i'm leaving this page as an official part of my site though. even if it doesnt get updated for another 2 years, its here to remind me of a lifelong goal i have: to create my own album. over the past two years, my musical tastes have grown immensely. im a bigger fan of rane now more than ever, and i look at ryan bowman's guitar style as a major influence in the way i play. in the last two years, my skills on the guitar have grown and over time, they'll probably grow more. it brought me to the point where i bought a new electric guitar (epiphone les paul standard) that sounds better than the one used in the recording of the original canned introspection tracks. ive been listening to music that has shed me from the acoustic pop-rock that saved me from musical boredom in 8th grade. bands like radiohead, travis, coldplay, new deal, string cheese incident, st germain, creed, and various other artists from different styles of music from techno to rap to nu-rock to indie to jam have all changed my perceptions of music. and while my songs in grade 12 may have been good at the time, i was writing what came out and what i knew; what i wanted to say but not how i wanted to say it. im on the brink of a new phase in life where im starting to get a little more complex in the musical riffs i can play, and a little more abstract in the lyrics i write. the songs originally slated for the album were written at a different time in my life and i feel that im maturing past that point. and so, maybe one day, ill get into the studio and get another shot at the album, but in the meantime, ill keep working to make this opus. and one day, you never know...

5/10/00 (posted 5/11)-For the first time in almost 3 months, I made it back into the studio to work on more tracks. After my AP english exam, I went back to school and Julian and I worked on three tracks to the song, "Used To," which is an original of mine. First was the rhythm, which I had worked on earlier when I wrote the song. Then i worked on a simple riff for lead which was a little improvision on the chords. My lead guitar is a little better but I still don't know the fretboard and memorized the chord makeup well enough to play lead well (Not to mention I lack some sort of agility in my left hand). after doing that and also finding out that the ADAT kept messing up, creating a clicking sound on every track, we recorded lead vocals. As usual, I throw up a mess up in every song. It wouldn't be me if I didn't mess up once and if I can't edit it out, you'll know. Maybe I'll leave it in anyways and you see how i cover myself :) The problem with the ADAT we realized later, was that the sync cable had to be connected from the machine we were recording on into the computer. It wasn't. We were recording onto the ADATs throught the computer, which was why we were in the DES. But all three tracks came out rather well and right now, it's one of the best songs (of 3) on the album so far. I have the songs in raw, totally unmixed version on a cassette tape but I'm not really sure who gets to hear that yet. Depends on how things go. Release date on the album is way off, but hopefully I'll get back in the studio a few more times next week. Focusing on the album definitely allows me to get my mind off things. I don't plan on selling whatever comes out of this project. I suppose it's not just for the music, but for myself.

2/16/00 (posted 2/17)-Today was a pretty decent session in the booth. I'm putting my energy into Persistence of Memory now, with a lead vocal track and background tracks. That leaves me left with lead guitar, bass, and drums left to record. My background vocals are a little off because I have a hard time harmonizing with my bass voice in triads. But we got this program today for the DES that allows you auto-tune your pitch for solo tracks, so I can touch up the pitch in my voice where its off. :) Thank goodness for modern technology. So anywho. I'm not sure right now what's gonna happen. While the musical is on, I'm not sure that I can record. So that might be on hiatus. But for now, i have a little opportunity to knock off a few tracks. If there isn't enough time, I'll skip the other two covers and only concentrate on my own music. Because that's what it's about. Plus, if i want to sell it, I don't have to worry about the other legal stuff other than with rane. There's a lot I've been learning on the DES- how to burn cds, how to create stereo documents from multitracks, how to get it all together. It'll still be a lot of work when i'm doing the mixing, but I've already learned it, so it'll go a little faster when I get to it. We're on vacation now, so I'm not really sure that there will be any other news to report on the album til the 28th except maybe for some album or any other studio pictures or whatnot.

2/15/00-Well now that Valentine's day is over, we're back in the studio...Today was a longer period, so we had a little more time too record, but we spent a little more time on playback than we should have. We only laid down two new tracks- some background vocals on Niagara and the Rhythm guitar part for Persistence of Memory. Persistence of Memory is an original track with multiple meanings in my own life...It has to do with feelings i have on people, it has to do with the evolution of my friendships at this point in my life, it has to do with me growing up...So we got that done, hopefully we can cut a few more tracks tomorrow. Graner looked kinda sickly today, so I dunno if he'll even be there tomorrow. But that should go ok...as for recording info on Niagara, i just got an email from the band today saying that I can record it, but i gotta sign a contract so if I make money on it, they get royalties, but that shouldn't be a problem cause I'm really not sure that the album is gonna be sold. More for family and friends, but we'll see...I think i'm signing anyways. I got nothing to lose. I don't know what else is in store for tomorrow, but if there's studio news, it'll be posted here...

2/11/00- Today was a really interesting day in the studio. Got in and pulled out the tracks, i was planning on rerecording the lead vocals and also start the background vocals and record the instrumental rap onto the ADAT. But i started on the vocals and Andrew was like, "Why don't you try singing it an octave lower and see how it sounds?" So I did and it turns out, I'd been singing around a tenor all my life and i should really be singing a bass. So i redid the lead vocal track as a bass and I agree, it sounds so much better. But it feels so odd to sing that way. Like now that i heard the playback, i know that that's how I should be singing, the only thing is that it feels so different to sing, like the breathing and my chest and everything feels so weird. But it actually sounds like a real song. And the tune and whatnot stick. So i'm much happier since I know now how to sing :) We may use the previous tenor vocals as background vocals in different places, so all i have left on that song really, is the bass and drums. Now that I'm a good song into the project, I'm gonna have to start planning the rest of the CD packet and cover stuff...I have some pics I'm considering using, but I need to work on credits, other graphics, and whatnot. Anywho. Monday, I hope to record the rap music on ADAT, and maybe bring in my rhythm guitar to start laying down another track.

2/10/00-I added the lyrics to all the songs, minus our freestyle rap. If you scroll down to the tentative track listing and click on the song, you can see the lyrics that I have so far...

2/10/00-Let's see, there's not much we did today with the recording. I know it works though on the ADAT on the DES(digital Editing Station). But with the 4 tracks I currently have, I know that I have to up the pitch of the lead guitar track.It's a little flat. The lead vocals, i may/may not rerecord cause it sounds a little too close to the mic and a little out of range. But we weren't able to record today (even though I wanted to). Since I hadn't mentioned it before, I have an instrumental track for our rap. We got the single to Will Smith's Freakin' It and it has 2 instrumental tracks. The other studio news is that the label under which the album will be released is called Smalrus Sounds, Inc. Hopefully we'll lay down another 2 or 3 tracks during lockout tomorrow.

BTW-I never mentioned this before, but right now officiality with the rane cover is in consideration. Alan, the lead singer, said he'd talk it over with the guys and then let me know, but to hang on to the tapes and they're flattered. So i'm hoping it turns out okay. Especially since I've already recorded four tracks of it.

Here are some pictures from yesterday's session- Right click to save as normal size (Credit to Julian):

2/9/00-we got back to school and got the keys and everything from graner. they were doing spectrum rehearsals, but i was still able to cut 2 tracks. the lead guitar is flat, so i'll have to bump it up in editing, b/c i couldn't tune it right with all the noise and the cables weren't working w/my tuner. no big problem though cause i can fix it hopefully. today's tracks were lead guitar and turkish drums. i already did lead vocal and rhythm guitar yesterday. right now i'm not worried about levels and whatnot, i'm mixing it myself so i can do that on the DES. jules got some pics of me. which will be put up...eventually there will be a page on the album. but i think it should be a really cool album. i mean granted, i'm no virtuoso on any one instument, but the principle that i can play all the instruments well enough to record and come out w/a cd---i can help but get a good feeling about it. all i have left on this song is bg vocals, bass, and drum tracks. but i can't do that til the instruments are out for the musical. so those last 2 tracks will be the last tracks i'll be adding on the whole album. the playlist is changing once again...now, its tentatively

1. (a yiddish rap w/garrett and me)
2. Niagra
3. Tea and Crumpets
4. Used To
5. Potatoboy
6. Now Sure
7. Persistence of Memory
8. Anything
9. I am the Walrus

we'll see what happens with the rest of it...

2/7/00-thought graner was back so i could record, but he wasn't, so julian and me went to his room during lockout and jammed on all the instruments. we were late to tech, but i got to play the drums, so that was cool...julian kinda plugged away at the chords to my songs on the piano.

2/6/00-the first is my new cd, entitled canned introspection. there's tentitively 7 songs
1. Tea and Crumpets 2. Niagra (rane cover) 3. Bokanovsky 4. Used To 5. Potatoboy 6. (Yet to be named track) 7. Anything (3eb cover)
i've already come up with a cover design and will start packet soon. hopefully we start recording this week or next week, so i can start mixing through april and may. i'm rather excited cause i'm basically gonna try and play all the instruments and i can say i have produced a cd of my own.