Rain

You know, its still has my favorite Vox-type of sound...

I had an extra night off so I took a trip down memory lane and through the archives - and I retrieved this "gem". I think it's the only 100% digital demo that I have for a rock song that I wrote. More of a jam idea than a song actually. The basic idea dates for the mid-late 90's when I played in a band, before I started dabbling with synths and samplers. All the music I wrote back then is on 1/4 inch tape or has been lost. But for some reason, I re-recorded this one in 2001. I must have been bored. I believe the basics would have been recorded in Pro Audio 9, right after I got my Line 6 POD - which I thought was the greatest thing ever. If you've ever worked with that old POD, you'll recognize it I'm sure. I must have revisited it a little later in Sonar 1 because I remember borrowing my new roommate's bass to do that. The drum loop is from a demo of some commercial library - the word Soundscan comes to mind, but I am not sure. I think it's something I got off of a CD that came with a music magazine. The multitrack is long gone, so this is a snippet of an old MP3. But since it was recorded in PA9, I thought I would drop it here... With an era appropriate photo. I may have to dig out my old POD... And the old XP laptop.

Happy Birthday, Sir Bapu.

There really are no words. So sorry, Wookie.

That one particular gig in a small village dance hall, we were playing social dance stuff, softer standard bits from the Real Book, and such - 3/4 of the band were guys my dad's age. It was not the most glamorous gig but I loved playing with those guys because I learned a lot from them - and also, the paycheck... But that little place was kind of backwards and one of the guys in the audience wasn't happy that his lady was apparently very fond of me and kept smiling at me and stuff. He even tried to climb onto the stage - which got him kicked out of the place. Not the kind of thing I expected when we accepted the gig. One minute you're playing Girl from Ipanema, the next you're fending off angry boyfriends. Ironically, I did end up dating a girl from that village after we played there again but this time with my rock band a few months later. Apparently, she'd witnessed the whole thing too and thought it was hysterical.

I always say the same about my cat. She's an alien, and she'll take me to her planet when I croak. The vocals are going to be tough. I think I found the angle. I knew I didn't want to do the whole thing falsetto, but the very first bit of the demo I did for it I sang those really high notes, the "cryyyyy" part. Those need to be there. Once I verified that I could hit those, I knew I could just figure out the rest. I must say I don't hate singing as much as I used to - especially since I got the Apollo. I feel that I finally hear myself properly, and singing with the headphones on does not seem to cause me to sing flat anymore. I'm still not a singer, but things are a little better.

🤣 An extra 2 cents... Last September when my old iPhone started exhibiting signs that I needed to look for a replacement, I decided to save money and get a Samsung instead. I lasted a month and then switched back to Apple. But the whole time, I did not have Authenticator installed on any of these until a few weeks ago when I was prompted to use it when I logged into my corporate Outlook account at work. On my end, Microsoft is pretty much the only company I deal with that constantly wants to verify my identity by means of texts or calls. And on these rare occasions, Authenticator. As for the rest, my iPhone is set to prompt me anytime an app or a site is requesting my location - most of the time, it's Google. I hate Google with a passion but I have yet to be able to get used to something else, and for type of trivialities that I look up online, its awful bias isn't much of a concern. The day it turns up a picture of Greta when I am looking for an image of a raccoon eating sushi, I'll reconsider. As for MS, I've had the old Hotmail account for almost 25 years but I've recently started to migrate to iCloud for my personal stuff. On a related note - the company I work for recently implemented one of those "security" feature, by issuing a code sent by email when people use the app - even when they are already logged into said app. So I guess it really is everywhere now. Not a fan, I must say.

Thank you, guys. It's good to get feedback from my peers. My cat doesn't seem to care much for my music. I was 12 when the song came out, and I'd just discovered that there was a world of music besides Elvis Presley - and I quickly became a metalhead. Of course back then, it was sacrilegious to listen to other genres, and stuff like Bronski Beat was girl music. It wasn't long before I stopped caring what people said, but back then it was a guilty pleasure. I thought it was a fantastic song.

Like, you buy a synth, and you mess with it and you find yourself with a new song or a new cover idea... That's what happened here, when I got that UAD bundle. Songs keep pouring out of that Onyx synth. I love that thing. So I ended up with a cover of one of my favorite 80's pop song, albeit one I would never had imagined covering - it pretty much just materialized in front of me. But there's this one part I am struggling with so I've been experimenting with it - and allowing inspiration to take me wherever it would. I just jam in Logic, you know... It doesn't really work (I think) but I had so much fun trying to evoke that The Cure/The Crow type of soundscape from memory...

I remember standing on the corner of the street when the cab dropped us off the first day, my (ex) wife and I looking at each other and going: this is not possible. Something's broken. It cannot possibly be this hot. And that was in September... This ties in with the Empire Strike Back thing I suppose - it was indeed like moving from Hoth to Tatooine.

Stumbled upon this in my memories again recently. The picture was taken in my hometown the year I was born. I've very fond memories of Canadian winters as a kid. Especially after seeing Empire Strikes Back, with all the snow. As an adult, not so much... I do miss it during the holiday season. But just for a couple of days. We rarely get snow here in Vegas and when we do, it usually melts the second it touches the ground. But in February 2019, I got to see a thin layer of snow on my house that remained for several hours.

Thanks to social media, I see kids whose parents weren't even born when I picked up the guitar who can play the craziest stuff - little 8-9 year olds a lot of them with genuine talent and heart, not just mechanical skills. Meanwhile, I'm still figuring out Shock Me... Good thing I'm old enough to no longer really care. I'm just enjoying whatever's left of the ride. And I'm in good company too, because, objectively speaking, most of my heroes are outplayed by those kids.

By these forums standard, I own a fairly limited number of Waves plug-ins, and I do not often upgrade my DAW, so I'd never actually WUP'd anything until very recently. I seem to have been unscathed by the drama if not entirely ignorant of it. By the time I had moved to a new computer and to an OS that no longer allowed me to use my Waves plugins, they had changed their mind about the whole thing. I am thankful to those users who picked up the torches and decided to let Waves know that this wasn't going to work. Currently at least, Waves allow to renew the WUP on individual plugins. The first thing I WUP'd was Element - which cost me $9 and brought my version up to date from 1 to 2. Not a bad deal after over 10 years. And I don't see myself needing to pay again for some time. I also have some plugins that I just don't care to renew at this time, like the CLA compressors, GTR3 and such. I recently purchased their Abbey Road Chambers and Plates for $50 and got to pick two free plugins as a bonus. I don't see myself having to WUP these any time soon, so, to me, that's worth it. But I can see how someone who owns and uses a boatload of their plugins and upgrades frequently may have a drastically different point of view.

After I decided to bite the bullet and renew my plan on a couple of Waves plugins recently, I also decided to demo a few things, including their Abbey Road Studio 3. It was the first time in a decade that I used headphones for anything other than recording, but I had used a plugin by 112db called Redline Monitor when we were on the road, "a listening, mixing, and mastering tool that makes your headphones experience more natural: as if the sound came from a pair of external speakers." What truly shocked me with the Waves plugin is that it actually sounded pretty much like listening to the same mix on my monitors in this very room and in this position (move a few inches and that's a hole different story). I sincerely doubt that it sounded anything like Abbey Road, though... It "fixed" the stereo image, put less emphasis on the mids and added bass, which these AKG-240 seem to be missing. So oddly enough, it gave me a sort of continuity instead of being some kind of alternative, pseudo-reality check. This means that, in theory, if I had to turn off my monitors for some reason and use these headphones to mix instead, I could pretty much pick up right where I left off. Something I had never considered. Not a bad thing, as, after 12 years, I am used to these monitors. I recently got ARC as part of IK's Studio bundle, so I'll probably be buying their mic and finally facing some awful reality in terms of what this room sounds like. I'll be curious to see how that plays out. And if the Waves plug-in still sounds like my humble home studio afterwards. 😁

My grandmother owned a hair salon and my mom worked there, so she did my hair until I decided to let it grow when I was a teenager. I've been taking care of it myself afterwards. I've had two professional haircuts in my adult life. I don't like people touching me, unless they're of the opposite sx, pretty, and have ulterior motives... 😁 These days I just trim the sides every couple of weeks. I have a big head with a weird, narrow face full of angles, so long hair doesn't really work for me unless I keep it in a pony tail - and I always end up feeling like I've a dead animal attached to the back of my head. Also, I don't want to look like one of those Las Vegas rock musicians.