Sessions #4 (Apr 26, 2009)1

I just got a new mic, and I needed to try it out.

This Session is “Ritual Dance” from the movie August Rush, which was played by Kaki King, who’s style I am pretty much obsessed with. Between her and Andy McKee, I have my work cut out for me in my life pursuit of general awesomeness. These players are amazing, and I kinda view them like the beatboxing flute guy: taking it to an unprecedented new level. Lots of house parties have a guitar sitting around. There’s always somebody who can pick it up and play some Jack Johnson tune, “More Than Words” or “Every Rose Has It’s Thorn”. I’d rather not be that guy. There aren’t many at parties who can touch play or combine percussive and melodic phrasing, so I’ll take that on.

One thing that I’ve come to realize is my acoustic sounds like garbage when it’s plugged in, but pretty good mic’d. That has everything to do with the Elixer Custom Light strings, which are sort of old on mine now but they can make the crustiest guitar sound amazing. The guitar itself, however, is barely physically capable of this kind of playing. I’ve picked up most of the tunes from August Rush, but they’re much more difficult to play on mine than the ones on the wall at Guitar Center. (At one point, the E string got caught under the fret, for chrissakes.)

I was there one day ogling Martin acoustics in the $3000 range. I picked one up off the wall, and played with it a bit. I use a lot of different tunings, so I began to change to a DADGCC tune for this song. *SNAP* went the G string. I felt like I had just gotten punched in the chest. I barely even moved it!! Luckily, nobody was in the room. I smoothly hung it up, walked away, out the store and then RAN to my car… and haven’t been back since. I just don’t know what would happen. They might just replace it, but it’s sort of like breaking the turn signal off while test driving a Maserati. $3k is too much for a guitar with 5 strings.

As always, comments are much appreciated at the very least (here and/or on Facebook) – and of course there is the Virtual Guitar Case in case you want to donate to my favorite charity!

Timing slightly off in places? Doesn’t sound cleaned up or “pro” enough? That’s okay – click here for the explanation behind my Sessions project and how it works.

Right-click and Save As to Download – Sessions: 4/26/09