Episode 16 – Tour Diaries 2011 – Episode 1

I’m on the road right now with Jim Witter and The Piano Men (a tribute show to Billy Joel and Elton John). We’ve already played a few dates in North Dakota, South Dakota, and Iowa, and tonight we’re in Wyoming, with a trip to Vegas right around the corner.

When I’m on these road trips, I try to film whatever happens, and once in a while I actually take the time to upload these videos to You Tube!!

Here is embedded video of my first 2011 episode, which features our journey from North Dakota down towards Mount Rushmore, which is featured in our 2nd episode.

Enjoy!

Episode 15 – My Little You Tube Promo

Here is my You Tube promo, spotlighting the soon-to-come OVER-THE-TOP-DIRECTOR’S-COLLECTOR’S VERSION of my album!!

Enjoy!

Ian

 

Episode 14 – Artwork Done!!

Hi everybody!

I’m so excited to announce that my artwork is done!!

Tony Shore (or DR. Tony Shore, as his friends call him!) has taken the artwork/printing roll on big-time. I was originally going to use a nameless/faceless online company to do a small run of covers until Tony stepped in and offered his services.

(I am proud of the work I do, but I guess I’ve been beaten up enough over the years (in this bidness!) that I don’t have a lot of faith in the ability to sell my music to a mass audience. Being totally independent (ie. no booking agent, no manager, no record company, no constant influx of expendable income!!), it’s hard to make a living from your own music. I make my living doing music for other artists and from touring with Jim Witter and his band. I don’t make a living from my own music – sadly, I never have.)

So that last paragraph is the explanation of why I was going a very cheap route in terms of artwork and packaging!  On my last album “Things Never To Say Out Loud” I never even made a single hard copy to sell. It was all iTunes based and thus, I didn’t have to worry about getting CD’s copied or doing legitimate artwork.

Now, because of the invaluable assistance of Tony Shore, I will have an album that actually looks (and possibly TASTES!) professional!!

Here is a little mock-up of what the album will look like.

I am hoping to have the album for sale by April. I’m still re-mixing the odd song, but I’m basically there!

Stay tuned for info on the EXTRA-SPECIAL, COLLECTOR’S, DIRECTOR’S CUT version of the album, that will contain TWO EXTRA BONUS DISCS with tons of extras!!!  (all for a slight increase in price! – for $10,000 I’ll come perform the album at your house!! – for $100,000 I’ll actually wear pants!!)

Thanks for reading my friends.

Ian

Episode 13 – Kill Your Darlings!

I learned a valuable lesson in ALBUM SEQUENCING today. It has to do with the concept of killing your darlings – that letting go of something important can sometimes make the entire project better.

My case in point involves the song “That’s It (I’m Goin’ Gay!)” This was a song that I had already recorded early in the 2000′s and released on the iTunes album “Things Never To Say Out Loud.” I really wanted this song to be included on my new album because it’s a “signature” song of mine and since I’d like to think that the audience that will hear my new album will not know my previous work, I wanted to make sure my best songs were on the album.

The problem is.. this song has been nothing but trouble to me in terms of re-recording and re-mixing. I added new drums, but I didn’t want to change the original vocal, guitars or bass. No matter how many times I’ve tweaked and re-tweaked it, my mixes always sound bad. I listened to my run-through today on the plane, and it suddenly occurred to me that maybe the album would be better WITHOUT this song. Maybe the forces of nature are trying to tell me something – you know… if it ain’t fixed, break it!!

So I think I just made my album 1 song shorter!

Stay tuned to find out!!

Ian

Episode 12 – Going to the Post-Office!

Can’t write long… I’m about 30 minutes from missing the deadline!

I woke up this morning and decided that I should totally re-sing one of my songs from scratch!!  This, of course, required yet another re-mix!!

Anyway… I’m done… at least until I actually make CD’s I can sell/give-away!!

I’m heading off to mail my CD to the RPM people and hope that I become bigger than Justin Beiber (I already am physically, so I got that covered!!)

Whew!!

Ian

 

here I am with my steller artwork (NOT!)

Episode 11 – And In The End???

Hiya friends!

It’s 1am here in Southern Ontario, Canada. This is a short announcement to say that, after having spent almost 17 hours working in my basement “studio,”  I think I’m almost, officially DONE MY ALBUM!!!

I fixed all sorts of things with my songs, and in some case, actually re-tracked all the guitars. There were a few songs that just needed too much fixing, so it was easier to just start over. On the songs Bitter and Undisclosed, I pretty much re-wrote all the lyrics, which of course, meant re-singing it (again!).   So I’ve done some audio surgery.

I won’t know if my mixes are good until I have a chance to listen to everything in the car, but my back is killing me and I’m too damn tired to go sit in minus 15 weather in my car and listen to mixes!  So I’ll have to check them out tomorrow. I have until noon hour to get a CD in the mail to the RPM Magazine people. This will very likely NOT be the final master, but it’s good enough for them!!  I’ll do some more tweaks as soon as possible and get an actual CD ready to sell/give-away/make available to pirates!

Stay tuned for more info on all of the above.

I just wanted to write a little blog to cap off a very long day, but a very productive one at least!

Cheers and nighty-night!

Ian

Episode Ten- I might actually finish this thing!!

Just a quick note to say, that I have in my sweaty hands – a copy of a possible run-through of my so-called album. I have 12 songs that I can use, and enough time to finish them off in time for the RPM deadline.

Here’s the run-through as I have it:

Italian Waffles and Scotch – Ian Tanner

1. This Started Out A Love Song
2. Bitter
3. My Situation
4. Ten Cartwheels
5. Father Like Son
6. Reflected Sense Of Self
7. Undisclosed
8. That’s It (I’m Goin’ Gay)
9. The Me I Still Wish I Was
10. Come To The Window Tonight
11. Wondering
12. Hearing Shelley Play The Piano

Possible Bonus Track: Killed By Cleets/Finnish Sauna Torture/The Man Who Drowned Himself
(That is the actual title of the song!)

From that list, you might notice some familiar tunes… songs that I’ve already semi-officially released on other projects, like “Things Never To Say Out Loud.”  There is a clear reason for this – Most of the people who will hear this new project will have never heard any of my songs before. I want this album to have the best material possible on it, and since Ten Cartwheels and Goin’ Gay are 2 of my “most beloved” songs (!!), I want to make sure they get heard by a larger audience. Take note though, that both of these songs have been re-mixed with parts added/taken away.

And those of you who were at my wedding in 2009 may recognize Hearing Shelley Play The Piano. I wrote this song before I knew who Shelley was. She was my next door neighbor, and I heard her playing the piano in her apartment. The song is really that simple. We eventually met, fell in love and got married… and moved out of our respective apartments too!   I thought it would be nice to end the album with this gentle, folky-sounding song.

So stay tuned. I plan on fixing my mixes and finishing the album on Monday next week.

(Now to find a suitable album cover!!)

Ian