Tripecac - Pho Kit

I wanted to start this album with an Asian theme, to fit the album title. So, I picked some "exotic" instrument patches, and tried to make it sound, well, Asian. However, it ended up sounding more like the usual Tripecac stab at trance or Krautrock. Oh well.

It's really long. I got tired of the original idea and wanted to strip it down to a simple rhythmic jam. I don't know how well that worked. The guitar was an afterthought, and I'm not sure I like it. I mixed it so low that you can barely hear it. And speaking of the mix, well, the mix is horrible. Double oh well.

The midi timing seemed a little off in the original recording of the song. I'm guessing there was a hardware glitch. Technical difficulties are abounding for me so far this year. Triple oh well.

A couple months later I re-recorded it, which (I think) fixed the problem. Unfortunately, I fixed it after I sent out the CDs to people, so it's unlikely that anyone will hear the "good" version, except for those of you who are viewing this web site. All one of you. Quadruple oh well.

By the way, the title is a pun on "noodle" and "new doodle". Real swell.

The day before I started this I listened to a bluegrass CD my sister made for her wedding. I decided to have the next "ethnic" song be hill-billy. The first track I laid down was the [fake] banjo. I tried to keep the rest acoustic sounding, but I don't think it sounds very bluegrassy.

As for the title, we had recently watched a miniseries (Into the West) which talked about the California gold rush. I named the song after panning for gold (which is oro in Spanish). Hmm. Panning for puns is more like it.

I tried to keep the music simple and tuneful. A few days previously I had listened to some random Tripecac songs on my new mp3 player, and decided that my favorite songs were usually the tuneful ones. There are exceptions, of course (e.g., "My Old School"), but I think I tend to have more fun creating and listening to songs which have something to day, either lyrically or melodically. This one is an attempt at having a strong melodic identity. Well, at least stronger than the recent krautrockish jams.

The improvised lyrics have more to do with the previous song ("Noodoodle") but felt good at the time.

G was talking about somebody getting a "Brightens Day Award" at work. I thought the title was funny, so decided to base my next song on it.

I initially wanted to make the song "bright", like the name. Light and happy, like a ray of sunshine. So I started with a pretty piano melody.

However, the delicate melody didn't fit my grumpy mood, and quickly grated on me. I then decided to make the song title "ironic". I kept the piano idea but immediately segued into a dark, droning instrumental groove. Bye bye, sunny organic whimsy. Hello, ominous robotic repetition.

To be "nice", I returned to the gentle melody at the end of the song, but by then you know that at the heart of every sunny person lurks a gloomy automaton.

I finally bought a (used) floorboard to control the Pod Pro. It arrived on a Friday, and the next morning I tried it out.

This song started as a test to see whether I could get the Pod Pro, floorboard, SoundDiver, and Sonar all working at the same time. I improvised some guitar parts, and then later added some keyboard drums, bass, and EP.

The end result is clunky and bland, but also kinda moody, which I like. I kept it short, so it shouldn't annoy you too much.

I started this on the same day as "Boarded". I was getting bored with that song (no pun intended), and wanted to try something peppier.

This might be a little faster, but it still feels sludgy to me. My timing on the guitar parts wasn't very snappy, so it feels a bit out of sync, especially in the beginning. Also, the mix is really wimpy near the end.

Oh well. At least it's short. Very short. And I think I've gotten my guitar fix for a while.

So, back to focusing on the keyboard and (hopefully) writing actual songs!

I wanted to see if I could emulate the speeding-up tape effect of the early Trex albums (e.g., Five Dollar Drummer).

Surprisingly, it ended up being more difficult in Sonar than with a real tape recorder. First I had to time-shrink each audio clip manually (for some reason it wouldn't shrink multiple clips at a time). Then I had to pitch-shift each audio clip. Then I had to adjust the project tempo (doing a little math to match the audio time-shrinking). Finally, I had to transpose the MIDI instruments to match the new pitch.

It was tedious, but a learning experience. I learned that "chipmunking" in Sonar is a pain in the butt, and that the end result doesn'tsound as naturally "cool" as it does on tape.

Also, if I sound grumpy (well, grumpier than usual), it's because this song took a whopping 7 days to finish. Yes, all that work for less than five minutes of, well, filler. Five minutes of scat. :)

The rule for this song was that I could not loop any performances; I had to play each pattern individually, "live". I wanted to see if this would make the music sound more like the stuff on In the Margins.

I don't think it worked. The song's not too horrible, but it doesn't sound trancy or jammy enough. There's too much going on, and too many bright major chords. In the Margins had a more minor keys, which made it feel subdued, bluesy, and mysterious. This song has no mystery.

We heard on the radio this morning that obesity contributes to dementia. So I wanted to make a song title with "dementia" in it. Gotta keep up with current events, you know?

For a rule, I wanted to see if I could make a song with interesting drum sounds. I had been listening to lots of old Trex songs, and wondered if I could emulate tupperware.

So, drums + dementia = drumentia. Yeah, it's forced, I know, but oh well. It was kinda fun to make it, so maybe it will be at least a teensy bit fun to listen to. We'll see.

The mix is kinda busy, bass-heavy, and muddy. Sorry about that.

To counteract heartburn, you're supposed to have lots of protein. But it's not supposed to be the hard stuff, like beef jerky. It needs to be soft. So the ultimate is a protein shake. Yeah right... like I'm gonna have one of those!

Well, for this song, I wanted the music to sound "meaty". By that I mean with a sharp, dark, tanginess. So I added a reverse-reverb effect which sounds kinda dramatic in parts. Also, I made the groove 6/8, which will hopefully allow for a "jammier" feel than 4/4. We'll see.

We've been trying to reduce our caffeine intake. So we switched from coffee to green tea. Then we found out that green tea has lots of caffeine too. So we switched to decaf coffee. Then we found out that decaf still has some caffeine. So we switched to herbal tea. Or at least I did. Hooray for me. Hooray for tea.

Anyway, as for the music, well, I tried to make it very soothing. Serene. The mix isn't as smooth as I wanted, but neither is Flight Simulator X, yet I'm still able to derive enjoyment from that. So you should be able to derive enjoyment from this. Happy deriving!

I liked the last song ("Serenitea") but felt like it was a difficult one to follow up. So I called this song "Follow Down". Ha ha.

One thing I didn't like about "Serenitea" was the kick drum. It was too busy and prominant, and not thumping enough. So for this song I started with the kick, and then added more tracks only after I was satisfied with the kick.

Unfortunately, the end result is kinda brain-dead. There are some semi-cool bits in part, but as a whole, the song stinks. It lacks strong melodies, chord progressions, solos, or anything memorable. It's basically just a bunch of noisy thumping that goes on for 8 minutes. Ironically, after a few hours I got sick of the kick drum sound, so not even the foundation of the song makes me happy.

Well, the good news is that the shallow, annoying nature of this song inspired me to pick a strick, melody-based rule for the next album. The idea is to avoid "air-headed" songs like this in the future. Oh well, lesson learned. I hope.

For some reason, it snowed several times in late April this year, which is rare; usually it just rains. The day I started this song, we had a little flurry in the morning, and the day before we woke up to snow on our lawn. On that day, we took a long hike in the hills, drinking in the crisp air and marvelling at the snow patches.

I wanted to song to reflect that hike. It starts off easy and pretty (like our descent into Arroyo Park), and then gets tougher and, steeper, like the long climb up to 1500 feet. I think we peaked at around 1700 feet (after starting near sea level), and that's where we saw the most snow. It was a great hike.

Does the music capture the snow, or the hike? Not really. But that's okay. It's kinda catchy at times, and it sure was fun banging out these ideas, which distracted me from the soreness in my limbs.

This is the thirteenth song of the album with the "dirty" name. So that's how it came up with its name.

I wanted to end the album on one last, loose jam. The next album should be a lot tighter, so I wanted to revel in improvisational freedom once more.

As with most jams, it doesn't have much of a "plot", but it has some nice grooves and solos here and there. Musically, it's probably the "cleanest" (simplest) song on the album, which is ironic given the name. Anyway, not a bad way to end the album.