Trex - Guitarded

This is a silly intro. I was showing Jessica the correct way to sing "ooh ooh". She wasn't getting it.

This was recorded between 1986-09-10 and 1987-03-16, but I'm not sure when. I'll guess 1987 since that keeps the dates on this album nice and neat.

If you thought my keyboard playing was bad... Here's my first recorded noodlings on guitar. In fact, it's the best of my recorded noodlings.

And what do I play? The stupid "fight song" again?!? Get over it, Trav!!!

The date was some time between 1986-09-10 and 1987-03-16. Mathematically, it was more likely to be in 1987, so I'll pick that year as my guess.

This is an even worse guitar attempt. It sounds like I am trying to tune. It's really, really horrible.

Well, I guess this just makes the keyboard stuff sound more "advanced". I need every illusion I can get. This is what I call scraping the underside of the barrel.

This is the first song on which I played guitar and keyboard simultaneously. It's awful.

This is a continuation of "Guitarded 1". As if those 72 seconds of stammered guitar noodling (with a brain-dead keyboard drum accompaniment) weren't enough. Collect 'em all.

Different keyboard rhythm, same lame guitar noodling. Of course, noodles are more complex than this stuff.

What, did I know only one bass note???

Lemme guess: E???

This is for the legions of fans who are clamoring for yet another guitar and faux-drum jam. Ugh. I told you my guitar playing was rough! It just took you 4 songs to believe me. Right? Hello? Are you still there?

Yay! Last one! After this we can get on with the glorious guitar-free stuff, which sound like absolute gems in comparison.

This one has the distinction of having no connection between the guitar and the keyboard drums in the background. Too much fiddling around with the mic, too little actual playing.

I'm guessing this was recorded on the same day as the next song.

This is the instrumental intro to "Bossanova Bunch". I guess the only interesting thing about it is how long I held that one chord. Fascinating.

This is the first (and shortest) of four long keyboard improvs. The preset rhythms dominate, making this sound very cheesy and boring. Better get comfortable with it, because there's over 45 minutes of this stuff on this album.

I'm guessing I recorded this the same day as "Bossanova Bunch". In fact, it was probably the second song of the "bunch". I'm guessing it was shortly before or after my first school dance.

It's really long, with not many changes. When I finally do play keyboard with my right hand, it sounds labored and annoying. I almost wish this were 100% presets, 0% Travis.

Another long improv. The arpeggios don't really "attack" until about 3 minutes into it. And they sound more like smurfs than an attacking army. There really isn't anything aggressive about this music.

This is the final long improv on this album. It's pretty lame, with sick-sounding cornet and a long autobiographical rant/rap towards the end. Also, part of the melody tried to rip off a popular song (which I can't place), which is annoying.

At the very end, it sounds like I walked away from the keyboard (with the rhythms running) in order to let the tape run out. So I was bored even when recording it.

Note: I'll probably have to censor this before uploading the mp3.

Here's an attempt at making a piano sound "tribal". Hmmm.

This brief chant makes fun of Christian rap. Talk about an easy target... Still, it completely misses the mark, making itself look stupid. Luckily, I "disguised" my voice, so that I could emerge with my reputation intact. Yeah. Whatever.

The beat-boxing is pathetic. I had actually overwritten it on the original tape, but discovered it on the same tape as Kim 11.

This song is notable for its inclusion in "Settlement of Southern Africa", which was a video I made for History Day in April 1988. Actually, it was a sped-up version that I included ("Waiting for a Call (2)").

This song sounds much cooler sped up, especially when we get to the main melody, at 1:15. This is probably the first almost-catchy song I wrote.

This was probably recorded the same day as "Waiting for Ian to Call Back".

I tried jamming with my Dad, who also plays lots of instruments. He played my keyboard and I played percussion (a collection of pots and pans) and french horn I think we used two passes to record all the tracks; how could I play percussion and horn at the same time? Regardless, the results are pretty awful.

This was on a tape labeled "1988" (right before "The Real Stuff"), so I'm guessing it was recorded in late 1987 or early 1988.