Splunge - 12/26/2011

Jason, Nick and myself, with no Sal this time due to a work emergency, so it'll be at least two months since we will have had the full line-up playing together.

Single guitarist sessions offer a chance to hear some things that otherwise usually get lost in the mix, and since we've been working on the rhythm of our guitar players in particular lately, Nick spent a fair amount of the session under more scrutiny than usual. I'm afraid it was getting him a bit depressed, but you can't fix a problem you don't know about. The strange part is that the songs he was having a problem with are usually solid.

We were sounding fairly good again vocally, mainly with Nick singing lead and me singing harmony. I was having serious congestion problems again, though I was almost clear by the end of the session. I was also having problems with songs that are usually solid, at least vocally, running out of air badly on "Runaround". Unfortunately no amount of practice can clear nasal congestion. Nick and I talked about harmony before we started playing, and he made some attempts at singing harmony a few times, with mixed results.

We actually hit the group riff on "Poor Poor Pitiful Me" with all three of us at the same time! There is hope for all four of us the next time we get together.

We made an attempt at "Space Oddity", which was again rough. This might be too spacy a feel for this band to pull off well. We'll see when we have everybody at the same time again.

I'm really enjoying the rhythmic rapport Jason and I have built, and it was especially good this time out. Jason was in a better mental space than the last time, playing with some flair he'd been lacking the last couple of practices. I'm still playing stronger rhythmically personally, but have realized that there are things I need to work on to make that approach feel as natural as I'd like.

We moved around a bit, with me in Sal's usual spot, which helped our ability to hear each other. We have a more radical change in mind for the next session, moving Jason to a corner and the amplifiers around to a more circular (and less stage-like) set up. I'm not pleased that this is necessary, but don't see any other solution.