http://goodbyetimebomb.bandcamp.com
This band started as a drunken duo
of me and my old Ginkins drummer, John. We got drunk one night and there so
happened to be a friend of his with a four track handy. The guitars and the
drums were all recorded by one hanging microphone. So the three songs on the
demo are just that, with me doing vocal overdubs while Kent held up the
microphone to my mouth. John didn’t have the stamina to do full songs so they
sort of break up in the end like that.
Of the three songs, the only one
that didn’t make it to the LP was “We Sound Shitty So Spin Will like us.” I
don’t know why I didn’t record that one again… Anyhoo, that one and Vampires
were made up on the spot. Rich Kid you can find three versions on my website at
http://goodbyetimebomb.bandcamp.com. My favorite recording is from the Seattle
John’s session. I really wish I could get in contact with him now. Anyways, I
played the song because I felt that it could be a solo guitar song so I just
started playing it and John followed suit. He didn’t know where to end it so
that’s sort of how the ending wound up on it.
The song “We Sound Shitty So Spin
Will Like Us” was the basis of the whole joke. I’d like to re-record it in the
produced Milkshakes way. That day will
come soon I hope.
The demo is all one take and was
basically a throw away until I put it into MP3 form and burned disks. I gave
them to my friends in the scene and to my surprise they all told me that
instead of doing Ginkins, I should do the (Vanilla added for legal reasons)
Milkshakes. So I gave a demo to the Hi Dive and immediately got a show. The
singer from Codename: TRIXIE could drum so I asked him if he’d do the impromptu
concert and he said yes. It was at that show that I met Fez Guzmen. Off a whim
I decided to record as the Milkshakes and asked him if he’d do it with me. He
borrowed Taylor Evans Rice’s amp (A Twin Reverb) and within a few days Brian
from Uneven Studios and The Hot IQs / Accordion Crimes was ready to record us.
I told Fernando the day before and met him with my Ibanez Jet King guitar down
at the Burger King off of Kalamath and Colfax. He picked me up and we went to
Brian’s house and set up. All he did was do two mics on the guitars and three
on the drums. We recorded pretty much everything in one take. Fez just seemed
to know dynamics in and out so it was no problem going from low to noisy on the
spot. All the vocal tracks are one take, plus any hand claps or what knot. The
only song with two vocal tracks is “One More Song.”
The few songs I wrote up on the spot
(meaning I told Brian to record and just did a guitar and drum take off the top
of our heads) were: Cookie Monster, Alan (You’re Outta the Band!), and One More
Song. I think that Yr Scene was one of those too but I’m not sure?
Recording the whole drums and
guitars process took about an hour; it was just the recording set up and the
mixing that took the extra two hours. Brian used all of his old school mics to
do it and even recorded it all on eight track tape (for that great lo-fi sound)
before transferring it to Pro Tools. He also plugged in the eight track when I
went to do vocals. Just saying, the microphone that Brian used on my vocals was
the same one that the girl from Fleetwood Mac sang into recording Landslide.
Fez left after nine songs saying he had somewhere to be. I wanted ten songs so
we decided to do Chai with just a guitar and voice. I did the guitar first and
then went ahead and did all the other songs first, knowing I’d have to be in
the zone for Chai. I think I did Cookie Monster first and then worked my way up.
I had just chugged almost eight PBR’s so I was pretty drunk and susceptible to
suggestion.
On The Pessimist Brian told me that
the whole recording session was going to waste so it helped me add the whole
vocalized sadness to the tracks. Then for Rich Kid and One More Song he egged
me on saying that I was being made fun of in the scene. I don’t know why I felt
the way I felt (probably the booze) and I just let my heart rip.
Rich Kid came from the initial anger
that I had about this girl who talked smack about me on the internet… And when
I told Brian what One More Song was about, he told me to sing it like just
truly and utterly wanted my favorite band to come back on stage. So I sang it
like I really wanted the (now defunct) Symptoms to come back and play me one
more song. Honestly that’s where the passion came from. This song features one
of the only two overdubs in the entire album. It’s my favorite song on the
recording.
This joke I made to the hipster
scene really just blew up. Originally intended to be a parody this whole record
just turned on its head, selling over three hundred copies in two months. Each
CD was made by hand, my hand. And I found myself playing in front of fifty to a
thousand people each show!
It was so easy to do and I wanted
nothing more to be a touring band.
Alas… Drugs and self-abuse ensued
and I had to stop it all. It took about six or so years before I could even
think about doing music again. But here I am, and I am ready and willing to do
all that again! Of course I mean sans drugs.
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