Back in 1991, I purchased a Tascam Porta Studio. It was the entry level four track cassette version but I pushed it to its limits. It unlocked a creative stream that saw me writing and recording the equivalent of nine albums over then next two years.
I started to record and took the name Rough Spots as my fictional band. It summed up the sound of the music I was recording. Solid but with rough spots. The band had three fictional members, each with one of first, middle or last names.
At first, I had no drums so the songs were mostly acoustic guitar/folky sounding. Then I picked up a used Dr. Rhythm that I programmed to create a virtual Keith Moon, John Bonham or Ringo. Unfortunately, all the music store had was the Electronica
version so all the songs have the sound like the 80s New Wave never went away. A few songs were covers but 98% were songs I wrote, usually in one sitting.
As time went on, I added more instruments. A Chicken Shaker (a plastic egg filled with BBs), a children's harmonium and others. The flood gates opened when I got a Casio synthesizer. Suddenly, I was able to add strings, brass and piano.
So why nothing new in 15 years? Unfortunately, life got in the way, I grew up, had kids and my recording studio became a nursery. It was some time ago and the trade off was well worth it, but those couple years were an incredible learning experience.
With the Tascam being an entry level four track, I really had to learn basic ways of creating additional tracks much like the early pioneers. To add tracks, I would bounce the four tracks to two. I then had two new tracks for additional tracks and vocals.
Sometimes, I would bounce it again, so I ended up with 8 tracks. It was very low-fi as there was no equalization.
Click on the playbuttons to start the Yahoo! Media Player. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed recording them.
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| Track |
Album |
Recorded |
| Floating |
Drumming Up Support |
03/92 - 03/92 |
| Instrumentally, this one is a totally improvised, spaced out song. The music made me feel like I was floating so I wrote the lyrics around that. |
| Glorious Light |
Alewives in the Basement |
03/92 - 05/92 |
| An attempt at a drone type of Eastern Indian song. Problem is I have no Sitar. |
| Diseased |
Rough Spots |
12/92 - 07/93 |
| Silly, pounding, dragging song that features backwards Bible verse under the lyrics to make it sound more freaky. Then there's backwards guitar. Sometimes I just don't know what inspired these ideas because I didn't use drugs. |
| And Your Bird Can Sing |
Stop Me If You've Heard This One Before |
08/93 - 01/94 |
| Beatles Cover that leads off the covers album that ever musician records when they run into a creative wall and can't come up with something new. The leads are pretty hard and I screwed them up royally but I love this overlooked song. |
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