eDWeiRD Says... | Soiled Utilities Productions

9/27/11

Tue, 27 Sep 2011 14:01:32 -0400

Wow. I really need to start writing again.

News: I'm selling off a good chunk of my gear. I have a Godin bass, an acoustic guitar, a pair of Behringer eq's, a Roland R5 drum machine, possibly an Ibanez Proline half-v heavily modified, SMPro PR8 mic pre strip, and possibly a few microphones (mostly condensers).

In other news I'm still working afternoons and largely see no one except on weekends. I need to get out more, but at the same time I'm barely able to make enough to adequately take care of this house.

7/12/11

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 23:08:54 -0400

I've honestly got nothing to say. I'm on the certification hamster wheel and I can't seem to get off. I have no time or energy for music right now.

4/7/11

Thu, 07 Apr 2011 01:25:38 -0400

So I'm watching the Making of Imagine and suddenly I have a thought. All these years some people have hated Yoko Ono. They say that she broke up The Beatles. Why is that so bad? Seriously. I think she made him better. Their relationship really shines thru on this film. They really worked well together. She was not only his muse, but his advocate, his protector, translator, colaborator... equal. It's quite frightening and inspiring at the same time.

3/27/11

Sun, 27 Mar 2011 18:28:59 -0400

You will have to excuse my slight state of inebriation. I was at the Corner Brewery with Jaimie and they happened to be out of beef. This is important to know since that's what I ordered on my burger and they didn't tell me until about 20 minutes later. Apologizing profusely, the barista (who was pretty cute BTW) asked if I would like to order anything else, saying it might take about half an hour to get more beef. I told her the wait would be OK but if it went much beyond half an hour to just slip some tempeh on it and don't tell me.

After about half an hour another barista (equally cute) stated that they still didn't have any beef. I reiterated the tempeh story and she walked away to get my salad. When she came back she had three tokens for free beers. um... SCORE! This is why I'm blogging drunkenly.

Now on to more important matters...

So, here in the fine state of Michigan, we pay to jail more people than we pay to educate. We are about to pay less to education. This will likely lead to more people being jailed. Warehousing, if you like. Now the Jesus freaks want us to make more people, but seriously, what's the point if, at the end of the day, we end up just warehousing them. Is this so when Jesus rises up from the dead again to lead the zombie infestation, we have some place to point them to so they can feed for awhile giving the rest of us fortunate (or rich enough) the time necessary to figure out how to stop the invasion?

3/24/11

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 20:01:19 -0400

So I finally pulled the files upstairs for "Day Trip To The Insane Asylum" for me to mix. I'm one song in and it sounds good so far. I'm having difficulty getting inspired, though. I have time to work on this stuff, but the job schedule kind of weirds me out. I'm getting used to it but it's slow. Mira wants me out of bed by 9am regardless of whether I went to bed at 1am or 3am. I end up moving to the couch and sleeping with her there for another hour every morning.

In the meantime, I'm slowly getting the house in order. I just finished some much needed repairs in the kitchen today and tomorrow I get my one gutter fixed and the roof properly ventilated and and the attic insulated. Kind of pricey to do it, but it needed to be done. I'm also sealing the cracks in the sill between the house and the basement a little at a time. Since winter is almost over, I'm not moving fast on this. I can't wait to start planning the garden.

I also broke down and ordered an iPad 2 through work. I think Garageband may go a long way to rekindling my creative urges and I also just snagged a paint app for the phone that'll also work on it. I'll try to post the stuff I like as I create it. The great thing will be how light my bag is going to get once I can leave the laptop at home.

2/16/11

Wed, 16 Feb 2011 20:31:34 -0500

I have a job and it's not too bad. I work nights which works out great for the dogs, but not so much for Lauren and I. We only see each other on the weekends now. At least I have an income again that doesn't involve making a call to a machine every two weeks. Of course I'm back doing tech support. It's a good company, though, and the people I work with directly are pretty cool. There's also room to move up as they are growing. So far so good.

Speaking of growing, Mira is getting big! She's over 40 lbs now and she's hit her teen years. Selective hearing in full effect. She still likes to cuddle, though. I woke up this morning with her sleeping on my leg. I didn't want to move because she was being so cute.

I got very close to finishing my latest solo effort. I'm one track away from completion. So far the tile will be "Day Trip To The Insane Asylum." I created almost the entire thing using the Soundlab 4.0. The last track I'm doing, though, involves the kick drum on the R5. I may end up laying down a bass feedback track too, but I won't know until after I finish the drum take. I played some of it for Goossen and he got excited, so I think this one will be good. I've abandoned the guitar record for now. Possibly I'll hand it off to AYTBN.

2/9/11

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 11:12:06 -0500

I have a job now so don't feel bad if I don't return a call very quickly (or e-mail etc). The training has been rough but I work with a good group of people. Nuff said.

I'm close to finishing a new record. I just need to review the tracks and make sure they are what I want them to be. Then mix and master. I'll need to come up with a cover as well. Maybe tonight.

12/6/10

Mon, 06 Dec 2010 10:16:53 -0500

I forgot to blog through November. It was a weird month, so I apologize for those of you actually reading these ramblings. I'll try to post more often.

Bob Pierce died. I first got a Facebook message from Kevin Sobieski. In it he told me that Bob was in the hospital and that it didn't look good. I knew he'd been ill over the course of the last year or so, but I was still shocked. I rifled off an e-mail to Colleen and Amy (his sister-in-law and wife respectively) letting them know if they needed anything to let me know. Bob was at St. Joe's which is a lot closer to me than to either of their homes. Within a couple hours, though, Kevin sent out the second message. Bob had died.

It all went so fast. I could believe it. I started spreading the word. Larry had just come back into town for a minute between horse track gigs. We made plans to do whatever was needed. Larry talked to Jeremy. The three of us (separately) told Eric if he needed money to come up from Chicago he had it. And so on.

10/31/10

Sun, 31 Oct 2010 13:04:38 -0400

Happy Halloween!!!

Last night I, Sue Blair, and her brother, David, went to a couple rural haunted houses. The first one we went to was pretty good. It was Darksyde Acres in Jonesville, just south of Hanover (Geoff will like this as Hanover figures in nicely to the evening later on). This place was pretty big with Zombieland playing on a projector against a large screen as you pull in. It cost $20 for three haunted houses (although it felt like we only went into two separate ones). The walk through was pretty sweet for the moderate amount of effects done. Most everything looked like it was cheaply done compared to other haunted houses I've been to but this was all done to brilliant effect. The zombie stripper on a pole was a definite stand out. I won't give away the best part of that, though.

After exiting the haunted houses, they had large bonfires set up and a band setting up. The band was obviously local amateurs and pretty badly trying to blend metal and ska. This would be the first detraction. Across from the stage area was a Zombie Shoot. This was cool. Some kid in Zombie mask and clothing runs around a target shooting gallery while you shoot paint balls at him. I pegged him in the throat! The kid was really cool about it. Said it was the best shot he had taken throughout the whole run. All in all a pretty good time.

10/27/10

Wed, 27 Oct 2010 12:23:26 -0400

So I've been alternately reading for school and working in the studio for the last few days. I'm starting to get the feel for this solo effort. It's going to be mostly pretty. I think I may do two releases. One of the tracks will not work with this project and I have another longer piece that I did via soundlab that may work with it. So an album and an EP, I think.

Anthea and I are getting together tomorrow. Hopefully we'll discuss this long gestating project we have. I really wanted her to mix it, but she wants to add live drums to it. We'll see. Regardless, it will be awesome to hang with her.

I'm also slowly formulating something that could be either a largish article or a book. It all depends on how much information I can get my hands on. Stay tuned.

I'm hungry. Anyone want to go get a burger?

9/30/10

Thu, 30 Sep 2010 18:42:01 -0400

Go read these two articles here and here. Unfortunately, this happens way more frequently than I would like. Witness the abuse this kid's getting from a public official. This shit has to stop.

I'm sick right now. My throat is on fire and nothing seems to cool it down. Wishing I had health insurance.

9/29/10

Wed, 29 Sep 2010 11:40:48 -0400

So I'm in the throws of my last semester at EMU. I never want to come back here. It's a pretty shitty school all said and told. Most of my professors have been good. The bureaucracy is painful, though, and I refuse to come back for my masters. Not at EMU at least.

I need update this site more, I know. The problem is one of too much time on my hands and next to no inspiration. My Facebook account doesn't help this situation. If it weren't such a good communication tool I'd kill it for my sanity's sake. So I'm going to try and write in here everyday. Even if it's just posting a few links. Eventually I'll get back to posting about music again.

Speaking of which, I have several projects up in the air. Anthea just moved here (to Ypsi). We may get that record mixed and mastered after all. I'm working with a drummer (Josh Weichmann) on a new project that is slowly coming together improvisationally speaking. Eric Brown and I recording some tracks while he was here in August. Josh laid down some drum tracks. I have an idea for more my tracks, but have yet to do anything. Eric has copies now and hopefully will be adding some kind of vocal. My album is on hold for lack of direction.

7/10/10

Sat, 10 Jul 2010 12:56:51 -0400

Things have been strange for me over the last few months. The creative process was wounded due to the ever moving target that are goals and too-much-time-on-my-hands syndrome. You'd think I'd be outputting a great deal of work, but I grew content in my relaxation. No more. I'm going to start planning out my days and checking things of my to-do list.

1/27/10

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 22:39:16 -0500

The people's historian has died this day. 87 is a long time to live, but it doesn't lessen our need for men like him. And so it goes.

Apple released the iPad today. For my needs it's virtually useless. I would rather it have the full version of OS X than the iPhone version of the OS. It would be way more versatile then. I can see it's usefulness in education, though. One to one laptop program? Screw that! Buy this. It's a closed environment meant to fail very infrequently. The ability to use it for text books and the web is nice. It has iWork for $10 an app. The only issues I see are a) how would you deploy them with all of the curriculum needed, b) since you can't just drag and drop documents to it, how exactly does one work with iWork, c) how would one print from this thing (srsly this is an issue in education even though printing paper should be irrelevant by now), and d) in order for the program to work these things need to go home with the kids. Is it durable enough to do that? I don't know, but we have two months for Apple to solve those issues or explain how they "just work." Regardless I think it has potential. Having seen quite a few kids with backpacks so heavy you wonder why their backs aren't broken yet, the idea of having all those books in a slim 1 pound computing device is very intriguing.

1/13/10

Wed, 13 Jan 2010 10:36:57 -0500

Someone can't seem to keep their hand out of the crazy box.

My favorite part of the whole article, “It’s pretty made up,” Palin said of the book (“Game Change” written by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann), which she said she has not read. Palin said she did not watch interviews with the two reporters or Schmidt on CBS’s “60 Minutes” Sunday because she was warned it was “bull.”

The real problem is that she's too pretty to just go away. If you believe this to be untrue take a close look at Paris Hilton's "career." This is the flip side of the power of pussy people. The seedy underbelly rife with white privilege, patriarchy, and the sweet sweet smell of greed.

On a musical note (um...sorry about that) I found new toys to lust after. You can look at them here. If someone wanted to be really nice and buy one of any of the three for me that would be really nice.

A real super hero is taken out of the game.

Sanity is in sight at least in one dark corner.

1/6/10

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 19:13:04 -0500

I'm a little freaked out. I have (hopefully) one more semester left to finish my bachelors degree in History. Then what? Fuck I don't know how to answer that. SRSLY. I'll likely try to get a job of some sort to bring in some money while I figure out grad school or some sort of certification on top of what I have. I definitely don't want to teach at the K-12 stage and I'd rather not teach at all. I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

For now, I have the most awesomest girlfriend in the world, tons of friends, great pets, and my health.

I've started my next solo effort and it's going really well so far. The next As Yet To Be Named record is in it's beginning stages. Drumbeats are going down and more to come today. I'll post more here as things develop. School will need to come first but I'm hoping to clear out some projects as I go through the semester. Chris is working on some video stuff to go up on here (Porkfist, Rustbelt Unsemble) and I'm going to start storyboarding an improvisational film I've been thinking about for awhile now.

1/7/10

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 08:54:17 -0500

"If there's a lesson to be learned from the last two hundred years, it's that while communication devices will invariably magnify us to the latest degree, they won't fix us. We've got to fix ourselves. We're the ultimate glitch. And if there's no code or universal workaround for us so far, there's always hope."

~Matthew Lasar

It's pretty much true as far as I'm concerned. I've never really seen technology as the solution for every problem. Is it a great communication tool? Of course it is. Can it it put food on the table? Not entirely and certainly not for everyone.

Today is my first day of school. I have three classes to get through. Fortunately Lauren's in one of them. The sad thing is she's leaving right now to go to her first class. It's 9am.

Worked with Randy in the studio last night. Awesome ensued!

11/24/09

Thu, 24 Dec 2009 09:12:41 -0500

Yeah, it's been awhile. New sites up now. Go peruse.

Now on to the fun. I'm in Pennsylvania for the holidays. I'm surrounded by children glued to a Looney Tunes cartoon. We're all laughing at the same time, but at totally different stuff. Here's what I'm laughing at. That's what they get for not studying!

9/20/09

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:46:23 -0500

I think I spend too much time on Facebook. There are cobwebs and crickets going on in here.

So I'm in school now and I'm already behind. I spent Friday getting domestic stuff dealt with instead of studying and I'm really all the better for it. I have my mortgage payment lowered now. This is a good thing short term, but I'll need to refinance again once I'm working full-time. It went down so low that, if I'm careful, I'll even be able to fix a few things around the house.

I love tai-chi! I have class every Saturday, but I've already worked the moves into my regular workout routine. I use it as the cool down part of my three day a week workout. Then I do just the tai-chi on Tuesday and Thursday. Cutting alcohol out of my diet back to one day a week has helped enormously too. The litle bit of gut I picked up is slowly leaving.

Musically things are a little on hold, but I'm working out getting my newest solo effort posted to Tunenami. I'll be hitting up FB and the mailing list after everything is working.

8/5/09

Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:42:12 -0500

Maynard gets feedback on a thread on prostitution in Ypsi from a former hooker. A stellar read.