Phil Spectors was a very talented recording engineer who created what people call the “wall of sound”. what this means is he used 2 to 3 layers of all instruments recorded. which gave the songs a very dynamic sound. He is in jail now, but he started something big. Layering your tracks in a recording environment is standard now in most recording studios, or at least the ones I have gone too. It blows my mind to see how far recording has come since then, honestly though listening through some 100 dollar headphones to a song on your phone sounds so clear that you could practically be next to that artist while they are singing right into your face! It is cool think that technology has advanced enough to let us even hear music at such a precise way. The instrument world in a studio is honestly endless, you sit their for hours and produce hundreds of songs all at the click of a button. I can only imagine if Phil was not such a crazy control freak and was not a murderer, if he would of been able to keep up with the rapid change.

I have a friend who is a pretty talented studio engineer from my hometown in Natrona Heights and he was a hip hop engineer, he has only been recording for 3 years, but he has been dedicating every day to the quality of his recordings and trying find new ways to keep music fresh. My buddy liked Phil Spector and learned a lot from what he has done and who knows, maybe one day my buddy will in his words “kill the game dog”.

The blues was very popular  , it was one of the foundations of Rock n Roll. It originated in the 1900s and it popularized fast. One of the biggest influences I had from blues music was B.B King. He was a incredible guitar player who knew how to distract you from whatever you were doing with his playing. I remember being in 10th grade and i was watching the crossroad guitar festival on you tube and I saw B.B King, Slash, Eric Clapton and so many other great guitar players. The person who stuck out to me the most was of course B.B king. He was just so technical every lift of a finger and slide of his hand was to tell a story through his playing. He showed so much emotion through his playing, he was truly a iconic figure in music history, and the king of the blues. He sadly passed away in may of  2015. I remember the day after he died I filmed a video of me playing a improvised solo to remember him by I tried to use every skill I learned from him, I lost the video on an old phone or I would post it here. B.B King was a great guy and surely a model figure for a lot of blues styled guitar players. I am sure that even to this day being almost 4 years after his death and people still listen to him an learn off of him, and I am sure they will for years to come.

We were on the topic of different ballads the other day. Ballads use to be my favorite, especially rock or metal ones. I use to like them because I thought the musicians in the songs put a lot of emotion and feelings in. I know musicians probably try to put feeling in most of their songs. Unless it is a song about partying or something that is on a complete other spectrum. Ballads are usually sad and slow, and most of the time in a minor key. When I was first learning how to play guitar, I would search up ballad tracks and play along with them. It was always fun improvising, and it taught me a lot as well. I use to use my guitar as therapy, everyday after school before leaving to go to band practice or baseball practice, I would just spend a couple hours playing guitar to just forget about stupid high school drama and the typical problems high school students face. As soon as I started playing I would forget everything, they were just so soothing to play too. They helped my depression a lot, but music in general did that for me. I am sure that is the same for other people. some time past and I met a new friend kid named Doryan Ward, he got me into screamo music and heavy music and now my life consist of playing heaving music all the time from sweet guitar harmonies and hard hitting breakdowns.