What's on my sonic plate?

...I'll tell you.

It all started tonight when I was trying to figure out what song was playing during an episode of House. I discovered that it was called "Kicked Out" by Pussy Galore, and I went in search of it.

Well, iTunes didn't have it.
Amazon didn't, either.

In fact, the only place that did was eMusic. So away I went to sign up. 50 free downloads, you say? Yes, please. I purchased the cheapest plan ($11.99) and started grabbing some songs.

---->rewind

I take that back. This whole thing actually started when I heard about Paul Westerberg's new 49-cent record. What a great thing to do - at that price, who cares if it sucks? The part that did suck slightly was having to sign up for Amazon's MP3 service and download their little program. I guess it wasn't so bad. eMusic has one too. Eh.

---->back to present

So now here we are, in the present, and I can tell you about all the great music I downloaded today and will probably listen to sometime soon:

Paul Westerberg - 49:00
Pussy Galore - Dial 'M' for Motherfucker
The Hold Steady - Stay Positive
Deastro - Keeper's
Fugazi - Red Medicine (on the recommendation of David Bazan)
Neutral Milk Hotel - Everything Is (because the preview sounded wicked)
The Dark Romantics - Heartbreaker (imported the CD I got on pre-order)
Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago (also found this through House)
Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles
The Field - From Here We Go Sublime
Spoon - Telephono, Love Ways, Soft Effects, 30 Gallon Tank

Mahler - Symphonies 5, 6, 8, 9 (I had two of these already, and found good recordings of the other two)

There you have it. I'm sure I'll rave about whatever jumps out at me.

What I got:

not a lot

What I need:

some arrangements, pronto

What I am:

surrounded by cats

Studio - Day 3

Saturday has been the most exciting work to date. We took on the challenge of the newest songs, working and re-working the sections until we had drum parts that we were satisfied with. That's sort of an understatement - during the final takes, I couldn't believe the sounds I was hearing.

I don't want to hype this project into the ground, so I'll just say it's going well and there are some incredible sounds on it.

6 drum tracks down, 4 or 5 to go.

Studio - Day 2

We hit the ground running at about 11 AM on Friday. Caleb was running late because a dog wouldn't get into his car. Eventually he got there and we started kicking out jams.

We had some problems with a scratch track I recorded too slow. I fixed it while everyone else got lunch. We ended up finishing drums for two songs in about 5 hours. Not bad at all.

I'm hoping that we can do 3 or 4 songs tomorrow and the same on Sunday. If that works out, we'll be ahead of the game.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Studio - Day 1

There's no time for anything. I don't have time to think, much less sleep or eat. After a couple of weeks of false starts, we are finally go for the Fourth of July weekend.

I don't know what to expect, because I've never done a real record before. What I have done mostly involves layering part after part in the safety of my own room.

Working with actual people is something else entirely.

Meanwhile, I put off preparations because we hadn't really nailed down a specific time to start, so when I get the word about July 3rd, I only have about two days to get everything ready. That means cutting scratch demos at my house, and it's not very pleasant. But it goes quickly and I'm able to squeeze out 5 or 6 songs. The quality is terrible, but all they have to do is keep time so the drummer knows where to play. I'm so rusty at playing and singing my own songs to a click - I hope I can get my act together when it comes time for me to track.

Thursday - the first night of tracking - went very well. We nailed down a solid drum part and worked together to get it done. There was plenty of open discussions about things, and I felt like it was a good process. I spend so much time thinking about what to do with my own songs that it makes it difficult to accept anything except the track that's already in my head. Fortunately, we came out on top and in the end we will have something to be genuinely proud of. I don't feel like it's too much to ask.

All I want to do is make the best record that anyone has ever heard.