Saturday, November 27, 2010

recording diary - two

the xmas demos by traveling light

8 tracks; 25min34secs; 192kbps mp3; 35.1mb

surely my mother is wondering why i would take the "Christ" out of Christmas by calling this "the xmas demos." i have discovered that centuries ago xtians replaced "Christ" with the letter "x" for many different reasons. if you care, you should research some of those reasons. i'm sure that if you know me you would know that taking "Christ" out of anything is not my style therefore understanding that i would have several reasons to use "xmas" in this manner.

andrea bocelli, josh groban, even norwegian pop idol (and eventual world idol) kurt nilsen inspire feelings of joy and heartache with their matchless voices. after listening to my latest recordings you could say that my matchless voice inspires feelings of pain and headaches. but i didn't record these Christmas songs for you. i recorded them because i was asked to play my guitar (not sing) at a Christmas party in december. i've heard that there will be other singers there. whew. don't get me wrong…it's not that i think that i'm the world's worst singer. it's just that these particular songs should be sung beautifully and that just isn't in my repertoire.

so, you ask, if i didn't record these songs for you, for whom did i record them? you see, my friend that asked me to play my guitar at her party matched me up with a drummer, the incomparable antonie (see recording diary - a history for more info, antonie was jeremy's first drummer). since we all know that it is very difficult to sit in with other musicians without knowing what to expect, antonie and i got together this to go over some of the songs. antonie's playing has a wild jazz/funk sort of swing to it and he suggested that we get a bass player to join us. i agreed and he called boB (yes, the boB that i wrote about before). boB suggested that we record the songs so he could hear them and here we go. now you know that these recordings are for boB and antonie, not you.

of course, if you are really that curious, go ahead. download and listen. have a ball. cringe, even. the recordings are demos in the strictest form of the word. just my guitar and my voice. no overdubs, no effects, no autotune (although that would really help in this case!), no lasting value.

eight songs. twenty five minutes.

01 - angels we have heard on high

02 - the first noel

03 - what child is this?

04 - it came upon a midnight clear

05 - joy to the world

06 - o holy night

07 - hark! the herald angels sing

08 - christmas at the zoo (flaming lips cover)

if you want to hear demos done well, check out my friend jeremy's 52-week project here. he's much better at this than i.