Somnolence

or the lack thereof . . .

I once had a doctor tell me that in times of war, men sometimes go without sleep for 3 days. I found little solace in that as I am an insomniac. Last night I stayed up while editing a report that I'd been procrastinating for some time. Sometimes there is a certain inertia or potential that must build up before the dam breaks and all the pent up energy is released.

I do that with music, but I'm either completely off or completely on. There is no scenario where I sit and write a little bit one day, and then add some more later, incrementally finishing a song. Most lyrics come in a matter of minutes to me (maybe that explains something) whereas I don't always get music with them. I tend to get musical ideas and then get some inspiration for the lyrics, though sometimes I flip through my notebooks looking for some unused words to wrap around a melody.

As a synthesizer player, I spend a fair amount of time doodling on a keyboard and fiddling with the sounds. I think that is what really attracts me to the synthesizer, is that aspect of actually crafting the sound pallet for a song. Sometimes I use presets, or some combination, but even with presets, there is a process of sorting through them, listening for the right sound for a particular part of a song. I'm sure guitarists go through something like that, but guitar is so dense in harmonics that you can always tell it's a guitar (well, most of the time.) Sure, there are guitarists like Adrian Belew or Robert Frip, and I'm not sure if I'm even spelling their names right.

I think my cat just farted. I hope that's what it is. Gotta go!