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A lot of things have been going on in a lot of different fields of my life at the moment, so this seems like as good a time as any to sit down and take stock of everything that’s going on and get it all sorted out properly. Music It’s been a busy week for me musically, even though I haven’t finished much of anything. The main reason it has been so busy is that I’ve finally figured out all of my projects and how they’re going to work. I’ve gone back up to three, and I can’t see expanding any further as all three of those projects cover 100% of what I want to do. The first is obviously Philistine on the Sidewalk, which is the one I’ve been creating for recently. Most of the work has been remixing old songs while on the bus, though I’ve already finished three and started two others. Once I finish ten, I’m going to do some final work on them here at home and put them out as an album. I’ve also got that four song EP that I’ve done a little work on and hope to do a little more work on this weekend. I’m tempted to bump the track number up to six, but I’ll consider that once I get further along. There’s also a song I’m working on that I’d like to get up on the site by Monday, so hopefully I can. Did I mention that I’ve also got three songs coming out on three different online compilations as well in the near future? Busy busy busy. While I’ve been working on the PotS project, I’ve been conceptualizing two others. I’ve put some thought into them before and I’m ready to launch them now, though it may be some time before I get much done with them. The second project is not a new project or really a new direction, but I’m ready to fire Amaranthine Skies back up soon and expand upon the sound I started with “Mindtrap” and “Dark Side of Zebes”. In fact, I listened to both of them yesterday to get an idea on which parts of the sound I created on those albums that I want to keep and want to jettison. The next album (whenever I start on it) will probably sound more like those albums rather than the detours that were “Days Gone By, Volume One” (which could have been an album for the next project with some reworking) and “Enveloped” (which could have been a PotS album with some reworking). I’m tempted to add “It Came from Beyond the Oort Cloud” to that list as well, but it’s some deeply ambient keyboard music which could be used as a point of reference for upcoming works, so I’m not going to. The third project is one I’ve been toying with for a few years, but all the pieces finally came together at the office last week. I might have written about going through my entire CD collection and listening for what I want to keep and what I want to sell, though it’s also serving as a way to listen to music that may have been forgotten and potentially use as an influence for my own work. I was listening to a couple of Red House Painters albums and something clicked. Mark Kozelek from RHP is known for taking songs and rearranging them into something that sounds completely different, and it occurred to me that I should try doing that with all those old death metal songs I wrote in the s and rearrange them into something that resembles that 4AD sound that bands like Red House Painters and Mojave 3 have. This third project isn’t going to have a project name – I’m going to release songs under my own name. The music will have a bit of the 4AD feel, but it will also likely sound similar to a good chunk of the latter Natthimmel songs I did, like “Alfred’s Last Day” or “Riding Still Waves”. There might be a little overlap between this and my PotS work, though my own work is going to be more acoustic guitar-focused and mellower. I will also be singing on a good majority of the songs, which is something I haven’t ever really done. I’ve roared and screamed to the high heavens, but there aren’t many songs where I’ve actually sung. There are three on “Days Gone By, Volume One” where I attempt it, but I didn't really go for it. Thanks to playing lots of the Karaoke Revolution, Guitar Hero, and Rock Band games, I know that I have a strong voice and good dynamics. My pitch control needs some work, but practice makes perfect and I likely won’t have anything recorded for this project until next year, which will be ten years after I released my first album under my own name. Hopefully it will sound a little better. I’m also in the throes of finalizing the mix for “A Chip off the Shizz Block, Volume Two”, which hasn’t been nearly as difficult as arranging the tracks. There are 20 tracks altogether and getting the flow right for them was rather time-consuming. Now that I’ve figured it out, the mixing has been rather easy so far in comparison. I don’t want to rush things, so I’m hoping to take a good chunk of time this weekend, next week, and next weekend finalizing the mix to make everything sound as good as possible and have the volumes as close as possible. I’ve also seen some of the art that’s been done for the album and it looks great. Finally, “Nevar Say Die! Compilation, Volume Four” is in progress, but it doesn’t finish up until the end of August, so I’m not going to worry about it yet. Fitness Thankfully, things in this area have been surprisingly simple. I quit going to the gym a couple weeks ago and I’ve dropped from the high 190s to the low 190s. I’ve been hanging around 192 to 193 and I love having the extra time. The caveat? I lift weights here at home six days a week for half an hour a day and do a high intensity cardio workout with lots of striking and jump rope on Saturdays. I’ve been doing an area a day with the weights – Monday for arms, Tuesday for shoulders, Wednesday for chest, Thursday for back, Friday for abs, and today (Saturday) for legs. I do 4 different exercises and six sets each, going from 14 repetitions down to 4. So, 14, 12, 10, 8, 6, 4. It seems to be working like a charm so far, as my stomach is still shrinking and I’m getting more size and definition. It’s also nice not going to the gym (save for chiropractic) because it was so sterile and boring working out there. Also, going to the gym at 5:30 PM after work would prevent me from getting home until 8:30 PM or later. Now that I come straight home after work, I get here at 6:15 to 6:30 PM and have a couple hours at night to work on things. I love it! Gaming I finally got over my Alpha Centauri binge after trying to get a certain map working properly time after time and having little success with it. It was starting to drive me crazy, so I figured that going back to the 360 and working on games for it would be more fun and a welcome break. I was right on both counts. I also noticed that before I stopped playing 360 a couple weeks before Mouse had to be put to sleep, I was in the top million in collecting achievement points worldwide and now I’m below that threshold. I want to work my way back up into the top million and work on getting my completion percentage up, which means going through the games I’ve already started and knocking out achievements. I’ve done Chime (though there’s one more achievement I might be able to do) and I’m working on Puzzle Quest Galactrix now. I might get some Mass Effect or Borderlands in this weekend too. I’m not looking to completely finish everything, but get as many achievements done without sinking ridiculous amounts of time into them. The time-sinking achievements are ones I save for the artistic realm. Beer I drink it on the weekends and it still tastes awesome! I haven’t started reading the micro brewing book yet, but now that I’m allotting a couple hours every weekend to reading, I hope to start it soon. As far as beer goes, I’ve been really enjoying the Brew Free or Die! IPA from the 21st Amendment brewery in San Francisco lately. Finances After talking with my uncle last week about the stock market, I kind of went overboard and did a 10-point test of every stock that I own, every stock that I was watching, and a few more recommendations from friends and blogs that I read on dividend investing. It took a while, but it was assuring to find out a good majority of my portfolio was well chosen. I do have a few that look like poor long-term prospects in the group, though I think they’ll be fine in the short-term. It would be in my best interest to not reinvest those dividends and use them instead to purchase shares of stock that will be good in the long-term, though I’m leaning towards doing that with almost all of my stocks once I build them up some more. Of course, the whole point of all this investing is to have the dividends make up a significant portion of my income, wherein I can use what I need and reinvest the rest to create a larger portfolio and more dividend interest and so on and so forth. It takes money to make money, as they say. Cats There’s not too much new to report here since last week’s post, though Barclay has started to climb under the comforter on my bed and crawl around under there. It’s funny, because Bootsie does the exact same thing, though she usually digs herself under a quilt and stays there for a majority of the day. Everything Else It’s my Mom’s birthday today and with Father’s Day tomorrow, I’m going to take them both out to dinner tonight and maybe do a barbecue with Dad tomorrow if the weather is decent. It wouldn’t be a big deal with the cooking as the grill is under cover, but who wants to barbecue on a rainy day? I also took the time to figure out when I’m going to work on all the projects I have, which also include the revamp of my sites that are in progress. The Realm is the one that’s closest to being done, and I can safely say that the blogs won’t look this way for too much longer. I’ve got a whole new format figured out and I’m going to re-do all the old blogs in that style. I have tons of plans and hopefully I’ll be able to get them all taken care of in a timely fashion. Wish me luck! Discuss this post at [The Forum of Jason Vincion]! Posted on June 19th, 2010. |
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