Thursday, April 26, 2018

A Little Boy Named Milo



12 Dollar Wednesday
After having ushered the sun to a spot below the horizon, shooting what turned out to be a 15 minute video, about 4 and a half minutes of which appear above, I went out and made 12 bucks in order to cover the kratom and cat food that keeps me going.

The song, "Cavorting With Amy," I wrote when I was staying with Leslie Thompson in 2014, and he had left Thanksgiving morning to go to The House of Blues for their free Thanksgiving catered meal that they offer to the public each year.
About a dozen restaurants send a diplomat to the place to take their place in the line and cater to people from all walks of life, from important people, all the way down to Leslie Thompson...
The song, is at "Level 1," which means that I have separated the audio track from the video, added compression and delay and reverberation as appropriate (though that is a matter of taste) to it, mixed a couple of background voices in, then put it back on the video.
I can add any number of additional instruments to it and, just as importantly, cause sections of the music to repeat, so I can eventually have the full set of lyrics represented on it.
As far as being creative with the placement of images, so as to match the lyrics, for example after the line: "She was standing in her unique spot in front of the Unique store," it would be cool to have that particular image of her fade in at that point. However, this is the kind of stuff that makes Openshot crash-prone, and so there is less of that kind of thing than I would desire. I make a few simple changes, just making sure all the pictures appear at some point in the video, and that is an accomplishment, with the Openshot free video editor.
It is an incredible piece of software, still, and if the next 5, or so, years see the fixing of its bugs then I foresee the time when I might make a video of myself playing in front of the Eiffel Tower, or Big Ben, with tourists seen milling about and cartoon David The Water Jug players walking up and saying "Pleeeze tell me you're smoking on somethin' Daniel!"
I can dream.
The Bigger Picture
The more important issue is that, as heard in the video, the brand new Epiphone guitar that Bobby bought for me, sounds a little less grand than the Takamine, which needs probably about a 20 dollar repair job done unto it.
This sound that you hear on the video was improved upon by putting the new set of strings on it, replacing the ones that had been put on at the factory maybe 5 years ago.
So, the next video that the Epiphone is used in will sound, say 8% better as far as the guitar track is concerned.
I can go back and replace the tracks with ones done on the Takamine, but that will only be a concern when I am attempting to polish off a song after having added drums and bass and maybe a piano, if I ever go back to Baton Rouge and use the one that is in a little chapel that nobody ever seems to be praying in...



2 comments:

  1. I couldn't listen to that whole clip - too awful! - but it was enlightening in that (a) you don't just sound that way when you sing, but when you talk. And (b) you really miss ol' Leslie Thompson.

    I used to work at a place that sold and repaired paint spraying equipment and I learned to repair airless paint sprayers. So I was around a lot of painters. And a lot of these guys had ingested, not only recreationally but in conjunction with their work, a lot of nasty chemicals and they tended to talk like you: That sort of nasal, "Yeahhhhh.... Mannnnn.... don't bogart that joinnnnnnt... mannnnn..." sort of voice that I also remember from hearing hippie burnouts talk that way in the 1970s as a kid.

    So it's not a mannerism, it's just ... your voice.

    I hope you can get dear old Leslie back into your life!

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  2. That kid startled me when I turned and saw him standing there, not knowing how long he had been there, and "what kind of adult lyrics did I just steal his innocence with," and feeling the impending approach of a mother like a dark cloud approaching, to yank him by the arm and spank him, after giving me a: "your beanie and your guitar aren't going to work in luring MY child, you Bayou St.John Park pervert!! type of thing.
    (I edited that part out at the end, for the sake of brevity, as the clip of the kid ran over a minute originally)
    But I was surprised myself at how my voice bleated out when I tried to chat with him, trying to find the 5 year old version of: "So where are you from?"

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