Headphones - Shit Talker

3:24 for March 24th

I guess that’s what you get for being born in the seventies.
But I won’t hold it against you
If you don’t hold it against me. 

David Bazan + Band - Gas and Matches

Holy crap. The original was good, but this is… holy crap.

weezer - The Good Life

When was the last time you listened to pinkerton through a good set of headphones? I’m guessing it was too long ago.

It sounds like a completely different album - in all the best ways.

Headphones - Major Cities

All empires eventually expire and when they finally do it’s never pretty.
So just sit back and wait for the attacks - especially in the major cities.

Please hold my hand, son. Daddy’s got you.
Mamma’s out in the car and she packed your favorite blue shoes.

Here they come: exploding like the sun, ringing in my ears like independence.
I agree; this doesn’t favor me. Still, bullies ought to get what’s coming.

Headphones - Shit Talker

You talk shit about them to me.
You talk shit about me to them.
They know that you have to know they do.
And now you know I know too.

I guess that’s what you get for being born in the ’70s,
But I won’t hold it against you
if you don’t hold it against me.

Because I talk shit about you too.
I swear I thought you knew
All the conversations 
That people have about you
Shit that you won’t ever hear.
Shit, man. Oh shit, man.

I guess that’s what you get for being born in the ’70s.
But I won’t hold it against you
if you don’t hold it against me.

Headphones - I Never Wanted You (steelopus cover)

I stopped into Guitar Center on my way home from work last night to buy some drum accessories and I wandered into the acoustic guitar room where I picked up a Cordoba C7 that I’ve had my eye on for a while. It’s a beautiful nylon string classical with gorgeous tone.

This has been a favorite song of mine since the first time I heard it. The original version is just vocals + synthesizer + drums. There is also a vocals + piano version that is, if you can believe it, even more haunting than the original. And then Bazan started playing it with his full band on tour last summer + fall and that version rocked a little harder (even at a dramatically slower tempo) but still had the incredible impact of the original, buoyed by the most heartbreaking lyrics that have ever been penned.

I’ve been tinkering with a vocals + solo guitar arrangement of it for close to a year. Hell, I’m still tinkering with it. I bounce between fingerstyle and strumming. I fumble my way through singing and playing the bridge section (crazy simultaneous 4/4 under 3/4 time signature happening in that section). I can never settle on an acceptable key because my vocal range just cannot hold a candle to Bazan’s (he’s powerful from the deepest bass notes to the highest falsettos).

Anyway. I figured it was time to just commit something to permanence. I knew it wouldn’t be great, and it’s not, but it gets my point across. So I went into the little practice room and closed the door, put my iPhone on the stool next to me, and recorded this. I was constantly interrupted by other customers in the room and my own indecisions about how and what to play. It took me about 45 minutes to get a good take. This was my last try and it’s completely unedited aside from cleaning up the beginning and ending of the voice memo into which it was recorded.

(17 down. 23 to go.)