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Some of you know that, while I'm not the worlds worst tone freak, I take my guitar tone pretty seriously. Debates about true bypass vs. active bypass not withstanding (i tend to side with the mentality that you need active bypass at the beginning and end of your signal but the middle is fair game) I have been in pursuit of a really good sound for a long time. While the amp that I really want is out of my price range, I've managed to gradually make my tone better. It's weird for me to think back to being at Greenville and running my DeVille's overdrive as my only overdrive. Or when I had that boss dual overdrive moded. It did sound good but sadly...it had to go in place of something far better....the Jekyll and Hyde. For a time I even used my Turbo-Tubescreamer in conjunction with the JK. It's what's on the Marcel ep and, honestly, I think it sounds pretty good.
Sadly, the JK has seen better days. I've been having trouble with it and it's to the point where it works only when it wants to. In the words of Derrida, this is not sufficient. So I've been doing some research...seeking out that pedal that would meet all my needs. It has to be thick but not muddy or sound too much like fuzz. It has to have multiple forms of overdrive, that is, it has to be versatile. And most of all, it has to sound good. I walked into guitar center today looking for a reverb and found them very lacking (why am I not surprised). However, I was struck that they carried a certain boutique overdrive pedal that I had been thinking about. Maybe 30 seconds into playing it I knew that I had found what I was looking for. Thick, versatile....sexy? Probably not but it sounds damn good. So I have now joined Wes, Chase, and Mike in being the proud owner of a Ful
ltone Fulldrive 2.
Yes, yes, I know I've committed post-rock heresy by not getting a big muff but that's just not my bag. Besides, bigmuffs are uglyass pieces of equipment and rarely sound good. But I'm super happy with the overdrive and am getting happier with my setup and overall tone the more I play it. for any who are interested here it is.
[Gibson Les Paul Classic-->Boss TU-2 tuner --Fulltone Full-Drive 2--Line 6 Delay Modeler--Digitech Digiverb--->Vox AC15]
so now that I've engaged in such vanity as writing about my pedals...i'm gonna go play.
Holy week. Its about this time that I remember lent. I attempted to be more responsible with my life over the course of this season and what a disaster that has been. Perhaps disaster is the incorrect word to describe my "lenten journey" as it is so called. Fizzle is a better word for it. Forgetfulness, non-intentional, laziness, malaise...all of these are good words to describe what happened in a corporeal sense. Reflecting back on the past forty days, the only thing that seems to have benefitted from this attempt at responsibility is reflection itself. I have found myself asking "am I being responsible if I do X, Y, or Z?" This, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. Far from it. But the attempt was to bring the whole of my life-the mental, material, and interpersonal-into some sort of responsible practice. Did that happen? Not entirely. Parts of it did. I don't eat out as much. I'm more mindful of what I devote my time to. I ended up practicing guitar (doing scales and chords and exercises and such which i never do) which has been a pleasant surprise. I read more but that's nothing new.
Along the way of this church season, I became acquainted with this little internet based show called "Quarterlife". It's not terrible but it isn't an amazing show like The Wire, The Office, etc. What it tries to do is both comment upon twentysomethings and speak for them, er, us. That tends to be a difficult task when you are in your 40's like the writers are. However, their portrayals of what it means to be a post-college middle-class (white) American is fascinating to me. The biggest thing watching this show has done, combined with the Lenten accentuation of reflection, is lead me to question what it means to be a young white American male in the city. What does this time mean?
Meaning is a volatile mistress, provoking one to wrestle with the many possibilities, both good and bad, that any actions or times might have. So what is the meaning of being a post-college twentysomething? Where does one find purpose in one's vocation? But I guess the question that plagues me the most is:
What good can a graduate student in the humanities, specifically philosophy, do to make the world better through one's vocation?
Of course the philosopher in me begins to deconstruct the very question I've asked at the moment it comes into being. Why portray the humanities in a negative light? In an age where science abounds and technology is the double-edged sword that provides a myriad of possible connections and yet pushes us more into atomized existence...do we not still need to understand what it means to be human? Why is philosophy seen as such a superfluity (unnecessary discipline)? Is it not important to ask these questions of meaning, to question meaning, to question questioning, etc?
Sometimes, I find this rather funny blog "Stuff White People Like" kind of depressing. The entry on Grad-School is particularly unnerving albeit something of a truism (especially if you ever go to a philosophy party). Honestly, it got me a little depressed for a bit. And then I read some Heidegger and it made me feel better (how weird is that). But I guess the point of this is that the majority of people see philosophy as less than worthwhile. The concern is with something other than the history of ideas, or new ways of thinking. So it's kind of depressing when you find out that you're going to be studying something that people won't value near as much as other things. And yet, I am reminded that I didn't get into this world of academics because I wanted to be valued or thought of as cool. I didn't get into it because it fulfilled my need to have my intelligence validated. I got into it because I saw the worth in learning about the way that we view things, the way we value things, the questions of what it means to be human, to live in the world, to do the right thing, etc. I got in because I didn't want to be the kind of academic that perpetuates the ivory tower but the kind that as my cousin in the Navy says "breaks it down to show that war is not the answer."
There is, I think, a myriad way of living life as a twentysomething. More than any show or blog could chart or describe. Certainly, there are trends and funny quirks that are elevated over others but there are also idiosyncrasies that are untellable and inexpressible to more than the parties involved. And there are so many questions. There is the wrestling with the idea of "a way of life" that seems to be highlighted in these middle twenties that I"m progressing through that doesn't lend itself to an easy answer.
Identity, purpose, communication...all of these things don't go away as I move on. Some answers become more adequate, others are revealed to be little more than a mask. But I think that the comedian and philosopher Steve Martin revealed the best way to move through these questions. In a recent interview with Charlie Rose he said (I'm paraphrasing)
"Be so good that you can't be ignored"
Timely advice. And in light of the resurrection, there is a touch of the divine in those words. A rumination of what that means is for another time, but at least there is comfort coming at the end of this afflicting season of Lent.
ltone Fulldrive 2.
