Ah, the old days. Sun Studios, Motown, golden takes, session players, and all-night jams. Groupies, cocaine-fueled time signatures, breaking equipment, tantrums, tracking, and overdubs. The recording studio used to be a hallowed and magical place to me. The mysterious sonically separated rooms, the endless supply of instruments and gadgets where songs were hatched. I would read stories about how Keith Richards would spend days trying to get one little riff, or how much booze and coke Derek and the Dominoes went through while creating their masterpiece. If I dreamed of being a rockstar, the part where I got to swig whiskey and smoke various substances with a pair of headphones on while a guy in the booth told me we were rolling ... read more >
Velvet ropes, wrapping paper, 10-digit price tags, burglar alarms, media coverage, and flashing signs. Sometimes we have to be told that something is special. A child will stare blankly at the work of an impressionist and ask his mother why a painting that looks like something his pre-school buddies collaborated on during recess is special. The child's mother, also staring blankly at the masterpiece, might reply, 'Because it is.'
Sometimes the experience is very personal. Maybe you've just seen a movie that will forever change the way you think about life. You leave the theater and immediately find out that everyone else thought the movie sucked and they can't wait to get the taste out of their mouths. Your companions' ... read more >
Now put yourself in these shoes: You've just left Ted's studio. Despite only knowing how to play three chords on his vintage guitar and refusing to ever play in front of anyone, Ted has ProTools and a studio and plenty of instruments. And while he dreams of one day luring Blonde Redhead into his home studio so he can help make the greatest record of 2009, he is happy allowing his actual musician friends to use his stuff in the meantime. Which is exactly what you've been doing for the past week, and now you've got an album's worth of songs to do something with, including one track which Ted considers to be, "revolutionary- maybe the best song not by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah since 2005."
You are also a relatively obscure art... read more >
Put yourself in these shoes: You've just left Ted's house. Ted is not just any friend. Ted is the guy who has European EPs on vinyl of bands that only existed for 2 weeks, has tickets to the show that the venue doesn't even know about yet, and has a lifelong to subscription to Rolling Stone, yet he loathes it for never containing any information that he didn't already know. You wonder, if Ted loves music so fanatically, why hasn't he actually made any of his own? But that's Ted's inner struggle to deal with. You respect Ted's taste and you meet most of the bands you like through Ted. It's people like Ted that keep us from ever having to rely on the radio to hear "new" music, so you're okay with the fact that after playing you a... read more >
As your favorite chain music mega store goes out of business, or your local indie CD shop downsizes their selection to make way for a smoothie booth, an uplifting thing to remember is this: the music industry is not the same thing as the record industry. This is important because, while the record industry is being moved to a convalescent home to spend his final years playing bingo and not receiving visitors, the music industry is buying new clothes and thinking about taking an exciting job in a new city. Or maybe even going back to school for that master's degree.
How did this happen, you ask? Weren't record industry and music industry engaged at some point? Weren't they expecting kids? They certainly were not this grossly mi... read more >
