Gear Lust

Working in JP's studio B has caused me to experience a condition common to musicians: gear lust. I did all the overdubs on this album using 3 mics, 1 mic pre and a couple different compressors. If you don't count the last session I did with Pauli on Percussion. Jonathan hooked me up with another mic pre and compressor chain for that.

I've been pricing the mics on eBay used and they've been going used for about 600, 400 and 150 respectively. The mic pre around 1200 ad the compressors around the same.

Luckily, 2 things keep me from upgrading my studio setup. 1. I don't have that kind of cash. 2. I'm almost done with the album.

I've been getting myself set up in case the transplant comes sooner. Although I'd be pretty much confined to the hospital for 3 months, I could set up my rig in my room and still do some recording. I think that'd be a very cool thing to keep me going.

I talked to J. Beckett who had a SCT from a related donor, and he said he set up his computer and used it quite a bit. I'm not sure how often I'll feel like doing it, but my grandpa Miller always said it's better to have and it need it than need it and not have it.

Any recording, I make there probably won't be as slick as the one I'm making now. I have a decent Rhode NT1 microphone which works alright on my voice. But the trumpet won't sound nearly as good without the AKG 414. I recorded all the trumpets using that mic with no compression (which was a bit of a drag - no compression I mean.) I actually haven't heard a better mic for trumpet until you triple the price. Very warm, kind of chocolaty. A subtle, but very noticable difference between that and the Rhode which is not flattering to the trumpet at all. Those of you who read my facebook updates remember when I had to re-record some horn parts. Part of it was I was re-doing the first song I reecorded. I decided I couldn't live with that sound.

Stick Boy didn't have that mic either, but Todd Reising did a great job engineering it. Anyway, assuming I get a chance to make another album, I'll purchase oe of those models for overdubbing. Drums I'll still do in the studio. i hope I get a chance.

Anyway, I go back down to Texas on the 22nd. I'm going by myself this time. We are a little short of cash for the extra plane ticket plus Jana would lose a day at work. I'll lose one day of jazz three, which won't be too bad and we had an extra full rehearsal, so it will all even out.

I'm not looking forward to the BMB, but when do I ever? I won't have been back on the trial too long, so I can only hope I that the cancer didn't progress much during that 3 month break.

I still feel good. I've been burning the midnight oil on the album while I was in studio B. Now that I'm back in my office, It's mostly clean up stuff. Going through track by track and listening for stray sounds, clicks, pops creaks, talking.... Larry of you're reading this, that is some habit you've got.

It's all busy work I can do myself in my own space, on my own time and not pay someone else to do it out of pocket. It is very tedious work, however.

Chris is coming over tomorrow night, assuming the weather cooperates. He'll lay down a solo on one of the tunes. I thought I was done with all the lead vocals, but I realized today that one of the big signature tunes on the album still has a scratch vocal. So, back to my trusty NT1 for that. I'll try to borrow a compressor. Once you get used to hearing your voice compressed, it is a very good sound. And you don't have to watch the levels so close when you are your own engineer. But, you can alco be a human compressor and just ride the fader while you sing. It takes some practice and coordination, but it can be done.

One day, I'll write my explanation blog. I'm making a big deal out of this recording, but with the technology available today, making a record just isn't that big of a deal. Why am I making such a big deal about it. That's another blog.

I've been very busy!

Well, I just read a column about SLL/CLL the duel designation of the disease is confusion for a lot of people (myself included). There is a new column on CLL Topics that tackles the differences.

I thought I had a pretty good handle on it. And generally I do. But I lost a thought with which I had been consoling myself. The conventional wisdom for CLL is the longer you wait for treatment the better, with indications for treatment being: large nodes, or B symptoms (night sweats, weight loss, etc.) . I consoled myself with the thought that if I had found it earlier, my treatment would have been largely the same.

Now I know different. If I had found this while it was in stage one or stage two, The treatment would have been radiation and it would have been curative an amazingly large number of cases. But now that my bone marrow is involved there is no difference in terms of treatment.

If you are really interested, you can read the article here.

In the meantime, I start Rituxan again tomorrow. Oh, I forgot. I don’t think I’ve mentioned it yet. I am back on the clinical trial. I was thinking that I would pick up where I left off. No go. The months I missed are gone. The trial is still open ended, however. So, I could potentially stay on Revlimid as long I am getting a response. No word on a potential match from MDA. Also no word on what kind of time frame we might be looking at on the transplant.

On the recording project front, I am very close. I have 2 major instruments missing from two songs and several vocal and percussion parts. I had to leave the studio early today, and I’ll lose all day tomorrow because of the Rituxan infusion.

I brought Bethany and Kaitlyn in to sing some parts. I’m obviously doing lot’s of parts myself and that sounds very slick and very studio. It’s a good sound, but I want to have more than one kind of song on the album. Anyway, I’ll have lot’s of different background voices, besides myself.

This album is my love letter to R&B and horn bands. I have some funk, some Memphis style R&B some 50’s flavored grooves, as well as some studio horn band vibes. I can’t promise you’ll like it all, but it is the kind of album I like. Lot’s of different styles, different grooves and different sounds.

I doubt it’ll be what you would call “major label” quality, but it will be a nice little project. I’ll write about it soon. As Chris Taylor came over to record guitar parts, I realized I have been working on this project for a year. It took me that long to figure out the best way to go about it. I’ll write a blog about the journey very soon.

My Health

Sorry it has been so long since my last post. As I mentioned, no news is good news.

Cancer is a war of attrition, so things go slow mostly. I am almost back to normal levels of my Thyroid Stimulating Hormone. Apparently it has a very long half life in your system.

I started back on the clinical trial on Saturday. My last blood results were disappointing. My tests in Houston were all in the normal rangea couple months ago. And now with just a couple months off the trial, all my blood counts were a little low. Nothing giganticly off the scale, like the thyroid thing. But white counts, red counts and platelets were all low. Hard to say what that means. I know what I think...

Still, the trial was obviously working before. They might bounce back. It might just be a side effect of the head cold I have (again).

No word on the transplant or whether they've found another donor for me. And as I mentioned earlier my transplant doctor wants to move ahead quickly and a little more aggresively and Dr. K seems to want to finesse it along a little bit. They lowered the dose of Revlimid and it takes a little while to work, so we'll definitely be in wait and see mode. A good guess on when the transplant will be is: when I stand the best chance of having my CLL cured.

I just read a blog of a man with CLL who relapsed after his transplant. I know of several people who didn't make it past the first year post transplant from various treatment related problems. But I have read blogs of people who did pretty well after a non-related donor transplant. There are a lot of factors at work.

Anyway,I've been busily recording my album. I hope to get Guitars and Vocals over the next two weeks. The great thing about immersing yourself in work is that you can forget you're sick, mostly. Great therapy. Work I love doing.

I played a gig on Saturday which went pretty well. Kim Bright Finn came up. I was so touched. We took her out for Sunday dinner with the whole family. It was so much fun.

Speaking of which, I need to get back to work. I had to stay home this morning and wait for the microwave repairman. He's gone and now I need to get to the studio.

As you can see from the widget above, my video funding project is close to done. I have 12 more days to get the remaining $200+ which gives the greenlight for production. I am still hoping to surpass that figure. The bigger budget Jesse Ewles has to work with, the slicker the video will be.

I have to admit, however, that some of his most creative stuff was done with next to nothing. I thought the balloon animal idea was da bomb. Kinda scary. Very striking images.

Anyway, off to the studio.

Be well.

Tortoise and the Hare.

I’ve always tried to teach my kids to be the tortoise. I encourage that ethos and I try so hard to live by it. The sad truth however is the artistic personality tends towards the Hare. It would be great to be the kind of artist that sets aside a certain amount of time every day to create and hone your craft et cetera, but so many of us get possessed by the creative spirit and when that is coupled with opportunity, we can work endlessly.

So it is now that I am deeply into my album!

The only thing I’ve lacked is the opportunity. I do need the other musicians to play their parts. I need a recording engineer to make sure I am getting the best sounds possible. Those technical skills aren’t a part of my arsenal. So I’ve had to work my schedule around the availability of those resources. But now the editing and recording is really starting in earnest. I’ve logged about 30 hours the last 3 days! I’ve gotten some great keyboard tracks and laid down some good trumpet tracks. Now that I am deeply into the project, I see that there is now way I’m going to get it done before the first of the year.

True, I now have big blocks of time to devote, but I also have quite a few family commitments, doctor appointments and gigs. I am feeling pretty good, but even without the cancer, I have a hard time pulling all-nighters these days.

Anyway, I am excited and being excited makes me want to work more. Working more gets me excited. It’s a vicious cycle.

There is still so much to do, including the Stickboy video project. It really makes me feel like I’m thumbing my nose at cancer! I am going to beat it, because not only do I have the will, I have a reason. I love creating and when death finally comes for me, he’ll have to knock loudly. I’ll be too busy to answer the door.

No News is Good News

I've been getting some emails reminding me that I haven't blogged lately: Randy, Mom, My daughter.

And the whole point of this blog was to let everyone know how things were going, without spending 3 or 4 hours on the phone talking to everyone. (Although I do love to talk to you all.)

I've been a bit frustrated with my album project. I'm slightly over budget for the editing/overdub segment so I took some time to get my home recording rig updated so I could edit things myself and hopefully make up that part of the budget. In fact I am about to put a rough mix of a song online somewhere so I can get some feedback on it. I think it will be the second single 3 -6 months after I officially release everything.

It has taken a little longer than I thought. But I do have it up and running and I just spent the weekend overdubbing horn parts. I'll post a rough mix somewhere.

As far as my health goes, no news is good news. If I feel good I'm trying to work every minute I can. If I'm sick in bed I have time to update my online blogs and social networking profiles.

So I actually feel great. I've been meaning to update my blog. But I am knee deep in my album. I am trying to make hay while the sun shines, so to speak. Once they got my thyroid back on track I started feeling better (it took a couple weeks). Although for a couple months I felt as bad as I've ever felt.

The long term plan is the same: get into remission then get transplanted. How long that will take still remains to be seen. I am still on hold for the clinical trial. I should go back on it after the holidays if my Thyroid levels stay in a good range.

It seemed to be working until all hell broke loose with the thyroid. If it continues to work, I could be on that for another year. I am still trying to put as much time between me and my transplant as possible, though. I still have a lot of stuff I want to do that would be nice to have in place before I am out of circulation for a year. (For instance, a way to support myself - more or less for that year - we'll have to make up Jana's salary too or pay someone to take care of me...)


I feel like I end up saying the same thing over and over, I'm hoping you all don't mind. I don't expect you to remember everything about my situation all the time and this save you from scanning all my back posts (unless you want to... some of them are pretty good , I think).

In the mean time, call your mother. She told me she hadn't heard from you in a while.

Our New Dog

We got a new dog! She is a really gentle girl and we are so lucky to have her.

We are still thinking of the name. Suggestions?

Stable!

Even though I had to take a break to get my Thyroid balanced again, The break has been useful for re-staging the disease. My nodes are stable since my last CT and the amount of cancer in my bone marrow is down to 10%. So this is all very good news.

Healthwise, I'll be starting the protocol again, I think. I'll be waiting to hear from Dr. Keating. And I should be getting the CPAP machine soon. I think the trouble with my sleeping was mostly due to the thyroid thing. I was really swollen and I think I was even swelling in my throat. Now that things are more regulated, I've been sleeping very well, even without the machine.

I am feeling great now. My energy is back and I've been using every available minute in the recording studio. Ideally, I'll have all the tracking done in a couple weeks (mid December) and then I'll let it sit for a while before I mix it down. That way I can make any changes.

In the mean time, I really need to get my video funded. I need to be at 50% funding by day 45 (1/2 way) and that is less than a week away. If you've already funded the album, thanks. If you feel like helping me a little more I really do appreciate it. My time table runs into April. By Late March/early April the video should be done and the Album should be up on itunes and Amazon and ready for official release.

I posted a more detailed table for backers on my project page at grooveduke.net.

For those of you interested in the long view, I am already funding the next album at Sellaband (again). Sellaband's website underwent some changes and during that time, I really couldn't reccomend it and I was debating whether or not to withdraw. But by all appearences, they have fixed the site. So even though it is competing with my video project, I am still using it as a fundraising site. I am doing comparisons between it and Kickstarter. To see which website will get my continued business. And I think that will largely depend on you folks.

The one where I am able to get people to actually support my nusical projects will be the website I use. So if you have any preferences, please write and let me know. I may do a compare/contrast article soon.

In the meantime, I am in this weird place: I have to be prepared for a coupkle eventualities. On the one hand, I need to be ready for the transplant, even though I don;'t know when it will be. On the other hand, I need to continue to promote my music and work on projects as though it weren't going to happen. My biggest worry in all of this is continuing to make a living. I know that when I'm in Texas, I won't be able to teach. And when I come back I'll practically have to start from scratch building my trumpet studion again. I am trying to be in a place were at least the selling music aspect will not be back at square one.