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I just completed building an isolation cabinet within my isolation room. It seems to work really well and I can crank up and record without bothering anyone. It has two speakers. One is an EVM-12L OEM and the other is an EVM-12L classic. The EVM-12L OEM is my favorite speaker. The classic is cool as well but it has just a little more speaker distortion or sizzle to the sound. Anyhow, check out the detailed pics for building the isolation cabinet

Recently I finished tracking the guitars and bass for a new song. I also worked on a new song with my drummer Allen Lynd. Allen is currently recording the drums for this song.

So where am I at with the new CD? Not where I really should be, but I think that is about to change. I should have plenty of time to devote to the effort and hope to have it finished in 2010. If not, maybe I should just give it up!

Recently I saw the band Monolith in Winchester at the Alamo Draft House. It was a cool show. They sold the theatre out and they truly rocked. I would recommend seeing the band. The music was very heavy and had a nice depth to it. Check out there website at www.myspace.com/monolithrocks.

I also came across a fellow shredder on myspace, check it out: http://www.myspace.com/caseyshreds

I finally have my email form working correctly from this web site. So drop me a line, I would love to hear from you.

The CD is on semi-hold right now. Over the summer we had a new house built. We moved in in October. Since December, I have been in the process of having my basement finished. It is almost done - just paint, carpet, and finishing the electrical. The basement will also house my new studio. So I am getting close to getting back on track. I'll try to get some picks of the studio up soon.

I have a good sized studio and also a 13 x 6 isolation room. I sound proofed the isolation room using 5/8 Quiterock. In the studio I used 1/2 Quiterock. Hopefully the Quiterock will provide enough sound isolation. If not then I may build a room inside of the isolation room that will be completely isolated from the exterior walls.

I bought the new Dragonforce CD. I think they are all great musicians and the guitar players are smoking. The CD is not really my cup of tea. I'm not sure I'm really into that "lord of the rings" sounding type of power metal. The guitars are great but at times kind of gimmicky,  the leads are laced with odd sounds that make me think that I'm listening to the sound track of a Nintendo game.

I am thinking about bringing back the "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" pod cast. If you or your band have an MP3 that you distribute for free and would like to submit it for the pod cast please contact me.

So what have I been doing? I am still working on the second CD. Recently Allen Lynd (http://www.allenlind.com/) completed the drums tracks for another song. I started editing the drum tracks for the new song this weekend, but once again, he does such a good job that they really hardly need editing. I currently have another song that I have given to Allen and he should be recording the drums soon. I have another song that I have recorded the rhythm guitar on, I need to still record the second track to double track the guitars. Once this is completed I will be giving the tracks to Allen to record the drums.

It has been really hard to dedicate time to recording lately. There is a lot going on right now. We are building a new house and that is eating up a lot of my time. The new house is really looking great and it will house a nice studio with a dedicated isolation room. It is going to be an awesome space to record in, I can't wait to start using it.

In December I received my new Jackson SL2-MAH electric guitar. It is a soloist that has a mahogany body and a maple top. It looks and plays great. I will try to get pictures up online soon. I did have to have the truss rod adjusted because the neck was starting to back bow. One I had it adjusted the back bow was completely gone.

Let's see, I got some new pedals: Boss Chorus - pretty kick ass, a really nice chorus pedal. Boss Metal Zone - an excellent pedal. I mainly get my main distortion from a head, but I usually split my guitar signal to two amps and record two tracks at a time. So on one track I'll go straight to the head, on the other I'll use a distortion pedal. So in the end I get four different sounding rhythm tracks form two takes. This will give me a lot of options when I get ready to mix down. Dan Electro - .

Also, I host my website through Yahoo. Recently they have moved my website to a different server. Since then my email page has not been working correctly. Please email me directly at curtshaw@curtshaw.com.

My friend Dan Lynch http://www.myspace.com/superatomic  came over recently. We did side by side tests comparing the POD to the JCM2000, JCM800, and Mesa Dual Rectifier heads. The POD performed pretty well and had a lot of characteristics of the heads. It seemed like the POD did not move air the way a head and cab do, you can feel the sound more with a head. But the POD was pretty cool in the way you could add a tube screamer or change the speakers. My mindset at this time is with using heads for recording. I think I would use a head for gigging as well, but it's hard to say.

Have a great month!

I'm also trying to get a band going around the Winchester area. For this area a southern rock band makes a lot of sense, but who knows, it could morph into something else.

Happy Fourth of July!!!!!

Hello, I hope everyone had a great time over the holidays! I have been keeping pretty busy. I’ve got  the second song 

for the new release sent to Allen Lind (http://www.allenlind.com/)Allen will be playing and recording the drums for the 

new song. 

I have a new video on YouTube. Check it out here!

I finished rewiring my Jackson soloist with Brian May pickups, the wiring went pretty well. After I completed

it, it was humming like a mofo. I realized that I had wired the input jack backwards. So I corrected that 

and now it still hums a little bit. I’m thinking that maybe it is because I used an old jack that is a 

little tarnished. I’m going to replace that jack and hope like hell the hum goes away. If not I will be 

pissed off. It was a real pain wiring that guitar. Some lessons that I learned 1. Use stranded wire, solid 

wires tends to break!! 2. I tried to solder the ground to a push/pull pot. Since the pot is so big, it was 

hard to heat and hard to get the solder to stick to it, I actually had to heat it to the point where it 

damaged the switch. This pissed me off. 3. Don’t use old parts i.e. old jacks. Click here for the wiring 

diagram and PICs.

My next project that I already started is a new isolation cabinet for recording guitar. I have already 

started putting it together but it is on hold until I get the acoustical caulk that I ordered. I will have

PICs of the complete project soon.

I’m also still practicing my first lead for the first song. I had planned on recording it last weekend, but

I really wasn’t ready. I’ll probably keep practicing it and record it in a few weeks when the isolation 

cabinet is done.

I am pleased to announce that the Curt Shaw CD is for sale on two additional websites http://www.echorider.com 

and http://www.abstractlogix.com/xcart/product.php?productid=21928 . 

I was also contacted by Mikolaj Furmankiewicz from Poland. Mikolaj has a website called www.hmpmagazine.imn1.pl. 

Mikolaj is working on a section called the Department of Virtuosity www.hmpmagazine.imn1.pl/index.php?m=dov. 

This section is still under construction. This printed HMP magazine is accessible in every bigger city in 

Poland. There have been printed 30 issues since 2000. HMP MAGAZINE is a bi-monthly one. I have sent CDs to 

Mikolaj and look forward to hearing from him soon.

I was also contacted by Andreas Kopp from Austria. Andreas request the use of Class Sick for use in a video be hosted

on his website www.darkscorner.de.  I am really looking forward to seeing the finished product!

Have a great month!

I received my POD XT and also purchased the Bass Pack for it. I think the POD is great for bass. I'm really happy with the sound I got when I recorded the bass for the first song. I really haven't checked it out for guitar yet.

Sales are going well on the Guitar9 website and It's really cool that I am in the top 10 for Heavy Metal sales. Check it out here!

I found some great software for writing guitar tab. It is TablEdit. Check out the Demo version! Now that I have this awesome tool, I'm going to be writing lessons. Hopefully I will get them on the Guitar9 website.

Here is the link to the article that I wrote for Guitarz For Ever , http://www.guitarz-for-ever.com/recording-guitar-striving-for-perfection.html Check it out! It's about getting ready to record.

I'm wiring my black Jackson Soloist up with Brain May single coil pickups.  I have all of the pickups and a 5 way super switch. I still have to order two 250k pots with switches built in. I plan on being able to combine the pickups in series (most guitars combine pickups in parallel). Having the pickups in series is the key to getting a Brian May (Queen) sound. I'm pretty psyched about completing this and will have pictures of my wiring diagram and my wiring/soldering job.

Have a great Christmas!

I also ordered a POD XT and should have it next week. I am really only going to use it to record bass. I don't see myself using it to much for guitar, but you never know.

I wrote an article for http://www.guitarz-for-ever.com . It is an article about getting the best results for your recoding session. It should be posted soon so check back for the exact URL.

I am writing some symphonic type parts to some of the songs, so I started listening to some more classical music. Trying to get ideas and influences.

I decided to quit doing the monthly Curt Shaw's Metal Show podcast. It was just to hard to find bands that wanted to participate.  So maybe I will revive it in the future or make it tri-monthly.

Recent CD purchases - Exodus, Bonded by Blood - This is a great CD. I had the cassette way back when. This is great old school trash. The lyrics are really sick, especially for the time when it was released.  Exodus had a quirky writing style. I don't know how to describe it, other that it's very angular. I also got Aerosmith, Aerosmith. This is also a great CD that has some songs that I love to jam along with. This CD is a great lesson in the blues style and represents Aerosmith when they were raw and uncorrupted by the corporate music business.

There are some cool bands on the podcast this month. They are Steve Gladman, Lions Share,  Neglected Fields, and Michael Troy. Check it out here.

I also have a MySpace page now. Please check it out and become a friend/post a comment. Here is the link to my page Http://www.myspace.com/curtshawrock .

I recorded the rhythm tracks for my new songs. Before I recorded the song I recorded 5 of my guitars to see which sounded the best for recording. It was a close call between my Jackson V, my Jackson Soloist, and my Yamaha SG1500. I thought the SG1500 sounded the best. So I recorded a track with the 30th anniversary head, the Yamaha, and the EV speaker. Then I double tracked it with the Jackson V, the 30th Anniversary head, and a GT-75 speaker.  I recorded a third rhythm track (probably won't use it) with the Jackson V, the 30th head, and the EV speaker. I think the guitar sounds pretty good. I think the API A2D preamps help a lot. So now I am practicing some of the lead parts that are hard as hell to play fast and clean.

I also ordered a Monster Pro1000 speaker cable and a Monster Pro1000 Instrument Cable to record with. I'm hoping this will help capture a better sound (every little bit helps). I already have Monster Pro1000 Microphone cables as well.

I've got a myspace page, but I'm still working on uploading the music, should be done soon.

Have a great month!

This months podcast "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" features the following bands: Parlay, Anton Tsygankov, and Thomas Tallchief.

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

I got a couple of good reviews this month:

http://www.geocities.com/behind_the_veil2001/Main.html - A few days ago I received a package from the United States that contained the latest self titled album of Curt Shaw. Curt has released this album as an instrumental one and as you can imagine you will have the chance to enjoy twelve tracks and about forty five minutes of crushing guitar riffs and remarkable solos. Usually when I receive albums that don’t have vocals, I am a little bit nervous, because besides the fact that I listen to them more than once of course, sometimes I feel a little bored. Perhaps it’s because I can’t play the guitar, maybe because I’m used to listening to vocals too. Anyway, the thing that I adore on this album is the fact that even if it is an instrumental album, I almost didn’t care about it. The love that Curt has for his own work and the way he has written the songs is incredible. I mean that he tried to write the songs as if they had vocals and maybe this gives to the listener the feeling that maybe in the next guitar riff he will hear a singer. Last but not least I’d like to note the fact that I really enjoyed the time I spent with this album; I hope you will like it as I do!
Official Site: www.curtshaw.com
E-mail Band: curtshaw@curtshaw.com

http://rockfest.blogspot.com/ - Heavy jamming with the best of them, Curt Shaw extudes the smooth percision of the craftsman deftly laying down smoking sweeps, running through classical modes like an understudy. He is without a doubt over the top, and he does not regret it one iota. If there is space, there is rip. A couple of breaks maybe here and there, but soon Shaw dashes back in and completely shreds. He has an excellent backup band in Nick Prysiazny clock perfecting the drums and Wayne Barry coming through like a tank on bass. Finest moment could be though when he steps back a pace from the blistering and puts more riff in his sweet (groove on the excellent "Egyptian Moon"). At times he is simply overwhelming fire power (listen to first of no-pun intending "I Am Not A Viking"). This guitar for the serious guitarist. He'll even slow his horse down a notch for the western-appalachian waltzy disc completer "The Trail". It is but a rare respite from all hell breaking loose! The man can tear it up! Contact: http://www.curtshaw.com

I also sent a CD out to this radio show: http://metalmorfose.blogspot.com

This months podcast "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" features the following bands: Gareth Thomas , Vindex, Neglected Fields, James D Gilmore, and Francesco Fereri.

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station! All of the songs were recently updated!

I have upgraded my PC and also ordered my new Protools Digi 002 rack system. I should have it delivered within a week or so and I'm already practicing a new song to record once I get it installed. I still want to order a new mic Preamp before I get to deep into recording.

This months podcast "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" features the following bands: Matt Mckay , Phil Lewis , and Until Escape. 

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

I started upgrading my recording system. I ordered a new Tyan mother board, a 3 gig P4, and a gig of memory. I started putting it together on Saturday and found out that ATX power supplies are now different. There are several different flavors of ATX power supplies and it is kind of confusing. I have an ATX power supply and an ATX motherboard, but now I need an EPS ATX power supply that has 24 pins on the connector. So I had to order a new power supply. I'm also going to upgrade my Protools setup to the digi002R which uses firewire to connect to the PC.

The podcast this month is great! You have to check it out. It includes the following bands: Bulb, Lionsgate, Fredrik Pihl, and Circle of Force. Click here to check it out!

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

I've updated the Question and Answer page, only this time I was asking the questions to Randy Cuffe. Randy is a great guitarist from Maryland. I was listening to some of Randy's tunes and had to ask him how he captures his guitar for recording.

This month I mailed some CDs to an Australian radio program called Fretnet. I also received reviews from Mario's Metal Mania and Maelstrom.

The podcast is kicking this month with some great bands. This month I have: Ariadna Project, Grant Tregallas, Lions Share, Nameless One, Envy, and Andrea Bottino. Check it out here!

I've recorded a template in protools for a new original, but I really haven't done much with it. I need to practice it more and then do the final recording for an acoustic part.

As always don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

Accomplishments this month: Now registered with ASCAP for writing and publishing, Sold a bunch of stuff on ebay as a start towards getting my new mic preamp, Now selling my release on Amazon.com, Sent promo package to Black Lotus Records, Put a review on Guitar9.com, completed an interview for Les Acteurs de l'Ombre, set up a Curt Shaw site at SoundClick.com and uploaded 2 mp3's, Submitted a profile to Ball Buster Webzine.

I also will have an interview coming out on http://www.lordsofmetal.nl

I recently jammed with my good friend Reece. Reece plays with Go Smack Alice and is an awesome guitar player. Photo Looking forward to doing it again soon!

The February podcast "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" is now online and features Dies Ire, Sabaton, Unbroken, Stairway . This is a great show! Check it out here

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

I actually started writing for the next CD, I really didn't mean to, it just happened. It's an acoustic piece that is pretty cool. I'm going to try to layer two guitars that are doing something different but yet compliment each other. The new CD should be out in the year 2020, just kidding. Hopefully it will be a lot sooner than that.

The January podcast "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" is complete and has the following bands: One Bullet Left, Aldo Vaccaro, John Mizarolli, Silvertung, and Unbroken. Check it out here!

I started designing my walk-in isolation room that will host two 4x12 cabinets. I am going to use that for recording. I will document the whole building process and post it on the website. I also am in the process of dumping all of my old ADAT tapes into protools. Once I have that done I am going to sell my ADAT and buy a new preamp and compressor. I have my eye on an API 512c preamp and also would like to have an EL Distressor compressor. These are units that are used in professional studios and will help me capture a better guitar sound.

Also don't forget to check out my internet radio station!

The December Podcast is now online! It features some great bands like One Bullet Left, Urban Snake, Matt McKay, Curt Shaw, and The Pocket Gods.

One thing that I plan on working on is setting up the podcast in streaming audio. Right now it is a 30 meg mp3 files and takes a long time to download if you don't have a high speed connection. So I need to do something for the dial up users to make it more accessible.  Also my internet radio station "Metal Guitar Spotlight" is still on line and I just refreshed all of the song that are on it. You can hear some of the best metal guitarists and it also works great on a dial up connection!

Have a great Christmas!!!

It has been an interesting experience with a lot of small problems. I had the CD mastered and then discovered distortion on two of the tracks. So I had to have the two songs remixed to get rid of the noise. Cue recording did this for free. Then I had the two songs re-mastered. Part of the re-mastering was to split one long song into two songs. When we did this it created a pop on the final CD. So I had to have them re-master that song and burn another CD. Now everything is perfect with the mastered CD. So I sent it to be manufactured via UPS. In the process of sending it there was a time where the CD could not be located with the tracking number, that just about gave me an aneurism. But that is all straight now!

The November episode of "Curt Shaw's Metal Show" podcast is now available for download here. The podcast features Images of Eden, Not Inc, and Dark Illusion. This is a great show with some great music, so check it out!

I'm going to check out the band Opeth on this weekend. Should be a great show. Be sure to check them out at http://www.opeth.com

I do have two previews of songs on my CD. They are in MP3 format, so check them out! classic.mp3 and arp.mp3

I also started my own internet radio station called Metal Guitar Spotlight. It features some cool metal with an emphasis on kick ass guitar players. You can access the radio station here.

I also now have a podcast of my monthly show "Curt Shaw's Metal Show". This podcast features some of the coolest unsigned bands. This month's podcast features Driveset, Fear 44, and Scarlet Angel. You can access the podcast here. If you know of a band that would like to be featured on my show, please email me.

I have learned a lot while in the studio. Mixing is an acquired skill that should be left to the experts. The mixes are sounding good and should only require minor tweaks. One thing I learned is to schedule enough time. You will need a minimum of one hour per song, but in reality closer to two hours per song. And you know what that means - mo money, mo money, mo money! But hey you have to get it done right.

The next step will be mastering the CD. Cha-Ching! $90 dollars per hour. It is recommended to have one hour per song for mastering.

I am presently considering having my own internet radio station. I am also working on creating my own podcast. One of the things I would like to do is to promote local unsigned bands on the radio and podcast. If you are interested in submitting an MP3 please let me know.

I think I have a pretty good picture for the CD cover. I think it will reflect what the CD is about and there will be no question as to what the style of music will be.  I am going to have the CD replicated at Media Services Inc. I have used them before and was happy with the results. I now have a finished bio and will be finalizing my press kit.

I also have been heavily researching how to promote the CD. I have a ton of ideas. So far it looks like the top two sites for online distribution are CDBaby.com and MP3.com, I will probably use both of these sites.

I have re-enabled the guestbook. Please sign it if you get time. Please remember to include you email address!

I've booked studio time at Cue Recording Studios www.cuerecording.com for the mixing of the CD. I have 10 hours scheduled for August 17 and 18. It is a nice studio, check out the web site. I will be in studio A. I have a lot of work to do to get my music imported into the studio's protools. I have the LE version of protools and the studio has the TDM version. So I have to mix down each track to a standard wave file to import it into the studios protools. So since there are 32 tracks on some of the songs I will have to record 32 waves, so that should take about 4 hours per song.

I went to Illinois over the fourth to visit family and friends. Check out some of the pictures of the guitars that my friend Jim Riddle has painted. Jim is available for custom paint jobs. Email me for details.

I have designed a logo. I have the rough version that I will submit to my artist for the finalized version. It looks pretty cool so far. I'm also in the process of getting pictures taken for the CD cover.

I caught Testament at Jaxx in Virginia. It was a pretty good show. Testament had the 100% original lineup. They only played the old stuff that they wrote and recorded together. This was sort of cool because I got to hear a lot of stuff I hadn't heard in a long time. But it also meant that I didn't get to hear some of Testaments really kick ass stuff off of "Low". The band pretty much rocked, as always. Testament is a powerful band. The sound man could have done a better job. you could hear the vocals plain as day, but the guitar solos where another story. Why is it that a national band can't get a sound man that can boost the solos? Jaxx has a pretty nice light setup, but you would not have known it because the person running lights did nothing impressive. But overall Testament rocked and it was great to see the original lineup playing all of the older stuff.

Tonight - Judas Priest at Nissan Pavilion!

I also went to Vegas and had a blast! Here are some pictures from the trip.

I also backed up all of my recording data onto a second internal drive and also onto an external drive.

I did get windows XP installed on my recording PC. I was then able to upgrade protools to a 32 track version. That is great, the extra tracks give me a little more breathing room.

I caught Queensryche in Philadelphia. It was a great show. They played one set of greatest hits, then they played the entire Mind Crime cd. It was a great show.

I got the Metallica DVD "Some Kind of Monster" as a gift recently. It is an interesting DVD. After watching the DVD it is very understandable why the latest Metallica release sucks! They changed there whole writing process for St Anger. They used to do more writing individually. James and Lars would get together and write most of the material. For St Anger they changed this and tried to write all of the songs as a group. I've been through this before. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. When you try to write as a group sometimes you end up compromising more by accepting an idea that someone else suggests. You don't want to reject their idea because you are trying to work as a team. Then later after it's to late to turn back you really realize that you don't like the idea, you get bummed on the whole song, you get bummed on the whole project, and then it's just a downward spiral from there. Writing as a group can work out well but a lot of things just have to work out for it to happen. After being in Matallica for so long, they are all burnt out on each other, that is not the time to try writing as a group.

One other problem with Metallica was the fact that James Hetfield was going through rehab and a lot of personnel problems during the recording process. he disappeared for a year, and then when he came back only wanted to work on the release for four hours a day. I always assumed that Lars was the difficult band member, but after watching the dvd it really comes down to James.

I also always assumed that the producer Bob Rock got in the way of the creative process too much, I really did not see that as the case while watching the dvd. Although I don't really think he should have played bass on the release.

Metallica even had a psychologist on board for the entire recording process. They were tip toeing around each other and trying to be non-offensive to each other just to get through the recording process. There was also a part where Kirk stood up and defended the right to have guitar solos in some of the songs. I respected that and agreed with him, BUT there is not one guitar solo on the whole release.

I hope Metallica can get their act together. The only way that I see anything good coming out of Metallica is if James and Lars truly rebuild there relationship (probably won't happen), or if they just suck it up and work together to create something, or if James works with another drummer to write, Lars works with another guitar player to write, and then they get together to merge the ideas - but if they do that they might as well just do new side projects or form new bands. I am hopeful that they can still put something good out. Sometimes you have to hit rock bottom before you can get better. To me St Anger was as close to rock bottom as you can get. I hope they realize this and maybe it will light a fire under their ass for the next release.

I started working on a bluegrass song today called Black Mountain Rag. I first heard Chet Atkins play it and have always wanted to learn it. I found the sheet music so I started working on it.

I ordered windows XP pro and should be getting that tomorrow. I am going to load it up on a spare hard drive. That will allow me to upgrade my protools to a 32 track version. Right now I only have 24 tracks. The extra eight tracks will give me some flexibility.

I got the Morely Bad Horsie Wah Wah pedal for Christmas. I think it is great. I am going to try to create a web page where I can review the different pieces of gear that I get. I also want to get some more videos and some updated lessons on the web site. I've really been slacking on that.

I upgraded my hard drives on my recording PC to two 50 gig SCSI drives. This was kind of a Pain in the but. I had major issues but finally got them both working. I started recording my old demo cassette tapes into Protools and burning them onto CDs. This will be and ongoing project.

I saw Michael Schenker and Uli John Roth at Jaxx in Springfield Virginia. Michael Schenker rocked! He played a lot of old UFO tunes and the band pulled them off well. Michael's playing was very good that night. They also had an awesome bass player. Uli John Roth was very different. I have admired Uli for the releases that he did with the Scorpions in the 70's. I respect him as a guitar player. But his show was kind of boring. He had a rhythm guitar player, but the drums and keyboards were on a tape recording. He played a lot of symphonic pieces that were cool, but just not really what the crowd wanted. He also seemed a little bit sloppy.

There is a big difference between playing live and recording. When you are playing live you can play a little sloppier. But when you record it's tougher because even if you nail all of the notes in a solo you have to listen for any noise behind the notes (open strings, string scrapes, etc.) So I would say if you have ambitions to record, then you should focus on this when you are practicing. Try to make sure that there is no background noise in your solos, focus on what is going on in the background. The reason I suggest this is because I know it is something I have to pay attention to  when I record. I wonder if it is a problem for someone like Steve Vai? You would never know it from listening to his CDs!

One thing that I've been thinking about is what I will do differently when I record my next CD. I think I will try to complete one song at a time. I will write a song, record a midi drum scratch track, record all of the instruments, then let the drummer record the drums. I think this will work better because my goal will be just finishing on song at a time.  Also the drummer will benefit because all of the guitar parts will be there when he records. This is important for knowing where the drums can showcase without stepping on the song. For this CD I recorded scratch tracks for all of the songs, then recorded the drums for all of the songs. Then I had the intimidating task of recording all parts for all songs. This is a very large task and can be overwhelming.

Concert Review: Brides of Destruction, JAXX, Springfield VA, May 01, 2004

I was not 100% stoked on seeing this show. I always thought Motley Crue was a little bit of a bubble gum band back in the day and I never really cared for LA Guns. But I do have to say I was wrong. This was a very entertaining show. The band consists of :

London LeGrand – vocals
Nikki Sixx – bass
Tracii Guns – guitar
Scot Coogan – drums

The band had great stage presence, they looked like they were having a blast. But the music also kicked ass. In the past I never thought Traci was that great on guitar, but he was pulling off a good solid, impressive solo in every song. London did a great job on vocals also. They played the new BOD songs from the new album and then after a break played two LA GUNS songs (I could have skipped them) and then they played Looks That Kill and Shout at the Devil from Crue. I would recommend seeing this band if they come to your town!

03.28.01
I went and saw Yngwie Malmsteen tonight. He is an awesome guitar player. Lizzy Borden opened up the show and they were pretty cool also.  I got together with Nick on Saturday and tried recording the electronic drums. The Pintech toms really don't track that well. It seems like they miss a lot of  hits. The kick and the snare performed well. So now I'm going to try to use the pintech snare and kick and then also use Nick's acoustic toms. One other major problem we ran into is that the recorded midi data from the electronic drums is some how playing out of sync with everything else in my Cubase recording program. Just another day in my electronic recording hell. I think it has something to do with a midi driver not being compatible with cubase.

03.18.01
I decided to put together a cover band to have some fun. We got together on Friday night and jammed a little bit and then picked out a song list. We should be out in a couple of months. Also me and my drummer Nick tried out the Pintech drum triggers and they worked pretty well. There was some false triggering on one of the toms but we tightened the head and I think that took care of the problem. I spent Saturday and Sunday in the studio recording tracks for my solo CD. Things went well and I finished the rhythm tracks for one of my songs. I have spent a lot of time ensuring that I have a good drum and guitar sound and right now I am happy with both. Things should progress quickly on the CD now. On another note I went and saw one of my favorite local bands "Hectic Red" last night. I like them a lot because they play obscure songs, have great talented musicians, and have a killer guitar player.

03.10.01
Me and Nick got together yesterday and went to the music store to check out some drum trigger pads.  I decided to try out the Pintech drum triggers to see how they work out. I should have them here by the end of the week.  After we got back we jammed for a little bit and worked on some tunes. Today I practiced for around three hours and worked on some parts for one of my songs. I also ordered and installed 256 meg of memory into the PC that I run Cubase on. This should give me more memory for processing my mixes. 

02.24.01
I worked in the studio today recording rhythm tracks. Things were going great,  I had about an hour of work done and then my computer crashed. I should have been saving my work but I wasn't so now it's history. After that I needed a mental break so I defragmented my hard drives and designed a new home page for the web site. I think it looks pretty good. I'm going to start recording again tonight.

01.31.01
Damn, I haven't updated this in a while. A lot has been going on with the new release. I have been tweaking the drum sounds.  Also I purchased a Line6 POD Pro that I am planning on using for recording. It has some really nice sounds. I tried adding drum triggers to Nick's acoustic drums, what a pain in the ass this was! They false trigger a lot. I'm still going to try to use them, but I am focusing on just getting a good acoustic sound. I've also bought a new used guitar. It is a Yamaha SG1500. It has a mahogany body with a maple top. It sounds just like a Les Paul but plays a lot better. I have the equipment to put video lessons on the sight now, look for that soon.

10.26.00
I've been practicing a lot lately. On Saturday I spent 2 hours writing a Latin Flamenco style original. The challenge with this song seems to be trying to put it in a rock format. It has such a strong traditional sound that it really is suited for acoustic guitars. I'm going to try to still put electric into it to give a flamenco/rock sound. Later Saturday Nick came over and we spent about 3 hours just jamming and working on originals. Nick is really picking the songs apart and I'm sure his drumming ideas are going to be deep. So far today I have just spent about 2 hours on the web site. I started editing pictures of my guitars to put on the site. I have a few bugs to work out on that but have a few pictures up.

10.10.00
On Saturday I spent a couple of hours photographing the guitars, the studio, and my amps. I have them all loaded into my PC now and I have started editing some of them to put on the web site. I also recorded  guitar, lead, and bass for the song "Living after Midnight" . I'm using this song  just for tweaking all of the sounds of the instruments. Since it is an easy song, I can try out 20 or so different guitar sounds until I find a good one. I am doing this with all of the instruments. Then I can hear all of the instruments in the context of a song to see how they mix. Nick Pryzania is playing drums on the new release.  Nick was in the studio on Sunday and we spent about four hours working on microphone placement for the drums. We tried different placements and picked the best for each drum. After that we recorded the whole set. Then we recorded Nick playing along to living after midnight. To see nicks drums Drums1 Drums2 . Now that I have some drums recorded I can work on equalizing them to make them sound kick ass! Things went good and we ended up with a pretty good sound without EQ. I can't wait to start EQ'ing to hear what they sound like.  I ended up going out Sunday night to see some lame ass national band that I will leave un-named. I was up all night so on Monday after work I crashed and didn't get anything done.

10.01.00
I have been practicing a lot lately. Today I spent three hours working on finding a good bass sound. I recorded drums off of the Korg Triton, then tried six different bass sounds to see which one sounded the best. So far I like the bass going into the Korg A3 into a MESA head, miked with a CAD mike. I'm also going to try going direct out of the Korg straight into the board. Now that I have a decent bass sound I am going to work on finding the best guitar sound. The Korg Triton has excelent drum sounds, so I will try to make the live drum set sound as good as the Triton. I will probably work with Nick Pryziana this weekend to record some live drums. Then I will record the guitar and do a rough mix just to make sure that all of the sounds of the instruments sit well with each other. Once I have that I will actually start laying some tracks down.

09.14.00
September 14, 2000 - I practiced for one hour today. I practiced pentatonic arpeggios. While I was practicing I came up with an advanced pentatonic riff. You can check it out on the Riffs page in the Lessons section. Riffs . I would have to say that right  now  between "get a life" and "get to work" I would definitely have to get a life.

09.11.00
I finished the structure of the web site today. Now I just have to polish things up with better graphics, installing  wave files, and installing the pictures. I probably spent about two hours today finishing it up. Also  I went and saw Mysteries of Egypt at the Omni Dome today. I am working on an Egyptian style song for the new CD and this movie definitely will provide inspiration. I'm also going to practice guitar for a couple of hours today.

09.10.00                                                                                                                                                       Over the last three days I have practiced a couple of hours each day. I have been working on a Japanese scale consisting of A, C#, D#, and E. These are the only notes in the scale and they are played in an arpeggio form. Also as of today I have started practicing to a metronome . I think this will have a huge effect on my speed. I also spent around one and a half hours working on the web site today.

11.08.00
In my daily battle against technology I spent around 3 hours working on the web site. I created the email form  and go figure, it wouldn't work. It turns out that I had a problem with my Front Page server extensions that are located on my web host providers server. I had to remove the extensions, reload the extensions, and then reinstall my web site. But it works now!!!! I also squeezed an hour of practice in.

11.07.00
Well I am in Oklahoma City right now so I'm not making much progress in the recording studio. I am making a lot of progress on the web site though.  I have probably put about four hours into it today. Things have went really well today. I'm using Microsoft FrontPage to design the site and so far it is working great. I went and saw the bands Cannibal Corpse and Nile last night. I thought Nile was really good, but Cannibal Corpse was awesome. This is the second time I've seen Cannibal Corpse and I have to hand it to the guitar players in the band. The are truly talented musicians!  I've had enough of the web site, it's time to practice!  Check out the Jason Becker Tribute Page.  It has some great lessons in it. http://www.saunalahti.fi/angwie/