It’s A Race…Two New Songs In The Works!
Much to Chopper’s consternation I’m sure, we now have two new songs in the hopper.
Song 1: Channeling You
This is a complete tear-down and remodel of the old Lizards From Afar song called Channeling Lou off of the Kick The Habit tape. I would say it’s as much the same song as New Coke was to Classic. (You younger kids might not know what I am talking about.) Anyway, it has all new lyrics that recall the magic of the original and new music inspired by the original while dwarfing it at the same time. Intrigued? I envy us.
Song 2: Just A Girl
This is a brand new track written by yours truly. (Sir to the Pent) It seems to have caught the eye of the Gecko, as he immediately started working on some ideas. I haven’t heard what he has put together yet, but am as excited as a young boy in a field. The lyrics are silly but also thought provoking. (I think.) I’m quite proud of them and hope that you will all get a big, ole kick out of it.
So please, feel free to comment away on which one you think will get done first. Which one DO YOU want to hear first?
Sir Pent
Lizards From Afar 
September 8, 2008 at 3:30 pm
…and my vote is that Just A Girl will be completed first as Channeling You seems to have a gestation period longer than an African elephant. (aka, Loxodonta Africana).
September 8, 2008 at 4:01 pm
I vote that I finish whichever one I feel like, whenever I feel like it. Oh! Look! My vote wins!
September 8, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Probably the worst decision of my LFA career was giving Pent-up-boy administrative power on this blog.
And quit asking people to comment. We’re pretty much the only people commenting here.
Don’t worry, it’s ok if I’m an asshole as I’ve arrived back at my Brooklyn pad and am now drinking beer after a marathon of teaching.
Anyway, since there is as of yet no music available for Just A Girl, Chops can’t put any vocals to it. He either does Channeling You or nothing. So my vote wins! Sort of.
September 8, 2008 at 4:30 pm
You guys having a bad day? Want to talk about it?
September 8, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Just giving you a hard time, Sir Bent. Beer makes it easier. Unfortunately, the beer puts me in no mood to work on music, or much of anything. Think I’ll go lie down and read. Or sleep.
September 8, 2008 at 10:33 pm
Demo of JAG is in everyone’s e-mailboxes.
September 9, 2008 at 6:02 am
I really dig this music. I have absolutely no idea how the lyrics fit…
And this is the “style” or “genre” that I want Mr. Peabody.
September 9, 2008 at 6:05 am
And the chunka guitars stay. If anything…even more chunka. I really need to hear Choppers guitar plugged into this song. I hear magic.
September 9, 2008 at 6:37 am
Lyrics begin where all the lead guitar and synths stop and we’re just left with drums, chunky guitar and, eventually, bass. Strummed guitar chords pick back up with the chord change when the lyrics go to the “hermit” part. Other verses mirror the first, of course. I don’t imagine any singing over the loud lead guitar or the synth.
I have no idea how Chop will fit a guitar part in here, really. Maybe something “clean” played over my overdriven guitars? I can also remove my rhythm part and he can make up one of his own to fit that part.
I’m not sold on the chunky guitar over the verses, however. With just a bass and drums it would really sound new wave pop (I’m not sure what that is, but I’m thinking of something like the Cure or Modern English). I had to put them in there at this point, however, as a place keeper, since I had no bass to play. I tried doing the bass with the synth, but it never sounded very realistic.
September 9, 2008 at 6:43 am
I dig it…with the chunka.
And today I will be writing a song called Chunka…
September 9, 2008 at 9:05 am
Oh, godz, no.
September 9, 2008 at 10:30 am
Chunka Chunka
Chunka Chunka
Wooo
Chunka Chunka
Chunka Chunka
Wooo
…I’m halfway done.
September 9, 2008 at 8:21 pm
Hey…geckster…
1) How is you daughter doin?
2) What are the technical specs for Channeling You:
time:
mhz:
bpm:
anything like that I need to know in order to set up my “project” before recording.
September 9, 2008 at 9:02 pm
Hmm. We may have a problem. I finished reading an essay, so I decided to try uploading JAG flacs to the uploader, but it seems the uploader is down, perhaps forever. In looking around just now, I think the guy who operates it set up a “new” uploader, but didn’t maintain any of the old accounts. Oh, well. I’ll try to figure out what’s going on. Eventually.
Well, Channeling Doo:
110 bpm, 4/4 time (duh)
Sample rate: 44100
Bit depth: 16
September 9, 2008 at 9:35 pm
So far as I can tell, that uploader is really down, but there’s another “updated” one that is practically the same, but all our files on the previous one are lost. I’ll send e-mail with the new URL and login. But I’m not going to upload the vintage LFA mp3s at this point. Seems too unstable. We don’t know when this uploader will disappear, too.
September 10, 2008 at 8:55 am
That blows. That was a pretty nice site.
Does that mean the links to all the MP3s on THIS site are broken?
Lame.
September 10, 2008 at 9:13 am
Yeah, they are broken, and in fact I have removed them all. The new uploader I e-mailed info about is, in fact, the same (apparently even the same guy). Perhaps he announced he was closing the other site and we didn’t read it. Well, it was all for free so one can hardly complain, really.
I’ve uploaded flacs for JAG on the new uploader, so get them before that goes away, but I’m not going through the trouble right now of uploading all the old LFA mp3s. If someone wants them, we can provide them on a per request basis, at least until we find a new hosting site. Technically, we could upload some of them to the Reverbnation site, but I don’t think there’s a good reason to do so. Let’s just worry about the new music and if someone asks for the old, we can provide them. Only old fans from the IWU days will want them anyway.
September 10, 2008 at 9:43 am
I agree. I think for the most part, anyone that wanted the old stuff digitally probably has it by now. The few that would remain can ask one of us for it.
September 10, 2008 at 11:12 am
I updated the site a bit this morn in during breaks of editing the proofs of my article (which was boring, tedious, and confusing): I removed the now broken links to the old mp3s (as I said), and also all the old comments. I also added perhaps fairly stupid images of my and Gordon’s guitars to the front page (at top and bottom), with brief excerpts from our lyrics “written” on the necks. I did a very sloppy job of cutting the guitars out of their environments, however. Oh well.
What about your guitar, Chopper? We need another tele on our site with an LFA sticker. And perhaps some crossed drum sticks?
September 10, 2008 at 11:50 am
I saw the new pics. I can’t make out what is written on them, though.
September 10, 2008 at 1:45 pm
“We drowned everything” and “Canceled is my fav. word.”
September 11, 2008 at 10:31 pm
!!!!
you quoted me back to me on my own guitar!
September 12, 2008 at 8:54 am
Hoping that I haven’t over-stepped my bounds…I forwarded the lyrics for GD, GD to the one and only Gila. I asked him if Matt were to put together a funky barnstormer if he would be interested in doing the vocals.
Having said that…Gila has not responded to an email that I have sent him in well over a year, so I am not really expecting to hear back.
I think that would be fun, though…the return of the Gila Monster?
September 12, 2008 at 9:01 am
Stop worrying about overstepping your bounds, this is equal partnership as far as I’m concerned. Anyway, I’d love to get the monster back in the mix, and as far as I’m concerned if you’re going to try and get fonky, you need someone less cornbread than myself to get off the ground.
Back to the subject of overstepping bounds, any chance you could remove that commercial from youtube? It bugs me.
September 12, 2008 at 9:04 am
Is that ok, Gordon? I felt like just putting the guitars up there was a little boring; they needed something on them and that’s one of my favorite lines in your tunes. I’m also a big fan of “Stop Staring at Me, particularly the line, “I’m just an English teacher; I’m not a Russian sailor!” But that wouldn’t fit on the neck. As it is, the writing is still too small to read. Oh, well. Maybe I can fix it later.
September 12, 2008 at 9:41 am
I completely forgot about the commercial being on Youtube. I will gladly remove if I can remember the password that I used to create that account. (It was one of those weird things where it disallowed every password I tried until I finally made up some nonsense.)
September 12, 2008 at 10:09 am
Commercial set to private. Only I can watch it now.
Sorry Chopps. Was just proud of you is all…
September 12, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Aw shucks.
Thanks for doing that.
September 12, 2008 at 1:49 pm
No prob, crybaby…did I mention I wrote a song called Crybaby?
Wonder who THAT was about…
September 12, 2008 at 2:47 pm
I’d be surprised if you hadn’t written a song called that, as you seem to have written enough songs to have used pretty much every idea or title possible.
I know you wrote a song referecing taking lost of Excedrin, I assume that I was somehow implicated there.
September 12, 2008 at 3:06 pm
Wasn’t sure if you picked up on that Excedrin thing…
And in actuality, the song was called Bedwetter…but it was about crybabies.
September 12, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Well, here’s a surprise. The Gila responded to my email.
He is up for recording vocals for Get Down, Get Down…
So the question is, do you want to compose some music or do you guys still want to lay off for a few weeks?
September 12, 2008 at 6:03 pm
I’m not sure I’m funky enough to write funky music. I’ll have to look at the lyrics again to see if anything comes to me.
But how would he record anyway? Does he have the equipment or would he drive down to Chopper’s to use his studio?
While working a little this afternoon I listened to the Raconteurs. Damn, I didn’t realize they were so cool. The White Stripes failed to save rock, so I guess Jack White decided he could do it with the Raconteurs. Or are they just a bunch of poseurs?
September 12, 2008 at 7:56 pm
You ARE the least funky white boy ever…but I also have full faith that you would be able to come up with something extremely cool in the genre which I will dub “Lizard Funk”.
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I sent Carm a few options:
They have recording equipment at the theater he’s involved in…can they record digitally?
He could drive down to Choppers.
He could come over to my place, which is quite close actually. (I should probably do a sample vocal and see if that is an option that Chopper can work with…)
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
I’ve heard a few things from the Raconteurs and found it to be cool. I also found just about everything I heard from the White Stripes to be cool.
September 14, 2008 at 6:52 pm
OK…am uploading the drums for Channeling You. I hope you like…and that Gecko doesn’t think that they are TOO boring…I can tell you that it took a lot out of me. I ask that you not judge them by listening to them solo, as they don’t make a lot of “sense” without the music over them.
Also, I didn’t see any folder/files on the uploader for CY so I made my own. My guess is that Chopper will sorta need those.
Since I didn’t have flacs to listen to…I played along to the demo that Gecko sent out which includes the radio portion in the beginning.
September 15, 2008 at 6:53 am
I can upload the flacs again at some point. I wonder if you can play accurately to the demo with the drum loops in there. Probably it would be hard.
I didn’t realize you hadn’t downloaded the flacs before the collapse of our old uploader.
BTW, to your point about JAG and MrP, I realized last night while playing my MrP progression that it is quite similar, just in a different key and with some different sections, so the JAG music _could_ be reworked for MrP–which is not to say that I’d want to do it.
Goddamn Ike played havoc in Dayton yesterday. Trees down all over my neighborhood and the power probably still out. And yet, I still had to come to NYC.
September 15, 2008 at 7:24 am
Hopefully the drum part will be fine. I’d hate to have to redo it. It was very painful and took about half a day…
The Chicago area had record flooding. My basement took on a little water, but I was able to combat it (towels, fans, shop-vac) before it did any damage.
September 15, 2008 at 9:14 am
I don’t like hearing this that playing drums causes you extensive pain. Playing a musical instrument ought to be a comfortable experience. Using a computer often causes me pain: my eyes are strained; my neck aches, and my right hand (the mouse hand) often gets very sore (I assume from carpal tunnel syndrome); but playing a guitar is pretty comfortable (although the acoustic guitar can make my fingertips hurt if I play too long).
Any chance that you’ll ever recover enough from your near-death experience that drumming won’t be an agony? I suppose I can only hope we don’t get asked to play a live set, or you’ll need a understudy. I can see it now: two songs in Sir Pent removed from his kit on a stretcher to be replaced heroically by Lizard understudy… the Chameleon. Maybe you can teach your son to play and he can be your understudy.
September 15, 2008 at 10:14 am
The chances of us being asked to play a live set seem somewhat remote. I would have suggested that Metro could, in such a situation, get a rocking chair and do what the old man in Arrested Development (the group, not the show) did, just kind of sitting there, but I had assumed that we’d already have Gator doing that, and having two members onstage not playing anything would seem to be overkill. Metro needs to develop his singing chops, so that he can pull a Phil Collins/Dave Grohl/Don Henley, and turn into the frontman.
Also, I would need to buy a double-neck guitar/bass and also develop more arms. And also practice more, as I already couldn’t play and sing at the same time like the new stuff would require. Or else we’d have to get Jerry.
Can we get Jerry?
September 15, 2008 at 10:59 am
Why worry about it until we have a gig? There are always bassists for hire. They’re like mercenaries.
September 15, 2008 at 11:21 am
I often feel like I’m never going to be fully recovered…unless I travel outside of my immediate network of doctors to find someone that would be willing to listen to my backstory + symptoms. For the most part the docs I see now are treating the symptoms and NOT the cause of the symptoms.
If we were to ever play live, I could do a 2 hour show. I would be in pain afterwords…but that’s why god spent years in the lab inventing pain medication.
And I bet we could get Jerry. He’s a ho.
September 15, 2008 at 1:50 pm
I actually considered how we’d play, say, Four H live and came up with a method that would work: it would involve Chops playing the “acoustic” part on a clean electric guitar, then hitting a stompox for his solo. I’d play his overdriven strumming + my intro and coda with a chorus pedal. That would be the only way unless one of us did all the leads and the other just the acoustic part.
Ye godz, I’m tired from teaching. But shouldn’t complain. I feel like a schmuck because my wife and daughter are living like refugees back in tropical storm-stricken Ohio.
September 15, 2008 at 3:54 pm
Or we could have pre-recorded tracks that would play as I drummed to a click track…
I never made it to work. I drove for around 3 hours and just couldn’t get close to where I work, no matter which way I went.
September 15, 2008 at 5:21 pm
Wild. I can’t for the life of me figure out why planes were still taking off yesterday. I should have stayed home and skipped this week, but I think my wife is past being furious at me. So that’s a plus.
September 15, 2008 at 5:49 pm
How’s your little girl doing with her burn?
September 15, 2008 at 6:55 pm
Oh, it’s practically all healed. Amazing powers little kids have.
September 15, 2008 at 7:36 pm
Even more amazing how much it freaks you out and breaks your heart to see your kid in pain!
September 18, 2008 at 5:53 am
I had to do some slicing and dicing…but I have a drum track ready for Channeling You with a surprise or two. The Gecko has also finished his guitar part…AND some surprises of his own.
It’s all in the more than capable hands of Chopper Newt. Run Chopper Run!!
September 18, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Run! Run! Run, Chopper!
September 18, 2008 at 4:57 pm
Chopper told me he will stay up late tonight and skip his Friday night online gaming to focus on finishing Channeling You.
(That’s how I interpreted it, anyway.)
September 18, 2008 at 9:13 pm
Well, he actually said something about how busy he was this weekend, doesn’t miss the Friday night online gaming and had multiple family commitments…BUT I READ BETWEEN THE LINES!!
September 21, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Online gaming! It’s as bad as having to watch a television series. Best thing I ever did was get rid of the television and remove almost all games from my computer, and never buy a game console. Now I have none of those temptations.
September 21, 2008 at 3:51 pm
I have all of those temptations. My addiction is TV without a doubt.
House
Lost
Venture Brothers
South Park
…I gets cranky when I misses me programs.