How Does It Know?

Just finished this little thing.

Sit Up, Sit Down

This past Sunday, my friend Chris and I went up to Lansing to record with John, this time so Chris could lay down his saxophone part on one of the songs, and also so he could record some piano on some others. We didn’t end up finishing (everything in the studio always takes more time than we have budgeted), so we’ll take another trip up there soon, but I’ve got to say — the saxophone parts kick ass. The piano we did ain’t too shabby either. There is still a ton to do, the hardest of which will be the vocal harmonies, but I’ve been reinvigorated in terms of the project based on Chris’ saxophone and piano. They really bring out something in the songs I wasn’t hearing before, and I’m really pleased.

Totally changing subjects:
I don’t often drag my really personal life out for display here, but my step-father-in-law (is that right?), a totally cool dude who was a Hawaiian musician and all around awesome guy, is really ill. Some kind of blood cancer that is eating his bones. Seriously. So it’s been kind of rough with the news of it worsening, etc. My wife will be going to Hawaii to visit in December, but I won’t be able to make the trip. Needless to say, the emotions surrounding the illness, the last minute travel plans, etc has been interesting. We are simply trying to keep our heads up and I’m trying to be a strong support for my wife. Whatever ends up happening, I am glad I have gotten to know and talk to my step-father-in-law.

Anyhow, Thanksgiving is a couple days away and that means long weekend, which I am very much looking forward to. Have a happy one!

Check out my new song.

Part Time Songs

That last post was pretty ugly, eh? Those images are way too big for my blog format. I am thinking about switching to a theme that’s wider… But I spent so much time customizing this one that that’s a time investment that I’m not sure I’m ready for.

Well, Friday again. My plan is to finish the Marshmallow Mission* 2-song EP this weekend and post that up on Part Time Songs (need to make some cover art too…); other than that, my family will be celebrating a late Diwali by having Indian buffet on Sunday. Other than THAT, I am hoping to get some sleep and hang around the house. I love hanging around the house, lazing about with no agenda. Except that I always seem to give myself an agenda (”record stuff by Sunday”, “vacuum out car”, “read for fun” — yes, I actually have that on a to-do list… what is wrong with me?). I tend to feel a little guilty when I’m not doing SOMETHING. You’d think I’d be more productive.

Happy Halloween.

And please please please make the effort and go vote.

*”Marshmallow Mission” consists of just me and Dan. The idea is to do these songs together where it’s really quick and easy. But it hasn’t been that quick**, due to my time restraints. Anyway, so it’s an easy mission, easy==!hard==soft==Marshmallow. There’s other reasons for the name when it came into my head, but that’s the rational, makes-sense answer.

**Though it’s coming together fairly easily, now that I’m learning/using/exploring Sonar 7 and the workflow is a lot smoother and easier than FL Studio***

***Though I did end up purchasing the VST versions of the FL Parametric EQ2 and other plugins that are built into FL, so I could use them in Sonar, because they are really awesome… I mean, showing a graphical signal analysis in the paraEQ alone is worth the money.

So I’ve been missing for a little while over here. Not a whole lot to talk about… I went on a vacation to Washington, D.C. a couple weeks back, and that was really really fun, educational, delicious, and somewhat debauched. I helped a friend move while there, spoke to another friend on the phone who I had expected to see, but ended up running out of time, and totally forgot a third friend even lived in the area (so I did not contact them). Then we came home and went back to work.

Last Sunday I went up to Lansing to record some vocals for the How Does It Know? EP… My ears were opened up to the possibilities of some vocal harmonies (something I haven’t played around with too much, since I’ve found it difficult to sing along to myself and not fall back into the original melody instead of singing the harmony). But I got some tips from John (i.e. recording the harmony with a keyboard, and singing along to that, without the original vocal playing back), and some random takes turned out some great ideas for harmonies on a couple songs. I hope to develop those ideas a little further this weekend when I have some time.

Outside of that, just working a lot, paying attention to the elections, trying to have some fun, and wishing summer wasn’t over yet. But now that the weather is crisper, I’m feeling more motivation to spend time doing some critical listening and work on the recording; we’ll see how that goes.

Posted a new song up at Part Time Songs. Check it out.

So the holiday weekend has come and gone, and it was a nice one. Wife and I have been biking a lot lately (well, not really a lot, and actually she’s been biking more than I have, but it’s more than I did last summer, so, “a lot”!) and it’s really fun. It just makes me really happy to be riding around, and afterwards, the tiredness is a good tiredness, distinctly different from the type you get from sitting in a cubicle all day and staring at code. Actually, we’ll be going out for a ride after I finish writing this. Anyway, we spent most of the 4th of July biking around Kensington and then rowboating. The rest of the weekend was pretty cool too, but not worth going into in-depth (though I’m sure EVERYONE was dying to hear about it).

Anyway, with the biking and the Super Tennis, and all the walks I’ve been taking around the lake here at home and at work, I’ve come to the scientific conclusion that physical activity is good!

As far as the recording is concerned (for How Does It Know?), we’ve had to postpone and reschedule the guitar/piano recording in Lansing due to first, my schedule, and then, John’s schedule. We’ll get it done soon, I’m sure, but the lagtime has got me distracted and not worrying so much about the recording, which isn’t necessarily good. I’ve still got parts to write to make things fuller, but I’m liking the approach I’m taking so far. I’ve been trying to do instrument parts that aren’t necessarily strummed guitar (which have taken center stage as far as my guitar input is concerned on my last several records). This EP will also feature some piano and (if possible) other keys. Maybe some hand percussion to augment the drums, too. Basically just trying to make it sound full without being all mid-range strumming, which has been kind of challenging, but it’s good to break out of my method and routine.

I haven’t been inspired to do much musical lately at all, though several motifs have been repeating in my head since last week for the Marshmallow Mission EP I plan to record at home. One of these days… With the weather, though, spending time in my dark basement setting up microphones and tweaking the EQ is just not what I want to do right now… Maybe recording is more of a fall/winter activity.

Hey there everyone… Just a quick note to mention that Part Time Songs has a presence on Facebook now. A Facebook “page”, if you will. If you’re on Facebook, you should join up, and get future updates in a Facebook-generation friendly way.

Not much else. I’m s’posed to take that MCPD test on Saturday. Not sure if I’m *totally* prepared. One of things about being a software developer with access to the Internet is that you can just look up whatever syntax/minute detail on the Internet whenever you need to. With the test, you’ve gotta have that stuff memorized. But I’ll probably go take it anyhow, if only to see what the hell these MS tests look like (since I hear they’re totally different and scored differently than the practice tests provided with the training pack).

Oh, and I’m back on the Scrabulous. On Facebook. Where Part Time Songs has a page.

Been super busy with work, studying for this (can’t wait to get that done with so I can… move on to more exams. Yeah, it’s sort of self-torture, but it should be worth it in the long run)… Also, the other night I had an experience I hadn’t had in a while… I woke up 3 times with lyric ideas and had to write them down before I could get back to sleep. I haven’t gone back and read them yet, but at the time I thought they were pretty good, all of them for the same song (”Totally Dead”, from my forthcoming studio EP How Does It Know?) I’ve been struggling writing verses for.

Other than that… not much. I’ve got a new little home recording project called Marshmallow Mission bouncing around my head… I have 3 ideas for that, so maybe some weekend with a few hours I’ll record those up. I need the ControlPad back first, though (I mailed it back for a replacement), as it will be the basis for all the drums on it. Did I mention that thing was really fun? Seriously. Hopefully my replacement comes soon.

Ok, it’s late. Good night!

After attempting to assign drum sounds to all eight pads on the ControlPad, I have realized that one of the pads just doesn’t work at all. Dammit. So now I’ve gotta send the damn thing back and get an exchange. The thing is so fun, though, that I’m considering not doing it. But it’d be stupid not to. I’m gonna need that eighth pad someday.

EDIT: another thing I realized really quickly was that a C5 MIDI note in FL Studio 7 (which is MIDI note 72) corresponds to a C4 (MIDI note 60) on the ControlPad. The only reason I was able to figure this out was by trial and error. I had no idea the thing would be an entire octave down from what the software is expecting. Hmm. Very confusing. I’m guessing that the last pad not working isn’t something I can figure out by trial and error since I’ve been messing w/ it for the last hour.