I’m SO not a studio musician. I enjoy recording. I enjoy doing things in the studio that I’d never be able to do Live – something I used to feel really strongly about NOT doing – but that was after I felt really strongly about doing cool stuff in my 4-track that I could never do Live, so that’s been a journey… at the moment I’m strolling through Rowan’s songs and avoiding setting up microphones by recording stuff that’s mostly direct line-in…my electric guitar and bass tracks.
There is a definitely argument for the idea that I SHOULD be recording them through an amplifier, air-gapping them, etc – but since in our Live performance I run them through my PA, “my sound” is defined muchly by line-in tone in-person, so I haven’t developed any sort of “amped” tone or anything. I’d have to either run through my PA (and mic it) or borrow amplifiers… my signal chain has more to do with the instrument and pedals than it does with what speaker I’m going through.
In any case, my fingers have been COLD all day (it’s 22 degrees outside but the house feels like it’s fighting something much colder) and I’ve been running them under hot water just to get decent takes, and after exhausting my hands on my not-oft-played-enough 5-string bass, it was on to Minotaur which is basically bending my low B up and down aggressively and, well, I’ve given my hands a pretty massive work out. “Taking breaks” to work on videos for Quiet the Mountain (Jimmy Stewart and Christian Alphonso’s new band), fight COVID policy confusion with Institute of Musical Traditions, answer FocusMusic questions, reply to emails… and then returning less fresh every time, I’m writing a Journal entry to take a DIFFERENT kind of break but honestly probably gonna call it a day.
Amy and Nate came over last night and we watched a movie or two while the snow came down, and alternatively watched the snow come down as a movie played. Kristen made shepherd’s pie and all was right with our little corner of the world. Waking up this morning to that bright beautiful reflected light that signals the snow kept on keepin’ on as I slept got me inspired for the day, even as the creeping cold kept invasively invading.
Sharif comes over tomorrow morning. Then Heather comes home late Monday night. Sandy Spring Museum. Live from the Lair. It’s not a bad Life.