I've been writing music and playing guitar since I was about 16. I've been in a few bands, but mostly I just screw around and record stuff on my own. In the '90s, I used my computer and an analog cassette four-track recorder, called a Tascam Porta 7. A couple years ago, I got a really cool super-portable digital four-track called the Korg Pandora PXR4. It's got a bunch of built-in vocal and guitar effects, plus a bunch of super-repetitive, somewhat corny drum sequences. With my bands, I've also done some recording in professional studios in Nashville, TN and Saginaw and Grand Rapids, MI. I'd say I'm sort-of-mildly to almost-mildly talented in the music department, but that doesn't stop me from having a ton of fun with it.

 


Tascam Porta 7 


Korg Pandora PXR4

Below are a few songs that I've written and recorded over the years. Most of the recordings are more or less demo quality. They're nothing incredible, but I like them.


High School Garage Band

My senior year of high school (1995), my buddy AJ told me that I was in his band (which didn't yet exist) and I could either play bass or learn drums. I don't do drums. We were kind of half Greenday-wannabe, one quarter early-'90s CCM and one-quarter cheesy love ballad crooners. We recorded an EP pseudo-cleverly named Straight Outta Hampton. This was way before CD-burners, so we thought we were pretty awesome, even if the insert was two-color, one-panel, one-sided. We did play quite a few gigs over the year we were together.

The Way
Written:   1995
Recorded:   1995 in a recording studio on Bay Rd in Saginaw. I can't remember what it's called and it doesn't seem to be there any more.
Guitar & vocals--AJ Wedding
Bass & BGVs--Me
Drums--Tim Dillard
What I like:   There's something snappy there. Considering it was one of the first songs I ever wrote, I give it a B.  B-minus?  C-plus.
What I don't like:   Where to start... The guy who owned the studio insisted that Dillard use the electric (read: fake-sounding) drumset. Which was a shame because Dillard was a pretty good drummer. My $200 Avery bass was plugged into a direct box, giving it a nice “thuddy” feel.
But worst of all: say/way, down/around, thing/king...who did I think I was, Whitecross?
Heh...I wished I was in Whitecross. Ah well, at least I didn't do the whole fight/night/white/light/knight/right/sight/kite thing. I wonder what Scott Wenzel's up to these days? Probably some kind of real estate king...thing.
Comments:   The ending's a mess, but we couldn't afford to record it again. We thought leaving all that “studio chater” would make it sound...um...hip or something...which, I guess, was the problem.

Happy Song
Written:   1995, the first song I wrote with my newly acquired “slap bass” skills.
Recorded:   1995
Guitar--AJ Wedding
Bass--Me
Bongos--Tim Dillard
Movie Quotes & Inside Jokes--AJ, me, and Dillard
What I like:   It's happy.
What I don't like:   Slap bass should be reserved for electric basses whose pickups do not make magnet-to-string contact with every slap. The resulting popping sound is...ugh.
Comments:   As it is, the Happy Song is only a song in the loosest sense. I think the bass riff was cool enough to be a real song without all the shouting over top of it. But oh well... who doesn't like a good Billy Madison quotefest? ('Tis a rhetorical question.)


College Garage Band

As soon as I got to Cornerstone Universtity, I met The Sunman and he recruited me into his band (which didn't yet exist). He was mostly starting a band to play some of the Christian rock songs he'd written over the previous few years. The Sunman was a music major and a classical pianist and a musical genius. Also in the band were Eric, a super-talented guitarist with an angelic voice and Chuck, a...drummer. Actually, we went through seven drummers in three years. We made a CD (paid for by Sunman) of seventeen of Sunman's songs.

After my freshman year, me and Sunman moved off campus together, changed the name of the band to Soapbox, and shed the early-'90s arena rock style. Sunman wrote some super-cool pop punk songs and we started doing some of mine. Unfortunately, we never recorded most of our coolest stuff, because we were still trying to get rid of hundreds of copies of the old album. Plus, we were trying to finish college, so we didn't really have money for studio time. We did, however, record a 6-song demo of some of our later stuff.

 

    

Thank You, Sir
Written:   I actually didn't write this one. Sunman did. In 1997. It wasn't until after we moved off campus and started playing more gigs that we did some of my songs.
Recorded:   We recorded it at Tall Cotton Studios in Nashville, TN.
Guitar & vocals--The Sunman
Lead Guitar & BGVs--Eric Arneson
Bass & BGVs--Me
Drums--Eric Sanger
What I like:   I like the riff. It's cool. Plus, the part where I strum the chords on the bass? That was my idea.
What I don't like:   While it's good Augustinian theology, “We're all human; we all suck” is a little on the hokey side. Oh well, Sunman's a great songwriter.
Comments:   Most of the other stuff on our “Dead Ostrich” album was vibrato-driven early-'90s rock. But most of our later stuff sounded pretty much like this one.

Prep Punk Wannabe
Written:   2000
Recorded:   We recorded this on the Tascam 4-track as part of a demo for our never-to-be “Soapbox” album.
Bass & Vocals--Me
Guitar & BGVs--The Sunman
Drums--Thomas Price
What I like:   There's nothing new about this particular critique of nonconformity (i.e. when everybody's doing it, nonconformity becomes conformity and vice versa). Still, I think I articulated it swimmingly.
“Shaved your eyebrows...” Heh.
What I don't like:   As usual with home recordings, the bass sounds like it was recorded inside a cereal box.
Comments:  


Acoustic Stuff

I started taking guitar lessons in 1994 along with my buddy AJ. I don't know what our teacher's name was; we just called him “Fat Man.” I have no idea why...he wasn't really that fat.

Anyway, I've probably written sixty songs and all but two of them have been on an acoustic guitar. I started with an Oscar Schmidt. Now I play an Alvarez.

Three Churches
Written:   2002
Recorded:   2009
What I like:   First of all, I love that people will be confused by the co-existence of my Christian ecumenism and my Reformed confessionalism. Good. Embrace the tension. I also like that I stuck with my first take for a vocal track, despite several flat notes, etc. It fits the spirit of the song perfectly (ibid a couple wrong notes in the bass guitar).
What I don't like:   The theologian in me thinks this should be titled "Flirting With Trinitarian Heresies." But, then again, it was our Lord who prayed that we would be one in a way that is both reminiscent of and based in the Trinity (John 17:21) and he surely knew that talking about it too long would lead us into some iffy ground (especially with the human tendency to allegorize and mix metaphors). The real complaint is...seven minutes, plus?! Who do I think I am?  Oh well. My sermons are long too, so what would you expect?  I also think it could have been a bit faster, which would have helped with the length issue.
Comments:   Christian unity doesn't mean Christian uniformity.

Bad Guy
Written:   1998
Recorded:   2002
Comments:   In the late '90s, my disgust for moral relativism took a decidedly political bent. I don't think I ever thought of myself as part of the Religious Right per se, but I'd say I was on the cusp (I love the word “cusp.”) Maybe I just liked the idea of being in a persecuted minority...sorta like student radicals in the '60s. Only I never got arrested. Or wore a beret. Either way, I'm glad my theology got better and I outgrew FRS (Falwell-Robertson Syndrome.)
What I like:   I think it's kind of catchy. I also think the song makes some good points about the “new tolerance” and the self-contradictory nature of moral relativism. The new tolerance is ridiculously intolerant.
What I don't like:   Well, I don't like the fact that every other line starts with the words “I hate.” Way to be positive. Also, does the end mean that the thought of people going to hell makes me happy? It doesn't. I swear.

Angry young man, I was.


Other Stuff

Everything's Cool
Written:   I wrote this song the summer after I graduated from high school. AJ didn't like it, so (couch) never played it, but Dead Ostrich used to close almost every show with it.
Recorded:   This is the first song I did on the PXR4 (guitar, bass, vocals)
What I like:   Ten years ago, I sure thought the “big city” was going to be pretty...um..neat. I like that imagery, even if it's naïve.
What I don't like:   Last verse is a little Disneyland, but oh well. Also, this recording is way too slow (it was always twice this speed live), but I didn't re-record it because I love the wailing guitar solo. (Hey, I'm a bass player, so back off!) Speaking of which, the bass is way too quiet in this mix. And that insufferable drum machine sound is bad enough without a beat and a half trailing the end of the song. Aww, peas. I guess I should just re-record it.
Comments:   “The car the size of the Silverdome” was a 1984 Pontiac Grand Prix with dingo balls, colored LED lights, multiple TVs and about 200 corny Christian bumper stickers.
Man, I miss that car.

Stroke of Luck
Written:   1997
Recorded:   I recorded it a few years ago on the PXR4 (guitar, bass, vocals)
What I like:   I wrote this when Alanis Morrisette's first album was huge and, unlike the lyrics of her song, these stories actually are ironic. (I mean a fly in your wine? An old guy dying? Unfortunate, but not ironic).
Anyway, I have no idea what possessed me to write this weirdo song.
What I don't like:   It seems like no one knows who Dino is. How do you not know who Dino is? Not my problem.
And I'm not so sure that “never let them see you frown” is the most healthy life motto.
Comments:   I have...no excuse.

Crappy Rap Song
Written:   2005. I decided I wanted to write a bad white rap. So I did.
Recorded:   2005 on the Pandora
What I like:   I like everything about it. It's the best horrible rap I've ever heard.
What I don't like:   N/A
Comments:   I performed this song for my congregation shortly after arriving here. They responded as expected.


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