Nothing to report
I’ve been back from holiday for a while and playing with lyrics and melody without much success. Some of the concepts I’ve been working on I’ve dropped as just cheesy or cliche’, some are working out well but I can’t get them to fit into the music so find myself either trying to change a lyric/melody that works, or change the music which isn’t sitting well with me as if I like both it seems stupid to compromise either/both. This has left me with either a vocal line that needs a new song writing for it, or a song with out a vocal line. While my number of musical concepts and work in progress are increasing and gaining some good output I’m struggling to keep track and actually bring some of them to a conclusion or finished product. I’m starting to wonder if a putting a few bits of work in progress snippets to friends would help to get some feedback, or maybe even work with a writing partner for some songs ? not sure at this time.
On a personal note I’ve decided to set myself some fitness goals that I may even document on this website
I’m a little disappointed that a drummer who seems a really nice guy and interesting musically and who had a bass player with him appears to have vanished leaving me again in the unenviable position of looking for people to play with. It’s more frustrating to watch people I’ve played with in the past rocket ahead falling into bed with good musicians that are carrying them.
Back From Holiday Break
I’ve just returned from a holiday in Skiathos in Greece. I had a fantasticly easy time enjoying some great weather, nice food and relaxing surroundings. I can certainly see why Joe Bonamassa decided to record his latest album “Black Rock” in Greece. While on this break I read through various books and zoned out a bit from the day to day grind. Without having a guitar or piano around I found it hard to get inspired to write music, however I pretty much listened to my whole ipod, which indirectly gave me some ideas, I also used my ipod to make lyrical notes and subject matter notes, I’m not sure how these will translate into real songs (my first attempt to pickup a guitar yesterday wasn’t really very sucessful) but it is new subject matter. I did come up with one subject matter and some lyrical content which I quite liked and it seemed to work as an honest bit of writing, however as a John Mayer fan some of it’s a little close in concept to one of his songs, however it really didn’t come from that (although I do love his song in question). I’ll see how it goes before worrying too much though.
I’m doing a charity running event this weekend at a reasonable distance away from home so I’m not sure when I’ll get both the time and the mind set and motivation to sit down and progress these ideas.
As a side note the UK has just had a large government change from the long standing Labour gonvernment to a Conservitive + Lib Dem. I can see and hear thousands of musical people writing about this now, but I have no interest in it from a musical context as I don’t see it as real subject matter.
Music in the ether
This week I’ve sent off some rough tracks to a few other musicians, some for critique and feedback on not only the music but the techniaues used to record it, others to see if they are interested in meeting up / talking about playing together. I’ve also been contacted by a covers band about playing with them as their regular guitarist left. I thought about it, for a short while as something that may be fun, but after realising they wanted to do a long audtion process, they played songs I didn’t want to play (lots of them, Blondie etc) and the fact that they wanted a bigger chunk of commitment than I would be prepared to offer I decided against it.
On a site note, I’ve updated the gear page and some of my links.
Fender Blues Deville – work on your tubes
I dug out my Fender Blues Deville amp the other day and played it on what I thought was full in the middle of my living room expecting the walls to come down, I was quite surprised to discover that a loud fart was the best sound I’d get out of this. This all opened a door for me to try some stuff Ive wanted to try for a while since reading and learning a little more from others how important tubes are to amps. A few discussions from my trusty amp tech at Tipton Amps and a little reading up from people at Music Radar and decided to work with some different tubes. A visit to HotRox and Tube Amp Doctor later, some cash has been splashed and time has fast forward I have new set of tubes and my spare set of Fender badged tubes.
My new tube array
This little bundle included a 6L6WGC-STR GE-Style black-plate premium matched pair and TAD 7025 highgrade selected valve pack from Tube Amp Doctor, some gold series 12AV7′s from Groove Tubes, and gold and black model 12AY7′s from Electro Harmonix, as well as the Fender branded (Groove Tubes I believe) Red valves. I first put the Fender Red’s in as a straight swap out, the volume came back and all was well, however I wanted to experiment. I normally do a slight mod swapping out the first pre-amp tube from a Electro Hamronix 12AY7, this really cleans up the clean sound and gives a lot more head room, it also warms up the sound a little for me. Instead of the 12AY7, I tried the groove tubes 12AV7, this warmed the amp sound up compared to the Fender tubes, and certainly gave more headroom, but the clipping it gave was a little harsher than the 12AV7′s. My next plan was to remove the second pre-amp tube and again replace it with a groove tube. This was done and it really made a positive different, cleaned up the sound massivly, and removed the clipping almost totally, but then when I drove the amp harder I got the clipping back, but it was much better much more full, but also still a little mid/tinny, almost like a cheap distortion pedal for the mid’s sound. Groove tubes to one side, I dumped in the Electro Harmonix black 12AY7′s in place of the two groove tubes, ahhh that’s more like it much much nicer, fuller sound, much deeper clean, warmer, and the clipping is very natural, I really had to drive the amp to get it to break up too. Very pleased with this, on my Blues Deluxe I use the Electro Harmonix gold 12AY7′s, as I’ve said on this blog before, I think I can hear a difference in them, slightly smoother, dropping out the mid and high end a little, and softening the bass side a bit, now that said I only think I can hear that, in that I’m looking for something different becaue thse are supposed to be different. I dumped the golds in and was happier with them, either because I’m nuts, or there is a slightly different sound to them. Now for more experimentation, for the phase valve I dropped the Fender out and put in the TAD 7025 not much different in terms of tone, but it really opened up the sound, made it sound a little louder and the speakers rang out so happy with that too. Now the big boys, the plan is to give myself so much clean head room that the pre-amp valves don’t muddy the sound, the power amp tubes do, so I dumped the Fenders again, and used the TAD 6L6WGC-STR’s. Perfect, it’s like a new amp, I’ve got a great clean Fender sounding amp, that I can drive really hard, and when it dirtys I’ve got a really natural and full driven sound that’s pretty much all created from the power amp, rather than pre amp. I’ve still got a few glitches with this amp which will require amp tech touches, such as the drive channel is slightly louder than the clean (never use the drive channel so it’s not a big deal, but I’d like to know if there is a problem) and as I’ve not used this amp for a while I want it to have a good good service
Reminder for myself what valves go where
Pink1 and 002BA Progress
Project Pink1 and 002BA (details on oo1BA here ) are underway. If you are aware of what the “black1″ is then this will make more sense to you. I made a prototype strat a while ago out of an old (80′s) Fender USA strabody and 40′th aniversay strat neck, with some custom wound pickups from Bare Knuckle Pickups. The project was to make a less harsh strat and experiment a little with sounds, setups and playability on the strat. it was a big sucess to me, and my guitar tech really liked it too as a strat, different from the norm and very playable. Taking what I learnt from that, with a bit more thought I decided to make a next generation model which for reasons which will become clear in a minute is called “pink1″. A big part of the features of the prototype partsocaster nick named MDJM was based on a sound from John Mayer’s custom shop stratocaster “black1″, and some of the parts for pink one have been taken from a John Mayer signature strat, in this case the neck. I pickedup a John Mayer 2009 Fender signature stratocaster neck for a snippet of the price, which has a nice C shape profile which I like on it. It’s currently had the laquer removed from it which I now do as a matter of personal taste, despite the think satin laquer on it. This neck has a nice African Rosewood board on it and the longer string tree placement, so should suit me perfectly and fix a few of the issues I had with the MDJM. The body has been found from a another 1982 alder stratocaster body which is a great lump of wood, and I’ve found a 1972 USA Fender trem unit. That’s where that currently sits at the moment.
001BA was a telecater project I wanted to build, initially I wanted it to come direct from Fender, or even the custom shop, but from what I wanted (telecater with a minibucker neck pickup and rosewood board) didn’t exist from Fender, and the custom shop price for these minor alternations was crazy high. 002BA is another telecater project in the same style, I wanted a slightly different sounding telecater and found the La Cabronita telecaster from the Fender custom shop, however this is £5000, and for what it is, well, it’s a lot of money. Plus I wanted a two pickup version rather than their standard one, so 002BA will be my own take on a custom shop telecaster and it certainly won’t cost £5000. Wroking with a luthier we’ve selected body wood (alder) and working out some template patterns for shape and layout. It’s very early yet, but it is moving.
Vomit stops music
I was supposed to meet a bass player and a drummer this weekend and was really looking forward to it, however since Thursday evening I’ve been feeling progressivly worse/sick, with what started out as a very minor cold to feeling like utter crap over the weekend. I’ve not been able to get in contact with either the guys I was supposed to meet up with, so I’m hopeful they are not annoyed and still keen to meet up to talk about playing. I think I’m over the worse of it now and coming out the other side, but I won’t know until tomorrow, thankfully it’s a short week this weekend and I can hopefully make ammends and do some music next week.
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