Music Monday - Take IX

Saloon Music:


The first section is just riffing on a G-minor 12 bar blues. In the later half I was going for more of a ragtime feel, using some chord progressions from "Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear." The first time I played these in front of anybody my uncle said that I belonged in a saloon, so that kinda stuck. Play this track whenever you feel the urge to smash a sugar-glass bottle or a balsa wood chair over someone's head.

Music Monday - Take VIII

Piano Fragments: TPS-006

The dynamics in this particular recording aren't how I usually want them to be, but I'm finding that I often tense up while recording and I'm pleased to get takes without too many mistakes. I know I should try to be more patient, and I can record as many takes as necessary to get the perfect one, but as soon as I hit the record button I make ten times more errors than when I'm playing normally. I wish someone would come and record me in secret; despite how creepy that would actually be, it might yield great takes.

On the subject of recording, I'm using a really quick setup using nothing but keyboard --> 1/4in cable --> 1/8in adapter --> computer, and though the scope of what I can tweak is more limited this way, it means I'm much more likely to record on a daily basis so my output will be higher. Unfortunately, it does produce a lot of pops at random times, but they go away temporarily when I restart the software, so I don't think it's a cable problem.

For those of you who don't care a lick about the recording process, just listen to the piece. It's got a nice sweeping intensity to it. I hope that makes sense.

Music Monday - Take VII

Piano excerpt: TPS-003

Another piano composition, this one written over the course of 2008-2009. A lot of what I write comes in scraps which later get refined and sometimes fused. What's recorded here is actually an excerpt of a long string of melodies that I've been stitched together with odd transitions--hence why it clips in and sounds like it's been cut short. The omitted portions have been scrapped and may be used for other works.

The mood starts off forlorn but shifts into something a bit more soothing. I always imagine rain when I play it: it's often associated with melancholy but can be very comforting at times.

The title comes from having worked on ant taxonomy all day. That's usually how temporary morphospecies are labeled.

Music Monday - Take VI

Fuck, it's Wednesday


I wrote this one last fall (2011) whilst hungover the morning after a craw-fish boil. Half of the lyrics came unbidden within the first hour of waking and I scrambled to get them down in a notebook as I groped around my kitchen for hashbrowns. I fleshed out the missing verses over the course of that day, and by the next day I had found all of the chords that matched the melody I'd been forming. By April I started playing it comfortably on the concertina, and in June I got around to recording it with Keith Bracy (whom I mentioned two weeks ago). He's still working on the EQ, so I apologize for the still-perceptible lack of a pop screen.

Here are the lyrics:

___________________________

Have you ever awoken from nothing--
Not a dream, nor the memory of going to bed?
You pounded your drink, but the moment you blinked,
the toilet was supporting your head.

How often do you wake up from nothing?
A dumbfounding, liquor-inspired blank slate.
Sprawled out you stall, as you begrudgingly recall
the life's worth of bullshit you tried to escape.

God, I hate waking from nothing.
The sting of reality's the worst kind of pain.
My body's intact, but I need to extract
the brick that's in place of my brain.

Have you ever awoken to no one?
We all have at some point in our lonely lives,
but the longer you wait, you'll seal your fate--
it's hard to get lucky when you're 65.

How often do you wake up to no one?
The vacant spot next to you hurts now and then,
but the deep-seated yearning can be quashed by returning
to the bars to forget once again.

Good God, I hate waking to no one.
No one has pity or ears they can lend.
My houseplants are great, but they won't get me laid.
This bottle of Tanqueray's my only friend.

Last night will remain an enigma.
There's no note or a single reminder in sight;
just this flippant erection, and no recollection
of events that transpired last night.

But you're here asleep right beside me;
Your eyelids are fluttering; you're wrinkling your nose.
It's warming my heart, but it gave me a start
when I woke to discover I was wearing your clothes.

But I'd rather wake up from nothing
than to ever wake up to no one.
If my liver is shot and my mind's been erased
at least I woke up to your face.

'Cause, I'd rather wake up from nothing
than to ever wake up to no one.
You're my saving grace, I hope you feel the same.
So tell me babe: what is your name?

Music Monday - Take V

Steph


This is one of my first compositions on the piano. Like any beginner I started in C major, and the rest developed by ear when I realized I liked the sound of a fifth played with the third and octave above (That's the lower notes you're hearing from the left hand). I didn't know what that meant as I didn't know as much theory then, but it was something neat I could do while making use of the 10 note span my hands can cover. Some of the chords are dissonant and some of the rhythms feel a little off-kilter, but I was experimenting as all I ever really played before this was the 1-4-1-4-5-4-1 of a twelve bar blues.

For the time being this is the best recording I have although the EQ could stand some tweaking.

Music Monday - Take IV

The Old Box Under the Stair:


This is a scrap of a song that I wrote a couple of months ago and had the wonderful opportunity to record with the aid of Keith Bracy, a drummer of outstanding talent. He has a jazz background but plays in a number of southern-metal bands in North Little Rock, and has a penchant for recording, mixing, and producing as well. His curiosity for my concertina led me to laying down tracks of anything I could play and this song ended up emerging in a fashion I'd never played before but really liked the sound of. The working title was "Cock Mongrel" thanks to my friend Jonathan, but I feel like that didn't really suit the mood of it.
I like to imagine something like this playing as someone is exploring an old abandoned house and stumbles across an ancient box with something devastating inside.

I'd like to expand upon it, ideally laying down some drums, and strings/electric guitar where it picks up towards the end.

Music Monday - Take III

House of Jeffrey - lyrics at end of post

This song was written on a front lawn one lazy Saturday, when Remy decided he wanted to write something with a slide guitar part. I hummed along a melody and slowly started patching words in, inspired and saddened by the fact that I would soon be leaving Davis and all my friends behind to start school someplace else. We came up with the idea of writing about a tree-house because it embodies childhood nostalgia.

The next day we set about recording the song, and rushed around the house "exploring" for sounds to compliment the whimsical mood of the song.  Everything you hear (aside from guitar and vocals) were made by the following:
-A guitar pedal
-A wine glass
-A parasol
-A cymbol
-A ruler
-A cellphone
-Wind chimes
-10 overlapping tracks of us yelling like pirates
Remy made a much better pirate than I did; I sounded more like an orc.
The song remains my favorite track from that particular collaboration. It stands as a monument to my best college years and very fond memories. I hope it invokes something similar in others who hear it too.

_________________________________________

Here are the lyrics:

I went home last summer
to get my roots back in the ground,
and I was back at the old tree house
with no one else around.
And I found myself thinking
of all the things it once had been:
spaceships and time-machines,
and Big Jeffrey looking in.
He was a mean old kingfisher
with a beak of plated gold,
and he'd sit upon the bow
as we'd let the day unfold.

Time-travel?
Not a problem.
Dinosaurs?
Yeah, we rode on one or two,
and the passers-by all swam in lava
though they never had a clue.
Yeah, we rode on for hours
'till the dinner bell was rung,
and we'd hitch our pterodactyls
and wash up for some grub.

Though seasons have changed and winters come along,
the memories remain and keep it standing strong.
The bones that we've broken and trouble that we've made
just help us to find the dreams we have today.

Aliens?
Green and slimy.
Flying saucers?
We flew them at light speed.
We'd drag race any comet
and explore the galaxy.
Pirates?
Fought 'em often
Treasure?
We dug up our fair share.
We made our sisters walk the plank
and hung their dolls up by their hair.
We'd sail on for hours
'till the wind blew out our lights,
and Jeffrey would sing us to sleep
it's how he liked to say goodnight.

Though seasons have changed and winters come along,
the memories remain and keep it standing strong.
The cannons have rusted. The crew has gone away,
but adventure lives on in the things we do today.

Remy became a river boat captain along the river Styx.
I work in a bar on Mars where I sing and do magic tricks.
We may not really be in the places that we claim,
but life looks a little more manageable through a childhood window pane.

Now a new crew has taken over
to get it running once again,
and they was up in the old tree house
with Big Jeffrey looking in.

Music Monday - Take II

Today's musical selection is another song from UCDavis days with Remy Chan on guitar. A cover of "Just like Heaven" by The Cure.




Like most of what I post it's not entirely polished, but it's nice enough to listen to given it's likely no other recordings will be made. It's compiled of multiple separate tracks (I harmonize with myself), and it could use a second guitar track to flesh out the parts with the picked line, but the result is a nice acoustic take on the 1987 alt-rock song. Dinosaur Jr. also does a cover if you like the song and are into them; it's a little faster and more heavily distorted.

This was probably the first thing I learned to play on the concertina that I bought online about 4 years ago. I've learned new material and have improved vastly since then, but I probably don't play it as much as I should. I still consider the purchase to be one of the best spontaneous and intoxicated decisions I've ever made.

Enjoy!

Music Monday!

I do have a handful of song recordings I've been meaning to share so I figured, "What better way to present them than by kicking off each week with a different song?"

After a rocking weekend spent reconnecting with old roommates and meandering the streets of San Francisco, I dedicate this post to Remy Chan, the song's composer.

Here's "Staying Out All Night":


Remy wrote the lyrics, melody, and guitar parts and plays guitar on the track, I'm on vocals, and our good buddy Erik Spickard laid down the saxophone unrehearsed on the first take. That's right: every note of sweet sax you hear is 100% improvised. For me the song really evokes the late-night streets full of weathered hedonistic individuals steeped in guilt from their weekend bender. . . in a good way. The track is almost three years old and still gives me little goosebumps when I put it on. The piece represents one of Remy's first solo-lyrical compositions and is a part of a project entitled "Once Upon a Greatest Story." The album was essentially a venue to lump any musical tidbits Remy and I had cobbled together while living in Davis.

Stay tuned to future Music Mondays for more tracks off that album, and newer musical ventures since the acquisition of my Concertina!

Koyoten von Weltraum

If I'm not mistaken, it means "Coyote of Outer-space" in German, which happens to be the name of the piece I'll be presenting to you today.

This song was written in 2009 by rock wizard Remy Chan and myself, and we recorded this take just last summer (2010). The recording is dropped 1.5 half steps to give my voice a grittier sound. It could stand to be cleaned up a fair amount but it's quite close to what I'd like the end result to sound like.




Here are the lyrics:

__________________________________________

Gather 'round folks, let me tell you a story
'bout a time in the future where I once have been.
Was a little caballera near Alpha Centauri,
runnin' from the law 'cause she killed 20 men.
At her call was a man made of alloyed steel,
killed for creds cause it was his trade.
Sent to kill the girl, but he fell in love,
so he packed his guns and he changed his ways.
She was there for him, he was by her side.
Hits on their heads, they were forced to hide;
just a gal and her tin man. . . tryin' to stay alive.

Droid and cowgirl chased like game
by the hunter they'd been assigned:
half-man, half-fox, red hair like flames,
and he went by the name of Valentine.
His gun, "cupid," shot plasma beams.
Never went for the head always shot for the heart.
Didn't quite matter where he laid his aim
'cause that damned thing could blow trains apart.
On Hades-6 he finally caught their smell,
and on the barren rock where many men had fell,
he chased them across. . . the plains of hell.

They ran as they could but he quickly gained
when they sheltered each other from the acid rains
that fell all night. . . at Back-Bone Ridge,
And the gorge at the ridge was a mile wide
and they tried to flee to the other side
across the old train line. . . the only bridge,
But the fox was there he had chased enough.
The bot stepped in front to protect his love;
he clenched his iron chin. . . and said "Let the duel begin!"
The girl protested with dread on her face
and Valentine shot on his second pace
so the cyborg would not win. . . but she took the blast for him.

His eyes grew red
with molten tears,
let forth a cry
hollow and fierce.
Drips of blood
on the metal man
flecked the ground
as he madly ran.
He clashed with the fox in a death embrace
of titanic proportions, blasting lasers
split the sky like a violet edge
as they both soared off of the canyon's ledge.

Red dust shifted on a stale wind
and settled on the hot and lifeless land,
but a silver claw rose and from over the lip
came the tall android, a severed head in his hand.
Valentine vanquished and lover avenged,
he wrenched and tore at his body's case,
found the last living part that made him a man
and with his dying act hurled it into space.
You can still see it there shining midst the stars.
Take heed these words I do impart:
Never second guess the love. . . from a steel heart.

_______________________________________

In addition, here's a rendering of my take on the climactic scene of the piece:

 Click for full size, and proportionate majesty.

Three men are playing golf. . .

. . . One of the men happens to be Moses. He tees off, and the wind carries his ball far left where it falls into a pond. The other men laugh at his misfortune but he puts up a hand to silence them. "I got this," he says confidently. Moses plunges his golf-club into the pond, parting the waters like a miniature, duck-infested Red Sea, and he hits the ball out of the now dry pond bed and onto the green.

The second player is Jesus. He tees off, and the same wind brings him similar misfortune, but Jesus' ball remains afloat on the water. He smugly jogs over, stepping on the surface of the pond, and chips his ball up onto the green.

The last man licks his finger and holds it aloft to gauge the wind. He hits the ball in exactly the same manner, and it to is whisked towards the pond . . . but before it hits the surface, an enormous fish leaps from the water and eats the ball. Before the fish even has a chance to hit the water again, a majestic eagle snatches the fish and starts to fly away with it. As the eagle flies over the green, lightning flashes down and kills the bird instantly, causing it to drop the fish. The golf-ball rolls out of the fishes mouth and into the hole for a hole-in-one.

With a sour look on his face, Jesus then turns around and says: "We're not playing like that, dad!"

______________________

And now for your listening pleasure, another theologically themed piece entitled "God's Song," written by Randy Newman, and performed by yours truly: