So, you may have noticed the lack of updates on the RPM Challenge — and you may have thought I hadn’t done anything since Idiot.

HA!

Heh. Actually, you’d be right. For a variety of reasons — most of my family spent significant chunks of this month sick; an air travel nightmare or two; and the fact that I’ve had just enough of a cold the entire time to prevent a decent vocal take — have kept me from wanting / having the time to record.

And can we talk writer’s block? I’ve written, I think, 10 choruses for the new song. I wish I could say they all suck in their own unique ways, but honestly they’re a big, shapeless, boring blur to me. And the in-the-mail deadline is Saturday. So I was gonna quit.

But quitting is even more frustrating than all that. So…

I decided to look at the rest of this as though I were just demoing, or recording a gig. Tonight I sat down, set up a couple of mikes, and threw down “live” takes of:

  1. Mind of Its Own
  2. Disappear
  3. Closer
  4. Room To Breathe
  5. Optional
  6. How Do You Do It?
  7. Not Wrong

I need to do the roughest of mixes before posting them, or at least edit out the squeaking chair, tuning, etc. at the beginning of each track. That’s tomorrow. I’m tired.

Are they perfect? No. What I originally planned? Nope. Is this the version of “Closer” I’ve been wanting to get on tape? No. Do I have the faintest idea how to EQ a vocal? More than yesterday, yes. Slightly.

But am I happy with how it came out? Yep. Like a decent gig, on a night when I’m fighting a cold and temporarily winning. Nothing I’d try to package and sell, but that wasn’t the plan, anyway…

Which isn’t to say you shouldn’t expect better, or at least more-polished versions, in the coming weeks. I’m getting the hang of this now.

And that chorus can’t hide from me forever.