I’m addicted to Solitaire
Oh god, it’s true. I spend far too much time playing solitaire. I’ll come home from work, sit around, trying to top out from my previous best score. I’ll think about my day, my plans, and I’ll “coach” myself to attain higher scores… it’s rather sick actually. So, here I am, playing this ‘game’ when a thought runs through my mind… “hey, mic up your drums and record… something”.
So I did… I started micing things at 6 pm, and did 4 test takes of some funk jamming to get a sound. At 7 pm, I started out thinking I was doing a songfight tune, going for a funk dance groove. Half way through, I digress into this Ginger Baker Trio-esque melodic drum thing.
As I listen back to this take, I am drawn to the section that started about 3 minutes in, and decide to work with it.
The bass line started out with a root of G, over a mixolydian funk groove, but half way through I got it in my head to work around C major… without actually using the third so it could be open to a mixo-aeolian-harmonic minor approach on the guitar.
At least, that’s what I was telling myself. I get in a groove and I think I know what I”m doing but really I’m just playing and listening. Sometimes with this kinda stuff, I’ll literally tell myself “it’s all in your head, don’t think about it, just let it out”.
So I laid down the bass, around the “C” idea, just a simple ostinato, and the drums work around it beautifully. It does meander off at the end,and I couldn’t resist trying to accent it with some guitar later. Before I knew it, it’s 9:30 and time to put Drayja, my daughter, to bed.
So, one night of goofing around with cubase and seeing what the hell would come out if I’d just let it, resulted in the track posted here.
I wouldn’t call this a “song”… I’m not sure what to call it. Other than fun.
At least more fun than solitaire.
on June 13th, 2007 at 3:26 pm
Interestingly (to me, of course) I’ve had a few friends who weren’t too into this “piece”. It took a while for me to realize… they are listening to the guitar, as if that’s the point of this thing. It just goes to show, you can’t predict what others will think of your work! I have a hard time NOT reacting to this kind of stuff. One friend said “it just sounds like you’re playing for yourself”. Despite my desire to debate the validity of the assumption that there is any other way, truly, to play (and I don’t believe anyone ever plays music without their own desires first and foremost in their mind regardless of what they might say about it…) I will point out that OF COURSE I’M PLAYING FOR ME.
I have always respected the attitude of players who do what they want and don’t waste time trying to play for others. The idea is, if you like it, great, we got something in common. If you don’t, listen to something else.
And I’ve stopped playing solitaire.