Saturday, June 29, 2013

Fuck Yeah/Fuck No

So I'm a fan of profanity and I just gotta say,

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK YEAH!

So I finally booked a goddamn show. This is the first time I've ever booked a show at a legitimate venue and I gotta say, I'm feelin' like I got a big cock. Now It's not like we're playing Carnegie Hall or anything but it's a place that people call a venue. Not a bar, not a restaurant, a real fucking venue.

Local 506 is the location of Stammerings debut into the world. I'm happy to be sharing the stage with a good friend Emily Pate and her band Ember's End.

Load in- 7:30
Doors- 8:30
Ember's End- 9:00
Stammerings- 10:00

Our first show is going to be a full hour set and I'm exciting/scared/nervous/shittingmypants/bigcock/happy all at the same time.

Saturday January 7th, 2012 was the last time I played with a band using my material. Returning to the rock scene will be such a trip. My band is awesome, they've turned my chords and melodies into something great, and we are ready for Tuesday July 9th, 2013.

That was some of the good shit going on. Now for the Fuck No.

There's two sides to every coin and being in a band is no different. June 24th, a Monday; Darious and Warren are booked for an early morning show at a coffee house. 7-fucking-am till 9am. I don't know why I wanted to do this but I fucking did. It was fun but what would've made it better is if my fucking drummer had made it out. Motherfucker was sleeping and I can't say I blame him to be honest. No big deal, it wasn't paying and honestly, drums at 7am might not have been the best thing.

The 25th
The next day we have rehearsal at 7:30 and then our first video/live audio shooting at a real studio with a fully functional stage and live sound starting at 10:00. It was dope as hell. Unfortunately, I was fucking up beyond belief. Forgetting lyrics, fucking up chord progressions, and getting shitty sound were just a few of my countless mistakes. I was very proud of my band however. They killed it and made me want to keep going (awwwwwww). At 11:45 and after singing for about 3 hours, my vocal cords just quit on me. I just couldn't even hold a note. Dillon, who when getting this band started was the challenging part of the process, kept pushing me and putting that fire under my ass to keep going. Our...producer...engineer...friend who works at the place, "B Rich" hooked us up with the next night and I felt a lot better about packing up and coming back with a fresh start. Me and Dillon hang out till about 3:30am that night at a Waffle House in Cary across from the Cook Out and when I get home I just want to keep practicing.

The 26th
The day that Theodore Roosevelt's wife died he wrote a large black "X" in his dairy. Now it would be a little dramatic if said that is how I felt but honestly I felt crushed. I get a text from Darious saying he can't make the recording session or the night gig at the coffee shop the next night. I call him back and tell to get his shit together and call me back. I don't hear from him until I text him back around 9pm and he says he still can't make anything. Later on we talk about the shit that went down and he actually said some things that made me think and showed me his good character and commend him for being a loyal dude. However, I still believe that you can't leave your dudes out to dry and a band has to become something that you at least think about when planning your week. Either way, I think we're cool now and I'm still happy to be playing with him.

The 27th
The day of the gig at Sip, the coffee house in Holly Springs that lets us make noise. I get a drummer to sign on to a gig with no pay for an undetermined amount of time and I already had a guitarist signed on but the shit wasn't over yet. I end up being 45 minutes late for a mixing session for the live recording we did earlier in the week because I was power washing (what in the fuck?!) and also miss the only rehearsal that me and band were going to have before the show because of how fucked my schedule got. Starting at 5, it took about an hour to get levels right and get used to playing with each other. Oh yeah, the guitarist had never played with the drummer, and I had never played with the guitarist. Me and John (the drummer)  have played together before but not in a very long time, long enough that when we were trying to remember when the last time we even jammed together we just looked blankly at each other. From 6pm to 9pm we rocked that place. We found our groove and we killing these tunes and people were really digging us. We almost couldn't take a break because people would be asking us to get back and play. While preforming, we had people dancing, taking video or pictures (idk which), clapping along, and best of all the people listening seemed to really love the live music and I felt like I was starting to be part of something bigger than myself.

The 28th
By Friday, I got a break from the craziness. I chilled with one of my old friends, jammed around, and listened to some Jazz. Four MFs Playin' Tunes is one of my favorite albums right now. Went over the fiancé's house for some home made chicken pot pie, another all time favorite of mine, and then back to my dude Chris' house for some brews and "Donuts". Harpoon IPA for me and Lonerider Shotgun Betty for him.

Good fucking times.

So the business side of the music is far from prefect and honestly I do hate it but it's something every musician has to do and I have to play catch up. I know it's a little crazy but I feel like I am on limited amount of time but fuck dude, I'm only 22.

So what's going on with this up coming week...well we're having practice again this week and then going to the studio on Wednesday only. Lesson learned with that shit and will not be soon forgotten. We got asked back to Sip so I gotta figure what I'm doing this week for that shit. Hopefully gonna get another show in the works while working on what's going to really happen for the one we got coming up.

Fuck dude, I don't know how people can be happy not moving.

Stammerings
The Book of Face, Like us!

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Let's Play This, with Distortion

Tonight was rehearsal night again with the boys. I'm known for being a hard ass at band practice and my friends still make fun of me for how serious I am behind the mic but lately I've been trying to tone it down and just let things work themselves out. I never thought I'd say this but it seems that chillin' out has it's advantages. My drummer, Darious, picks up the music more organically, Dillon writes better lead lines, and Kenny kills those bass lines. It also amazes me how the guys remember songs better when I just shut the fuck up and allow them to create. Definitely taught me a valuable lesson I wish I could have had about six years ago.

Well let's see hear what else is going on...

So I got added into this facebook group that has a bunch of local show listings so I'll be able to see who's looking for supporting acts on a date and which places have open dates available. Very cool. This shit is pretty dope if I do say so. If I can't get a show now, then I think it's time to hang up the guitar.

Unrelated to our little band, I was practicing a Giuliani's Etude for guitar op. 51 no. 15 and it's pretty fucking cool. I would really like to turn this into a song. There are two voices that are interacting and creating harmonies so it wouldn't be to hard to just separate them for the two guitar players and write a third line and some words to make this into a modern tune.

Free Jazz!

So the coolest thing we did today happened during the last thirty minutes of practice. I played some tracks off of Four MFs Playin' Tunes, last year's release from Branford Marsalis Quartet for the guys and said "Let's play this, with distortion" and so that's what we did.

|| C-7 | Bb-7 Eb7 | Abmaj7 | Abmaj7 || in three was a pretty fun way to get our first Jazz/Rock fusion tune. Dillon stopped at one point and recorded about seven seconds of footage. Unfortunately, seven seconds isn't really worth posting anywhere so I guess we'll try to get something next week.

I love music

Stammerings

Sunday, June 16, 2013

So about the Drum part

I was recording a live version of song today with me playing all the instruments and I great drum take except for one thing.

I added extra beat into a measure in the bridge.

I have no fucking idea how this happened and it pissed me the fuck off when I heard it. I can't believe I could even make a mistake so stupid like that.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Fuck.


Well I have a small check list of things I want to get done within the next two weeks for the band. I think these are pretty basic things and that anyone in a young band is just has to do. The press kit is my small project that is nearly finished and I have a nice big band project that I hope will be done and out in 2 weeks.

Things to do:

1. Finish Press Kit.
I've almost got this one down. Really I just need to get us all together for a picture and we should be good. There's a band bio, a little blurb about each one of us,what we sound like, what we want to do, what our show is like, and some actual press (even if it is from a few years ago...)

2. Live Recording/Video
This is definitely the next big project. Not this Tuesday but the next, we are supposed to get into a studio and get live recording and a friend is shooting video for us. That is very exciting for me and that is going to be one late night. We're going to have a rehearsal starting around 6 and going until 9:30. We'll pack up our amps and shit (luckily theres a kit already at the studio) and set up again, get levels, and go for it around 10:30 and hopefully in an hour, we'll two or three songs with pro sound and video...maybe two hours for that.

3. Beer
I had one beer yesterday which is large increase of daily alcohol consumption for me but it was a Redd's. That shit is off the chain. Gotta get more of that shit.

4. Book a Goddamn Show
I think that with the press kit and now and something live, we will look like the very real and very serious band that we are. I have called emailed a lot of places, once. I think I should focus on only a few places but hit them up everyday. Thinking out loud there.


I guess this was more of a more random, I feel like writing something, addition to the blog but whatever. Beats practicing.

Well I guess that's it.

stammerings
Listen to tunes and watch some vids if you would.

Peace and blessin's


Saturday, June 15, 2013

Pretentious Post Rock Jerk Off

So last week, me and my fiance went and saw Kenny play some pretentious post rock jerk off music. That was at least the sub-genre he gave me in his txt about the show. Nonetheless, I was really digging it. Instrumentation was was as follows: Fender baritone guitar, Boss tremolo, Boss Gigadelay, or something like that, going into a Peavey bass amp and an old Fender Deluxe tube amp. He also had a small Korg synth going into a PA and his coolest piece of equipment I'll talk about later. The delay was used as looper and he built each song from the ground up. Some of the tunes were monstrous and made the building shake while others sounded like conversations between friends. This was one of two local shows I've ever been too and not been bored out of my mind. I actually found myself getting lost in the music and watching each note tell a different part of this story. The amps he used were prefect for the guitar he was using and for those of you not familiar with a baritone guitar it's basically the lower part of a seven string, so BEADF#B (note the interval of a major 3rd between the third and second so there's no need to relearn anything). The Peavey made was a solid state amp that was very modern sounding but was still nice and full while the Fender was glassy and would fuck every now and again in the middle of a song. His tone was 3D as shit and made the performance that much better. The songs all seemed to flow into each other and could have easily have part of a soundtrack.

Now for the coolest part of the show. Twice during his set he put the guitar down and let a drum machine with some samples play. These weren't shitty drum beats or anything like that, they were recordings he had done of cities. One was from a subway platform in San Fransisco (the city as I'm told) and the other from a skate park in Durham. These were not necessary to make the music but rather brought a unity between each piece of music. We've all heard this one before by countless musicians but this time it was different. There were no guitars or drums added to the music. They were as raw can be and were beautiful.

He faced away from the audience the entire time until he turned and said, "Well, that's about it" and took off his guitar. It was only about 20 minutes and I could have used a little more.

Well that's why he's the homie.

One time before Dillon got back with us, me and Kenny traded instruments for a second and it was kind of dull. Nothing really happened and we promptly switched back to our original instruments and continued rehearsal. I have no idea where this Kenny was hiding but it was awesome and I hope more of it happens in the future.

Mr. Kenny Wheeler's music can be found here: A Soap Bubble And Inertia and here's a link to a live performance New Year's Eve last year: Kenny Live

He has more music he will be putting out and something to possibily look for in the future is his project that might be called "Earworm" so keep your eyes and ears open for that.

No self bump this time, Kenny did way to a good a job for that.

Shit was dope. Dope indeed.

Sunday, June 2, 2013

Hi, live music?

So on Tuesday I'll be getting together with my four piece for rehearsal. I'm very excited for this since I can't remember the last time we were all in a room together. I don't know why we're getting together since we don't have a performance coming up and we're not planning on doing master tracks yet but fuck it, playing music is fun I guess.

Me, Dar Bear, and Kenny made a recording of one of our songs "Arkitechton" last time we got together and it was ok. I decided to not be original at all and do an acoustic version of the song using a nylon string guitar and jazz style drumming utilizing brushes. Something kinda cool about this song is that I didn't use any compression. That's right folks, none of that awesome "pop" that we've all come to love in our modern recording and instead just boring dynamics. Now you might say Warren, aren't you really just being a dick now? and my response would be yes, so I apologize. Really I do love that modern edge to recordings as much as next guy but there's something special about hearing the volume changes and even the mistakes that compression can hide become as obvious as, well, a loud mistake. I guess I can't say that the track is just completely bare. A touch of reverb to fill out the instruments, some EQing to help out my collection of renegade microphones sound like they're part of society, and a limiter. Something else you might ask could be Warren, what the fuck is a limiter? well, I don't really know. From what I can gather it's half of a compressor where it doesn't let a track clip but doesn't squish the volume. Fuck if I know. Either way, I'm proud of this track even this it's filled with flaws.

So about the title of this post.

I spent most of my Saturday this past week calling up bars in Raleigh looking for maybe an open slot for band on a bill or just a date not yet filled. Instead I was found that many bars do not have live music anymore or possibly even worse, they are just hiring DJs. Now I've performed with backing tracks before and have used sound samples in songs in the studio and live, but I have always used them to enhance a performance, not as a substitute. So there's that shit. Not all places are like this of course. I did talk to some people who were cool and looking for groups, but they were looking for more indie rock or jazz. Right now it looks like Slim's is gonna be the place for us to play in Raleigh until the band is big enough to play at the actual music venues. On wards to other cities.

Regardless of shitty recordings and difficultly booking a single show, I'm still feeling pretty good. I'm still thinking abut my music and how to write for this band instead of how to sell t-shirts. I guess that is an important part of the business but I'm not there yet and I'm glad my focus is still getting my music prefect.

Now where did I put that soap box...oh here it is.

So something needs to be done here. When I call up a bar on a Saturday night and say, "Hi, do you guys do live music?" and some asshat on the other end of the line says, "We don't do live music." something is fucked up. Really, I haven't my part for the Raleigh but my shits gonna have to change too. I hope that this isn't a trend going around the country and I'm sure that there are more places that supporting live music than not so it's just getting out there and supporting those places and others will follow.

Well I guess that's it for tonight. If you read the whole thing, thank you very much. I wish I had something nice to give you but I don't.

Here ya go

Stammerings