So, I have six pieces now (and three rejects) and started working on a new one this morning. I got about two hours into it and every time I played it from the beginning to where I was working, I burst out laughing for sheer joy. How often does that happen to you, listening to music? This piece is some kind of salsa that’s threatening to blow its wad about thirty seconds in. It sounds like a Latin band with a tabla player sitting in. Only he’s not playing tabla, but has picked up some crude, Pictish goatskin drum and is scratching it like a DJ. Just a little demented.
I’m so happy with my other six pieces, I can’t even tell you. After I finished the segue piece (see Nov 9, below), I spent a chunk of time mixing three of the others. Holy crap… do I ever like them. I have never heard anything like any of them, ever. (And I’ve listened to a heck of a lot of music). But, hey, if I set out to duplicate someone else’s efforts, I would never have embarked on this project to begin with.
Lately I’ve been doing some molar-grinding over what to do with them when I’m done – live performance-wise. Do I go the Ableton/laptop route? Or hire musicians and play concerts in clubs? And then I thought, fuck it. I’ve listened to thousands of artists’ music over the past several decades and rarely wished to hear any of them live. Why would I? I have their very best quality audio version in my own little hands, right now. So, for now, I’m not going to sweat it. I’m thinking of this album as destined for the zillion iPods out there, not the comparative handful of live music clubs.