#dreams | MidiMike

Posts Tagged ‘#dreams’

Rule #1: Always Play with Musicians that are Better Than you!

Posted: May 20, 2015 in Opinions and Observations
Tags: #audio, #band, #bass, #creative, #dreams, #drummer, #drums, #guitar, #inspiration, #journey, #keyboard, #life, #Liveband, #love, #lucky, #lyrics, #microphone, #Midi, #midimike, #motivation, #music, #musician, #observation, #performance, #performer, #personal, #piano, #recording, #recordingstudio, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #story, #studio, #studioengineer, #truth, #vocalist, #vocals

I have been very fortunate over the years in a number of ways. As I look back on my history and the events I have been involved in, this rule became obvious to me. I have always performed or created music with people that are much better than I am. I did not do this by design, it just seemed to happen over and over. One of my favorite bands I have been involved with for many years is Euphoria. Think of all the adjectives you know to describe excellence and you can use them all for the members of the band. They invited me to run sound for them and that is how I got the nerve to be a sound guy. As they played out and I ran sound and helped with musical toys as a music store manager, we became great friends and shared a real passion for great music. When the keyboard player decided to work on other projects, they found out I played keyboards and asked me if I wanted to take his place. I cannot tell you how much courage it took to say yes. I had never really played out before and we were into progressive rock and really complicated songs – many you heard clips from the studio demo posted earlier.

I knew I was not ready for prime time, but I got my keyboard gear together – practiced on my own every spare minute I had and forced myself to show up for practice. I had big shoes to fill. To their credit each of the band members were extremely patient! The knew it would take me some time to get to their level. Some songs on our set list were replaced with songs that had less emphasis on the keyboard until I could get my chops up to speed. Some we had to drop altogether. But they all worked with me and did not make me feel like I was slowing them down or not up to par. Had it not been for their great attitude and flexibility, I may have thrown in the towel and called it quits before it got started.

The only better piece of advice in this area I think is just as important is to always play with great people! Band life can be hard work, physically challenging and demanding and at the same time can be disastrous

The Personal Touch does “The Pleasure Tax” – Rare Release

Posted: May 11, 2015 in MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: # mixer, #12string, #atari, #audio, #band, #bass, #cdbaby, #creative, #demo, #digital, #dreams, #drummer, #drums, #guitar, #itunes, #keyboard, #life, #Liveband, #love, #lyrics, #microphone, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #performer, #personal, #poetry, #recording, #retro, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #story, #studio, #studioengineer, #touch, #vocalist, #vocals

Recently I was asked in comments (The Observer) if a song I posted was recorded at home or in a studio. I replied but thought I might expand on that a bit and also introduce another version of “The Pleasure Tax”. As my brother and I got older we kept writing poems that were now almost always designed to be lyrics. We got better. Instead of playing the bongos, I played the toy organ I mentioned and everything else from there. Here is where I get to also blame my parents again. For Christmas we all got cool toys, but many of mine seemed to be music makers; recorders, tiny piano ‘tinkley’ toys, little ukuleles and eventually guitars with plastic strings and a drum set that was made for a three year old, but you get the point. So we got better and we played instruments and my brother started playing guitar as well. We had more toys to create music so when we wanted to record them (I was probably fourteen or fifteen by the time recording was a possibility) we wanted to add the various instruments and record them all together.

Through the years, we met other musicians and became great friend – or as I seem to recall – we met great friends that were also musicians. Eventually there was a central core of serious song writers. Sometimes there would be around eight or ten core writing members. It would seem there was a competition going (and there always was!) to write the coolest or most clever or the most groovy song. And we would have friends that would stop by and jam once in a while or would write lyrics and were willing to turn them over to a group of people that would fit them , with force if necessary, with a musical arrangement, melody line and harmonies.

The rambling link to all this is when we often played a collection of each other’s songs, we more than likely played with different performers supporting a few core members. Those were exciting days! One time you would sing the song and the lead vocalist was not there. So you let an ‘orbiting member’ do the vocal melody and you sing the harmony part. Most of us played instruments and sang – especially if we wrote the song as you can guess – so if the lead vocalist also played guitar, we filled in as a ‘core member’. On one visit or jam session you performed and sang your song all by yourself to the group. In other visits you were surrounded by full instrumentation and a choir of vocalists! So here is an example of all that tied into a version of this song by a full band I toured with. You heard us play live to an audience in Texas when we played the original song “Our Bodies Move” posted earlier. We also played other original songs and snuck them into our sets. One of them was “The Pleasure Tax”. We called ourselves The Personal Touch. Ric and I were a duo and when we decided to add a female vocalist as recommended by a booking agency they decided to sign us up for out of state gigs. We got some studio time when signing up and we performed some original tunes and some cover stuff…. done The Personal Touch way. “TPT” by TPT!

So this is rare original song of mine that was recorded in an actual studio. We are a trio and there was a studio drummer. Everything else is The Personal Touch with a very new vocalist.

Getting to the Next Level

Posted: May 5, 2015 in Opinions and Observations
Tags: # mixer, #audio, #band, #dreams, #drums, #fan, #fans, #Irish, #itunes, #keyboard, #life, #Liveband, #lucky, #microphone, #Midi, #midimike, #mixingboard, #monitors, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #performer, #personal, #piano, #runningsound, #singer, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #story, #synthesizer

We all try to rationalize situations we are not sure of. We attempt to explain why things happen – or things that happen to us. We try to understand the world around us. When I worked at the instrument music store, I rationalized that I got the job because I was a previous customer and that I could program and understand the new digital MIDI keyboards hitting the market. Very quickly (months, I believe) I was given my own satellite store to manage. I opened three more chain stores in a few short years. In reality, I probably bought more in equipment than I got paid to work there! Almost kidding, but I understood a lot of the toys and had played with a bunch of them, but to get a room full of toys all day long and then get paid to learn all I could about them, well, I won’t get into religion here but that was heaven on Earth. I would have done it for free. And do you know how I rationalized being a SALES MAN? (I am pretty anti-establishment from way back………..) I tried to listen to where the customer was coming from and what they needed. From there I would teach them what I knew about gear that would help get them to the next level. Everyone needs to get to the next level. That is what I am doing today. It is what you are doing right now.

And sometimes we need to explain to ourselves why. Why do I need to buy that new toy? Why do they like me? Why does the sun always shine where I am? Why aren’t things working as I planned. Why don’t they understand me? What did I do right or wrong? This has bugged me all my life and I hope it does not get to you. Working in the music store(s) I sold gear to a lot of bands. Some people were regulars. Always something needed, some new gear. One of the bands told me that their sound man was on vacation and they needed someone to run sound for them. It SEEEEEEMED logical to ask me, I knew about the mixing boards and PA systems. But I had never run sound before ( truth in advertising alert – – – I did run sound for one other band prior to this but that is a funny story I wanted to share with you later. So I did it once before ….. technically …….) What would you do? These are good customers and by now good friends too. If I run sound and really suck, the friendship and the work relationships are out the window. I let them know I do not have a lot of experience but if they don’t have anyone else I would be glad to help. They decide to go with me for the vacation gigs. I run through the checklist a thousand times in my head. I set the stage and house equipment up methodically, I run through the gain staging like riding a bike, I get the monitors working and run CD audio through the mains to test them. Time to start. Big crowd. Lots of people and friends. As you can imagine I am rapidly cycling through excitement, concern, confusion, fear, panic, and jazzed up one after the other. The band starts playing and they are soooooo good I just relax. I think even I can make these guys sound good! I was lucky. From what I remember the event was fine.

Their sound man decided to move onto other things and when he came back from vacation I was asked to take his place. Again I had to rationalize; well, they only like me cause I can get them a deal at the store. Well, they like me because I can set up the equipment pretty fast. Well, it went over well because they are really tight and have great equipment. You have probably done that a bunch of times as well. It was hard for me to accept all the way down to the point of knowing that they noticed and appreciated the mix. Their fans did too but most importantly, so did the band wives! Never forget the power of the spouse! So now for the first time, I am involved with a real band. I am the regular sound guy. The Band understands the power of the PA, and they determine that the sound guy gets equal cut…… as if he is as important to the overall sound as the individual band members were. Amazing concept and it worked so well over the years. I could not rationalize my way out of deserving that one; we worked as a team and the band always sounded great.

All this from knowing how to program a digital keyboard.

My Original Tunes on ITunes and a Heartfelt Thank You to My Followers

Posted: April 21, 2015 in MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: #audio, #band, #cdbaby, #creative, #daughter, #dreams, #family, #genres, #itunes, #keyboard, #life, #Liveband, #love, #lyrics, #midimike, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #performer, #personal, #piano, #poetry, #recording, #recordingstudio, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #stage, #studio, #vocalist, #vocals

As demonstrated in the past, I have shared my compositions and songs with friends and family. When asked by a blogger (and now a good friend) in a comment on my blog if my songs were available on i-Tunes, I replied that I believed they are but have not checked. I know this sounds strange and it is! Of the number of things I have learned and accomplished over the decades, I have not learned how (or desired…..) to promote my own work. That is one of the reasons why my daughter had to give me a big KICK to start this blog and get my songs out there.

It appears I need another big KICK! I placed my songs on CD Baby as I am an independent songwriter/performer and I do not have the backing of a major label (Yet???!!). Thank all of you for checking out this blog and for comments I truly feel are precious and thoughtful. Many of you are encouraging and supportive and I very much appreciate it. I want to help others understand the music environment and cut to the root of many systems or procedures we use that seem too mysterious or challenging to beginners.

I did check and I want to make sure you know that my songs (individually and as CD’s) are available on i-Tunes, and they can be found in streaming services like Pandora, Spotify, X-box and many other channels. If plans go well I will also be releasing more songs this year and early 2016. My daughter posted the i-Tunes links on the midimike blog recently, and I wanted to let you know if you are not familiar with CD Baby that the songs are available in other channels. Deep down, maybe everyone wants to be a famous rock star, but I simply want to create original music, help others do the same and share them with people that are as passionate about life as I am.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/retrograde/id962542260

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/dark-energy/id962943592

https://itunes.apple.com/us/album/touch-down/id962542289

What I Do At Night – The Driving Song

Posted: April 8, 2015 in family, MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: # mixer, #atari, #audio, #band, #bass, #daughter, #demo, #digital, #dreams, #driving, #drummer, #drums, #family, #guitar, #keyboard, #life, #Liveband, #love, #lyrics, #Midi, #mixingboard, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #piano, #poetry, #recording, #recordingstudio, #retro, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #story, #studio, #studioengineer, #synthesizer, #tech, #vocalist, #vocals, #Yamaha

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/perigee

**This is MidiMike’s daughter. I help my dad out with his blog. I wanted to tell all of you that this is, by far, my favorite song that my dad has ever written. If you stop to listen to any of the original tunes, I would highly recommend this one!! Thanks.**

And now a message from my dad:

On most of my tunes, I play all the instruments and sequence the drums and other sound effects. I usually sing lead or I have my wife take the vocal lead. Once I started working in music stores selling instruments and sound equipment, I asked friends (and customers at the time!) to come over and lay down guitar solos or I might have a guest vocalist. What I do at Night was one that we did ourselves. I play all guitar parts and the back up vocals. I think at this time I had graduated from a Yamaha MT4X (I think they were called and this was a 4 Track double speed cassette recorder) to the Alesis ADAT. So now I had an amazing 8 tracks to record on! Actually I needed one track to record the SMPTE time code so the Alesis ADAT would sync up to the computer (now I actually have a PC and put the Atari in deep storage). I can go into this details on this system for a later post when I am feeling nostalgic, but it allowed unlimited MIDI tracks on the PC or Atari and connect to the playback of the ADAT.

The song itself reflects my thoughts on a number of topics. I really like to drive. I don’t have a fast or luxury car. I just like to drive. When I have some free time or just want to think, I often find myself cruising the local country side. I would listen to music while driving and that sometimes adds to the frustration. Most of the music you hear on commercial radio is garbage or re-packaged songs and ideas I have heard for the last few decades. Like a lot of us struggling artists and performers, we see a bunch of bands with lots of air-play and they are just so-so. OK music, but nothing special. As a songwriter, I get so tired of the same theme or idea in every song on the radio and they seem to get played non-stop.

One line reflects this fairly well…. ” so I turn the radio over to the right, playing the same songs as the other night”. Originally titled – “Rainy Day”, What I do at Night has become one of my favorite driving songs. Enjoy.

Slick As A Dream

Posted: April 1, 2015 in family, MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: # mixer, #audio, #band, #bass, #daughter, #demo, #digital, #dreams, #drummer, #drums, #family, #guitar, #keyboard, #Liveband, #logical, #love, #lyrics, #Midi, #mixingboard, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #piano, #poetry, #recording, #recordingstudio, #retro, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #story, #studio, #studioengineer, #synthesizer, #vocalist, #vocals

Plain and simple, the lyrics are about my daughter. As a proud parent, I am often overwhelmed by the innocence, beauty and unlimited potential when holding a new-born in your arms. Not to get weird here, but there is nothing like it. As I cradle, rock or talk baby-talk, it is difficult not to think about the new life I am holding, how fascinating they are and to drift into thoughts of what will happen in their future and how we can make that path easier. This song also features Gary Jefferson on vocals. You will hear him a lot on my tunes, and he was the vocalist in the demo recording the band did in the studio. He has pulled me into a number of projects and I often ask him to help me with mine. There are so many musicians I depend on and work with regularly. I will introduce you to them and the work they have done in future posts.

Most of the music is sequenced along with the drum tracks, I play the rhythm guitar parts and had a friend come in for the guitar solo, while my wife adds back-up vocals. All grown up and with children of her own, the meaning of this song gets deeper and closer to the heart every year.

“Slick as A Dream” (c) MSK 1988

Slick as a dream, this beauty machine

Sharp and so cold, young – just as old.

Moving so sweet you can feel the heat

Smiles of sorrow can’t wait ‘til tomorrow.

One thing you’ve learned: love has to be earned

Pain must be shared, embraced if you dare.

Nightmares are gone, but she carries on

Can’t forget her, love lasts forever.

Tender love cries slowly hypnotize

The helpless day now melting away.

And if you dare she’ll become aware

Give those who bleed whatever they need.

She knows exactly who she is.

And exactly what she needs.

Red on Your Blue Suede Shoes

Posted: March 25, 2015 in MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: # mixer, #audio, #band, #Cincinnati, #demo, #digital, #dreams, #guitar, #keyboard, #Liveband, #lyrics, #Midi, #music, #musician, #performance, #recording, #recordingstudio, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #speakers, #stage, #studio, #TheWho, #vocalist, #vocals

So many tragedies have happened and each gets buried under the other.

http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/perigee

I was walking downtown recently and took a picture of graffiti on the bridge going from Covington to Cincinnati and used this opportunity to look at the past and hope for the future. I know this is an old subject and many people have forgotten all about this and therefore some may think it unimportant. Red on Your Blue Suede Shoes is an up-tempo catchy rhythm but the lyrics are in stark contrast. The song is in honor of the innocent victims of bad decisions and prejudice. During earlier years, concert promoters tried to cash in on what they called ‘festival seating’ where they could remove chairs and pack in as many people into an area as they can – as long as they are all paying customers, that is. This by itself is not necessarily a bad thing, but it was combined with bad decision making, planning and execution. As the crowds in Cincinnati Ohio anxiously anticipated a great performance by The Who, the doors remained locked. The crowd now gaining mass and enthusiasm, wanted to make sure they got a good spot for the concert, and people started pushing toward the many closed doors before anyone was allowed to enter. Unbelievably, the venue only opened a few doors in each area and kept the others shut. Once this happened, everyone tried to rush into the few open doors so they could get to their spot.

Thousands of people squeezed and pushed those in front to try to get in. Not everyone was able to handle this crush. Some people fell down and literally got trampled to death by other fans. The Red on their Blue Suede Shoes came from walking over fellow human beings that are unable to maintain their balance. I am not sure if the song is mostly anger toward those who could do something like this or mostly hope that many did try to stop the dangerous mob to assist fallen fans. This song is dedicated to the Cincinnati 11, and the Who. I will never forget.

St. Patrick’s Day – A Part of Me

Posted: March 17, 2015 in Holiday, MUSIC, My Tunes
Tags: # mixer, #American, #audio, #band, #demo, #digital, #dreams, #family, #Irish, #Liveband, #livesoundreinforement, #love, #lyrics, #Midi, #motivation, #music, #musician, #recording, #retro, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #St. Patrick's Day, #stage, #studio, #studioengineer

Speaking about lyrics that never become songs, etc., sometimes I write and record a demo or rough track of a song and it just never seems to go anywhere. Some of them do get resurrected, many don’t. For some it may be as simple as a tempo change or a different arrangement. Other times for me it is mysterious. In honor of Saint Patrick’s Day, I would like to post lyrics to a song in the making. As this platform gives us access to followers around the globe, I do not want to leave anyone out, so please take this as intended. If I don’t mention your country, other people’s songs will!

Then in a later post I can bring in the recorded demo tracks. I like the lyrics for the most part and I love the idea behind the song, but it is not there yet. Maybe after a pint or two of Guinness and some suggestions from you I can finish this song. And of course, that could be a topic in and of itself. We hear phrases like “final mix”. Some people say there is no such thing. Others say you just have to stop at some point and let it go. Much of this may depend on your final goal. Are you a singer/songwriter trying to get a break and some air-time? Are you shopping for places your band can perform your unique style? Do you want to have a clean demo to send to your favorite artist? Is this a sound-track for video/YouTube? Do you make sound effects for games?

We can always say make it as good as possible but that is very subjective. Hire 50 sound engineers and you will get 45 different mixes (there are always people that look over your shoulder!) Tip for today; it takes a really long time to fix it in the mix even if you know what you are doing. It is much easier and preferred to get the great sound first, and then record it properly (using gain staging and other procedures mentioned earlier). When you record a great sound it will sound great. As a sound guy for a local band I would get compliments on the sound (House from the audience but almost always monitors from the band). I thank them and tell them the band sounds great, I just let everyone hear them.

“A Part of Me” © 08-2000 MSK

American Indians gave me my soul,

A spiritual guide for all living things.

Each man’s fate is his to control

Peace with Nature, the warrior sings.

A Part of Me belongs to all of Them

From the Germans strength was my first lesson.

Trial and precision as you master these.

Pride that’s passed down from son to son.

Built in each hand crafted Masterpiece.

Oriental neighbors have shown me the light

Truth, Balance, Eternal harmony.

The beauty of patience and delight

Traditions deep within history.

A Part of Me belongs to all of them.

I’m proud to be an American.

Sisters and brothers from every shore,

That’s what makes us Americans.

Part of Me belongs to all of Them

From the Irish I inherit my pride

I stand my ground and I will speak my mind.

I will honor the lands and the tide,

And I’ll never leave a neighbor behind.

My English side embraced nobility.

Dry humor in the face of foes

Hardy enough to capture the seas.

Portraits legends and heroes.

African Americans forced to become

A torn people of two nations.

Tribal tales and melodic rhythm

Passed onto the next generation.

The French helped me understand

Style and grace can be nurtured like wine.

To believe there is no better place

Life shared with friends, bread and wine.

A Part of Me belongs to all of them.

I’m proud to be an American.

Sisters and brothers from every shore,

That’s what makes us Americans.

Part of Me belongs to all of Them

Year after year

They want to raise their children here.

Because sweat blood and tears

Can amount to something here.

There’s a lot of people in my life

A part of Me belongs to all of Them.

Your song may be different and that’s OK.

Sing it with your fellow American.

Lessons from the Studio

Posted: March 11, 2015 in Cover Tune Tuesdays
Tags: # mixer, #audio, #band, #digital, #dreams, #drummer, #guitar, #keyboard, #Liveband, #livesoundreinforement, #lyrics, #Midi, #music, #musician, #performance, #recording, #runningsound, #singer, #song, #songwriter, #sound, #Soundengineer, #soundman, #stage

In Euphoria at this time, I am the keyboard player and I do some back-up vocals and percussion.

I get to set up in the recording control room and listen to the studio speakers for monitors. I can look through the glass and see the other players; drums in isolation booth, guitar amp and bass rig in separate areas with go-bo’s and sound partitions avoiding spill-over. Vocalist was in place in booth, but we are doing scratch vocals now for the most part to keep the musicians on track. The studio is using reel-to-reels back then, but they are great machines and the board is more than I had gotten my hands on at the time. To let you know I was the performer here. I was not the engineer and I kept my mouth shut. [OK, maybe that was a hidden lesson if we think about it!]

To set up the story a little, when Euphoria plays live and the guitar player breaks a string (in our band this happens all the time and even our BASS GUITAR player breaks strings regularly!) we have to stop the song. The guitar players will grab another guitar or change if needed……

And no matter where we were when we had to stop playing the song, we started from the same place and continued the song to the end. So when we came into the studio, we knew what songs we wanted to record and in what order, but we also knew which part of each song should be on the demo. We did not want to record a bunch of full songs all the way through. When we were ready to record, the vocalist would call out what song and Verse 1 and 2…. Chorus 2……., Verse 3, Solo – then Verse….. Whatever it was that we wanted to record. We did not play all the way through and then have the tape ‘cut’ to those areas; it is all we recorded. We caught the sound guy off guard. He must have initially thought we were going to go way over time. As it happened, we did all the cover tune sections we wanted and had time over to play with an original tune the guitar player was working on.

Oh, yeah, there is still a lesson for the recording engineer in all this. He told me during a number of conversations (I asked about stuff after all, but I tried not to back-seat-drive the recordings) that he had struggled for two years on getting the drum booth tight. He had changed the drum heads multiple times. He bought more and more expensive microphones. He used the latest gates and processing gear. He moved everything up, down and sideways. He changed soundproofing a million times.

Here is what he said to me that day, “All this time I thought I didn’t have the right drum booth and gear. It wasn’t until tonight that I figured out that I just did not have the right drummer!”.

Unfortunately the other band members would not let me tell the drummer that for a long time in fear his head would get really big and explode!

Journey – Separate Ways

Black Crowes – Hard to Handle

Yes – Long Distance

Yes – Changes

The Who – Can You See the Real Me?

Shooting Star – Last Chance

Queensryche – Jet City Woman

Everyday Lessons of a Musician

Posted: March 10, 2015 in projects
Tags: #audio, #band, #charity, #digital, #dreams, #fan, #guitar, #journey, #keyboard, #Liveband, #livesoundreinforement, #lyrics, #Midi, #motivation, #music, #musician, #performance, #Queensryche, #recording, #runningsound, #Shootingstar, #singer, #song, #sound, #soundman, #stage, #studio, #studioengineer, #TheWho, #yes

I have always been into helping charities and volunteering for good causes. I entered a few tunes from a local cover band I was in (Euphoria) for yet another battle of the band contest sponsored by habitats for humanity and a local radio station. The bands would play in Eden Park at the very-cool Seasongood Pavilion. At first it looked like we might not even play, then the dust settled and we would go on to play last. The other bands were interesting and pretty good. We were hi-energy progressive rock and we played our short set really well and had a great time. We even made the goof of mentioning the wrong radio station’s call letters! Agh! I thought on that alone we might get overlooked. But they might not have heard the comment and in all modesty we were really good. We won a trophy – some unknown band member still has it hidden safely in some underground bunker – and recording time at a recording studio! For me, this was like candy.

We were awarded the prize and a limited time to go into the studio. We decided to use the recording time of three hours (yeah, kind of a tease and they probably figure you will run over and have to pay them for additional recording time) to record a band demo. Eventually we got a list of songs we wanted to do and had some discussions on what parts of the songs to feature.

As the time got near, it became more and more difficult to arrange schedules of the various band members (and lets NEVER forget the schedules of the family of band members!). So I told the band guys that this weekend was it. This is the deadline and if we do not go in a few days we will lose this opportunity altogether. After the whining and complaints, we agreed to go that Saturday, the last day before the deadline.

There are two reasons I bring up this story. A couple of good lessons keep this fresh in my memory. The following is the first;

Sometimes you have to lie. I knew we had another two weeks to record, but I also knew if I left it up to the band to schedule, it would never happen. Everyone wants to do it and everyone SAYS they will, but other things always happen and conflicts crop up at the last minute, and it is too late to save the project then. I knew how the band put things off and I did not want to miss my time at the ‘candy store’.

The second lesson was learned by the studio recording engineer. I will share that in the next post. Here is a bit of the demo we did in the studio so you can get an feel for the mix.

Journey – Separate Ways

Black Crowes – Hard to Handle

Yes – Long Distance

Yes – Changes

The Who – Can You See the Real Me?

Shooting Star – Last Chance

Queensryche – Jet City Woman

MidiMike

Available on iTunes and CD Baby

Social Media

MSK original Songs

Posts Tagged ‘#dreams’

Rule #1: Always Play with Musicians that are Better Than you!

The Personal Touch does “The Pleasure Tax” – Rare Release

Getting to the Next Level

My Original Tunes on ITunes and a Heartfelt Thank You to My Followers

What I Do At Night – The Driving Song

Slick As A Dream

Red on Your Blue Suede Shoes

St. Patrick’s Day – A Part of Me

Lessons from the Studio

Everyday Lessons of a Musician

Archives

Available on iTunes and CD Baby

Social Media

MSK original Songs

Posts Tagged ‘#dreams’

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