Music

 

Believe it or not this is a parody of the Led Zeppelin song Rock and Roll. Since I don’t have a drummer the opening intro had to get cut. Instead of a hard rocking beat I went for a more grungy country/western vibe. I was thinking a lot about Johnny Cash putting this song together so when the opening needed a little something interesting I remembered the opening to The Man Comes Around where there was a bible sounding verse at the open. Instead I used a Batman quote and used an old time radio filter set up to give it that old timey sound.

I used my Les Paul for this. I tried different settings on the Strat but the Les Paul sounded good out of the box so I stuck with that.

Enjoy if possible.

 

You Aint Seen Nothing Yet is a solid song by Bachman Turner Overdrive. I like listening to it well enough when I happen to be listing to a Classic Rock station. I never realized how much fun the rhythm is to play until I tried it.

I don’t use the same finger positions that BTO does for the A and the neck E chords. Like I’ve said before, I don’t really practice the guitar very often. If you listen to my songs you are probably hearing literally 10% of my total playing time.

Randy Bachman uses a c-shape fingering on the opening A up the neck and the pinky hitting the A octave on the A string.  He uses the same fingering on the next D chord. I’d have to take a few days to get my pinky fast enough to keep up with the rhythm. So instead I decided to wimp out and just do regular bar A and C chords. I think it sounds just fine for what it is.

Since it was now so simple, I was able to have fun strumming away on the rhythm. Playing the rhythm from the verse my jam, man. This was just the second take I did of the song. The first take sounded good until I hit the break and completely forgot how the song went. Take two.

That opening guitar was also a lot of fun. I don’t think I got the notes exactly right, but it was close and I liked how it sounded. I made a second copy of the track and added some delay. I played around with the two levels until I found a balance I liked.

The lyrics are pretty easy, mostly a copy of a hundred other songs I’ve done for BBFB (Beginners, winners, spinners, sinners, dinners). I planned to break up the last line of the break (“we’ll help you find a Bat Book  you will neverrrrr forget”)  into two separate lines and to be honest I just did it like this expecting to replace it. But it grew on me and I left it in. Sha na na na. na na na na. hey hey hey goodbye.

I played my Les Paul with the pickup selector in the center position. I didn’t want to make the rhythm sound too icepick-y and it was just dull on the neck pickup only. Playing with the tone knobs I was able to dial in a solid tone. I was going to try some distortion on it, but I like the simplicity and fun of the guitar like this.

I don’t know why I didn’t use the Strat, I probably could have gotten out a better tone than this with some work. But with a Les Paul you just have to plug it in to get a solid sound. I really like the options these two guitars give me.

Anyway, enjoy it. It was fun to do.

 

 

This is the first pass at the song that would become the Heart of Hush song. It has three sets of verses separated by chorus’. Some of the lyrics are just stubs, this was an experiment. The chorus’ stayed the same for the Hush version but only some of the scarecrow verse remained.

The idea of this version was that Bruce got a hot of Scarecrow toxin and while he was able to defeat Scarecrow he would then go on a stoner binge hangover. So lots of head references. Most of the ranting and ravings were boring though and better off cut.

This is supposed to be a parody of Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again. I got the chords near enough though I ignored the capo. However, I didn’t get the rhythm exactly right, enough to bother me.

Before I figured out the rhythm was the problem along with the boring length of the thing, I added in that guitar lead. I would have gone in to rerecord it or at least do some clean up on it. I would have if I was really releasing it on the show.

 

 

I had the idea to do a parody of this song over the Labor Day weekend at Dragon Con. I listened to it about a hundred times while I was away from my music recording gear.

When I got back home I learned the chord changes (it is done using a capo that I prefer not to use. I just sung it all lower.

The idea wasn’t specific to the Heart of Hush however. It was just using the Memphis Blues Dylan song. I had the Oh Alfred and after part figured out. But I was thinking of making this a full length song and had like three sets of verses. It was a very long song. There were funny parts but overall it ended up being boring.

Getting the initial joke of doing a Bob Dylan voice on this song and a few funny lines really only was supportable for one set of verses and one chorus.

Stand up. Tell your joke. Sit down.

The chorus didn’t change but the only verse of the original that survived is the verse about the scarecrow toxin. That was the funniest part of the original.

So I recorded the full three set version. The problem was that I didn’t get the main rhythm quite right. I was adding things to fill and and make up for it. The production was getting very complicated and fussy.

So this morning I listened to the song a few times. Got the groove of the guitar rhythm and recorded it in one take. I used my Strat with the Duncan Vintage Rails humbucker neck pickup. I was very happy with the results of the single take and realized that I should approach this version simply, with just the rhythm guitar.

When I realized I had the guitar take I wanted, I rewrote the lyrics keeping in mind the events of Heart of Hush. I tightened it up as short and sweet as I could while still alluding to the story. Strangely enough I did this in one take too, which made me very happy for time management reasons.

 

I was at Dragon Con 2018 in Atlanta. One morning, still in bed and half awake, this song arrived in my head. Sometimes a song does that and goes away. Other times you just know there is only one way to make it stop. So I did this.

I wanted to make the tie between Bruce Wayne and Zorro, the movie he saw with his parents the night Joe Chill shot them. Both verses have to do with the parents, of Bruce and Diego. And the break shows how Bruce thought of Diego dealing with the man that usurped his Father. It would ultimately be the way he dealt with Gotham Crime.

It took me a little bit to learn the guitar. I found a video on YouTube, the guy used a capo to get the sound right. I don’t like capos so used bar chords instead of the open chords the Eagles use. I’m not totally happy with the two guitar parts as the song builds. They are a little out of beat with each other and it bothers me. Also, the beginning is too slow. It is the same tempo as the original song, but the Eagles had more instruments to keep the listener’s ear busy. No such luck here. I had to add the lead guitar to keep things interesting.

I used my Les Paul for this. It is easier to play and doesn’t hurt the finger tips like the Strat would have. I haven’t been practicing so don’t have calluses. Bad Gerry.

My Bat Books for Beginners partner Chris and I recorded the Batgirl Rising episode last Sunday and for some reason I got the idea I’d be able to whip together a Stephanie Brown song super easy. I’d always thought the song Brandy would be useful for a parody but couldn’t work “Bat Books for Beginners” into it. So it made sense to use it to describe the character points that I thought were the best part of the comic.

The guitar is using the Strat, a touch out of tune. I used the neck pickup which is a Duncan Vintage humbucker in a single pole package. I wasn’t really fussy about the guitar sound. There are two pieces that I Frankensteined together.

The vocals were trickier. I had recorded them and over dubbed a few parts. It was just too fussy so I recorded four takes real quick. The last one was the best. I probably should have tried a few more times. LOL.

It is pretty clear I’ve lost the thread.

Oof.

This is what happens when music is allowed to be played in public. I hear these songs, they obsess me, and then I do bad things like this. It is the world’s fault. I’m the real victim here.

Babe I’m Gonna Leave You is a great song off Led Zepplin’s first album. I always considered it a warm up to Stairway to Heaven, they are both even in Am and have a lot of structural similarities. And I’ve only heard this song a thousand times rather than the twenty thousand for Stairway. It is not as played out. Yay.

I played this on the neck pickup of my Les Paul. It is the combination of two takes, the split between the takes is right before Jimmy Page’s ‘Spanish Bit’ in the middle. There is only one guitar at a time, there are some fingering tricks to make the opening sound like several guitars.

I use the trusty old Boss DS-1 for the distortion on the back side. I have several distortion boxes but none of them give such a sweet even wave distortion like the DS-1. It is my go-to box.

I hope you enjoy the song.

 

For some reason I got the Moody Blues song I’m Just a Singer in a Rock and Roll Band stuck in my head. This is what we do to earworms here in Frenzyland.

 

Smooth Operator by Sade came over the radio on the way to Cape Cod. As it played I ran it forward in my head so I was ready for the chorus, to BBFB-It. It sounded good in my head but you have to actually hear it to know if it works.

Smooth Operator is a very simple song to play from a technical standpoint. The crucial thing is to keep that slinky vibe going without making the song sleepy. The guitar is my main Fender Hiwy One Strat with the bridge Vintage pickup selected. Now that I think of it, I could have used the Les Paul for the rhythm since it would probably have a slicker sound. Oh well.

The I tried to make the vocals as smooth as I can. They turned out just at the edge of sloppy, there are two places I wanted to redo but I decided to let genuineness (laziness) rule the day. For the lyrics I wanted to match the mood of the song, kind of sad and tragic, with the story of Bruce Wayne’s tragic early life. I used ‘Batman’s Toys’ as a link to Bruce’s childhood. He is eager to stop other tragedies, in a doomed effort to stop his own.

This song was written and recorded in the time it took to make a two-bag shopping trip. I had figured out the chords earlier this morning from watching a guy on YouTube. I didn’t want to do all 4 bars of the opening lick that the sax player does on the album. You have to keep these songs as short as possible. So I had to make something up for the second bar that was in the spirit of the sax but worked as an opening to the vocals. I improvised the little base line before the chorus. I think it is right, but not 100% sure.