Studio Diary 9

Current mood: contemplative

It’s 2am, and I just got back from the studio. Got up @ 9:30 today and was working by 11am. Another very productive day. It’s crunch time. Finished bass, all the remaining guitar tracks, some gang vocals, hand claps, and more. I’m not out of the woods yet, though, I still have lead vocals to lay down for the last track, a bunch of backgrounds, and a few things here and there for sweetening. But most everything is recorded. I should be mixing at some point tomorrow. Things are really starting to sound sweet. Today I did my solo for “Dream Girl”, and initially i wanted to just shred it up, but then we realized that the solo section started to sound a lot like something off of a Lenny Kravitz record, and I wasn’t really into that. So, I started experimenting and Allen came up with a cool little motif for the solo section that really makes the solo section what it is. Then I had an idea for a second motif and to sing along with the main motif in almost an operatic, over the top way…to create this really, well beautifully haunting kind of effect. I don’t know how to explain it. I think it’s great. I’d say now it’s much less a “solo section” now as it is a nice interlude or transition in the song. It’s like the “dream” sequence of the song. Sorry, no shredding.. There were a bunch of other cool things we did today, including slide guitars for “Movin’ to the West Coast”, and surf-style tremelo guitar parts, but unfortunately, the banjo didn’t make the cut. haha. overall, things are turning out very cool. i’m stoked. in other news, (and this is completely un-studio related) the weirdest thing happened last night, or this morning, rather. Ok, first a recap: 3 nights ago, I had a dream about this girl that I’ve had a crush on, and it was one of those very vivid types of dreams where you can remember everything in detail and then you wake up and are somewhat disappointed because you realize that it was only a dream. Those types of dreams don’t happen very often, (at least not for me) so this dream was dramatic enough to have an impact on me after I woke up. Well, last night I had a similar dream, just as vivid and moving, only about another girl, one that i’ve had a crush on in the past. It’s just weird to have 2 very vivid dreams in 3 nights about crushes. As I stated in my previous post, “Studio Diary 7”, the lyrics for “Dream Girl” were written naturally, without really thinking much. The lyrics I ended up with were very spontaneous. I couldn’t make much meaning out of them after I wrote them, and i thought they were lame because i couldn’t pinpoint who or what they were about, but now I feel like I’m finding new meaning in the words. It’s kind of creepy, because this is after the fact, but at the same time I also feel some spiritual thing that I can’t explain. And I’m not formally religious at all. I don’t know. It’s like some psychic nonsense. Either way, whatever it is or was, it has affected me on some emotional level that I wasn’t aware existed, or didn’t necesarilly think was possible. Or maybe it’s all just coincidence. Anyway…i’m spent..time for bed. How weird would that be if I had another dream tonite? Tune in next time…haha..