PLAN 34!

http://www.luth.org/plans/instrument_plans.html#plan34

This is not what I’m actually trying to do, but not completely different either. Swap the guitar stick with a bass stick, move the harp strings below the bass and have them going higher in pitch, not lower. BUT IT COULD BE DONE.

I’ve been talking about this idea I’ve had for an electric instrument; a bass-type fretted set of strings across the top bar – a stick-type bass – and a panel of deep harp strings coming off the bottom of that which could be finger-plucked, all with electric pickups and stuff.

It just struck me as something an elfmetal band should have, and I’m semi-serious about getting a luthier to make one at some point. It’d look like kind of a wedge bass, but with a bunch of extra strings and pickups on it. The top bar could also be fretless, but that’s more a jazz thing than metal.

Somebody beat me to an acoustic version. They have the harp strings on top, and it’s all acoustic (which is NOT THE SAME) but it’s still the same basic idea.

(photo Long & McQuade, Surrey, BC; h/t Pauline McDonald)

I still want my bass electric version. But… yeah.

Oh awesome, the nwcMUSIC preview pages are up! Check all these out:

This is the landing page, kind of an overview of what’s going on and what we’re about. Plus it has this picture of The Screech sitting on Richard Glover’s head:

The Screech is the one on top

Here we have the concerts page, which has playable tracks from most of the people who have stage time. Not all, because some people don’t do that, which is totally cool. But most.

Workshops, events, and more workshops! Did I mention workshops? Also panel programming, we have that too.

Pass these around to anybody who might be coming, or thinking about coming, to Norwescon this year. I’m really pretty happy with where nwcMUSIC is going, and people have a good time once they find out about it, so let them know.

The ghost of Admiral Shack continues to fail me.

I thought I’d already choked this guy to death.

I mean honestly, how do you even get here? In an adaptor, I mean. With a cable it’d be easy, but adaptors are solid pieces of shaped metal. I didn’t even cheat to make this happen.

You are in command now, Admiral Monoprice!

place your bets

I’m going to end up walking off the bridge in silent rage again, aren’t I?

It’s a 15 second ident, to be used with the podcast. Whaddya think, sirs?

First show’s first segment is all edited. Second segment recording had to be delayed due to the guest waking up with a head cold. Hopefully she’ll be feeling better soon.

Back to learning some tunes. Last session-style track on the soundtrack album needs to be recorded next week, and I don’t know these at all yet. Yay?

Hi, visitors from Gawker‘s comment sections! Nice to meet you! Welcome to rage-driven acoustic elfmetal.

I know you’re here for the triple-rainbow pictures and the aftereffects of the Rainmaker 68000, but if you get a chance to listen to our music or watch any of Dara’s solo-performance video, that’d be awesome too.

We’re currently in studio working on our new album (Din of Thieves), a second project involving a book soundtrack for a fantasy novel series, and a couple of side-projects with other bands. Lots of planning, lots of plotting, lots of mayhem, hopefully lots of sales! Ah, a supervillain musician can dream, can’t she?

Anyway, no rest for the wicked and all that. We’ve moved a bunch of wires around so more of you should be seeing this. Thanks for coming by, and thanks to whoever for the link – Gawker obsfucates the referral URL so we can’t tell.

Recorded the first segment for the nwcMUSIC pilot podcast last night, with Nicole Dieker from Hello The Future! It went really well and we may actually keep some the second half of the conversation for episode two, because we got going on musical culture and what that means, and went well over time. It was a lot of fun; I think you’ll enjoy listening to it.

We are specifically incorporating some of the feedback we got, by the way. Hopefully you’ll be able to tell.

Still have a few more interviews to do, though. I’m trying to have four different people on this pilot episode, representing a bunch of different kinds of geekmusic. Mostly people have already signed up, but there’s still scheduling to work out.

Hopefully we can get this in the can quickly; I want this out as soon as I can manage, so there’s time for people to listen to it before Norwescon. Zoom zoom zoom!

The writer of The Free Court of Seattle series – my partner Anna – has a second fantasy novel series starting up through Carina Press! The first book, Valor of the Healer, is coming out in April, and she’s giving away a copy! It’s a raffle, so go check that out.

Carina started out as a romance imprint. Can you tell?

She’s publishing it under a pen name because there’s simply no way the book databases will not screw up our last name. Which is annoying, but trust me, it’s true. But it’s still her. ^_^

With all the new DLC, I’m back to Skyrim a lot lately, and I’ve only now found out that you can custom name items, so now I need to make some custom items just so I can name them. Like, maybe, Daedric Bow of Fucking Your Shit Up and Ebony Mace of Sit the Fuck Down.

See what font I used there?

Also, I’m doing the Companion storyline this time, and they want me to become a werewolf. But I don’t wanna be a werewolf! Fortunately, they’re being cool about it, but now everything’s just a little awkward. I hate that.

Anyway, back to tracking. Irish Bouzouki today. Anna was up last night working on sheet music to the fight set, because people other than me will need it and can use it, and we don’t have music for some of this, not even the parts. Glad that’s not my job! I could write anything – it’s all dots and lines to me. XD

Bone Walker, the second book in the Free Court of Seattle series, is off to the editor. This is, of course, awesome, and big news.

Bone Walker cover pencils (draft 2)

What you don’t see in the Kickstarter update – that only project backers get to see – is that we also dropped a rough-mix of one track from the soundtrack album. It’s not complete – the flute part isn’t even recorded yet – but Anna really wanted to let the backers hear what’s going on. It’s the song for a higher-powered-than-seen-before fight, in Bone Walker, on the Burke-Gilman trail, with elves and kitsune and a dragon.

You’re gonna like that one. It’s boomy. But I have to wonder what’s up with that trail in this universe, because it seems to attract a lot of fights.

Me, I was up late last night laying down more instruments for more tracks. This one’s currently just called “Chapter 23.” It’ll need a better name! But right now I’m just working on getting the music finished. Titles can come later.