Surgery

I had a herniorrhaphy last week. In my case, specifically, it was an inguinal hernia. Apparently, the recovery has been relatively normal, but way too slow for me personally. It’s day 10 and I’m ready to run hard and play hard – but the body’s not. So, I’ll be patient.
More importantly though, I’m looking forward to rebuilding the strength in my core. I’ve felt very weak in that area for almost a year, and making decisions and reacting from the base of a weak core is NOT recommended. And although I am still weak from the surgery, because the wound has been healed and secured, I already feel stronger. Soon enough, I can start to rebuild a solid foundation. Let’s see what the future holds when power is restored to the body.

Today’s the first day…

Of the new
album.

Stuart is one of my favorite artists and as usual, I’m excited to start the new album. This will be the third one I’ve done with him and it seems my preparatory notes about the songs get more and more abstract as the records progress. Ironically, my focus about the direction of the albums, as a whole, gets more and more focused.

When I first met Stuart, I saw his genius and immediately wanted to document and enhance it. That was the album Bell. That was good attempt, but it didn’t quite capture “Stuart”. For the next record, I wanted to accentuate every eccentric part of Stuart. That was the album ¿What. I’m very proud of that collection of songs. It came out just as I wanted. However, I think its wildness scared off a lot of people.

Which brings us to the new one.

I’ve decided to print out a set of questions and post them around the studio.

1. Is it simple?
2. Is it familiar?
3. Can I sing along to it?
The idea is not to handicap Stuart, but to build a stage upon which he can perform to a wider audience. We’ve done narrow and deep VERY well. Now, I want to try opening the aperture a bit wider to include some new faces.

We recently did a song for the new Owen Wilson movie

, set to come out next spring. It’s one of the simplest songs we’ve ever produced, and so far it seems to be one of the most memorable.

It’s a great place to start.

So, if I don’t check in as much, it’s not because I don’t love you. It’s because I do love you.

Archives

Credits

A few projects I've been fortunate enough to work on.

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Music

A sample of past projects

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