Week 36, The Witching Years

Project 52, Volume 2

Hello again friends. I’m happy to announce the release of Project 52, Volume 2 after many weeks of trying to carve out the necessary bits of extra time to re-master the tracks. It’s been a nice little trip back through the second quarter of the project. My personal favorites include “Dig In,” “The Creature” (think toy orchestra), and “On Ice.” You can preview all 13 songs and download the album on my Bandcamp site. The download comes with the cover art and is available in mp3, FLAC, AAC, and other standard high-quality formats. As a special promotion to celebrate this release , I’ll include a free download of Project 52, Volume 1 with the purchase of the second volume.

In keeping with the last couple of weeks, I’m going to keep the details of how I recorded “The Witching Years” to a minimum. The guitar is in the same fashion as week 31, and I’m still using the five-mic drum setup from week 29. As has become standard practice, the majority of the tracks were recorded on my iPhone using the MultiTrack app.

I’ve mentioned some bands and influences occasionally throughout the project, and to my mind the connection is usually pretty obvious. To me, this song is a great example of the influence that one of my favorite 90s bands, The Spinanes, had on my development as a guitar-player and songwriter. The Spinanes’ front-woman Rebecca Gates had a brilliant knack for writing great pop-rock songs with a simple but unconventional and interesting guitar style that really struck me. Her guitar parts were often driven by the would-be bass-note, but then she’d swing in nice melodic and sometimes unexpected accents within the chords.

This style is most exemplified on the album Manos, where it’s really perfect for their two-piece lineup. I picked up Manos at a time when I was re-evaluating my guitar playing and songwriting. I was bored with bar and standard-style chords, but I really loved the simplicity and clarity of the three-piece with a single guitar part. When I heard the Spinanes, I found just what I was looking for. This was also at a time that if you didn’t live in an area with a good college radio station (and even that was a crap-shoot), or unless you knew someone to introduce you to lesser-known bands and music, you were really on your own. I was lucky to have happened upon the Spinanes – I’m pretty sure that it was while watching MTV’s “120 Minutes.” After watching the video for “Noel, Jonah, and Me,” it was enough for me to run to the local record store and pick up Manos. I distinctly remember going through the album and figuring out the guitar parts. That style stuck with me, though it only comes through really clearly on occasion.

Rebecca Gates is still out there making music. Stop on by and give her a listen. She’s still one of my favorites.

Tags: 120 Minutes, bandcamp, Cockos, Corey Layman, developer, Harmonicdog, hovland, indie, indie rock, iPhone, Karl Hendricks Trio, lo-fi, manos, MultiTrack, phone-fi, Pittsburgh, podcast, Project 52, rebecca gates, the spinanes, Woolslayer and Main