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The lowstar lowdown 10 - monday 17th july
A very good day to you all, we trust you are well and, if not well, soon to recover at least. Ain’t summer grand. And I don’t mean summer out of the the oc nor do I mean grand as in a thousand. No, quite simply, I just mean isn’t this season of the year marvellous. It’s hot and sunny and everyone is in a good mood at least some of the time. Even the misery duo of lowstar can’t help but smile a few times. It doesn’t last long of course because for every hot sunny day spent idling by the river on a daisy infested meadow there are six spent in sweaty carriages packed full of people who spent the night before eating something deeply unfragrant and didn’t bother showering with no air conditioning. I know you all know what I mean. But let’s not dwell on that, because lowstar managed to get a rehearsal studio with a fully operational air conditioning unit for their practise this week and boy are they pleased about it. The air con was working so well in fact that half way through magic had to put on his hoodie. Fortunately the cops didn’t bust his ass.
However, for every silver lining there is a cloud. And this week it was supplied by a PA system that didn’t work. So we didn’t feel unpleasant, but we couldn’t hear any singing. Swings and roundabouts. One day we’ll leave a practise room with nothing to complain about. Maybe.
So how was it, I hear you ask? It was great actually. Mostly because when you’ve spent the week with your nose to the grindstone and those kind people on the underground have screwed up your line for 3 of the days of the week or you’ve had to write a 10-minute talk on how computers are taking over the world and started by designing shopping trolley wheels, or you’ve spent the week being available to help people out but no bugger’s about, or yogi and boo-boo have stepped up their pickernick basket snatching and if that wasn’t bad enough the sycamores are aiding and abetting and your tree officer is deep deep undercover pretending to be a dutch elm, but sounding more Belgian, it’s utterly utterly brilliant to go into a small room and smack the living crap out of a set of drums that have done nothing to deserve it or crank up your amp until you have two forms of control: off or squealing feedback. Honest. Try it, it’s awesome. And we loved it.
So what did the ‘star get up to? Well, we ran through a bunch of old stuff, tried to figure out how we are going to play the recorded versions of the new songs we’ve just recorded, we talked about designs for the new cd - coming soon folks, so watch this space for details - and then we went and worked on a couple of possible new songs. Provisionally titled ‘that one in b’ and ‘the riff one’. Although, that might change. I’m not saying it will, but we’ll keep you posted.
It’s quite interesting how these new songs come into being, keith seems to jump right ahead and starts worrying about what the middle 8 will sound like while still playing the first verse, ian alternates between trying to haul everyone in to repeating a part of the song so people can ‘jam around it’ -lowstar go jazz - and jumping right ahead to working out the ending and sticking in a bar of 5/4, rob picks out a killer bass line then claims he doesn’t know what he’s doing and magic plays along serenely quietly wondering how late he can leave it before coming up with the words. The inner workings of a band, it’s a beautiful thing.
So this week’s teabreak was spent poring over designs for the cd cover. They will need some tweaking but we’re getting there. But as we’re in an advanced stage, this coming week’s discussion topic is up for grabs, so pleased feel free to write in and give us something to get our teeth into, we’ll gladly include it in the lowdown next week. As a brief example, this week one of our breatheren had this thought - wouldn’t it be ace if we could control cars with our minds. The feeling was that if a car could be controlled by our very thought processes, maybe it could be tapped in to our consciences too. And that would mean that not only would the control of the car be more instant and smoother, but if we were to think to ourselves that we’d like to drive at 80 on a road with a speed limit of 50 the car would stay at 50 because we can’t fool our conscience and the world would be a safer place. So that’s all sorted. But there is a problem, so maybe you’d like to write in a help us out with it. There is some debate as to whether this process would help the problem of falling asleep at the wheel. Now, ideally, when controlled by the mind the car should just shut down when the mind goes to sleep, making this safer too, but of course the mind doesn’t shut down and what if once the driver is asleep he starts dreaming of flying, would the car try to take off? Could it change shape into I don’t know an orange helter skelter. This would make motorway driving extremely hazardous. Needs more thought, I think.
So, to the adventures of imaginary alan. This week, imaginary alan came down to London with his imaginary girlfriend and had dinner with not-imaginary keith. They all had pizza. Imaginary alan had garlic bread and not-imaginary keith had ice cream. Then they chatted for a while and caught up a bit. Things are going very well for imaginary alan but he doesn’t think he’ll be around for a while now. It’s weird isn’t it how an imaginary friend can spend so little time with his not-imaginary friend. But then he’s got people to see (who can’t see him) and things to do imaginarily. It’s a tough job.
Back to the practise, who excelled and who was keith. Well, goes without saying that keith was keith. And as a result he won’t be getting the lowstar woestar award, yet again. I believe this is very close to a record. My gut feeling is though that he’ll find some way of winning one just before he manages to obtain that record. Maybe one week he’ll turn up and no one else will. It could happen. Anyway, this week, he counts himself out by mucking up the recorded songs again and for inflicting his racket directly onto the refined ears of magic and stopping him hearing properly. Magic blew up the mixing desk and also loses points for emptying his kit bag in the middle of the room which made it look like one of those find which bit of string leads to the cake after the kitten has been at it puzzles. I’m all for a bit of rock’n’roll, but there’s no excuse for an untidy kit bag. Ian was ‘this’ close to winning again, but messed up right at the death by talk of bars of 7/8, 5/4, and god knows what in the new song. It’s not even got a tune yet and already there are lowstarmen quaking in their boots. Or maybe it should be quacking in their boots. But to be fair, the dude is a drumming superbeing, he has special powers: his speedy fills can bring on heart arrhythmias in his enemies, his twirling sticks can hypnotise and so act as a truth serum, his headphones are impregnable to any known sound, and he has x-ray eyes and pointy hair and stuff. He is The Paradiddler. But he was beaten fair and square this week by the Throb. The throb kicked bass ass, with some great new song moments as well as some mighty fine backing vocals, this week he am the man.
All of which leaves us just the thoughts from practise.
- you know them biscuits with the cows on, they’re called milk biscuits, but all biscuits have got milk in right? So what’s happening there?
- Who’d have thought that the only picture we have of the four of us playing together has us all smiling?!
- Is it wrong that we were all really pleased to see the ikea trolley this week, truth be told I’m sure that more than one of us actually thought the ikea trolley was pleased to see us too.... or it might just have been one of us....
- Rob the throb had to do some very complicated mental arithmetic to work out the change from the hire of the room, how hard would it be for them to supply blackboards and chalk to work that shit out
- Do ian’s mighty ear defenders leave an imprint in his spiky hair, much like alien spaceships leave crop circles? And will he end up with cauliflower ears like those big rugby playing men who stick their ears between other men’s thighs?
- When given the choice between a clean guitar sound with chorus and a dirty sound in the new song, who really thought keith would go for the clean one? Perhaps he’s feeling unwell
- Did magic refuse to bring anymore yumyums to practise because of tharpy’s lack of enthusiasm? And uncle rob’s continued insistence that they should have jam in the middle. I mean, come on, he’s just describing a jam doughnut, it’s like saying, ‘the yumyums are nice, but I’d prefer them if they were a bit more cod-dy and covered in batter and maybe served with chips. Sheesh
So that’s it for another week. Have a good one yourself and write and tell us what you’ve been up to or anything really, even if it’s to call keith a loser for still not being able to win the woestar, I mean come on, how long has it been?
Next week, who knows what we’ll bring you, probably some stuff about practise and the latest on the ikea trolley, maybe something about imaginary alan, but one thing I can practically guarantee is some bitter and twisted words from half of lowstar as the throb has yet another Friday swanning about at home after a practise and the paradiddler pops off to Greece. It’s started already.... more next week. See you all later (except rob and ian, part timers....)
ls
blog list
recording november 2008
gig email - 20 nov 2007
gig email - 24 jul 2007
happy new year - tuesday 16 jan 2007
lowstar lowdown 17 - monday 16 oct 2006
lowstar lowdown 16 - monday 18 sep 2006
lowstar lowdown 15 - monday 11 sep 2006
lowstar lowdown 14 - monday 28 aug 2006
lowstar lowdown 13 - monday 14 aug 2006
lowstar lowdown 12 - monday 31 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 11 - monday 24 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 10 - monday 17 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 9 - monday 10 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 8 - monday 26 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 7 - monday 19 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 6 - monday 05 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 5 - lowstardate 27th may.6
lowstar lowdown 4 - monday 22 may 2006
lowstar lowdown III - return of the blog (15 may 2006)
lowstar lowdown 2 - wednesday 10 may 2006
lowstar lowdown 1 - friday 28 april 2006
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