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Rain

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Posts posted by Rain

  1. Neck joint is fine.

    And it has been played a lot.

    But almost exclusively in the studio. 

    I should not omit to mention that my skin does something to guitars. I burn through cheap bridges and pick up covers on Epiphone in no time.

    Here's an example, a Epiphone LP Traditional. You can see that it's not just the finish of the screw - the metal is actually eaten away.

    70273893_10156786710517582_4890200169238233088_n.thumb.jpg.b914e36071ce7cd39353d4393dda7d61.jpg

    Here's my Gibson SGJ after 3 months.

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    After 5 months.

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     And after 5 years. 

     66426523_10156655863287582_4608975498926620672_n.thumb.jpg.fff7df79cfd788f252c4ba87cd8d1512.jpg

    • Like 1
  2. 1 hour ago, craigb said:

    LOL!

    This was Walter Trout's '73 Strat on the table in front of me for a string change.

    walters73strat2.jpg

    Here's the fun part:  It was originally an ARTIC WHITE!!! 🤣

    And I thought I had done a number on my Strat... 

    Of course it's black, but still... Spilled beer and wine on the electronics countless times, played it out in the rain, threw it around on the stage, stepped on it with my boots, smash it against a tombstone, and it was kept in a small room where I used to chain-smoke for almost 2 decades.

    I did sand the upper part a little to make it more even because there were deep dents there and it wasn't comfortable. I've also sanded the back of the neck a bit last year and adjusted the truss rod for the first time. Other than that and cleaning up the pots and switch using deoxit a couple of years ago, no work was done on it since I bought it in 1996. It has the mandatory cigarette burn on the headstock and the fretboard finish is chipped in several places but not that bad.

    It's hard to believe that it is now older than the very first Strat I ever played  when I was 12  was back then - a black 1957 with a white pickguard which became my holy grail and one of the reasons I eventually bought this one.  1957 seemed like ancient history to me at the time (1984)..

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    • Like 1
  3. My guitars rarely see the light of day, but every time I take my white Les Paul out of the studio and downstairs in the daylight, I am in for a surprise. This morning I realized that the lacquer had started to crack on the back as well as around the knobs on the front.

    Collagedf.thumb.jpg.8f2b4576eea616b265debdc5ca56a003.jpg

     

    It'll be 9 years next month, and it's been kept in a smoke free environment. You expect Stratocasters and Telecasters to get all beat up and worn, it makes them look cool - and my old Strat has seen a lot of abuse. But Les Pauls and Gibsons in general are a different thing, what with the set neck and all. So I’ve always taken great care of this one. 

    Seems to me that it's aging rather quickly. But that's ok I guess. Gives it character.

    • Like 2
  4. If we were to think strictly in terms of quantities, statistically speaking, I'd have to say that I hate music. Especially in this day and age when so much is being released...

    The idea actually occurred to me on a few occasions in recent years, when I was subjected to some particularly horrible music song after song after song.

    Music is like people - I intensely dislike the majority of it, but I love and care deeply for a bunch of exceptions.  

    I guess that's what getting old is all about - seeing the number things that annoy you increase exponentially every year until you're just too anxious to leave this crazy planet behind.

    • Like 1
  5. Western music history seems to demonstrate that until very recently, few people if any would have thought to ask that question.

    Actually, the most mind-blowing creative musicians were typically well versed in theory - from Bach to Beethoven to Stravinsky to Miles Davis and Oscar Peterson to Zappa.

    It seems that it's often people with a more limited set of skills that feel that knowledge can endanger their creativity. I say that as someone with very limited skills and knowledge myself, and as an huge fan of some of those same musicians, such as John Lennon.

     

    • Like 4
  6. I'll get an idea for a few notes and words, just a bit of something and then keep repeating that part over and and try to add to it. The outline of the words is discernible in the notes, so to speak. It's all in there, I just work on revealing it. I feel that you recognize what works and what doesn't, the song tells you.

    Fortunately, I am not under contract to write music or lyrics, so I can afford to do things that way, and to let the songs come to me. Which doesn't mean you don't polish your skills in the meantime. Some songs are like mere exercises. 

    But unless it is one of those exercises, I never sit down and think about what I want to say. If there's anything meaningful that I need to say, it's been marinating in my old brain for long enough, it should come out a little more "organically".  It's almost like pulling on a thread.

    Otherwise things tend to sound a little too self-conscious. I studied literature so that part of me always needs to try to impress people with its fancy words and references to literary works, and to try and sound clever. That never works. Well, it works, but it's cringeworthy.

    That being said, I've written songs strictly based on title ideas, but the title was connected to a mood, it already was, eh, more than words. 

    Anyway, by the time I get out of the shower, which is where I get most of my ideas, I usually have a good verse ready to dictate on the phone. 😁

     I wonder how many gallons of hot water it would take me to write a whole album worth of lyrics... I'm sure there's an equation for that. 

    • Like 2
    • Haha 1
  7. I can do barre chords no problem but most of the time I use my thumb for the root note because it's more comfortable and more convenient in many cases. My classical guitar teacher used to hit my thumb with a ruler all the time because it wouldn't stay behind the neck of the guitar.

    She had small hands, and sometimes I almost envied her - took her her whole index to hold a barre. Me, there's a lot of finger left and a lot of my hand just hanging out there doing nothing except putting my wrist in an uncomfortable position. 

    And you got to use what you got. I have big hands, and big thumbs, so I try to make that work for me. 

    423026_10150594321377582_195046993_n-1.jpg.4d9a906d687081da4c6d48911737a627.jpg

    • Like 1
  8. When I was 16, my best friend and I made a pilgrimage of sorts and visited Jonquière, the small city from where our heroes from the band Voivod came. 14 hours by bus. 

    The first thing that hit us when we got off the bus was the smell. The city was home to a few plants, including a very large aluminum plant. Those plants and the pollution they caused provided inspiration for much of the bands post-apocalyptic imagery. But we'd never imagined the smell. 

    After a day or two, we were stunned - and amused to no end - to realize that our farts smelled like that plant (teenagers, you know). I guess it was like a naturalization process or something. We were becoming locals. 😁

    Maybe the fact that we ate nothing but Big Macs and drank lots of Heineken and Jack Daniels didn't help. 

    That smell is the second thing that comes to mind now when I see or hear that city name, after Voivod of course. 

    Sidenote -  my younger brother and his band opened for Voivod a few times in the last few years and he got to hang out with them. I was very proud of him. I also got to hang out with the singer in a bar in the late 2000's. I didn't tell him that his hometown smelled like McDonalds farts.

    • Haha 2
  9. 8 hours ago, Leadfoot said:

    That was cool Rain! Great bass tone! I enjoyed it! Any vocals going on it?

    Thank you for the kind words, man! 

    Not so far. This is one of those songs which I'd originally planned of having my now ex-wife sing. I'll either have to reach out to another friend who's always willing to help or to sing it myself (meh). 

    • Like 2
  10. I'm still waiting too. I'm in the right place at the wrong time. 

    elvis-sign-at-international.jpg.webp.59f5e14c2afd23bdf4eb2d65818e368b.webp

     

    Who am I kidding? I wouldn't survive half an hour even if I were to revisit my own childhood and my old golden years. I've gotten used to the comfort and the convenience of modern life a little too well.

    Although people still smoked in Casino the last time I went (2015 or 16?), so there's that...

  11. 6 hours ago, Grem said:

    I remember those pedals. 

    I recently got one of those kit builds from StewMac. It's a pedal they created based on a "Klon Centaur Professional Overdrive"

    I have never played through a real Klon, but this pedal I built is the best overdrive pedal I have ever used. I recommend them highly.

    20240126_001933.thumb.jpg.0b8942f827c11d3c4410860a7efd2667.jpg

    Neither have I, but a friend in Canada hand builds pedals and he sent me a bunch of them, including the "Clowntaur": Love it.

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    He also sent me a fuzz, which I never thought I'd enjoy this much, a great Tube Screamer clone, and this Rewolver which is a fantastic booster. Put that in front of the green channel on my otherwise generic Marshall DSL and the amp just comes to life. I always felt the green as an "almost" and the red one was "too much or not quite". The Rewolver just gave me me a "that's it!" golden channel.

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    I am not much of a pedal guy, but I'm glad I have these for different types of dirt. 

    • Like 3
  12. The words of Leonard Cohen always come to mind - You don’t really care for music do you?

    I found that out when I started putting my music online on MySpace in the early-mid 2000’s. Pictures always got a lot of hits, but the songs not so much.

    I soon realized that priorities in order were: fame, then looks, and only then music.

    Sometimes, months after they added you and sent a bunch of messages and commented on all your pics, you’d finally get a message about a song, like: wow, your stuff's actually good. 

    I remember one girl who started by telling me what my new song inspired her - it was all cute, very romantic images, but the next few messages quickly shifted from romantic to lurid and downright explicit.

    Which I can’t complain about, can I? I did eventually meet her and she remained a supporter ever after - and to this day - sending gifts and all.

    But music was secondary. As with a lot of people. There needs to be something else that will incite people to actually make the effort and listen.

    • Like 2
    • Haha 1
  13. Something I wrote in the 90’s on an acoustic. Like everything I wrote back then, it was clearly inspired by the Beatles- I think maybe Glass Onion (the original version revolved around that Bm - G7 bit pattern).

    A few years ago, I started working on it again and it changed quite a bit. I shot a quick video while I was recording a basic bass line idea. I may have posted it on the old forum.

    Then a couple of weeks later I died.

    But just as I was about to choose between entering Stovokor or meeting all my musical heroes in hell, a bunch of over-zealous doctors pulled me back down. I tell you, Hippocrates and his stupid oath better watch their stupid ghost ***** next time I croak.

    Anyway, tonight I found myself working on that song again so I thought I’d update the audio part of the video - minus the live bass track obviously. There were little things that bugged me every time that clip popped in my feed.

    I must say it feels a little strange. Almost as if I was working on my own posthumous release. A one point, I even thought I was a hologram and I started worrying that I was about to go on tour. I don't have any holographic clothes to pack...

    Anyway, I realized that I’m like the poor man’s Ringo and Paul, working off of a poor man’s Lennon demos. I’m pillaging my own tomb, and Yoko doesn’t even seem to care. 

     

    • Like 5
    • Haha 1
  14. Holy Tony Iommi, brother!

    Sorry I'm only getting to this - saw it earlier this week but wanted to wait til I could listen on the monitors. 

    You F'in' nailed it - and then some. Wouldn't change a single thing. 

    (And sorry to hear about the marital issues - been there myself. Hang in there and keep pumping out them Sabbath covers).

    • Like 1
  15. 4 minutes ago, craigb said:

    I wonder how many redneck front yards they had to steal from...

    rednecktoilet.jpg

    I am still getting used to the whole "chilling in your garage" thing down here. I guess our rednecks don't have lawns in front of the house so they use their garage...

    • Haha 1
  16. 7 hours ago, craigb said:

    Yes!  And those buttons that can trigger a Samba rhythm! 😆

    I've always loved the sound of those old organ "drums" and managed to incorporate samples from them in a few songs. Nostalgia, I guess.

  17. 26 minutes ago, craigb said:

     

    😂

     

    Must be told that I myself wanted to be a bass player.  Even though I started on the guitar, after a friend of the family broke my acoustic guitar, what I really wanted was a bass. I had no idea what a bass actually sounded like, but I thought Gene Simmons and Nikki Sixx looked cool. 

    Then I heard Randy Rhoads. 

    I often wonder how different my life would be if I'd picked up the bass instead of the guitar. I'd live a radically different life, of that I am sure.

  18. 10 hours ago, John Vere said:

    I'm teaching my Grandson to play guitar.  I taught lessons seriously for 25 years on and off. A first stumbling block I would run into was figuring out if this was going to be a waist of time because the person had zero musical ability.

    https://www.themusiclab.org/quizzes/miq

    I've been there. What you put yourself through to earn a few bucks...

    For some strange reason, I've encountered a lot of people who wanted to play bass who had absolutely no musical talent. It's almost as if they couldn't hear the instrument and thought they could fake their way through a song. Maybe they felt that if Sid Vicious could do it...

    The most surprising was my ex - after all, she's a prodigiously talented singer, classically trained and all, so I expected that she'd pick the basics very easily, even though the motor skills might have taken some time, as for most people. I don't know how many times I tried to show her the simple chorus run for Babe I'm Gonna Leave You that she really wanted to learn. Or the Seven Nation Army line that she loved so much. But you'd put a bass in her hand, and it's like she'd become tone deaf and lost all sense of rhythm. I tried using different analogy, shapes, box, and so on, but it just wouldn't stick. She'd go through it laboriously a few times and but the 3rd or 4th, it was as if her memory had been wiped and she had to start from scratch.

    But then again, in some ways, I can relate. I've been messing with keyboards forever and I still struggle to play the simplest things one hand at a time. 

    I'll have to look into that test when I have a moment. I'm curious to take it.

    • Like 1
  19. 23 hours ago, Shane_B. said:

    I got a message from Google a few weeks ago the my forum credentials were compromised and I changed my passwords immediately.

    The 2 factor and the authorization thing isn't as bad as it seems. There's an official Google Authemticstor app that is used to do the authentication if I remember correctly. I had to use it once or twice. There's the initial setup then I never had to do it again. I can't even remember what I had to use it for to be honest. 

    Irt my password from here being put out on the net, if you save your passwords in Chrome they are checked regularly. I think how it works is, if you use the Google Authenticator the password can't be changed unless it's done from the location the Authenticator was installed. It's been a long time since I did it but I think that's how it works.

    IMO I think it's a good thing. I always have everything set to send me a code on my cell if there is a login from anything other than my cell or PC. Edit: let me rephrase and say that everything that has the security option to send a code. Not everything does.

    Same. I know I do have the Google one because I see it in my apps but I don't think I ever had to use it after the initial setup. That may have been fro my previous job, where they used the Google suite.

    I also have the Microsoft one because it's mandatory at work and also because someone managed to steal my hotmail credentials in 2019. I remember the first time I looked at the log of failed login attempts. I was a little shocked, although I really shouldn't have been.

    I still see 20-some attempts on any given day. 

    ScreenShot2024-02-20at7_28_08PM.thumb.png.0a2ea3ff338236eba40e760fbaf2a42c.png

    If tapping on a number to confirm my identity on my cell phone can make things a little safer, I don't mind. 

    • Sad 1
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