Friday Morning Musings

Naked in the Great Outdoors

Summer is here, and for me, the season of warm weather hasn't been properly initiated until I've stood under the open sky without a stitch and felt the warm breeze across my bare skin. Where we're living now, it's harder to find places where one can do that without the risk of being seen by those who might not appreciate it, so my better half and I took a little drive out into the woods a few days ago. I even had a few pictures taken, but it was about 90 degrees and I was burning up even without clothes, so the "photo shoot" was cut short. It was fun while it lasted, though!

Fun With Technology

I got brave and installed a second hard drive in my recording computer the other day. I know, for most who are technologically savvy, it's hardly an accomplishment, but it felt like one to me, hehe. Had to take a few things apart to get it in there, and then when I rebooted the PC wasn't seeing it. It turned out I just needed to go into the BIOS and turn on the second SATA port. Now I can just dedicate the original 40GB hard drive (which was almost full) to being a system drive and use the new 250GB drive the actual recording projects. (And yes, by the way, I do back up my projects often and also keep a set of backup DVD-Rs at another location in case the house burns down - I'm paranoid that way!).

Another New Song in the Works

I'm also working away at another new track. This one is another kind of mid-tempo piece, so on the dance floor it would be more suitable for the slow, steamy, "bump and grind" kind of moves, I guess. I've been doing a fair amount of that kind of thing on this project - those more snaky, hypnotic kinds of grooves that just sort of unfold and envelop you. Beats that go boom-boom-boom-boom at 124 to 132 beats per minute are all fine and well, but God forbid I should be stuck doing that kind of thing all the time; it gets monotonous after a while. The more "organic" approach of "Surface Tension" is continuing on this song, too. Lots of piano and layered bass tracks.

A little while ago, I was briefly flirting with the idea of going back to a Fender Precision Bass, just because my recordings of late are taking on a slightly more "old school" vibe, but the notion kind of came and went. The Steinbergers just seem to be the right basses for me - they feel more comfortable than anything else I've played and they sure do stand out in a mix. Given the humid weather lately, I'm also appreciating the fact that the Steinbergers' graphite necks don't go out of adjustment every time the weather changes!

Time to go get something to eat...and get some more recording done. And later, I really need to take the time for a workout. I'm at least trying to make an effort to get into better shape - I spend way too much time parked in front of a computer. Not to mention, working out helps you look better when you're running around naked outdoors. :-)

DV

"Surface Tension" - Stripping Down on a New Track

Striving for Simplicity

Another blog entry, another new piece of "candy" for your ears. "Surface Tension" is playing now on my Myspace page in its entirety (although it's not a final, mastered mix, since this CD isn't at that stage yet). I guess I should note that by "stripping down," I'm not talking about getting naked (for once!) but rather a more stripped-down approach to song arrangement. It's something I've been trying to do on this new project to some degree - focusing more on the core of the song and a little less on all the gimmicks and hip sounds and effects.

Now that I'm playing a lot of piano again for the first time in a few years, there's almost a slight "urban jazz" kind of flavor coming into the mix, or at least a touch of jazz with a pop sensibility (a la Bruce Hornsby or Sting, maybe). I get into a different mindset when I play piano, grabbing more interesting chord shapes, sometimes almost at random just to see what they sound like. And it tends to result in music that has more of an ebb and flow and a more human feel than tracks that are primarily based around loops. One thing that's cool about "Surface Tension" is that I could play it as a trio with just piano, bass and drums, and it would probably work just fine.

"Swim Below the Surface Tension..."

Isn't that what many of us are trying to do a lot of the time? I swear, there are days that I just want to stop answering the phone, lock the doors, close the blinds, and just generally tell the world to leave me the hell alone or else! You know the state of mind I'm talking about? I thought so. I think almost everyone can relate to this song, even if you're not a disillusioned cubicle worker like the gent in the lyrics who's having fantasies of jumping out the twenty-second floor window!

We just have to find our own way to "swim below the surface tension" and smooth out those rough edges a little bit so that we can deal. Not necessarily "bend and be not broken" to the point that we tolerate things we shouldn't put up with, mind you, but just hang on to enough inner stillness to keep from going postal. Even if you do end up in your dream job or inherit a big pile of money, that state of total bliss we imagine we will someday arrive at when we're young is never really reached - even in the most "perfect" life, there is always some kind of stress.

Speaking of Which...

I've kind of had "one of those days" myself, so I'm going to go take a short walk through the woods and try to smooth out my own rough edges. I hope that, whever you are right now as you read this, that you find a way to alleviate your own "surface tension." Or at least that you don't snap and knock somebody out cold with a desk lamp.

Later!

DV

What I Want to Be When I Grow Up

“The struggle for definition is the struggle for life itself”
- Thomas Szasz

I'm surprised I have any sense of myself at all right now after all the changes that have blown through my life like a hurricane, tearing up everything that was familiar and felt safe. Within the last few years, I've come out of the closet, discovered the world of sex later in life than most (I wasn't one of those closeted gay men who gets with women to fit in - I was completely chaste instead), found myself in my first intimate relationship, had a small taste of the "adult entertainment" world after being a choir boy most of my life, moved to a new location three times, lost my mother unexpectedly. People have told me I'm nervous and high-strung sometimes, but I'm still trying to "process," so cut me some slack already!

Then there's the whole music thing, which has been a part of my life ever since my teens, and the rug of familiarity has kind of gotten pulled out from under me there too. For a long time, I was basically stuck in a time warp musically, writing and recording music that sounded like progressive rock from the '70s and '80s. Then music got pushed off to the side for a while when I came out because I had so much to deal with. When I finally came back to it, I found that I had changed enough that the kind of music I used to make wasn't doing it for me anymore. So I started exploring completely different, more modern genres, trying to find something I could get fired up about again.

That's basically what I've been doing for the last two or three years...tasting every new thing I can in the musical a la carte line in various combinations and trying to figure out what the roulette wheel will finally land on when it stops spinning (okay, okay, I'll lay off the metaphors!). I had a lot of fun going deep into electronica on my last two albums, and now I find myself drifting back toward a slightly more organic direction again, using a lot of piano and thinning out the synthesizers a bit. I guess most artists are usually a little more settled and "solidified" before they start releasing albums, but if nothing else, you get to watch and listen to me in the process of "finding myself" (and hopefully some of the experiments along the way have actually been worth listening to!).

"The struggle for definition is the struggle for life itself."

Truer words were never spoken. Some of us are lucky and self-actualize and know exactly who we are fairly early in life...for others, the process goes on and on and is pretty traumatic. But I think we have to have a fairly strong sense of ourselves before we can go after lofty aspirations and go out to "conquer the world"; otherwise, we'll fold like a house of cards as soon as we encounter resistance and rejection.

I'm working on it. I don't know if even the new project I'm working on will necessarily be a major "solidification point," but I do feel like I'm getting closer. Maybe some of you guys out there are trying to get it all figured out in your own lives too, and can hopefully forgive me if I've been a little erratic while deciding "what I want to be when I grow up."

What the hell, maybe I'll just opt not to grow up at all. Forget "David Vector." Just call me "Peter Pan."

DV