Idea begets Idea

Since I seem to be at a temporary pause with my current song, the creative juices are flowing, just not in the direction that they need to be from my point of view. So a new song is in the works while the other new song sits and thinks about what its trying to prove.

Coolness, that this new groove comes together so fast. The challenge is to create a somewhat viable electric guitar sound out of a synth. It needs some teeth and edge and groove to work. Again we'll see. This whole Chroma Specter project is really one big experiment, carefully intended, but ultimately trying to be something new yet approachable to the casual and serious listener alike.

Anyway, the new tunes working title is "If I Ran The Circus"; taken from an obscure Dr. Seuss book, but also a phrase that means "I have an opinion!"

In other news: My young son and daughter attended a "Rodeo Party" today and rode horses (real cowboy work horses) for the first time. Quite a thrilling experience though my daughter who is almost 3 was also amazed at the manure on the ground and couldn't stop talking about that too. It's the simple things in life I guess.

Thanks for listening.

Lyric Block

It usually takes a bit of time to get the rust out of familiar tasks or skills that have laid dormant for a while. Such is the case with writing the lyrics to the current song that I am working on. I really had no idea where to begin. I knew the subject matter that I wanted to write about but was at a loss as to where to start.

In the past, my lyrics have usually come in fits and starts as they were tipped off by whatever muse worked the process. But again this time. . . nothing.

As you may recall from my first post, there has been a year of total inactivity in the music department of my life, due to a job layoff, major move and all sorts of recession scrambling. After some time thinking about trying to write some words to the music, I remembered one of my unusual methods that seems to work.

The steps are as follows: Begin listening to some music and lyrics that may or may not have a similar feel to my own song. Then I start to write phrases or sentences that seem to flow together and begin to create some coherent stanzas. At this point usually my mind takes over and the words start flowing freely.

I think that by listening to other lyrics and more importantly the flow and rhyme and meter of the words, my brain is able to start piecing the word puzzle together. For that is how I think of poetry, as word puzzle, phrases and words and couplets that fit together, referencing each other, forming interrelated symbolic phrases and an overall feel to the song. The amazing thing is that the finished product sounds nothing like the lyrics that I was listening to that get the juices flowing, but flow they do.

Now I just have to let the words sit for a little while. I'll re-read them in a few days and see if a fresh mind still thinks they work. There will be some tweaks and word changes, but by this point the song is pretty much complete from the lyrics point.

I'll leave you with a small snippet of my latest song lyrics that I particularly like. This section also came in a mad rush and was on the paper less than a minute after the idea came to me.

So here is a possible 2nd verse:

Hey Hey Little Dancer
Float On The Music In the Air
Let Us Ride The Rhythm
Take Away All Sadness & Cares

Next, to try and find a vocal melody that works with the lyrics and the song—I feel another creative block coming on.

40 is the new 38.

The above title and its ilk must be some sort of consumer conspiracy to get everyone to buy stuff that is 10 years too young for themselves. I take notice of the "40 is the new 30" because 40 is indeed the supposed age that my being currently resides at. Of course in many ways we rarely feel our actual age. And in most ways I do feel about 30 and in some ways I probably act my age or even older at times. I like to think that my 2 kids (age 5 and 2) keep me young as does my 7 years younger wife. So let's use math (a process I have never understood very well) to produce a scientifically accurate age for myself and see if in fact 40 is the new 30.

So a 7 years younger spouse actually comes out to 5 years off my current age. Each kid accounts for another 5 years each. The fact that I don't wear dress socks or slacks on a regular basis adds 2 more years. I managed to be born late enough in the 20th century to fit the Generation X demographics and as such grew up playing video/computer games and still enjoy doing so today—add 3 more years. I can still keep up with 85% of high schoolers in terms of general fitness which gives me another 4 years. Finally I don't drink or smoke and am not overweight and have never had any major health issues—lets say 6 years. So the total so far is 30 subtracted from 40, which means that I am really like a 10 year old.

But wait, we have to factor in the mishaps, butt-kickings and general wear and tear that is our mortal experience. Being married to a spouse 7 years younger than me—2 years for general misunderstanding based on generational differences. 2 kids, put 3 years each back onto my actual age, based on the same reasons that kids seem to keep you young, they also suck the energy right out of you. All the time I spent doing mind-numbing tasks at the various jobs that I have had the past 15 years, add 4 more years. Now lets look specifically at the year 2009 and the layoff starting in January, the selling of our wonderful house in Bountiful, Utah in march. The move to Phoenix Arizona area, living with relatives for 9 months, job hunting for 8 months, landing the worst job of my career and somehow surviving that for 5 months, topped with the overall psychological and financial stress of the whole experience, lets add back about 20 years, which puts me at 42 years of age, 2 years older than I am now.

Hmmm, in some instances this sounds about right but there is something that we haven't accounted for yet. And this brings us finally to the whole point of this blog. There is a certain passion that has always been with me, since I can remember. All the way back to when my dad was going to graduate school at Denver University in the early 70s. I can still remember listening to the Kinks "Soap Opera" album that my dad owned. I had made a cardboard electric guitar and stood on the couch (the stage) in the front room listening to Ray Davies and crew rocking out through my dads KLH stereo speakers. I was able to pick out the structure of the songs. Verse/Chorus/Verse/Chorus/GuitarSolo. . . (ABABC). It makes sense as the Kinks have always been such smart pop music songwriters. And here it was at the age of about 5 years old, I remember thinking, this is how a song goes, this is how its all put together.

Jump ahead 35 years and I'm still heavily engaged in music, sure graphic design and a host of other hobbies and interest play their part in my overall make up, but my brain is constantly churning, thinking, listening, daydreaming about music. Riffs, melodies, rhythms, lyrics, sounds, themes and solos all bursting at the seams. I fall asleep to music in my head and wake up to some other strain. So many killer grooves and played their part while taking a shower and are promptly forgotten by the time I get dressed. I'd be more upset about forgetting so many ideas if I didn't know that there is an endless stream of new ones waiting in the wings.

Of course you would think that I would be world famous with all this brimming talent, but alas though the ideas are there, the actual musical skill level is sadly pretty average. The drive though strong, does not always mean I am super-productive, and I am blessed and cursed at being averagely creative in many disiplines. Graphic Design is my day job and my safety and at this point I think I'm pretty good at it, but I haven't had the "noodle dream" (taken from Kung Fu Panda). People have been impressed on occasion with the way I write. The jury's still out on this, perhaps this blog will be the judge. I even have a knack for interior design, and on and on. All the skill and talent that I seem to possess hovers in this artsy corner but isn't firmly anchored to any one. . .but the music keeps speaking to me as it always has.

So going back to our completely bogus scientific study of my actual age. Well go ahead and subtract a final 10 years from 42 because of the music. My saving grace, my reason for living. And while we're at it lets subtract 2 years for hope and optimism and another year for luck, which brings us finally to the ripe old age of 29. . . did I do the math right? Anyway, 29 sounds about right. That's how I feel and coincidentaly that is the age of my inner and outer rock star. That was my age when I was in my musical prime playing with my favorite band "LoveSeat daredevil".

So there you go, I'll try to age gracefully from this point on and we'll see where the music takes us. Thanks for listening.

PS. The image at the beginning of this post is of the Rock Star, myself age 29.