so i came up with a really nice fingerpicking riff while fuckin around trying to figger out a Robyn Hitchcock bit. i had a few lines of words almost immediately, too. it’s very very CSN (well… filtered thru Jefferson Starship or Boston, that is… *groan*). i dunno, we’ll see. i’ll definitely keep working on it.
bought a cheap little cassette recorder for $20 today, just to see if i could get some of these new (and overdue) songs on tape. it sounds horrible – really noisy. but i got a pretty damn good take of Neil Young’s “The Needle and the Damage Done”, which has been a staple for me for over a decade now. the vocals and guitar playing were miraculously spot-on, in a single take, too. i’ve played it live several times already and always find myself coming back to it, so i guess it should have been pretty good. i also “got some levels” with “Blackbird” (Beatles) and “Band on the Run” (Paul). the former sounded okay, but the latter sounded awful, even though i know i can do it really well when i really put myself into it. i kinda do a Freddie Mercury thing on “BotR” a little bit, usually, but it’s late and i just wasn’t singing OUT like i should have been. don’t get me wrong, i could never sing a tenth as beautifully as old Angel Freddie, but hey, i try.
so i think i’m going to go ahead and finally get my old dusty Fostex four-track into the shop and see if i can’t get it fixed up. i used to get some pretty decent sounds on it. i’m a trained audio engineer, after all. i just wish i could afford a decent digital eight-track. but wtf. lo-fi analogue it is. or will be, with any luck (and/or a very tiny repair bill).
