Wow, if I consistently played like I did tonight at Sweet Rockin’ Coffee, I would book the world tour immediately. It felt awesome, and it was no coincidence I think that I played songs I’d played live before and had PRACTICED. Like, A LOT. On a related note, here’s a demo of the canned band version of I Know This Won’t Solve My Problems as requested. The vocals and guitar are the original place-holder tracks I recorded so I could make the synth parts.
1. I Know My Rights
2. I’m Having Trouble Concentrating
3. One Less
4. We Have the Technology
5. I’m Going Away for a While
6. Chance
7. Method of Delivery
8. Boundaries
1. You’re a True Believer
2. It’s Always Something
3. Let It All Burn
4. It Won’t Last
5. Flagwavers
THE ECHO CHAMBER
7. Don’t Be Afraid
8. Uniter
9. Divider
10. Open Your Eyes
You can buy Divider at CD Baby.
Started in 2003. Intended to be done in 2003. Instead, I finally tore myself away from the last mix in October 2004. I had to post it on the web just to keep myself from messing with it into infinity. Delays continued, and I finally received my box of CDs for selling in late January 2005, about a week after the inauguration of the original Divider.
It’s a semi-political album… but hopefully more to me than to anybody else. Personally political. I wouldn’t really want it to be specific about that stuff lest the life get sucked out of the music once the national tide turns.
The CD has the video for “Let It All Burn” on it as well as some extra mp3s:
Cold Sweat
Complaining
Don’t Be Afraid (acoustic)
Don’t Let the Waiting Wear You Out
It Comes and It Goes
It Won’t Last (alternate)
Sad Saints
They Will Sing
Voices Constantly
Your God Is an Idol
Your God Is an Idol (Acoustic)
1. Zoo Station
2. Even Better Than the Real Thing
3. One
4. Until the End of the World
5. Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses
6. So Cruel
7. The Fly
8. Mysterious Ways
9. Trying to Throw Your Arms Around the World
10. Ultraviolet
11. Acrobat
12. Love is Blindness
Songs written by U2
Produced/performed by Jeff Fal
I needed to work, and I needed to work fast. So I ditched the burden of writing songs. We were listening to this album on a roadtrip to and from California. It was speaking to me.
1. Scared to Death
2. Locked Box
3. Towering Inferno
4. What’s Happening to Me?
5. Shades of Black
6. New York
7. Good Morning!
8. Coming Dear
9. Red
10. When Have I Been Wrong?
11. Air Traffic
12. Maybe So
Songs made by Jeff Fal
Made in late 2002 and early 2003, this was an unrealistic project undertaken by me and some of my Song Fight friends. We came up with 12 titles by secret ritual and then attempted to each write and record songs for all 12 titles within a month. We gave up that deadline in favor of making more polished work, which I think is for the better. The companion albums for this are Frankie Big Face’s Smile If You Absolutely Have To and John Benjamin’s Feel Things Deeply.
You can order it here.
1. Back Like This
2. A Reason to Stay
3. Choose My Battles
4. Dirty Water
5. Alone
6. Carrying On
7. Exactly the Same
8. I Know Better
9. Wears on Me
10. Let It Go
11. I Feel Bad
12. The Smile on Your Face
13. I Know Better
Songs made by Jeff Fal
This album took me all of 2002 to make. Ok, That’s not completely true. Probably 80% of the work got done in the summer. There are a couple of songs from before then, and I did a lot of mixing and remixing afterwards. But all in all, I’d say it’s a summer document. Something about summers… They just get me working.
1. Midnight Rendezvous
2. Don’t Dance
3. Shipwreck
4. On a Line
5. Black Hole
6. Dad, I’m Changing
7. Listen Close
8. It’s Invisible
9. Been to China
10. A Thousand Swords
11. I Can See You
12. Do It for Captain
13. Red Robot
14. Birds of Our Own
15. Firecrackers
16. Acid Mouth
17. Experimental Fashion
18. Secrets
19. Hotel
1. I Won’t Be There
2. Hard Enough
3. Fall Apart
4. Five o’Clock
5. Guess You’re on a Plane
6. I Know This Won’t Solve My Problems
7. Maddie
8. Bad Guy
9. Quit Breaking My Heart
10. Tell You Today
Songs made by Jeff Fal
This is an album I recorded in the summer of 2001. It’s actually the third or fourth album I made, but this was the first one after people other than me and my brother began to listen to my music. Which is fine, because those others weren’t great, and Bad Guy was really the first time I succeeded at recording an album of songs that all belonged together that were also all good songs. Of course, to accomplish that, I had to set myself the modest goal of 25 minutes. Actually, my goal was 30 minutes, but you take what you can get.
April 17th, 2004 at 8:21 pm
Jefff-
I seriously love this. It’s great. at first i was suspicious of the “la la la”, but I ended up loving it and pestering at least 3 friends online with it. Keep up the good work! I can’t wait to buy the new album.
April 22nd, 2004 at 1:30 pm
So what is playing the synth parts? What gadget do you cart around and how are you plugging it into the PA or whatever? *preparing to steal ideas*
April 22nd, 2004 at 4:13 pm
we practiced the same 14 song set probably twenty times before our first show, and we still practice it. sometimes we swap out songs, but i think it’s important to have a core of music that you can rock the ass off of when there are no monitors and someone has a stomach ache and you’re shit drunk. people seem to like hearing song they’ve heard before, too.
April 23rd, 2004 at 8:55 am
JB – I just brought a CD with me and gave it to the guy running the boards. I would’ve preferred to plug in my discman so I’d have start/stop control, but I didn’t want to make too big a deal. If I were to make a habit of this, I’d really like to just have an mp3 cd (or ipod) with all my backing tracks on it. But anyway, there’s no special gadget playing the synth, it’s just my regular synth recorded. There’s no reason I couldn’t throw on some real instruments and backup vocals. But I want to make a clear distinction for the audience of what’s live and what’s a recording, so they can focus on my performance.