minutes in, and also was able to sit down and get my goals for tomorrow at least somewhat squared away in my head. I'm hoping that tomorrow will be a big day for me. We shall see.

Well, today didn't exactly go as I had hoped it would either, but I at least managed to get myself moved back into the studio tonight, if not quite completely settled in there.  That will have to be a job for either tomorrow night or Tuesday, when I'm off.  Don't ask me why they have me come back from a week off to work a single day, and then turn around and give me another day off, though, because I'm not sure I can answer that one. I'm looking forward to taking the new Sturgill Simpson record with me in the car on the way to work tomorrow.  I've been looking forward to hearing that album ever since I found out he had a new record coming out, and I picked it up when I stopped by Exclusive the other day on my way back down to the DBQ. It's been a long week, for a week that was supposed to be a relaxing one.  I'm hoping that the next few days let me fall back into some sort of routine that turns things around for me.

Another Saturday, and another day spent mostly on the road. Having been home for less than 12 hours, we were up early and out of the house for the third week in a row. We got home late  (again) and so I am left, at the end of the day, with even less energy than I started with. That said, I still don't feel like I am fully settled back into the studio yet. Hopefully that will be tomorrow's project. If I'm lucky, I will even have a bit of time to play.

Well, we made it home from vacation today. Entirely too soon, if you ask me, but home regardless. Got everything hauled in from the car, and managed to get some of it back into the studio, but we got back late enough that I still haven't gotten myself completely moved back into the studio yet. The rest of that is going to have to wait until tomorrow, because I am honestly too tired to do the rest of it tonight. Even though I didn't have the kind of time that I had hoped to find for practicing while we were gone, I am left with the feeling that the work I did get done still showed me the way forward, and that the chance for rapid growth and improvement is right at my fingertips.

Once again, today was far from the full day of playing that it was going to be, but yet again, I managed to make the best of it. I spent some more time with the lessons that I brought along with me, and am feeling better tonight than I was last night. The progress is showing up well... I can only imagine what it would look like if I had gotten the time to play that I had hoped for when the week began. Also, the world lost another icon today, with the passing of Prince. 2016 has been a crap year for musicians.

Today wasn't quite the day that I had been expecting when I went to bed last night. That said, it was still the best day of music making that I've had since we got here. I worked my way through some of  the GT pentatonic lessons that I have been meaning to spend more  time with of late, and by the end of the night, I was starting to see some of the progress I have been looking for. I also had a bit of fun with some Led Zeppelin this afternoon. I brought along the tabs that had come with a DVD that I had picked up a few years ago. There will be more of that tomorrow, for sure. Either way, it was a good night for me. Leading, I hope, to another good day tomorrow.

Well, I got started on the work I am hoping to get done this week. It wasn't a huge start. Not yet, anyway, but it was something. Most of the reasons behind that fact centered on the fact that I had been expecting today to be the day that I ended up having a good chunk of free time, but instead of it being today, it will be tomorrow that I have the biggest amount of time to sit down and play. That said, I still found time to get some work done on learning some of the songs that I brought along the tabs for. It was a good thing, getting the guitar back in my hands again, but I think that tomorrow is going to be a great day indeed.

Today was a day of exploring the peninsula for the three of us, which is not synonymous with having a lot of time to sit down and play. What I did discover, however, was that the local bookstore carries music magazines. I picked up the latest issue of Guitar Techniques while we were out. Tomorrow is shaping up to be a rainy day that the Mrs. is going to be spending focused on homework, which means that it ought to be a great day for me to get a lot of work done on the music stuff that I brought along with me.

So, we made it up to Door County. We're at least somewhat settled in, but I am entirely too exhausted to get any serious work done tonight still. That being said, I thought it would be wise to get myself set up for the week, so instead of expending energy I didn't have on playing, I sat down and sorted out everything that I brought along with me for the week. And there you have it. The real work begins tomorrow.

Today was another day spent mostly on the road. It was the day before we leave for vacation, and all of the drive time gave me a chance to think through everything that I am planning to take with me one last time. As a result, I've got myself 99% packed, with only a final dash through the studio planned for tomorrow morning, just to make sure that I didn't miss anything. The next week is going to be such a great time, I just can't wait to get a bit more windshield time in tomorrow.

One of the biggest advantages of not getting all that much done this week is that it clues me in to what I need/want to take on vacation with me.  It's basically everything that went along with me when we left to go and dog sit on Monday night.  Granted, there are a few extra things I need to pack (the notebooks with the first two recording projects in them, for example), but that shouldn't be too hard to fit in. Most of the day tomorrow is full already, but there might be a bit of time in the evening (like there was today) to get into the studio.  Then, possibly a few hours on Sunday morning before we hit the road around noon. My shoulders have started to loosen up a bit from all of the insanity the last few weeks.  I'm ready to finally have an extended chance to focus on music next week.

Tonight was an okay night. To get it out of the way early, I downloaded the new Steven Page record from iTunes, and picked up the new disc by The Lumineers when we went out to run a couple of errands this evening. As for the playing side of things, I got in a little bit of work this evening, and in the process, I further clarified some of the things that will be going with me when we head out on our vacation. I didn't get as much work in tonight as I would have liked to, but nonetheless, I find myself feeling pretty good as we head into Friday.  There should be a bit of time both tomorrow night and Saturday night to fit in a few things, and then Sunday afternoon the vacation starts for real. Going to be a busy weekend followed by a great week.

I made a bit of progress tonight. The week has gotten off to a bit slower of a start than I was hoping it would, but even getting a little bit of work in this evening felt good. Tomorrow night, I think, will be the big one for me this week. It will be the night that truly sets the stage for what will happen up in Door County next week. If I can stay focused tomorrow night and find a way to make a good push forward, then I can put myself in a really good position heading into the weekend. Here's hoping that tomorrow builds on the small successes of today and serves to magnify them.

Second day of our time spent dog sitting, and I finally found a few minutes of time to get into some of what I felt needed to get done this week. Not a ton of progress tonight, but enough to make me see what the rest of the week can be if I am focused. I also got to the end of the book I was reading about the history of grunge. That was a great read.

So, we are on dog sitting duty again this week, for the first time in a long time. Those weeks are always more focused ones for me, so I am really looking forward to the next few days. We got everything moved in around the dinner hour tonight, and I spent the rest of the day making some progress in the book on the history of grunge, and then trying to push forward a bit with the playing side of things before collapsing and needing to get some sleep. It was an okay start to what I hope will be a great week.

Today was another day spent mostly in the car. Once again it left me a lot of time for thinking through some things, and not a whole lot of time to actually get into the studio and play. I can't even begin to express how frustrating that was, especially given the fact that I feel like I was making good progress up until Friday night. At any rate, I have tomorrow off to try and recapture the momentum. If I can get focused at all, I don't think that I will have any trouble getting back into the groove. It was a good weekend, but not one that left me with the kind of time that I would have liked to have for music.

There wasn't a whole lot of time for anything resembling playing today. We spent a lot of time either in the car, or in conversation with people. That said, I had a lot of time for the thoughts that were running in the back of my mind. A lot of it was focused on recording projectsand the practice binder, and it was all needed. I'm really looking forward to getting home tomorrow night and being able to make some notes and keep building momentum as I head into the week.

Tonight was, again, an extension of last night, where a bit of productive playing turned into some thoughts on the next couple of weeks. Here's the beauty of the situation I'm in right now.  While we're out of town for the weekend, we also dog sit for some friends next week.  Those weeks have, traditionally, been fairly productive ones for me, and it just so happens that this time, it leads me directly into my week of vacation.  This is my shining opportunity.  If I can do well enough in the coming week, the lead-up to my full week off has the potential to be a huge payoff for me. Fortunately for me, we will get home on Sunday sometime, and I've got Monday off as well, so this week sets up about as well as it possibly could for me.  Tomorrow might be interesting for finding time to fit something in, but I'm feeling pretty confident that I can do it.  The big push starts now!

Tonight was a decent follow-up on last night.  While I got into the studio a bit on the late side, I got down to the playing side of things straight away, and had some fun with it.  I'm working my way, slowly, to where I'd like to be, but I can tell that I'm headed in the right direction. I also sat down and took a few minutes to continue to map out at least a little bit of what I'd like to see in the next few weeks, and then months.  As I said the other night, the biggest key for me is to make the best possible use of my time.  I did okay with that tonight, considering that I didn't have all the time in the world. I'm still really looking forward to the next couple of weeks.

I kept up with the process of digging myself out of yesterday's hole, although it really feels as if today was the true beginning of that. I got in a bit of practicing, which I desperately needed, and then started to get some sort of a handle on the rest of this week and the next two.  Where this last is concerned, I feel like I started okay, which was half the battle for me.  I gave myself a jumping off point for not only my own work in the next few weeks, but also a sense of solid ground on which I can hopefully rest the base of that other albatross I'd like to wrap into some sort of form this year: the practice binder. After the all-consuming frustration of yesterday, today offered me a ray of hope that things can be better than they are right now.  Hopefully I can continue to build off of that as I head into tomorrow and then the weekend.

I kind of feel like I bottomed out today.  Every time I tell myself that what I really need the most is a day in the studio, something always, always seems to get in the way.  Today was no exception.  As always, everything hit just as I was getting up to head in there and get to work. Finally tonight, I snapped.  There haven't been enough hours in the day lately, and with the Mrs. graduating and her job search in full swing, and a move coming up and everything else that's going on right now, I haven't done a good job of balancing time and getting things done and making the progress that I'd like to. I finally got in there really late, and was able to focus a little bit and sort a few things out in my head and get some playing done, but I still feel like today was a complete system failure. Nothing that happened today is insurmountable, and nothing that happened today erases the fact that the next two and a half weeks feel like the most important ones of the yea...

Spent a bit of time doing some listening in the car today.  I cranked up No Cities To Love by Sleater-Kinney on the way to and from work.  I must have been listening to some form of sad bastard music previously, because it jumped out of the speakers as a blast of fresh air and rock & roll. I did a bit more playing tonight. and like yesterday, it seemed to feed into things that I'm hoping to accomplish this year.  I know I mentioned it last night, but I've got Tuesday off, and I'm very much looking forward to getting into the studio early in the day, and on a (somewhat) full night of sleep. I'm back to feeling like I'm oh, so close to some sort of breakthrough, and I feel like a good day in the studio tomorrow might just get me there.

I actually got into the studio a bit today, and it felt like a miracle after a few days where I felt like I was hardly in there at all. More than that, I sat down with the intention of actually getting in some practice time, and I did so, albeit in a somewhat limited fashion.  I worked through a few examples from some old lessons in back issues of Guitar Techniques .  Not the stuff that I had on my list of things to work on, of course, but more-so things that caught my eye as I was sorting through one of the piles of magazines that was sitting in the studio. Either way, it was a good push forward that helped me to see a bit more of the path ahead for the next few weeks.  Somehow the next three weeks feel like they will be crucial to my progress for the rest of the year.  That may seem like an odd statement, but the next three weeks lead up through our vacation.  Once that's over, attention will need to be a bit more singularly focused on a potential move and...

Today was an odd day, in that I didn't really get into the studio all that much, but I found a bit of clarity for the next few weeks at the same time, so I'm left feeling like something got accomplished even though I'm not sure much did. We were out a lot of the afternoon, doing some of the typical weekend running, and I managed to pick up a little bit of music and a book in the process.  As for the music, it was a 3 disc live album by the Drive By Truckers, and the latest Sleater-Kinney record.  The book was Carrie Brownstein's recent memoir, so the last two should tie in nicely together, while also fitting in at least a little bit with the book on grunge that I'm inching ever so close to finishing. I've already decided that I'm not leaving the house much tomorrow, if at all.  I'm going to need the morning, while the Mrs. is at church, to get into the studio and get some practicing done, thereby at least making up a little bit for my lack of time in...

Another long day on a Friday turned into a night where most of what I was able to get done involved plotting out the weekend ahead of me. My list for the next few days is perhaps a little bit less aggressive than it has been for the last few weeks, but that is only due to the fact that I have been able to get a lot done during the last two weekends. The main focus for me this weekend is to actually get in some good practice time. I feel like the early part of the week involved setting up some things, and now is the time to get all of that set in motion. If all goes well, it should be both a productive and fun weekend.