365 Day 363ish: Penultimate

or, fun with quickly rotating unrelated triadic tonal centres. kind of a drill I guess. progression is E G Db F Ab C E. guitar melody is phrased in 4 beat groups, bass and second guitar are in 3.

neat, eh?

365 Day 358: Too Many

recordings

story: I was going to do this one much nicer with electric guitar and drums as well, but I discovered I didn't actually have a pick. I used the corner of a cardboard battery package for the acoustic here, and it was destroyed after this first take.

365 Day 349: Eszett

finally sucked it up and bought a new xlr so my fancymic will work again. and it does.

the machine head for Donna Lee's D string broke, and Ibanez wants over $100 for a set of new ones, so I will probably cannibalize my p bass (featured here) for one until I can get home and cannibalize my other bass.

unplugged electric instruments.

365 Day 336: Hatchet

A piece I wrote for an "advanced ensemble" course I'm taking at school. started with a groove and expanded it into a piece. initial groove was the line that the sax and guitar synch up on after their kind of winding/interlocking duet intro. performing this at a recital tomorrow afternoon.

sax - danny b
guitar - joel saunders

drums - ryan turner

bass - yours truly

buried?

365 Day 333: Cozy Overnight

No reference to A Night Away.

Free medium-ballad style improv. Thought I'd give it a whirl, could've done it better but it's still pretty neat. Right channel recorded first.

(so what if there's a ton of line hiss, I bet you I sped up too)

365 Day 332: Into Town

No reference to Into the City.

All midi. heading into the toronto to play a big show with lowlands tonight. EXCITE.

amerigamelan.

365 Day 331: Under the Bus

where I fear I might get thrown.

sorely out of practice, but this is still pretty neat.

My Apology

I have missed four days in a row.

This has cataclysmic implications for the project, I suppose. I've missed days before, but never four in a row. I could justify them, but it doesn't change it.

But I'm going to keep the project going and still finish with 365 recordings at the end.

This, however, presented me with an interesting opportunity: making the four recordings in one night. So what I've done is four improvisations on the electric bass, trying to make each one substantially different. I played a draggy pitch-based one, a rhythmic percussive one, one with the quietest sounds I could make on the bass amplified (pardon the incidental noise), and a quicker, wonkier pitch-based one.

(For the record, a gig in Kingston ON, some four hours drive away, was the kicker)

365 Day 270: Messes of Men (cover)

mewithoutYou cover. should've actually memorized the lyrics and set up a click track... and tuned more thoroughly. but whatever. acoustic guitar and voice recorded same track with mic, two electric guitars and bass added later.

getting better at the clawhammer style I'm adopting from Ben.

I'd never want someone so crass as to want someone like me.

365 Day 257: Five

yep. really wish I'd miked the bass instead of done it line in.

oh well.

365 Day 252: Hunter (Bjork cover)

Bjork cover done on electric bass and electric guitar. additional hardware used was an ebow and a mason jar.


some nice warm low end for ya.

365 Day 250: Not Entirely Numb

little latin-ish ballad-ish head. I like how it turned out. could alllmost put words to it.

do da-do.

365 Day 245: Bass Fiddle

school starts tomorrow, not friday apparently. so I'm fiddling with my big butch bass fiddle.

listen to with good headphones or a subwoofer on for maximum enjoyment.

nn ts nn ts

365 Day 243: Space Dubstep Remix

Finally a decent recording to commemorate the 2/3rds mark of the 365 project!

Remixed a little minimalist piece from earlier and also sampled this one. other than that I think I used the bass drum sample stretched once for the snare and then again and with a hell of a hi-pass for some of the noise at the beginning.

I didn't think of it, but I should've really accented the structure of the original tune. Guess I sort of did, but not a whole lot.

Here she is.

(also I should point out that I don't really listen to dubstep or go clubbing that often)

365 Day 238: Stir Crazy Cold Feet deficit

just a bop head. original idea was to have a trumpet pad with it, but didn't get around to it. maybe later. also a very dry take. and cheesey synth drums. hah.

very excited to open for Wax Mannequin tomorrow with lowlands

kind of pissed that yesterday's recording won't go through on vimeo. will have to deal with that tomorrow. crappy unproductive day today. maybe I won't take a year off between undergrad and masters.

stir crazy cold feet deficit

365 Day 235: Walking All Day

felt like I was walking all day because I was in toronto today and yesterday, and everyone walks really slow there, so I walk faster to compensate.

Kind of want to write a piece for Tripoli. maybe I will.

365 Day 231: Floating in a peaceful sea

A better rendition of sunday's piece. Sight read in true allsoundsareholy fashion on alto horn by Danny Berezowski. (All other parts me)

I was floating in a peaceful sea, rescued by a sinking ship.

365 Mass Update: Days 226, 227, 228, and 229

Well, went camping with the family this weekend. Wasn't really camping because we had my family's giant RV.

on friday (day 226) we sat around the fire

on saturday (day 227) it poured, so I wrote a little progression that I might not use.

on sunday (day 228) my family ran a triathlon, we stopped at a family friend's place in Barrie for a sweet dinner of bacon burgers (burgers with bacon in em), and then I had tea with a good friend. Then I came home and improvised this on my first bass, a Slammer by Hamer that I defretted after I got a good bass. I don't know why I chose to play very in and minor, but I did.

Today (day 229) I wrote a little tune after looking at the chords for Sara Serpa's Praia a little closer. I love her writing, and I'm beginning to understand her use of slash chords a little more (aside from really eschewing the tonal center of the chord, her 'slash' roots usually create a stacked fourth or fifth kind of thing three or four members high). Here's a bit of the chord progression of the piece I wrote. It's a bit slow and sparse but with more direction than the last thing I tried to write like this. I'll render it better when I get back to my proper instruments in Guelph (how I miss them).

365 Day 225: Waste of Life

feel like this all of the time

365 Day 224: Stay Calm!

sort of a rondo form I guess.

stay calm