Building habits, bit by bit

Yesterday, after I finished my post for the day, a habit that I’m trying to build after years of not sticking to writing every day, I got down to work on Seesaw.

It’s another habit I’m trying to build. Working daily on my own music, with the intent of making at least small steps in finsihing things. Not necessarily getting done with one song in a day (as some electronic musicians seem to have the habit of), but more like setting an achievable goal (every night) and achieving it.

So I’m quite proud to say that I finished the song as a draft production, and it has come out surprisingly well. This basically means it is yet another song that I could choose to professionally produce and release whenever I get around to doing it.

As usual, I shared the song with the three people that I share my works with, and all three had shared positive (varying levels of) feedback about it. The most positive one came from my ex-colleague, and hers felt more like how I had felt about the song. So I chatted with her a bit about the song and the whole creative process.

That’s when it struck me that I could write a blog post about the song, the process, and the habit that I’m trying to build. Here it goes.

Seesaw has been in my life for about 8 weeks. It was born on the day before my knee surgery. An idea had seemingly floated into my brain, inspiring me to grab the guitar to write a hook and record it on my phone.

I remember having checked out the recording after dinner at the hospital, before Jay would leave for the night. It still had it. It had me. It had the potential of being a catchy song that would easily find its place is my top 10 dance/pop discography.

I came back to it on the second week after surgery, when I was finding it difficult to sleep one night. By then the melody for the three parts of the song was set in my head, and it was easy to write lines of the right meter to fit it.

The next day I sang it for the first time, and it was a bit of a let-down because I wasn’t getting the poppy punch that I was hoping it would have, right out of the gate.

Cut forward three more weeks, and I was able to sit at my music work desk for a long enough duration to start working on my productions. Mind you, I had a good excuse to not work on this song. My pop bass was away with my bandmate, who was sub-bing for me during my recovery period.

Yet, somehow, picking up the bass that I generally use for thrash metal gigs out of storage, I started laying down the parts.

The guitars were simple. Clean Telecaster with middle-of-the-neck riffs with a lot of syncopation and muting. Drums were too. Straight up one-two kick and snare with hats. A pickup loop and claps for the chorus. Reverse cymbals for transitions.

Keys were more difficult. I needed some nice sounding pads and a gentle arpeggiator. Pads were a disaster and eventually went on mute. The arpeggiator was found after a few hits and misses. Then came the bass.

For producers/musicians out there, if you are wondering why I’m tacking bass the last before vocals, I really don’t have a good answer.

The best I can come up with is that when I lay down a bass groove after the other elements come in, it's almost like I’m jamming with a band, just like how I would in a real band. That seems to give me enough freedom to loop and come up with some bass line ideas, one of which will eventually make it to the song.

It wasn’t easy at all. Because of some damned pick-up, earthing noise I have at my desk with that bass. It was frustrating at best, and over the course of three days (not consecutive by any means), I had three versions of the bass line, each noisy in one way or the other.

Of these, the last one had manageable noise and was groovy enough for me to want to sing the song in the way that I had always imagined it. That’s how I had left the session three days ago.

So when I wrapped up my post here and opened the song session, I had no idea that it was that groovy. Also, before sitting down to write on the blog, I was jamming some songs on a new acoustic grand piano VST I had downloaded (Autograph Grand; thank you, Spitfire Audio).

Since I’m about a year into playing chords on keys (it means that not proficient at playing piano), I had to slow my chords down so that I made fewer mistakes, which also forced me to sing the same melody in diferent ways.

Finally, I had hit the right vocal texture for Seesaw. Then I tried the vocal texture on the guitar at the right speed, and it sounded good. So much so that I came up with a backup vocal hook that had the potential to fix my arrangement as well.

Voilà, in about an hour, I had done the vocal tracking and done the basic mixing. Then I did some more editing for getting the dynamics of the arrangement right and did a quick master, before cranking out a mix-down.

My first listen on my MacBook Pro speakers was a disaster. Terrible cut-through noise from the bass (instrument) over the bass (line). It had sounded so good on headphones and on the monitor speakers!

A couple of listens on some bluetooth earbuds eased my anxiety, and the song did sound great in the choruses, especially the second one, which had the new backup vocal hook glueing everything together.

By the time I was in bed, adrenaline was high, and I was expecting another night of difficulty in falling asleep. But I had some podcasts as lullabies and despite sleeping 2 hours later than my schedule, I did get a decent night of sleep.

So, after a terribly busy workday, featuring me doing a lot of re-reviewing things—because the original review’s comments were ignored—I was left with choosing to take a break from the new habit. I am tired. I was tired when I had the option of not sticking to the habit-forming habit.

I resisted. I went back to a song that I wanted to improve on. And I started the process. Before I had my dinner. That’s because I knew that I ought to give myself an early night of sleep.

So, here I am, after dinner, feeling the first waves of sleep, finishing this post, proud of having two habits with unbroken streaks.

Tomorrow will be a challenge because Jay and I are headed out to the country house over the weekend, after a late-evening physical therapy session. I do have to wake up real early and get my reading and exercise done before a whole workday and the evening shenanigans.

I’ll wish myself luck, but I’m fairly confident that I’ll keep the street intact, for I can choose to write for both. Maybe I can write about what I wrote for my second habit. We shall see tomorrow evening.

Creativity after a creative workday

There is a problem with spending your entire workday being creative, especially if you have to continue being creative beyond the workday.

Months ago—maybe years ago at this point—I was researching on the best routines for creative individuals to not get stuck at creating. The consensus answer seemed straightforward—make use of the best part of the day for your creativity.

For me, this happens to be the morning. Early morning, actually. When things are quiet and when there is more hope than the bottom of the barrel.

I still remember a period about a year an half ago. It had felt like I had come upon the gentle slope that would lead one out of a trough of depression. It was not. At this point, the trough seems more like the freshly minted ocean floor that surfaces as the ice age deepens.

There was this one morning when I had woken up before dawn and I had written a song about suicide called The Night Ends at Dawn. Within a couple of days, I was able to render it in a draft recording that somehow made me sound less like how I used to be. It has turned out to be one of the best songs I have written.

Anyway, at the end of this recording, I came to the conclusion that the more I used the mornings for music, the more I would feel satisfied being a musician.

Then my reading routines changed. I was reading more and it was easier for me to settle myself for the day if I were to have read with my morning coffee, before my morning exercise routine.

It felt okay to change the routine because I still had the evening, hopefully, after a busy but rewarding workday. And it did work, for a few months, until I started doing creative audiovisual work at work.

Coming back the full circle. Today, at work, I spent a lot of time outlining, prepping for, recording, and early post-production for some videos that I’m making as part of a video series at work.

But unlike other days, today I was positively triggered (?motivated/?inspired) by a new piano VST plugin that I could download. So right after logging out, I installed the plugin and started singing (no surprise) Dave Matthews songs. And that led to other songs and that led to me singing Seesaw, the song that I’m struggling to complete.

By the time I reluctantly peeled myself off my desk to grab some questionably safe dinner (leftover yesterday’s prawn biryani from the fridge), I had already sort of worked myself into a mindset of hope/determination to be able to make some strides on the song.

That’s what I’m about to do now. Wish me luck. And maybe hope and determination.

Come into me

No, I’m not being lewd. It’s just want Dave Matthews is singing to me. In Crash Into Me, that song from the ‘90s that typified him and his band.

I was watching a Dave Matthews Tiny Desk Concerts literally a minute ago. I stopped because I was sufficiently inspired to go back and work on that song that I’m working on.

Despite the headache that I’m having. The one that has been there for over a day. Not sure what’s going on. Is this how the rest of the life is going to be for me? Hopefully not.

The song that I’m working on is something that I would imagine a artists with shades of of George Michael and Bruno Mars would write/sing. It’s called Seesaw. The problem with it—well, the problem is me—is that it is just right in the middle of my comfortable chest and head voice ranges.

My vocal instructor did ask me to roll some songs down by three to five half-steps so I could render them at my best. This song might need a six or seven.

So why am I typing this when I got inspired by Dave Matthews? Because I can’t renege on the promise that I made myself. For writing every day. Every night actually. Maybe on weekends, I should try writing on the day as well.

Anyway, I think I have done enough writing. The headache’s still there. My friend at work, who I knew before I joined work, is going through some trouble. I spent over two and a half hours listening to his side of the story and trying to understand.

Oh, also I met someone from Philadelphia who I think I’m going to be working closely with for a cause that I think I’ll be proud of in the long run. Sneak peek? Well, it’s related to LGBTIQ+.

How NOT to Share Feedback with Artists

My search for performance coaches has not yet yielded a viable one. These individuals are highly accomplished and trained individuals whose fees are like sledgehammers, something someone making a living in India will struggle to meet.

Hence, I turned to my extended friend circle and asked around. Basically, I texted a select few friends to query if they had such a skillset, and if they did, I asked if they would be interested to coach me. In all fairness, it was not so difficult to find the likely candidates. Both the people I got in touch did have the skillset, one of them, said they could work with me. Yesterday evening, I had my first meeting with the one.

It’s a he. It’s a he who I have had a physical relationship with. It’s a he who has been there for me, by my side, in some of my darkest phases. It’s a he who has given me unforgettable experiences of various kinds. It’s a he who has been consistently welcoming toward me in the several versions that I have iterated myself through. I’ll refer to him as SP.

SP, in a nutshell, said that the most important thing that I need to do is to believe in myself and my potential. He wants me to be confident to ‘market’ myself and work on my networking skills. He thinks that one needs to have a certain blend of arrogance and indifference toward the world. Our meeting ended with the promise of a few more at the very least.

I was also left with an assignment. Somewhere in the middle of my narration of what I thought ailed me in terms of sharing the output of my creativity with the rest of the world, I mentioned that I have had a few traumatic experiences while attempting it previously, with some of them being with people what one would refer to as “friends”. He asked me to write down two such experiences, which will immediately follow this. I am to share these with him and we are to discuss these in our next meeting.

Traumatic Experience #1

Age: 21
Year: 2001

I had just recorded and mixed my first original song called Castle Without A Rock. The song/lyric writing, and all the performances (guitars, bass, drums, and vocals) were by me. The song itself was about the experiences that we (my close friends and I) had had around our first-ever concert as part of the New Year's Eve celebrations for the coming of 2000 (Y2K).

The landmark album Parachutes by Coldplay had been released only a few months before, and the hit song Yellow was on everyone’s minds. The reason I mention is that I thought it was a masterful song arranged relatively simplistically, which is what I was attempting to go for in my song.

It was late afternoon on a mid-summer day. As soon as I finished a decent mix for the song, I exported it in the mp3 format, copied into a portable USB drive, and ran over to my friend’s place—our usual meeting place.

The house was that of a friend who was much older than the rest of us. He was a music connoisseur and had been collecting CDs and records for years. He had a high-end hi-fi at his place. On that particular day, we were three—the older friend, a younger friend (who since then went on to be a drummer in many bands I have played with), and I.

I excitedly announced what I wanted to share with them, and I figured out a way to play the song on the hi-fi. My friends did not demonstrate any excitement. In fact, halfway through the song, the older friend started laughing, which prompted me to stop the playback. In the ensuing conversation, I explained what my intent was (in terms of artistic style). I only remember getting more chuckles and laughter. At the end of my explanation, I remember receiving some critique (on the following lines) from the older friend:

“Such work will never be received well. You might as well as give up on writing/performing music. You shouldn’t set high hopes for being a professional musician.”

Years later, I would take courses on Coursera, with some of them being on songwriting and musicianship. One of the important aspects of every such course is the importance of learning to share feedback with peers. The entire focus is on the need for kind, constructive feedback, with strong advice against harsh and hypercritical ones. I guess my friend did not know this, despite him being a popular and successful teacher in accounting.

I don’t remember my younger friend sharing anything on the song. This despite him and me having been jamming regularly for several months and having dreams of being in a band and writing songs. Years later, I remember him coming around and admitting to how highly he thought highly of some of my later work.

This incident was followed by another traumatic incident with the younger friend’s family. These two incidents were triggers for my eventual move away from Thiruvananthapuram. The incident also started the gradual severance of the friendship with the older friend. Although I continued to work with and be friends with the younger one, things have never been really the same.

Traumatic Experience #2

Age: 28
Year: 2008

I had just released an EP of five of my songs on MySpace. Although I was sure of the quality of my songwriting, I was aware of my production and performances not being up to the mark for radio airplay. The songs were actually recorded with the aim of a submission for a talent hunt by the premier indie record label then. The idea was for me to showcase my work so that they would consider me signing with them as an artist under their label.

Back then, I was actively involved in networking in the music scene, being part of two popular bands on the rise. I also personally knew many active musicians and was friends with some of them. Internet chats were popular. I had just struck up a chat conversation with one of the scene guys on MySpace.

He was someone who I respected and looked up to at that time. He was funny and charming and was part of at least two successful bands. Later on, I’d realize that he belonged to a clique of musicians who were fortunate enough to know each other from their school days, with their collective might propelling them to the top of the indie music scene.

I remember thinking that I will ask his opinion as to how to go about taking my project on live touring, considering that he and his bands were doing that consistently for a few years. I had shared the links of my songs and asked him for his opinion. The lasting memory that I have of this conversation is him telling me this:

“Who is this fucking singer, man! He is so baaadd, oh my god. I have never heard worse singing in my life!”

I left the conversation with him and have never talked to him properly since then. This crushed me in ways that I can’t even describe. It triggered my reluctance to share my work with my friends and “scene guys”. It also created roadblocks for me to share songwriting ideas with my then band, which I partially overcame in the coming years.

Like with the previous incident, I experienced a life-changing traumatic event soon after. This time, I would almost lose my partner to near-fatal health complications during his visit.

He had come to Mumbai from New York City, with the intent of figuring out a way to eventually move to India to be with me. In the course of the next few weeks in India, and in the following months in the US, he would go through multiple devastating health events which would render him in a state of dementia, where he would not even recognize me or our relationship. This wiped out our bank accounts, and would eventually result in me failing my exams for the first time in my life.

The series of unfortunate events triggered the darkest phase of depression I think I have gone through. I would spend several months toying with the idea of suicide. Eventually, with the help of some close friends and the partially-recovered partner, I started taking medications for depression. I somehow found the courage and drive to give my post-graduation exams, and would eventually pass them on second attempt.

On the positive side, this incident also guided me to explore ways to improve my voice, and I eventually even found a vocal coach, who restored a lot of the confidence that I had lost. Eventually, I would find the courage to share my work with a select few friends, and most of them would end up having startlingly different opinions.

The band that I am in right now includes two such people. I remember having played my songs on the car stereo on a ride back from a rehearsal. I was only seeking feedback on my choice of guitar tones. After listening to a few songs, they would tell me how awesome these songs are, why I hadn’t yet shared these with them, and that they would love to work on these songs in a band project.

PS: The one thing that I realize after my first meeting with SP is that performance coaches (and performers, as a matter of fact) are those individuals who have figured out ways to overcome their self-doubts and negativity in a consistently replicable manner.

New computer, new songs

I sent my band mates at Bad Influence a few songs that I had written previously – the songs that are on the playlist on the right sidebar on the blog. They were happy with some of the songs and they wanted to take some songs and perform them as a band.

This inspired me. Or should I say “inspires” me? I had already taken up the assignment of writing one or two news songs for the band in two weeks time ending this Sunday. So, after work, I came home and I sat down with the guitar and I recorded two melodies/songs over chords on my computer.

Since buying my new computer, which has Windows 7, I have been unable to record how I used to previously – multi-track recording with Cubase SX. I only have Audacity to work with and I can’t record more than one track without latency issues.

I’m hoping to fix things up soon and record recordings whole songs on my computer. Here’s to the fruition of that plan!

Singer/songwriter debut

Well, the Queer Azaadi March this year features a week of queer-related activities leading up the pride march on the 29th of January (Saturday). I have already applied for a half-day leave on that day.

More importantly for me, however, are the dates 27th and 28th, when I'll be performing as a singer/songwriter at two separate venues - at the Carter Road Amphitheater, Bandra and at Cooper Candies, Pali Hilll, Bandra, respectively.

On the 27th, I'll be joined by Rob (on guitar/vocals) and S (on djembe, percussion). The fantastic Alsha Batth will be performing alongside. On the 28th, I'd be performing solo for just a song or two at the Open Mic Night event. Both will be memorable days in my life, where I'll be performing songs that I wrote, songs that are so very personal.

This will the first time that Ideat Savant (my pet music project) songs are being performed live. As a prelude to these two gigs, if things go well, I'll be performing a 3-song set with Rob and S at the Cirkles gig at Not Just Jazz by the bay on the 21st of January. That makes it a total of three singer/songwriter gigs in a week's time! Wish me luck fellows!

Here is the QAM schedule:

My Addiction

I can't see, I can't breathe, I can't lay still, without the sight of you
I can't scream, I can't fight, I can't play cool, without you being there
I can't sleep, I can't eat, I can't stay still, without the sight of you
I can't dream, oh my plight, I'm such a fool, without you saying hey

Like dark chocolate
Like a cup of latte
Like a glass of scotch
Like an OCD
So hard to shake you off

My addiction, it's a contradiction
My addiction, it defies deaddiction
My addiction, it feels like corruption
My addiction, no one's jurisdiction

I can't feel, I can't shield, I can't bear it all, without you inside me
I can't leave, I can't move, I can't just live, without you being there
I can steal, but I can't give, I can't keep up, without you inside me
I can't plea, I can't flee, I can't but slide, without you saying hey

Like dark chocolate
Like a cup of latte
Like a glass of scotch
Like an OCD
So hard to shake you off

My addiction, it's a contradiction
My addiction, it defies deaddiction
My addiction, it feels like corruption
My addiction, no one's jurisdiction

What I Have Lost

This is a song I wrote at the Juhu beach one fine evening when I took my guitar with me. This was back in October 2010. Of course, it's about me and Vinokur.

What I Have Lost (2010)

I look back, to see what I've lost
I lay back, to feel it rush in fast
Eight half past, the waves are gushing past
The past oh past, I'm sure it didn't last forever, and ever

I'm here all by myself
And you have moved on fast
And I feel what I have lost
It's so hard to make it/you past

I'm back, to the time that I was lost
I hold back, the world spins so fast
Third year at last, the masterplan has crashed
It had to crash, because we made sure it didn't last forever, and ever

I'm here all by myself
And you have moved on so fast
And I feel what I have lost
It's so hard to make it/you past

The best jerk

Oh please, would you please, stop it, you bastard
It's not as if the world around you is deaf
What you do does indeed go with the groove of Morcheeba
But that's no excuse to go on and on, so tirelessly

Like a jerk, like an asshole
Like a fucked up pretentious fool

You look back at me and scream as if I'm responsible
It's part of your 'job', as you always claimed it to be
Don't let your dirt spill out like a leak in the toilet
Don't let your hands push on this monster, creating a racket

Like a jerk, like an asshole
Like a fucked up pretentious fool

You are more jerky than a motorized saw
You don't know how to ride this monster
You better quit what you are doing
You better stop what you are doing

Life and Love

Life is a misery, your soul is sold
She is a lost cause, you are getting old
Life is a parody, your hope is restored
It's lonely path, you ain't growing up

You are the travesty that the world should never see
Your are the ignonimity that the world should never see
You are the mediocrity that the world should never see
You are the nothing that the world loves to ignore

Love is a misery, your heart is sold
She is a lost cause, you are getting cold
Love is a parody, my hope is destroyed
It's a tricky path, you ain't moving forward

You are the majesty that the world always bows before
You are the firefly that the children run behind
You are the amnesty that the world hides behind
You are the nothing that the world loves to akcnowledge

Choose your path carefully as
You are always alone in life and love

Awakening

Hey belief, hope you’ve not given up on me
Hey grief, hope you’ve not shined up on me
Hey mischief, you have been a blessing to me
It’s a relief, you have dawned on me

Hey face, hope you’ll dawn up on me soon
Hey grace, hope you’ll glaze over the moon
Hey disgrace, you have been my spittoon
It’s a place, where I want to be so soon

Take me there, hand in hand
Lead me there, my heart’s going blind
Take me there, holding hands
Lead me there, my heart’s going numb

(Title suggested by Bruno Nigita)

Waiting for you

Winter afternoon, as time slowly passes by
Whisper in my ear, your face flashes past
Within me a feeling of pleasure, it persists
Without you this feeling would never exist

Hold me in your arms, kiss me with your charms
Feel me with your hands, give me all you have

Wanting for this moment to stay forever and long
Waiting for your lips to push me down strong
Wishing that us and this would be real, really soon
Waiting, if only it would be sooner than soon

Hold me in your arms, kiss me with your charms
Feel me with your hands, give me all you have

Bad Influence

I don’t have a clue how many readers I have in this blog. But at least some have requested me to update them about the situation with the new band, Bad Influence. Well, at the moment that I’m writing it, we have had three rehearsal sessions. Overall, it has been a good experience. But we need to tighten up a little bit more and may be requiring some personnel changes for the same.

We have already started working on our original compositions. Of course, this is what inspired me to get back into songwriting, which I had done last weekend. I hope to do so in the New Year’s weekend too!

Free me, feed me, kiss me, kill me

You may not be what I had in my mind
You may have come up from behind
You have always been far from being kind
You have always been that, I don’t mind

Feel me inside out, it your only chance
Drown me down and out, it’s a fat chance
Feel my breath, it’s not happenstance, you
Drowned me in your charm, as per plan

Free me, feed me, kiss me, kill me
Free me, feed me, cuss me, kill me

Writing songs again

Being part of the new band Bad Influence has kick-started my desire to write songs again. I only wish I had a better recording setup at home. This weekend, I spent a lot of time doodling around the guitar, trying to create riffs and hooks. I wrote some lyrics as well, which I will post soon. I’m glad that I have restarted songwriting again. May the force be with me!

Together, forever

Thanks to inspiration from Sidd Coutto and constant coaxing from Robin, I wrote a song tonight. These are the lyrics to the song. I have just recorded it as a scratch tune. Hope to record it sometime in the future.

Together Forever (2010)

We were meant to be deceived
We were meant to taste defeat
We were meant to share our lives together
We were meant to bare our souls forever

Together, forever
Together, forever

All it took was another of my kind
And it was something happening behind
All I knew was that I was kept blind
All those days, that I was slipping behind

Together, forever
Together, forever

Together, forever (4 times)

Sound theory

You can't imagine how boring it is to seclude yourself to studying everyday. My seclusion has extended a few notches further with me minimising the conversations that I have with friends and going out as less as I can. Hell, it's been four days since I 'talked' to Vinokur. I don't know why I feel like I would do better by staying off contact. Just 10 more days before I can re-calibrate my life.

Anyway, to convert those boring low-productivity afternoons into something meaningful, I've taken up a little side-business. I am trying to figure out some songs and trying to figure why they sound so beautiful and interesting. For someone who doesn't understand music theory, this might sound weird. But this is actually fun.

To make things a little easier to understand, I'm figuring out the little motifs that are found in popular music and trying to figure out why they sound 'good'. Of course, most of music is not intentionally written to sound this way. But those songs we end up liking usually are weirdly interlinked. What do I get out of this? Some harmless, recreational, educative fun. Weird combination of words I suppose. Finally though, I hope to incorporate some of this knowledge into writing songs.

I need some opinion

Hey people, I guess I am being a little too narci-song-issistic. But still I would like to know what you guys thought of the recording of 'A World Full of Lies'. I uploaded it to MySpace and Last.fm and they don't offer song widgets like SoundClick. The lyrics are given below. For those who can listen, please do and comment.

• Listen to the song on MySpace.com
  
• Listen to the song on Last.fm

A World Full of Lies

I could look at your face and
Tell how long I have hated you
And leave you feeling dazed
But that would be too easy on you

I could wipe the dust of the pane and
Show you what lies inside
But is there a point in all of this
If you are blind to what you have done

But I can't do anything
To wash out the dirt that's inside
And I can't do anything
I am burning, burning from inside

I could list all of the lies you said
And still be short of breath
But why are we wasting time
On something that was so easy for you

I could have seen through the veil
That you were wearing all through out
But is there a point in all of this
If I can't wipe this scar away

As I can't do anything
To wash out the dirt that's inside
And I can't do anything
I'm still burning, burning from inside

Burning inside, Burning inside

As I can't do anything
To wash out the dirt that's inside
And I can't do anything
I'm still burning, burning from inside

Burning inside, Burning inside

I've been busy in the last two days trying to come up with ideas for the last two songs in this recording. I am nearing completion to both of them and you can expect to hear them very soon.

Ideat Savant

It's time to look ahead. After a lot of depressing posts about how my life sucks in general, this is a welcome change for me too. This recent resurgence of song-writing and positive comments from you guys and Rob have made me rekindle the idea of forming a band featuring such material. I've always had a plan actually. After the relative success of Noise Market and Shoonyas, I feel more confident.

Another striking fact - after spending a lot of time recording my own material in past few days, I have also starting to realize how much easier it's to make music alone. Your can let your own ideas flourish and not be restricted to any other view point. Of course, this can be a bad thing as well. But in my case, at least until now, I think I'm making better stuff out than when I'm with my bands.

The name that I came up with is 'Ideat Savant'. If you are wondering what it means, I would like to clarify that it's not a spelling mistake. It's a spin off the word idiot savant, a condition of people in Asperger's Syndrome. Vinokur is borderline Asperger's and he uses this term quite frequently in the conversation. But that is already taken up by other bands.

idiot savant (noun)
An intellectually disabled person who exhibits extraordinary ability in a highly specialized area, such as mathematics or music.

I wanted something with the same concept. And I searched for words similar to 'idiot' and stumbled upon 'ideat'.

I`de´at (noun)
1.(Metaph.) The actual existence supposed to correspond with an idea; the correlate in real existence to the idea as a thought or existence.

Savant (noun)
1. A learned person; a scholar.
2. An idiot savant.

Obviosuly I want your opinion of what you think of this name.

I've just started my own MySpace and Last.fm pages and have uploaded the latest songs as well. I am planning to find some guys or gals who are interested in joining me in this band. I am hoping that this time I'll be succesful. Even if the competition that I'm sending an entry to turns out to be disappointing, I might check these songs out with a record label and pursue this further.

I hope this was some good news after all!

(A mix of my latest recording 'A World Full of Lies is at either of the pages. I'll probably mix it once more before putting it up here.)

Hope It's Over - mix

Yesterday night, I couldn't sleep well. Was worrying a lot about what's going to happen to me. After getting up, I logged on to MonsterIndia.com, created a profile for me there and submitted for a couple of job applications. Side by side, I've also started checking out options for getting Sugar Daddies. If I'm in a mood later on in the day, I'll probably look up jobs in music stores, radio stations, music channels etc. You can keep on giving suggestions so that I can at least have food and internet - I need to have internet to maintain contact with Vinokur.

Since I'm feeling slightly better after a couple of 'Dads' responded to my messages on a personals site, I'll bother to post in the song that I recorded yesterday. It's the second in line of at least four that I'm going to send in for the competition. It's called 'Hope It's Over'. I had posted a shabby acoustic version earlier. It's a full fledged electric version. Once again, I would put in a disclaimer - Don't worry too much about the vocal track. It needs some work. But I don't have better mics and saner mind to do it now. Lyrics are attached below. In a weird way, this song kinda sums up my present state of mind as well.

Hope It's Over

Hope It's Over (lyrics)

When did I stop being, what I used to be
Where did I start falling, you weren't looking
What did I start chasing, it feels so long
Whom did I leave stranded, I fell so hard, I felt so low

Was it you, was it me, who knows

When did I stop listening, it was deafening
Where did I stop looking, what lies ahead
What did I start wishing, wish I'd be there now
Whom did I try faking, I tried so hard, I felt so lone

Was it you, was it me, who knows
Was it you, was it me, who knows

The hope that is left, is it too heavy to confess
The hope that is left, it's so easy to forget

Was it you, was it me, who knows
Was it you, was it me, is it over?

Is it over? Yes it is.

(PS: This was originally written after a phone conversation with my sister which I've blogged about. She is a silent reader on this blog. When we talked yesterday, she said she liked the 'words' of the Rainbow Song, but not the tune. I hope she likes the tune of this at least.)