Almost one year!

Hi, Internet! Something Julia said yesterday made me sort of wonder why I just stopped "blogging," and I'm supposed to be putting together a presentation on the jazz drummer Art Blakey, so what better way to put that off? At the very least I am currently listening to an album my dad listens to a lot, Art Blakey with the Original Jazz Messengers. I've heard this record many times, starting way before I knew anything about jazz. (It is still debatable whether or not I know anything about jazz.) Allmusic gave this one four stars out of five, but I have probably listened to this three times as much as I have Kind of Blue or A Love Supreme. I guess I would call it a pleasant listen, although supposedly this record is "hard bop," characterized by extreme tempos, long harmonies, and aggressive playing. The first track, "Infra-Rae," is indeed really fast, and I think that's the one I'm going to play for the class tomorrow. The track I'm now on, "Nica's Dream," is something I would put on while having some friends over for a nice dinner or something. Who knows, I've probably heard this tune at my aunt's nice town house in Greenwich Village as the family gathered round for roast beef with scallops and red wine. It is long and smooth, a Horace Silver composition which is heavily reliant on piano, played by Horace Silver. I'm drinking a cup of coffee and listening to jazz in my room, and I must say, it's pretty decent. Interestingly, this is probably the first time I have written about jazz since I took Jazz Harmony I my freshman year of college, and was honestly considering studying jazz. Things sure have changed.

And boy, what they have changed into. Since my last post, I have gotten much deeper into the world of electronics. Julia got me her dad's Access Virus digital synth as an early birthday present, and that thing can make some really great drones, as well as, Youtube tells me, some pretty trashy Eurohouse. I will probably rely heavily on it to produce a ten-minute piece by Tuesday for Richard Teitelbaum's Electronic Music Composition workshop, even though I'm still getting the hang of what it can do. Slightly less complicated, but exciting nonetheless, is my current project, a dual-oscillator synth based heavily on the Weird Sound Generator circuit, with some deviations that have come from weeks of breadboarding the thing. I spent about eleven hours on it last night and it's barely half-enclosed, having already populated the three(!) circuitboards, and having discovered that one of the two filter circuits does not quite work. If I can find the time, I'm going to troubleshoot that ASAP, since everything else that I've done is sounding great. It'll be battery-powered and switchable between regulated and unregulated voltage (completely different tones result from the two), with two outputs, each with a great low-pass filter, volume knob, and a knob for balance between the two oscillators, each of which have four variable pots and three switches for pretty much total control over the sounds. After that, I'm working on an Ampeg Scrambler clone, a treble booster (which I can maybe sell), and a Proco Rat distortion clone which my friend Rory paid me for over a year ago (sorry dude!).

If I continue posting stuff here, it'll probably mostly be about electronics geekery, so bear with me. I am currently working towards the final step in my degree from Bard College, so project is on the brain. Julia came up with the excellent idea of taking some electronics classes at RIT next fall, which is nearer to Geneseo, where she is. As I don't really see the need to move straight to Brooklyn, that sounds like a fine solution, and perhaps it'll bring me one step closer to selling a huge expensive thing to Radiohead and profiting immensely. That isn't actually my goal, by the way: I love the thought of making my own instruments, which produce sounds only I have access to and which only I know how to control. If all goes well, immediate postgraduate life will involve a job that pays for things (probably food service; set the bar low!), close proximity to my best friend (even if that means Rochester), time to learn about electronics, and time to do something with them. Seems pretty simple, and I think therein lies the appeal: since I don't have a huge career in the music industry waiting for me, the chance to continue learning and to be happy seems to be one worth treasuring.

That said, it sure is going to be weird living life without insanely long vacations. I guess my plan for this summer is to work Bard's Summerscape again (which I did last summer), which should be fun, but my last "real" vacation will be going to Brazil with Julia. I've never been, and furthermore I haven't left this continent in quite some time now (last two out-of-US trips were to Canada and Mexico, and even Canada was over a year ago). I do not speak more than a word or two of Portuguese, but I went down to the City and got my visa last week, so it's happening! Additionally, I like that I'm able to pay my own way for something extravagant; it feels "adult" in a way, and I feel like I've earned it. That aside, it's going to be awesome hitting the beach in January. Julia and I have talked about moving south after college, but she still has a year after I'm done, so any escape from the northeastern winter in the meantime is welcome! Anyway, wow, I should probably stop and put my presentation together.

I really will end with this: Razor's 1990 album Shotgun Justice is hands-down the most contrasting display of cover art and music ever. Look at this beast:

Have you ever seen a worse album cover, like, ever? It in no way prepared me from probably the best pure thrash album I've ever heard. (It's better than Kill 'Em All, and Ride the Lightning and later are something else.) This is my favorite album of 1990, I've decided, a year which included Judas Priest's Painkiller, Megadeth's Rust in Peace, and the Black Album, which I strangely have a soft spot for. I've also recently been turned on to the Devil's Blood, an "occult hard rock" band from Eindhoven, Netherlands. They have an album coming out in November that I am looking forward to immensely after hearing their debut, 2009's The Time of No Time Evermore. Parts of it remind me of Thin Lizzy, but other parts remind me of Rumours-era Fleetwood Mac, which is a really interesting combination. I showed them to Daniel and he loved the instrumentals but hated the female vocals; weirdly, I think that makes this band stand out from a lot of other stuff, which is also sort of the reason I like Fleetwood so much. Anyway, this was fun; hope to do it again soon!