Spaceship Concert

So after we finished construction on Day 2, we went to Baja Burrito and then had a concert.  We pulled off one of the walls and performed in the ship.

I played a bunch of new songs from Leonard, finished AND unfinished.  And I had a few friends join me.  It was an amazing time.  Check it out...

Special Guest #1 - Friend and neighbor, Christopher Williams.  Check out his amazing new record, "Stone Water Wood Light" HERE.

Next up: New Nashvillian Drew Michael Blake.  He came and volunteered for the build and was just great to get to know.  I thought it would be fun to have him play a couple songs.  And he killed it!  He has a new EP coming out soon, and if it's as good as him live it will be well worth checking out.

And our final guest, the legendary Don Chaffer.  Waterdeep is awesome and Don is half of why.

It was a special night.  One I'll never forget.  Thanks to everyone who made it happen.

Building - Day 2

Sorry this is a few days late.  By the end of day 2, building and the concert, I could barely speak in complete sentences, let alone put together a blog post.

I took this morning off to nap and read and got a basic recording setup rocking in the spaceship in the afternoon.  Actually made some music in there today!

Anyway, day 2 in photos...

  

I was working really hard.

The ceiling is a huge white sheet, called a "scrim", that we rolled up end to end, like a scroll, and then tightened over the frame of the ship.

Here's where the lights (that we found in a junk room and some geniuses rewired and hung from the ceiling) meet the ceiling of the ship.

 

Building - Day 1

Wow, what a day.  Amazing folks came and worked crazy hard on this crazy dream of mine.  I can't believe it.  What a gift.  I'd tell you more, but I think I'll just let the pictures do the talking.  

This is my Mom.  Getting interviewed.  I hope she talks a lot about my 7th grade year.

Stephen Lamb made this panoramic shot.

This is where we left off tonight.  Walls, panels, floors and ceiling tomorrow.  Then a concert to say thank you.  Going to be another awesome day.  And now I have to go to bed.

I did eventually finish doing the dishes.

Wow.  Yesterday was a strong day for songs.  But not until later in the day.  

That song I've been so excited about, "Beat of my Heart" hit a major roadblock.  I wrestled a verse to the ground over the course of an hour to both A) love it, and B) realize it doesn't belong in the song.  It's cool, but not what that song needs.  So I kept scrapping and writing, scrapping and writing, until I was just frustrated.  I finally said, "screw it" and just changed guitars and started trying to find something else.

And I did!  Pretty quickly I established another chord sequence.  It started out feeling rhythmically like "Beat of my Heart" but then gradually, as I uncovered a lyric, found its own pacing.  And it has got a crazy catchy chorus.  I'm so excited about it.  Right now it's probably titled "Out of Time".  Who knows.

I tell people often to set aside time to write.  Put it on your calendar, shut off your phone and computer and just write.  Don't wait for "the moment" to hit, because you can make that moment show up by putting yourself in its path.

HOWEVER, if that moment does hit outside of your pre-ordained writing slot and you have the opportunity to actually chase it.  DO IT.  Which is why, at 12:30 last night , three dishes in to clearing out the dishwasher, I ran to the living room, grabbed the old Yamaha acoustic that sits in there and wrote until 3.  

Yes, I am crazy tired today.  But I got a second verse to that "Out of Time" tune and found a structure and one of my favorite lyrics in a long while for an idea based on Adam in the garden and God saying, "It is not good for man to be alone."

This morning I got the girls ready for school and once they were off, took a short nap and flew to the studio to play guitar on the new Slugs and Bugs record, which was so fun.  Now, back at the studio after lunch, I've got about three hours to revisit what showed up last night.  Going to try to assess this pile of ideas and see if I can get one or two into an actual first draft of a full song.

Posting this blog and then…  COMPUTER OFF.  There's writing to do.

Journal of a Space Record

John Steinbeck is one of my all-time favorite authors.  I know that's kind of likes saying, "You know who's a great songwriter?  Bob Dylan." but it's obviousness doesn't make it any less true.  "East of Eden" is one of his most famous books, and some would argue his best.  (Not me, but whatever.)

He wrote that novel in big bound sketchbooks and would "warm up" every day by journaling on the left-hand pages, before working on the novel itself on the right-hand side.  A few years ago the left-hand portion was published under the title "Journal of a Novel".  It's a fascinating look at the writing process.  He talks about everything from moving his desk to get better light, to what he's planning on writing in the novel that day, to how his family moved to a new house last year and he's still getting used to it.  It may be as much fun to read as the novel itself, though for completely different reasons.  (You should read both.)

I officially started writing for "Leonard the Lonely Astronaut" on Tuesday.  I already have a number of songs written, but I have about a week before we start building the ship and I'd like to take this time to concentrate just on writing.  In homage to Steinbeck, and because warming up seems useful, and because it will allow folks to follow what is intentionally a very private and personal work, I'm going to try to treat my blog as the left-hand side of my notebook.

So here goes…

This record has been different for me.  I have a LOT of fast or more upbeat songs.  Some of that is intentional, I get tired of feeling like I can only play two songs off of each album at band shows and I know that the slower, melancholy stuff comes easier for me, so I'm leaving it for later, to make sure I have enough "up" tunes.  Also, since I started running a few years ago I've discovered different music, stuff that moves and keeps me pushing forward in that third mile.  I think it's all been steeping inside me for a while and I'm having a BLAST.  It's so fun to get psyched up about what you're writing.  To have it in your head and want to sing it out loud just so the people around don't miss out on what's so exciting.  

I'm trying to fit the narrative of a lonely man inside the up tunes, and it's been making for a really interesting endeavor.  Getting into his head.  I've set up so that one of the guitar amps and a vocal mic are live and recording all the time.  I put on my headphones and just play and sing.  Jam.  Mess with a pedal and try something else.  And every now and then I'll catch something.  Some release of emotion.  Abandon.  It's not a lot of words at this point.  Mainly vowel sounds or a few phrases over and over, changing just a bit minute by minute until it takes a form that feels natural and true.

I might do that for two hours, then listen through and grab the highlights to make mp3s of them so I can carry them in my pocket and work from that moment where something clicked.

And I'm getting a new sense of Leonard.  In the darkness and loneliness of the past years of his life, he hasn't had much fun.  There are songs of introspection and melancholy, but there's a lot of fun.  Release.  Joy.  When nobody's watching and nobody's mad at you, you just get to be a kid again.  In a good way.  You turn it up and have fun, because you can.  No other reason.

So those are the songs I'm going to try to discover today.  A few working titles of things that seem promising: "The Beat of My Heart", "Give Me a Pill" and of course, "Space Pirates".

And now, time to fight the emptiness of that right-hand page…