Errands & Recording
Sunday, August 25th, 2024 02:19 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snoozefestaudio |
91F and sunny this afternoon.
The forecast says 98F on Tuesday!.. that's gonna be miserable!
No building checks today, thank goodness.
I'm just back from what's become my normal Sunday routine... out the door with garbage, then to Aldi for groceries.
Then fill up the tank with gas.
Then get beer.
I realized today that if there's an asshole in the loading zone, as there always is, I can park in the loading zone of the building across the street.
So I did that and ran my groceries upstairs... then brought my luggage dolly back to the car with me... parked the car in the garage... and wheeled the beer back to the flat.
After that, I put all the groceries away.
I miss the InstaCart delivieries, but in this building it'd be too much of a hassle for the shopper... because like I said, there's always an asshole in the loading zone.
That loading zone has space enough for two vehicles, but what always happens is some asshole parks right in the center, so there's no space for anybody else... then disappears for three hours.
And on the weekend, there's nobody to police that at all.
Management, maintenance, and housekeeping are gone with the wind on Friday at 5PM.
And every weekend one of the three elevators has a computer glitch and becomes inoperable.
Then like, the front door closer falls off, and nobody closes it behind them, so the building's wide open to the public.
Then somebody walks down the hall with a leaky garbage bag and leaves a trail of gross liquid that stinks like shit.
And it all stays that way until Monday.
No way to record vocals again today, with the AC still blasting, but I did go back to the FLP of, Never Rains and tweaked some things... added some delay to the piano to make it sound wetter during it's solo, which takes place with the loudest rain on the track.
I also adjusted the pan and volume on the violin and cello, because they're providing the harmony for my vocals in the chorus, and needed to be more present next to my voice, and above the thunder claps that now begin each chorus.
After exporting that new FLP of the music to a WAV, I swapped it into the AUP file for the song and listened through it.
My shitty vocals in the chorus were still distracting, but then I realized that in the third and final chorus, I actually sang it well, so I just copy pasted that one into the first two choruses.
After a bit more tweakng I exported all that to a FLAC, and listened through it.
The result is actually enjoyable to listen to, as these draft tracks go, so now I can finally move on to, Bed in the Suburbs.
I did also export a WAV of that song to use in an AUP with vocals, but... as I said it's too loud in here do vocals this weekend.
As I've said before, the goal right now is to get a listenable draft version of all 10 songs with vocals before revisiting anything to perfect the vocals.
And there are several reasons to do it that way...
- I'm honing the engineering techniques with vocals as I go, from getting used to how the mike behaves, to post recording adjustments to the vocal's EQ, wave form, auto-tune, and other effects.
So it's silly to waste time perfecting the vocals on one song, only to find down the road that all the techniques have gotten better, so now I have to re-do it anyway. - When I have the full album with draft vocals, I can listen through it over and over for a few weeks to, learn the songs, as it were.
Several of these songs have updated lyrics, and most of them have updated structures, in terms of where choruses and bridges fall, and how often they repeat. So I need to learn those new changes by listening.
And reviewing a draft version for a few weeks also just reveals different production changes that may need to be done... like, maybe the drums should do something a bit different here, to punctuate the vocal rhythm, or maybe some other instrument is being buried in the mix... or is too loud.
That kinda stuff. - Once I've learned how the new vocals should flow, it makes it easier to practice singing along with a non-vocal draft... because I don't have to think as hard about... what's coming next?.. what are the lyrics, now?
And if you're singing in the car, you don't want to have to be thinking really hard about that kinda stuff.
I'm all clean & shiny, and my laundry's in the washer downstairs.
Around 7:15PM, when the sun was low, and it'd gotten down to 86F, I went out for a walk, with Pokemon Go open.
I turned all five gyms in my vicinity yellow, because I'm sick of seeing them be red all the time... and caught some pokemon, and fought a bunch of Team Rocket grunts.
I got some scented candles at Aldi today... gardenia... and I'll be damned if they're not the best ones I've found so far!
I left them going before the walk, and when I got back, I could smell them in the hall, outside the door!
That's important because these new doors they put on everybody's units do not seal well at all.
From the inside, I can see light around all four sides of mine.
But out in the hall, you can not only hear everybody in their apartments, but you can smell everything... all the food they're cooking, and whatever.
So, I don't want to be the guy who's putting the stale cigarette stink into the hallway.
I have a draft dodger I grabbed from home that I now put down at the base of the door when I'm in here for the night, that helps a little bit with that.
And my makeshift exhaust fan also helps.
But nothing beats a strong scented candle to keep the flat smelling nice.
So I think I'm gonna be grabbing these from Aldi on the regular from now on.
Okay, laundry's in the dryer now.
I now have five songs with draft vocals... half the album.
Tracks; 1, 2, 3, 4, and 7... because I skipped ahead and did, Clue Phone a couple weeks ago, which is track seven.
So if the weather breaks, I should have the other five songs in draft mode by the end of September.
When I started this project in earnest, last December, I figured it'd be ready for release in October.
But the foreclosure crisis put everything on hold for two months.
So now it's looking like January, after the holidays are over.
Actually... January's out, because of the inauguration on the 20th.
If it's Kamala Harris being inaugurated... and I hope and pray that it is... then you know there's gonna be some shit going down again, like in 2020.
So... maybe it's better to shoot for a Valentine's Day release!
For me that's... Distro-Kid releasing it to all the streaming platforms... and BandCamp... the old SoundCloud too... and then I'll try to promote it a little bit on like Facebook and TikTok I guess?
I can release it on YouTube later.
AI text to video is coming into it's own right now, so I should be able to put together some interesting actual videos for this album... or maybe a mix of AI generated stills and video clips?
I'm sure it'll take some time and money, as NightCafe taught me, so the videos will come later.
The old SoundCloud, as it turns out, is still there.
I'm at the upload limit right now, because I cancelled the subscription.
But I can start that back up down the line.
No matter what I do, the release won't get much attention... but it'll get some.
And that'll be a bit more if I wait until everybody's done freaking out about the holidays and the election.
and Valentne's Day fits well enough...
Magic Monday would be the perfect first single for Valentine's Day, because it's very romantic and takes place in winter.
Okay, all the clothes are back up here and put away!
I'm all ready for another damn week!
Final week of August too!.. before a 3 day weekend!
Just hope I can survive the heat!
°¦}
