Need Some Old Music

So I’m working on a comics script, and I need some music from the 1920s — partially to reference, and partially for ambiance while I’m writing. Unfortunately, I don’t have the money to buy this stuff, and I think a lot of it might take some effort to track down.

So does anybody have any of the following: Blind Lemon Jefferson, Louie Armstrong And His Hot Five (or Hot Seven), Leadbelly? Or Texas swing of the 1920s? Or really any popular music of the time?

Or links to where I can download this stuff? Streaming is okay, but I prefer download, so I can listen to it when I’m not Net connected.

Thanks!

Currently Listening, 05-10-08

  • The Magnetic Fields, Distortion: Lovely goodness from Stephin Merrit & Co. Sonically very Jesus & Mary Chain, but pure Merrit in terms of songwriting.
  • Feist, The Reminder: Yeah, I know, late to the party, but this is an amazing and beautiful album.
  • Nine Inch Nails, The Slip: I love Trent Reznor again.
  • Sarah McLachlan, Fumbling Towards Ecstasy: One of my favorite albums of the early 90s, and it mostly holds up well. If you’ve never heard pre-Lilith Fair Sarah McLachlan, you might be surprised by how goddamn good (and dark) this is.

More Sonic Youth, Less Paul Simon

Listening to the mixes I’m making, I’m surprised by how dissonant and raw these songs are sounding in the end. “Berlin Floor Show” was written on an acoustic guitar, but this version sounds a lot like recent Nine Inch Nails, and “Scarecrow” sounds like Radiohead meets Massive Attack meets TV On The Radio. They’re really noisy — much more so than I’d anticipated.

I think that’s a good thing, honestly. Just surprising. I can’t speak for other musicians, but I’m constantly surprised by where my music ends up. It’s usually never where I meant for it to go, but that’s what’s awesome and engaging about the music-making process.

I just wish I was a better singer. But c’est la vie.

"Berlin Floor Show" and "Scarecrow" Are In The Can.

I recorded vocals last night, all hot and sweaty ’cause I had to turn off all the house fans so they didn’t register on the mics. Mixed “BFS” and “Scarecrow” tonight. I think the mixes are pretty much perfect, or as close as I’m gonna get.

When I’m done with all of the songs, I’ll dump the bounced tracks into a new project in Logic for mastering. This brings all the tracks to the same level, with the same basic EQ. Then I chop the finished product back into individual tracks, and I’m done.

That’s still a few days away, though, at least.

Sigh.

So I may make the India trip, but not until August or September. I feel so fucking stupid — I’ve flown literally fifty times or more in my life, and I’ve never missed a flight before, ever. I simply misread my itinerary — I was flying from Vegas to Chicago to Delhi, and I read the departure time from Chicago as the departure time from Vegas.

In my own defense, I was completely deranged from sleeplessness and stress — finishing a web project (see below), sorting out a couple of other projects (also see below), packing, sorting everything out…I got a total of ten hours of sleep in the three days before I was supposed to leave. I’m lucky I was able to read it at all.

And, honestly…this is going to sound odd, but I just had a sort of bad feeling about the trip. It wasn’t very well organized and…I dunno, I just felt apprehensive. I don’t know why, but I felt like something bad was going to happen.

I don’t get those sorts of feelings often, but when I do, I’m usually right. I’m not claiming psychic abilities or anything silly like that…but I am right, more often than not.

I still feel dumb, though.

So I’m going to record my vocals instead, for the album, now. Which means it’s almost done. And I’ve got some more info about that blogging thing I mentioned recently, which I should announce soon — probably tomorrow.

Meanwhile, take a look at the Flash header I just designed for Vortex Immersion. I’m rather proud of it — it’s all done in Actionscript 3.0 programmatically, no pre-created movie clips or anything. It loads content dynamically, so the guys at Vortex can just add new video and clips at their leisure.

I hope to be working with these guys more in the near future on other cool projects. And I’ve got another thing coming up which I hope will come together.

Lots of work, but no money. I can’t afford to pay my phone bill, for reasons I don’t want to get into here, so it will remain off for the time being. (Anybody need a couple hundred bucks worth of web/print design? I work quickly and I work well.)

I’m really stressed, but hopeful about these new projects.

And now to haul out my recording gear and try to get at least one song tracked tonight. I think I’m going to try and do “Berlin Floor Show” and “Scarecrow”, since they’re the ones I’ve got melodies and harmonies actually sorted out on.