Thoughts of the Townedger-April

April showers brings may flowers and too much fucking rain.  Once again like last year I had to put a hold on the new album by dealing with another flood in the basement and hoping that we can get the GD motherfucker dried one time before I'm dead and gone.  Getting too old to keep doing this shit year in and year out.  Time to fix the cracks in this leaky assed basement.

A tip of the cap to Diggy Kat for his help on the Soundcloud site.  Of course only me and him have been the regular visitors

It didn't help that I was sick most of the month after my brother got the flu on his 50th birthday.  Think I had the fucking flu in some way all month and now am in the process of using vacation time since my sick time is used up. 

I think Alex at work is really jumping at the chance to get together and do some jamming. If he's real interested of starting a new band, I can probably grab Russ to do bass, provided if I get him off the golf course this summer.

I have been very selected in what I hear for new music.  The new Kaiser Chiefs album is not that great but I do like the new Black Lips, love the Strypes and Len Price 3 new efforts and admire the latest from Leon Russell. In comparing the new Beck Morning Phase to his Sea Change, I like his latest much more.  But then again I find Beck Hansen to be acquired taste at times although I have come to like Mellow Gold more now than 20 years ago.

In going to Davenport I was dismayed at the fact that the place I got my DW's from Griggs Music, didn't have any DW drum sets around.  I had aspirations to trade my set in for a new set but will have to wait.

With Forthcoming Trains, it was a trip to yesterday since I used the Pearl Snare for the first time since 1986 and it sounded excellent on some tracks.  Somehow on the recording the Zildjians used didn't stand out in front like the Paiste set did on 30 and Pawnshops For Olivia.  But I think on the next project the Z's will be the choice once again but on the next set, I'll dig out the ones that I used on The Road Less Traveled and 20. And go with a ride with a more definite ping than the old Sizzle Ride which didn't stand out very well for a ride after all.   Can't figure that one out.  I might unretire the Impulse Ride (used on all of the 90s albums up to Road Less Traveled).

April marked 20 years since I started up a relationship with Clarise (which ended in Valentine's Day 1998) April 12th it was when I ran into her at the old SkyWalk in down town Cedar Rapids.  I could remember that day, however I can't remember her birthday at all.  Her youngest turns 20 in May.  Haven't seen her since picking the car up, (three car payments late and one step ahead of the Repo Man and a bad credit rating) in 99 but I do wish her well.

Let's hope for dry weather.

The Townedgers Are Now On Sound Cloud

I have been very busy of late putting together the new album and after getting 7 and half inches of rain last weekend, had to deal with water in the basement issues once again so everything got put on hold.  But my good friend and big band supporter Diggy Kat finally got me to open up our very own Sound Cloud site of where you can hear some of our "hits".  For the most part, Diggy Kat has a his own show on Radio Buzz'd and Thursday Morning he paid tribute to The Townedgers by doing a full hour of our music!

I'm not worth a shit on MP3s but Diggy has a way to convert the music over to MP3 files.  This computer does WAV and the files are way too big for me to put songs on Sound Cloud but he can.  Anyway, this will be the site where we show off our wares and have new music as well as my favorites from the past on this site.

Check it out whenever you can!

https://soundcloud.com/thetownedgers

Home

A forthcoming train coming down the track
Moving due west and not looking back
As I sit back and watched the sights
A passenger, dreaming away far from home

In my youth I went out for baseball
Had ambitions to make it to the hall
But in the end I couldn't hit the ball
Bases loaded, swinging away, struck out at home

Playing guitar in a empty bar
Realizing that I didn't get too far
But in my mind I am a star
Singing songs that nobody knows, thinking of home

Yes I know I got no expectations
I'm dealing with life's frustrations
The more I try, the more I fail
It's getting old
Leave me alone
Take me home


I'm getting old
Leave me alone
I'm going home

(C) 2014 Townedger Music Emporium

End Of The Month Thoughts From The Townedgers

Finishing up the loose ends on the Forthcoming Trains and amazingly the drum tracks were all done over the weekend.  But I did add some more supportive vocals on three songs in the late hour and didn't wake my brother up. Score!

When working with Hugh McConnell, we have a time limit to get things done and this album is no exception.  I recall when we did 30  it was done in three weeks as well, and Weather On The Nines, the 1994 album with him was done in 4 weeks.  Pawnshops and 30 both took about three months to complete.  Kind of sense of urgency to get this one done it seems but everything came together quite quickly.  Also helps to have a back catalog of lyrics and songs to have as well.

Forthcoming Trains does have a direct link with the Paraphernalia since I used the Pearl Snare from that time on this recording.  It sat gathering dust in the basement and after the Tyrus Reunion on Facebook, I managed to revive it to use on the new album.  For the cymbals used, the old 12 inch K Splash returns from the dead as well as the other survivor of the bar band years the 16 inch Zildjian Rock Crash. the old Medium Thin Crash was sold off years ago and I found a replacement that I really didn't use much when I first got it.  I believe that the 18 inch K Session Crash sounded more like the old Medium Thin than the latest Medium Thin Crash   The old A Swish Ride (including rivets) was the main ride, I probably would have been better off with the Armand Ride, but on the recording I didn't substitute any other cymbals this time out, unlike changing over to RUDEs from the 2002 on 30.  With the nostalgia out of the way,  I'll end up using another cymbal lineup.  Not sure which ones.

Drinking Again was a one take number, which is why it ends abruptly, and Martin playing the bass tag line ending.  Light Years Away was about 20 to 25 although on the tape I made a smartassed comment about being the 40th take. The first version was a much faster version but doubt if we'll use that one.  The last couple albums we overloaded on cover versions, most which didn't make the final lineup, this time I covered our catalog instead.  It made better sense rediscovering and re-imagining the songs in a different arrangement.  Come to think of it, How Hard It Is was done in one take too.

2033 will be the 50th anniversary of Town's Edge Rock, but I'll doubt if I'll be alive to see that special occasion.  Why we keep bringing that record up?  Because it was the first actual proper album of actual songs, not that So Much For That wasn't that, I was still trying to get a feel of this new found freedom of writing my own stuff, rather than the one take throw them out in the open songs of Big Crash Collection.
The only things that will remain will be this blog and a handful of albums that did get out there in the free market that nobody knows about.  Or cares.

The story about Isabella losing her methadone in the pizza place on our last get together is a true story.  I remember it well since I wasn't feeling all that great and needed to head to the bathroom for about 10 minutes, then having her crawling back on hands and knees making a scene about misplacing her stash while everybody looked at her with disbelief.  Good to know she's still alive after all these years.

I'd love to return back to the great Northwest but I don't forsee that in the future.

I'm not buddy buddy with neither but I have great respect for Craig Erickson and Billy Lee Janey, the two best known musicians from Cedar Rapids.  I've seen Erickson in Half Priced Books from time to time, he's usually stocking up on blues CDs.  For up and coming folks Samantha Fish is the best blues guitar player I have seen and her stock keeps going up.

For myself, I'm not the wild Crash Meister as from the Paraphernalia days and even the first two decades of Route 66/Townedgers.  When you're playing along to the finished guitar tracks you have anticipate where you're going to do the drum rolls and cymbals accents at and if I go too wild, I'll miss coming on the right beat and being off a step.  When I do listen to the old bar band stuff I still wonder how the hell did I actually do those crazy rhythm drum roll and cymbal crashes.

Since January the Tyrus talk has died down.  I'm open to suggestions about if they want to get together to do something but since it's spring and the weather is getting better to hang outside more often, and golf season is here, Russ is focusing his energies on the back 9.  Mike is feeling better but we haven't done anything since 1992 and there's nothing on the horizon about getting back together again either.  Time and age are against us. So basically it's the Townedgers for me.

I think everybody has neighbors from Hell and we got one next door, he's always shooting dirty looks from the other side of the fence, mostly at my brother and his car collection outside.  Then again everybody hates the freak next door anyway.

My brother and me, we get along fine together and he's the biggest supporter of Townedgers Music by providing the room and tolerance for drum solos and oddball guitar work. He has become the ultimate Mountain Man, growing his hair out and regrowing his bushy beard.  I don't think he'll get to Dusty Hill ZZ Top propositions, it don't bother me as much it does for Mom.  Used to be she used to get on my case for long hair but since I'm becoming more bald anymore, I been more to Super Cuts than bro, simply of the fact that I look like Doc from Back To The Future if I do grow it out.   I can't be the hippie anymore.  But my brother can.  Ain't generics wonderful?  Wish I had his hair (although it's mostly gray which maybe I don't want it).

I am thinking of going to Arizona again this year and hanging at the usual haunts but I haven't even looked for plane fares this year, I'm thinking of St Louis if I don't want to fly this summer, I haven't been to The Chain Of Rocks bridge since 2009.  It's time to return there.

Heath permitting.

R.S.

Drum Tracking On The New Album

And so we begin the next step in finishing Forthcoming Trains; the drum tracks and I managed to get through 11 songs, but feel a need to re do Drinking Again.  Starting working around 1 and finished up before 6, not bad considering we're fighting the damn 4 track for a decent drum sound.  But I do think that the majority of the songs it did come away fairly good.

I'm surprised on how fast this album has taken shape over the three weeks in March. It came fairly quickly by revisiting the old lyrics that I have stored up and rearranged some of the other tracks from other albums into a whole new version of the song.   I didn't want to just do cover versions like we did on No Exit, with the exception of Knocking On Heaven's Door, I covered myself, even going back to 1979 on a drums only track and rearranged it with some new words and with the help of the capo that Diggy Kat got me a few years ago made it into something it wasn't back then.  With myself strumming a few chords the lines of Seems To Me You Have Changed came into my mind and I started singing the original song How Hard It Is (to find that you're finally gone).  The original version was done with some coffee cans and an cymbal that seen better days before I got a hold of it.  It's not a final go on the album but so far what I heard it sounds worthy enough.  Anyway I still have to deal with another 10 songs before we start chopping things down to a selection of 12 songs.

While Jack Orbit's name pops up on the original lyrics and credits of said song, Jack hasn't been in person in the makings of this album and Geoff Redding for the most part has played some electric guitar and some acoustic but it has been myself and Martin Daniels piecing things together.  However while on a conference call with Jack, he did give his blessings and hopes he can hear the finished product too. 

Some songs of that past I wanted badly to redo and Midnight Run was one of them.  In 1985 the original version was on the R.Smith/Route 66 album and it was a fucking bitch to do a straight ahead 1/2 beat, instead of the usual 4/4.  We tried to redo it for the 20 album but the guitars were too fast for the drums to catch up.  This version is more true to the 1985 arrangement.  

Another reworked version was Somewhere Between You And Me, which was the final song recorded and while the 1989 version had a straight reggae beat (or attempted to do that), this version is straight ahead acoustic rock and roll.  It's much easier in this day and age to do acoustic rather than electric songs, I follow better on the drums on the recording the tracks afterward.  Ever since A Long Time Forgotten, a lot of the Townedgers albums have gone more acoustic than electric, not by accident but rather by not having to deal with loud amps and trying to shout over the noise.  Last years album 30, had the fewest acoustic numbers but still I did enough of them to give a bit of variety to the flow of the album.  But even with the finished product I'm still tinkering with it to see if I can make it sound better.  Or get valued opinions from Martin or Geoff or the producer at hand, in this case Hugh McConnell who I have worked with for over 20 years off and on. 

There's variations in McConnell's production work then Richard Dennanbaugh or Brian Mullahan, but in Hugh's case when he works on a TE project he's cracking the whip to get it done, whereas Richard would be more of a laid back approach, or if I produce it, I tend to work until I either get bored and shelve it or in the case of Pawnshops For Olivia have a creative spark and finish the album in record time.  I had to, I had to keep my mind off the GD floods that was commonplace that year, just like last year.   But still if McConnell wasn't on my case getting it done, the other guys were.

Spring has arrived and I took time to go out to the Nature Center and count the trains that run through the area and seen 5 of them today, double than the last time I was out there.  I gave myself the window of a week to do drum tracks and they're half done after one day.  A good sign.  Which leaves the rest of the time to either add some more backing vocals to the completed tracks.  Once done, the next weekend will be mixing the songs for radio consumption and for my pleasure since the albums don't sell.  I suppose if I was more outgoing rather being the introvert that I am, that the music would speak for itself more often than not. 
But it takes forever to get the right take down pat, we rarely ever get a first take done although on the new album there are a couple songs that are first takes. If they're good enough they'll be on the album.

I'm also aware that being over 50 that my years of rock and roll are just about up.  It's hard to write new songs when you really don't have the hunger like you used to have and believed that we could make a difference with rock and roll, but it's a hobby nowadays and don't pay the bills like a real job does.  I don't forsee myself 10 years from now doing new songs, I don't think I'll have the capability to do that. What's a 63 year old dude going to write about that hasn't been written or played before.  You can't write about high school girls without sounding creepy, so can't do that.  But you can still write a song about love gone bad, or yet another train song or a song for the road or protest songs about Dick Cheney being a asshole that should drink his own fracked water.  It's sad seeing the world that I used to know being drowned in spilled oil in your river or lake, watching honey bees being eliminated due to Monsanto poisons and week killers. And seeing fewer and fewer music stores to hang out.

But I still play music because I still have fun with it, just like hearing the results of a finished album.  And so here we are again adding the drum tracks to the numbers and hoping that something will be played on the radio. If the stars align just right, the album will be out by the end of May maybe.

Recording Session Saturday

I just got done finishing up another session and two more songs to add to the album for consideration.  We have 19 songs to choose from but will get down to the necessary 12 for the album.  We're just about done.

The first song I did was Home.  It's basically a looking back at a life that hasn't been so fulfilling, noting of the time that I went out for baseball hoping to become a big star, but only end up striking out with the bases loaded.  And then moving to playing songs nobody knows about in a empty bar and the last verse a summary of the way things go.  I have too many demons in this life that rob the fun out of me and everything that goes wrong gets noted in some way.  It's getting old, leave me alone I'm going home.

The other song dates back to 1979 and was a smart ass drum only number called How Hard It Is, and back then I gave co writing credits to my best friends Russ and Steve, even though they didn't contribute.  This time out while Geoff was playing a guitar riff I started singing Seems to me you have changed and with a little revision and update from Martin we turned this into another sad song about begging a lover wronged to take another chance and of course the outcome would be that she moved on.  I think I prefer the 1979 smart ass version myself.

Took a break in the afternoon to go do errands, and to the recycling center to get rid of some things, getting rid of a old beer clock sign that didn't work anymore. It used to be a nice beer sign but the clock quit working years ago and it was taking up space.  To my amazement, I didn't run into many idiots going into Cedar Rapids.  For the first time I went out to the Nature Center to hear two honking Canadian Geese making a racket and flying overhead of myself and Martin.  In the chilly afternoon we sat and waited for trains that never came and while the sun was setting, the Geese that flew over our heads came back with about 10 more honking buddies, but fed up with lack of train watching, we took in a Mexican supper in Anamosa before coming back to the studio and listening to the playback and making notes here and there.  Working with Hugh McConnell once again and in true fashion has managed to make the album get done.  I recall we didn't take much time to do on 20, the last time he co produced.  After 2 weeks, we got the songs done and now the second step in putting drums on them will be coming up in the next week. And then mixing it down and finishing it up before the end of April.

But for a hobby of sorts, the music isn't selling, just like 30 didn't sell either.  It got airplay on Radio Buzz'd but the Radio Maierburg Records didn't get any sales, despite a meet and greet and and Q N A session on the After Dark special on Radio One.  It's like that for a lot of bands out there, there's so much music and so little time and you basically are competing with over 100 years of recorded music as well.  I haven't talked to Diggy about how  the Songs That Made An Impact 2014 is faring.  But I think he used the version of Cannery Row from the No Exit album rather than the better mixed version that appeared on 30.  I wasn't impressed with how the song sounded when it came on the Impact 2014 version.  I suppose if I lived out on the West Coast Diggy Kat would be setting fire to my butt to play some of the music showcases out there, here in Iowa, there's hardly any place to play.  But since I continue to fight myself in the studio, doing take after take of songs that I either fuck up by playing the wrong chord or singing the wrong words that I haven't made myself available to the public during jam sessions.  Plus having stage fright doesn't help either.

But I have good supporters in Geoff and Martin and Diggy Kat and they continue to help me through the crisis that is recording Forthcoming Trains.  30 plus years of doing this and it's still never easy to get through a song on the first take.  The more you work on something, the more you mess up and the song takes a different turn.  Knocking On Heaven's Door, there's such a resigned frustration that it does sound like I am knocking on heaven's door, even towards the end to which the ending gets fucked up and so we improvised and turn it into part of a song.  Even if we had pro tools, I still fear we would be fighting everything just to get a suitable take.

I donno if there's any other band or musicians out there that have to fight everything just to conceive and make a good album that I have to do. Why do I continue to do this?  Because I'm still a fan of this music and I still enjoy hearing the past efforts.  I still hold out some kind of hope to be discovered down the line by some out of country fans who make it a pilgrimage to seek out the artist.  After all that's the only thing left, I'm too old for the major labels and our music isn't for corporate radio.  It's for the fans out there, even though I could count on them with one hand.  I probably had a better chance playing in bar bands and playing Mustang Sally for the drunken crowd, even though I would have preferred our originals.   You make good money still in this day and age playing Talk Dirty To Me or Taking Care Of Business but to myself it would feel like a job rather than fun.

But in the meantime, I'll continue to shape Forthcoming Trains into a type of album that I'd play on a daily basis. It's the only thing that keeps me going.

 

Walk A Thin Line

Spare me a loan on your time
Take me where you go
Whip out your key of theory
Show me what's in store
Now spare me no memory
When you speak for yourself
Don't take all day to tell me
Cause the world runs on a tilt

Why don't you walk a thin line
You can do it if you wanna try
Why don't you walk a thin line

Hold out a little longer
One more minute will kill you
Bear out all the guilt
The results will thrill you
It's the way that you feel babe
Not what you say or do
For all the bottled up feelings
In the long run, you'll be a fool

Why don't you walk a thin line
You can do it if you wanna try
Why don't you walk a thin line

And when you're dead and gone (Walk A Thin Line)
You'll be on your own (Walk A Thin Line)
All alone, all alone (Walk A Thin Line)
drive on.

(c) 1987 Townedger Music Emporium