Curtis Unplugged

The following are complete songs (words and music) I've written in the past few years but have not yet put into a polished form. You know, not quite ready for Prime Time.

Baby's Got a Way of Breaking My Heart (Oscar's Song)

My latest studio creation on which I've decided to invest effort. I've got a number of jams/song seeds that I've created in the past couple weeks, but this one is the most promising -- or rather, the one I like best -- so far. So I'm going to run with it.

The title is a working title, but it's very likely going to end up being close to this, as I'm already quite hooked on the chorus, and my attempts to change the words have been less than convincing. Other strong possibilities (that, in my mind, then themselves to a little more freedom in developing the rest of the lyrics) include:

Maybe it's a way of breaking your heart
Baby got away. It's breaking my heart.

 Meh. I think I'll still with what I have.

This demo is very rough. You've been warned.



 Update: Nov. 7, 2013 

I've been dogged by (1) lack of time and (2) slow-in-coming lyrical inspiration on this one. But I've finally got lyrics that are mostly acceptable....I think. Anyway, at least now you have something a bit more interesting to listen to than the same incomplete first verse repeated three times.

This is a rough mix after putting down the vocals with new lyrics last night. My voice was not "on," so I really need to re-record them. Also I'm not sure if I'm going to keep all if any of the harmony vox I threw down.

I've remixed this a couple times since last night, but it's still a bumpy mix, with things poking out where they shouldn't and other things buried beneath the surface. But it will give you an idea of where I am.

 


Update: Nov. 19, 2013 

I'm getting closer, my salamander. (But still no cigar.)

Update: Nov. 10, 2014

I finished this version (S68) in June but am just now posting it.

Mezcal distilled

After more than 60 hours of recording, rerecording, and playing around with the mix in the studio (and this does not include countless hours listening to my latest mixes in the car and recording "listening notes" on my phone to use as a punchlist my next time in the studio) over the course of five months, my song Mezcal has been distilled down to this. Oh, and the new title is Mezcal / El Rey del Pinchismo.

Update 7/12/2013: Replaced Demo 77 with a new mix (Demo 7c) in which I incorporated a few fixes. Also lyrics are below.

Mezcal / El Rey del Pinchismo lyrics

Meanwhile back in Cuernavaca

living like there's no today

don't know what tomorrow holds

but this is what the people say

they say yeah yeah yeah

and Mitch he says, he says yeah yeah yeah

Talking to the Doc at los Arcos

trying to get to Holland or France

el mariachi says it would be so easy

If only you could learn how to dance

and Mitch is looking surly and says you think too much

what you need is a shot of mezcal

Though I thought I knew the answer

now I'm thinking Mitch is right

I'll never be a pretty dancer

or rule the night

but it's groovy down where I be

it's so groovy down Teopanzolco güey

para todo mal, mezcal

para todo bien, también

He is el rey del pinchismo

yes, he is the king

there is no one else here who can even begin to sling it like he can sling

el rey del pinchismo

es el rey, el rey del pinchismo

What music looks like

A screen snap from my current version of Mezcal on Reaper.

Click to enlarge

Wow

A short rock instrumental.

Wow (download)

Devil in Jeans

This is the current demo of my 2011 song, Devil in Jeans. Even though it's progressed a lot from earlier versions, I still hear a lot of things that need fixing, so I expect to issue new version in the not-too-distant future.

Devil in Jeans (download)

Mezcal -- early versions

This is the original "boombox demo" I recorded in about 90 minutes late one evening, on a whim. It's pretty rough, with some of the noodlings on the second bass guitar being way the hell off, in terms of song key. But it has a good feel and it seemed redeemable, so I've kept at it.

Mezcal "Seed" (Download)



Next comes my third mixdown, after having done some "upgrades." Note that I've not added any new musicianship to this -- it's the same vocals, bass guitars, and drums from the first night of recording -- but it's been dressed up using Reaper, cutting out the bad parts, replacing them with duplicated good parts and rearranging the order of things.

I've also thrown in a few samples:

• The song opens with live music from a video I made at Wes and Ana's going-away party at Los Arcos last spring
• The jarocho break after Misifus' meow-meow-meow is the audio portion of a video I made of a jarana class I attended a couple years ago
• There's also a tip of the hat to the boys from Liverpool.

Note that these samples were not in tempo with the song, so I had to stretch them to fit the song tempo.

Mezcal - Jan 22 Mixdown (Download)



Jan 24 Update: Further listening in my favorite listening space (my car....always my car) has revealed that this version is too trebley, thanks to a combination of adding a bright reverb to the mix track and the mp3 compression algorithm to make the file a bit smaller. The maximum-quality mp3 file is less harsh, but is still too trebley. The cymbals are just way too piercing. Expect that to be fixed in the next version.