Why Would I Write

  • And you smile like a saint but you curse like a sailor

    If there’s one thing a lot of people tell me after they listen to me perform is that it’s my music reminds them of Dashboard Confessional. I can’t disagree with them because Chris Carrabba is probably the main reason I even picked up guitar in the first place. But my songs are nowhere as near as good as his. Honestly, if my songs were to be placed side by side with Dashboard songs, nobody would disagree that they are miles apart – objectively speaking. Also, subjectively speaking – his songs are much more interesting and varied than mine. But today I’m not talking about my songs, instead I’ll be sharing about Dashboard Confessional (which I’m surprised I haven’t done yet for my Music Monday posts).

    I was first introduced to Dashboard Confessional via the MTV Road Rules soundtrack alongside Thrice and Coheed and Cambria. I really enjoyed the respite of an acoustic track in a mostly energetic album, but I didn’t really listen to much of them until a friend (a huge Dashboard fan who frequently quoted their lyrics in her MSN statuses and blog posts) shared Hands Down with me and I was hooked.

    Saints and Sailors

    (more…)

  • 16 going on 17

    It’s the same story, just a different day. Cigarette hanging from his mouth, coffee by his side, while he typed away on his laptop.
    It’s been almost three hundred and sixty-six days (yes it was a leap year, he had to look it up) – time to kill off our calendars and get used to writing seventeen at the end of your dates.

    He doesn’t have to recount everything that’s happened over the year (he’s done plenty of those already, TL;DR: he traveled a lot, worked a lot, played a lot of Dota). What about goals? Hm. Make a game – failed. Made new music – one song, and that happened about a month ago (and it’s still incomplete). Learn new things – he did learn to play Somewhere Over The Rainbow on his ukulele but is still terrible at ‘dabbling’ with the piano. Get scammed by some rap artists – succeeded! He did read more books than before, which is an accomplishment given his busy schedule. He hasn’t really written anything significant since his Nanowrimo novel back in 2014. So overall, besides advancing in his career he hasn’t really done much.

    Sighing to himself, he lit up another cigarette. What next? 9 more years to live, still nothing accomplished. But wait, does he really need to accomplish anything? After all, he’s just another human being. Another speck in the universe. A nobody. He’s not special. So no, not really. Everybody else’s life seems better, so what? His life is fine. There’s nothing absolutely wrong with it. Sure, it could be better – but so could everything else. Also, he looks young for his age.

    So what’s in store for the following year? Who knows. He still needs to work on his time management. Better time management will lead to more time to spend on his hobbies and things outside work. Be a better son. A better boy friend. A better writer. A better musician. A better person in general. And hopefully, a game developer! Let’s not repeat 2016.

    Make moves, not excuses.

    Taylor Swift – Back To December just came on. How fitting. Happy New Year everybody!

  • I’m on fire and now I think I’m ready to bust a move

    When I was young, I used to record myself talking into a tape recorder, pretending to be a radio DJ. Now I have the ability to record my own ‘radio shows’ (podcasts) and broadcast them to the whole world but I don’t do it.

    I’m sure what I said was full of cringey shit, talking to an audience that didn’t exist, and not even fading tracks in/out while talking in between them. Then again, those fades always annoyed me.

    Now I just sit behind my screen and type out my nonsense onto a screen. I hit publish and the whole world can read what I’m thinking about. All my stupid thoughts and stupid songs. It’s mostly garbage. Sometimes I come up with something that people find interesting to read.

    Most of the time I don’t. And I end up with half-assed thoughts like these.

    Ever since I started listening to podcasts, I’ve had countless ideas for podcasts of my own. Mainly just me and a friend sitting opposite each other, drink in hand and shooting shit. I don’t think it would be entertaining to anyone besides myself, so I’ve never done it. Also, I think I have a shitty radio voice.

    I would probably need to train myself to speak differently if I want to sound better over the air. I know because I hear my voice all the time (when watching playbacks of my Twitch stream (shameless plug – come hang out if you enjoy watching Dota fails), and listening to my WhatsApp voice messages to Milin).

    Also, your voice sounds different on recording because you hear yourself in two ways – the first is through vibrating sound waves hitting your ear drum, the way other people hear your voice. The second way is through vibrations inside your skull set off by your vocal chords. Those vibrations travel up through your bony skull and again set the ear drum vibrating. However as they travel through the bone they spread out and lower in pitch, giving you a false sense of bass. Then when you hear a recording of your voice, it sounds distinctly higher. [source]

    I have no idea where I’m going with this. I guess that’s why I’m writing this for my Thursday thoughts.