Change is good

I haven't played hardly a note on any guitar lately except yesterday at Brueggers... so I have nothing to report on the whole acoustic-girl-plugs-in front... except damn, that Telecaster sure is shiny and blue.

CD is out and ready on CDBaby

Here's the link: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/GaylaDrakePaul - it's called Eating From the Tree.

Already sold one, so that's an auspicious start!

Spent some time with the Telecaster today, and I'm really starting to get the hang of this. I can make it sound like car horns honking, which may seem like the opposite of an accomplishment - in fact, the opposite of desirable at all... but I WANT it to sound like that for one song, and I sorted out how to get that, so I'm excited.

The thing about distortion is, you have to be in charge to make it work. I never knew I had the option to be in charge... but that's the key. You don't let it run loose like a poorly trained dog, you keep it on a leash. The volume control on the guitar is an amazing device... I must sound like a total innocent! But I am like a child discovering a whole new world.

Tele good

Telecasters really are the king of electric guitars. I went from spanky, snarky blues to angry growling rock to smooth and jazzy with the flip of a switch...

Ricky Skaggs said that tone is in the hands - he's totally right. I'm going to sound like ME no matter what, acoustic or electric. My hands are not like anybody elses...

Shiny and Blue

After a long conversation with the inimitable Dean Farley, I started trying out Telecasters. And who knew? (Well, Dean knew...) I'm bonding. So I bought a very nice shiny blue Mexi Standard Tele to play with so I can see whether this is gonna take. So far I've got 2 new songs in the hopper, but that doesn't mean anything. Trust me.

I played until my hands hurt. It needs a set up - it's not bad, but I put .010s on it instead of .009s and the neck came up a little bit. I'll take it to Dr. Tom Monday and let him work his magic.

Thanks, Dean...

Done deal... mostly

So yeah, we recorded and it went okay, and I have only listened to hear mistakes and problems and not to see whether I LIKE it... stay tuned... or not...

More interesting to me at the moment is that I have decided to learn to play electric guitar, really play it, not just play AT it. If I would have started playing electric when I was 10 I'd probably be having a pretty good time with it by now. But starting to seriously learn it at 44... well, that's different. But I'm determined to get there, because I've had a hankering to for years.

Most guitary stuff comes pretty naturally to me, so having to struggle with something is very new. So I'm bringing books and DVDs home that I can work with - got a new one from Hal Leonard, At A Glance Blues Guitar with DVD, which seems like a good thing to start with. I know scales and stuff, but I don't practice that way. I think this fall and winter I will do some serious woodshedding.

For any fellow guitar nerds reading this - I borrowed a Taylor Solid Body Classic, which is a really nice guitar, with 2 mini-humbuckers and a 5-pos switch, one volume, one tone, and I'm playing through a Peavey Bandit 112. So far I'm keeping it clean, because I just don't know how to do dirty... being an acoustic guitarist, I tend to want to hear THE GUITAR and not so much the amp - the less I notice the amp, the happier I get. But electrics, wow, you gotta play the amp as much as you play the guitar, and that's the thing I'm really struggling with.

Is there anybody who can actually articulate an explanation/answer for what I'm not getting? More than, "Well, you just... do it, it's a feel thing. You'll know it when you feel it." Well, no shit, Sherlock, that's real helpful. Roadmap, anyone?

Well, whaddayaknow?

I recorded yesterday... didn't mean to, nor did I really want to, but the man talked me into it. Cajoled and manipulated is more like. And the tracks turned out really well. I played as well as I ever do, and everything seems real solid. We recorded guitar and vocals separately for the first time in my entire recording history, and much as I hate to admit it, it really worked. Shock and surprise. Now there are some other technical difficulties plaguing the project, and if I have to record it all again I will hurt somebody.

Long quiet

It may seem as though I have been quiet a long time, and while I have not blogged for months, I have been anything BUT quiet. It's perhaps too long a tale to tell.

The CD I was so dedicated to recording is still in limbo. Many reasons. But I have decided that I need to get it done by the end of the summer, so... by September 21. No later. That's it. I am playing better than I have in a very long time, and will continue to keep playing and working on my chops several times a week, so when I am finally ready - really ready - it will be much easier.

I hope.

Recording is not relaxing or pleasant for me. Always too stressful. But it's gotta be done.