Saturday...

So Saturday... I had arranged to go to lunch with Blake. I felt like I hadn't seen him since break since he had been sick most of the week, so I was looking forward to catching up. That in itself would've made Saturday a good day and we did, in fact, get to catch up over a 2-hour lunch at a restaurant Erin had recommended. (Appetizer sampler, caprese salad, pizza, pasta and dessert for 14.50 euro!) We talked a lot about the music we had traded before break - he gave me songs from quite a few bands that I need to go check out further - about his time in Paris and the 30 pounds of used CD's that he bought, my break at home, school ending, the usual sorts of things. But then there was the unusual part of it. The night before at the art show, he had been outside rapping in the street with a friend. A French guy approached him in the middle of this explaining that he produces music in Aix and has been looking for Americans to rap and/or sing for his recordings since the French can't rap/sing well in English. Blake was interested and invited me to come with him to this guy's apartment after lunch on Saturday.

We ended up spending the next four hours recording loops and various ideas for a track that we'll try to finish this week. I don't know what this guy intends to do with it, though I'd be happy even if it was just for fun. Olivier, the French guy, has a Yamaha RS7000 (a digital instrument/production studio) and he knows how to use it. Just listening to the different effects he could do was awesome because he wasn't just playing around to see how much he could screw up some sound - he really has an ear for it and with every effect or added instrument, he was enhancing what we had already done until he had built, within a couple hours, this amazing layered beat that I wouldn't have been surprised to hear as part of a song in a club or on the radio. The possibilities with his machine are endless and it overwhelmed me thinking about all the different directions you could go just starting out with a simple melody when you have the right tools. It really drove home the idea that you need to decide on a direction in which to take a creative project before you get started - otherwise you'll just sit there overwhelmed by the possibilities and going in circles. Perhaps that's one of the hardest things about any creative endeavor - making that decision and a commitment to a particular direction for your idea. Anyway... it was a lot of fun and I hope we're able to finish the track this week, but even if we don't, it strengthened my desire to learn about music recording and production at home.