As some of you know, I sang in a band called Skeptic Slang in the early 1990s. I’ve also been playing guitar religiously for the past year. A former bandmate has decided to start playing again as well, which can mean only one thing: The band is back together.
Mood music:
Well, sort of.
We don’t plan to go in a studio and record an album, or line up a bunch of gigs. This will be something more laid back: Jamming in each others’ living rooms, writing songs and recording them on my laptop recording software. We’ll upload MP3s to Soundcloud, where you’ll be able to hear them.
Though I sang with these guys last time, I’ll just be playing guitar now, mostly holding down the rhythm while the other guys — Chris Casey and Elias Andrinopoulos — do the fancier melodies and lead.
Some have suggested we make more ambitious plans. After all, we have plenty of friends with kids and busy careers who still manage to put out CDs and gig on a regular basis. A good example of that: My friends in the band Pop Gun (see my review of their new album “American Soul” here). I don’t want to speak for the other guys, but my schedule is way too crazy for that — at least at this point in time.
My overriding need in doing this is simple. I have music in me and a good friend told me last year that no one should go to the grave with their music still inside them. My playing is still amateur, but I’ve learned several songs — The Kinks’ “You Really Got Me,” AC/DC’s “Hell’s Bell’s, Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” etc. — and I’ve come up with a whole bunch of original riffs. I say original with half a grin, because no riff is truly original. We’re always drawing off our influences.
I regularly use mood music in my blog posts. I figure why not have some of my own music to use as well?
Above all, we want to have fun and burn off steam. I can picture us rotating to each other’s living rooms, playing while our kids roughhouse in the back ground and our wives critique our work. It seems like some good family fun to me.
Stay tuned to hear what happens next.
Below: The younger, thinner and long-haired version of Skeptic Slang
