For those of you wondering why you haven’t gotten your mail-order copies yet, the time table has shifted slightly. It doesn’t happen often, but once in a while, you can catch yourself in the middle of a mistake, as I did this time around. I was coming very close to putting out a version I…
It’s out there, we’ve seen it, and now that she’s appeared on the Tonight Show, it may be over. That’s as high as it goes, right? You get on Jay Leno, the world gives you a round of applause, we all move on. Maybe. Or maybe, the Arc Music Factory pumps all of their resources…
It’s been forever since I posted here, and I’m gonna work on that, but for now, let’s get to the business at hand. At this point, we have a big picture in frame where the album is concerned — this is, by far, the most well-planned project I’ve ever done, with Mark and I constantly…
This past Saturday, I tried out a new venue in Pittsburgh! Papa J’s Centro, right across from PPG Plaza, is an Italian restaurant converted from an old-school brothel, which they advertise fairly prominently. Why they do that, I’m not sure — rarely do you see marketing that lowers your expectations for sexual conduct — but…
….So you’ve all heard “Jerk” by now — it has a driving four-on-the-floor rhythm, which lends itself to an implied drum part. I was on the way to the studio a few weeks ago and was listening to Elvis Costello’s “Get Happy,” and thinking about how much I love “King Horse,” a song that I…
It needs to be said that I’m still buzzing off of the success of my TRAF set, partly because you can YouTube the living hell out of it! Thanks to David Oleniacz for: [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRKL0J0LlBE&hl=en_US&fs=1&rel=0] I think my favorite thing is the two crotchety guys who full-on have a conversation about which way to go…
I had an idea for a transition, and I shared it with Mark at the top of the session yesterday, so we started on “Wonderful Lie,” a newer song about stuff that happened a year-and-a-half ago. Some subjects just stay with you, which is fine, as long as they stay catchy. “Lie” is probably my…
….have been extended through May. We’re going 9 to midnight — come on out!
Going out to Mark’s studio this past Wednesday, I had, for the first time in a while, this amazing Zen-like feeling that everything was where it should be in my life. I mean, let’s not even get into my dating situation — that’s always a mistake, and no one should ever ask how that’s going,…
The first day in the studio with a producer like Mark is all about pre-production. The two of you sit across from each other and talk about your music. You play him a song, he listens to it beginning to end and makes notes about how to make it flow better, trim excess time, tighten…