Too Much Noise.

I find myself tuning out more and more.  Everything these days just seems like a wash.  Too much noise.  The noise I speak of has little to do with sound, but content.  I listen to loud noisy guitar music everyday on my bike everywhere I go.  Somehow all that screeching guitar feedback is more soothing to me than the human voice most times. It’s the over-stimulation that has left me under-stimulated, if that makes sense. 

I'm overwhelmed by useless information, sensationalism, and the disposable culture this world has churned out more and more of.  I find myself checking facebook, and twitter less these days.  The content of 90% of my "friends" is pretty disheartening, uninteresting, or just hostile.   I can only assume the same can be said of some of my content as well.  What was supposed to be a great way for me to keep in contact with friends and family has turned into very little actual interaction, only blind spam like sharing.  The internet card meme thing has worn old, pretty damn quickly too.  Nothing like someone else writing your feelings for you.  Few people seem to be interested in what everyone has to say or what they're actually doing.  We're all now plugged in now to share the mundane that would probably be best left unshared or unliked, or "poked" or whatever. 

This is all ironic too, when I hear so much about our lack of privacy in this age.  Yet, it seems people are perfectly fine sharing so much of their personal lives, and few will give a second thought to uploading any picture onto a social media site.   No one is forcing anyone to do any of this.  Yet there is this huge outrage, I digress, but the point is, more noise. 

How much more noise do we need?  I find my head hurting and my resolve in my fellow humans low at times because of this noise.  This post is more crap added to the pile in the grand scheme of things.  Where do we go from here?  I think it's time for me to step back a bit.  I might even throw my cellphone away, as I rarely have real human interactions these days.  It's rare I even hear a human voice at the other end of my "phone".  Just cold straight text messages or emails.  As much as I tend to loath a lot of humanity, I still need human interactions.  It's what makes me human.


 Or maybe it’s just time for me to start yelling at the neighborhood kids to “get off my lawn”. 

Joy Division

So, here's a crappy mix test of a cover.  Joy Division.

Salvador- Astral Eyes

 

 Well, here it is. Perfect release date. 12/21/12 We spent a long time on this.  Two years in the making.  It's truly the best music I've been a part of. Hope you take a listen. I can't wait to get back to Portland and make good music again with everyone.  Soon...

DIY and Punk

I took this picture a month ago.  It got me to thinking.  In some sad way, this is almost as “punk” as it gets.  Cutting stamps out and slapping some ink on some self-made CDs.  The “Do- It-Yourself” mentality gives you power.  Punk and DIY isn’t necessarily a style of music or what clothes you wear; nor is it shopping at a conglomerate or corporation like Hot Topic, or sporting a Mohawk.   It’s getting shit done on your own or with the help of friends and a community of like-minded people.   I was happy to help Juan in making all these CDs.  I hope he gets some use out of them.

I have a feeling a lot more music from the past is coming out soon..................

So this was made.......

So this was made last week.  My friend Juan had a week left before he moved away so we were on the clock.  We did what we could, with the little we had.  I hope it offends you. 

The Autopilot Dojo

 

Pretty much a double album up at autopilotdojo.com

Revuelta Roja

After 6 months of struggling at trying my hand at producing and recording an album for a friend, it's finally finished.  I still have a lot to learn.  There's a crazy story to the meet up I first had with my friend Juan.  I was sitting in a park with my guitar one day and this dude comes up to me.  This was Juan Pablo whom I would later become good friends with.  Well, it's not everyday you meet someone in a park who isn't a drug dealer.  Juan had a band in Panama once. The band was destined to be finished for good.  The guitarist passed away and the drummer ended up on the streets addicted to crack. I decided to help Juan remake some of these old songs which the band had.  They never had a chance or money to pay for a proper record or a recording of any kind.  I will never know how much this band influenced people in Panama, but it sounds like they once had a good following.  Their lyrics were highly politically and socially fueled.  I hope the old surviving band members and their fans can appreciate the work we put into this.  Well, enjoy.

New Music Video

 So a really nice dude in England decided to make a video for a song I did a few years back.  He goes by the name 11:11 and can be found here: http://elevenpast11.blogspot.co.uk/?view=snapshot  and https://twitter.com/ElevenPast11https://twitter.com/ElevenPast11  .  I'm really flattered a random person would make such a thing for me and others to enjoy.  Maybe he can help someone else out in the future.  Check out this video and the others he has done.

Revolt 1989 Release

Well, somehow writing songs on a bridge 7 months ago led to this.  A two (sometimes 3 or 5) bass band.  A kind of tip of the hat to all the great bass players I've been lucky enough to have played with over the years.  I made this mostly at home.  With some help from Juan Pablo.  It's a kind of artys fartsy home recording, so patience please. 

Streaming and MP3's here:

Wav, MP3, and Flac here:

http://aaronlum.bandcamp.com/album/revolt-1989-2

What is Revolt 1989? Well, the un-obvious answer is……….Well it was kind of a band. Sort of, for one night live and for a few days of recording. A short lived band I imagined while living in Asia. It was also the year of a very famous protest in Asia. Over the last two years I watched quite a few of these revolts. Ideas that now spread almost as easily as the wind. Much like what the wind would carry where I lived. A phenomenon called yellow sand. No not a derogatory term. Yet, a real thing; a dust from China, which would appear all over my stuff overnight, if I had left my windows open. One day, I found this sand and dust on my bass. I felt sad that I had neglected this instrument in such a way, even for a day. So, I wiped it off and began to play it again. Not long after that, one fall afternoon, I met a few guys in a nearby park. These fellows also played stringed instruments. One of those hombres was Juan Pablo. He played a bass once in Panama. He also played a jovial accordion, which brought many smiles. One night we wrote some songs together on a bridge, at the edge of a red light district in a far off land. It was a cold night, yet somehow, we met many crooked and twisted fellow Thud Stick players that night. We also somehow wrote a few songs on that bridge. The view was amazing, inspiration was running high, and some strange people came and watched us play. I then ran home and quickly bought a Theremin. Juan Pablo then sailed on for new lands and new frontiers soon after. I felt it was a great collision for the Thud Stick, which I won’t soon forget.

Setting Up a 12 String Acoustic For Better Action.

Filing the nut for the thicker gauges.

Filing the bridge down for the thicker strings.

I recently bought this late 70's Yamaha 12 string acoustic for about $70, which was a steal.  I think the shop I bought it at didn't realize the quality of the guitar because it did look as if it had been neglected for years and the action and playability was like a boxing match with Muhammid Ali for 9 rounds.  A constant struggle.  The Strings were too high to start with.  This was an easy fix.  I simply sanded down the bottom of the bridge and adjusted the trust rod, to my liking.  The other real problem was that the nut and the bridge were level and straight.  This causes a real problem when you want to fret a pair string pair.  The thicker string ends up being higher than the thinner gauged string.  Makes for clumsy fret work when playing.  So, to put the string at the same level point from the top, I stared with the nut.  I simply filed down and widened each thicker string gauges slot until the strings were level.  Next up, the bridge.  I slotted down each point were the thicker string ran across the bridge.  The playability really improved.  However, I ran into one last problem, the thicker strings were barely touching the bridge at this point.  The contact point was a little too low.  To fix this and to keep the action low, I filed out part of the bridge base were the string runs into the bridge pin.  Making the strings angle over the bridge contact much sharper, keeping the string snuggle over the bridge.  These adjustments took a bit of adjusting and time playing between each change to get everything just right.  It paid off.  I'm surprised these adjustments aren't standard on all 12 strings, considering the uniqueness the instrument poises. 

Routing the thicker strings lower in the bridge.