:: anne in the attic ::

Create Your Own Countdown

:: Sunday, October 29, 2006 ::

Something went awry with the server that had my MySpace background image, so in the interest of brevity, I'm simply posting it here so I can link to it and be done with it. For those who care, it's a close-up of the sound hole of my Gibson J-45, shaded to sepia and with the contrast and color balance settings tweaked.

:: Anne 5:21 PM [smartass remarks] ::
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Strange how it happens and I don't always get the link between cause and effect, but sometimes the things people do and say make me feel insignificant, like I have no business making music or trying to make a film because everybody else is better than I am... at everything.

I can only try. And damn it, it never fails-- just when I'm starting to feel like I might be doing something worth keeping, something that other people might actually want to hear or see, something or someone always creeps in to show me that nobody really gives a shit about me or what I'm doing, that I'm just wasting my time and theirs. It's not that nobody is supportive-- there are people who are, and it's appreciated, but it seems they're the minority. What I most often see instead is a competitiveness that makes people want to put me down or supercede me somehow. Minimize my work, or ignore it completely, like I just don't exist. Is that what artists do to each other?

So that brings the query to mind: maybe I am hanging out with the wrong people? I crave the company of people who do what I do (it seems they're few and far between in my life right now), and so am willing to endure a lot for the repoire of someone who is able to "go there" with me, so to speak. But maybe the people I see as the most talented are not the best people for my psyche. We should be good for each other, and good TO each other. And there are quite a few folks/friends(?) whom I admire a lot for their abilities and their accomplishments. But maybe these particular people, accomplished though they may be, aren't particularly supportive of others or perhaps they're a bit Narcissistic in their focus. I know this isn't a nice thing to write, and I'm not pointing fingers, but it has been on my mind lately. There are people in my life who, when I was focussing on them and helping them, they were cool with me, and would accept all praise and acknowledgement I would offer them. But turn the tables and, well, it just doesn't happen-- they don't help me with my projects; nor do they acknowledge my efforts-- in fact, some of them have even publicly insulted my work (is it that bad, really?) and tried to sabotage projects. Why is that? I might expect that in the corporate world, but not from people who call themselves my friends and have had my support in their lives.

I guess ego and competitiveness are nasty things in friendship, and I'm sure have destroyed many. So that's one option: ego and competitiveness. The other is that really my work is shit and I have no business trying to create anything musically or otherwise and most people just put up with my Philistine efforts... barely. Either way, it makes me not want to share my work with a great many people.

:: Anne 11:37 PM [smartass remarks] ::
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Where Sam likes to sit when I'm recording...

So, I finally set up to record in the living room again. Last Saturday night I meant to begin work on a song I've been wanting to record for a few months now, but lo and behold! Once I set up and began the sound check, I kinda sorta wrote a DIFFERENT song and recorded THAT instead. Well, that's how it happens, I guess. (The song I did then is called "Underneath" and is posted as "Underneath My Breath" on the MySpace music page. It's a reprise in a different form with different lyrics and a slightly different structure.)

Today I had an unexpected day off, so I began working on the one I've been wanting to record, called "Lighter Than Air." And it's a pain in the ass. There are things I want to do that I don't know how to do, and I know what I want to hear, but don't quite know the path from A to B yet, so it's trial-by-fire. As always, I guess. But I know how to get good acoustic sound. I've worked that out. I can whip out a decent acoustic mix all right. But add that midi piano and I can dump it into an audio track and tweak 'til I'm blue, but I just can't seem to get that genuine-piano-in-the-room sound. I guess that's 'cause I really just need a genuine piano in the room. Midi piano, as perfect as it is, sounds so canned sometimes. Mine is a Yamaha DJ mixing keyboard, and it's great, but I think I need to do the Korg thing.

This EP is going to take a lot of reworking if I don't want it to sound like I just threw together some shitty demos. I do, actually, have a theme and a structure, and have even designed the jewel case covers. Haven't decided about liner notes yet-- on an EP? Hm. But anyway, I have these goals, paralleling other goals in my life, and well, we'll just see, won't we?

:: Anne 10:57 PM [smartass remarks] ::
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