Popular chords

Spent an enjoyable and  busy day recording yesterday. As it turns out Em and Cmj7 were the most popular chords. You just never know quite what direction music sessions will take you in. Other chords used included Am, Bm and a few others for good measure. Now it's all somewhere in the mix.

Completer Finisher

As I have a number of guitar projects on the go and am forever moving bits between them, stopping work to concentrate on something or just being unproductive (lazy) so it's unusual for me to have actually finished something. (Of course in a sense they're never finished because tinkering about and rehashing things is all part of the game).  So today it's the composite P Bass that's done and it has  turned out to be reasonably playable. It started up as a blank eBay body, everything else is new, imported, recycled or just different; neck, machines, bridge, electrics and Wilkinson pickups. I kept the sunburst finish, it's not in bad shape (and I'm not sure what's lurking underneath the finish) and restricted the dragon tail pyrography to the headstock. I'm still adjusting the action and intonation but it sounds ok so far. It's also very heavy...more protein needed in my diet.

After, after, before.

A few months ago the shed roof blew off. I've been holding myself back from doing the repair and watching the always unpredictable weather. Well the weather moved on a bit into sunny and slightly calm and so I replaced the damaged sections and laid on some new roofing felt (obviously as above). There's still a bit of finishing off to do but the worst is over and I didn't hurt myself too much during the repair programme, something of a first. This spot of DIY was swiftly followed by the ritual hacking into shape of two virgin guitar headstocks. Sadly I missed out on a proper before picture so it's a semi complete along with a nearly finished. Posted for (future) reference only.

Saw this inside my brain and I thought of the relative mediocrity ingrained in Scottish politics and songwriting:

I woke up this morning, the election was done,

A rainbow result, they all think they've won,

Seems like everyone did well or at least as expected,

Got a steady job for 5 years now that they're elected.

Yesterday's efforts

That awkward, fiddly bit where you mate guitar necks to bodies and hope for the best, almost done for these two. There was a fair bit of frantic measuring and searching for the usual sources of dimensional help across the web. Trouble is that there are so many experts and internet slackers out there all peddling advice and ideas. Beware. It seems like I've been footering with the same batch of guitars for ages, that's true. I enjoy the staged procrastination, building and then taking them apart and then longer periods of time when nothing really happens until there is some spurt of activity, like yesterday.

Burn the Witch

As ever it takes me a while to get round to looking into the latest cool thing that's floating around, so much so that I'm no even sure that the latest cool thing is even cool. Are Radiohead cool at all or are they living in that 90's twilight zone where they are famous enough to coast along and command an audience and rich enough to not bother. They can also delete their internet presence (how's that work) and then relaunch themselves and so on. In all this meandering and coming and going I'd like to think that they can still throw a decent tune together or at least come up with a challenging set of lyrics that..."makes a person think". Maybe making people think is a bit risky these days, let's just keep them comatosed nicely. So the brave new Radiohead video has been launched and everybody is excited. I'd be a bit more excited if I understood a few more of the references and keys but I can't help my age and general lack of education. Anyway I like it and I suspect that that the audience they are targeting (30s or so) will get it all right away.

Guitar repairs etc.

Photos from top to bottom: repair to the nut of an Epiphone Flying V, nice banana headstock, new nut due in from AxesRUs any day. Then on the "Lone Wolf" Strat body I'm using veneer shims glued together to ensure the neck and body are a tight fit. Because I'm modifying fairly well used guitar bodies the neck pockets (as per photo three) are often worn or damaged. Thin strips of veneer can at least pack the joint and once compressed and oiled up like the rest of the body the repair shouldn't be too noticeable. That's the theory. The guitar has a single JB Seymour Duncan H with coil tap; simple and hopefully effective.

Get through the slump

(From Saturday's canal boat outing).The serene and effortless swimming of a swan...except for the cliched notion that under the water a lot of unsightly and ungainly paddling action is going ahead. So the three day hangover has lifted and the steady rains of a grey public holiday discourage the thought of venturing out and fixing the shed roof...I'm fixing guitars instead, planning projects and drinking coffee. It was also no surprise to read the usual Monday morning spoilers regards the resurrection of Jon Snow in GoT. Now that this plot device has been taken up no character is safe or even unsafe albeit the word out there is that Jon will be a changed man following from his soul's temporary vacation into Ghost the wolf/dog and the fact that some of his soul will have been distorted in the process. It all sounds like a bit of a holiday treat that we can properly savour at 2100 tonight.

Falkirk Tunnel

There is a light that shines, there in the distance as you travel under Falkirk by canal boat. I didn't know that this 600m tunnel existed but it does and it is fully navigable from end to end. A strange mixture of carved out walls, hewn stone and brick work supports a high and dripping roof as we sailed serenely through, twice. So I quite enjoyed this piece of underground exploration from light to dark and back again. Canal boats, canals and tunnels are all pretty good.

Alternative cheeseboard

Whilst I've nothing against the fine cheeses of Iceland, I'm less than convinced about their cheeseboard awareness over there. Maybe not a regular Viking pastime. I think I mentioned that in a previous post. Above is a rather nice Scottish version from the fabled and often overlooked village of North Queensferry where we ate a hearty (?) supper last night. I don't believe all the cheeses included are from Scotland mind you, but it's a fine wee example of the cheese-boarder's ancient skills and craft and it looked fancy.

Seasonal Variations

There's a mighty cold wind blowing down upon us from the Arctic. Soon it will be Christmas and Games for May have well been postponed this year as the stubborn seasons refuse to cycle on in their own confused despair. I believe that it happens this way every year around these parts. I'm not troubled by this, any bad weather that comes my way gets quickly recycled into poor quality photographic artwork thereby rendering it a wee bit more interesting but ultimately forgettable.

Project Geo

This is interesting and if you're at all interested then you can follow the Project Geo adventure here - https://www.instagram.com/project_geo/  also good to see pyrography being put to some other kind of use. Good quality output as well with very touchable timber. Here's what some of it says: 

Project Geo

 Art project - based in Scotland Everyone should take a moment to look around now and then, you never know what you might find. #Exploreyourcity🍃 jchonours.wordpress.com

Thanks

Three news stories running, all equally telling as to the kind of government we enjoy (?) and the attitude that the establishment hold toward the others (that's us, the commoners); Sir Phillip Green and his asset stripping of BHS and his toadying with senior politicians, the Commons vote that went against allowing the 3000 refugee children a place in the UK and the result of the Hillsborough Inquiry against the hypocrisy and lies that both governments and media have peddled over the years on that tragic incident. Make no mistake our overlords are anything but kindly and benevolent, they'll happily jail the doctors, fudge tax issues and hold their money anywhere but here. They are not to be trusted, believed or respected...but somehow the great British public has placed then in positions of power so we're stuck. Anyway, here's Clint the cat having a nap. I'm off to split some logs.

Purple Rain Revisited.

OK, he's proper dead and proper buried or cremated but I still can't get the music of Prince out of my head. How does that happen? I've never actually owned a Prince album or CD or anything, never really followed his career but now he's dead there's a strange persistence that's calling to me from his music. Maybe it's just the fear of missing out, irrational as that seems or just some modern way that we heathens need to spend some time processing the death of somebody we didn't quite appreciate enough in life. I also wish I'd bought a Hohner Telecaster copy back in the day, those guys must be priced way off the scale right now.

Money

New Money: I don't really care for the ill-fated and badly reconstructed RBS but I like their money. These are the new notes, not ready for spending yet. Famous women from a limited and unfamiliar part of Scottish history are featured. One lady with a grim and steely stare pondering her worth on a five pound note and the other lady looking wistfully and mysteriously down from the loftier heights of a tenner. A lot better than the beardy old gits who pop up on paper money or even the queen. Should anyone reading this be uncomfortable with this kind of money please feel free to drop it off with me. I promise to take good care of it.

Waterfall

Nature News

Clearly this applies to the wild and wooded areas surrounding our garden. You have been warned. There are no street lights, phone signals or passing tourists ready to lend a helping hand. No.

Saving a bee

It actually happened today. A bee flew into our conservatory and slowly died, stuck in the heat and the closed space it hit the floor all punch drunk and fucked up, not a good look or situation. I administered a teaspoon of watery sugar and watched it wriggle and struggle with survival, I didn't think it'd make it but it did. A brave and resolute bee indeed.  After a few tense moments it began to buzz (as bees do) and it quickly flew up from the floor and out of the door and onto some waiting daffodils where it resumed it's god given mission. I almost cried at the happy sight.  Go Mr (or Mrs as the case may be) Bee.

Meanwhile the struggle with a dodgy internet connection continues; switch it off, switch it on...anything to avoid contacting the offshore help centre allegedly run by our profiteering friends at BT of course.

Rainbows all over your blues

Here in the wild the (not so wild it seems) fence just manages to hold the rainbow back, for the time being anyway. That's the thing with rainbows, they exist in one way but in other ways they don't, so they though they may seem to be "held" or stopped somewhere, that's just part of the illusion. The light and the colours are travelling continually, getting somewhere and going nowhere all at the same time. We who watch them just have to stand back, hold the memory and perhaps chase the fading image.

More on the Raspberry Beret piece here...http://thatispriceless.blogspot.co.uk/2016/04/masterpiece-1436.html

Google did it

Strangely effected photo of mine (an enormous waterfall etc.) that Google have doctored in some desperate bid to befriend me into using some of their options, tools and tricks. I'm not really bothered. Still reeling a bit over the news that Prince has passed at the (young) age of 57, Ooft!

P.S. from Iceland

Large sunflower used to keep bees happy in a thermally heated tomato glass house complex. 

Icelandic cheese board that contains only one type of (Icelandic) cheese.

Hot springs and geysers. 

An enormous waterfall. 

A glacier leading to the active volcano that stopped all trans-Atlantic flights in 2010.

Even after being home for a few days, chopping up logs and doing gardening I still haven't quite got Iceland out of my system. There are a few pictures on Instagram and FBook so I wont be a holiday bore and use any further ones here. It's over, the garage needs a deep clean, there's stuff to take to the dump, the weather is actually allowing us to go outside and I've a pile of ironing. This is normal, normal life in all it's warmth, colour and physically detrimental activity.