Rumors Jam 6/4/17-No Expectations No Disappointments

Recording Session 8-Hoarder House Of Hits-Anamosa IA

Production: Rodney Smith/Terry Bainbridge
Recording: Martin Daniels

With: Geoff Redding, Mel Strobie

Songs:

Love's Guessing Game (Smith/Redding)
Solid Rock (M. Knopfler)

(L-R: Bart Carfizzi, James Gritman, R.Smith, Russ the Bartender, Kevin Simnacher who also took all these fine pictures you see here)

Rumors Jam On A Sunday Afternoon:  Terry McDowell: Host

With:

Kevin Simnacher-Guitar
Tim Wiley-Guitar
Bart Carfizzi-Keyboards
James Gritman-Bass
Russ The Bartender-Vocals
Rob Wallace-Vocal on Too Much Time On My Hands


Songs:

Can't Get Enough
Feel Like Making Love
Brown Eyed Girl
Too Much Time On My Hands

Given the circumstances the jam went better than expected.  Dewayne Schminkey talked about showing up and never did and Julie had to take care of other things and couldn't make it, so basically it turned out to be a reunion of me and Tim Wiley, helping out Russ sing his usual Bad Company numbers.  Ron LeFleur and Dakota McWhorter was in attendance and it was a Saloonatics gathering too. I wanted to jam with Kenny Webb, but James Gritman does a good job on bass. Very workmanlike although he was giving me a much needed laugh while he was mugging with Bart on Feel Like Making Love. Tami Soukup takes a picture of that.

Summer is finally here so the air conditioning was on full blast, which turned out to be a relief. Later, Russ brought some chicken strips over and I had a couple and Terry took one.  Turns out we were both eating the chicken strips that Ron ordered, so I gave them a few dollars and told them dinner at McDonalds was on me.  Later on, I directed Trevor Worcil on how to play Ain't No Sunshine from the crowd as he seemed a bit lost on the breaks, they threw a lot of curves at him but the kid still did a nice job.

(Photo: Frank Smith from last week's jam)

Earlier in the afternoon, I worked on a couple songs for the new album.  Love's Guessing Game just happened on the spot and I wrote the whole thing out in a two hour session.   The new album is becoming an emotional sort of record.  But I keep pushing on with new songs and hope to have some sort of happy to combat the usual dark and despair numbers that keep cropping up.  The recording room was getting to be like a sauna so I turned the ceiling fan on and it can be heard on the recording. I think it gives a bit of ambiance to the song.   Next up, was a run through of Solid Rock but it's very problematic, so let's call it a rehearsal number.  I think we'll try for a better take next time we attempt to do it.

Tim Wiley was the special guest star of the jam.   The way it goes.

Recording Session 9-Hoarder House Of Hits-Anamosa IA 6/5/17

Producer: Rodney Smith/Terry Bainbridge
Recording: Terry Bainbridge
With: Geoff Redding

It's Just A Notion (Smith/Redding)

Recording Session 10-Hoarder House Of Hits-Anamosa IA 6/6/17

All We Are (Smith/Redding/Daniels)
For What It's Worth (S.Stills)


Producer: Rodney Smith/Terry Bainbridge
Recording: Martin Daniels/R.Smith

With: Geoff Redding, Martin Daniels

It's funny how jamming with the same three chords will yield into a new song and All We Are was yet another out of the blue song using a repetitive G and D chord, done in a power pop arrangement. Terry Bainbridge did remark how much we have improved since the last proper album he helped produced thirty years ago, Tales Of The Red Caboose   It used to be that we go into a song on a dry run and hoped that things fall into place.  Had we had a decent recorded back then, that album would be a much better sounding album rather than recording it Low Fi on a Metal cassette tape, which didn't work very well.  Nowadays, I will do a song a couple times before pushing the record button, which means most songs get done in one or two takes.  And the less work on a song the better it holds up.   It was a good thing that these songs get recorded, I basically have forgotten had they went now.

The second song, it was decided to cover For What Its Worth on tape since chances are it will be put out under this album or a covers album.  And we may have to use another tape to get more songs into the can for that to happen.  I've done this song many times to the point I can sing them without cheat sheets, although we had a false start since I forgot the first line of the song (there's something happening here).  Plus on the final line which goes into your life it will creep, however I ended up singing heart in stead of life,  I don't see a need to retake the song but next acoustic jam I will remember the actual word.    I hope to cover a couple more before it all ends for this album, most notably Gold Dust Woman and see if I can do justice to this song, from a male point of view.   In reality, Julie Gordon owns this song.  If I fail to keep the spirit of this song alive, Julie will once again be called upon to sing it.   I may have to enlist either Rod Albaugh or Brook Hoover to record it instead of me.