Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

Creative

…and there was life

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My body is convinced that there are 27 hours in the day.

It will gladly absorb a requisite eight of sleep, but then it wants to stay up and about for a too-long 18 hours, plus a bonus hour to wind down to sleep.

I’ve long since been used to tricking myself into being tired, but I cannot always trick my brain into making a to-do list that can be completed before midnight.

Tonight was an epic amount of exercise, mixing for a top-secret freelance project, uploading brand new Arcati Crisis videos, chipping away at some freelance writing, and beginning the massive late-spring cleaning required to accommodate the hulking new digital audio workstation Gina and I lugged from her car on Saturday before a completely exhausting/exhaustive drumming rehearsal with Chas.

BTW, Arcati Crisis with drums is awesome. Just you wait.

If you have been wondering where the spiffy PM demos have gone, they are far from over. It’s just that I realized somewhere around 9:30 p.m. on June 7th that I haven’t had to contain many more than a dozen well-rehearsed, original, solo songs in my body all at once for several years – let alone contain them on top of my AC repertoire – and so it would be a stretch to assume there were another 46 good ones ready to tumble out daily for the rest of the month.

Also, there was the little matter of having completely worn through my dozen-years-in-the-making guitar calluses, a feat I’ve only accomplished a handful of times previously. Merrily, my vocals stayed strong throughout – more points towards the value of good voice instruction. Old-school me would have been croaking like a frog by day four.

(Also also, I was primed to miss out on some actual life in order to keep recording – including seeing good friends (and clients) play big shows, supporting local open mics, and communicating with my wife, amongst other things. Oh, and maybe a Buffy the Vampire Slayer marathon.)

(Don’t judge.)

Point being, I’ll be back with another run of of demos as soon as I have the time to rehearse them a bit, because scrabbling through a daily duo of tunes so barely-rehearsed that they hardly hang together sortof defeats the entire point of the project (i.e., to rehearse for my impending studio album and definitively/digitally put to rest some older tunes).

In the meantime, I am insanely happy with the results of the first seven days, particularly Saving Grace and Colorblind, both of which are intricate and in alternate tunings. Not ones I thought you’d hear in the first week.

Knowing my body and its various to-dos, I’m thinking sleepiness will arrive circa 1:50 a.m.

Held My Tongue (2009 Demos) – 7/30

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This is post 7 of 30 featuring live, single-take demos of each of the 30 songs I’m considering for my upcoming studio album. Each potential album tune is accompanied by a B-Side, to make each post a virtual 45 single (remember those?).

This pair of songs have always been as easy to play as they were to write. I wish I could say the same for the remaining 46 songs I have to capture.

Also, the fingers on my left-hand are completed shredded, which – given my decade-plus of guitar calluses – is a pretty impressive feat.

Song #174: Granted (live demo)
Last recorded the night it was written in October of 2003.

Granted was perhaps the first time a song woke me up from a dead sleep. I’ve been listening to its original early a.m. demo for so many years that I didn’t realize the subtle changes in how I perform it. Today it is for Sandra.

Song #141: So Hard (live demo)
Last recorded for Trio in February of 2003

This song began in an AIM window in January of 2002. I was talking to someone who was perpetually at odds with life, trying to explain that he should anticipate what he’d think about some of his decisions in hindsight. The rest of the song emerged in short order. Since he’s long since been forgotten, I tend to perform this as if it’s about myself. It’s a particular favorite of E’s and mine.

If you dig one (or both) of these songs, please leave a comment – your feedback will have a big effect on the songs I ultimately choose for the album.

Held My Tongue (2009 Demos) – 6/30

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This is post 6 of 30 featuring live, single-take demos of each of the 30 songs I’m considering for my upcoming studio album. Each potential album tune is accompanied by a B-Side, to make each post a virtual 45 single (remember those?).

This was definitely the hardest pair I’ve yet to tackle, but for different reasons – I know exactly what one of them should sound like, but I don’t have a clue about the other.

Song #228: Tattooed (live demo)
Never previously recorded

Last summer I found myself watching a very young, vaguely Christian rock band cover Death Cab For Cutie’s “Soul Meets Body.” I was fascinated by the lead singer – I felt like he was a flamboyant ambisexual rocker hiding beneath a godly image and a wedding ring. That’s where the chorus came from (hopefully not verbatim enough that Ben Gibbard needs to sue me). The rest of it came a little later, about having an affair with the love of your life.

Song #120: Colorblind (live demo)
Last recorded for Trio in November of 2001

You should get at least three songs out of every breakup. In 2001 I got nine. Does that mean the breakup was three times as severe as the norm? This song almost got discarded for having one too many metaphors, but Rabi’s continued attention has kept it around (and lead to this major update of the arrangement).

If you dig one (or both) of these songs, please leave a comment – your feedback will have a big effect on the songs I ultimately choose for the album.

Held My Tongue (2009 Demos) – 5/30

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This is post 5 of 30 featuring live, single-take demos of each of the 30 songs I’m considering for my upcoming studio album. Each potential album tune is accompanied by a B-Side, to make each post a virtual 45 single (remember those?).

These are certainly not two songs I expected to wind up with this early in the month. Hopefully the weekend will bring more surprises (along with some time to rehearse).

Song #236: Saving Grace (live demo)
Never previously recorded

There are a lot of interesting things in the subways in Paris – mariachi bands, marionettes, and women genuflecting with silent poise. I wrote the chorus on Champs Elysees, sang it on every Metro line we took, and then wrote the first verse and the bridge on the back of my Eurostar ticket en route to London. When we got back home I walked directly to piano and played it without so much as a chord chart. Afterward I simply had to make all of the internal rhymes match, learn it on guitar, forget it on guitar, and reconstitute it in CADGCC just to make things difficult for myself.

Song #58: Novel (live demo)
Last recorded for Trio in October of 2000

Directly between writing the two 1999 songs that have stayed with me for the past decade – Bridge and Other Plans – I wrote this one. I discovered that once you leave yourself open to writing songs sometimes your feelings come out through them, and suddenly you have a song about something you weren’t planning on ever telling anyone about. Aside from its single Trio appearance I think the only person I’ve ever played it for is Lindsay.

If you dig one (or both) of these songs, please leave a comment – your feedback will have a big effect on the songs I ultimately choose for the album.

Held My Tongue (2009 Demos) – 4/30

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This is post 4 of 30 featuring live, single-take demos of each of the 30 songs I’m considering for my upcoming studio album. Each potential album tune is accompanied by a B-Side, to make each post a virtual 45 single (remember those?).

Thankfully, my voice was back tonight. Also, I actually managed to improve some of my engineering. Woot.

Song #205: None of These (live demo)
Originally recorded as an instrumental on 7/31/06

A rare instance of my noodling in a peculiar alternate tuning winding up as an actual song. The tuning is DA#DDAD, and after choosing the title I decided the song would be my version of Gina’s “Fisher Price.” And it is. Some bits of it are incredibly hard to play – not to mention singing them at the same time (me and my damned overly-literate lyrics).

Song #149: Spin (live demo)
Last recorded for Blogathon 2003

“Spin” was written in 2002 as the result of perhaps my first serious fight with Elise. I have always used that as an excuse for why it is so unapologetically emo. We both have a bit of a soft spot for this song. It was maybe the first time I had ever intentionally used a diminished chord.

If you dig one (or both) of these songs, please leave a comment – your feedback will have a big effect on the songs I ultimately choose for the album.