More oppressive heat and humidity. Come on down to Florida, die of heat stroke, or huddled about the A/C of your partial northeast ocean view from condo canyon. I’m using the morning hours to get everything done before “big ball of fire in sky” turns the streets into lava. Sometimes I miss winter (hello, Mitch of the frozen north) but it never gets to me since I can drive up and see it for a while any time I’d like. My idea of polar conditions is late fall in downstate Colorado.It looks like the new Ed stalled himself out of a good job. He never kept in touch to my several emails to pick ten songs, my litmus test of a guitarist’s sincerity. Guess he’s too busy working the loading bay at Guitar City to be concerned about a career in the performing arts. It never occurs to these people that not much ever occurs to them, I mean, what are the authentic odds of a non-singing, non-picking over-30 rhythm guitar player ever getting into a working band?
Scooter it is, my plan is to visit several places and inform them I’ve got $300 for the shop that gives me the best deal. There is a theft problem with scooters in Florida, so they cannot be left parked for overlong, though I’ll wager the units that get lifted are not securely locked. That’s an error I never make and a trait among successful bicyclists. Scooters are seen a lot more these days as reality settles in but there are still few secure places to leave them unattended.
What I don’t know is whether a sidecar makes a difference. Would it make the rig too distinctive to steal? Is the added weight a deterrent? My thinking is that I’ll quickly learn which parking lots have security cams and I’ll plan around never leaving the scooter around for long, the maximum stay for me might amount to a grocery shop. I cannot find any local regulations of whether a scooter has to pay for parking, or I can pull onto the sidewalk and chain it?
I’m wrapping up “Naked”, the novel. The author is plainly a humorist, and the book was on the New York Times bestseller list. Yet he’s one of the few of the published I would not care to meet in person and certainly not to shake his hand. You just know when somebody has walked too many less beaten paths. Or the converse.
Dave-O has come up with an interesting one. There is a guy on Hollywood (Blvd) that has an Internet radio station and is actually making money at it. Dave-O asked to broadcast my material and I had to tell him honestly that I do not have a single recorded minute of music ready for that. I do have excellent backing tracks that are original. These won’t help in a situation where anyone would naturally want to sound their best, but not the Hippie-form of including musicians and instruments that will never be there.
Instead, I requested Dave-O put together a meeting with the owner to show us how the software works. Dave-O needs that kind of experience by the bucket. And I am damn curious after reading my little iPod booklet for the examples given were within my reach. Allow me to digress. Years ago, before I found out about artists whose families paid them to stay away from home, I could not understand why many creative types had weighty collections of unsold and earlier work. Or how they could afford to stockpile it.
I was forced onto the streets at 17 and had no spare anything to accumulate. Yet, when I look at my recording tracks (all produced before I got serious about singing), I’ve got just such a reservoir of music--but none of it studio quality. The days when Sinatra could record a hit song in three hours are gone. Like the other artists, it is not my best material and would require exception effort to put into form, so there it sits, reflecting my personality. But my music appeals to audiences, not to guitar players.
For instance, the Hippie would always want me to play “Gimme Three Steps”, which is a dreary mismatch for my bass style. Why bother with that so-so hit, when I could learn four audience-oriented tunes for the same effort, plus there was no guaranty if I learned it, the Hippie would ever play it. I have a lot of such music, so maybe I can find something. It might be the Internet, but it is still called radio.
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