days 4 and 5: thurs and fri in the last two days, we’ve been recording quite a bit, and have completed (or so we think), 4 songs: ’escapism is fantasy’, ‘small are the words’, ‘regarding present fears’ (formerly called ‘hope’), and ‘rainfall’. these have not been easy, but i think they’ve turned out very well. anyway, that brings the total up to 7 songs done, leaving 6 to be completed (or, 7, if we record a secret track of some kind). ...
i transport myself two millenia back in time and thousands of miles in an arbitrary space direction. i enter a dwelling of sorts, and it blurs between wood and stone, thatched and open-air. the scene flickers like three-dimensional images on glass, and sometimes the dwelling is in the middle of a smallish town, sometimes it feels more on the outskirts. like continually-molded gel humanoid figures gather at the edge of my vision. i say the edge, because only one thing occupies my attention. like a flattened vortex seen head-on my sight is focused inexorably on something that stands out from the rest in virtue of being real. more real, even, than my thoughts as i look–they, too, are only shifting flits of particles in comparison. ...
day 3: monday 12.23.2002 dave and i woke up around noon today and got to practicing and recording a few hours later. today we attempted a song many of you probably know, ‘a pixelated life’. i’ve had an old recording of that up on the internet for about a year now, but i wanted it on the new CD so we had to re-record it for quality’s sake. we spent about an hour or two practicing the song, and then got to recording. i laid down the guitar track in two takes, so we switched the mics to vocals, and i was able to get a good take on the second try for that as well. ...
day 2: sunday 12.22.2002 you might wonder what happened to saturday–well, my family went down to west palm beach for part of the weekend to spend some time with my grandma and aunt and uncle, who live down there. we got back at 2pm today, and dave and i redid the drums on ‘so talk about it’, since we decided we weren’t happy with them. hopefully third time’s the charm! but i think we have a finished or near-finished product, anyway. then duty called and we had to go to a christmas party until 7. once all the weekend’s obligations were over with, we began to practice and record ‘hear this’, a song i wrote this summer, but haven’t played at any shows this year, since it’s rather long, and hard to nail the vocals on. ...
today, my brother david and i started recording songs for our new CD. i picked him up from gainesville on wednesday, and after a brief stop for some rock climbing action at a local gym, we came home and set up the studio. in our house there is one second-story room, which we call the bonus room. we cleaned this room out of every unnecessary object, and quickly set up drums, guitars, an amp, a PA, mic stands, a gigantic mixer (that can probably fly, it looks so sleek), our computer, etc… by the end of wednesday night we had what for all purposes looked to be a bona fide home recording studio. ...
…and as it turns out, real blankets have been the order of the most recent days. due to the cold (sub-50-degree…just a hair from freezing) temperatures and the fact that our heater likes to trip its circuit breaker without reason or warning at the onset of darkness, i’ve been spending most of my hours under the comfortable enfolding grace of my bed. now let’s make my writer’s craft(y/ &) intent transparent and force that into an analogy for what i really want to say: i wish with all my might that i was under a different kind of blanket right now–the kind that means the end is at hand, or in sight. a blanket that helpers throw over the shoulders of a disaster survivor to let him know he is safe and on the way home, for example. here’s another: the one that is worn like a cape around the skinny frame of the victor of a 26-mile battle. or, lastly: the linen wrapping (yes, christ’s shroud no less) that is the tape binding two souls for the first time as they begin their life’s journey thenceforth as one. ...
…and after two days of intense relaxation, i’m off. tomorrow i brave the ‘winter storm’ conditions and pray that my planes all go where and when they are supposed to. lord willing, i will be, fair weather or foul, beneath the blanket of floridian humidity in 18 hours. to all those not yet done with school, good luck.
one more thing left, and i am done. two finals under my belt, and one horrendous logic take-home exam with them, but still remains the hardest of all–my ontology paper. die, paper, die. still, in a matter of hours, whether done successfully or done having failed, done will i be. and then, it’s party time. the thing that’s been keeping me going this week is the thought of recording a CD this christmas–that’s right, i’m recording a CD with super-awesomex drummer david lipps. i’ve got about 12 or 13 songs written since i put out the Effortless ep, and it’s time those got recorded. no more shoddy dorm-room work, though–dav and i went all out and got a ton of top-notch recording gear. if all goes well and god is with us, we will be spending 8 hours a day playing and recording (and of course working out to remain the buff studs that we are), and emerge sometime in january with a set of professionally-done songs. that is exciting. ...
i am back in california for a week of final papers and final exams. i should be working on them right now, but my cursed laziness and procrastination prevents me. ah well. i recorded a song today. i could, theoretically, have recorded any as-of-yet unreleased jonathan lipps gem (and they are all gems, mind you), but i re-recorded ’escapism is fantasy’, which, if you are a regular blog reader, you will recognize from the 17th of last month. maybe it’s because the lyrics were heavy on my mind today. in any case, some of you i’m sure missed out on the song the last time i posted it, for one reason or another, or perhaps because my linking to it was not as helpful as possible. this time, then, i’ll try to make myself completely clear. the line after this sentence is a link to the song! ...
not to continue with the theme of my last post, but i’d just like to say that i took no less than five whole minutes to pick what to listen to just now. organized by artist and album, i have simply to use my optical mouse’s scroll button to view any segment of my cd collection. then, i have simply to use the left button three times to spin any desired virtual disc. these actions combined can take no more than 1.5 seconds, and yet, the decision takes five minutes. extraordinary. ...