Author Archives: matthewlarsen

Session #20: Greg’s Living Room

Using a laptop to record some extra elements in various locations has been really fun. Tuesday evening, Greg, Steve, and I decided to give this a shot over at Greg’s place in downtown Holyoke. Greg’s place is great… A nice loft with lovely views of the awesome buildings in Holyoke. I really love my city.

So after some delicious mole, pupusas, and pork burritos at El Guanaco in South Hadley Falls, Steve, Greg, and I headed to Greg’s to put some finishing touches on The Spires. Steve had to download the driver for the Tascam US-144 interface we’re using, but we were up and running in no time.

Session 20: Greg's Apartment
 



Down the street at city hall, a chicken ordinance was being debated. There was quite a turnout! Parking on the street was a little busy.

The other thing that was happening was a lively service at the recent storefront church that opened down the street. What was great was that Greg’s amp was picking up some of the signal from it (maybe they had a wireless mic?). The person giving the sermon in Spanish can actually be heard towards the tail end of Greg’s guitar track on The Spires. It’s awesome.

I am getting really excited to start promoting the record, and am pleased to tell you that I’ve decided on a title!

More about that soon.

Session #19: Rebekah’s Living Room

I recently got together with my bandmate from my Northernly days, Rebekah Dutkiewicz, so she could add some cello parts. The portable laptop rig situation we threw together worked out pretty well.

Session 19: Rebekah's Living Room
     



Rebekah lives in a cool lofty apartment in downtown Easthampton with Jack Brown, rhythm guitar player for the excellent jazz ensemble, Swing Caravan. They have two adorable dogs, Sam the beagle and Pepper the dachshund. They also live nearby Riff’s Joint, which is where Rebekah and I got some delicious burgers for eating.

We setup a borrowed MacBook and a little Tascam interface and Rebekah recorded a bunch of cello parts for Mirror. It is going to sound amazing when it’s mixed all together!

Session #18: Sackamusic

I took the day off from being chained to my cubicle in the MassLive.com office and headed up to Conway Rock City by myself to get together with Mr. Dave Chalfant. It was kind of a marathon day of tweaks and little things added to a bunch of songs.

Dave added bass to Little Black Boxes and I added a percussion part– a mallet on a tom basically. That song sounds spooky now, I love it. Dave also added some rocking bass to Pulverized and an in-your-face fuzzy bass part to The Spires which sounds amazing. We spent the remainder of the time listening and making some notes for mixing.

Session 18: Sackamusic
 



Really hoping to wrap all this up by the end of the summer, for either an August or October release. Why not September you may ask? It’s because I’m going to ITALY with the wife.

Session #17: Greg's Living Room

Got together with Greg Saulmon in his swanky downtown Holyoke loft to listen to the record all the way through. Back on Friday, March 12th, my cousin Steve went up to Sackamusic without me to add some acoustic guitar, tambourine, snare drum, and chorusy vocals to The Spires.

Between Greg moving to Holyoke, my grandmother’s death and a wedding to go to, the month slipped by with not much thought given to the album. It was nice to get together with Greg again and take stock of what we had. We shared thoughts about the cohesiveness of the album and schemed up a couple guitar parts to be added. Despite being worried that everything had become so stalled, the record is sounding great as a whole, and I think we got the sequence pretty much nailed down.

The record is likely going to start with Fourth Floor.

Session #16: Sackamusic

Whether you celebrate President’s Day, Presidents’ Day, or President’s Day, for me it was a day off from my day job and an opportunity to head up to Conway to do some more work on my forthcoming record. Dave Chalfant and I worked on adding new elements to a few songs that I recorded as Dining Room Demos, and he added some bass parts to Fourth Floor.
Error: the communication with Picasa Web Albums didn’t go as expected. Here’s what Picasa Web Albums said:

No album found.

It was fun times.

Fourth Floor is sounding particularly amazing since its been graced with fantastic musicians adding their stamp to it. I mean, just look at this:

Me – Piano and Lead Voice
Aric Bieganek – Drums, Glockenspiel, Background Voice
Rebekah Dutkiewicz – Cello, Background Voice
Matthew Carefully – Banjo, Mandolin, Background Voice
Dave Chalfant – Bass

I’ll be posting a track from my upcoming record sometime soon… maybe this one. Also I may have a name for this thing. More about that later.

Session #15: Matthew's Dining Room

In 2005, I faced some serious decisions regarding treatment after learning that my Hodgkin’s Lymphoma had come back. It was hard to know what to do, because whichever option I chose came with some consequences. Ultimately I chose to undergo a stem cell transplant, which was a nasty affair with a tremendous affect on my emotional state as well as my body. Now a few years later and cancer free, this song seems to have creeped into my consciousness again. I decided to finally record a demo version this past Monday.

[nggallery id=15]

Along with the piano and voice parts, I recorded some background melodica and some kazoo parts reverb-ified.

Listen to “Happens In Stages”

Matthew Larsen - Happens In Stages

Happens in stages
Dog-eared pages
Two roads at your feet

Heaven and Earth
Or what it’s worth
You could take chances or time

Also recorded on Monday was a song called Little Black Boxes, inspired by The American Widow Project.

Session #14: Matthew's Dining Room

Inspired by The American Widow Project, I wrote lyrics to this song around Veteran’s Day in November of 2009 after this story on NPR caught my attention. The melody came a little bit later, and actually over time I wound up stripping down some of the other parts to keep this more straightforward.

Listen to “Little Black Boxes”

Matthew Larsen - Little Black Boxes

Little black boxes
Stacks of letters I sent
White car in the driveway
Two men and a flag
Within “The Days Ahead”

And I try to smell him
But they washed all his clothes
And sealed them in plastic
In little black boxes
Within “The Days Ahead”

* “The Days Ahead” is the name of the 3 ring binder the U.S. Military gives to widows. The American Widow Project is on Twitter @americanwp

Session #13: Sackamusic

Nearly hurricane-strength winds and heavy rain and fog couldn’t keep me from heading up to Conway Rock City to work on a couple songs for the new record.  I sang some vocals on Fight or Flight and The Spires and did some organ tracks also. And of course, like a good New Englander, I had a “how about this crazy weather” discussion with Dave.

It was some of the weirdest weather we’ve experienced in awhile around here. By most accounts, it felt like a late summer storm, except we’re in the heart of winter. Driving up to Conway in the dense fog was a little challenging, since Sackamusic is in the middle of the woods on narrow country roads.

[nggallery id=14]

I’m looking forward to heading back up to the studio again really soon. Working with Dave Chalfant has been a great experience.

Oh! – We were doing some brainstorming, and I think I may wind up using some components of “Salt”, the ‘prepared piano’ song I recently recorded last week. Really excited.

Session #12: Matthew's Dining Room

While setting up some mics with the piano lid open, I accidentally dropped the end of the mic cable on the soundboard. It wound up being the inspiration for this song.

[nggallery id=13]

I used a carpenter’s hammer against one of the bass strings, then plucked the upper melody with my fingers. The sustain pedal has to be held down, of course. Then I put some water in a wine glass and clanked it with a paint stirrer… and then of course there were tambourines and egg shakers… and then the singing of four part harmonies.

Listen to “Salt”

Matthew Larsen - Salt

When all the walls that you had built
Could not protect you from the guilt
The secrets hid behind the eyes
Were darker than your safest lies

And when they come, they pull you down
They crush the peace you thought you’d found

But we’re deciding who’s at fault
We stand the breeze and taste the salt
We’re deciding who’s at fault
We stand the breeze and taste the salt

Session #11: Sackamusic

This past Friday, my old friend Ethan Tufts was in town. After having some good lunch at Local Burger in Northampton, we headed up to Sackamusic in Conway Rock City. Ethan added some great guitar parts to Fourth Floor and Pulverized.

[nggallery id=12]

Me, Ethan, and our friend Bill Belina started our first band back in 1989 when we were in middle school. All we had at the time were two keyboards and drums. I aspired to be the next ‘guy from Tears For Fears’ or maybe Phil Collins with a mullet. We played music in Bill’s dad’s basement, which was lined with polka records and wood paneling. We wrote tons of songs and learned how to be a band. Gradually Bill and Ethan learned other instruments and I learned how to play keys. A couple decades have gone by, and we’ve all played in various bands, grew up, etc.

Now Ethan lives in Los Angeles, has a record label, and makes awesome music asState Shirt. He manages to come home a few times a year to visit with family and friends, and we seem to get together and collaborate on music things all these years later. It’s nice to have him be a part of this record.