feelin' old.

So I'm listening to Fiona Apple's "When the Pawn..." album right now, and I decided to go look up the release date thinking I could put it in my favorite albums of the last ten years being 2000 - 2010. Well I can't!!! It came out November 9th 1999. I can still remember sitting on front porch on what seemed like a warm October or November night with my hippie next door neighbor Alicia forcing me to give it a listen, and after a week or two of my down right denying any thought of even listening to it, I agreed, and from that day on it has been one of my favorite albums of all time, it is definitely a desert island jam!


It's just weird to think that some of my favorite albums are just about a decade old, or only a short distance away from being a two decades old. I'm not talking about older bands I got into in the recent years that have had albums out for decades before I've gotten into them, but straight up albums I bought on the day they came out, and spent many nights and days laying in bed reading the booklets front to back as it played across the room on my little boom box.

But music is great like that it can bring you back to any moment in your life where it played a significant role. It's probably why I love it so much and why myself and my best friend connect so much over music.

What are some of your favorite albums and what your fondest memories of them?

I'll post more of mine soon.

PS: This album needs a deluxe version! but that's a whole other topic in itself.

Twenty Years of Sleep Before We Sleep Forever

I'm just feeling restless. I'm behind bored on my days off, but I can't work up the energy to clean or anything that I should be doing.

I think I should take some guitar lessons, I've been playing for almost 13 years now and I've plateaued over the last few years. It may be from the fact that I don't have any friends here in Jersey that play guitar and would keep my playing in check.

Listened to Luke's new band "Minutes" they are really fucking good, I'm probably bummed out that I don't have anyone hear to help me get a real band off the ground. Oh well.

HOLY GRAIL OF YOUTH!

I saw my parents tonight, and my mother had this box!!!!

It might not mean much to anyone, but contained in this box is anywhere from 75 to 100 cassette tapes that feature tape recorder and 4 track recordings that I did between the ages of 12 and 18! Yeah it doesn't look like that many but it is deep and long, much like your anal cavity.

I'm so excited to dust off the 4 track and run all of these into pro tools, no matter how bad some of these are I will mix down everything!

days of hell.

So seriously this fucking sucks!!! I didn't get nearly as far as I was hoping to get on music last night. I have about 66 CDs in so far. This is going to take me forever!!!! The first time I started putting everything on my hard drive I probably had like 200 CDs tops, I also had a part time job where I only worked like 20hrs a week so I had plenty of time to do it.

But since then my CD collection has grown insanely in size. I also have a full time job that I work 40hrs a week. Man!

I did get those 16 CDs up this afternoon that I was supposed to do today. Right now Animal Collective's Strawberry Jam is finishing uploading then I'm onto Animosity's Empires.

I did play with some of my new pedals that came in the mail on thursday! The Boss RV5 is sooooooo much better then the Digitech Digiverb. I shouldn't have been such a cheap bastard and just spent the extra $30 to get it in the first place. Don't get me wrong I still like the Digiverb but the RV5 blows it out of the water. The MXR Carbon Copy Analog Delay is awesome it's going to come in handy to make some drones and I love the fact that their is no tail when you shut it off so the sound just stops.

Fat Cat is still with us I'm not sure when the vet is happening.

New Drone Phase

Yesterday I picked up a new hard drive. It's only 250G compared to the 320G I had before, but it'd a Western Digital passport so it's small and compact and I don't need to plug it into the wall which means I can take it anywhere!

So in the past two days I've uploaded roughly 50 albums and I'm thinking I'll get about 13 more done tonight before I decide to pack it in. Which means I'll have up to Am finished with alittle bit of An started.

Sold a shitload of stuff on eBay so tomorrow I'll be spending a bit of time at the post office after work.


Other shitty news, I'll probably be taking Fat Cat tomorrow to the vet to be put to sleep. I'm not sure of that yet It may happen on Tuesday before work. I'm thinking Nicci's mom may want to see her before I have to take her.

drone destroyed.

So yesterday I finally went to Pennsylvania to get my new drivers license. I've only been driving around with an expired one for a month. Anyways upon coming home I'm laying in the bed and it just smells like cat piss. Turns out I think the one cat is dying and just losing functions. So I take the sheets off and febreeze the shit out of the mattress and decided to flip it. As I'm flipping it came down on my external hard drive on the side of the bed and it started making crazy ass noises. So it died on me, the hard drive that is. I don't understand Nicci has pushed me off the bed in the past and i've landed my fat ass right on it and it never did anything, it got buried by garbage and got stepped on by animals and nothing but a mattress destroys it!!!!

So all my music on it is gone. Good thing I'm an avid collector and have my whole collection on a shelf in the basement. It's just going to be a bitch putting it on my new one because this is 5 years plus of intense music buying that needs to go on here. Around 90GB or more

The only advantage is I'll be able to take time and look through booklets and stuff I haven't looked through in a long time and listen to stuff I haven't listened to in years even though they've been on my computer the whole time.

Dallas, TX

So I've been home for a few days after being in Dallas, TX for 4 days. Let me tell you Dallas fucking sucks! I was in meetings most of the time, but we had a bunch of free time to go about town, etc. Well there isn't much of a town to venture too. It seemed that everything there was closed by 5pm everyday. Everything else was either a hotel or a business building.

I went and saw the X on the road where JFK was shot. That was pretty much the highlight of the city.

'cuz i'm bored.

so I thought the album was in its final days, about to be sent off to the pressing plant, but it's not. I was listening to the last few songs I recorded and I'm just not feeling them. I'm kinda bored with some of the music I've recorded lately. I dunno. I've worked on it for this long already so alittle more time won't hurt anything I suppose.

Closer.

Holy shit it's been hot outside the last three or so days! Saturday Nicci and I drove to Philly for the Kurt Halsey opening at the Art Star. It was a good time, Nicci bought an orginial and a print, and I also bought her a print. We have to go back the 2nd or 3rd week of July to pick up the painting. We ate a a place called Soy Cafe across the street and had "chicken" wraps. It seems any time we are out of town we always eat vegetarian or vegan food and LOVE IT. we should get a cook book or something and start eating home more.

PFB Update:
I have a few more songs recorded but I think they threw the whole feel of the album I was going for off. So just as I thought I was coming close to finishing the damn thing I continue working on it more and more and more. It'll more then likely NEVER! come out.

princeton record exchange

so i finally made it to the princeton record exchange after living in jeresy for over 3 years now. I picked up quite a bit of CDs, nineteen to be exact. Though this blog is not about the record buying experience, but about the walk back to the car.

Some crazy event was going on in town at the college so there were massive groups of people walking around all we were wearing the colours black and orange. I'm assuming these are the colours of the school or something. Anyways I see some guy trying to hand out pamphlets on to the groups of people walking by, near him I see a little home painted billboard that reads: "Are You Going to Heaven? I Have the ticket!" So as he walks up to Britten and I he says something, I only half listened to him, and I say no thanks. I'm no more than 5 feet pass this guy when being the smart ass I am I say: "I know I'm going to hell and I'm totally cool with it." To my surprise he heard me, he starts saying something, and totally abandons his post and starts following us saying HE HAS THE INVOTATION AND I CAN BE SAVED, BLAH BLAH BLAH BLAH. Its starting to creep me out so I ended up walking faster and totally walked into the street and crossed over during a red light without even looking because I really didnt want to be stuck on a corner waiting with this guy.

boring story. i know.

Wasted Day.

So I had all intentions of coming home and recording some music today, didnt happen. I looked at the bed and that was it next thing I knew it was 9PM. I did however stop a Vintage Vinyl after work and picked up "Isn't Anything" & "Loveless" by My Bloody Valentine on vinyl! Way pumped about it. I also got a couple used things as well. yeah this is a wasted post as well. fuck it.

the problem with music buying public.

So yesterday I get bored and decide to run over to the Holmdel store, and look around their CD section to see what they have that my store doesn't. Upon getting there I see a kid that only works there over the summer that I haven't seen since I left their last year and start talking to him. Out of nowhere some guy walks over with a CD and asks Steve "What does "unplugged" mean?" I kind look at the guy like he can't be serious. So Steve explains it and you can tell the guy just doesn't get it. Fast forward 5 minutes, The guy comes back up to Steve who is talking to me as I look at CDs and comes up with the Alicia Key's album "Songs in A Minor" and askes him "What does "Songs in A Minor mean?" I almost lose it I stare the guy in the face and give him a look like he is thee most retarded human being ever. He had no idea that it was the title of the album. This is what fucking mp3's and itunes has done! People need to get back to buying albums.

Cold Turkey.

So I've been off ebay for about 3 1/2 weeks now! I got my final vinyl purchase today in the mail. I realized I was spending WAY too much money so I just deleted EVERYTHING off of my watch list. Its been rough but I'm kinda glad, I need to start saving up money again, damn.

But.

I did pick up Godspeed You Black Emperor's "Lift Your Skinny Fists...." 2x12" from Jack's today. Its a hard find so i just had to do it, they have two other GYBE vinyls there too, hopefully they'll be there next friday when I get paid again.

Vs.

So Wednesday night into Thursday morning I just couldn't sleep. Most nights this is my time to watch "TV", and when I say TV I really mean I'm seeing what movies are on demand to watch. So that night I watched The Boxer & Last of the High Kings both very good movies. I go to sleep at around 6am, I wake up a few hours later and think to myself "Were both of those movie about Catholics hating Protesants in Ireland? Yeah they were kinda, it played a back drop to the overall story of both, but it was just wierd that I watch two movies in a row with a similiar theme.

!!!$$##@@@#@^#@%$

I FUCKING HATE!!!!!! THE TYRA BANKS SHOW!!!!!! There is just something about this bitch!!!! How the fuck does she even get her own show?!?!! and how has it been on tv this long!!?!?!?!?!!!!?!???!!!?

Protection.

So I'm strolling through the grocery store last night, I come across the "pharmacy" type aisle to find condoms on the top shelf in LOCK UP cases. The same type we use at work to lock up high price items like digital cameras, video games hardware, higher priced software, etc!!!!! since when do condoms need to be in lock up cases?!?!?! So now if you're a young guy or girl and still alittle wierded out with purchasing them in public (which you need to get over and just do it!) you can't just go to nice convienent self check out lanes, and get the fuck out of there without anyone knowing your business. You have to go to a register see one cashier who will probably send you over to the customer service desk to use a magnet to unlock it, what a fucking hassle!!!! kids arent going to want to do that especially if its a small town and word gets around fast! fuck man!

Day Light Savings

Can suck my fucking dick! i can't sleep at night properly. my sleep schedule is all kinds of messed up. i come home from work in the afternoon sleep all evening than i'm awake until 5 or 6 in the morning.

Punk Rock Choir

I've always loved the sound of many voices singing in unison, almost like a chant. I try to recreate it by multilayering my own voice in different keys than drenched with reverb behind the main vocal, but I wish I had the knowledge to actually conduct a small little choir to be able to sing behind some of my songs to make them fuller.

just a thought.

120 Minutes.

So a week or so ago while browsing the tv guide I noticed vh1 was showing 120 minutes (an awesome video show from mtv way back in the day when they played videos for those who dont know) very late one sunday night. I wasn't able to watch it because nicci doesnt have the tolerance of watching music videos that i do. So anyways I thought to myself HOLY SHIT we pay for the DVR shit for a reason. I set it up to record every episode that comes on, to my suprise monday afternoon TWO episodes had been recorded. In the middle of watching it came to my attention that there is no Matt Pinfield, than at the end of the second episode they played a Hall and Oates song, so now I believe that these are just some "alternative" videos VH1 has laying around that they are showing under the 120minutes name.

ill still watch. they did play some joy division, echo and the bunnymen, sisters of mercy, jesus and mary chain, the church, love and rockets, and shit load of other awesome stuff. a few not so awesome things. whatever as always everything i start writing loses its meaning at the end,

in other awesome news I BOUGHT TICKETS TO SEE BORIS!!!!! on march 4th in NYC!!!!
!

autumn airs rolls in.

it's starting to get too cold to sit on the back steps and play guitar at night. I'm not complaining about the weather because I love this season just stating a fact.

I feel like I've been working two jobs this last week, I go to work from 6am to 2pm monday through friday doing alot of Prep for our inventory this sunday. It's not my normal work schedule then I come home take care of the dog get alittle rest then go over to the house and work on painting some more, I'm getting pretty exhausted and its only 3 days into it. The living room and bathroom should be complete now so tomorrow im pulling up the tarps and putting all the fixture covers back up and thursday we'll move some of the living room stuff over. Tomorrow matt and i are going to do the bedrooms, then all thats left is the kitchen and the hallway.

Oh on top of all this I leave for California monday morning I'll be coming back Thursday night at midnightish so its really more like friday morning, So I need to pack up everything because we're having movers come on that saturday more then likely!