Scathed no vox mix

I just uploaded this new tune--click one of the links above to give it a listen. The version with vocals will be up in the next couple of days.

Let me know what you think!

Recurring life themes

I don't believe in the supernatural.

There is no god. No ghosts. No magic. No psychics. Nothing like that exists.

However, I do believe that there are some physical laws of our Universe that are not understood, or maybe haven't even been guessed at. Quantum mechanics, vibrations at a subatomic level, particles, vibrations on a string . . .

My life consists of shifting, often meaningless themes that crop up constantly. Sometimes it lasts for a few days, sometimes, weeks. Occassionally months. Even a lifetime.

I'm not talking about stuff that I do, or control--I've been a loner, single, girlfriend-less, most of my life, and that's not really a mystery to me. That's something within my sphere of influence. Nothing odd about it, really, or, I should say, nothing not understood.

But take, say, spiderwebs. Not cobwebs you see gathering dust in corners. Not those nasty webs woven by black widows, or the intricate creations of garden spiders. I'm talking those single threads that those tiny spiders use to rappell down from a height.

You know what I'm talking about--go walking in a wooded area one morning and you'll get caught in a few.

I can't move over the past few days without getting caught in one of those things. They are suddenly everywhere. Even in the bed of my truck. After a couple of days I realized this was the theme of the week for me.

A month or so ago it was website crashes. Every time I tried to log onto a website it crashed. This happened to me at work and at home, two completely different networks, and all I was doing to trying to load a home page. Bam. Down. Or really, really, REALLY slow . . .

Sometimes I wonder if there isn't some sort of supernatural force trying to tell me something with these things. Then maybe I'm just seeing connections where there are none. Humans are bad about that sort of thing. Which is where religion and superstition come from in the first place.

So, I chalk it up to coincidence, or a vibration of a string, or emissions of a mysterious, undiscovered quark.

Roen

I just posted Chapter 15 of my novel--check the blogs at the iLike or MySpace link above, or Notes in Facebook, if you're curious. You can find the previous chapters there, too.

This is the next-to-last installment. I'm putting the final two chapters together into one posting, since the last chapter is more of a coda than anything.

Anyway, it's there for your reading pleasure if you're interested. Let me know what you think!

My idea for a reality show . . .

You find, say, 10 really annoying people. Five men, five women. You audition as many as you have to, until you have found the ten most annoying people available. Then you make them all live together and film the results.

That's the extent of the gimmick. It'll be a smash. Why? Because, for some reason, people these days absolutely can't get enough of annoying people.

I really don't understand this. I personally avoid annoying people, every chance I get. But listening to other folks talking about these idiotic reality shows, for hours and hours and hours, convinces me that there is money to be made here.

Do you watch these things? If you do, think about the people you talk about the most to your friends. Are they the cool people, the ones you'd want to hang around with? Or the ones that you think need a good swift kick in the ass? Trust me, it's the latter that you find fascinating.

So, that's my pitch. Any producers out there, you can contact me about it.

I'll leave the casting and the watching up to other people. I just don't think I could handle it.

Sunday Afternoon randomness

Okay, it's 96 degrees right now according to www.weather.com--just got in from walking my Akita and I can believe it. It's ridiculously hot out there. Atari, for his part, finished his business quickly and came back in without protest. He and I are both cool weather dogs.

I finished the basic rhythm tracks for my new tune, "Scathed." It's going to be a little different from my previous tracks. Sort of like "Beast of Love" but not quite as dark. I really enjoyed recording the bass line for this one--I love playing bass, especially my six-string Schecter Stilletto. It's such a bad-ass. And on this tune it's not just a simple droning bass line--it actually gets to sing!

I finished my rerunning of the entire The West Wing TV series the other day, and now just finished watching (again) the final season of Stargate: Atlantis. Trying to decide now what else to put in the DVD player. I'm not really in the mood for anything I have here. May just go to hulu.com and watch old episodes of Bones or something.

I know, I really should be doing something productive. In a little while I'm going to make some sesame chicken for dinner--does that count?

I'm just trying to keep my mind busy so I don't think about the next two weeks. About half (or even more) of the people I work with are going to be on vacation. I wouldn't be surprised if someone else didn't call in sick three or four days, either. So, for those of us who remain, it's going to be busy. Thankfully we get a holiday next Monday.

Hopefully work won't leave me too tired to work on my music this week--I really want to get this one done but there's still a long way to go on it. Gonna be a lot of tracks--more rhythm guitars, leads, a synth line, some fills I'll probably do with the Strat . . . not to mention the vocal. I'll be doing something else a little different for this one, too--I'm going to do one mix without a vocal and one with. Why the hell not?

So, what are you up to this Sunday afternoon?

Pieces of You now up

Click one of the links above so you can hear my newest tune, "Pieces of You." Turn it up loud. To heck with the neighbors.

MJ

Yesterday marked the one-year anniversary of Michael Jackson's death.

I've refrained from blogging about him until now, but maybe this is the time for me to admit that I never got Michael Jackson, musically. I never heard the genius. All I heard was standard pop music. Which I almost always find boring.

Part of my problem with his stuff is, the actual music is only part of it. There's the dancing and the other crap that goes on during his shows. That's something I have no interest in, all the choreographed nonsense. For a music act it all boils down to one thing---is the music any good? If that answer is "no" then you can have all the dancers, lasers, elaborate stages, video screens, whatever, but it won't be very interesting to me.

I guess the rest of it is it's just not my cup of tea. I just didn't hear anything in his stuff that interested me.

I got no problem with his fans--those who want to mark the anniversary of his death, who still mourn him and want to celebrate his life. Good for you. I totally understand that part--this past year has been rough on me, too, with some of *my* icons dying. Peter Steele, Ronnie James Dio, Paul Gray . . . their deaths hit me, really hard, so I understand what it feels like. Not to mention the grief I felt over the years over John Lennon, Bon Scott . . . so, do what you feel like you must.

Just, please, don't inflict his music on me.