But! There is a silver lining. I found a store called Daddy’s Junky Music. They sell used gear in stores and online. They have a unit that sounds like its in better shape and they want $30 less. I have to return the one I got, but at least I can get a pretty good replacement. I emailed them to get an idea of its condition and if everything sounds cool then when I get my refund money I’ll order it.

I hope the Korg ER-1 is in better shape.

Yeah, I got it after all. It was totally worth the wait. I met up with the seller in the driving rain. Because of a few loose keys the seller dropped the price. He was awesome. Turns out he does scores for student films and such. Slowly, but surely I’m getting in touch with the synth guys of Austin.

The CZ-101 is truly unique. The only way I can describe it is that it sounds like an FM synth, but is programmed more like an analog synth. It has two voices and each voice has an 8(!) stage envelope for each of the DCO, DCF (called DCW), and the DCA. They can be used separately, together or one can be doubled. One voice can ring modulate the other and there is a noise generator to add grit. It has MIDI (up to 4 parts monophonic/multi-timbral), vibrato, and portamento. It’s very versatile. I can’t wait to use it in a mix. Oh, yeah! I almost forgot, it has pegs for a strap to wear it like a keytar! sweet.

The first song was a no brainer. In 1997, I was spending a lot of time slacking around with my buddy Josh, making music with whatever device we could get our hands on. I had bought a Roland MC-303 and we decided to try our hand at making a hip hop song. We didn’t have proper recording equipment, so we patched the mono output of the MC-303 into the left mic input on a tape deck I had and a mic in to the right input. This totally separated the vocals from the music. When it played back it was like listening to one of the first stereo albums with wacky extreme stereo effects, before they calmed down and put the vocals in the middle. It was fun but always kind of disappointing. The other problem was that we used a shitty mic without a pop filter so the vocals were really muddy. Most of the words were unintelligible.

Now, 13 years later, I’ve digitized the two tracks, cleaned them up (the best I could), mixed it to center and equalized it. It’s no Phil Specter Wall-of-Sound classic, but it sounds a lot better than it did and I’m happy to release it. Since I have the music and vocals separated, I think there might be a 2010 remix in the future.

Please understand that we’re not rappers. This was just for fun. Two dumb slackers playing around. I produced the beat and melody, Josh wrote and rapped the first half, I wrote and rapped the second half.

Style 2 Sell.flac (Lossless)
Style 2 Sell.oga (OGG Vorbis)

The ER-1 is a percussion synthesizer (fancy talk for drum machine). It has 4 virtual analog synths you can program to make bass drums, zaps, glitchy clicks, etc. and 4 sampled drums (open hi hat, closed hi hat, crash cymbal and hand clap). The samples are similar the 606 or 808 sounds, but the 4 perc synths are TOTALLY customizable. Lots of creative potential. It has a built in sequencer like the 606/808. Unlike those, the ER-1 has MIDI and when you tweak a knob in real-time, it can save the performance as part of the loop. Also it looks dope. For $150, you can’t go wrong.

The EA-1 is a monophonic virtual analog synthesizer that tries its best to pretend to be a TB-303. Like the TB-303, it has a built in sequencer and a monophonic voice. Unlike the TB-303, it has MIDI, built in effects, and is 2 part multitimbral (plays two separate bass/lead lines and sounds per pattern). It also has an audio input jack that passes through the filter. It can use the audio in to modulate OSC 2. Like the ER-1, it can remember the tweaks you do. For instance I can rhythmically tweak the cut off of the filter, save the rhythm, and apply that to my guitar playing.

Only downside is that I had to buy them off eBay as they are out of production. Hopefully there are no issues, but baring that, I should have them by the end of next week. Like Tom Petty said, “waiting is the hardest part”. If I can get this CZ-101 today, then I’ll have my toy to play with until they arrive.

I have an original SNES, a DSi, and a Wii. I also have a knock off Yobo NES. I would love to get a restored original NES and an Advance SP (to play OG Game Goy games with a backlight). Tracking down the individual games will be a little hard, but thats part of the fun, I guess. There are easier and cheaper ways to play these games (emulators, anyone?), but I want the real thing.

Speaking of the real thing, I might be getting a Casio CZ-101! This is identical to the CZ-1000, but has smaller keys and regular buttons. This is Casio’s “Phase Distortion” synth. Digital and totally different in tone and character from my Nord Lead 2. For a while I was using the VST version of the CZ-101 called “PlastiCZ”, but I love hands on gear. I really look forward to setting up my studio as I piece it together.

Today I got the van back. I dropped it off yesterday and picked it up this afternoon. Since last Friday the engine was overheating. On Monday I tried to fix a leak in the cooling system and broke a bolt off in the water heater in the process. In the end I sealed it up, and that didn’t stop the overheating. So I took it in to the shop (with a thermostat that I got on the cheap) and had them put the thermostat in and seal cooling system properly. It worked. Well, it worked after I discovered that the radiator cap was either left off or it was on loosely. Either way, after I put the cap on, the van is running cool. There is a scrape/whining/squeaking noise coming from the rear drivers side wheel. The brakes work, but I will look in to it. At the very worst I’ll have do a brake job.

Today at work, while I was out, they had the meeting to tell us who is getting furloughed and who is staying. I wasn’t there and I think they tell us one at a time. So tomorrow I get the big news. Either I stick around for a while longer (could be all year) or I get let go next Tuesday. I’m not that worried. If I stay, that means more money. If I get let go, that means more time. Either way, I’ll be fine. If I get laid off, that means that I can try some of my other income ideas. PC work, writing, activism, volunteer work, eBay, web work, etc. Also more time for music and working out. I’ll have to find a temp/part time job, but that’s later.

We’ll see what happens.

First, watch a bit of this:

Then watch this:

Repeat with any other Songsmith videos you can find. You’re welcome.

We played around with guitars and writing songs and had a band with several different line ups. Once out of high school, it got harder and harder to stay in touch as it always seems to be. Our musical ambitions diverged and that was sort of that. We’ve stayed great friends, even though my musical progression has atrophied. Andy, on the other hand, has been pretty active. He’s been in several bands, DJed at clubs, promoted his own club, and other various musical endeavors. I envy him a bit, but I know I’m the only one holding me back on that stuff. Music is hard hard work. It’s fun and it can be the best time of your life, but it takes dedication, thick skin, and a fair bit of stubbornness. I’ve got plenty of reasons (or excuses if you prefer) for the choices I’ve made (bills to pay, a girlfriend to support, etc), but the biggest roadblock has always been my homebody nature.

But none of that is really what I’m thinking about tonight. I’m not lamenting how much my out of shape musical career imitates my couch potato body. Tonight I’m thinking about that big box of tapes in the closet that represent the body of my musical work. I have something like 30 tapes that contain various musical pieces, complete and incomplete, that need to be transferred to digital. The process is easy enough, but I need a decent cassette deck to play them back in to my PC. And then there are the 4 track masters.

A “4 track” recorder is a tape recorder used for creating songs. Cassette tapes store stereo recordings on both sides of the tape. A standard tape player has a “2 heads” for playback and can play 1 side at a time. A 4 track has “4 heads” for recording and playback and can record or playback both sides at once. Since each side is stereo, this gives you 4 total audio channels per tape, or “4 tracks”. The 4 track recorder allows you to discreetly record 4 separate performances to those 4 tracks. Add in the ability to pan each track left or right, set the playback volume, and adjust the EQ for each track, and you have a mini recording studio. Once you have all the music recorded on the 4 track, you can play it in to a standard tape recorder and “mix down” the whole song to a stereo recording (with all your pan/volume/EQ settings intact). Of course there are ways to squeeze more tracks out of a 4 track and that is were science meets art. A talented four track engineer can make some pretty amazing recordings with one of these decks. I loved mine.

These days you can download a program like Audacity and have 1000 tracks of audio, all crystal clear digital and non destructive, for free. But it’s on you PC and like any other piece of software, its about as reliable as your PC is. You miss alot of the immediacy that comes with a 4 track. Plus a 4 track is a lot easier to operate drunk or intoxicated. With a 4 track you can sit down, plug in, and hit record. You don’t need to wait for boot up or your virus scanner. You don’t get distracted by Digg or have to figure out why your sound card isn’t making any noise. It’s just one REC button away.

Alas, the only 4 track I have at the moment is a Tascam Porta 02 that Erin gave to Corin. It’s missing the power supply and a replacement is $25-$45 on eBay. The funny part is that a Porta 02 with the power supply included is only $9.99! But if I’m going to buy the whole thing, maybe I might want something with a few more features. But man, tapes? Talk about dinosaurs.

I really miss 4 track recording. It was a lot of fun and I always felt productive when I finished mixing down a track.