This has been posted a few different places today, but I thought I'd round it out and post here too.  This will be the last official post here to this LJ.  I don't expect to log in again.  If anyone (besides Jenn) reads this, thanks for the interest and support.

**************

Hi everyone, it's time for a long-overdue update.

The decision to end the band didn't come lightly, but it's the right decision and we're happy that we can put the band to rest and move on to other things.  This end has nothing to do with the usual "creative differences" stuff and no one is leaving to "go solo".  This past September Jennifer came to the decision that she no longer wanted to be a professional musician.  Perhaps as a hobby, sure, but she no longer had the desire to be rock star and tour the world and give Tori Amos foot baths.  We discussed her realization and she agreed to continue on with the band for the foreseeable future, hoping that it was only temporary and she would come to love playing music again.  In November we recruited Matt Beechhold to handle the drum duties for the band (we had been looking for a year) and played our first and only gig with Matt at The Cave in Chapel Hill.  I had a good time at the show and even with the trainwrecks I thought we did a good job.  For Jenn, it was a completely disconnected performance where she felt she wasn't even present.  The week after the show she informed Matt and I that she wanted to take an indefinite and serious break from the band with the intent of hopefully coming back.  Matt and I continued to work on new material and eventually started playing with a guitarist, Matt Fasnacht, while I moved back to bass.

After months of serious consideration about her place in the band, and music, Jenn finally decided to leave the group once and for all.  As she wrote to me, " ...My active involvement with the band is at an end.  This needs to happen for a couple of reasons. 1. It's dragging on, and that is because of me thinking I'm going to find some magic bullet that will inspire me to be musical again. I can't put a timeline on something like that.  2. The lack of that timeline is holding you and Matt to something, holding you back from other things."  Jenn and I met for beers a few days later and decided that the end of Protean Mean was something we both agreed with.  For my part, I cannot imagine doing PM without Jenn and it wouldn't be right at all to continue on with the name and not have her singing the songs.  The band began as a partnership with Jenn and me, so if one of us isn't there anymore, it's not Protean Mean.  Beech is also in agreement with this idea.

So...the band ends, there are no hard feelings, we're still friends and I'll always consider Jenn to be my sister.  We made some great music together and I'm really proud of the songs we wrote and performed together.  The band existed officially for 3 years and 5 days and I had a great time doing it.  What's next?  I have joined forces with the Matts (Beechhold and Fasnacht) and we've already started our new venture (only 1 official rehearsal, so there's no name yet).  We'll probably do a few of the PM tunes, but in different arrangements.  Keep informed of future developments for the new band by checking in at my website, cheevyjames.com.  For those of you who are Jenn's friends, she'll also keep you updated on her future artistic projects.

I would like to give some thank-yous at this point -

first to Jenn, for being a great friend and musical partner.

to Matt for having boundless enthusiasm for the band

thank you to our spouses, Julie and Eric for the endless support

thank you to Josh Stohl for playing the drum tracks on our demo from early last year.  He did a magnificent job and brought out things I didn't know were possible in the music.

thank you to all who came out to see us play.  We really appreciated it, every time.

Extra Special Thank You to Bryan Younts.  Besides our spouses, Bryan came to more shows than anyone.  He made it out to just about every one.  A dedicated fan and great friend, thank you.

This email was approved by Jenn and she wanted to include the following thanks:

"Thanks to you and to Matt for being patient and for understanding my need for time away to make the decision. I'm looking forward to being a fan of your new venture."

Our myspace site (myspace.com/proteanmean) will continue to exist, at least until myspace goes bankrupt.  The 2008 demo will continue to live there in listening form.  If you'd like to download the songs (they're free!) head to http://cheevyjames.com/music/protean-mean-curiosities.  Proteanmean.com will soon redirect you to the myspace site.  Do some searching, there will continue to be live videos from us on youtube.

I think that's it.  Thank you for listening.

On behalf of Protean Mean,

James Hines

Setlist: Surrounded By Trees, Travelers Merchants & Masters, The Storm, Snow, She Waits By The Sea, Mr. Raleigh’s Dilemma, Hanging Up the Dream, Abused’s Song, August, 10K

Raleigh was a debut.  Also this was the first gig with Matt, first gig in Chapel Hill & first gig at the Cave.  Lotsa firsts.

The show was decently attended.  I think it’s the best we can hope for.  Julie, Eric, Bryan Younts, Brooke & Travis, Don & Lizzi and Chris & Andrea, plus some regulars.  We made pretty good money and that was a total shock.  I forgot to bring the mailing list & CDs (and setlist, thankfully Matt had a copy), but we managed.

Jenn wasn’t completely present tonight, kinda disconnected.  Matt did a great job of setting her levels and I could hear her voice wonderfully.  While her voice sounded great, her guitar playing was a bit off on a few songs.  The Storm started out so awful, like that one show at Pheasant Creek.  It eventually got better, but it just wasn’t there at the beginning.  She played better for Abused & Hanging, but it was still REALLY quiet during those.  During all of her guitar playing, actually.

While she contributed a few guitar-clams, I certainly contributed my share, which is usually pretty significant.  Overall, I thought it was a good show, though.  A good number of mistakes, but good overall.  We were stupid to open with Surrounded.  It was a trainwreck and Matt had a tough time with it.  I tried with all my might to hold it together, actually.  I like Travelers as a song, but I don’t think it fits in with our set on an every-show occurrence.  We need more material before we can start playing others less.  Ideally?  If it were me, I’d cut Abused’s, Snow & Travelers down to “not very often”.  Same with Amnesia, but we’ve already kind of done that.  Abused’s is currently one of our major songs, and one of our few up-tempo ones at that.  I just feel that it doesn’t reach people.  There’s no reaction to it.  I think it’s a pretty good song, but really, no one cares.  Mr. Raleigh’s Dilemma got a good reaction tonight.  I thought we played it WAY fast, but Brooke & Bryan specifically really liked it.  I have to say, it was very nice to play again and except for my horrid bass solo it was good.  I thought my backup vocals in the chorus sounded good.

My singing?  Overall I’m still too afraid of the mic and when I’m not singing, I just stay away from it.  I thought it was decent.  I still can’t hear myself well enough when singing, so we’ll have to work on it.  We’ve talked about having some specific vocal rehearsals with all 3 of us.  I think it’s a good idea.

So, Matt.  It was a lot to try to have him learn 10 songs in 3 weeks.  For the most part he sounded really good.  Songs like Raleigh, She Waits, Snow, Hanging and Storm really sounded good with him.  He did good on August too, specifically.  Surrounded was a mess; he’ll get better.  10K was still a bit too scatter-shot, esp. the chorus.  Travelers was good, but it just needs a bit more on the verses.  The “heartbeat” thingie.  He made some real nice, subtle touches to the music that I loved.  I think with a few more weeks/months of good practice we’re going to be a hell of a band.

I think it was a good showing all around and I’m pretty happy about it.  We have a lot of things to work on, so that’s good.

@ MarVell Events Center - Durham, NC
w/ Yohimbe & the Durham Ukulele Orchestra

Setlist: Lady Pilot, The Storm, Abused’s Song, August, 10K, Matte Kudasai, Travelers Merchants & Masters, Hanging Up the Dream, Snow, Surrounded By Trees, She Waits By the Sea

 

August was debuted.

 

I had a few nerves earlier in the evening before I headed out and also a bit on the way there. Once we set up and waited around to start, I was fine. Not a single nerve for this show! HOORAY! It was like, no pressure whatsoever. Just get up there and play. Extremely sparse audience…I only saw 5 people total, not including the bands (Yohimbe & Durham Ukulele Orchestra). Matt the hopeful drummer showed up. He said he really liked it and had lots of ideas for the songs. For the most part I think I played pretty well, maybe better than I ever have in this group. Of course I made some massive clams and I had some big troubles with Matte (but I heard the chick from Yohimbe say at the end of the song how beautiful it was), but overall I think I played well. Some songs, hell yeah, were spot-on. A few lyrical mess ups from Jenn and a couple of chordal mess ups as well, but mostly she sounded good. She said afterward that she couldn’t hear herself too well, but from my end of the stage everything sounded good.  I especially loved the perfect telepathy between us in the improv section of Lady Pilot.  That was sweet.  The sound in club was quite cavernous, but that’s expected with such a low turn out. Where were our friends? I don’t know.  I *hope* it’s just MarVell and they’ll come out to the Cave show. The “trilogy” went pretty well. We haven’t quite got the transition from Abused’s > August, but I know it’ll come. Having a drummer will certainly help out. Uh, yeah – for the most part I was happy. I’m thoroughly glad the nervousness has gone and now I feel like I should. I was pretty happy while playing and happy overall.

I think about writing about practices right after they're over, but then I usually grab some food or head to bed and it slips my mind until the next week.  I was thinking earlier that I hadn't written in a while.  I didn't realize it was 5 f'n weeks!  Oh well!

We didn't practice this week since Jenn wasn't feeling too well.  Haven't heard from her directly, but I assume she's better (since she's posting live journals!).  In our last few practices we've been discussing the issue of time management and how it affects us as individuals, not to mention us as a band.  We both face the dilemma wanting to do too much stuff and not wanting to ever say "no" to people.  This works its way into our creative lives as well.  We'd both like to practice more and write more, but the time eludes us.  A few weeks ago I was speaking with a local Economics professor about this issue and he mentioned the concept of "stealing time".  He said you have to steal time for what's important whenever you're able.  Even if you have only 2 minutes to spare, do what you can do.  In my case, that's picking up a guitar or bass and playing what I can.

I still marvel at how much crap I was able to squeeze in while I was in college.  Let's take my junior year - full time in school, homework/studying, volunteering at the campus radio station and having a weekly radio show, playing in my band with around 1 gig a week & 1-2 practices a week, practicing my bass & writing a bunch of music, going out and seeing a ton of live bands, I had a new girlfriend that year, part-time job, hanging out with my non-band friends, watching the TV shows I was interested in, heading back to my hometown to see friends and parents on some weekends...

In doing all of that, at the time I didn't feel like I was too overwhelmed.  Somehow, I did it all, everything I wanted to do.  Then again, I was a night owl and I didn't sleep that much.  I guess that's how you do it!

So, Jenn & I are working on more organization for ourselves, not only individually, but also in the context of PM.

In our practices the past few weeks, we've been working a lot more on August and it's sounding pretty good.  I think I mentioned before that Cryptic is done and that just requires some song arranging before we start rehearsing it.  Krythe is in the room, waiting for us to re-learn it.  Lyrical ideas are nearing completion for Niagara on the Pacific.  We've agreed to do another old 3 Penny Opera song, Mr. Raleigh's Dilemma and that's ready for rehearsal.  So yeah, lots of new material on the horizon.  The other (old) songs are always getting more and more comfortable.

Our search for a drummer has yielded 3 responses so far, but nothing has gone beyond 1 email.  I know there HAS to be a drummer out there for us.  It's frustrating going through this whole process, but we don't exactly make music that's easy to categorize.  We're not a punk or metal band, we're not a church, we're definitely not a cover band.  Well, something's gotta happen soon, but until then we'll just keep plugging away as we are.

I'll be sending off our yearly application for SXSW in a week or so.  As usual, I'm not pinning any hopes on this.  It'll be a nice surprise if it happens.

So, that's the easy run-down of the Life of the Band.  Hopefully I'll have more to write about after next week's practice.

Good practice.  Jenn's excited about leaving ASS - today is her last day in that hellish place.  We worked quite a bit on August, which has a particular resonance with many things going on with us right now.  It's the perfect "new" song to be working on right now.  I think it'll be a good one when we play it live.  Speaking of live playing, we suggested some transitions (>) going into and out of August, so we'll work on those next week and see if we can pull it all off.  Looking through her notebook Jenn came across an old song of hers, Krythe, which looks to be yet another new song.  I imported it from the old tape (same as August) so I worked on that for a few minutes after Jenn left and she'll search for the chords in the coming days.  I don't think it'll be too hard to figure out, a bit harder than August, but still doable.  I like using the part of my brain/ear to figure songs out.  It's a nice exercise which I haven't done in a while and I like that I feel more comfortable doing it now.  Of course, it's easier when you only have 1 acoustic guitar to deal with.

If you're reading this, give Jenn a toast to getting out of retail hell.

The rehearsal after each gig we like to get together and watch the tape from the show so we can critique it, make fun of ourselves and see how we did in general. We never got to do it for the B&N gig in June, so last night I went over to Jenn's and we watched both the B&N show and the MarVell one from last week.  The show at B&N, ehhh, it was OK.  Some good moments.  Matte Kudasai sounded good except that I cut the song short.  We discussed some points about performing and stage presence and all that.  The MarVell show turned out to actually be pretty good.  Yes, the idiot-noise coming from the bar was pretty loud, but we still played well.  We both agreed that all 5 of the songs should go up on the website.  Overall the video showed we were better than my post-gig reaction made us out to be.  That's good.

After the PM we put in video of Jenn and her friend Ember playing songs together (and for each other) back in 2002.  I've seen this footage before, years ago, so it was nice to watch it again.  FYI, Ember and Jenn wrote Abused's Song together, in addition to numerous other songs.  One of the tunes they played on the video was called August.  After about 30 seconds I thought how cool of a song it was and how it'd sound great in PM.  I really like it and Jenn agreed that it'd be fun to do in the band.  It shouldn't be too hard for us to get the song down.  We're going to work on it Tuesday night.  If she can find the chords, I hope to have it my part ready by then.  It's a really cool track and I can't wait to get it in the set.

This was an interesting show and something we really haven't been a part of.  It was a benefit show for a local magazine and also part birthday party for the sound guy/show booker Justin.  A free show!  Before the bands started they played 5 short films about various subjects (I think there was one about the Black Panthers) and I only caught the last one, which was about how love is revolutionary and anti-capitalist and other crap like that.  Love wins over all!  Love is anarchy!  Whatever.  I thought the premise for the film was pretty lame and the supporting argument was really weak.  The filmmaker didn't make a good case for their idea, I thought.  I did like the part where the chick got shot in her car, in the neck with blood gushing out everywhere, and she still managed to call her husband...but he sadly never picked up the phone because he was too busy working in his cubicle (with a frame picture of President Bush on the wall!) to hear the phone.  And she died, and it was SO SAD.  Actually, it was fucking hilarious and I was laughing loudly.  I think the only one in the place laughing at that part.  Anyway, bad film.

The Durham Ukulele Orchestra opened the show and they were pretty good.  Lots of fun and they did good versions of a wide range of cover songs.  The audience was super quiet and completely paying attention to them (justifiably), but once they ended the conversation at the bar went up to 11 and it never decreased one bit while we were playing.  I'd guess that there were 10-15 people who were actually listening to us.  So, if you're reading and you were listening to us...THANK YOU!  We appreciate people who actually pay attention rather than talk loudly at the bar.

Let's see, the set was: Abused's Song, The Storm, 10K, Surrounded By Trees & Lady Pilot.  As usual at the MarVell, the stage was super duper hot and I was dripping sweat everywhere by the time Surrounded rolled around.  The heat, whatever, you deal.  The loudness was a bit frustrating, esp. during The Storm where I couldn't hear Jenn's guitar too well and we got off rhythm.  Otherwise, while I was playing my thoughts on the "talkers" were just to not worry about it.  Just have fun and play well for the people who ARE listening.  I thought most of the songs went well.  Minor timing issues in Storm and a sloppy solo in 10K, but mostly they were solid.  Abused's was solid, I liked that one.  Surrounded...holy crap, I screwed the pooch on that one.  I missed a ton of notes.  My problem with that one especially is that I don't practice it standing up (yes, you've heard this before) and playing it standing up at a gig doesn't work for me.  I have to rely on my eyes, rather than my hands, and the lights combining with the shadows on the strings messed me up a couple of times.  I just couldn't see what I was doing.  The only fix for that is to just not look!  Even with all of my mess ups, I thought the rest of the song went well enough.  When we were on, it sounded good.

Lady Pilot was the closer and it got a bit more emotion and energy than it normally might because I was pissed off about my performance in Surrounded so I went with a general "fuck all" attitude for it and that really worked.  I thought it sounded great.  I really loved my improv and then Jenn tore the fucking roof off during her vocal bit.  She's *never* sung it like that.  Absolutely awesome.

I thought she did great for the whole show.  Her guitar playing was solid and her vocals sounded great, with no assistance from lyrics on a music stand.  We still have a lot of tightening up to do, and a drummer is needed for us, but mostly it was a good show.  Frustrating at times, but for our part I thought it was fun.  A really important point for me - I think I'm over all of the "being nervous" crap.  I was a bit nervous about 20-30 minutes before we started, but once I got up there to set up the gear everything was gone and didn't show up once during the show.  It appears to be over, thank goodness.  I was getting quite tired of it.

No shows currently lined up, so my focus is on writing new material and finding us a drummer.

Ah, good day yesterday.  Jenn quit her horrible, soul-sucking day job and I am immensely proud of her for getting a job in publishing.  It sucks that we can't be making money from the music right now, so if we have to work day jobs, we should definitely do stuff we ENJOY.

Good practice last night.  Dropped one song from tonight's set for time constraints.  No big deal.  Ran through the set, everything sounds good.  I'm psyched for tonight.  Rest of the playing time was spent running through most of the rest of our songs (even the forgotten Snow, which we haven't played since the last MarVell show), as well as Discovery.  Every time we play that I can't wait to play it live.  Alllllmost there.

After the departure of The Voice, I went back to mixing with the intention of finishing.  Jenn liked the instrumental mix on Surrounded, so I spent a few hours getting the vocals right (yes, my voice graces the recording as well) before exporting the final stereo master at 12:27 am.  Fuck yeah, I say.  I'm really happy to have it finished, as it was a big stress on me, but I'm also happy with the way it turned out.  I think it sounds good; it's a million times better than the last demo.  Today I posted the tracks to the myspace so now anyone can download them if they want.

Gig tonight, so knowing me I'll post later about how it goes.

More work on Surrounded.  Got some good work done last night.  Somehow, my voice was present so I was able to record all of my vocals (yay!) and they didn't sound too terrible.  After that extravaganza  I went to work on mixing the individual instruments.  Started with the drums (of course) and had a similar problem to what I had on Abused's Song - most of the drumming was too quiet, but the snare hits were too loud.  So yeah, lots of editing of snare drum hits in the pre-choruses.  It's an annoying process, but I'm really particular and I really like Josh's drum part and want it to stand out.

After a dinner break w/ Brooke & Travis I came back and got through the guitar and bass.  Since the bass is a new instrument for this song, I'm a bit apprehensive about having it too loud, so I was sure to have it quieter than I usually would.  It's true that I was mixing the bass at 11:30 at night and I was tired as shit, so it might sound bad.  I'll check it when I get home and then I'm going to bust my ass to get the vocals mixed before Jenn gets in for practice.  I'm still a bit unsure of how the track sounds, but everything indicates that I'll eventually be happy with it.

Gig tomorrow!  YAY!

I didn't get as much done yesterday as I would have liked.  I worked from home (the day job) because Julie had some surgery.  I thought i would have more time to work on music stuff, but that didn't happen until the evening.  Jenn gave me her opinion of 10K & Abused the other day so I went back to re-mixing those yesterday.  Lowered the bass on 10K just a smidge and I think it sounds good.  It doesn't surprise me that I tend to mix the bass louder when I do the mixing.  I trust her judgment on the situation, though, so I'll happily do that to make the songs sound better to non-bassists.  After the ease of 10K, I moved on to Abused's Song.  Her thoughts were that the bass was a good bit too loud and the drums & guitar were too quiet.  After listening in the truck I agreed with her on all counts.  Lowered the bass & raised the drums, although I had to play around with that as most of Josh's drum part was quiet...except for the loud bits where he'd be at maximum level.  I solved this by raising the volume of the whole track and then bringing down *every single* individual loud snare hit.  This took quite a while, but in the end it was worth it.  After correcting those two instruments, I thought everything else sounded fine.  Mixed down to a stereo master and mailed it off to Jenn for approval.

After that, worked on web stuff.  Posted 10K to the myspace site.  I put a background color on it a few days ago (turned out to be the same color as on the .com...totally by random luck) and it looks decent for now.  I tried to write a proper bio for the band, but a paragraph or two into it I realized it was suck, so I used the one that Jenn wrote for our yearly SXSW submission (and yearly rejection) and with some slight editing we have ourselves a bio.  Also added a link to this journal so all you people can now read it.  Whee!

I'm off to practice for a while before getting back to mixing.

Good practice last night.  Recapped my weekend & the Rush show before delving into "band stuff".  The drummer I mentioned yesterday is too busy - so much for that.  Eh, we'll get one.  The talk amongst the band is to have the demo available for the show next week, free copies.  Now, I just have to finish it!  I will.

We wrote up the setlist for the show and ran through it twice.  Going to try the "extended intro" on 10K and I'll attempt the solo on guitar as well.  Should be interesting!  We settled into the groove quite nicely and I thought everything sounded good.  I need some work on various parts, but that's nothing that can't be fixed in the next week.  I think The Storm sounded especially good and something seemed to click on a deeper level last night for both of us.

We further discussed venue stuff and really hitting it once the demo is done.  We're in a good place right now.  Also discussed revamping of websites & if myspace will work properly for me today, I'll get started on that.  Also we agreed that this journal would no longer be private, so everyone will be able to read this crap!  Whee!

I'm out - hopeful mixing & practicing tonight.

Got home from a long weekend in Charlotte yesterday evening, so after the normal "chill out" period I got some practicing in.  It wasn't an attempt at perfection and hard core practicing, just running through some songs.  I went through the batch of our "new stuff" that needs lyrics and all that.  Most of the songs were already in their finished musical forms, so my main bit of "work" was on Cryptic.  I'm unsure if the "happy" part of the song fits (the rest is pretty dark) and if it does fit, how it should be resolved.  Should I go back to the song proper or end it there or even go somewhere else?  Questions, questions, questions.  I'm getting a better feel for the "happy" part, which is very Who-sounding.  It's an odd transition from the middle part of the song, but I think it can work.  I'm still curious as to whether it should be a separate song and they'll just exist together or have them completely songs.  Once I get the lyrics done (I'm roughly half-way) we can work it all out.

Sent an email to a drummer last night who posted on Craigslist.  I know we're not officially putting stuff out there yet, but I figured it was worth a shot.  We'll see what happens when he replies.

I thought we had a good practice last night.  I played Jenn what's recorded for Surrounded and she liked it a lot - hopefully I'll have time tonight to work on my vocals and maybe do some mixing.  She showed me what she's been working on with Insurrection.  Lyrics are really good and I can't wait to start working on this song.  Hell, I've been wanting to play it since she first showed it to me years ago.

Besides the usual catching up, the rest of the time was spent running through the set and re-familiarizing ourselves with it, as we haven't played together since the B&N gig over a month ago.  Everything sounded pretty good, even Matte Kudasai was pleasing.  At one point when Jenn had to step out for a minute I played through Sunday Brunch and I was really happy playing it.  I can't wait to get that one in the set.

Attempted a small bit of recording last night.  Worked for about an hour on my vocals for Surrounded.  It wasn't happening.  I'm not a very good singer, and maybe I'm just REALLY out of practice, but it really seems like I'm singing it a lot worse than I was a year or even two ago.  Hearing the raw tracks of just me was very painful.  In some places I don't sound too bad blended with Jenn, but solo I am awful.  I'm not exaggerating here, either.  And I want to record myself singing on a solo album?  Fuuuuck.

It's a really hard line for me on this, because I really want to sing and I love singing.  Plus, I think it really makes the band better.  I just don't want to be the weak link of the band.  I wonder if I can actually get to a point where I sound good enough to open my mouth.  I thought last night about vocal lessons, that's a possibility.  Not right now, but maybe soon.  I figure that once I get this demo done I can find specific ways to practice (singing with piano, probably) and then if I need to or have the time, then take lessons.

So, since I was definitely *not* hitting the notes last night, I programmed in some guide tracks to help me hit the pitch.  I seem to remember having to do that last time we recorded this song, 2 year ago.  We'll see how it goes tomorrow when I get back to doing the vocals after full band practice tonight.

Did a lot of work today.  I forgot to mention that on Thursday I did indeed record a new take of my bass solo for 10K.  It was a success.  Got a couple minutes of mixing in before Spades & Poker became the events for the evening.  Friday got a good amount of mixing done for 10K also - finished up the bass & started on the vocals.  Yesterday I think I got a couple of minutes in of mixing Jenn, but not much.

Today, however, was the big day for work.  Finished all of the mixing of 10K - vocals, any distortions I found and all of the (many) final passes-through before I committed it to wav file and then converted to aac and sent it off to Jenn for her thoughts.  I'm pretty happy with it.  While mixing, I remarked to myself that I really like the song.  I'm proud of it, and this is the best recording of it so far.  Fuck yeah.

After a short break, I moved on to Surround By Trees.  There was a significant amount of stuff I still needed to record: all of the guitar parts, bass part (which had never even been attempted by me) and my vocal.  I didn't get to my vocals today, so I'll do that tomorrow.  I did, however, get all of the various guitar parts recorded & edited (3 different tracks combined) and of course the new bass part.  Did a little bit of editing of the drum part during the "solo" section since Josh and I weren't on the same page.  No big deal.  I think all of the guitar and bass parts sound really good on this and I have to say that even at this early stage of the song, I'm really fucking happy with it.  It's still my favorite song we do and I was really happy while working on it today.

Tomorrow - my few vocals and then on to the mix.  Whee!

The original idea was for a "normal" band practice, but Jenn got sick so it was decided we'd be better off doing our own things at home and then meeting up next week.  Plus, I really didn't want her to hurl on my cats...

It worked out really well, actually, to just do our own things.  I got a lot done, so that's a good thing.  I started off by practicing guitar a bit.  I'm a few weeks rusty, so I tired pretty quickly.  Played through Discovery & 10K, with attempting to hit actual vocal notes on 10K.  Did a few minutes of singing practice before Julie came home and we ate dinner.  While playing through the songs, I was thinking about my right hand motion.  I noticed that when we watched through the last MarVell show a while ago, I look like a dork in the way I use my right hand.  I mean, I know it doesn't matter if I look like a dork, but it's something I noticed.  I just hold the pick and strum how I always have.  I know that I *could* change my playing motion, but I have no desire to undertake that right now...or maybe ever.  I'm trying to become more aware of my body while playing guitar (it still feels a bit unnatural to me, honestly).  Part of the problem of "unnatural playing" is due to the size of my gut.  I noticed this especially at the last gig.  Sitting down isn't a problem, but I'm not Robert Fripp so I'm not going to sit down while I play live.  I mean, I really don't want to anyway.  So, more reasons why I need to lose weight.  I had an idea this morning while on the bus that might help things along better.

So, after dinner I played on my new ukulele that Julie got me in Mexico.  It doesn't hold tuning very well, but whatthefuck.  I can play 10K on it!

Following the uke-fest, I got down to mixing.  I used the computer speakers exclusively (Julie's TV watching be damned!) and it's so much better, and more accurate, than going with headphones.  I did check everything with the headphones to make sure I didn't have any level peaks and distortions.  I need to get some good speakers for mixing purposes.  One day.  I think I spent an hour or two finishing up Abused's and making sure everything was as good as I could get it.  I see the limitations in how we recorded and doing at home on my old computer, but I think I got it as good as I can.  It sounds good, I'm happy.  Sent a finished copy to Jenn for her approval (hopefully she'll have time tonight to listen).  For my part, unless there are some minor corrections I'm DONE with the song.  Yay!

Next I went back to Lady Pilot (ah, my perfectionist tendencies) to make sure everything was right with that one.  Everything was good or could not be improved so that makes 2 down, 2 to go.

Spent the rest of the night until bedtime working on 10K.  Drums, Guitars & Bass are all mixed.  I mixed the bass solo, but there is one run that I'm not too happy with (I can play it tons better) so I'm going to re-record the solo when I get home.  It shouldn't take too many passes to get it right, and I should have done it right the first time.  Oh well, no big deal.  I don't have problems playing it so it should be painless.  So, all that remains on the mix for 10K is the vocal.  She's more consistent level-wise on this than she is on Abused's so hopefully it won't be too time-intensive and MAYBE I can actually finish it up tonight.  Fuck, I hope so.

After 2 weeks off it was nice to have the band "working" again.  I had the idea of working on new material instead of the usual running though songs.  We did discuss a song I wrote a couple of months ago, In Our Own Minds (lyrics only) and since that's a political song it naturally led to a large political discussion...which then led to talking about everything else in the world.  So, we didn't get much done!  That's alright though, I love the times when we can just hang out and talk.  I did play Jenn my sorta rough mix of Abused's and she liked it.  Of course, hearing it on the speakers, instead of through headphones, it didn't sound so hot to me.  We'll see how it goes.  Next week's practice is canceled as I'll be in Mexico for a wedding.  Should be fun!

Further work on Abused's last night.  I guess I forgot to post the last mixing session about it.  Oh well.  First time was drums, guitar and then 1/2 of the bass.  I finished up the bass last night and moved on to the vocals.  Have a rough mix of the vocals but need to go back and fix specifics.  The majority of Jenn's vocal was too quiet, so I had to double her voice to raise the levels.  It sounds good and it doesn't sound like there's "two of her".  That can be a good thing, but not really on this song.  The bass did take a while to finish, mostly because I went off track from where the first half of the song is.  I noticed that when I'm mixing the bass, it's hard for me to get a consistent sound throughout the recording.  True, the song does get more intense as it goes on, however, I tend to mix my bass louder as the song goes on.  This could be due to the increased intensity, or that I'm listening with headphones.

I have to say, even with the rough vocal mix on top of the rest, I was really excited by the track.  Most of the time I was indifferent, but hearing it like that, yeah, I really dug it.  It's like, at that moment I could stop thinking of it as "work" and sit back and enjoy it for what it is.  I'm hoping to finish the vocals today after work so that I can get Jenn's approval for it.

After the mixing I found out how to delete old deleted files.  Thanks to Don for suggesting this was possible...I had no idea those things stuck around.  So, I used that part of the program that deletes music files not associated with any song (and they're all wav files) and it cleared up half of my hard drive!  HOLY CRAP!  I was amazed.  I also listened though some song-parts that I've written and have forgotten about.  Some interesting stuff in there.  There's a nice bass riff in "New Song For Ass Crack Hell" (the actual first thing I wrote after moving back here...as I was reminded of last night) that I want to see about doing something with.  The other riff is kinda crap, typical James stuff and I just don't feel it anymore.  That 2nd riff is cool, though.  It's been a while since I've written a full song on the bass (not to mention that it's been a long time since I've written ANYTHING...fuck, I need to finish this mixing) so it'll be really cool to see what I can come up with.

I'm excited for practice tonight - we didn't have last week's (I was in DC) and the week before was the B&N gig.  Should be fun tonight.

The very act of playing music in a place where you used to work (retail job, no less) is a bit odd.  I haven't played a gig at any other place I've worked, so last night's gig was the first.  Obviously that particular store has great significance for me and Jenn as we met there.  I guess it would have been more appropriate for us to play in the music department, as opposed to the cafe.  Still, it was that very room where we first met (and she suspected me of shoplifting!) and started working together.  One of my favorite things about our relationship, both on the personal and professional level, is that we became friends before there was even talk playing together.  I mean, it might've even been a few weeks/months(?) before we got to that conversation of "oh, you play music?  So do I!"  I like that our relationship developed organically and it enabled us to be as close as we are.  Shit, I consider Jenn my sister....way moreso than I do my actual step-sister.

It was 4 months, I believe, before we even got together to jam.  We became friends first, before moving on to music.  I've been a musician for over half of my life now and the strongest musical relationships have come out of friendships first, before moving on to the music part.  The obvious exception is for the guys in Miniver Cheevy, Dave & Bryan, since that was the first band for all three of us and we formed a huge bond because of it.  So, yeah, Jenn and I became friends before the talk of jamming came forward.

I don't remember everything she played for me, nor do I remember everything I played for her.  I know I played Space Boy!  As I mentioned at the gig last night, one of the first songs I heard her play was The Storm, and I'm pretty sure Abused's Song & Hanging Up the Dream were played that night too.  I loved those songs the first time I heard them and I *really* loved Jenn's voice.  It was the 2nd time we played, a few months later, that cemented in my mind I *had* to play music with her.  Hearing Jenn sing one of my songs (Fairmont, which we currently don't play) blew my ass away.

So, with all that going through my head, we played a gig at the place where we met and the band was essentially born.  It was an important gig, I'd say.  How was it?  You know, I had a good time and that's the top priority for me.  It was a good gig, certainly not amazing, but not horrible either.  Mistakes occurred, but they didn't overwhelm us.  I thought that The Storm was quite good, as was the debut of Matte Kudasai - even if I did cut it short because I lost track of where I was in the song.  The sound was pretty strange there in the cafe.  The floor caused the sound to bounce more than it should, and it also made everything sound "thinner" than it should.

I felt more comfortable playing bass than guitar...and while that's certainly a "comfortable" place for me, I consider myself more of a guitarist in this band and that worries me a slight bit.  It means I need to work on my guitar playing.  There were some times when I noticed Jenn losing some strength in her voice, but it wasn't more than a few times and I know that's easily corrected.  Even with the mistakes we both made, we more or less played well.  A good gig.  I'd like to play there again sometime and do a better job, though.

My focus is now back to the demo.  She justifiably ragged on me for not finishing it yet.  It's my priority since we've got this gig and the debut of Matte Kudasai taken care of (yes, I was worried about it).

Setlist: Surrounded By Trees, Abused's Song, Travelers Merchants & Masters, Matte Kudasai, Lady Pilot, The Storm, Amnesia, Hanging Up the Dream, She Waits By the Sea, 10K

The band had a Sunday practice since Tuesday is gig night this week.  We practiced at Jenn's to make it easier on her since we always play at my place.  It's a bit more fair that way...and easy for us to be transportable since we don't (yet) have a drummer.  After our usual catching up conversations we ran through the set for Tuesday.  I made the decision on the way over that I wasn't going to try to sing since my voice was still recovering from 3 concerts in 3 days (Adrian Belew on Thursday, Swervedriver on Friday & Jimmy Buffett - where I REALLY gave my voice - on Saturday) and I didn't think I needed to push it.  I'll work on stuff tonight and will hopefully be able to nail all of my vocal parts tomorrow.  Really, that's mostly what I worry about at gigs.  It's not playing the songs, it's my vocals.  I'm still over not confident enough in my voice.  Things that concern me for tomorrow - my vocals and the chord in Matte Kudasai.  Our run-though of MK yesterday was really good.  It gets better every time we play it.  It's finally to that point where it sounds like the version I always heard in my head for all those years.  It's not perfect, but I'm confident for the song....and confidence is 9/10 of the law or whatever.

Tomorrow's gonna be a fun show.  I won't have the demo done for it, but that's OK.  I'm going to finish it asap, but I'm not going to let it bring me down.

After the set run-through yesterday we discussed a song idea that came into my mind a few weeks ago.  I think it has the possibility to be a very cool song with an interesting set of lyrics.  If I have time tonight I'm going try to write some music for it.  I haven't written anything new in quite a while, so this sounds like a good challenge for me.  Main priority is practicing what already exists, though.