ron raze he has this remarkable, remarkably emotionally resonant voice, and the most impressive set of sideburns i've ever seen. i think a record label once expressed an interest in signing him but told him he'd need to shave off the 'burns. he told 'em to go stuff it. good man. some singing and story-swapping will happen at the end of the week, hopefully, maybe. it's been a long time coming. 140922 ... raze it took a little longer than expected, but he came, and sang, and the sideburns were there in all their glory. we did one of his and one of mine, and it'll be fun to figure out what kind of clothes they want to wear. 141014 ... raze finally got around to dressing up his song after being scattered for a while, working on too many different things at once to give any one thing my undivided attention. just in time for his birthday, too. it's about the miles his shoes have seen. i hope he likes what i did with it. he has a unique way of pronouncing certain words. when i was adding harmonies to the chorus, something didn't sound right on the word "alleyways". it was because he was singing it "alley-wheeze". so i sang it that way too, and then it blended better. 150403 ... raze he likes it. yesh. yesh, i says. 150405 ... raze well, now it looks like we're making an album together. i didn't see that one coming. i've been a fan of the guy and his songs forever. my brain is going to explode. 150410 ... raze we got the bones of half the album down in a few hours. then i had a dream he was singing a song about dame edna. always a good sign. "dropping off the kids". that's what he called recording some songs for me to mess around with. "spank 'em if you need to," he said. i don't think it'll come to that, but it's a nice feeling to be given that kind of trust. i'll do my best to raise them right. 150427 ... raze we're having some fun, those kids and me. i took a few of 'em on a little day trip today. no mosquito bites, no bloody noses, no run-ins with the law. all good. 150609 ... raze those kids have been put on hold for a while. but he just put out a different new album that was always meant to come first. there's something surreal about seeing "string arrangement by [you]" in the musician credits beneath one of the songs in the liner_notes when you can't read music to save your life and had to scratch out the notation one uncertain tiny circle and line at a time. just goes to show what oscar the grouch once said is true: "all things are possible with a little parsley." 161102 ... raze "i'm more of a glass half empty kind of guy," i said. he laughed and said, "i'm more of a glass with a single drop of water in it kind of guy." 170723 ... raze we got a few more songs down. the chorus for one of them goes, "adventures, they keep on piling up on top of these crazy dreams." he said he kind of summed up the last few years of his life with that one. the fragile falsetto has a real emotional kick to it. 170917 ... raze it's taken a while, but we're in the home stretch now. sad to say those wild sideburns have been tamed. he said he thought it was time to clean things up a little. i'll have to keep things dirty on my end to compensate. 180203 ... raze bed tracks have all officially been tucked in. now it's up to me to wake 'em up when the time is right and ask 'em what their dreams are made of. 180224 ... raze we're done. it feels so weirdly sudden, though a lot of work went into it and it was a long time coming. when someone gives you the amount of trust and creative freedom he gave me, there's always the fear that you'll bring too much of yourself to the table, and then the tablecloth will turn against you and all the cutlery will clatter in percussive rebellion. but he seems really happy with the finished product. as long as i've done right by him and the kids, that's all that matters to me. 180731 ... unhinged (just by the virtue of the fact that you are writing your concerns here, you did right by him...of course you did. and of course he's happy with it. you have skills at this point man. hands down, no joke, you definitely have skills involved.) 180731 ... raze i appreciate that, nic. really. i think i've finally reached a point where i can accept that i've put in enough time and work to get pretty good at the whole recording thing. took me long enough to be able to accept a compliment like that without hemming and hawing, didn't it? ha! 180731 ... epitome of incomprehensibility Congratulations on finishing the project with your friend! It's an accomplishment even if it's someone else who's the main focus. I'd say some "pat yourself on the back" is definitely warranted. I felt like that when I finished up the edits on my student S's Masters thesis last Friday. (I've tutored her for about two years now.) ...Well, I thought I'd finished the edits, but she signed up for a class tomorrow. Okay, so ALMOST finished. Anyway, congrats! If you don't mind, can you please send some of it my way - or point me to where it is - once it's released? Thanks! 180731 ... raze i can do even better than that: pre-release video sneak-peakage in email form is on the way. (damn you, google chrome! i say "sneak-peakage" IS a legitimate compound word.) 180801 ... raze there are some people who leave such a sour taste in your mouth, you kind of wish you could step back in time and retroactively erase them from your life. he's one of them. 220214 ... raze i heard his music on the radio this morning. i said, "fuck_you," and turned it off with my fist. 221123 what's it to you? who go blather from