Monday February 16 • 3:10

mood: reflective
song: a twisting mindful of harmonies

It’s raining, it’s pouring; the old computer has definitely been spinning. Yeah, it’s been one of those days. Yeah, it’s been one of the long ones.

Recording background harmonies for a friend of mine, I’ve had this microphone stuck to my face the whole night, trying to get the song “just so”. I keep getting stuck on the same part. It’s my meter, I think. I’m just not feeling right now.

With a pair of headphones over my ears I can be absorbed in a tune for hours. But I took ‘em off just now — my ears are kinda sore. And, it’s strange how the world sounds right after — kind of open, spacey — it’s in stereo.

I still have my recording ears on, so I start up the mental mixing board:

On our right, at about 45 degrees, we have big fat drops of rain doing a march on the outside air-conditioning duct. I take out the treble and most of the bass and leave it pretty midrangy. A little dull, but it’s a good pad.

On the left, at about 90 degrees, through the window a steady rain is pattering. I think “soft shoe number,” for this part, sort of suave. Even. I crank the treble here to make it nice and hissy.

Then, dead center is the wind, cutting through the pepper tree in the yard: our leading instrument. Howling, moaning. I bring it to the top of the mix. Ah, but not too loud, just to the point where it sticks out — floating on top of our rhythm section. It rages, then calms in such a fascinating melody.

Now time for the bells and whistles: that noisy supped-up yellow hot rod growls down the street. Up and down the street — just as teenagers do with new cars. New old cars. I blend this one in the background and put it in my ear to balance out the mix.

A work of art.

Okay. Snap out of it, time to get back to work. My freshly recorded harmony tracks — still sitting patiently in Digital Performer on my computer’s desktop, kinda pale in comparison to that kind of music... Though, they probably have captured this wonderful clattering of the storm in the background. My CAD condenser picks up EVERYthing and all its whoopla.

Oh, but I am so tired. At this point I could get back to work and go to bed late and get up even later. Or I could go to bed now (i.e. read acoustic guitar encyclopedia until I wake up in the morning,) and then, in the morning have a fresh clean start to recording.

Hmm...

Okay, goodnight.

Yours,
megan

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Friday February 6 • 2:12

mood: nervous, thrilled
song: “nothing,” sensory lullaby

It’s at this type of moment I always marvel at the ways of God, of fate, of self-motivation, of everything lifelike; of the way Twinkies never get stale. It’s when I am nervous that the wheels in my brain kick into 4th gear. Nervous about the Great American Music Hall show tonight? Me? Never!

Have you ever all of a sudden “realized” yourself? Like realized your situation and wondered how you got there, and why, and you look at the people around you and think the same? All these details come up — that maybe were taken for granted — and now all of a sudden we’re curious and amazed at it all.

You’re like: waitaminute here, this is so so strange. How’d I get here?

And all of a sudden you realize we’re these little things called human beings and we do little daily things that help us get through the years of our lives. We have cars, and money, and garden parties, Twinkies. We make wars; we fall in love with each other. We have imaginations so we invent things. We laugh, and somehow that makes us feel good, and these things we have, that we call “eyelids,” squint into smiles. We live, we die.

Now you’re probably like: yeah, I knew she was a little strange. She IS after all, an “artist”.

[On the side — maybe I’m a little nervous about the show… but just a little.] But, I bet you do it too — I bet you start to think too much about everything sometimes, and so it all starts not to make sense anymore. But not in a scary way, just in a wondrous and marvelous way.

I’m like: whoa, too many science fiction novels.

Yeah, it’s when I start to philosophize, that I marvel at how I “discovered” music, or how it discovered me. Was that luck? Was it fate? What if I never picked up the guitar that one day — what if I had been sick and I stayed in bed? What if I had hurt my finger playing table tennis?… Would I be a veterinarian right now? Would I be going to school full time and working on a degree in Marine Biology? Would I be going into the family business? (Heaven forbid.) What made me all of a sudden start singing? What if I were too shy? What if I never saw that Beatles’ movie in the library and so I didn’t rent it, and so they never influenced me? What if I wanted to be a professional llama trainer-epicurean-homemaker-Martha Stewart type? It could have happened…

So I find it so fascinating that I have been put to the path on which I am now.

Whew. Yeah, these nerves are really kicking up now†— I am just babbling now. Butterflies.

Okay, yes, I AM admitting to you that I am quite nervous about the show tonight at the GAMH. My hyper-nervous-ADD state is keeping me up (along with being a night owl), it’s keeping me thinking. Maybe just a little too much.

I think maybe a midnight snack would calm me down…

Twinkies anyone?

Yours,
megan

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