Chris Smith Band: Home Jam Sessions- Taking It Easy... Acoustic Version

Since beach weather seems to be here already, I thought I'd record my beachy'est song while testing out my video recording capabilities.  

Since I am a huge fan of Apple's products, especially for production type work, this was done entirely using Apple gear (other than the instruments and microphones).  It was recorded live, one take, with two microphones; one condenser on the guitar and a vocal mic.  Both were fed through the Apogee Duet interface, into Logic Pro X on a 2013 MacBook Pro.  The audio was mixed and compressed in Logic and then exported to a wave file.  The video was shot with a single iPhone 6.  Audio and video were combined in the free iMovie software that comes with every Mac.  

Hope you like it.  If you like the song, be sure to download my album, Imaginary Fears on iTunes or Amazon, or give it a listen on Spotify!  

Chris Smith LIVE: Partial Cover of "Just a Friend" and "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air"

Last weekend, I had a great time playing a gig with Overeasy at Black Eyed Sally's.  In prepping for the show, I was messing around with my Boomerang 3 loop pedal, and stumbled across a really fun way to cover Biz Markie "Just a Friend" and mix it with the Fresh Prince song.  Although I wasn't planning on playing it at the show, I decided to give it a try live anyway.  Psyched about the audience singing along!  Check it out!

https://soundcloud.com/chrissmithacoustic/chris-smith-live-just-a-friend-and-fresh-prince-medley-4-17-15 

Chris Smith Featured on Black Eyed & Blues Podcast

Hey everyone, check out this week's Black Eyed & Blues podcast!  They talked about my recent album release show at Black Eyed Sally's, last weekend's show, and played "Hold On", the bluesy 6th track from my album, Imaginary Fears!  

http://onthehorn.com/2015/04/22/beb-174-caught-breaking-and-entering/ 

Chris Smith Band: Home Jam Sessions- California Stars (Wilco) With Steve Sidorak

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN:  Chris Smith & Steve Sidorak:  California Stars (Wilco cover)

I've decided that I want to capture some jam sessions from time to time with musician friends of mine and share them with you all here.  For this entry, my good friend, Steve Sidorak, and I spent an afternoon a little while back messing around with my home studio set up.  After playing him some of the tracks I was working on just before the release of my Imaginary Fears album, I take nearly full responsibility for him dropping quite a few bucks to grab a MacBook and buying the amazing Logic Pro recording software the very next week!

He and I met up for an afternoon with intentions of recording some music, but we hadn't discussed in advance what it was that we might record.  We decided for purposes of getting something done quick, that we were looking for some songs that had a pretty easy arrangement and nothing too complicated.  After batting around a couple of ideas, one of us suggested "California Stars" by Wilco.  It is the same 1-5-4 progression repeating throughout.  We found the tempo, Steve laid down a few acoustic rhythm tracks in stereo, I added the piano, bass and drums and Steve belted out one or two takes of the lead vocals.  (I had since asked him about sharing it with you all, and he said that he'd prefer to do another cut of the vocals, so I ran the tracks again and sang it... will share again when we re-record him).  

We had pretty much the whole thing done within a couple of hours of trying out some things.  I regret that we didn't have some photos from that day to share as we were working on it.  But we do have a pretty good rough recording.  Check it out by clicking below!  Hope you all like it!

Chris Smith & Steve Sidorak:  California Stars (Wilco cover)

Make sure you sign up for the mailing list by visiting the home page, www.ChrisSmithBand.net and hope to see you at an upcoming show!  

~ Chris

Valerie

Had the opportunity to jam a little bit this afternoon with Marie Hopperstad.  She's got one hell of a voice.  Check out this little recording we put together after just two takes.  It is a cover of Zutons' song Valerie.  It was also covered by the late and great Amy Winehouse.   

Valerie

"Imaginary Fears" Release Date to be Announced Soon!!!

Hi friends and fans!  

For those of you who have followed me on Facebook (www.facebook.com/ChrisSmithAcoustic) or on Twitter (www.twitter.com/CSmithAcoustic) then you've probably already heard that my first studio album, Imaginary Fears, is just about done.  The recording and mixing of 11 original songs has been completed.  It took me a while to get done, but I'm almost there!  Just working on the mastering, the album artwork and a couple of other minor details and we should be ready to release in the spring of this year!  

I am super excited about this record and I hope you all pick it up at one of my future shows or download it from iTunes or other digital music sources.  It contains songs that, for the most part, were written over the last five years of my life.  In some cases, I've had the music for a couple of them well before that time period, but re-wrote the lyrics to fit into the concept of the album.  

The concept of the record is a bit of an autobiography of my adult life while highlighting the fears that sometimes paralyze us into inaction, but which should never really be fears in the first place;  fear of losing, fear of rejection, fear of change, fear of regret.  These fears seem so very real at the time we experience them, but they shouldn't need to exist.  Life is too short to be afraid of little things that don't really matter in the end.  

I'm psyched to be able to share the full album with you all very soon, so make sure you check back here often for the release date and a very special album release show!!!  In the meantime, check out www.chrissmithband.net for clips, videos and other information.  See you soon!

Cheers!

Chris