Somebody Else Remembered So I Don't Have To

And now for something marginally different, or perhaps just marginal.

Theme From An Unimaginative Western (5.22MB mp3) Download from MediaFire

This is from the late 1980s, but I'm not sure of the date. What I do remember is that my brother Jim, who at the time was operating a small recording studio in NYC, invited me up to spend a few days of studio downtime recording some of my tunes. And so I brought a few guitars, synths, a drum machine and my so-not-a-laptop computer into the city with the two songs I had ready to record - or so I thought at the time.

The other song I had was called Something Really Stupid. Once I was back home and had a listen, I realized it had a serious problem, mainly in the choruses but also the way I sang it, so it got scrapped. Some day I'll record a proper version of it.

This song was luckier though - it didn't have any lyrics, which also meant that I couldn't ruin it with my singing. HOORAY! It also doesn't have any guitars. That's right, it's 100% synths, samples and drum machine.

And you know what that means.

It means everything actually plays in tune.

I had graduated to a much nicer drum machine, so to compensate I was trying to do too much with it. It's not so noticeable until you get to the second, faster half. Then it gets...well, I really cringe at my too-busy drum parts.

One thing I don't cringe at is my attempt at synth whale sounds. I was clearly still in thrall to Star Trek IV, which featured a giant alien space probe destroying everything around it because it really, really wanted to sing with whales, making it either the scariest, most psychotic tree-hugger in movie history or Woody Harrelson.

Anyway, I still like that sound.

Casual Recordings: Don's Boat Number Four

The whole inedible saga of the Don's Boat recordings can be found here.

Well, I finally ran out of excuses for not doing one of the even-numbered songs and decided that since this tune was already pretty rock-y, simply recording it with guitars would be enough of a change for this one. And I think I was right. Which is remarkable in itself.

This is another song that I wanted to do as a vocal number, mainly because when I was working on it, I was hearing lyrics in my head. Sadly, I never got past the couplet So call me a cannonball / I'm flying right into the ground, and eventually I just gave up. Just as well I expect.

Don's Boat Number Four AKA Cannonball (2.29MB mp3) download with MediaFire

Casual Recordings: Don's Boat Number Seven

I already covered the saga of Don's Boat last year, so I won't repeat myself.

Here is Don's Boat Number Seven AKA Hi, my name's Ben (3.28 MB mp3, Download from MediaFire). If you were paying attention, and know your numbers, you may suspect some sort of pattern at work: First Numbers 1, 3 and 5, and now 7? So, what up? Heck if I know. Those are just the ones I thought were most promising. I swear there's a #4 I'm thinking of doing, but I can't figure out how to make it sound different.

Like the previous three, #7 sounded like BMBPDJ (Bad Marching Band Plays Disco Jazz), and, well, now it doesn't. I had actually done most of this right after numbers 1, 3 and 5, but as a vocal number. At the time there was an amusing phenomenon on the Intenet concerning an apparent attempt to create a viral publicity whatsis for a bodybuilder who wanted an acting career, or something. It was all very confusing as no one was taking responsibility for what they were doing and for all I know it could have been some sort of weird conceptual art piece done using a piece of found video.

At any rate, while I was working on #7 I suddenly heard words being sung to it, as happens now and then, so I started doing it as a vocal piece. And then a whole lot of Real Life happened and I didn't get back to it until now and I don't feel like doing the vocal any more. But you can sing it if you like, as I'm including the lyrics. Just sing along with the acoustic guitar (except for the first half of the second verse, as I was apparently planning to do a solo there).

It was gonna be called Hi, My Name's Ben.

Hi, my name's Ben
You may have seen me at the five and ten
Or where I used to work at the A&P
I still go in there now and then
But I'm on...my way
Don't wanna waste another day
In this life I'm living.

My name is Ben
And I've been awesome since I don't know when
Just look at my handsome smiling face
I'm like a walking 8 by 10
I'm like a sun ray
You can't look the other way
Even if you want to.

My wheels are spinning round and round in this
two-bit nowhere place
I'm gonna find my fame and fortune and
next time you see my face
You're gonna know who I am.

(solo?)

Hi, my name's Ben
Say hello to my little friend
You better not make me angry yeah
or you could come to a sticky end
It's like a nightmare
But it's finally coming clear
What I gotta do now.

They've been ignoring my existence in this
godforsaken place
I'm gonna be all over the nightly news
And next time they see my face
They're gonna know who I am.

Casual Recordings: Don's Boat Nos. 1, 3 & 5

Edit: For those who have trouble with Rapidshare, I've added links for using MediaFire to download the songs.

Way back in the olden days - I don't know exactly when, but I was doing my MIDI sequencing on an Atari ST computer - some siblings-in-law, who were into amateur video making, asked me if I would provide some music for a video they were making about Don, another family member who was a competitive bass fisherman. Without having seen the footage, or having the first clue about making effective score music for that matter, I eventually tossed off a dozen or so tunes, gave them catchy titles like "No. 01", sequenced them for the drum machine and synths I had on hand, and recorded them straight to a cassette which I mailed to them. I don't remember if they actually used them.

Anyway, time passed and in 2008 I needed to get a file off the old Atari, leading to a few days spent recovering as much stuff as I could off the old dusty disks. I recovered most of the MIDI files from the Boat video and played them for the first time in years.

Boy, were they bad.

No, not all bad, but a lot of them sort of sounded the same: 120 beats per minute, bouncy synth bass, and (since I had just gotten a sample player that had decent horn sounds) lots of horns. It sounded like a bad marching band trying to play disco jazz.

Anyway, since I'm getting back into recording after a long hiatus, I thought it might be amusing (for me anyway) to take these songs and see if I can't make them sound very different, and also replace all those freakin' horn samples with, I dunno, guitars maybe? And so here are three of them, all MP3, 128kb.

Don's Boat Number One - 3.9MB
download from MediaFire or Rapidshare
I'd been messing around with a bit of quasi-Hawaiian slide playing, so I decided to slow this one way down and try to make it Hawaiian. Well, so much for that. I actually had it even slower than this, but I wanted a quick-and-dirty substitute for the bongo track I had sequenced, and I found a few bongo loops at this speed, so there you go.

Don's Boat Number Three - 4.3MB
download from MediaFire or Rapidshare
Well, this one had a very happy sound to it, so the logical response was, 'I wonder if it will still sound happy if I do it with super-overdriven guitars?' I believe the answer is Yes. And the cheesy resolve is still cheesy! Hooray! Longest fade ever.

Don's Boat Number Five - 4.6MB
download from MediaFire or Rapidshare
This one was all bouncy bass and trombones, with a muted-trumpet lead that was me trying to do a Miles Davis thing, although Miles would've used about 1/3 as many notes, and, you know, been good. Nothing to do but take the bounce out of the bass, ditch the trombones, and play the trumpet part on a guitar, even thought the notes don't really sound right on a guitar.

mood: spearmint