Sorry folks, No RPM Challenge this year. But honestly, saying “no” this year was more difficult than saying “yes” two years ago, and I didn’t actually officially say “no” until February 28th.
See, I was really looking forward to recording an album in February. I was looking forward to it months ago, and in December, and even in January, but once February hit, it wasn’t looking good.
2008 was easy, I’d just fire up GarageBand, find some drum loops, grab the guitar and bass, and a few hours later, I’d have a song done. I did 10 songs in 2008. 2009 was harder, and I wanted to set my standards a bit higher, but I did manage to do 5 songs, which came out to 35 minutes of music. I was happy with what I produced within the time limits. 2009 was a bit harder as far as getting the time to do it all as well. I think my final mixing session was like 5+ hours straight, and ended after 2am.
Still, I was looking forward to doing it again in 2010, especially since I wanted to dig into Logic 9 a bit more. (Amp Designer and Pedalboard!) But.. and everyone I know has a big but… it just couldn’t happen. Between work, work, work, and the Winter Olympics, and family time, and oh, more work, it just didn’t happen.
I did record a bit, but not enough. Last year I joked that for 2010 I’d just record 1 single 35 minute long song, along the lines of Sleep’s Dopesmoker, but even that couldn’t happen.
I also made the mistake of upgrading to Snow Leopard, which broke my FireWire audio input for two days. So I put in probably 3 or 4 hours fixing that so I could record, instead of actually recording, so by the time I got it working, I had no time to record. The whole month sort of went like that. Even though the Doctor (who doesn’t really appreciate the music I make, but supports me nonetheless) was very supportive. Still didn’t happen. I finally got down to the last weekend of the month, and thought “Hey, I’ve got 2 days, I can do it!” but I ended up spending Saturday driving all over Waukesha County, and the rest of Saturday meeting various deadlines. At that point, I knew all hope was lost. Just to top it off, I was at the office for about 5 hours on Sunday, because on Monday I was involved in probably the most important presentation of my life. That trumped it all, so I really don’t feel too bad about not finishing an album.
The sad thing is, now that I think maybe I’d have some time to record, I need to return the Fender to it’s rightful owner, so I’m out one good guitar. Damn…
Well, there’s always next year!
1 reply on “Just Say No RPM!”
2010 was the year I didn’t have time to do the RPM Challenge, either. I didn’t even start planning for it this year. I just decided bak in January to not do it.