Lunch Report for July 5th

Hey there folks,

Little early at the moment, but lunch will probably be a pork loin sandwich with swiss, likely with grotesque amounts of coffee and a side of low plasticity clay journal papers. It is hotter than I would like it to be at the moment (ambient 30-33, humidex 40) and I am busy trying to keep as much fluid in the body as I can for a cheap guy with no AC.

Anyone else as meticulous with coffee as me, no I don't roast my own like one of the previous guys (Jbo?) but I do have a manual grinder and only make it in a french press. There is a brand in Canada called Kicking Horse (from Alberta) and their coffee is amazing.

Hope all you folks had a good Independance day, I was out catching Iron Maiden in Toronto this weekend, and Canada day fireworks were for some reason after the show that night (delayed to saturday I guess?). Dream theatre opened, their sound was a bit off but man those guys can rip it up, they looked like the had a blast, shame they were only a 40 minute opener. I was kind of a expecting a bit more of a joint show than a opener/main act thing from 2 big names. Maiden was a ridiculous good time though, if I have that much energy north of 50 I will be pleased, 2 hour set, no intermission. I came away impressed with how happy Murray looks playing solos, how ridiculously energetic and awesome Dickinson is, and how the bassist from Spinal Tap was clearly modeled after Harris.

I would like to take a random stab at what inspires one to play. What makes you get up and play, to practice more, to strive to be better (if you still do)?

For me oddly new approaches and often technical players drive me to practice. I like new approaches as they open a lot of doors. Take my recent interest in chicken picking for example, am I really interested in giving in and playing country all the time? Heck no. I am more interested in stuff like John 5 and Zakk Wyldes use of chicken picking in metal. I plan to learn it , to see how I can use it to improve my music, mostly experimental. Same goes for slap/double thumb/ tapping on bass. I learn these styles more for their dynamic properties, than to actually use them stand alone. Ever picked up a style then never used it 'relevantly'?

The other huge motivation for me on a guitar are the shredders, people like Paul Gilbert and Joe Satriani blow my mind, so I practice their stuff, a lot. I don't really shred, and can't see myself shredding for my own enjoyment, but it is the building of melodies, quickly, the precision, finding the right notes without thinking. All that comes with practicing this style, then you step back and everything before the limit is airy and empty, very easy to play in, comfy even. I like to have that feeling to my music, the effortlessness. Hence my dedicated practice regime.


As far as my music goes, I will ween folks in slowly if they would like a listen. I will start with 2 older recordings, that I recently redid the mixes on, as I had an issue with bass levels not existing on any speakers but mine (really need a set of monitors).

The first one is here Tenderness. I wrote this one in February for valentines day for the wife. She really liked it, by far the most accessible of my songs and most standard. Nothing really experimental about it, the chord progression may be odd for some I guess.

The second is one of my 'experiments' this is a song in 9/8, written with 3 tracks, drum , bass, and guitar. The bass for the most part plays the entire rhythm, and the guitar all the leads (they occasionally switch for some bass jamming, but not much). This one is dreamscape, it has a sort of surreal feel, it doesn't stick on the beat much but tries to go around it. Dreamscape

And lastly some porn, This is my LB75, the most beautiful bass you will ever see. Decked out with SS frets, abalone block inlays, abalone logo, Chevronned flame top and headstock, ebony board, 2 giant beastly ultra awesome humbuckers, and a piezo pickup in the bridge. The picks are big, so those are thumbnail links, can click em again then again on the image shack site to make em all huge.





Hope your day is looking up.

Belated happy Canada Day to you Yesterday I spent witnessing a Dutch friend of mine being sworn in to become an American citizen with 513 other people at Seattle Center. Pretty impressive. Hope to be able to do the same in about 2 years. In the mean time I'm still rooting for the Dutch in the FIFA world cup to hold off Uruguay and (likely) Germany in the finals if it comes that far.

Must have been a blast to hear John Petrucci play. The man has a keen ear for sound and technique. Mentioning iron Maiden Naiden just brings me back to some early '80's 'athletics day' in high-school for no other reason that many of my school mates were into the Brittish hard-rock bands in those days sporting their tees.

I would like to take a random stab at what inspires one to play. What makes you get up and play, to practice more, to strive to be better (if you still do)?

For the most part for relaxation. Although still getting better, it is pretty marginal. But it is just so much fun to play the instruments in my collection; each which their own distinct character. I've never been into shredding. A more honest remark would be that I just do no have the technical capabilities to pull that off. But lately, I have been more into making sure every note speaks by actually de-emphasizing technique, velocity, and number of notes played. Accuracy and 'soul' are more at the forefront. And at least to my ears, I am playing better than before. Guess it's my way of trying to get 'better'.

BTW, nice Carvin you have there. They do some beautiful work. For a killer price mind you!

That's a beautiful bass you have there. What are all those knobs for? ;+)

Coffee: I like Starbucks and drip brew it at home. I used to grind it at home but the grinder wakes the wife who gets up after me, so..... Now I buy it pre-ground. French press tastes good to me but paper filters are supposed to trap unhealthy oils so....

Beer inspires me to play and helps me stay forever mediocre or worse. New approaches scare me the same way finding out my house had an entrance I never knew about that has always lacked a lock might.

I did get a new tuner recently that helps me play rather poorly but in tune. My chords sound better than ever now so maybe I'll be inspired to write a new song.

I like your music, so good job with that! - ed

PS: Nice first Lunch Report!

Must have been a blast to hear John Petrucci play. The man has a keen ear for sound and technique. Mentioning iron Maiden Naiden just brings me back to some early '80's 'athletics day' in high-school for no other reason that many of my school mates were into the Brittish hard-rock bands in those days sporting their tees.

The unfortunate side effect of them being the opener, meant their sound mix was not what it could have been, at times everything kind of got lost together, others it was fine, depended how similar the guitar and bass were at the time. I was more interesting in Myung and JP though, both are extremely talented fellows, but I can pull off Myung's stuff, permitting I don't have to retune heavily, just don't enjoy retuning. I like the tension and whatnot of standard. Maiden is just slightly below my peak ability on a guitar, but they make it look much easier to play those solos.

I am by no means shredder calibre yet, but every day it seems I am a little faster than I was on certain exercises (I have about 10, on a given day I do 5 of them with MIDI and let it loop with increasing speed). I do understand that sometimes less is more though, that comes from learning to shred outside my teen years , The soundscape is always more important, and to me that is where Dream theatre shines, their woven melodies are borderline ridiculous yet very intricate.

That's a beautiful bass you have there. What are all those knobs for? ;+)

Coffee: I like Starbucks and drip brew it at home. I used to grind it at home but the grinder wakes the wife who gets up after me, so..... Now I buy it pre-ground. French press tastes good to me but paper filters are supposed to trap unhealthy oils so....

Top row (closest to strings) is Volume, Pickup sweep (neck to bridge with center detention for 50/50) and Mag/Piezo sweep (back all 'acoustic' front all magnetic pickups). The little switch is a coil split, you lose a touch of volume and some of the boom on those HB's. The bottom row is stacked treble over bass (cut/ boost, center detent), and stacked mid over mid sweep (frequency). Good actives in them, I do all my EQ shaping there instead of on the amp.

Starbucks, must be nice to be rich , frankly I have never been too impressed with their coffee, little more bitter than I like. I can understand the grinder noise thing though, the manual is quiet, but takes a good 2-3 min to grind 500 ml cups worth.

Beer inspires me to play and helps me stay forever mediocre or worse. New approaches scare me the same way finding out my house had an entrance I never knew about that has always lacked a lock might.

I did get a new tuner recently that helps me play rather poorly but in tune. My chords sound better than ever now so maybe I'll be inspired to write a new song.

Looking forward to the new song, I am on the verge of buying myself a TC polytune (can check all strings tuning in a single strung, and has a chormatic or strobe display tuner, very neat and nice little stomp, new tech). Beer is always fantastic, I am out OH NO! I will probably go in a few days and do my quarterly restock.

Glad you liked the tunes, there is more, weirder stuff on the way. Although dreamscape is probably one of the weirdest, if not the most out there, Remixing that one was a .... It had all different input levels and the like, things you learn to avoid quickly in the mixing game. (over 2 guitar and 2 bass tracks to make it even more fun)

Happy Monday.

My 4th was VERY quiet. I'm trying to recover from a fall I took on Wednesday--and we have a gig tomorrow. Not sure how I"m going to be able to play as my left ring finger is still painful and swollen. Never done that before. I've had blisters and even torn nails, but never a sprain like this. Ice, beer, Ibuprofen and Ben-Gay...and pray. It's all I can do.

I'm a big coffee hound. Used to go hang out in the original Starbucks at the Pike Place Market in Seattle back in the early '70s. There were some other roasters I liked too: The Good Coffee Company was a favorite, and The Wet Whisker was an ice cream shop that roasted small amounts of coffee down on Pier 70 in Seattle. Now that I live in Portland, a lot of people rave about local roaster Stumptown Coffee. Unfortunately, a heart arrhythmia has got me switched over to decaf these days--and it's not nearly as much fun.

Inspiration is where you find it. A new romance, or an old photo can easily be the catalyst for a new song. It's easy to get stuck in a rut, in terms of technique, and it takes a fair amount of time, committment and discipline to continue your growth. And you can say that about almost anything in your life.

Bill