• Enough with the pity party. Let there be rock!

My recent posts have been a little too Woe Is I for my taste. Yes, I've had some setbacks, but I'm more determined than ever to finish my album.

I'm also gonna finally really try to build this blog's readership a bit, so that when my album is finally ready, more than 15 or twenty people will know about it.

So, in the spirit of Web 2.0, Social Media, The Conversation and all the other jargon out there to describe, uh, The Internet, I am asking for tips! No, not the monetary kind. Rather, I mean good old fashioned advice. If any of my cadre of commenters and anyone else who has read this blog for a least a day or so has ideas on how to make it better, please let me know.

More music?

More rough tracks?

More gear details or songwriting thoughts?

Less me? More me?

Any input would be hugely appreciated. Even though I've been at this for a few years now, this journey is just getting started.

• What I've learned: If you're going to make a record, set a course and try to stay on it.

I'm not sure of the exact date I started work on my album, but it was sometime in late 2006. Now, 2009 is here, and my album is... not.

Many folks have recommended that I not get too bummed out about my snail's pace, that I should enjoy the process, and they're right. But.

TWO YEARS OF ENJOYING THE PROCESS WITH NARY A RESULT?

What have I done wrong?

If I go easy myself, the answer is nothing. I started this project knowing very little about making records, so, of course, my pace was hardly going to be predictable. In hindsight, though, my original plan was my best: I was going to draw up a list of tunes, go into the studio for two very focused days of recording drum and bass, then I would methodically build on these tracks until I had my rocket ship to pop superstardom.

Unfortunately, the chemistry wasn't quite right between me and those players of yore, so I pulled the plug and set out to begin the process again. Only this second round started filling me with musical ideas, and my original notion of how my album would sound morphed. Then it morphed a few more times, and before I knew it, I was no longer making an album; instead, I was recording a series of individual songs, sometimes working on only one per session. Add health problems to the mix -- a few wasted sessions due to my not feeling well, creativity issues as I struggled with depression, limitations to how much time I could spend on any task before wanting to lie down -- and you've got a situation where nothing happens fast. Nothing.

Now if you're Michael Jackson or Axl, you can afford to take this approach, but those guys I ain't. So, I started to burn through funds quite quickly, and with no end in sight (no plan, no end!), I was soon going to put Catherine and me in the poorhouse. Then my insurance company dumped me and Uncle Sam showed up with a whopper of a tax bill, and into the poorhouse we went post haste.

I finally got religion.

The way to make an album, if you're an individual songwriter such as I am, is to research costs and create a budget, pick the tunes you want to record, rehearse them with your players before committing to pricey studio time, CHECK YOUR BUDGET, have the guts to kill your babies (songs that just aren't working), CHECK YOUR BUDGET, set brand new songs aside for the NEXT album, CHECK YOUR BUDGET, go double platinum and move to Malibu or the Bahamas or wherever you want (WHAT BUDGET?).

Oh, and about that budget, it will need to cover player/singer fees, rehearsal studio time, recording studio time (which usually includes an engineer, who you will want to meet first, if practical), mixing time, mastering and (optional) duplication and packaging costs.

To gauge going rates for musicians in your area, ask the engineer at the studio you've selected. He can give you ballpark figures, and possibly a few specific ones. He can also help you find good people.

Last but not least, as you look for partners in crime, a good rule to follow is Pros first, Friends second. In other words, make sure you get people who can really play and who know the studio drill. If you don't, the frustration and extra costs can run very, very high.

• White Punks (Dance Too Fast). A song from my Hollywood years.

After graduating from college back in the mid-80s, I moved to LA to go to guitar school (where I learned I was a budding rock god not). At one point, I had an apartment in downtown Hollywood, which I shared with fellow guitar student Mike Northcutt. Both of us were always trying to write hit songs, but every now and then, I would just say,  "Screw it!", and write something fun, no pressure. This is one of those songs, and if I remember correctly, it was inspired by a visit to the Kingston 12 reggae club. Oh yes, and the words were written by the incomparable Erik Eff (in photo), who was living with me and Mike at the time, before going Morrison and moving to the beach.

Vocals: Toby Germano

Backup vocals: Me, Erik Eff, Mike Northcutt

Guitars/Bass: Me

Drums: Some dude named Linn

• The song that started it all, then never got finished.

Tonight, I was going through my main recording disk drive and deleting files I'd backed up, and I came across a song, which, if memory serves, and mine rarely does, was the song that initially sparked my recording rebirth.

It was recorded while I was still pretty much a talking vegetable, and accredited to The Shit Dealers, my first stab at a band name, but i think it's got potential. In fact, I might just try to finish it.

Or not.

Details: Gibson 336, SansAmp, Fender P Bass, Alesis SR16, Pro Tools LE, Ativan, Aspirin, Lexapro and Imitrex.

Does anyone out there like it, hear potential, want to light a Bic?

• Advice from Theoloniuous Monk.

The legendary Mark Sanders, a former colleague of mine and seer of all that is digital, sent me a link the other day to a site posting the advice that Theoloniuous Monk gave to a sax player named Steve Lacy, who played with Monk in 1960. I've cut and pasted the transcription of the notes below, but to see the actual document, penned by Lacy, and to read about the history, click here.

Just because you’re not a drummer, doesn’t mean you don’t have to keep time.

Pat your foot and sing the melody in your head, when you play.

Stop playing all those weird notes (that bullshit), play the melody!

Make the drummer sound good.

Discrimination is important.

You’ve got to dig it to dig it, you dig?

ALL REET!

Always know….(MONK)

It must be always night, otherwise they wouldn’t need the lights.

Let’s lift the band stand!!

I want to avoid the hecklers.

Don’t play the piano part, I’m playing that. Don’t listen to me. I’m supposed to be accompanying you!

The inside of the tune (the bridge) is the part that makes the outside sound good.

Don’t play everything (or every time); let some things go by. Some music just imagined. What you don’t play can be more important that what you do.

A note can be small as a pin or as big as the world, it depends on your imagination.

Stay in shape! Sometimes a musician waits for a gig, and when it comes, he’s out of shape and can’t make it.

When you’re swinging, swing some more.

(What should we wear tonight? Sharp as possible!)

Always leave them wanting more.

Don’t sound anybody for a gig, just be on the scene. These pieces were written so as to have something to play and get cats interested enough to come to rehearsal.

You’ve got it! If you don’t want to play, tell a joke or dance, but in any case, you got it! (To a drummer who didn’t want to solo)

Whatever you think can’t be done, somebody will come along and do it. A genius is the one most like himself.

They tried to get me to hate white people, but someone would always come along and spoil it.

• If you've never heard Graham Wright, a singers/songwriter from the Great White North, your life is the poorer for it.

I'm humbled.

Today, I got an email from Bandcamp, the BEST site for independent musicians, announcing new features and highlighting some artists. I confess, normally when I hear about new artists, especially unsigned no-names like myself, I prepare for the worst. It's a sad fact, but far more often than not, I have been disappointed. And a little smug, thinking to myself, "I'm better than that."

So when I followed the link to Bandcamp artist Graham Wright, I was thoroughly ready to be thoroughly disappointed, then enjoy a brief period of gloating.

Man, was I let down.

Graham Wright is amazing. His album is called The Lakes of Alberta, and having spent a little time in the area, I can say that the songs evoke the place eerily well, using no more -- an no less -- than an acoustic guitar, a voice, and some stomping/clapping, all underpinned by truly great lyrics.

I bought the album straightaway for $5. You should too.

• When does technology cross the line from enabling to disabling?

As I sit here and gloat over the fact that I just got a totally legit, brand new copy of Adobe Creative Suite Master Collection for under $200, I have to ask myself: will it open doors to possibility or stand as a wall between me and my objective, which is to write, record and market my songs?

As with all technology, probably a little of both, because all tech is a blessing and a curse.

On the positive, tech enables me to do all kinds of things on my own, from designing this blog, to creating album artwork, to recording demos, to shooting photos and videos.

On the negative side, tech is seductive in that it always offers more, more, more, taking me away from my core objectives.

So as I delve into my new Adobe software, it will be incumbent on me to know when to say ENOUGH and turn a task over to someone else, budget permitting.

In fact, I think this is one of the most important things home recordists have to do: limit themselves. Because with more tracks, more plug ins, more ways to manipulate sound and images, it's way too easy to stop writing songs; it's also way too easy to delude yourself into thinking you're saving money in the long run as you do more and more on your own. Sure, your DIY chops might help you shell out fewer greenbacks overall, but in the end how much real VALUE did you get for your money? How good are your home recordings really, your home-made artwork, your Flip shot video?

No, in my opinion, do as much as you realisticallly can on your own, but through trial, error and unflinching honesty, learn when it's best to call in an expert. Otherwise, you'll spend all your time futzing around with new gizmos instead of creating.

Okay, I'm off to check out my new Adobe software (doh!).

• Recording with Josh Fix and learning firsthand how much mics and mic pre amps matter.

A recent post on Recording Review titled Preamps Don't Matter? at first reinforced my belief that for home recording enthusiasts preamps really don't matter much. I mean, unless you really have the technical chops to elicit the preamp's magic, by the time your mix is done, whatever tone the preamp helped create will probably be buried. I still believe this, but pro studios are a whole different matter. There, mic choices and mic pres make a world of difference. I learned this firsthand on a recent session at Hyde Street with vocalist/songwriter/musical ace Josh Fix.

From Engineer Jaime Durr: "On the Josh sessions we used an Audio Technica AT4060 tube mic into a Vintech x73i which is a Neve 1073 clone. We then borrowed a Sound Delux ELUX 251, clone of a Telefunken ELA M251 into a Neve 33114 pre."

And what a difference! The AudioTech thru the Vintech sounded great, but too clean, too precise and a touch thin for me. We then hooked up the ELUX 251 and BLOOM, wow, all these mids came out, it was a beautiful thing, but still not quite right. Finally, we hooked up the Neve 33114 and all was right with the world.

For my home studio, despite the all-too-easy-to-hear quality difference, I would never invest in this caliber of gear. I just can't rationalize the cost. But in a pro studio, where everything is being routed through great stuff and a gifted engineer is running it all, well, I'm glad someone was willing to pony up!

• In the long run, is MySpace really relevant to musicians?

The other day, I posted about the demise of fuzz.com, a site for bands and artists, which elicited a comment that really fired up the old synapses.

Here is the part of the comment that I found so thought provoking:

“…I don't think we can ever not be on MySpace. MySpace has reached such a level of ubiquity that I think you'd be shooting yourself in the foot if you were exclusively listed on Bandcamp or ReverbNation only. Thoughts?”

Before I delve into this, full disclosure: I really hate MySpace. It’s ugly to look at, unsatisfying to use and clearly a trainwreck of poorly written code. There is no love whatsoever in the way MySpace is built. It looks and works like exactly what it is: a quick and dirty opportunistic Friendster-clone that has grown way beyond its founders wildest dreams.

Okay, got that out, now, onto the discussion.

I think the ideal solution for musicians would be a site that would let musicians post music and concert schedules, but leave the social networking to Facebook and whoever else comes to the fore. Best of all would be for Facebook to let users who are musicians customize their pages a bit, so music is front and center, but leave the hosting of the music and the player/widget creation to someone else. Right now, Reverbnation, by offering so many versions of its player comes closest, but I don’t like how Reverbnation tries to also do social networking. In fact, this ‘jack of all trades master of none” approach to social networking sites sucks. As I said, I want a social networking site that gives me the freedom to present myself a certain way, but doesn’t also try to supply all the functionality for how I present myself.

Here’s the approach I will take ASAP.

Facebook/Twitter will be my social networking solution.

This blog on squarespace will be where I interact with my legions upon legions of fans.

Bandcamp.mu will be where I place my music for sale, and I will use Bandcamp’s widget on my blog as soon as they have a blog-friendly version. I want Bandcamp for this instead of Revernation, because Bandcamp is simple, elegant and clean.

Tunecore will be how I distribute my music to iTunes, Amazon and the like.

With this approach, I will have one social networking site where my friends are (real friends, not the MySpace B.S. kind), and one blog for my music, to which I can drive traffic from Facebook and Twitter and by commenting on blogs of others, one music hosting site in Bandcamp, and one distribution solution in Tunecore.

A little messy, yes, but not as messy as a crummy MySpace page.

All of which is to say, YES, I do think musicians can do just fine without MySpace. What’s more, I believe MySpace is dying, as it should. It’s like Windows; people only use it because others use it, no one really, truly WANTS to use it.

What do other musicians out there think of all this?

• Launching my new political blog. HuffPost, look out!

I promise not to clutter up cerebellumblues.com with political rants, ever, but I just gotta get on a milk crate every now and then and spout off, so, I am launching The White House Is My House, a new blog that will monitor the actions of my new tenant, Barack Obama. Hope to see some readers! TWHIMH replaces my old political blog, Stumped, which focused on the campaign.

Jeff

• Farewell to fuzz.com.

Fuzz.com was launched to compete with MySpace and other social networking sites, with its main point of difference being that it was set up for musicians.

It was a beautiful thing, with a gorgeous player, a clean albeit slightly confusing interface and a friendly support staff, who would actually write you back fairly quickly if you had a question. Compared to the mess that is MySpace, fuzz.com was pure gold.

But it failed because MySpace was good enough, and people didn't want to switch to something new, even if it was better. Plus, MySpace has momentum, or had it.

To my mind, the best kind of site for artists would be one where they could post and sell their music and share it easily via portable widgets, leaving the social function to another site, say Facebook or a blog. Reverbnation is close, but my biggest hopes lie with Bandcamp. As soon as Bandcamp makes new, blog friendly sizes available for its widget, and allows purchase by credit card, it will be double platinum.

Here's to hoping they hurry up!

• Just added a photo gallery of my sessions with Tim and Eryn Young.

To check it out, click here or click on Faux Toes in the upper nav bar.

Forever Young: Recording with Tim and Eryn Young.

On Monday and Tuesday of this week, I had the TRUE pleasure of working with guitarist Tim Young and vocalist Eryn Young. Why was it so great?

Because these guys are totally killer and totally NICE.

Yes, nice.

Nice matters because recording is stressful and volatile, touchy, prickly personalities make it a way harder process than it already is. But when you’re working with nice people, as I was, recording is collaborative, productive and -- most imporatant -- fun.

Thank you, Tim and Eryn, for an amazing couple of days. I look forward to doing more with you both in the future!

To discover more about The Youngs, pleae visit their myspace page here.

(Off topic) A review of the French Laundry by Admiral Specialist First Lieutenant General Master Sergeant First Class Agent Orange Double O Delta SEAL Marksman Jeff and his team of Special Ops earth worms.

The day Catherine and I drove up to Napa from SF for our second visit to the French Laundry began like most days: I was up early, while Catherine slept in, blissfully unaware of all the packing and general tidying up I was doing before we would depart around noon. Finishing my tasks as the sun rose over The Bay, I then contacted my support team, which would be performing recon and force protection for our trip north.

The team is top secret, but what I can reveal is that it consists of Special Ops earth worms, a sniper, a satellite and a few ICBMs (only for extreme situations).

At 11:30, Catherine finally arose, showered, and strolled to the car, confident that I had planned and prepared everything to perfection. We headed out over the Golden Gate and as we sped through San Rafael, I used my toe-enabled shoe phone to send an SMS to the earth worms, requesting that they advance on the soil surrounding French Laundry’s kitchen and perform toxin and radiation analysis. Within minutes – they have vehicular technology – I received their report, which was projected onto my HUD equipped glasses. All clear. Using my shoe phone again, I SMSed the sniper and my ICBM facility requesting that they confirm their readiness. Again, my HUD told me what I needed to know: everything was in place and on high alert.

We checked in to the hotel and cooled down in the pool (which I first scanned using my satellite for cleanliness and safety) for an hour or so before heading over to the Laundry. On being seated, I immediately read through the wine list and upon seeing the prices, I SMSed my sniper and requested that he target the waiter. Confident that I had the right response should the waiter’s selection prove to be of insufficient “value”, I ordered an exorbitantly over-priced rosé champagne, but on tasting it, I asked my sniper to stand down. The champagne was exquisite.

As Catherine and I debated what to order food-wise, I sent my team of earth worms into the French Laundry’s garden to assess the quality of the soil and vegetables and authorized them to tap the satellite’s sensors should they need to. The restaurant shook slightly as the earth worms powered up their nuclear reactor driven vehicle and tunneled their way from the back of the restaurant to the front, where the garden is located. Catherine barely noticed the vibrations, as she languidly sipped her champagne and requested that I explain the various menu items, which I did with grace and accuracy. Receiving the all-clear from the earth worms, I suggested to Catherine that she should order the vegetarian menu, while I would order the regular menu. As the food started arriving, the mixed menu plan proved a good one as we were able to taste far more dishes than we would have had we both ordered the same meat-based menu.For pictures of the dishes, please ask, but I would wager to guess that the data-packed realism of my satellite infrared images would be lost on you.

The food was quite good, but when we ran out of champagne just before our final courses, I was forced to study the insultingly over-priced wine list once again and to radio my sniper to be ready. I then asked the waiter for a pinot that would feature the fruit of a new world wine for Catherine with the earthiness of an old world wine for me, something dry and subtle, like the soil of a summer battlefield before the fighting has begun. He brought the wine and just before I sipped it, I leaned back slightly, so as to avoid the splatter that was sure to occur as my sniper did his duty. Again, though, I had to SMS my sniper to lower his weapon, for the wine was spot on (as it should have been considering the price).

On looking back over the meal, the highlights were Catherine's earth worm-approved fava beans and my eel, although the veal heart was also bloody good (ho, ho, ho). My scallop dish and beef dishes were perfect, but, to be honest, perfectly dull. I thought for a moment about having my satellite vaporize the the FL's nearby sister operation, Bouchon, for a small bit of retaliation for the boring beef and scallop grub, but thought better of it, once I considered the risk to my team of earth worms.

We finished up, then headed back to the hotel, where Catherine drifted off to slumber, while I packed our suitcase and readied everything for a smooth departure come morning.

• Balancing music with my other life. Finally. (edited)

Note: the earlier version of this post was, um, to put it politely, f-----g confusing. So here is the same basic thought written in English.

Once upon a time I was an advertising copywriter, and I was one dedicated bastard. I worked nights, weekends, vacations, personal days, even sick days.

Then I fell and hit my head.

The accident changed me in some ways, I think, one of which is that as I got better, I realized there was more to life than advertising. A lot more.

One of the "more" was music, specifically songwriting; and nowadays, copywriting has effectively moved down the speed-dial list.

But I still gotta make a living, or at least do my damndest, despite some limitations.

So, at the moment I am attempting a first for me: work/life balance.

The work-side remains advertising, the life side I'm writing of is, of course, songwriting.

To wit, much of last week, I was deep in the pit of prose, mining words and ideas for a new ad campaign (see photo!), but this Monday and Tuesday I will be in Mother Lode of Music, ensconced in Studio C at Hyde Street with  a killer husband/wife duo from LA called The Youngs, my friend Toby and the greatest engineer in the world, Jaime Durr. I'll be writing more about the Youngs soon, but for the moment, please go here to check them out.

Anyway, all of this is just a long way of saying that I am finally learning how to balance work with other interests. It's something I wish I could have learned long, long ago.

• What I've learned: drinking and songwriting.

I can't deny it. I won't. I like booze, especially wine.

I used to like booze a lot more before my accident, but since hitting my head and driving a bit of bone into my cerebellum, I'm less predilected to libations. Something changed in my taste center. Still, through hard work and dedication, I have gone from not being able to even stand the smell of alcohol right after my injury, to once again liking most forms of drink.

Weird thing is, though, I don't love anything the way I used to. There was a time when I would spend upwards of $150 a bottle on scotch, and wine that cost less than $30 merited only suspician. Now, all scotch tastes fine, and, save for the fruit forward, high alcohol wines so loved and promoted by Robert Parker and the Wine Spectator, the grape is, you know, nice.

And overall, I think this is a positive development as far as my songwriting goes. Because I have never written anything better than drivel when drunk. Oh, while writing said drivel, I thought it was amazing. So tragic, poignant, unique. Right. Come morning, it was invariably crap.

Further, I do not have Keith Richard's constitution. Shit, I doubt I even have Rick Warren's (wait, he drinks, doesn't he, the whole wine-into-blood thing, yes?). Regardless, the point is, after about a half bottle of wine, or a few shots or one martini, I'm done, unless I want to spend the night writhing in agony, because of a headache, and the next day moving no faster than taxidermied banana slug.

And it's sad, because, damn, I romanticize the booze thing like you can't believe. I love my photos of Keith with his bottle, my recordings of Tom Waits slurring out pure genius, my Hemingway books in which Papa gets hammered on the good and cool wine left in the urn by the door of the dry, stone ruin where shelter from the stray bullets was at least better than in the field of low trees.

And my favorite album name of all time is a Stones boot called Whores, Cocaine and a Bottle of Jack.

Still, I have to face reality. If I want to write a good song, a glass or two of wine might be nice, but that's it. Then I switch to fizzy water, or coffee, or even -- and this is truly un rock-and-roll -- Coke Zero.

Cheers.

Sigh.

• What I've Learned: Drum programming.

When I bought my first home multritracker back in the 70s — a Fostex four track that used cassettes — I thought I was off to the races. I had everything I needed, right? Wrong. In order to create the sound of a full band without actually having a full band, I needed bass and drums, too. The bass was easy. I played guitar, I could play bass (you know, well enough). Drums, however, were a different story. Drum machines at the time sounded like rhythmic electrical problems, and there was no way my craving for a real rock beat could be met with one one of these primitive beasts.

And lo, the Drumulator was released. It was the world's first sample based drum machine priced for the pecuniarily challenged.

I still remember when I first heard a Drumulator. It sounded so... real. Of course, it actually sounded terrible — no highs, cymbals died prematurely, the bass drum was more of thud than anything else — and programming anything but a basic beat was just asking for trouble, because it would sound so machine-like. But I was hooked. After all, how else could I give my home recordings the thump of real-sounding drums?

Then I got a Linn Drum (pictured at right in the '80s, I was a spoiled kid) and it, too, blew me away at first, only to wear on me over time with its too perfect feel, its short-lived cymbal crashes and toms that made you laugh harder than they made you rock.

Finally, I purchased an Alesis SR16, which was decent, but still, I mean, you KNEW it was a machine after mere seconds.

After buying the Alesis, I not only quit my quest for the perfect drum machine, I also quit music for years. No, it wasn't because of crummy drum machines, there were other reasons, too. When I finally got back into music after my accident, drum machine technology had progressed. A lot. The reason was simple: storage for holding massive samples had gotten really cheap, and processors had gotten really fast.

To dip my toe back into the new waters of artificial skins, I bought a Doggiebox, a teensy software program for $35 that smoked my Alesis. The Dogg served me very well for many a month, but then a friend mentioned Drumkit from Hell and in researching it, I came across all kinds of cool, new, amazing stuff.

I finally settled on Digidesign’s Strike, which, just like all of my other drum machine purchases blew me away. At first.

And then, good ol' me, always a little slow to see the obvious, realized that my decades-long quest of seeking the sound and feel of a real drummer from a machine was a fool's errand. It can't be done, at least not by me.

What CAN be done is to create a great sounding metronome, over which natural instruments can be layered with the end result being musical, possibly even natural, but not the same as what you can get with a real drummer.

What's more, you’re better off working WITH a drum machine's limitations not AGAINST them.

What I mean by this is KEEP IT SIMPLE. Don’t program complex beats and fills in an effort to create a realistic feel. The simpler you keep your programming, the better your drum tracks will sound.

That said, if your drum machine comes with loops played by real drummers — as Strike does — then by all means use them, if they fit your song. In fact, I’ve found some of Strike's loop’s and preprogrammed fills to be so good, they’ve actually inspired music. Here are two examples (both have been posted to this blog before, both have me singing, you have been warned).

But, every time I start to get seduced by Strike’s incredible sound quality and tweakability, and try to program my best approximation of a real drummer, the result kinda sucks. Then I strip everything away and, well, it’s better.

So, here’s what I’ve learned: if you’re going to use a drum machine in place of a real drummer, which I like to do in the demo stage, keep your beats simple and let your natural instruments create the groove a variety your machining can’t. Or, and this is something I have not done successfully yet, embrace the drum machine’s mechanistic side -- as Prince and the Eurythmics did -- and don’t try to make it sound real. Embrace the machine.

And when you get frustrated with your fake drummer, try to remember what a pain in the ass real drummers are!

• What I've learned: depression and songwriting.

We've all read of Van Gogh's ear, Hemingway's prowess with self-inflicted shotgun wounds, Kurt Cobain's last days. And we think to ourselves, or at least a lot of us do, that great mental depression and great art must go hand in hand.

I couldn't disagree more.

As a person who has dealt with depression for as long as he can remember, I see it as something that gets in the way of great art. Because when you're depressed, you don't want to play your guitar, write a poem, sing, create. Or I least I don't. No, I want to sleep, or drink a little, or maybe just have a nice cup of coffee in the hope the caffeine will perk me up.

More important, I think people confuse depression with hardship. Personally, I believe that emotionally intense times/thoughts/conversations can lead to interesting, maybe even great, art, but they are very different from what you feel as a result of depression. An intense experience -- even a happy one, for matter! -- triggers a raft of feelings, stirs up your thoughts, make you look at the world differently. Depression is deadening. It kills thought, or at the very least, creates a very one dimensional thought pattern, hardly the kind of rich, nuanced, layers thinking required of lasting, meaningful art. In fact, research has shown that autopsies of people who suffered depression have brains that are missing gobs of healthy tissue compared to people who were not depressed.

I used to romanticize depression but now I hate depression. I fight it every way I can, and I will not for a moment give it credit for anything I've done, because I have never written a song in its clutches. Only when I've come out of an episode, have I been creative. Clint Eastwood calls me a member of the Pussy Generation for my condition. So be it. But I side with the folks who characterize depression as a disease: you can treat it, you can reduce it, but there is no surefire way to cure it. Not even Scientology.

If you have depression you're tortured for sure, but not necessarily an artist.

If anyone out there reading this post is interested, the best book I've read on depression is Against Depression, by Peter Kramer.

• My Ode To McDonald's, a supersized magnum opus in which Micky D outcooks Thomas Keller and others.

(Not: I orginally titled this something about dumbass songs, and Catherine pointed out, rightfully, "who's going to want to listen to that?" Hence the rewrite of the post!)

I take my songwriting seriously, too seriously probably, and when I'm in the throes of creating a song that I hope will be really, really good, I feel stressed, pressured, torn. I rarely chuckle.

So every now and then, I allow myself the luxury of writing a song of plain old lunacy. Don't get me wrong, I try hard to make these good, too, but there's simply not as much at steak when one takes on Quarter Pounders versus matters of the heart.

One such composition is called "The Might Micky D's", and it's my ode to McDonald's, which I confess I love, but don't eat at very often because I don't want to turn into a fat bastard.

Here's the tune in SuperSized Stereo! (Lyrics are at end of post.)

Fair warning: I'm singing this one!

For all the gearheads out there (I'm one, too!), here's the stuff I used to sing Micky D's praises:

COMPUTER - MACBOOK PRO 2.33 GHz

DAW - PRO TOOLS MBOX 2 PRO running PRO TOOLS 7.4cs7

ELECTRIC GUITAR - 1980 FENDER "THE STRAT"

ACIOUSTIC GUITAR - LINE6 VARIAX 700 HARDTAIL

BASS - LATE '70s FENDER P-BASS

DRUM MACHINE - DIGIDESIGN STRIKE

GUITAR AMP - AMPLITUBE 2.0

BASS AMP - AMPLITUBE SVX

MIC - SHURE SM-57

THE MIGHTY MICKY D's
© 2008 Jeff Shattuck, Cerebellum Blues Music

I've been to the French Laundry
I've been to Three Stars in Paree
I've been to some of the best in New York City

Of course, I've eaten caviar
I've sipped Sauternes with seared foie gras
I've had cracked quail egg over steak tartare

And it's all been served with grace and style
But sometimes it's just not for me
So when I want a place that loves to see me smile
I head straight to Micky D's

And get a Quarter Pounder with Cheese
And a Coke and fries with that please
And a lotta extra ketchup and a straw for free
There's nothing quite like the Mighty Micky D's

I've savored Montrachets
And vintage bubbly French rosés
They seem to go quite well with foams and gelees

But sometimes I have to find a jacket that fits
To get past the maitre'd
So when I want to just say "I'm lovin' it!"

I head straight to Micky D's
You can take Thomas Keller / And all the fuss
Mr. Kitchen Confidential / Colicchio if you must
And Jean Georges Vongerichten / And Gordon Ramsey
Have them all pack their knives and go / 'Cause they're not the Mighty Micky D

And I love grass fed steak
I love o-toro fresh from the sea
But on days when I deserve a break
I head straight to Micky D's

• Was my last post about nationwide songwriting really stupid? I'm trying to be all zen about this.

Yesterday, I posted about how I was working on a song with Dave Tutin, a friend who lives in New York. I live in San Francisco, so I went with the oh-so-clever title of "nationwide songwriting".

I waited for the laudatory comments to pour in, but only one popped up. It said:

"This is stupid. Without additional audio clips, the revised lyrics don't add a thing. It's kind of a cool tune. Let us hear how it develops.... JB"

Now, my first instinct was to write some sort of snide comment back, but I've been a writer in advertising long enough to know that many, many of the things I do are stupid.

So I calmed down, re-read the comment, re-read the post and... I gotta with JB. It was stupid. I mean, what the hell is the point of a BEFORE without an AFTER?

Right.

Next week, possibly sooner, I will complete the second version of the demo.

And just to clarify, I didn't start on music until Dave was happy with the words he'd written, so there is no BEFORE and VERSION with just a change in lyrics. Rather, the BEFORE and AFTER versions will be different in music alone.

One last note: I also screwed up the way I posted the lyrics, so here they are again.

DAVE’S ORIGINAL “VERSE IN NEED OF A SONG”

THE FORGOTTEN PLACE

There's a need that burns like a forest fire
Scattering the casualties of my desire
From Hong Kong to London
From Bangkok to Rome
From New York to Rio
To a forgotten place called home

MY FIRST WHACK AT COMPLETING DAVE’S TUNE

THE FORGOTTEN PLACE

There's a need that burns
Like a forest fire
Scattering (s) the casualties (ashes)
of my desire

From Hong Kong to London
From Bangkok to Rome
From New York to Rio
To a forgotten place called home

But nothing grows
No, nothing works out
Because all the seeds scattered
Are just seeds of doubt

In Singapore cafés
Under cathedral domes
In hotels and airplanes
All forgotten like that place called home

(these four lines are from a poem of Dave’s that I thought would form a god middle 8)
There are some Jigsaw cities
where I may rest a while
Knowing I am safe
within the suburb of your smile

But the need still burns
Until it all lights on fire
And scatters one more casualty
Of my desire

And I go back to London
I go back to Rome
I go back to Rio
But I can never go back
To that forgotten place called home

WHAT DAVE ULTIMATELY WROTE

THE FORGOTTEN PLACE

There's a need that burns
Like a forest fire
Scattering the casualties
of my desire
In love and loss
In flood or drought
All the seeds I've scattered
Were just seeds of doubt

From Hong Kong to London
From Bangkok to Rome
From New York to Rio
To a forgotten place called home

Sparks on the wind
And a new fire starts
The ecstasy of every
Collision of hearts

From Berlin to Cape Town
From Bangkok to Rome
From Singapore to Paris
To a forgotten place called home

But the need still burns
And that wall of flame
Stops you from returning
The way you came

And with their mother's ghost
Still between the sheets
My imaginary children
Walk the streets

From Hong Kong to London
From Bangkok to Rome
From New York City
To a forgotten place called home

©2008 Dave Tutin / openDmusic

©2008 Jeff Shattuck / Cerebellum Blues Music