Final Project

OK, now its ready.

http://www.wfbportfolio.com/#!

Here is my final project. A short song expressing my short journey in this course. Just pick the song Hidden4.2.mp3 and click play.
-Bill

The Self/Identity Project...

   Well here are the lyrics to the song I've been working on. These two stanzas or whatever you call them, lines, represent the transition from fear to light that I have experienced through this class. I'm not sayin' I am without fear or stage fright completely, I mean I have broken through that which has held me back for so many years.
 I shall post the completed song for Wednesdays final class.
-Bill

HIDDEN
written by William F. Backhoff
6/19/2011

I've hidden you
Inside me

I've hidden you
Despite me

In my mind

You held the fear
I thought I
I
I had lost

But I
Was wrong


I realized
I'm hidden

Where no one else
Can find me

So I thought

I've always been
In the sun
Now
I will run

Toward
My dream...

the Self Project...

   All week I have  been thinking about me. It sounds vain but its been necessary for this assignment. I think I will write a song with lyrics, obviously, that will attempt to cover my whole life up until now and in the process help me and maybe others who I am.

Bliss...

   For class this past Wednesday I found bliss in a nice long nap with a bit of reading to start. As a stay at home dad and student who has the crappiest part time job in the world, I need my rest, if not physically then mentally for sure. However I didn't just find one 3 hour period of bliss I found other smaller periods that I quickly took advantage of. I watched a few movies I had previously not seen and spent some time cooking. I like to cook.
   Now I will think of a project about me or whatever.

Fear continued

I was able to successfully  perform one of my songs for the class. I must admit I was very nervous and just wanted to leave. I could pick that performance apart for weeks but I won't. It was extremely fun to sit up there and talk to the class about the guitar and the song. I am very glad I challenged myself by using this assignment to confront one of my longest lasting fears. Thanks to the class for allowing me to do it!
-Bill

FEAR!!!

   Well last week I attempted to scare or disturb everyone in the class by playing a piece of audio I put together that sounded like a mass shooting. It failed fantastically. Its just as well though because that whole project was skirting my real fear which is performing alone in front of a crowd. This week I will face that fear. I will perform a song I wrote in front of the class... and most likely forget how it goes.

Play Time

  When I play, I usually play with one of my big boy toys like my computer or recording equipment. When I go out to play I jump on my motorcycle and meet my friends out and we go for a ride around town. But sometimes I find one of my sons Hot Wheels cars and I push it around the kitchen floor just like I did when I was small.
   Last Sunday at the track the Hot Wheels company had a life sized jump track set up and they were planning on running a truck down a giant piece of track then jumping it over a huge ramp. They also had a life sized version of one of the first Hot Wheels cars ever made. It was awesome!


                              Hot Wheels Teaser Trailer

My Voice

   I was very happy to learn a few things about Afro-American culture today. I felt enriched by the conversation and am thankful to Michael for speaking to us about the topic.

   Obviously I was quite irritated by the comments made about kilts. It's funny that people who know very little about a subject seem to be the first ones to comment on it. I think he( I don't know his name) needs to go put a kilt on and get over himself. I am also not Scottish. I am German, Irish and English. I choose to wear a black kilt not only because it is my favorite color or lack thereof, but black, if I am not mistaken, is one of the 3 colors on the German flag(I am mostly German). The Utilikilts brand of kilts allow people like myself, who are not Scottish, to wear kilts and have fun in them.

   Overall it was actually a fairly productive conversation. Too bad we didn't get out early.

 

Rule Breaking Assignment

   I decided not to break any rules for this assignment as I don't like getting in trouble. So, I had a detective friend of mine give me a warning ticket to apply to this assignment. I will be bringing it to class so we can play with it.
   To me a warning ticket is a symbol of getting away with breaking rules. I have broken many rules in my life and have received several warning tickets for it. I also view this as a consequence of breaking the rules.

Breaking the Rules...

   There wasn't much I can think of from our discussion in class that I can apply to my last assignment.
If I wanted to break the rules of that assignment I could have disregarded the instruction to use my book and used a sound effect of real leaves instead of the ripped out pages. But that is kind of straight forward. I am not a very political person. I tend to get extremely angry about certain topics and no one I know, not even my wife, agrees with me entirely. So as far as I am concerned my politics is my business and yours is yours.

  Another way I could have and did break the rules on the last assignment was to use the pages from my textbook to make the sounds of real leaves, fooling everyone listening into thinking they are hearing real leaves. When designing sounds and creating sound effects I prefer to use the real thing to make the sounds when possible. However, it is much more fun to "lie" to the listener and use other objects to make the sounds. I tend to laugh hysterically when I pull off a successful effect.   

    I guess I am getting old but I just can't stand soap box preaching about how screwed up the government is and how our rights are being violated. This shit has been going on since the beginning of this country and it will never stop. It is the nature of a democracy. I have more important things, TO ME, to worry about. I can't imagine politicizing my music or my sound design work or even making a documentary about a political issue. I just don't care because like we said in class, talking is good up to a point, but then you have to take action on that speech. And by action I don't mean a march on some capitol somewhere, all that does is fuck up traffic and waste the taxpayers money on extra police. You must let your own personal, daily actions do the speaking for you. Be a good citizen, vote and try to follow the law the best you can. If you don't like something write your congressman a letter. Don't make ignorant comments about burning down the capitol building. I gotta stop. I'm getting irritated.

I cannot find anything in our conversation I would include in my work.

Affecting the Cause

For this assignment I chose to develop the winds that reminded me of October. I made a sound-scape of what October sounds like to me. I used my book by ripping out several pages and crumpling them up. I then made a pile of them on the floor and recorded my hand brushing through them to make the sound of someone walking through leaves on the grass.


See the pic below and enjoy the audio on my portfolio site here!

My portfolio site

Go to the media player and click through the songs until you find OctoberSoundscape.mp3

What class did for me...

   Today I was in deep thought as to what, if anything, I was getting out of this class at this early stage. It is in my nature to worry about things I cannot control, such as what I might absorb, so I just sat there tonight and listened. I found alot of idle chatter and many times the conversation strayed way off the subject of the class and I found this to be distracting. I did, however, come away with the realization that I have allowed myself, over many years, to close up my creative mind and limit its uses to what I have become comfortable with. My comfort zone consisting of things I can create at home. It has been about 7 years since I have performed music live and part of me misses it but the other part has no desire for the rehearsals and the lugging of equipment that comes along with it. I also haven't written music with anyone else for just as long and have grown comfortable not doing so.
   I think I know what I need to do to start creating again, if I could only find a way to do it while enduring the daily rigors of life that always seem to pop their heads in at all the wrong times. I have a humiliating and mind numbing job and I am surrounded daily by my 2 young children who seem to need things at the exact moment I sit down to be creative. Its maddening sometimes so I just give up on it and move on. However, I have been fortunate to watch my children be creative. In a way I get the same kind of satisfaction from watching them be creative that I get when I am being creative.

The Unexpected Egg-speriment

 After taking it on a harrowing motorcycle ride through the streets of San Fran, I mean Indianapolis, I decided to boil my egg and then do something fun with it afterwards. However, while boiling, the egg cracked. Fearing I was about to lose my precious egg, I removed it from the boiling pot and began rinsing it with cold water. As I was rinsing it I noticed that the crack had closed to the point that it was no longer visible. I then grabbed a pencil and started coloring around the egg in order to find the crack. I was able to find the crack and then draw along its length.
My theory is that the egg expanded in the boiling water and cracked. The egg then shrank to its original size as it was rinsed in cold water.


See pics below...

the Egg

Here is an update on the egg...

It is still in one piece
  and awaiting further torment...

New blog page!

For some unknown reason Google decided to remove my previous blog. So, I am now starting over with this blog.