They no showed and cancelled their concert tonight. Disappointed...
Friday, February 27, 2004
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Tuesday, February 24, 2004
And there was silence
I finished tracking my drums. 12 tracks are complete, now the rest of the band gets to work on parts.
Monday, February 23, 2004
Gene Simmons To Release Solo Album
I've been waiting for this since the mid 80s when I first read that Paul and Gene were obligated contractually when they renewed their contracts with Mercury in the late 80s. That contract came and went and some 15 years later Gene now releases his disc.
Of interesting note is a post humous appearance of Frank Zappa, vocals and guitars. This is definitely a disc to get, I have high hopes but am not overly optimistic. Has the potential to be one of the top 10 of the year.
KNAC.COM - News - Gene Simmons To Release Solo Album
She bang, she bang
This has got to be one of the more bizarre stories of the year. Good to see that Mr. Hung is a good sport with all the laughing. CNN.com - The 'Idol' star who can't sing - Feb. 23, 2004
Sunday, February 22, 2004
BONNAROO here we come
Yesterday we procured a couple of the VIP tickets to this year's fest. I thought quite a bit about getting a hotel but after we read the faq, saw that VIPs get showers, and looked at tent prices, we decided to rough it to take in the whole experience.
2004 BONNAROO MUSIC FESTIVAL
Thursday, February 19, 2004
Quiet
Three days in a row in the studio and we are all ready for a little peace and quiet. Actually the tune I tracked tonight is called Quiet. A very long evening but the results are something the entire band likes. We had to break down every section of the song down to its bare elements. Not a fun experience but it was rewarding to have something we are all proud of.
Tuesday, February 17, 2004
A day in the life of a stick monkey
8:00 am:
Get my ass out of bed, grab my sticks kiss my bitch
goodbye and I'm on my way.
9:00 am:
The neighborhood dog grabs me in his mouth and takes
me to his favorite hiding hole. Stick Monkey is dirty
yo!
10:00am:
Digs myself out of the hole and go down to the corner
store to down some 40's with my boys.
11:00 am:
Still Chillin' and drinkin'
12:00Pm :
Still Drinkin'
8:00 pm:
After a long day of downin 40's, it's time for stick
monkey to get his swerve on. I grab my newports and my
40 and head for downtown.
10:00 pm.
Stick monkey's getting freaky wit the ladies. It easy
bein a playa but it sure is fun.
11:00 pm
Retire early with a fine female monkey.
Wonder what tommorrow may bring for stick monkey
Monday, February 16, 2004
Do You Want Internet TV? :: AO
Yes I do. But at what cost. Akimbo sounds interesting on the surface. When I was forwarded this article I was expecting another model of a wireless media gateway. They are pushing business models but it seems as though the day Tivo decides to do this Akimbo would be instantly crushed.
Expect an interesting niche play sub 10K users and then they will need to morph our be acquired by another player. I doubt they'll reach the 50K profitability step they seek.
Do You Want Internet TV? :: AO
Sunday, February 15, 2004
The Dave Blog
In keeping up with the logging personal stats I've set up a page that tracks the music I've most recently listened to through iTunes at home. I've update in the navigational links or you can click here
The Valentine's Occastion
Started the evening out at Ali Oli. Nice Italian style dinner in an upscale Buckhead restaurant. I was a bit overwhelmed considering how picky of an eater I am. But after a couple of questions I ended up with a nice tomato based pasta dish with fenel sausage. Great food. Jacki ended up eating a tuna dish.
Next we headed to the Roxy to see Edwin McCain last night. Sold out show was expected considering the Valentine's occasion. Some highlights for me included Darwin's Children and What Matters. The crowd was a bit too chatty but when the crowd was quiet Edwin's vocals sent chills. He is such a talented singer. The opening act, Will Hoge, was pretty interesting as well. Will probably seek some of his music out in the near future.
At the end of the night we met up briefly with Mike G and his wife. Mike is the bass player in the band. Well he has been on a mission to build a Stick Monkey. A later post will go into detail but I suspect the Stick Monkey will make its official appearance at our gig on March 6. Look for a preview on these pages in the next couple of weeks.
Saturday, February 14, 2004
The Darkness | Men What Do Rock, Baby
Picked up tickets for the family today. Hopefully "D" will be able to get into the show. Show sold out in less than five minutes so it should be a pretty fun night.
The Darkness | Men What Do Rock, Baby
Wednesday, February 11, 2004
LGWH Round 2
We have been invited by the Last Great Watering Hole to play another headlining Saturday night show on March 6. Details are forthcoming but it looks like we'll accept the offer and play the show.
The Superlatives
'L.A.' Reid named Def Jam chairman
So what did I tell you! As predicted LA Reid lands in the Universal family of labels. If you recall what I wrote a month ago I pegged him for Universal and mentioned Interscope and Def Jam as likely candidates. I had leaned toward Interscope but due to the fact that Lyor Cohen left Def Jam at the end of last month this left the door wide open for Reid.
If I had the piece of information up front I would have favored Def Jam over Interscope, note that both are part of Universal Now that it is all said and done it appears my insticts were correct and I picked the company LA would be working for the day he was booted from Arista.
'L.A.' Reid named Def Jam chairman
Tuesday, February 10, 2004
Recording
We continued were we left off from last Thursday. Tonight was good, I laid down three tracks in about 4 hours so six drum tracks are complete. Too Far, Anymore, and Can't Say No are now complete. Too Far as I expected took some time but I finally got it. Anymore and Can't Say No took no more than 2-3 takes to nail.
This Thursday we have one more of Katie's songs and then we will start working on Mike's songs. Probably only 4 more days of recording for me than we can start focusing on playing gigs again.
Monday, February 09, 2004
GRAMMY.com
In my opinion there weren't any surprises in the awards list. As usual Steve Vai lost out on the the Rock Instrumental, and the Miles Davis box received the best packaging but that has been a constant for nearly the last 5 years.
The press has zeroed in on 50 cent not winning. Well after looking at the number of RAP categories that are available if they couldn't find a home for him then they didn't want him to win. The press has said that he should have considering he had the best selling album of 2003. When has popularity ever been synonmous with artistic integrity, however one could argue that the Grammy program has played both sides in recent years.
I was quite happy to see Evanescence take the Best New Artist category. And yes I'll probably have to go out and get the OutKast record considering the album of the year nod.
The odd ball win for me was Sting and Mary J. Blige for the best pop collaboration. Just because it looks good on paper doesn't mean it works.
GRAMMY.com
Saturday, February 07, 2004
Breaking News : Kazaa Raided
So are the days of free file sharing over? For the record I've always had quite mixed feelings about the free file sharing solutions. I've been friends with many starving musicians through the years and now that I'm in an active band I understand the desire to protect the artistic intellectual property and earn a profit from the hard work.
However the freedom that Kazaa type solutions offer are quite compelling. For the record I'm honestly probably in the 1% of people that use these solutions to check it music. If I do like something I'll go out and buy the cd or I'll erase the software. The exception, which is the gray area, is if it is rare, unreleased, or out of print material. All recordings should be fair game and if it isn't available for purchase I still at times want a mechanism to trade to get it.
About 2 years ago I almost went to work for Audio Galaxy in Austin. Literally the week I interviewed they were sued by the RIAA. Was what these companies do illegal, without a doubt yes. Is it compelling and important, yes.
Breaking News : Kazaa Raided
Friday, February 06, 2004
The click goes on
Last night I retracked Rejected. Miraculously the first take of the night was the keeper. I re-tracked Lonely One and then we attempted Too Far. I knew it would be a tough tune, considering it has the most intricate drumming out of all the tracks we perform. Performance is getting real close to being a keeper, however there are still some rough spots related to fills not properly carrying the mood of the song and some discussion regarding if the bass drum should follow the bass or the rhythm guitar.
Drums are complete for three tracks, so the rest of the band can start laying down their parts anytime. On Tuesday we will continue tracking more drums. We hope to record 10 tracks so after 8 hours of recording over a period of one week we are about a 1/3rd of the way there.
Wednesday, February 04, 2004
Yahoo composing music download plan | CNET News.com
Honestly I don't believe Yahoo could pull this off. The primary reason being the leading music stores online have a rich user experience focused on marketing and ease of use. iTunes clearly leads the way from a store standpoint. Yahoo historically has been a minimalist interface that is fast however barebones in many ways. Yahoo's power is through the web, not through a standalone application.
A web version of Rhapsody I could see Yahoo doing, bundling or rebranding an iTunes or Napster type solution I just don't see as happening.
Yahoo composing music download plan | CNET News.com
Tuesday, February 03, 2004
Ghosts in the machine
The band I'm in continued working on demos tonight. I laid down one more track for Lonely One. Pretty good but I'll probably cut it one more time. We were having some ghosts in the machine tonight so we will be redoing the takes regardless. It seems we continue to get some distorted sound on track 2 out of 24. We tried all sorts of things to no avail. Hopefully it will be resolved before our next practice on Thursday.
The other big news when I played tonight was I'm getting the hang of playing to a click. Some tips from my friend Dean, formerly of Color, and some email discussions with our bass player Mike G and I was able to make some adjustments in the studio that allowed me to focus on the click.
Monday, February 02, 2004
Google Rankings
So if you have noticed I like collecting lists and stats about what I listen to, purchase, or random things such as Seti.
Along those lines now that I've been doing this blog thing for several months I thought it would be interesting to track my google rankings.
As you can see the name of my site is "The Dave Blog" and as such I recently registered thedaveblog.com.
Now doing a search on Google for The Dave Blog you see many blogs for people named Dave. Unfortunately mine isn't near the top. As of this writing my site is the 27th Dave Blog listed. One thing to point out is that the URL shown is for my old dyndns address.
Interestingly enough, if I put quotes around "The Dave Blog" my site comes back second on the list. Note, once again it is the dyndns address.
I'll attempt to revist this next month. We'll see if they start recording the new domain and if I can get higher in the rankings.
Janet and Justin
In what will go down as the most over hyped moment of 2004. Here are a couple of momentos...
HARM Recordings
A buddy of mine from Austin sent a group of his friends the premiere set of HARM Recordings. HARM (Half-Assed ReMasters)
This was a total surprise. I get to hear recrodings made by many friends including some early Dig / Seed demo recordings. A session I did with Mark Leary, John Oliver and Ron Rudd in the summer of 92 at UNT in Denton. And lastly a disc with Mark noodling himself, I mean with himself...
Thanks Ron... and Island Thang and Slakt are even cooler than I remember. Looking forward to the Unknowns set with the Bullfrog!
Sunday, February 01, 2004
The Links on the side
For those paying attention I've updated and enabled the links in the navigation bar on the left of the screen.
Click, Click, Click, Click...
Most of Saturday afternoon was spent in the studio working on demos. I've never played to a click track with a band and it was a bitch. I still don't have the hang of it quite yet, but I did cut two tracks. One for Rejected, and one for The Weather Song.
I still may revisit The Weather Song but the performance isn't anything to be embarassed by. We will probably cut 10 tracks over the next couple of weeks. And at that point the rest of the band will lay down their tracks.
The Rock Show
Last night I made it out to Smith's Olde Bar to see Supagroup. Katie and Mike from my band were going to the show as well so we met early grabbed a bite downstairs and headed to the the show.
The opener for the show was a band out of Athens called
Southern Bitch.
I usually don't do this but I enjoyed their set quite a bit so I bought their disc at the end of the night. The cd is a couple of years old and based on the concert they've toughened up a bit. The cd may take me a few listens to get into. A little more mellow and country than their performance. But hey, that seems to be the story of my own band as well.
The band I had been looking to see was New Orleans based Supagroup. Great show, lot of intensity and was everything I was looking for from them. The only gripe is I wished they had played a longer set. If you haven't seen these guys go check them out. Yes, their music is straight from the AC/DC book of rock and roll, but it still makes for one hell of entertaining show. Their CD was made my top 10 list for 2003.
The last band was Antigone Rising. An all female group. Not bad, but not the right band to follow Supagroup. The intensity wasn't there and they place emptied half the crowd within 30 minutes of their set. I left shortly there after.
