Day 24: Getting down to busy-ness

Productivity drive: vocals for Everyone Likes Coffee Except Me, July, Reverie; a first draft of Doodlebug; first verse and chorus lyrics for Fail; and electric guitar for Impulse Control. I'm hoping to get all my left over piano stuff recorded on Thursday so need to have all that prepared by the end of tomorrow. It's exciting...

A friend and I had a bright little thought the other day about what I might do with these songs when they're finished. My original idea was to be obstinately retro by releasing the thing strictly on cassette only, in part for the sheer perversity of it but also because I like the idea that whoever wants to hear these songs will have gone to some effort to do so. However, my friend Catherine and I have now had a better idea, one that involves concealing CDs all around the city, which is going to be a fun project in itself, and will probably be reported on this blog. I might still put it out on cassette though. I'd love to do a proper vinyl release of course but that's just too expensive.

I also managed to go swimming today, which left me feeling elated but exhausted and slightly sick as I haven't exercised my upper body since about 1998.

Day 14: Wires and hammers pt. 2

So today I risked my spine by lugging all my location recording stuff back into town for the second day of piano recording. I got parts for a new song called You Amaze Me and Reverie. I also sat with those words I found on the way back from High Barnet (see Day 6) and started to improvise. Now I don't write songs like this very often, but if I just keep playing and playing with lyrics in mind, usually something weird starts to happen - not at first, but after about ten minutes I start to get really (and I mean really) into it, sweating, swaying and gurning, and it's only when I get to that place looking like a total idiot that great chords start to appear. I can only do this on piano, as I'm much better than I am on the guitar (although my limitations on guitar actually make it better for songwriting in some ways). Anyway, I played and re-played for about half an hour, and ended up with something that sounds to me like it has something Vaughan Williams-y about it. I then tried to do some other stuff, re-recording a song that may be called July, and another about a reincarnated pigeon, but none of it quite came off.