Author: Dave

A few stylized yellow emoji faces, showing a range of emotions.

This one is about emotional issues we might pass to our children.

I used the Hohner mini guitar, recorded with the Zoom recorder (as were the vocals, via an SM-58). Bass and electric guitars via the BOSS interface.

Lyrics

Didn’t mean to make you blow up
Didn’t mean to make you mad
Didn’t mean to make you have the worst day
You’ve felt you ever had
So what do we do now?
How can I make this right?
‘Cuz I want you to feel happy again
And avoid your birthright

I’m sorry you have bad feelings
I know ‘cause I have them too
And if I could, you know I would
Feel those feelings instead of you
I’m sorry you have bad feelings
I’ll try to help you grow
Please be strong, ‘cause it might take long
And progress could be slow
Sorry you have bad feelings

Let’s work through this together
And see what we might learn
If we ignore the feelings now then the
Hotter they will burn
And do I blame my genes
I know it’s not your mom
Who gave you the fuel and lit up the match
Made you a volatile time bomb

A stylized image of a man and a woman, fairly glamorous looking.

This song is pretty straightforward. It’s about how we see a manufactured image from the rich and famous, carefully controlled to make them appear to lead flawless lives. We then turn around and do the same thing on a smaller scale on social media. The end result is a certain selection bias that makes it seem that everyone around us is living glamorous, fun, meaningful, brag-worthy lives. Which is not true — a lot of the time we’re hating our jobs or struggling to help our kids or pooping. But you wouldn’t know any of that mundane stuff by looking at the average person’s social media feed.

This was recorded with all electric instruments (except the drums, arranged as always) via the BOSS amp simulator. The vocals were a simple SM-57 through the Zoom recorder.

Continue reading “Jamuary 2023 Day 19: “Unbroken Humans”” →

A highly stylized profile of two people, the one on the left holding something elongated like a cane or a comically large cigar, the one on the right holding something abstract and standing in front of what appears to be water.

I think a lot of the stuff that’s written about generational cohorts is just bunk. With a large subset of the population, not even very broad generalizations are applicable. That being said, I do think that we have problems in this world that have not been addressed by those wielding power, and this leads to a certain irony. The future has been set up by those who will not experience it, and many pressing issues are not addressed, or dealt with only halfheartedly.

This one was recorded with the Zoom recorder for the acoustic guitar and uke, plus DI guitar and bass via the BOSS interface. Vocals were done with an SM-58 going into the Zoom Recorder. The drums are the default kit in Superior Drummer, quickly arranged by me.

Continue reading “Jamuary 2023 Day 17: “Millenium”” →

This song image has a highly stylized bald-headed person with what looks like a chainsaw coming out of their mouth.

This song is about the weird sort of depression I experienced at the height of the pandemic (say, mid-to-late 2020). Since I wasn’t going anywhere every day, I reduced showers, clothes changes, started slipping on dental hygiene, etc. One crucial fact I learned is that my right armpit starts to stink a whole lot more (and reaches a higher level of stank altogether) than my left pit.

The only things that are recorded here are the acoustic guitar part and the vocal lines, both of which I captured via the Zoom recorder, with DI on the guitar (plus the Zoom XY pair) and an SM-58 for the vocals. The rest of the instruments are various synths and virtual instruments.

Continue reading “Jamuary 2023 Day 16: “Habits”” →