Baking with Peja: Episode 6 from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

CKWS

Had a meeting yesterday at Kingston's own CKWS.  It's our local CBC affiliate station, and like all local stations, they just run CBC stuff, and then do 3 or 4 news programs to make their money.  And.  And.  And they might air some Baking with Peja episodes.
I edited them two 3 minute episodes (I got edited out, mostly for time, and because drunken, ignoring father's don't make the best family television) and apparently they're likely to air in the next few weeks.  I'll post when I find out when.
I met with the head of news or the station or something, a really nice guy.  We talked about the segment, and sponsorship (the only way they could pay me).  He showed the videos to the head of sales, who thought there was a good chance to get the episode supported.
So.  So.
Does Peja had a TV job?  It might just happen.
Oh, and they wanted to interview Peja live on set.  We turned them down.  They asked me to fill in, which almost made me get Peja to do it.  In the end I said, maybe after 5 episodes. . .
It was awkward when I mentioned I didn't own a TV.
Stay tuned.

Baking with Peja -- Episode 5

Echo turns 2

Hey, look, my son is 2!  Many happy returns, little guy.

I guess that means that our album ECHO is also 2 years old.   Seems like it's about time for a new record.  I started recording at NOP studios in August and the album is almost done.  Lots more news to come about that in the new days.

New Baking with Peja will be posted on Saturday.  Stay tuned.

Post Show. . .

Thanks to Sherwood and all the dudes from Hey Buster! for inviting us to play at their great show.  They filled the Mansion with tiny people and put on a very intimidating set of polished material -- their backing band even had some great pedal steel - which wins me over pretty quick.

The sound guy evaporated, so big thanks to Casey for coming in (with 2 kids in tow) and setting up the stage and teaching me how to use the sound board.  Once upon a time I took a sound class at film school where I learned how to use a digital mixing board -- those memories were sifted through today!

I was joined by Kevin Bowers (lead guitar), Kevin Holloway (drums), and Damian Thornton (bass), all of whom put in a lot of time learning the new kid's songs.  Thanks guys!

Pics and maybe some video very soon.

I should stop eating Peja and Echo's halloween candy and go to bed soon.

Rock and roll.

- Jay.

NOV 6th @ THE MANSION

Baking with Peja Episode 4!

It took a couple of months -- Peja has been back in school and I've been working on the "secret project".  But we got together on Saturday and finished shooting and editing.

I'll put a post up when I have a poster done, but we're playing at The Mansion on Nov 6th, a Sunday afternoon show.  We're playing with a great band from Ottawa called Hey Buster!

Music School Commercial. . .

Secrets, and Episode 3 of Baking With Peja

There's a secret project on the way.

Not really related to the following:

Baking with Peja: Episode 2

Boathouse from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

Baking with Peja: Episode 1

TRAIN TEST from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

Commerical Test Run. . .

Bike Ride -- Soon!

I got an email from a kids-music band in Ottawa -- a friend of a friend who recommended my band as an opener for a gig in the fall. They're into playing bar shows for families, just like me, but they needed a local opener to book a gig at the Mansion. Who knew? I count as a local draw? Cool! I guess I'll need to put together a band again. It's, uh, November something. I'll look it up. November 6th. There you go. Be there! It's like 4 months away. . .

Peja and I have been working on a couple of songs together. She actually walked up to me the other day and showed me a sheet of lyrics that she had written. Sometimes I forget that she can write. . . And then she proceeded to sing the songs for me; she had work out some melodies. I never asked her to do it, and I was really surprised. She takes piano lessons, and enjoys them, but doesn't practice much (generally only when I ask her to), and rarely asks about going over to the music school. My hammond organ is just as likely to be a spaceship as a musical instrument when her friends are over. But here she was creating stuff. Pretty neat. Sienna's still telling me to do a kids album -- maybe Peja's ready to write/record one with me. Our best song right now is a counting song. Spanish numbers have WAY more syllables than english, french, or japanese. . .

I got invited to jam with one of my favorite bands, The Trash Daddies, last night. They opened the first Central Family Dance show, and they are an amazing group of musicians. They're also the nicest 4 people I've ever been in a room with. I brought my telecaster, and was terrified all night of fucking up the great sound they have. I hope I stayed out of the way enough. On every song they have this amazing tight 4 part harmony, and they have great banjo, mandolin, and guitar stuff on everything. I've been trying to get them to come and record a song and make a performance video -- maybe I'll just bring some gear next time.

I'm finishing up the script for Bike Ride -- I thought the next Happy Kid Production would be a script called Stroller, but my cousin Tom, who I cast for the lead, hasn't managed to find time to come to Kingston, so I think I'm going to start working on the next one. I've cast the two leads (Peja is one), and I think I'm going to shoot it in Skeleton Park (I wrote it with City Park in mind, but then remembered that I live 2 blocks from Skeleton Park). After those two is one called Monopoly Junior -- I kind of want to act in that one, but I need a camera operator. . .

Anecdote has gotten lots of good reactions, and it's viewing numbers have been great on Vimeo. It was made so quickly and for $0 (uh, I think Emily kindly bought/made her wedding dress; Thanks Emily!), but I really loved making it. It took me a few shoots to get comfortable with directing actors, but the last day of shooting was really fun, and Mark and Emily did such fantastic jobs. I think my work on it is very student-filmish, but, hey, I dropped out before I finished film school, so I think I deserve a few more low-pressure directing gigs.

Anecdote

10 Days In. . .

A week ago from Friday, it was raining, and Peja was home for a PA day. Sienna had just switched jobs and the hospital and got her vacation time paid out. It was a lot. We paid off some debts and then I suggested we by a new camera.

It is awesome.

And makes beautiful images and video.

It is awesome.

My parents gave me three awesome lenses (30mm, 28-80, 75-300), and I got the $100 kit lens (18-55mm), so, aside from something really wide (like the 10-20mm zoom I tried to steal from my dad) I'm really set up for lenses.

The video files look like 35mm film. Movie film. Amazing film. And they are HUGE files. And my computer is suddenly outdated by the size of its files.

Sienna looks at me, as if to say, "when exactly will you have everything you want?"

More. More. More.

Books with Peja

Books with Peja from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

Echo's Journey. . .

Echo's Journey from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

Camera Tests continue. . .

Jam Sandwiches -- boom arm test from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

DIY Steadicam Imitation Test from Jay Middaugh on Vimeo.

Spinning in the Backyard

I've been shooting a lot of test footage with my video camera, seeing if I can get the "cinematic" look that all the new cameras promise.

I slowed the footage down to 5% using frame blending in Final Cut Pro, which I'm slowly learning my way around. My 2006 computer can't quite handle all the cool effects and stuff that FCP can do, but for normal editing stuff it's working great.

I've cast some friends in an upcoming Happy Kid Production called "Anecdote". It's a bit different tone than the silly stuff with Peja, but hopefully people dig it too. Stay tuned.

Candy Store -- A Film by Jay and Peja

Speaking of Video Equipment. . .

The Dreaded G.A.S.

No, it doesn't mean that.

I heard it from Kevin Cooke. I sent him an Email asking about some gear I was thinking about buying, and mentioned some other things I thought I could use in the future, and he wrote back, "ah, the old dreaded G.A.S. -- Gear Acquisition Syndrome".

Sienna and I took a trip out to the township, and while she tortured Echo with a trip to Michaels (it was actually fine, she found a small toy basketball and let him throw it around; that's my boy!), I went over to Henry's to check out some DSLR's and Camcorders that shoot the new high-def, manual focus, super-amazing video that all the kids are using these days.

At the end of the day, I was fully convinced that I needed a $1000 camera, a new iMac, and a whole wack of software. Convinced. Like an addict, I was searching around my studio for things I could sell for $2000. Turns out, I don't own anything worth $2000. Which is probably for the best.

I told Sienna about what I wanted to get, and she said, as she always does, "Sure, whatever you need". There are two reasons she always says this: One - she is very supportive of me and my work; TWO - she knows that anytime she agrees to buy something, my CHEAP alarm goes off and I think of reasons to not get whatever it is.

It's so easy to blame gear or money for not starting or completing projects, but that's bullshit for the most part. If I had the gear I have right now within 3 feet of myself (i.e. my digital camcorder and macbook) when I was 15, I would've shit myself. Shit myself and then shot a feature film about, oh, maybe something about a 15 year old troubled loner. . .

There is a baseline of gear needed to produce video, but it involves linking two vcr's together and you can buy nearly all of it for $10 at value village.

I have been so blessed in my life to have had the means to buy what a lot of I wanted (or thought I wanted) to be creative. But looking back I know that my best always involved struggles with (what I thought was) inadequate technology. My favorite barn flyz songs were recorded on a four track where I had to plan track-bouncing and had no editing abilities. My favorite video work was shot with a 2MP digital still camera on a 15FPS "film mode" with a broken shutter button, and pirated shitty video editing software.

I don't need to be able to shoot 600 frames a second, or have an f1.8 lens, or render videos 10 times faster. I just need to keep my ass in gear and actual do the work. The Peat Bros, who are heros of mine, borrowed a mic from my studio to do some recording. Their audio interface? One XLR to USB cable. One Mic. One single cable. And it sounded awesome.

Fuck the dreaded G.A.S.

Catching Up. . .

That's Echo, about to attempt to unplug about 40% of the sound equipment. He was stopped.

Alright.

We played a show.

It was in the afternoon at a bar.

Children were running around, and I'm pretty sure as much juice was sold as booze, and that makes me glad.

Thanks to Casey and the whole crew at the Mansion, they were awesome at every step of the way.

Huge thanks to the Aldous Huxters, who were as great as I had hoped. Thanks to Geoff Chown (Geoff, I'm just guessing at all the spelling there. . .) for rocking the sound board (along with the bass with the Huxters).

Thanks to the Kevins (Bowers, Holloway, Cooke) for bringing it, as always.

Thanks to the kids and parents who came out.

Was out in the studio today working on a new song, working title, "every step that you take on your way" which is too long a title and sounds like "every breath you take". Not the song. Just the title. Other songs on the front burners these days -- "the grey in your hair", "might mean the same", and "if i knew how to fight".

The last one we played at the show, and a version of it spends a bit of time filling up the background in Lenny Epstien's "Guy and Me" a short staring my friend Tully. I was in the right place (Kevin Bower's studio) at the right time (when he had 30 things on the go, one of which was writing some music for the film) and somehow I squeezed my little song in there. Thanks Lenny, Tully, and Kev! I would love to do more of this.

Peja and I started work on a new film project; a new web series that should be out by the summer.

The Central Bears, the junior boys basketball team I coach, started their season with a game at Rideau Heights. We had a great effort, and great sportsmanship all around. Thanks to Heather and Seth at Rideau Heights for hosting a great game.

Hope you are well.

Jay.

NEW SHOW

Details (poster to follow):

Feb 27th, 2pm

The Mansion

The Aldous Huxters

Jay and the Barn Flyz

Special Guests

Come on out for some Sunday Afternoon Rock and Roll.

The Massie Johnson Combo. . .

Kids are sleeping. Wife is working. Blogging time!

After 4 sleepless nights and days, I lost my head and bought some drum mics, then panicked, and bought different mics instead, and then panicked, and then finally got some sleep, and then decided that the mics were a good decision. I've always recorded my drums with 1 or 2 mics (I think I used 3 a couple of times), and I liked the sound, and mostly the simplicity of setting up 5 minutes. The new mics clamp on to the drums, or hang high above, or need to be carefully placed on stuff near by drums, and when they are all combined, they sound fucking (sorry mom) awesome and huge and punchy.

Sometimes Barn Flyz Kevin Cooke sent a cd from ottawa of a group he's been playing with - The Massie Johnson Combo, (link is to a youtube clip of dubious sound quality, but you can get a bit of an idea) which is really fantastic instrumental jazz/blues/r&b that makes me want to shoot a black and white 16mm film about walking down quiet early morning misty city streets. We're in discussions about him mixing the next bit of Barn Flyz music; he just may have persuaded me to let someone else have some control over the sonic aspects of my tunes.

Movie Review: True Grit. . .

I took Sienna to the movies for the first time in 6 years.

We saw the Coen Brother's "True Grit".

There was a line-up for tickets, but apparently everyone else was going to see the Green Hornet or whatever else. We shared the theatre with one middle aged guy that came in 15 minutes late. Maybe he couldn't buy Seth Rogan as an action hero, ditched his 3-D glasses and wandered across the lobby. Either way, it was a quiet crowd.

Sienna bought a $7 bag of popcorn. It was f'n huge.

In film school, one of my instructors was always talking about how movies seem more entrancing then TV because the bigger screen makes your eyes move around and that keeps your brain more active. It's also nice if you're near-sighted like me. It's like a large print book in movie form.

The movie reminded me a bit of The Murder of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford; it is set it a similar world. But the pace is much faster, the whole thing is under 2 hours. But the plot never feels rushed, everything has time to breathe and be noticed.

There is a man wearing a bear as outerwear.

I really enjoyed it.

You could go see it, if your wife likes seeing movies in theatres, and you never, ever, ever go with her, and by going together you will share an enjoyable afternoon in a dark room with a strange man and $7 popcorn.

I don't mean the other guy watching the movie was strange. Just that he was a stranger. I think. I wasn't wearing my glasses. He could've been my 3rd grade teacher.

Notes from the Recording Studio. . .

I've been spending some time in the studio working on demos for a new record. I suffer from demo-itis a lot of the time; I make really fast sketches of songs that have a lot of energy, but lack polish. The plan is always to go back and do a "better" recording based on the demo. But, after listening to the sketch demo a few times, it becomes the song for me, and it's difficult to live with anything that doesn't have that same first-time energy.

3 steps down the road towards solving this problem:

1. Become a good enough player that I can get a great first or second take.

2. Work on song building (as opposed to writing) before hitting the record button.

3. Write down song structures so I don't have to relearn parts from quick demos.

Most of it involves planning and discipline. Not being lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy lazy.

It took me two days to write this 200 word blog post.

Hmmmm. . .

MMXI

Alright.

Now.

I resolve to formalize the time I spent on my creative efforts. Specific to discipline, be it film-making, writing, song-writing, music-recording, times will be allocated and regimented.

Regimented?

I'm not sure that works there.

Add time for editing.

Rewind. . . and play. . .

Specific to discipline, be it film-making, writing, song-writing, music-recording; times will be allocated and maintained.

Better?

I'm not sure.

It's all very confusing.

When I was trying to become an English teacher (alright, lets be fair, I was actually trying to not live in my parents basement forever, and maybe meet some girls), I decided that I would write a novel, get it published, and not need to complete the plan I already had grown bored and jaded with. So, I had never written anything longer than 4000 words. Books are like 80,000 words. Small books. So, like the German army at the end of WW2, instead of going, "well, it'll take me a week to write a quality 500 words, so I should probably plan to finish the novel in like 5 years", I instead picked a long-term goal, and then forced the short-term issue (side note, I wrote a really long side note explaining the WW2 analogy and then erased it because it seemed a bit much; email me for details). I wrote 500 words a day, no exceptions, editing in spare time, and a bit at the end, and wrote my novel in about 8 months. I have no illusions about it being a great work of fiction, but I got it done, published it myself, and I never look back and wonder what would've happened if I really tried to write a novel. I can go to my bookshelf.

I'm looking to regain my foolhardy aspirations and the discipline they require.

Also, I should stop staying up late and rambling on my blog. . .

And a big shout-out to anyone in England reading this. Man, I'm sure that Blogger's stats have no idea what's going on. Adam, do you know anything about their accuracy?