The rest of my stuff came on Saturday, and I'm pretty excited about to start working with it all. Though, I must admit, I'm a little nervous about the learning curve there will be with adapting to a new recording software. But, I know Pro Tools is said to be better than Audacity in every way (and of course I already agree), but it's still a little nerve-wracking nonetheless. Perhaps I should consider playing with it some today so that I can at least have an idea of what it will be life using it tomorrow night to record the live sound at open mic night (and how to work it in the first place). Alas, I'm on a schedule. But then again, my schedule has been skewed already this semester. I have an indefinite extension on a paper in one class and a project in another; perhaps the only academic thing I need to concern myself with today is studying for a test that I have tomorrow morning. That could allow me time to learn at least a few basics with Pro Tools before I go to use it tomorrow night.
Anyway, what's remarkable is that for what all you see here (and what you don't see here yet) I only spent $735. That's right... $735. Here's the breakdown of the cost:
M-Audio M-Track Quad (w/ Pro Tools Express): $199 (on sale) Rode NT1a vocal mic (w/ shock mount, pop shield, and cable): $229 Audio Technica Pro 37 instrument mic: $108 Mogami Silver 25ft XLR cable: $30 (x2, so $60, plus shipping) On Stage Stands mic boom stand: $25 (x2, so $50) 40ft sq of acoustic treatment foam: $85 shipped
Okay, so $735 is a lot of money. It was painful to spend, but for a starter setup it really was a pretty great deal. I'm journaling up a "gear wish list" of items I'd like to see in my future studio setup, but for now I'm more than pleased with this.
Today I must confess something. I have found myself, for the longest time, bitterly jealous of "cradle Christians"; people who grew up in Christian families, Christian homes, going to church, learning about scripture and Jesus, and having a beautiful, almost naive faith that seems unencumbered by things that so easily weigh me down. I scoffed at many of my bible college peers simply because I would give up my whole life to have what they seemed to take for granted: whole families, Christian parents, solid spiritual support networks, a church to call home, and a deeply rooted faith. I hated them. If that's you reading this, I'm sorry. And then I get jealous; oh, do I get jealous. Not that I would ever wish calamity on someone like that... If anything, I wish they could see their situation through my eyes; perhaps they might appreciate it more. But I get so jealous of them, because things that seem to come easy to them just don't come easily to me. Some things which they have had ingrained into their minds since an early age I am just recently coming to grips with and am trying so hard to put into practice. I feel like an acorn sitting on the ground next to an oak tree, feeling so small and intimidated, trying to find a place to grow roots without disturbing the space that they have clearly been occupying so long before I came around. Maybe some seeds aren't meant to grow. As an "outsider welcomed in," I find it incredibly difficult to fit in to the bible college social atmosphere even after 3 1/2 years. I feel like an awkward bud in a field of flowers. Instead of embracing the process, I became jealous. I grew cold. I envied every person around me for one reason or another. Perhaps I wished I could have their kindness, or their social charisma, or their musical ability, or their money, or their seemingly naive willingness to submit to authority. But the people I am most frequently jealous of are those who seem to be deeply and immovably rooted in the faith. I often find myself wanting more than anything to be able to say something that I will never be able to say: "I am so grateful that I grew up with an example of faith and love." Maybe I'm just too scarred to stand among models.
But I failed to address my own disorder. Instead of watering my own lawn, I grew increasingly jealous of my neighbor's grass. Instead of accepting that my brokenness would require a long and careful process of God putting me back together, I chose instead to sit in pieces, staring at others who were whole and wishing I could be like them. Sure, part of it is depression, but that's no excuse. If creator-of-the-universe God could do all the amazing things shown in scripture, then my own depression stands no chance. But the biggest problem is that I want to be like everyone else around me. My own talents and abilities never seem to be enough.
I wonder how many of those people I find myself jealous of find themselves jealous of me. It sickens me how much calamity is glamorized. Those who should be bursting with joy and gratitude for the examples of faith they grew up with often find themselves full of discontent, wishing they could have the cavalier story of one who grew up in a context like what I grew up in. And yet I, who should be grateful for how much darkness God overcame to find me, and should be exulting in His glory, and bursting with joy and gratitude and singing praises about how great and powerful He is to save a wretch like me, find myself instead discontented, wishing I never had to go through the things I did, and am still going through. Maybe I need to just be still and let God do His God thing.
Last night, I was working with text and images in Adobe Premiere Pro. I was using text overlays at the end of a video. I had inserted and blown up a transparent PNG logo image with additional text as the last overlay, but had to change the font of the rest of the text to match the font in the image. The first three text overlays were 150% font size. But when I resized the PNG overlay in the last bit, I had to use 160% font size to match the image's text. Well this proved to be sloppy and unprofessional looking, so I wanted to fix it, but I wasn't sure how to resize the image and text to match 150% font size that was present in the other title overlays. Then I remember something I learned in high school: algebra.
The image was scaled to 185% original size. The font was 160%, but needed to be 150%. If 160=185, then I needed to figure out what 150 would equal. I just needed to work the numbers a little.
185/160 = 1.15625 1.15625 x 150 = 173.4375 So I resized the image to 174% and the text to 150%, and presto, everything matched.
YEAH, MATH!
Call me a nerd, but I think math is immensely important. I have to use it all the time when I'm working with sound, video, or general I.T. stuff. Perhaps your line of work won't require you to understand algebra, but understanding basic tenets of mathematics is essential in life. Want to know your fuel mileage? Track your miles per tank and gallons per fill. Want to know your cost per mile? Track your cost per tank and miles per tank. Want to be able to project your current spending into the future and re-configure your budget to be able to save a certain amount of money by a certain date, perhaps to buy a plane ticket for travel? Are you in a band and need to figure out how much you can spend on a tour while staying profitable? You need to understand math to do these things.
Props to Marjorie Craemer, one of the few high school teachers I had who legitimately cared about her students and their futures, for devoting her career to teaching math. Partly because of her influence in my life (along with numerous other factors), I really think CCCB needs to incorporate math into its general curriculum. Even if the college can't afford to hire on a part time mathematics professor, at least requiring students to take a course or two at MACC would be better than nothing. If the college wants to train people to work in churches and help those churches to function well, then it needs to train its students in mathematics beyond an elective "personal finance" course. It should include at least one course in basic business management so that people can get an idea of how to work an organization's budget.
My birthday was a couple days ago, so I treated myself to something nice. That is, I picked up this new recording interface from Amazon. Saved fifty bucks on it with the sale price, too, and got it for $199. And, as you can see by the box, it comes with Pro Tools Express and Ignite by AIR. Not too bad. The disadvantage to Pro Tools Express is that the two most frequently used plugins aren't available without upgrade to the regular version of the software, but the advantage is that upgrading to Pro Tools 11 is only $200 and allows free upgrade to Pro Tools 12 when it comes out, which is very cost-friendly as compared to buying the full software outright for $900. The rest of my equipment should be coming soon, too. All $535 of it (bringing the total up to $735). My bank account is looking rather sad after taking such a heavy hit, but I'm sincerely hoping that I'll be able to garner some, if small, financial backing to help offset the cost. I also hope to use this in the future to perhaps make a little bit of money recording local artists.
But today, a couple days later, was just... a generally rough day. Actually, I must rephrase. The first half of today was pretty amazing and I was in a fantastic mood after last night. Then I went home from my first shift and... Anyway, the second shift got off to a decent start but for some reason, my mood crashed mid-shift. It could just be tiredness from the headache I was battling today (further reason for my concern about my mental health; I was in a great mood despite a headache), but the crash was sudden and hard. I'm doing a little better now that it's late and I'm mellowed out, but I hate these mood crashes. They're brutal and leave me wondering why this has to continually happen to me. It's nights like tonight that, while I trust that God has a plan and purpose for me in the context of the Kingdom, I can't help but feel a little bitter and discouraged that I have yet to figure out why I am the way I am.
But, recent events (that I may talk about later on, when they're not-so-immediate) have me feeling hopeful that things will be trekking upward.
The winter here seems to be rather cold this year. But the coldest part about it isn't the weather. No matter how cold the winter gets here, it will always be warmer than Wisconsin. So really, it's never that cold. But yet there is a coldness in my heart and a bitter chill in my bones that I cannot shake, but rather is spreading and intensifying by the day. At the end of the day, my emotions crash, leaving me incapable of genuine empathy and simply going through the motions of what I know to do. It is an emptiness that I would never wish upon another. I become discouraged too easily. Each time I talk with my closest friend, they go on and on about this incredible journey of faith that God has them on, and how much they are growing by the day, and while I am genuinely happy for them, it only makes my own emptiness more apparent. Here I sit in an actually worse spiritual spot than I was when I first met them. But here's what they don't tell you in bible college: spiritual distance is still distance in a relationship. It's true that two cannot be unevenly yoked. It places an awkward strain on our friendship. Normally it would be a strain for the friend on the higher ground to stand up, but for me it is more of a strain to not follow them. But every time I get up and try to follow Christ, I fall back down and I begin to feel paralyzed. I used to feel level with them. Now I feel like a burden, like they are now so far above me and I have fallen into their shadow. I know this is inaccurate thinking, but the strain is still there and I can still feel it. On the one hand, it shows me more and more how much I need to pursue faith, love, and righteousness with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. On the other hand, it makes me feel so utterly incompetent after all the grace I've received that I actually want to pursue God less. As the picture become clearer (to me, though my friend), these eyes see fire and terror and I become discouraged because I know that only God can save me, yet I feel as though He is uninterested, as though I've reached my grace limit and He has said, "Nah, you're done." The more my friends pursue Jesus, the more saddened I become.
I used to believe that hell was reserved for the afterlife, but I am becoming increasingly convinced that we experience degrees of it here, in this lifetime, dependent upon where we are in relation to the cross of Christ. I say this because what I am feeling literally feels like hell--separation from Christ. And no matter how I long to return to Him, the distance grows colder and colder. If hell feels like being separate from God, then this is hell.
A couple days ago I released an acoustic cover of my friends' song, which they released just a year ago. It was recorded and edited over several months, and it shows... The guitar sounds like garbage, tracks were recorded in different locations, and when I first started working on it I had just gotten my Sampson Go Mic. Also, I was sick the day I recorded the vocals... Frustrating, I know, but I was halfway through processing them when I realized that my voice sounded ill, and didn't want to go back through and re-record them. Perhaps a little more patience would have paid off in the end with this, but then again, I started this project back in October and just wanted to get things done.
That cheapo home "studio", though
Anyway, I've ordered a new recording interface which should be here sometime late this week or early next week. This should solve the component noise problem that I was getting with the Tapco (you can see it in the picture laying on the floor). Hopefully in the near future I'll be able to look into getting a new (better) vocal mic as well. I'd love to get an Avantone CV-12, but that's $500. Likely, the best I'll be able to go for is the Rode NT1a at $229, and even that will have to wait a month or two at minimim. Between now and then, though, I'll try to go ahead and start doing some acoustic treatment to the recording room here in the house so that when the time comes, I'll be ready to start recording my EP (which will include re-recording this cover).
The Plus is probably my favorite Eau Claire venue to play at.
So
it's been a month since my last entry. Here's a quick catch-up:
December 19th I returned to Wisconsin for ten days or
so to hang out with my family. Played an open mic at the Plus and it was
rad, as always.
Returned to Moberly, don't remember what day, talked
with the folks I was staying with, and I moved in under a month-to-month
rent agreement.
The new semester started and I found out that the I.T.
department only has a limited amount of student worker hours still
available to give me through the end of June. I picked up a couple
Saturday shifts in the cafeteria dish room to make up the difference and
conserve my I.T. hours.
The semester itself has been rather busy and
less-than-satisfying after having a semester chocked full of counseling
classes with two of my favorite professors. I have some young hotshot
professor who thinks every student's life revolves around this one class
and that nobody has other time-consuming responsibilities to take care of.
Needless to say, if I wasn't on such a tight academic schedule, I'd be
dropping the class. Another class I'm less-than impressed with, even if
the professor is pretty cool. The rest of my professors and classes are
awesome.
Oh, and that "older mic" I was talking about
in my last post? It's an Audio Technica Pro 37, and it works like a dream.
I used it over break to record a collab project with
a friend and record a concept that
I recently re-mastered. I think I'll use a SM58 in the future for
vocal recording, though. And the SA-M20 gave me hiss like none other, so
that's out for recording (which is fine, since some online talk alludes to
the idea that it's horrible for recording).
Abbi tracking vocals for her song collab. Again in the background, the noisy Tapco.
Okay,
enough boring stuff that nobody cares about. Last week was Revival Week here on
campus, and Thursday was Day of Service, which is a pretty big deal. It's an
even bigger deal if you're in student council (which I am). Ironically, I
skipped Day of Service to drive back to Wisconsin to get an early start on the
weekend. See, I wasn't going back for Valentine's day. I don't even have a
girlfriend, and am still questioning whether I even have an interest in
something like that at this point in my life. No, I wasn't going back for
Saturday the 14th; I was going back for the night of Friday the 13th.
The
event's name was Unlucky in Love,
and it was a pre-Valentine's acoustic show which I was invited to open for. So,
away I went on Thursday. Hung out with the dudes from Stay Strong on Thursday
night and went home just before noon Friday when my dad got done with work for
the week. I figured I'd go home and work on some academic things for a few
hours and then head downtown for the show, but my dad had other ideas. He
wanted to fill out a punch card that required buying drinks at different
establishments to enter to win a collectible New Belgium bicycle. So, we
went out. A few hours and a few bars later, we made our way home. And I managed
to get a little pre-show practice in before heading downtown to the Plus.
Rad,
the guy hosting the show, wanted me to go in the back door. So I went in, and
immediately went back out because it looked super creepy in the back; I thought
I had the wrong door. But, as it turns out, I did have the correct door, so in
I went. Making my way around the corner, past the kitchen, and up a short
flight of stairs, I came through a door that put me right next to the
stage.
Oh, so this is why he wanted me to come in the back.
They moved the stage. That make sense. A little further back so traffic between
the dining room and the bar would be less condensed.
There's
something you should understand: the bars in Wisconsin are generally pretty
nice. I didn't realize just how nice they are until I came to Missouri. The
places around Moberly are dingy, smelly, hazy from smoke, and generally not
places I want to hang around. Around Eau Claire, they're generally
fairly nice, clean, well-kept, and of course, they're not full of smoke,
thanks to Wisconsin's statewide public smoking ban. Yes, in Wisconsin, you can
go out to a bar and not come home smelling like smoke. It's absolutely
fantastic. The Plus, in particular, is one of my favorites (mostly because of
its place in the local music scene).
Anyway,
even though I was on time, I was ridiculously early. For a show that was slated
to kick off at 9 and sound check around 7:30, I ended up sitting and hanging
out with Andy Elwell for a solid hour before the rest of the performers started
showing up. My dad and stepmom showed up around 8, and the restaurant side of
the Plus was starting to fill with people who were coming for the show. My
glass ran dry and I walked over to order another drink, and turned around to
see my mom and her fiance standing right there. She was pretty upset that I
didn't tell her I was coming up to Eau Claire, but she was excited to see
me.
What the heck. You didn't even tell your own mother
that you were going to be home?
See,
in cases where I'm only in town for a weekend, I figure I only have time to
hang out with one set of parents, so I have to choose in advance who I'm going
to inform of my plan to return, and who I'm going to leave in the dark. It's
just easier for all parties involve that way, because I don't want to try to
budget one weekend between two sets of parents, and I don't want one parent to
feel short-changed if I spend more time with the other.
This
has generally been pretty easy for me to handle, too. Even though my
parents only live a mile apart, they're worlds apart it's pretty easy to
compartmentalize my trips home, keep family matters separated, and pretend that
everything is okay. I've learned to not ask my parents for advice because they
give me such widely varied opinions that I'm generally left to fend for myself
anyway, so when I do visit, it's usually pretty cordial. And of course, when I
leave town again, I don't tell anyone about it. It's a complex and volatile
situation, so I have to keep my family relationships as simple as I can. My
parents have been separated for 20 years, so I try to keep them separated in my
personal life. It's just easier that way.
But
the simplicity of keeping the two apart and adapting to being around either one
or the other broke down on Friday night. I still feel guilty that I bought a
drink for my mom (even if it was a guilt drink for not telling her I was in
town) and not for my dad, and I still don't know how I managed to keep myself
together as I went between their tables to talk to my parents and hopefully
retain their individual approval, but when they did leave after my set, I kept
my glass full. I went slow and didn't go too far, because I wasn't really
wanting to spend money on a cab, but I definitely wasn't going to let this
fluke (and strangely emotionally taxing) incident plague my mind and lock me
inside myself for the rest of the night.
Of
course, there's one thing I find myself oddly grateful for: Jenn wasn't there.
This isn't to be angsty and say I'm not over her, or that it would have been
particularly emotionally difficult to see her. To be frank, there's not a
chance in the world that I'd go back to be with her. But, having expected her
to be there (her name was on the guest list), it was a pleasant relief that I
didn't have to add one more thing to my plate which was already full with my
parents being there. Had she been there, would she have talked to me? I
certainly wasn't in a state to deal with that. Not to mention, two of the songs
in my set were related to her, and I wouldn't want that to be stuck in her
head. As much as she hurt me, I still respect her as a human being.
Anyway,
coming back to the show itself, I had taken my cameras to the Plus and set them
up (one above and behind the stage, and one down and in front of the stage) to
record my set for some people who couldn't make it. The show itself was pretty
great, and my set went without setbacks. There were a couple points where I had
to back away from the microphone because of reverb feedback, but Sean (the guy
who was running all of the tech) fixed it pretty quickly. The rest of the acts
were solid, with F.M. Down and Andy Elwell being my favorites. Pets With People
Names were fun to watch, and I give them creative points for using two
acoustics and a cajon. Heat of the Heart was interesting to behold, and they
were so talented and meshed so well as a group. I feel bad that they were the
last group of the night, because by the time they took the stage, most of the
crowd had left and only a handful of people were still around.
Eventually
I made my way back home and the night was over. It was a long drive back to
Missouri on Sunday, but it was worth it for the chance to go up and play the
show. In fact, I have a couple videos from that night for you to see. Here they
are:
And I can't forget F.M. Down!
Anyway, enough of my ranting about the show and family and such. I made it home safely, the show went well (despite some social-familial hiccups), and I made it back to Missouri safely. That's enough to get me by.
Stay tuned this semester; I hope to continue writing.
