a joyful noise

hola amigos! I do hope you all are having a great Spring! Myself – I have been busy on several fronts and thought it a good idea to say hey…or hola…or whazhappenin. First up> I have been working my way through Psalms and have been so utterly inspired in so many ways it is difficult to summarize in a single post, but I will say this; reading Psalms makes me want to make a joyful noise! Psalm 98 is where I currently reside and the poem resonates with sacred energy…some interesting points include the fact that it was written about 1,000 years before Christ, but stretches all the way past his birth to the judgement of the earth (that’s some staying power in relevance), David instructs us to sing a NEW song, and includes such details as “make a loud noise / rejoice / sing praise / let the sea roar / let the floods clap their hands” one interesting thing of note is the “noise” element. As a drummer I’m going to say many a joke is had at our expense…our implied lack of musicality if you will…in the sense that drums are rarely “in tune” to the song…even when a pitch is found – it’s sharp on attack, and we cannot tune specifically to every song. Anyway – a joyful noise is more of a victory shout (and less of a sung note)… furthermore – have you ever been by the roar of an ocean wave? Lemme tell you it’s big my friend. Overwhelming even. In your face loud and noisy. I’m thinking the idea here is to go big or go home. Wall o’ Spirit infused sound! The Hebrew lexicon lists various meanings for noise in this psalm including “to break out / break forth / shout / raise a sound / cry out / give a blast / shout a war cry / shout in triumph.” And yes, the triumph piece becomes important as we look to the end of the psalm we see the Lord coming to judge the people of the world with righteousness and equity. Holy good from our Lord Christ will triumph over skulking defeated evil… I’m thinking a day of some joyful noise sounds quite pleasant thanks.

On other news fronts I am working on an entrance song for a 4 time muay thai champion – somewhat hip-hoppy / dub-trappy…I’m also messing with some new HD video gear (Go Pro and a Canon T5i)… and re-doing a song I wrote on a $100.00 acoustic (Lately I’m lovin me some slide guitar with open tuning). The reason for the “redo” is I had a 1930’s era guitar valued at over $3000.00 fall in to my hands (only temporarily). I am doing some A / B comparisons on the song, and may do 2 complete versions – I dunno yet – just to illustrate some examples in vintage era sounds / cost / theory on fidelity and so forth. Too often people think if they get an instrument that is $$$ they are automatically better musicians, or if they get that piece of gear / software their songs become better. Not necessarily so. I recently read an article by Dave Simonett from Trampled By Turtles where he theorizes about a $500.00 dollar hammer and expensive music gear – not making you a better carpenter / engineer / musician and he made some salient points about this idea (learning recording the hard and satisfying way *)… that tie into music and musicality in a few ways… the thing is there are so many intangibles and x-factors that weave into what defines good music and while good gear can enhance your sound – it won’t increase your musicality… (I am starting to feel another post so I will just mosey on here…)I’m spinning so many plates I’m thinking of giving Guinness Book Of Records a call to see how many more I need to get an entry. OH! OOOOH!OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Have a great one!
Flipside.

* This article is in Tape Op, one of my fave mags – and a subscription is FREE