Watson here. Long day of recording our new album today. Last night we fell asleep early. 9pm Alyssa and I were dozing. And we slept long.
But I should give some background. This is the first entry after all.
My name is Matt. Aka Watson. Aka The Red Baron. Aka The Gross Shark. I created Watson Moon sometime in 2018 as my other band burned to ashes. Things fall apart. Many many such cases.
I got in the Prius and went to LA. Why not? That had always been the plan. And my cousin was there. Megan, an actress, soon to find much success. https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4366442/
I'd already recorded See You Out There, our first full length. Inspired by Bowie I hulled up in my mother's basement eating nothing but peppers and milk. The peppers and milk part was Bowie, not so much the mother's basement.
Anyway, I'd “finished” it and mixed it myself, a horrendous mix that I pressed on to mail-order 300 CDs (most of which would burn up in a fire – more on that later). I figured I had to have something to show people in LA. I was thankful for my mother letting me stay at her house and focus on writing. I worked at the local electronics shop to save money for the move.
Crashing on Megan's floor I wasted no time hitting the sunset strip. I handed out the Watson CD's liberally but I found that the market in LA was quite saturated. With my savings I got an apartment in Culver City and start working at the Boys and Girls Club. Calabasas. You know where the Kardashians and Drake live.
There I wrote The Great American Novel. Since my collaborators were still in Seattle, I'd fly up to record drums, saxophones, keys, and vocals. Rob and Andy, of the Seattle band High Pulp, were deeply in the project. Gabija too, a Lithuanian ex-patriot trained in the veteran bars.
Drew, a pilot and radio DJ, mixed the record as we went along. He is a great man who BOUGHT his own house in West Seattle. In THIS economy? The man is incredible.
The trips to Seattle became my sanctuary as life in LA became increasingly intense. I took another job delivering illicit marijuana in Beverly Hills. When the lease expired on our apartment we left the furniture on the sidewalk and I moved to an “artist collective.”
In those days, before Covid decimated them all, there were several of these huge collectives in LA. Basically you'd pay $800 for a pod in a wall. These were curtained inlets, all in a row, large enough to sleep in but not much else. With a cubby outside them to store all your earthly belongings. These places were popular with artists moving to LA from all over the country who wanted to test the waters and live among other creatives before renting an apartment.
Included with the rent was the ability to book time in their custom built recording studios. So here I wrote and recorded another album, unreleased now and likely forever. “My Life In The Shallows With Ghosts," we called it.
When Covid hit I was relieved. I had just sold my amp and didn't know how I would pay the next month's rent. I must've not been working enough hours. In any case, the company designated our house (there were several) the “quarantine house” and everybody healthy was ordered to leave. I returned to my mother's basement for the last time. She would sell the house soon after.
In the dark depths of the quarantine I wrote a lot. Hundreds of songs. These were strange times. Most of these songs are still unreleased but a few have come out: “Annika” “This Is No Time To Dream” …
Eventually we would complete another album from the best of this material. “Sometimes In Tehachapi,” named after the city we later completed it in. Finished 2023 and as of now still unreleased, though I hope it will someday see the light of day.
As insanity gripped us all after months of isolation, I had a choice to make: put my roots back down in Seattle or get in the car and drive back to LA. An LA friend had a lease overlap and therefore a vacant apartment for a few weeks. She offered it to me. I took the offer and rocketed homeward.
Long intense times as Covid continued and I blew my stimulus money on very stupid things. Very stupid things and activities I won't talk about here. That's for the deep dive post. (Are you guys interested in those???) This is the general story. When the lease of that LA apartment ended I moved to Orange County to stay with Joe, a very old friend.
And there I was in Orange County. “I'll start working again,” I said. And I did. I got a nice place with a big yard and even got a kitty cat from the local animal shelter. “I'm finally settled down,” I thought.
And it was true. In this current home, since late 2020, I've set up a studio and written/recorded all the songs you probably know. All of PPBOTS was recorded here.
So that is the story. The last few years have been very chill compared to the previous ones. And I'm blogging up a storm!!! Surely I will continue to blog and this will not be the only post!! Surely!
But anyway that's the backstory to what I did today.
Woke up with Alyssa at like 9AM or sum and we made some bagels with that interesting lemon pepper seasoning. Then we went to the library and RECORDED!!
The main songs I'm working on now are called: (working titles)
- Poor Old Tuko (or Tuko Says)
- Concrete and Cobblestone
- At Least It's Simple
- What's The Difference (Come And Take My Gold) (not very far along yet at all but I like a lot)
All of them are close to done except for drums. I always have to do drums last because I don't have a recording setup for drums here. So I either go to Alyssa's Alesis Nitro Max E-Kit or up to Eagle Rock to do IRL drums with Rob. Sometimes I even get a Fiverr drummer to help me out. I forgot all about that, I haven't done it in awhile.
Rob's on:
Sadie, Leave Your Husband, Fly In The Aeroplane High, Cornered In The Alleyway, Zoomer Girl
The Alesis is on:
You Look Like Someone I Knew, What's The Temperature, O Vegas
And the Fiverr Drummer guy I always use is on:
Anne Marie, Bad Science
Anyway that is not really useful info except for the NERDS who are obsessed with Watson (there aren't any YET). But I'm hoping there will be some at some point! Like I read all of Billy Corgan's livejournal writings with fascination. I hope to someday inspire kids to read mine just cuz they love the music and want to know more about it.
Trying to think about what we actually did musically today…. I recorded the bridge of Poor Old Tuko and tried to splice it in. Living in my current house kinda sucks because we can't record anything past 9pm. We got early sleepers. And, like most of you, I feel most inspired at NIGHT. So I guess ya'll getting BLOG POSTS instead of SONGS now lmao!!!
Aight I'll sign off for now but hopefully will post again very soon!!! (btw its now 9:26 so writing all that took aprox 45 min…. is that fast or slow writing??
Love,
Matt