Year's Plans Taking Shape
Sunday, January 5th, 2025 06:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
snoozefestaudio |
18F and holding tonight, with overcast skies.
I love when it's below 20F, because the radiator stays on continuously.
I slept in until 2PM on Saturday, but had a mind to go straight to Jiffy Lube and get an oil change for the car... because it's desperately overdue.
So with my coffee I drove to the one in Montgomery, and they were so busy they actually turned me away.
So I went to the one on Lake street and... same deal!
Apparently you can't just go to Jiffy Lube on a Saturday... especially the first normal Saturday of the year.
I did, however, get gas and smokes, and after parking the car back in the garage, took a little walk to Hoof + Horn and bought a tumbled hunk of malachite, for good luck in the coming year... along with a couple candles.
I spent the rest of my Saturday working on, NYC Gargoyles, in a, "version 2," copy of the .FLP file, so as not to lose the current good version.
Recall that this was the one song I found to be over-taxing the CPU, over Christmas break... after I strummed the guitar strings... which does take more processing power.
The main goal yesterday was to make the song more dynamic... with some parts quieter, other parts louder.
But I did need to get to the bottom of the CPU issue, first.
I figured out that it was due to the fact that I had four instances of Sakura, going in that song!.. Sakura being the plugin that generates the guitar sounds.
So, basically I had four different guitars... and that's... kinda ridiculous!
I had the one main guitar, and a second one with very muted strings, meant to accent the main one, simulating muted backstrokes.
Then I had two lead guitars... for no real reason... because they were both exactly the same!
But the color coding I did for the guitar patterns did not match what guitar each was supposed to be, so I had to go through very slowly... check each pattern... and re-color & re-name it, to reflect which instance of Sakura it belonged to.
Only after that, could I take all the patterns from one of the lead guitars, and copy paste them into new patterns for the other lead guitar... so that I could eliminate one instance of Sakura completely.
I then just eliminated the back-stroking guitar patterns altogether, and deleted that instance of Sakura... leaving me with just a main guitar, and a lead guitar.
And that solved the CPU issue.
The dynamics of the song are another matter entirely.
It's requiring me to go in and re-do several drum patterns, and tweak everything else in certain sections.
So, it's slow going, but I think the final result will be a more listenable song.
As I said yesterday, the issue was that, NYC Gargoyles was just going full throttle from start to finish... just, full instrumentation, and everything up to 11!
The song has all kinds of different changes in it, and those different sections are supposed to be different intensities.
But... NYC Gargoyles has been a difficult song to produce, since the very beginning.
It's a fast paced story song, and while the different parts repeat... their sequence, and their duration each time around, are tailored to what's being sung.
I also did talk to Colleen & Tim last night for a while.
Payment history for the storage unit shows that the price stays the same for four months, and then goes up $16.00, for the next four months.
It started at $52.00 per month, and then jumped up to $68.00.
In March, it'll jump to $84.00... and then $100.00 in July, $116.00 in November, and $132.00 by March of 2026.
But Colleen's daughter, Celina, is getting married in October, so that's the big event the family's planning to reunite for, out east... meaning that any reunion here in Aurora, to divi-up the stuff in the storage unit, won't happen until next summer, when it hit's the real pain point of $148.00.
So, I have 2025 to upgrade to a 1BR, and get my shit out.
And then when that reunion does happen in 2026, I'll be able to host a couple guests in my place, including Brian, who would likely stay the night here, before claiming whatever he wants to take back to DeKalb with him.
This analysis also reveals that it wouldn't be wise to get a cat until after Celina's wedding this October, which could have me out of town for a week.
So... 1BR by July... Album by October... Cat in November.
Slept in until 2:30 or so today, and then it was off to Randall Liquors for beer & smokes, followed by Aldi, for groceries.
I brought the backpack this time, and the luggage dolly, so that when I got back, I was able to go straight to the garage, and then wheel the beer back, with one bag of groceries on my back, an the other in my hand.
And it's a good thing I did that, becuase the streets around the building were backed up with traffic, and the loading zone was full, as usual!
My binoculars also came!
I went with a 20X pair, with a wide field of view, for $40.00.
Research revealed that, higer than 20X requires a tripod, because the image is too shaky.
They're pretty big and bulky, which is nice, and a quick test of them shows they're much better than the old pair... but I need to try them out during the day.
With any luck, that 1BR will be on the 10th floor or higher, and have an eastern view.
And then I'll have two windows, not blocked by stuff, like my single window is right now... with a garbage can and mike stand in the way, and a bunch of things on the sill, because there's nowhere else to put them.
All clean & shiny, with the laundry in the dryer.
I've been doing more work on, NYC Gargoyles, and it's coming along.
I've got the drums and bass under control, in terms of dynamics, so the next step will be the guitar patterns.
There's also horns, strings, winds, marimba & xylophone, in different parts, so the plan with them is to introduce them slowly throughout the song... until by the end, it's a fully orchestrated, full-volume affair.
I do need to start disciplining myself to be doing this kind of stuff on the weeknights.
I had a lot of time off through October, November, and December, but now it's back to two-day weekends for another three months or so.
And on the weekends I never really settle in to do recording until it's late.
There are always other things to take care of during the day.
But now that the songs are all at a certain level... thanks to the Christmas break... I am able to make significant progress over just a few hours.
So... either Monday & Wednesday nights... or Tuesday & Thursday nights, every week... should be all recording and no writing.
Friday night's always a phone chat.
But if I can make it the routine to record two worknights a week, that'll add up to a lot of progress over time.
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