in the meantime, i can’t do a darn thing. i can’t even launch pro tools because my G5 doesn’t recognize the Digi002. i’m about as dead in the water as one can be right now.

i don’t really have a time line as to when it will be fixed, probably measured in weeks. Gah! this sucks. i had two good songs in the works as well, and now i can’t work on them, not even a little.

stupid technology.

things are set in motion, there is nothing you can do to stop what has already started. there is no looking back and all you have is the hope that your training, your experiences and whatever planning you may have done prior to this sequence of events will be good enough to see you through to the other side. when the saturn 5 rocket launched, there were only inches of wiggle room between a few million pounds of rocket fuel and thrust and the gantry crane. everything, the mission and the lives of the crew were completely reliant on the guidance computer to make sure they didn’t end up a sad story about what could have been.

i think about what could have been, in those quiet moments when there’s nothing else to think about. i wonder if i could have been a better mate, a better friend, a better perfect stranger, a better human being. the friends i do have, have no idea how appreciated they are, how much value they bring to my life and because i can’t even begin to express that, i have learned that i’m not fit for human relationships, friendship or otherwise, not any more, and not that i ever was. i just can no longer delude myself as i had done in the past. i will live alone, and slowly slip into a self-imposed isolation because i lack the tools to reach out. this makes me angry and sad. and i feel completely unprepared for what lies ahead, for this mission. guidance may be internal but the computer isn’t calibrated quite right.

this song i’m working on, also in a way, represents how this mission has come to be, everything for me is internal. i internalize everything. its my training, programming, never let the facade of a perfect house of cards fall, never provide ammunition to your enemies (and everyone is an enemy) because they will use it. i imagine sometimes what my life would be like if i knew how to externalize things, to reach out, and the picture is so cloudy and the amount of energy it would take me to engage in that kind of transaction is just too costly. its exhausting. i wish i could even just say that much to help those in my life understand that, that it isn’t about not caring or laziness or callousness or carelessness. its about me trying to find a way to not have everything cost so much.

the facade is cracked, its broken and everything isn’t right. my guidance chip is trying to compensate and doing a sub-par job so far, there will be more balls to drop, more mistakes made and all the while i will fight this rocket every inch of the way from the pad to orbit. to the vacuum of space, and i’ll try to remember to radio back my position.

i have to finish this record. if just anything to have a full release under my belt. its not like i’m out to make the ultimate post-rock statement, just something i can have, something i can point to as having done something with this music i make. this record will be something that is mostly personal, a collection of thoughts and musings put to music. that’s pretty much it.

so i keep working on it, piece by piece, here and there, in between resting, the day job and the rest of the crap that life presents me with.

but the reconfiguration (as it is) is complete and i should hopefully be able to continue to work on the record. i have to have about four additional new songs before i’ll be in a place where i can start the work of compiling the material for it. i had hoped to be further along by this time than i am, but life and the events that take place conspired against that.

i’ve also started hanging out at a new community site, centered around t61. MaxBumps.net its called, and while its focus is creating community for listeners, there are a few of us artists there. i’m not sure how much i fit in there. i mean, listeners don’t really care (nor should they) what goes on with the artists. the roles are clear. listeners drive the show, an artists job is to provide the material, and if that material isn’t up to the listener’s tastes, then the listeners find artists’ material that is. Its pretty simple, and very democratic, refreshing actually. but with that goes a very real detachment which is what i’m trying to grasp, between the listeners and artists.

i’ve actually written, briefly, about this in MaxBumps forums, its a bit of a social contract, of sorts. in that contract it doesn’t state that listeners have to care, even a little, what artists do, think, say outside the very specific boundaries of the music they offer, and through t61, that is very easily bubbled up or down in the social hierarchy in a very clear manner. of course this isn’t to say that listeners are just cold consumers devoid of any curiosity, compassion or feelings with respect to the artists, its just i don’t know how much traction there would be in a community like MaxBumps. Does that make sense? So we’ll just have to wait and see. i still think its a fabulous idea, because for the genius t61 is, its seriously devoid of any sort of community features (which i believe is by design and i can appreciate that, keeps the mission focused.)

well, enough of my yackin’ just wanted to toss in an update here for those playing along at home.

i’m not free. no i’m too busy holding myself prisoner. and even now, i wouldn’t even know what to do with freedom if i managed to stumble on it anyway. i’m the one who gets completely bent out of shape when there are dishes in the sink. i’m the one who when she tried to kiss me, i would lock up and freeze because i frankly don’t know how to act… too many voices in my head, too much self-hate, so many judgments and condemnations from those voices and thoughts. i am my own worse enemy. the noise is almost deafening. i think that’s why i like to incorporate so much distortion in the music i make.

if i had it my way, i would have had myself locked away a long time ago.

so here i am. some weeks on, and all i have is my music. its the only thing that works. the sounds i put together in a finite package of time that some how tries to say the things my neurologically non typical brain cannot.

it is as if i crave this pain. i’ve lived with pain my whole life, what would i be without it? life is pain. experiencing pain is the only way we have to remind ourselves we are alive. joy, happiness, love, kindness, all fleeting, mostly conditional and rare. pain is an almost universal constant. and i have more than my fair share of it. i wonder if i learned to let go of it, would i still exist?

music, music is the only thing that mutes that pain, if only for a few minutes. just a handful of minutes, an hour here and an hour there, that i can focus long enough to concentrate on sound and tone, structure and melody that even if i am expressing pain through these things, i don’t have to feel them first hand. i think it has to do with that fact that i can only disappointment myself when it comes to making music. there really isn’t anyone else to disappoint. oh sure, if i make a crappy song and publish it and those that listen to my music may be disappointed, the worse they can do is just stop listening. i’m used to that. that is just a simple question of math.

now i retreat back to my solitary monastic life, where its safe. no one else can hurt me, not for a while anyway. and i get to rebuild my life, again. i’m not fit for anything else i believe. i think i’ve proven that, without any shred of doubt.

now to finish this record.

I was a good kid, and I never wanted to hurt anyone, but the world had other ideas. This song is about realizing that, and seeing that good kid who has died, put to rest finally. He’s done his job and has stood up to so much that its time for him to take a break… let someone else stand guard and take the hits.

Its a song about understanding that you can never go back, and you can’t make it better or make up for the bad in the present. It just doesn’t work like that. There is no making up for a bad past. I’m trying to realize that and writing this piece is just an exercise to help me remember that.

I listened to the takes a few times and even started messing with some piano and synth parts only to be completely disgusted with what was there. Here I have this likable bass line, with a nice progression and its just getting mired with guitar! I can’t believe it!

So, I did what I had to do, I deleted the guitar tracks, and well things are a lot cleaner now. I may go back and re-do some guitars in one part, the bridge, the part in the song when all hope is lost, just before everything picks itself up and begins again. That might need some good somewhat overdriven sad guitars ringing out in the background. We’ll see.

I dunno, no one really cares. I get it. I just like chatting about guitars and recording. Maybe next time I’ll go on and on about tone and how difficult it is to reproduce good warm natural sounding guitar tone to “tape?”

Case in point. I was working on a piece this weekend, I’m enjoying it so far, has a nice solid melodic bass line, got some toy-like synth-pop-ish drum loops, and just has a nice melancholy feel to it I really like. Then I wanted to add some nice guitar accompaniment, then added a second track of guitars, all the way through the piece. It first sounded like what I was hearing, but then I woke up this morning and thought "that is just way too much."

So, I’m going to go back, trim down the guitars and not rely so heavily on them. I’ve got other tools now to use, and I just need to realize that guitar tracks now aren’t always going to be in the driver’s seat.

Don’t get me wrong here, I’m not ditching my guitar, and the wonderful all-tube Marshall head I have in lieu of the analog synths, but more moderation.

It looks pretty interesting, and I really appreciate the non-exclusivity of their agreements as well as the potential for exposure. While I think it goes without saying that my exposure will be nil, it is, I believe, a worth while exercise.

So I’ve created an account, and am waiting to see what happens next. I’ve also been working on music too, heh yeah, the actual job of this record (everything else is just window dressing until the record is actually finished and done).

I was working on guitars today on an older song that I’m brushing the dust off. I’m not entirely convinced it will be on the record because its really different than the stuff I have been producing of late. Its more guitar-driven rock stuff, but it does have that “feel” that I’m looking for. I know I mentioned something about posting a rough cut of it, and I still will in the next few days. Frankly I’d like to get some feedback as to whether or not it should go on the record.

I have volumes of older songs, in various half-finished states that while I may cringe when listening (the quality of the recordings are dreadful… I’ve learned A LOT over these years) but there are some songs that have suitable foundations. This is what I’ve done, I found an older song I recorded in the summer of 2004, and basically gutted it completely. Recorded over the guitar tracks with new guitars, scraped the drums entirely and am in process of re-doing the bass guitar. This song, called “A Simple Restart” will most likely also go some other changes, adding some noisy synth parts, and things of that nature.

I like this song for its simplicity and melodic sensibilities. It has a “feel” that I appreciate, so I’m going to spend some time this weekend developing it, and probably post another rough mix.

Well, I should probably get back into the studio, but I’m completely engrossed in this John Adams mini-series. Paul Giamatti as John Adams is brilliant. Absolutely.

This aside is brought to you by the letters p r o c r a s t i n a t i o and n.