Zen and Gear
It seems like musicians have it rough. We love music, equipment and toys and man I love audio gear. When I worked at Sweetwater I had a blast talking about it, learning about it. EVERYTHING. I have tons of vinyl, guitars, amps, pedals, turntables, microphones. But as I look at life it seems I want something maybe more simple, more streamlined. At times my mind seems overloaded with clutter. For a while I have been reading blogs like Zen habits, also I have been a design junkie for years (maybe this is why I like Apple so much) but it is time to cut back. Every time I sell the extra gear it doesn’t seem to help the clutter, so I am taking drastic measures. Getting rid of almost everything in life. I will keep just enough gear to do any jobs that come my way, I will rely on software for almost everything INCLUDING guitar amps. All my vinyl is going, I am trying to get all my books on Kindle. Because at the end of the day it seems like it will just be stuff my kids will have to throw out when I die, so why not make life easier.
Also there is something appealing about having my entire life on one laptop that is backed up to dropbox. In life we are also trying to go totally paperless, all magazines in digital, all mail scanned and discarded. I am even trying to get a simple minimalists wallet that will only house my ID, a few credit cards and that’s it. I believe this will give me extra mind space to focus on good songwriting and getting all the tone I want from Reason. If I need to sample there is a wealth of stuff on the Internet. Of course I will keep a few guitars that I need, but most will go. All my notes and ideas will be recorded into Evernote, most of the music I listen to is stored on a NAS box, Google music or Spotify. All the music I am working on will move to a single laptop. Just to focus on writing and music making, health and entrepreneurship sounds refreshing getting all the distractions out of the way. This adventure is very exciting, here is what I want to have for my setup when all done.
1 electric guitar
1 bass guitar
1 acoustic guitar
1 Audio Interface
1 highend laptop
2 event 20/20 monitors
1 MPK61 keyboard or other 61 key keyboard with control knobs and sliders
1 big screen.
1 FBV express foot pedal for controlling amps in Reason
1 Reason software with a BUNCH of refills and Rack extensions
Thats it, and its a lot less than before. Also I would challenge you that if you think all your stuff is worth money, sell it and see how little you actually get. Now that I am a month or so in to this, I have to say it feels great it is literally a weight lifted off me. It is wonderful to just focus and clear my mind.