Throwing Rocks at the Sun

"Throwing Rocks at the Sun"
01-The Morning Show - Opening Theme    25:10
02-Dewdrops Don't Descend     15:13
03-Grey Clouds Approach      8:34
04-Albert's Train      10:23
05-Fried Samosa       5:17
06-Minimalambience 1      17:28
07-Skipping Stones Stoned     41:29
08-The Warm Pond      14:48
09-Mirror rorroM      4:01
10-The Fun House      30:00
11-Laugh With Us      7:22
12-rorriM Mirror      8:11
13-Minimalambience 2      28:09
14-Variations on a Loaded String    16:33
15-sin(r2)/r2       24:51
16-The Ripple Tank      21:00
17-Minimalambience 3      13:35
18-The Morning Show - Closing Theme    7:59
Total Time   5:00:11
Subtitled "and other acts of futility"

It's dfficult for me to write about this one, because every time I lisen to it, the explinations get buried in the music itself.  The title "Throwing Rocks at the Sun" is similar in language to Patti Smith's "Pissing in a River".  Exercises in futility.  I was at this point in the world of Oenyaw that I believed that it no longer had a purpose, so I just impoved.  I was playing with no preplanned ideas for the music, practicing for gigs that might never come.  What happened was that the music was better than anything else I had ever done.  There was an apparent fact that I didn't want to accept:  That when I planned out every step of the way, the journey was quite boring.  But with this one, I planned nothing and the music, from the direction of plaing and recording to listening, was much more enjoable.  I wasn't about to ditch planning enirely, but this project was very liberating.  One person up against the universe, feeling that insted of finding an area in the shade or retreating inside to a shelter, he'd rather stand out in the middle of the desert and throw rocks  the sun, hoping to send it away.  Any sane person knows that this is a totally insane idea, but from the viewpoint of the person throwing the rocks, the sun does eventually go down, and he wins his private battle every day.
"The Morning Show"  begins as a happy morning soundscapes, which ends as an self-inflicted withdraw into anger.  The sounds and playing of the Opening theme was made using a clear guitar sound through a "Growler" filter".  The closing theme is made up of the same loops, but closed into an infinite echo shell.  Overtaken by it's own creation.
"Dewdrops Don't Descend"  Illiteration is something I aspire to.  So much for the title.  The music is made by using a loop while playing a minor scale.  Which one, I would have to go back and figure that one out, and since sometimes I play more than one at the same time as well as throwing chromatic runs in on top of it all, it may be difficult to state.   To further complicate matters, I start with a loop, play in G minor, and the switch to D major, starting to throw notes into the loop that are contained in both scales, and when the first loop begins to fade, the new loops take over, and the notes that differ are then played.
"Grey Skies" approach is a small, dark soundscape which uses the same patterns used in "Dewdrops "Don't Descend" but have a few different filters thrown in.  I let things get out of hand at the end, which led to some of the sounds used in the ending of "Albert's Train."
"Albert's Train" is a psychedelic train ride, named after Albert, the inventor of LSD.  "Fried Somasa" is an Indian inspired soliloquy to the piece.  I hope someday to travel to India and ride on top of a train.  The train sounds in "Albert's Train" contained heavy reverb and flanging, to give a very heavy feeling of the the steam engine struggling to turn the wheels.   The train is a scary way to travel when you feel the pain of the train.
The background loop in "Fried Somasa" is played like a sitar, one finger playing up and down strokes across the chord without using a misharab.  The lead on top is an improved jam, using a muffled filter and a U-Vibe modulation.  But the world is beautiful when you leave the box and step outside.
"Skipping Stones Stoned" More illiteration.  Not as much in the area of loops as usual.  The loop eventually sneeks in, but is then pushed into the backgound, the overcoming loop changes the mood from a riff to a drone.  Happiness to the anticipation of the upcoming event, and then stress to the event in the emotion which questions "will I get it right?"  In the end, all walls are torn down, and I just start trhrowing the stones.
"The Warm Pond" is another continuation.  Starting once again witht the "Minimalambiance" theme, but then allowing it to be washed away in the echoes and reverbs which define the piece.  After the stones are thrown, just dive in.
"Mirror rorriM", "The Fun House", "Laugh With Us, and "Rorrim mirroR"  are a set of pieces which combine in a Psychedic Carnival sort of way.  The bookends, "Mirror rorriM" and "Rorrim mirroR" are done with a short loop piece which is doubled, reversed, and then separted into two reversed tracks: track one A, A reversed, track 2 A reversed, A.  "The Fun House" is a piece which starts out scary, but then you realize there is nothing to be afraid of.  "Laugh With Us" is a much happier side insanity.
"Variations on a Loaded String", "sin(r2)/r2", "The Ripple Tank".  I didn't want to name these "Jams 1, 2 and 3".  They are improve pieces, but as my improv pieces go, they are a bit more involved than playing box runs over 12 bars.  (I don't mind the blues, I just detest people who think blues musicians in the 21st century are in anyway creative or relevent.)  The titles are taken from a website which occupies a significant amout of my time.  It is a set of mathematical aplets in which a digital artist with a knowledge of physics a mathmatics I will never prentend to even touch has set up on the internet for anyone to view.  I copped the titles based on the feelings of which applet best fit the music which was playing.  It was one of the most enjoyable time consuming afternoons I have ever spent.
There are three pieces called "Minimalambience", which are similar in musical structure and delay/modulation, but the differences distinguish the separate pieces.