Musician Diaries

Not much time available for rock and roll today. I'll try to take it where I left it yesterday; I'll listen to the session, polish a bit the things that stick out the most and try to get something printable that is convincing enough for effect in the Bandcamp placeholder. I'll move in that direction as much as I can (A snail just passed me from my left side at dizzying speed... but whatchagonnado...) The deadline I set is gone. As these logs help my process so much I'll keep going for five days more, as a homage to Megadeth's "Five magics"...

My plan for today was to finish real quick the redux-to-normal montage of voice tracks, print the session, upload it to Bandcamp and listen to the album I have so far, kinda like the painter who takes a step backwards to watch the whole canvas. But I didn't get to Bandcamp because housekeeping has caught up with me; there was some serious tidying up needed after fighting the "guitar tone wars" of 2 weeks ago. I didn't name consistently or usefully the guitar tracks then, so I've had to go through most of them to tell which one was which; for example, there was one called "g_vamp", as in "virtual amp". The reference was a good enough locator at that moment, with my brain more engaged in listening and experimenting, but, come to think of it, all my amps are virtual so, it hasn't been too eloquent later. Plus I still had laying around the guitar mockups of the demo stage, plus some of the tracks that were intended for experimentat...

Done with the vocals. And I don't want to be overenthusiastic, but I'm certainly enthusiastic. To me artistic creation is about at some point being able to say "yeah, that's me". It's like your face is buried and sometimes, after a lot of effort, you get to unbury it and recognize your features. I feel like I AM in this song, and that's such a rare occurrence, it's a moment of growth for this little life living here. This can sound so pompous, of course... So I do my best to stay grounded too. I remember a quote by Rilke -I quote by heart-, that went something like "we know how fragile we are by looking at how small our victories are". At the end of all the struggle, all the change you get in the world is a new song out there, yet another computer file out there, with 3-5 minutes of sound who someone hopefully will enjoy, without noticing it too much... It's easy for anyone to say "big deal", even for the same perso...

New voice tracking session. All undesired vibes of Paul, Gene and company have been removed. I have recorded 5 takes, plus a few more of a stubborn section where I think I could do something more. And I'm not hardly as beaten up as I was in the previous session. It was expected, after all; the other session was a bit of a stubbornness case; after all the effort of setting the process, the sensible voice advised to just dismantle the whole thing, but it was just impossible to resist giving it a try. This time, with the extra mental resources liberated, the process has matured a bit more; it has grown a separate section about getting the right headphone mix, something that up until now I've been doing winging it time after time, as with so many other things. Regarding the singing, I entered the session with a stance of "I've done the due diligence, so now I'm going to forget all about it and just sing". My previous singing was perhaps too "acad...

Yesterday's works went to adding a couple of needed guitar blings (saturated amp screaming in the intro; swarm-like background sound a la Morbid Angel during one of the slow parts). Measuring the results in terms of my own previous production, I think this thing kills; but regarding the vocals I found a surprise. My raspy efforts of the day before yesterday seem to have been in vain; with the vocal tracks aligned and with reverb, the raspiness does not come through. What sticks out the most is my high pitched voice, in a very melodic way that, surprise surprise, made me think immediately of Kiss; to be preciser, of the song "Love Gun". At that moment, the following inner dialogue took place in my brain: --Ehm... Kiss is a great band... --Don't give me crappy excuses you lazy bastard! You know you have to redo the vocals... So well, I'll have to experiment and record more. Should be easier now that I have a well defined process... Today I cannot record any...

Haven't done the music part yet, but I figured I'd take this entry out of the way first in case I'm too tired later. Perspective for today: first, check vocals' validity. I think they will do. Fingers crossed. Second, a lot of tiny confusing things. I'll try to be diligent and maybe finish the song today (I think I'm being fooled by Hofstater already...). Meaning, finishing the tracking part, after which it will be so good and healthy for my psyche to work in some different song and come back later for the production part with fresh ears... The main hurdle I see is how to make QTractor's midi output be received by Ardour as several tracks (one per Drumgizmo instrument). I've researched this thing several times and never found the way to do it, or even (yikes) if it can be done. Maybe QTractor is more in beta than I thought? I hope it's just a case of the confusing documentation. Worse case scenario, the battery goes untouched, as a on...

Recorded vocals today. Tomorrow I'll listen to them and if they sound authentic that's it. I've sung really comfortably, in terms of sound. Just a little bit of delay effect in the headphones, and everything has melted together nicely. Info I've gathered from the internets on singing raspy: 1) It's better to start with a clean voice (aaaaa) and then add raspiness gradually (ajjjjjjj). Otherwise you might strain your voice --I forgot to do this, and, being new to this style, after the third take I was gasping for my life. 2) A good starting point is thinking you're holding your breath. 3) A definition that I loved: "you use less air and more power". The "redux" system has also contributed to make the session a short, tremendous blast. After the recording session I was in a state of "eustress", a word I once read online, ugly but very useful: it is the kind of stress you get for a good reason, when you're euphoric. Also,...