Four Man Splunge - 6/12 Session

Jason, Nick, Sal, and myself - Jason ran very late, so we got another late start. We also tried another set up, with Sal, Jason, Nick and myself from stage left to stage right. It was almost the same as our old standard set up, except for Nick and I trading positions. This was the guitarists' idea. In all honesty, I couldn't hear as well as I usually can, but I think the others could hear better, so I decided to just deal with it.

The much improved tightness of the last session continued into this one. I was concerned that we may have just had one particularly good session (not to mention that it had been a month between sessions), but we seem to have finally improved to the next level as a group.

This session also stood out in terms of new material, with the Kinks' "Low Budget" and "Celluloid Heroes" being added to the list along with the Beach Boys' "Little Deuce Coupe" and "Help Me Rhonda". Nick had worked on "Low Budget" in advance, but for the most part, we had agreed up front to just wing these at the session to see if it was worth putting more time into them.

"Low Budget" went really well, once we got past the intro. "Celluloid Heroes" hadn't been agreed on in advance, but Sal brought copies of the lyrics/chords for everybody, and Nick was familiar enough with it to do a great job singing it right out of the gate.

"Little Deuce Coupe" worked right away as well. "Help Me Rhonda" was epic fail, however. We agreed to work on it and take another shot at it next time.

Jason struggled with his electronic kit throughout the session, getting some unexpected sounds. He said he'll probably go to some kind of hybrid set, mostly acoustic with a few electronic drums for effect.

We're still having a hard time with "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" after all this time. Somebody always seems to miss the cue for the group riff. We can play "Losing My Religion" well enough, but nobody seems to be able to sing lead on it because the vocal is a very different rhythm than the instruments. I'm going to put some work into it, and if I can't pull it off, we might have to drop it.