someday we're all getting paid

Felt sluggish today due to the indolence of the holiday hoo-hah. Went to the folks, opened presents, ate, watched movies (Gunfight at the OK Corral and the end of the Malkovich/Sinise remake of Of Mice and Men), ate some more, and felt so fat and lazy that I forced myself to brave the cold and rock out at the Box.

Nothing was happening. Hell, I kept yawning. I couldn't sing worth a damn. My ideas were bunk from the get-go. I picked up the acoustic, strum and sang very Neil Youngish stuff, which is really where my head is at right now. Doleful and soulful. Not necessarily sad, just deep.

I've tuned my telecaster thus: B-A-D-D-A-E. Lots of drones, unisons and weird groupings. The tuning deliberately limits you to very simple stuff. No room for real solos (though they do sound cool when they're on the unison strings of D and D) or complexity, which is ideal. I have a habit on electrics that are tuned to standard to wank out; on open tunings, I tend to spend time diddling with hammerons and fake celtic melodies.

I was tired and didn't get anything done. I then went to Edison's, hung out with a few friends (and a pair of Fosters), and suddenly feel recharged. Funny how an animated conversation will just get me absolutely wound the fuck up.

Things will come together. I know this.

Mm, Christmas. I'm not much of a holiday person--I think it's the mandatory march of holiday tunes on the radio and the ulcers that are apparently required of everyone due to rushing and spending and wrapping and giving--but I gotta admit, it's a nice excuse for folks to feel cheery and for friends, old and new, to make merry. From my window I can see that it's postcard-perfect, and from my brief jaunt tonight to grab cigs and a Free Times, it really isn't that cold. I had plans tonight, but if that falls through, I might take me a little stroll through the 'hood.

For lack of anything better to do--and to scratch and itch that's been bothering me for some weeks now--I donned my epiphone tele copy, ran it through a compressor pedal I have, and into my beat-ass, ratty-sounding Ross practice amp. I've actually liked the way that compressors can affect guitar signals; as you may or may not know, they take quiet signals and give them a boost. I remember doing that with rhythm guitar strumming and coming up with crisp-sounding stuff, a la Fugazi or Joe Strummer, et al. Obviously you've just got to able to play percussively, too. Compression takes the 'chk-chk' of whatever you're doing and enhances it.

This little blue box is a compressor/sustainer. Basically not only does this thing give the quieter spectrum of the signal a boost, but also causes signals to be sustained much longer than they normally would be. Run with just the slightest bit of distortion, I got a pretty cool sound. Pretty gnarly as on the first QOTSA record but with a lot of snap and click. For no reason at all, I then started de-and re-tuning the guitar by ear. The six string went very, very low, and I think I may have even tuned two strings to the same pitch. I strummed a bit and felt like I was in Dead Meadow. And then I pulled out my hard rock licks (generic classic rock stuff in a silly exhibitionistic way). And then I ran out of ideas, as usual.

I can't sing at night. I can't sing at night because I don't want to wake up my very kind neighbors. I'm also at home, which often has a creativity-neutralizing effect. I'm too relaxed here; I need to go to a proverbial workshop. Who knows--I may have to load up my car with the usual musical crap and hit the practice space ('the box') for a while. I'm looking forward to playing guitar for a while. To be honest, being in three bands on bass has stunted the creative part of my musical brain that writes songs. On the other hand, I haven't really had any serious and thoroughgoing urge to start writing tunelets of my own.

Speaking of bass, I had a pretty chatty e-mail exchange with the aforementioned Wasco regarding bass guitars and their playing. I believe it was brought on by all my ebay.com prowling, looking for that one truly econo bass with a distinctive sound for my arsenal of toys. The 'big bass'--the fender jazz--is probably the most versatile, though with the roundwounds and its general fat tone it isn't good for anything truly noisy, percussive, or jarring. Plus there's the fact that my hands aren't that big, and moving around on that thing with any sort of speed is damn near impossible. I used the 'little bass'--a fernandes copy, I believe, of a jazz bass--for the Bad Brains stuff and the occasional Prole gig. I dunno. I found that with a pick, the EMGs and the bass's lightweight body give off a bit of Jesus Lizard/standard-issue punk rock vibe, yet still with a pretty hefty bottom. I simply don't find it that great for R&B or anything that's related to soul music. The epiphone hollowbody I bought from Doug Niemczura is so damn 60s-sounding. But it's very small and feels frail and is riddled with problems: the pickups are noisy, screws are coming loose here and there, and because of the peculiar bridge (it isn't glued or screwed in), notes become sharper higher up on the neck. I have been using it with the new lou reeds somewhat. I just think I need to rethink how I play and learn tricks that are appropriate to that instrument (for instance, I've been able to get feedback swells live) On ebay I've been eyeing what the seller calls a 'vintage epiphone bass', which resembles a mosrite, weird body shape, crooked pickups and all. Those babies look like humbuckers, which offer a sound I'd like to explore more (I always think of the bass sound on those Allman Brothers records is from a humbucker set up. I could be wrong). Should I purchase that bass, I do believe my search will be over for a couple of years. In a live setting, not too many people notice exactly what the damn thing sounds like, and to this point in all of my recording with various bands, no one has been able to make the bass sound distinctive. The bass on those records is more of an 'implied' notion. Could be because I'm too goddamn sloppy!