1 week till my birthday... i'm saving a good bottle of shiraz for the occasion. my brother is coming to town so we'll celebrate together, his birthday is close to mine.

last night i played supermarket with courtney... she and i are becoming quite the couple when our men are out of town on world tours. ;) doing the gig made me realize how much i'm missing touring again... mike helped me carry my gear out to the car and it was reminiscent of the chapters tour last year... we both were feeling nostalgic. time to get this record done, and get back playing shows!!!

speaking of which, vocals are going really well... at the moment i've taken a break from the actual recording to do some editing of the stuff i've got down, basically to make sure i'm on the right track... this is because i'm producing myself and it's the only way i can sort of act as a second set of ears, without doing it while i'm actually performing. in doing so, i've actually re-record some of the stuff on the fly, because i was hearing new things i was missing... and i'm pretty happy with the first few tunes now. it's time consuming work but it's the only way to produce myself... i'm my only set of ears. many more to go though... i'm trying to power through as much as i can this week while i've got the apartment to myself.

thanks for the emails, pm's on the messageboard and phone calls from people who are making sure i'm not completely isolated (in regards to my recent post here)... it's great to know this journal is being read and gives me added energy in my day!! :)

till next time,
k

vocals are going well. feeling kinda disconnected and unplugged but it's a good thing right now. i meant so many things though... through the making of this record. i meant to be doing video journals... i meant to be taking more photos... i meant to be doing more memory saving... instead i'm finding i don't have the time or the energy right now... it's all going into the music. i guess it will have to wait until the touring starts up again...

what are you all up to?

k

today was vocal mic testing day.... numerous test with various mics, and many "science experiments" with the lovely 6176 preamp/compressor... i admit it... i'm a gearhead and it's such a sexy piece of gear that i just want to lick it. my ears are starting to lie to me now so i've called it a day, but tomorrow i will come back and listen to what transpired in these tests and it will hopefully help me come to some decisions about gear for the vocal session this week.

in other news... i've officially been turned down for all funding, so as it stands this record is a completely independent effort once again... kind of disappointing, as it would have been nice to be doing vocals and other overdubs in a nice studio... but this also means i can do it however i want and if there are changes in plan as we go, there's no obligation to run it by a committee. therefore, i'm holed up here in the home studio once again.... living in your studio has it's ups and downs; while it's great for any-time-of-the-day inspiration, it also can burn you out, as you can end up working longer than you should and you also have no "sanctuary" to get away from work... so to try and make matters better, we took a day last week and rearranged the entire apartment... it's much better for both working and actually relaxing now, as there's actually a living room with a new couch for breaktime... a miracle of modern furniture...

more later...

k