I Remember the Stones on the Beach

In December of 2016, I felt creatively unfulfilled after the end of Beat Noir and decided that I needed to fight that feeling by outlining some writing and music goals on the blog. By writing it down here, it would be more real and some people would know about it. Maybe that would make it more important? I referred to it as "the project" to myself that year.

Jesus Christ, IMU is so navel-gazey. I'll try to not be so nostalgic and talking about past things I've done so much in the future. This is a tendency in myself I don't like and try to work against.

Second note: Each IMU title is usually taken from a song I'm listening to while writing the post. Though I enjoy making references to other things I enjoy, it can sure make it hard to find the specific post I'm trying to reference.

It took a while, but most of those project actually got done. The baseball zine came out later that year and the short stories that I thought were actually good ended up on the wordpress.

By far, the hardest part for me was the songs. For whatever reason, finishing songs has never been in my DNA, which is probably why I functioned much better as Beat Noir's long-term hired gun on bass. I've (mostly) consistently tried to write my own songs since I've played bass and guitar, but I've never been able to get over the hump that comes after the initial burst of ideas that generates something new. Maybe it's because I've never made the jump of working on them with other people. Maybe it's because I am bad at writing songs. Maybe it's because I'm scared of finishing them.

I wanted to get five songs down with the hope of making a demo and eventually I did that. Then I realized that some of those ideas sucked and I moved onto new ones. Then I decided I didn't want to make a 5-song demo.

Ultimately, the songs were the ones that project that petered out the most. It was easy to just put the other stuff out into the internet and have them live there. The songs required a lot more effort and needed me to learn how to do new things, like recording at home, that were a lot of work. I looked into getting some equipment to do that, but then gave up. I downloaded Reaper to get started on some tracks, but then gave up.

I'm still working on them, albeit in the most minimal way possible. I even came up with a name, The Vice (a reference to Northrop Frye, not the website) and had a pretty solid vision of what it would be like that has mostly stuck (all songs in DAEAC#E, emo meets 80's power pop with Tony Molina aesthetic). Three-ish years later, I have 7 songs with lyrics (and two covers that are original enough that they get a mention here) and have moved onto the idea of only doing 2-song digital singles, should I ever do enough work to release them (I probably won't). I got into playing to drum loops for a while and feel like that will stick.

I write all of this because putting it down somewhere makes it feel more real, even if posting it on IMU is, for all intents and purposes, shouting into the void. To me, writing it out here is a way of me affirming to myself that it's real, even when I haven't been giving it much attention.

A tepid and, to be honest, pretty cowardly way of doing that, but a way nonetheless. Maybe one day The Vice will come to life in a more tangible way.

I'll Put It in a Place We Can Both Forget

A collection of random thoughts for you on a Friday afternoon.

I cannot tell you why, but today I started thinking a lot about the movie Donnie Darko. Rebecca and I were discussing it recently and we both agreed that it falls into the category of "Movies That People in Your First Year Dorm Like to Prove That They Are 'Deep'". I still stand by that, I guess. I was introduced to the movie by my brother, who fell in love with it while he was in university and it was released, so much so that his email at the time was "mikeydarko". I was only about 12 or 13 at the time and hadn't been exposed to "thriller" or "philosophical", or even "indie", movies yet, so  Donnie Darko seemed like this crazy distinctive thing to me. Upon revisiting it years later, I was a little bummed to find that the movie didn't quite live up the version that I had kept in my mind all those years. But still, while it's not a perfect movie by any means, it will still always live in a nice, little nostalgic corner of my mind for what it meant to me at one time. Plus, the imagery of Donnie with Frank the Rabbit is great and the soundtrack bangs.

Everyone knows the Jules and Andrews version of "Mad World" from the movie. Have you heard the Makeshift Heroes version? It's wonderful.

I am a huge fan of Pete Holmes' podcast You Made It Weird. Pete's empathetic and a gifted conversationalist who's adept at being as silly as possible and asking the most personal and deep questions possible at the same time. It's an interesting mix, but I like it. Holmes has an autobiographical show Crashing on HBO that is currently airing its second season. I'm a fan of the show and heartily recommend it, if only for the subtle Christian jokes.

I haven't run into a 2018 record that's turned my world upside down yet. I did listen to Teenage Fanclub Bandwagonesque for the first time today though, and that was just wonderful.

I'm inching towards starting demos for songs I've been working on. They make a lot of sense in my head, but I haven't translated that into any sort of physical form yet. To tide my legions of devoted fans, I've made a playlist on Spotify that is inspiring my approach to them. I love Spotify now, apparently. Check it.

Another key influence: Gated reverb and the drumfill on "Calling in the Air Tonight".

Editor's note: While titling post, I started listening to the above playlist and ended up writing and re-writing three different lines from "Deeper". What a song!