On Fall, on the fall, and thinking.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately. Fall, Autumn, the place between Summer and Winter; it’s been doing a lot to me lately. The season is changing, and I am changing.

The fall of man. Think about it.
The new m83.
Good coffee.
Beautiful people.

God guide me.

On which season is the best & why.

Fall. Final answer. The early fall is the best. I’m not even going to explain why; but I’m going to explain why.

Today I was driving to work, trying to keep my mind occupied, and I thought to myself:

“The greatest albums of the year have all come out since September 6th.”

Seriously, thing about it. What did we get before September? Bon Iver, Manchester Orchestra, Fleet Foxes, My Morning Jacket, and August Burns Red. Which one’s not like the others? It doesn’t matter, I like them all. That’s the only albums I can remember prior to September. In September alone we’ve gotten new records from: Thrice- 5 stars, Saves the Day- 4 stars, Oh Sleeper- super good, The Devil Wears Prada- almost super good. That’s not even technically fall yet, and the best is yet to come.

Come on, tell me you’re not so stoked for that. 11/1/11.

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The Evolution of my tone. LOLOL

OMG. this is going to be nuts. I am sitting here, and I want to see just how many stupid things I have done in the past 15 or so years. I’m going to write down a piece of gear, and to the right I will note how long I had each piece. I’m sure this list will grow as I remember things. Holy crap. Here goes:

This one doesn’t count, but I want to list it, so I can cry whenever I think about it- Steinway Model O, I think it was like a 1932 or something. It was the nicest piano I’ve ever even heard, let alone touched. It’s the piano I learned on, and the one I wrote my first song on, and now nothing I ever touch even compares. Anytime that I try to play piano now I just feel like I suck because it sounds like mud.

I had a no name Nylon string guitar that was like a gift when I was like 5. I rocked that B for like 6 years, then my mom sold it a garage sale. I think P Bob gave it to me. Thanks P Bob.

I got my first electric guitar from New York Music for my 9th birthday (RIP,Thanks for the job and all that stuff). I remember being sick at school that day so it kinda ruined the surprise cause my parents came to pick me up (I was so manipulative) and then they figured we could just go get it. It was a Peavey Raptor strat copy with a Peavey Rage amp with like an 8″ or 10″ in it. It was one of those amps that the gain stage sounds like they just direct ground hum into the amp. The guitar was kinda cool. It’s in my friend’s van floating in pieces. During my John Mayer phase I decided that I was going to finish it like his Hendrix Monterey strat, but I never did. I’m thinking about putting it back together so that I can practice setting up guitars on something that I don’t really care about.

I got a Digitech RP100 when those things were brand new, it was like my main Christmas gift from my parents when I was 10. I remember cause it was a year after I got my guitar. I thought it was so cool then, it could make my guitar sound acoustic! and chorusy! and like complete crap! I still have it, it’s in my desk drawer, and I might use it if I ever need some super low fi sound- or if I ever need a chorus, cause chorus sounds like crap all the time no matter what- so it doesn’t even matter.

I remember upgrading my amp a while after that, it was my first “tube” amp, and it came from my guitar teacher for 100 bones. It was a TUBE WORKS, Tube Driver. It was a 1×12 and was all black and yellow and metal. I felt like I was in Stryper. It actually was kinda awesome, but by “tube” they meant “12ax7 pre.” I still thought it was the best amp, and I kept it for like 7 years. I sold it to a friend for like $50, then he sold it for like $100 to the guy I hadn’t yet met but now plays drums with me at church. All my gear gets sold and moved around in circles.

This is the part of my gear life that is kind of a blur. This probably isn’t chronologically correct, but I don’t even care, cause this is for me not you- unless you want to make fun of me.

I got a Yamaha APX5A on ebay. I still have it. I’ve loaned it to a few people who beat the crap out of it. I put some nice silk&steel strings on it last night and it sounds ok. I’m probably gonna sell it soon for like $150 or something dumb.

I’m pretty sure the next thing I got was an Epi Les Paul standard. I was pretty into like Third Day & DC Talk at the time, I wasn’t allowed to listen to “non-christian” music. That was back in the days when people still believed that music had a soul. idiots. jk guys. I got this guitar for like my birthday and Christmas combo- cause they’re so close together. I loved it. I remember playing it through the Spider II that my church had and thinking I was the S cause I could play like Metallica riffs. Then one day it got knocked over and one of the plastic covers on the tuner broke. I took it to the shop (again RIP) and this dude- who is now my buddy/tech Steve- was like, dude you gotta buy a whole new set of tuners I cant fix that. So I left all bummed and assuming my guitar was worthless, and I ordered some grovers off the internet- when like WOW or something was still how you got online. I got them, and they didn’t fit. Glad I knew that it was possible to have different bores for tuners. So I put those grovers on my Yamaha up there. They work well, but this guitar was doomed, you could only tune it with plyers- I wasn’t dropping another 70 on tuners. It ended up with the guy that knocked it over. He needed a guitar, and my parents sold my Steinway and told me they would buy me anything I wanted if I blessed someone. I gave away my Les Paul. It made me cry. I was like 14. I really really liked Creed, Nickelback, and stupid stuff at this point in my life- so I naturally had to have…

a PRS Custom 24. I got it the first time New York Music went out of business- not like now, which is the real deal, seriously, Ralph moved to Florida. I really wanted a Tremonti signature, or at least a singlecut; but they sold too fast. It was that kinda cool Heritage Cherry, w/ Birds of course. You had to have birds or you weren’t cool. What would distinguish your Custom 24 from an SE if you didn’t have those awesome avians flying all over your fretboard. The birds were even cooler than the sweet vine on the Schecter C1 Classic! I really wish I was me back then so I could have picked a different guitar, I also wish I still had this guitar sometimes- it was really really nice, I just didn’t know why at the time. I sold it to some dude in Michigan on eBay. I used it to fund my first purchase that me from the future approves of…

But before I approved of myself, I’ll add that I had a Line 6 Spider II half stack for the duration of my PRS. So sad…

But with my PRS/Line6 money I picked up a Gibson SG special, one of those faded ones- it’s still in the family, just not my family. It’s a great guitar, and I miss it sometimes- it just looks like an oar from a boat.

I also picked up a Peavey Classic 30 from a friend in that era too, as well as my first real pedal board. Now, here’s when stuff gets really blurry, so I’m just gonna start a list from here. Amps, then guitars, then pedals, and this is all in the past 4-5 years. Holy crap. If I still have it I’ll star it, if it has a good story I might add a line. Boom.

Vox AC15CC: Love/d this amp. Sold it cause I was hot for a hot rod. Heh. Sold it to manager of the shop who then entered it as a return for himself and made 200 bucks off me. Darn.

Marshall Artist 3203 head & 4×12. This was cool. I don’t really miss it though.

Fender Hot Rod Deluxe (Brown LTD w/ Jensen) & 112 extension cab. My church bought the amp, my pal bought the cab. Rad.

Marshall JCM900. eBay. Miss it, don’t miss it.

Orange Tiny Terror. Perfection, minus headroom, equals a good effort.

Mesa Boogie Stiletto Duece. HAH.

Orange AD30TC. It was a head. If it was a combo I’d still have it. Great amp. 1 channel too many.

Vox AC30CC2. I’ll own another someday I’m sure, or something like it. Best reverb.

Vox AC4TV. Cute.

Fender Hot Rod Deville. Gross.

Epiphone Blues Deluxe. 3 days.

’95 Matchless Chieftain; it had a story all of its own. Best gear purchase ever; I’ll never get rid of this amp. Unless I can find the same thing with 12s.

(2/08/12) Ok, I sold the Matchless guys. Now I have a Top Hat Club Royale 2×12 coming my way. For now at least.

I think that might be all my amps, aside from tiny ones, or ones I only had for a day. Maybe. To guitars!

From the SG I knew I wanted a tele, and I’ve been searching since. I’ve had receipts for all of these guitars, how long I kept them is all over the place.

Fender Cyclone, red, rad.
Fender Highway1 Strat, 2TSB, rad.
Fender MIM Tele, purple, Sheryl Crow.
Fender ’72 Tele Custom, VSB, cool.
Fender “Blackout” Tele, good tones.
Fender ’72 Thinline, natural, yup.
Fender ’66 Mustang, stripped. Meh.
Fender ’72 Tele Deluxe, walnut, 4sale?
Fender MIK Tele, black, Conway Twitty
Fender Jaguar CP HH, white, great.
Epiphone Casino, VS, great.
Hofner Verythin, ltd walnut, wow.
Gibson ’01 LP Standard, honey burst.
Gibson ’98 Explorer, white.
Gibson Explorer Pro.
Gibson ES-339. I’m so dumb.
Fender ’95 American Std Tele.*

(02/08/12) I have an AVRI ’62 Fender Jaguar coming now too. I’ll keep it for a while I think.

There’s more. I’ll keep thinking. I don’t even want to talk about pedals.
I’ll tell you more later.

MY CURRENT LIFE

I might try to blog again. maybe. if you care. but i’m so busy.

This is my current life:

7 Days a week.

Wake Up before 6:45. Work, be it at church or my job from 8-5. Work at the music store for the remainder of my day. Play some music. Sleep.

So, I don’t have time to blog in a legitimate manner. I just have to get my thoughts out somehow; & tweeting get’s me in trouble sometimes. When I blog, I at least have to think about what I’m saying before I press the Publish key.

I want to write some real music… in my spare time.

that’s my only thought right now.

oh, and I need to figure out a gameplan for life.

Third Times A Charm. (or something like that)

It is the one month anniversary of the one month anniversary of starting this blog, or close to it. I have another blog, on blogspot. I haven’t touched it since 09. I forgot about it, to be honest. So let’s catch up. Things are changing. Life is changing. I need to find something to do with it. Like move to Australia, or California, or Texas, or Nashvegas, or Charlotte, or New Mexico. I have absolutely nothing to say, except that God is good; and I really really really love music. I’m really glad to be able to play music, even though sometimes I don’t enjoy the music I play. I think I need to just start playing by myself; so that I can play what I want. Then maybe I can become a semi-successful ambient artist and have about 1200 followers on twitter. That’d be rad. I’d be content with 1200. Perhaps I’ll even follow random people, so they follow me, and then unfollow them. Just to seem popular. I am a crazy person. I break everyone’s heart. I even break my own heart. If I just type my thoughts I feel like this blog can become huge. yes? I need an iphone.

I made it back.

I usually start something and never finish it; but not this time. Oh no, there’s no way I’m gonna forget to blog. So what if it’s been almost 2 months.

So what has happened since then. I don’t know. I don’t have a car anymore. I don’t have a guitar anymore. I sold everything, or crashed it, you decide which.

I don’t have anything else to say. I just wanted to post.

Life is a crazy ride isn’t it?

Here We Go

Hi world.

This isn’t my first rodeo.

I’ve blogged before. If you know what I mean.

I just always give up after…oh about 2 days.

Not anymore. This time it’s for real. I’m for real. Blogocalypse.

I don’t really know what to write about. I don’t really have an exciting life. I don’t really have good stories. I don’t really know how to do much. IDEA! I’m gonna start of this blog with a list of 10 things I can do.

1. I can be your friend. I can get to know you, decide what I like about you, decide what I don’t like about you, and make those things work around each other so that we can be friends. Unless you’re like a mad scientist or just pure evil or something. I’m a nice guy.
2. I can play the guitar, kinda; and all the other instruments, kinda. Except for the ones you have to blow on, I can’t do that well.
3. I can clean stuff really well. I should do it more often.
4. I can shoot guns kinda good, I just never get to do it.
5. I can drive a forklift.
6. I can cook well.

I got 6. That’s better than none. Everyone should go to:

http://www.comeandlive.com/downloads and download Mattie Montgomery’s “When Sons Become Fathers.” It’s Good.

Oh yeah, I think I’m gonna build one of these:

Ok, Blog complete. We’ll see if I ever log on here again.