Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

my music

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Life does funny things sometimes.

A little over two years ago i was sitting on a shag carpeted floor, tearing up. Across the room from me was Lindsay, who was directing her attention at our friend Kate, who had just decided to move a quarter of the way across from the country. Resting in Lindsay’s lap was a shiny hardcover of Dr. Seuss’s Oh The Places You Will Go, and she was equally tearful as she read it to Kate. In that second something in my head gelled, something about the way that Kate made me feel like i was really a part of something here at Drexel – and now she was leaving that something behind.


That night i sat in my dorm room and wrote Never Say Goodbye all in one sitting, revising over and over again until it resembled something very close to what it is now. And then i hid it… sat on it for the entire summer, afraid to play a song that was so directly personal and not just about some failed attempt at romance or a missed kiss. I finally played it for Kate the night before she left, and it felt like a load of creative bricks was lifted off my chest as the words finally reached the ears they were meant for. And then i didn’t see her for almost a year.

Flash forward two years. Lindsay is now my roommate living directly underneath me, and Kate is staying with us for the summer now that she’s back in Philadelphia. The two of them are moving out of our apartment and into a new one in the next few months. And the both of them are going grocery shopping for me since i’m chained to the computer all day.


It might not sound as though this is such an unusual twist in the light of how connected i felt to the two of them years ago, but i definitely couldn’t have ever predicted that anything would wind up in quite this way. So, life is sortof funny, friends are entirely wonderful, and “Never Say Goodbye” is for the girls downstairs; i love you both.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85288286/

85287995

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Day 94 was a hard song to write, and it continues to be a hard song to sing. I wrote it as random scribbles on the back of a concert playbill i had in my pocket while i was waiting in a doctor’s office. Random enough? The inspiration was as much anything that song refers to as it was the fact that i was due to have my tonsils removed by said doctor within two weeks; i felt as though i hadn’t made good use of my voice for a while and wanted to work on something new before i has things taken out of my throat by surgical force.

Having written the first draft of the lyrics on it, the playbill then found its way to my floor – where it stayed for two weeks until i read them to Elise one night. I don’t remember the entire chain of events, but a few hours later i came out with the revised and arranged song that kicked off today’s event. It’s still rather young and rough around the edges (and has oh-so-many lyrics to squeeze in), but i definitely like it already.

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I am a bit deflated.

For the record, Radio Shack is Satan. Did you get that? RS = SATAN … Without going into exhaustive detail, the short of it is this: last night i want to my local shack of horrors to pick up some audio cables and a quarter inch signal splitter. After talking for a while to the sales person as i picked out my equipment it became obvious that i was buying things to make up for the fact that i don’t have a digital mixer to run mic and amp signals through. It just so happened that (surprise), the shack had just such a mixer on sale for $99, but at a different location. Biting the bullet solely for the quality of my Blogathon entries, i paid in cash and agreed to pick it up this afternoon. Well, i’ve just now returned from the downtown store sans a mixer, because the mixer had very little to do with anything i’m trying to achieve in my “home studio.” I understand that a lot of instruments and turn tables have a whole ton of RCA Stereo outputs, but i’m a musician and have nothing of the kind, so a mixer with 4 stereo RCA ins and 2 stereo RCA outs just means i need 6 RCA to eighth inch adapters. Did you follow that?


So, the very short of it is that, for the time being, the Blogathon songs will not be recorded in full-quality digital audio as supposed in the last post. Furthermore, if you know anything about home 4+ channel mixers for under $200, please contact me ASAP.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85279554/

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At first I thought that i was hungry. Two in the morning, lying on my back on top of the covers thinking that maybe, perhaps, i was hungry.

There was definitely a sensation of roiling unease in my stomach, and i had definitely jogged two miles between the last time i ate and the moment i resignedly turned to my side and pulled the covers over my midriff. I could go have a snack if i really wanted to, but i was already dangerously close to staying up for an entire twenty-four hours. I didn’t relish the idea of doing it twice in one week. I would eat in the morning.

I wasn’t hungry. The bowl of Cheerios stared back at me, scores of tiny unwinking eyes returning my blank gaze. Never a blink. Probably wondering why i poured them in the first place. The spoon and i were like a assembly line machine, working with deliberation rather than care to finish one task and move on to the next. I finished unenthusiastically, my stomach still adrift. I wasn’t hungry.

I claim to be immune to stage fright, but having a big mouth doesn’t equal star potential. In fact, it can be exactly the opposite. Lately, our entire apartment and all of our significant others (oh, and Ernie) have become hooked on Fox’s American Idol. Somehow the show avoids the nauseating generic pop culture that most other Star-Making programs of late have engaged in, instead opting to lead with the contestants and their voices. On each show they sing a song… they can dance or smile if they want to, but really they’re just there to sing. Live. In front of over 10 million viewers. For the chance to be a superstar.

Lindsay and i are invariably amongst the first people into our building on Wednesday mornings, and as we both delve through endless boxes of records we talk about what songs we would choose to sing on teevee. Underneath all the laughter and bragging, i know that i wouldn’t make it. Even with the quality of my voice left wholly aside, i know that i could never walk out on stage and stand still – knowing that a number of eyes beyond my ability to count were on me. And so i settle for watching, for being nervous on their behalf, and for dreaming about being in their midst.

Blogathon is not a top rated teevee show… last year my hits for the 24 hours were in the thousands, but people who actually listened to my songs were probably only in the tens. However, this year looks like it’s shaping up to be a lot bigger than last year, and i really have no way of predicting how many people will visit my page or listen to what i have chosen to invest: a dozen of my most valuable possessions – my songs – plus another dozen covers of some of my popular favorites. In three days they will appear, one per hour, for thousands of people to sample and form opinions on. And my stomach is aflutter. 72 whopping hours left until i have to go live with my my first song and i already want to duck out the stage door and either be sick or hide.

Elise pointed out i have to record a song every three hours to get all 25 of them done by Saturday morning. I would like to point out that thanks to two very generous pledges i have now raised as much money for Planned Parenthood as i have spent on recording equipment for Saturday. Which is now 71 hours away.

I think i might be hungry, but i’m not sure. Back to work.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85277890/

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I am the sort of person that, once i have something fixed in my head, it overwhelms everything else in my life. That’s what happens when i ‘crush’, so to speak. I can safely reveal to you that this sort of attention is rarely paid to anything resembling work. When i’m at work i can become so focused on something that i’ll skip lunch breaks and leave later than expected, and i have been known to grow so engrossed in writing a paper that i forget to sleep or use the bathroom. However, the way crushing works is that it subverts other intended activities — and getting the records organized at work never crosses my mind when i’m working on a decent logic puzzle in the same way that writing a paper usually doesn’t distract me from writing a song.

Having spent all that time setting up what doesn’t usually distract me to no end, now let me (predictably) contradict myself: in the past week an official job i have has superseded everything else i could possibly be doing: working, sleeping, eating, spending time with Elise, and even getting near Blogger. The job, as it were, is to arrange Lisa Loeb’s “Stay” a cappella for eight or more women’s voices so that everything about the song – guitars, drums, harmony, et al – is represented in full by the singers.


It was not easy. In fact, looking back over the last week i would say i’ve easily spent upwards of fifteen hours on this barely three minute song with its half-octave of lead vocal notes and its five essential chords. Fifteen hours in front of my computer playing back the same collections of three and four measures back over and over as i first change a sixteenth note to an eighth note, and then from a major fourth to a major third of harmony.

Almost a solid day’s worth of arranging later and i have suddenly realized that Drexel had managed to teach me something, because i couldn’t do any of this three years ago – or even two. Possibly not even one. I haven’t mentioned it lately, but i’m currently in choir. Yes, choir. Singing in a group of over twenty people, some of whom are very highly distinguished singers who have been in such groups for well over a decade. I, by contrast, have been in such a group for going on five weeks. I start each session frazzled and rigid and end each one relieved and smiling and ready to belt out just about anything.

Conclusion? Some things do change, but the most basic of things always wind up the same.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/07/85252415/