Therapy for Promised Calm is a strange affair. Like Oswald Copperplate writes above. Sometimes it’s here…..sometimes it’s there. When both ‘here’ (daytime) or ‘there’ (nighttime) is found and started? Yes…..consistency whatever time of day or night can definitely exist.

Daytime is always King with recording. It feels good to raise your head from the writing desk, or swivel the stool you sit on when recording the songs onto the home studio recording system, and just simply look out the window to the hillsides and woodland out back and side of house for a short while.

Nighttime has to be quiet. No sound proofing. So a gentle vibe exists by playing on an electric guitar ‘off amplifier’.

Music recording is holistic. Ambience, Day or Night, is constant in The Den. Familiarity is cool.

‘Here’ above…..is writing doodle words for therapy and gazing at the countryside for peace and joy. ‘There’ below…..music.

I now have the Hohner Les Paul electric guitar back after it has even ‘set up’. This involved a professional guy who gets the whole playing status improved. This involves adjusting the guitar’s mechanical set up with focus on five basic steps/elements: new strings, adjusting neck relief (allows strings to ring without buzzing), setting the action (the distance between strings and fretboard in order to make playing easier), calibrating intonation (staying in tune the higher up the fretboard you play) and adjusting the pick up height (changes the overall output and tone of the sound produced). There is more to consider if other adjustments or change of various parts is needed. But the initial five steps are the basics.

I played and experimentally recorded a sound for a song vibe today. It will be called ‘Stars above the Dunes’. The intention was to record the main chords and then overlay two guitar mess arounds on top of the main chords. I am no six string guitar player! I am a bass guitar player who loves to write songs. So it is always a bit naive when I play. But playing like this brings about little melodies that can be mulled over and added as the song progresses. My guitar playing is so erratic it can bring about groans….or little ‘Ooh. That could work’ scenarios. What happens is that I can hear little ‘riffs’ or simple melody off shoots that can be isolated, practiced to get them cleaner and in tune and finally played properly as the song progresses.

HEADPHONES 🎧 FOR LISTENING ARE KING!

As always, the intention here on each audio bar is to present the Warts and All of three little experimental recordings of this ‘Stars Above the Dunes’ idea. The swirly echo version awaiting rework/polish it up properly status. The acoustic version of trying out the vocal tune. And finally, the beefier version.

The softer electric guitar version above was a quick half hour of recording three guitar bits and bobs over a quickly chosen rhythmic percussive beat from the GarageBand drum library. I slowed the drum tempo down, but just ignored trying to get a perfect rhythm and various percussive instrument choices in order to play along to. Just went with the basic offering and grooved happily to the flow. Yes. It was Fun really. Therapeutic Promise for Calm.

Calm? Everyday recently, and without fail , a guitar is always picked up and strummed. A few melodies in the mind often surface to say ‘Hi’. Some are absolutely awful. Some are surprisingly okay and bring me a vibe that produces a smile. I could use my past nursing brain knowledge and think ‘Hey Man! Your multiple synaptic network of connections for firing up the neurological process in order to find a much needed musical and emotional rehabilitation are a-tingling along nicely Mr. Summers. Cool’. In reality and in a now retired nutshell mind I actually translate that to ‘Oooh! That’s nice. Cool’. Acoustic guitar is fairly loud. A luxury for daytime. Nighttime it would wake up my wife. That’s not good with her early morning start for the busy day she invariably has ahead.

So this acoustic try out below is the vocal tune and lyrics that will be polished up and tried over the above audio bar Soft Dune version. Well….when it is eventually recorded again and played properly.

A little thought on songwriting.

Daytime acoustic is replaced by Middle of Nighttime electric guitar. If nighttime electric is used….it gets ‘scratchy’. Is it easy to not be bothered using no amplifier with electric guitar at times? Yes….very easy. You tolerate the lack of resonant sound. At 03.00 to 05.18 in the early hours, when you’ve woken up and a melody is saying ‘Hi’ in your head you would play on a plastic toy guitar if needed. Electric guitars are softer than acoustics when played quietly. But scratch sound has to be tolerated. But….you instinctively know you have to catch ‘that thar’ song. A song written in dreamland is ethereal. Much better dream imagined than it actually sounds in reality. However past memories of failures surface. Dream songs can sound terrible when sung or played on wakening. And…you still have hope that on suddenly awakening that you can be successful in the ‘catch me if you can’ scenario. It never fails to get you panicking. A get it quickly before it goes off on holiday, never to be seen again experience. But! As said above. The hush shush of 05.18 quiet is required when your wife is sleeping and she has a full day ahead.

Here below is a song currently being worked on. ‘Where in the World’. Having the idea early in middle-ish of nighttime the electric guitar is strummed oh so quietly. Then I can go into the ‘scissor’ alter option in the SHURE MOTIV App it was recorded on and shift the sound to medium or loud if I have strummed too softly and can’t pick up certain notes, etc. I tend to hum sometimes too. If I save the medium/loud choice, it can be a new file catch. In other words there can be two or three different volume levels for safe keeping. Ideas are naive and rough. But priceless to have as the original reference to go to.

Then when I have time I record it on the Mac M2 to see if it was worth capturing.

Here below is the full on sound of the song Stars Above the Dunes that I played last year.