Monster Noodles is a collection of unfinished sketches of material I was working on from about 1985 to 1989. I say they are unfinished because they were mostly recorded as a way to learn to use new equipment I had gotten at the time.
Noodling is another way of saying screwing around, and that is what these songs are: musical screwing around. Most of the material was improvised. I played, or sequenced, all the parts, using a now quite antiquated setup. The sequencing was done with a variety of low end sequencers, including the one built into the Casio CZ230, and the Casio CZ5000. The drums are from the drum machine built into the CZ230 and also from an Alesis HR16 drum machine. All the Bass lines, and keyboard parts come from one of those synthesisers. The synthesiser and drum machine parts are a combination of sequenced rhythmic loops, and improvised tracks added to them. The guitar parts were played on an Ibanez Artist, and a guitar I built from parts of other guitars. All this was then recorded into a Vesta Fire MR-10 4-track cassette deck, and mixed down to stereo on a boom box that gave up the ghost years ago.
Eventually, I obtained a CD-Rom writer for my computer, and Viola! The material found its way onto compact disc.
The songs:
1.) Red Rover
Sometimes a song needs a name, and when there are no lyrics to summarize into a thesis, you have to stretch. The Rover in the title is a reference to Hendrix, and the title and the reference gets used later in Red Rover Revisited, Found on the Plenty of Nothin' CD. Move over Rover, and let Jimi take over.
2.) Rock-O
No good explanation for this title, the song needed a name other than song number two; although it was probably song number something else.
3.) Song About Nothing
This title is as straightforward as they come.
4.) Under Currents
The chord progression for this song and the next comes from a song called If Wishes And Horses, found on the Random Noise Bursts CD.
I had a cheap digital delay that was able to sample one second loops of sound, and I created the background loop for this using that cheap guitar effect pedal, I then re-recorded the loop through the delay again to add echo to it, added the keyboard part, then more echo, and while working on another song, accidentally added part of the guitar, so I came back and added more guitar, then more echo, and more keyboard, and more echo. Kind of a musical finger painting.
11.) Prelude to the Diner of Fear
No surprise to find out this is also the first song on The Soundtrack to the Diner of Fear CD. See the liner notes on that CD for an explanation of the title.
5.) Horse Shoes
If wishes were horses, beggars would eat them.
6.) Noodling Guitars
I love playing the guitar. The drum and bass part was sequenced, and then layered 3 guitars over that, or was it 4??
7.) Based on the Names of Girls
More noodling guitars. Stan Freberg did a Lawrence Welk parody many years ago in which Mr. Welk announces, "And now an instrumental-um medley-um, based-um upon the names of-um girls um..."
8.) Pacific Standard Time
Chord progression based on What Time Is It? Found on the Plenty of Nothin' CD. This was the musical answer to that question.
9.) Alien TV Solo
The aliens are watching TV. Not on any other CD's yet, maybe Later. This song suffered from my tendency towards long, long songs. I clipped this solo out of the original.
