monster

demo/demonstration

Recorded on the H2 with our new $10 guitar (tuned CCCGCE I believe), an old digitech pedal, and the DR 660. It's not the most challenging thing I've written as far as composition and it's overtly poppy, but I like it. It's for Bub, in a roundabout way. I wanted to post it to give Karlos the Jackal an idea of how I've been doing music with samplers/drum machines in the basement lately.

Words (since you can't hear them well):

There’s a monster that still lives in the house where you used to sleep
His eyes are glazed white
And his teeth are as yellow as death
And he wants to know how you’re doing
Where you’ve been
What you’ve seen

There’s a ghost that hovers ‘round the kitchen where you used to eat
Her hair sticks to the ceiling
And her fingers look just like talons
And she wants to know how you’re doing
Where you’ve been
And what you’ve seen

There’s a monster that lives in the house where you used to sleep
And his muscles can’t contract
So you know he can’t hold a pen
And he wants to know how you’re doing
Where you’ve been
and what you’ve seen

And he wants to know how you’re doing
Where you’ve been
and what you’ve seen

(Get Flash to see the track player.)
posted by sleepy pete (8 comments total)

What can I say? I love the sound of this. The drum machine sounds like it's playing through an amp and mic'd from a few feet away, which rocks.

I never have such luck at yard sales. I have a bent bass which my friend found in his apartment's garbage, but there's a giant, hardened drip of white paint that oozes into the tone knob, forever silencing it, and the neck is so bent that you can't play anything above the 3rd fret without it being in a different key. Also I bought a crazy Bontempi mini-organ at the Sally Ann last summer for $15 but it suffers a similar problem of not staying in key when you roam the keyboard.

I'm always waiting for the yard sale where there's a Martin D28 or something and the old lady says, "What, that old thing? Sure, take it, it's yours for ten bucks."
posted by chococat at 10:46 PM on September 20, 2008

Thanks for thinking of me!

So this is one-take-no-overdubs, right? Basically live?

I bought a looping station and I'm looking forward to trying some of this type of stuff out.

"Overtly poppy"? Huh, you say that like it's a bad thing.

This is pretty neat.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 12:35 AM on September 21, 2008

One of the best things I've heard on MuFi in a long time.
posted by dobie at 9:35 AM on September 21, 2008

a big big sound. I really dig this; clever lyrics, too.
posted by February28 at 4:45 PM on September 21, 2008

chococat: Thanks a bunch. The drum machine was playing through our kinda crappy PA (old 70s Randall speaker and a peavey head from the 80s) we use for practice. I'm' singing through the PA as well. I've found some crazy stuff at yard/garage sales, mostly of the non-instrument variety, so that guitar was just an interesting find. I only bought it because it was called Kansas, fully not expecting it to really work. After getting it home and getting my amp back from the repair shop, I was really surprised at how good it sounded. It's definitely not a D28, though. I swear that the back of the neck is unfinished--there's no shellac on it and the whole thing feels like a big chunk of wood. The second coolest thing I've gotten at a garage sale besides a lot of great records, by the way, is an old dryer chair that I never really used, but have hung onto it for days when having hot air blow on your head is exactly what I need.

Karlos: Yeah, it's all live. No overdubs. I keep meaning to buy a newer looping pedal (I've wanted a Boss RC-20 since they came out) but still haven't picked one up. The one I have only has about 2 seconds of record time on it and you can't save anything, so you can't really record a whole phrase. That makes it more interesting to me, though, and usually gives everything played through it a disjointed feel (unless it's just straight 8th notes or something).

dobie and February28: Thanks a lot for the nice comments.
posted by sleepy pete at 7:04 PM on September 21, 2008

Love the janky, off-meter pedal loop, dude. Love the whole thing, really, though I wish your vocals were more there in the mix. It's an excellent piece of work; the lyrics really nail it for me.

Yay for Kansas guitar!

"Overtly poppy"? Huh, you say that like it's a bad thing.

In his defense, sleepy pete's relationship with poppiness is a complicated monster not remotely reducible to "doesn't like pop". Oh the beerish discussions we've had.
posted by cortex at 10:01 AM on September 24, 2008

Oh, you know I love you poppy pop pop.
posted by sleepy pete at 8:24 PM on September 29, 2008

Somebody do me a favor and favorite it again for me, as I already used the one favorite per song we get. This is really, really good stuff. Rock at its best. I can see why dobie says it's one of the best things he's heard around here in a while.

And I kinda like the vocals at the level they are. It's a bit of a shame because the lyrics are good and it would be hard for someone to understand them without reading them, but it adds certain charm.

You constantly make me wanna move up north just to make a band with you.
posted by micayetoca at 1:55 PM on October 8, 2008