For the past fourteen years, I’ve been running a medium sized recording studio and working as a freelance record producer. In other words, I’m self employed. For twelve of those years, I was without health insurance. Why? Because a health insurance plan for a single self employed patient costs roughly the same as a 30 year mortgage on a $165,000 house. So, for twelve years, I paid all of my medical costs out of pocket: doctor visits, prescriptions, and even a couple of emergency room visits, one of which included a $500 ziplock baggie with ice in it.

In 2007, because California allows for domestic partner insurance, I was able to get insurance through Jessica’s employer. Six weeks after the insurance took effect, I had to visit the emergency room. I’ll spare you the gory details, but it was a minor issue, and I was there for six hours, and the only treatment I received was a small shot of morphine and an endoscopy. The bill for this was over $50,000.

Had this happened to me just six weeks earlier, quite simply, I would have been ruined financially.

We need health care reform desperately, both for the uninsured, and for the insured. The current system is completely unsustainable. It’s choking small businesses to death and forcing the self-employed to either go uninsured or live in poverty.

Also, if you’re a pinko commie social liberal like me, you might also believe that a for-profit health care system that allows for a cost/benefit analysis on whether someone lives or dies is fundamentally immoral, that retroactive cancellations are fundamentally immoral, and that denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions is fundamentally immoral. If you’re a conservative, you might at least consider that sweeping health reform with a strong public option will, at the very least, be better for business.

In short, that’s my view. But I’ll add this, a few facts about our current system:

• Reform opponents in congress like to tell Americans that the United States has the best healthcare system in the world. The World Health Organization rates the United States 37th out of 191 countries it ranked on health care in 2000. The report analyses five factors: 1.) life expectancy, 2.) inequalities in health, 3.) the responsiveness of the system in providing diagnosis and treatment, 4.) inequalities in responsiveness, and 5.) how fairly systems are financed.

• If your car was manufactured in the United States, nearly $2000 of what you paid for it went towards providing health insurance for the workers who assembled it.

• In 1995, the number of uninsured workers in the United States was 14%. Today, it is 20% and rising.

• Health insurance premiums are currently rising 6 to 8 times faster than wages.

• Since 1999, employment-based health insurance premiums have increased 120 percent, compared to cumulative inflation of 44 percent and cumulative wage growth of 29 percent during the same period.

• In 2008, health care spending in the United States reached $2.4 trillion, 17 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP). Health care spending is projected to reach $3.1 trillion in 2012 and $4.3 trillion by 2016.

• Reform opponents often say that they don’t want a “government bureaucrat standing between them and their doctor,” but a 2003 study by the New England Journal of Medicine showed that patients with private insurance received the care recommended by their doctors only 54.9 percent of the time.

• The currently proposed reform bill will not: force anyone to give up their current health plan, insure illegal immigrants, pay for abortions, pay for sex change operations, or force elderly patients to discuss end-of-life planning with anyone.

I don’t claim to approach policy or politics without prejudice. I’m an unapologetic and impatient liberal. But I do approach them without emotion… as best I can. I had been doing a pretty good job of that watching events unfold in Iran. Until Saturday.

On Saturday, when I saw Neda Agha-Soultan die, I immediately thought of Roger Waters’s song “Watching TV” which he wrote about a young Chinese student who died in Tiananmen Square. Particularly these last lines:

“And she is different from Cro-Magnon man.
She’s different from Anne Boleyn.
She is different from the Rosenbergs
and from the unknown Jew.
She is different from the unknown Nicaraguan:
Half superstar; half victim.
She’s a victor star: conceptually new.
And she is different from the Dodo,
and from the Kankabono.
She is different from the Aztec,
and from the Cherokee.
She’s everybody’s sister.
She’s symbolic of our failure.
She’s the one in fifty million
who can help us to be free,
because she died on TV.”

I don’t know the name of the Chinese student Waters was writing about, and I haven’t seen the video that he saw. But I know that Neda’s death, while tragic and unforgivable, won’t be in vain if the fact that we have it on video for the whole world to see helps lead to real change in Iran.

In an effort to gain some objectivity on the bewildering process of putting together my own record, I’ve decided to treat my own record as I would one of my clients’ records in as many ways as I am able. That would mean the first step is to put together a board so I can track the status of the project.

Five boards cover between 50 and 55 songs. If I can abandon about eight tracks, this is enough:

I’ve been recording material for what would be a “Daniel Farris” record continuously since 1995. Three times, I have paused to take stock and consider what might be included on such a record. The first time was in 1997. I had more than enough material at that time, but I was hoping for just a couple more magical pieces, so I pressed on with recording. In 1998, Jonathan, Paul, Heather, and I formed Lunasect, and this became my overriding interest, so releasing Lunasect records took over as first priority. We released our first record in 1999. In 2000, Paul and Heather left the band, and Jessica took over as lead vocalist and keyboardist. We started working on our second record, and this gave me the opportunity to incorporate some of my solo recordings into Lunasect songs. A collaborative band environment was (and continues to be) the best outlet for my solo recordings, because I stopped writing lyrics when I was 20, and I’ve never been very good at writing vocal melodies. So Lunasect’s second record and the third record (recorded as The Black Pill, and still unreleased – a whole other story) allowed me to dispose of all of the “proper songs” in an ideal way.

This left me with only the instrumental, the experimental, the atonal, and the steady state. Twelve years worth by 2007.

In January of 2007, Jessica moved to Los Angeles, five months ahead of me. So I gave myself five months to finally complete and assemble a solo record before it was time to move. I got a whole lot done, but didn’t quite finish.

When I arrived in Los Angeles, my new studio space was not quite ready, so I accepted an offer to spend the summer on tour with an artist whose major label debut I had produced. When I returned from touring and finally moved into my new studio, I immediately began work producing a massive long term project for a new client. I finished that project at the end of 2008 and, in January of 2009, immediately moved out of that studio and began designing and moving into a new one.

It’s now March of 2009, and my new studio is almost complete, and I’m now looking again at finally releasing a record. Now I have fourteen years worth of material… minus the most compact and accessible material, which all morphed into Lunasect or Black Pill tracks, to evaluate. Unsurprisingly, this is both overwhelming and paralyzing.

Over the years, I’ve been setting aside the material that does nothing for me, so some of the editorial work has been done along the way. But I still have almost five hours of material that I do (or once did) consider worthy of release. How to extract 60 to 75 minutes for a single record? How to abandon four hours of material? A single record can’t possibly, at this point, serve as a sufficient calling card. I’ve been accumulating work for longer than most careers even last.

Over the last 13 years, every dime I’ve ever earned or spent has come from helping other artists make these decisions and recording the results, and I’m quite good at that. But this task is proving to be almost too much for me.

Clearly, it’s time to ask for help, perhaps in more ways than one. But who will help?

More often than not, in modern record production, this technique is simulated by placing multiple mono sources at various positions in the stereo field. But actual binaural stereo recording is still used in a few situations, such as drum overheads, orchestral or string recordings, and on the piano.

The way the vast majority of recording engineers (including better engineers than me- ones I look up to, admire and respect) use this technique on the piano drives me absolutely crazy. It seems that, since the late sixties or early seventies, popular wisdom has been to record the piano so that the bass strings (low notes) are on the left and the treble strings (high notes) are on the right. Some engineers might record it the opposite way, so that high notes are on the left and low notes are on the right. Either way, in my considered opinion, is completely boneheaded and moronic for a number of reasons.

The first reason this seems dumb to me is that, in order to create this outrageously drastic and contrived sounding effect in the first place, the microphones must be placed so close to the instrument that it sounds completely unnatural. It’s not uncommon for an engineer to place microphones under the lid, six to eighteen inches above the strings. Would it surprise you to hear that, within audio engineering communities, there is absolutely NO debate about whether or not this is too close? This is, by far, considered the “correct” way to record a piano on a pop, rock, jazz, or country record. The microphones are so close to the instrument that they’re literally inside it. I find this outrageous, and I find the fact that this technique is completely non-controversial even more outrageous. When was the last time you listened to a piano with your head inside it? The piano was never meant to be listened to in this way. But never mind that! This is now virtually the ONLY way you can hear one on a record.

The second reason I hate this technique is that hearing low notes on one side of the stereo field and high notes on the other sounds patently absurd to me. It sounds almost humorously bad. And it represents a fundamental (and often willful) misunderstanding about where the actual front of the instrument is. Modern record making proceeds from the assumption that the front of the instrument is where the player sits. Wrong. But I could forgive this assumption if it were off by 180 degrees, and this was actually the back. No. From the front of the instrument, there is no horizontal variation from low notes to high notes. The front of the instrument places the audience so that the player and the pinblock are on the left, and the hitchpins are on the right, like so:

So… looking at or listening to a piano from this position, which is the proper performance position, how is it possible to hear low notes coming from one side and high notes from the other?

It isn’t.

But that hasn’t stopped thousands of recording engineers, on tens of thousands of recordings, over four decades, from recording the piano that way… from the SIDE instead of the front.

How to add insult to injury? Well, this wrong-headed recording technique is so pervasive that even FAKE pianos sound that way now. If you buy an electronic keyboard, digital piano, or sampler, some of the piano sounds are quite good and sound an awful lot like an actual piano, but they’re ALL divided at middle C with low notes on the left and high notes on the right. It’s a painful reminder that, with sampled instruments, you’re speaking, not only with your own voice or the voice of the instrument, but also with the voice of the audio engineer who recorded the samples.

If my career in music and audio engineering amounts to nothing else ever, I would like to at least help end forever the pervasive use of this recording technique.

The classical engineers have this one right. Here is a montage of pop, rock and jazz tracks that were recorded using the popular technique, with low notes on one side and high notes on the other:

Stereo Piano Montage (MP3 File 2min 41sec)

And here is a recording of Maurice Ravel’s Ondine, recorded properly, from the actual front of the instrument, with the player and pinblock on the left, and the hitchpins on the right:

Ondine (MP3 File 53 sec)

This is, for me, not a dogmatic thought process. I don’t just dislike the common technique because it’s theoretically flawed from some sort of academic position. I dislike it because it actually sounds bad to me. It sounds unnatural. It isn’t how you hear a piano when you actually sit in a room where someone is really playing one. And I don’t object entirely because I’m an audio engineer. The first time I ever complained about this was 17 years ago when I was playing a piano that was being recorded by another audio engineer, who I consider one of many of my mentors in this craft.

2. The original post was not about race… AT ALL, in spite of Guy White’s repeated attempts to make it so. But for Guy White, everything is about race, whether it is or not. That’s because he is fixated on race and has so far not denied being a racist. I made the mistake of using two words that are “code” for people like Guy. Those words being “white” and “diversity.”

So let’s clarify the original post, shall we? My complaint was that all the twenty-something actors on Fox look alike. But because I used the political buzz word “diversity,” and distinguished that I was talking about white actors, it was assumed that I meant that there should be more black faces on Fox. (There probably should, but that’s another discussion entirely.) Diversity in this case is not an abbreviation for racial diversity. I mean all the actors look like Ryan Fucking Seacrest. I could not give a rat’s ass what color the actors are. They can all be white as long as they look different enough for me to tell them apart as a casual viewer.

I can see why this very simple point might be easy to miss if you’re so full of hate and fear that race is all you think about. And this is clearly true of anyone who spends as much time blogging about race as Guy White (nice name, huh?) does. If people like Guy spent their time and mental energy more productively, humanity might have flying cars and food pills by now.

But alas, I’m still waiting… and I’m now officially done discussing this.

Apparently some racist white people read it, assumed I was black, and took offense. But here’s the thing:

I’m white.

SEE?

So how exactly is one white guy complaining about the other white guys on Fox racist?

And, more importantly, what about my post would make you assume that I’m black? I find that very telling. And so should you… if you don’t already know what you are.

I really have zero patience for the “I’m not a racist, but…” racists. It’s the new racism for the 21st century.

If you spend a lot of time discussing and interpreting The Bell Curve, keep a close watch for reverse racism, feel like a member of a persecuted majority, pay close attention to the racial makeup of your community and how it might be changing, or (like Bill O’Reilly) find yourself surprised when people of other races don’t behave like savages, well, congratulations. You’re a racist.

I truly believe that a great many of these neo-racists honestly believe that they aren’t racists, because they don’t actually know what racism is. Having grown up in Alabama, I’ve seen this mostly in people who grew up around a much more overt and aggressive brand of racism, so they believe that their new and improved pseudo intellectual racism isn’t racism at all. They’re not burning crosses and using racial epithets like grandpa, but instead they’re discussing the IQ gap and reverse discrimination. It’s a really insidious disguise for the exact same thing: fear.

All the adult  white men look alike to me. It’s so extreme that I can’t follow the story line on some shows, because I can’t tell the white male characters apart. They all have the same facial structure, the same haircut, the same five o’clock shadow. Usually wardrobe doesn’t differ enough to be helpful. Glasses help, but they’re rare.

It’s patently ridiculous. This is what happens when intelligence and intuition are put on the back burner in favor of focus groups.

“Sir, our focus group data tells us that women between the ages of 14 and 25 would prefer it if all male roles were played by the same hunky 27 year-old with short brown hair, bed head, and a five o’clock shadow.”

“Great! Let’s go with that.”

Meanwhile, I can’t follow a show I’m not already familiar with, because I can’t tell the male actors apart.

People often say “seventies boobs looked different.” Now you know why. The reason you never saw A cups with small nipples in the seventies isn’t because there weren’t any. It’s just that you weren’t going to get a job as the babysitter in “Friday the 13th” if that’s what you were rocking.

When I was a child, particularly ages 5 to 12, I’m fairly certain I was full-blown obsessive compulsive. I counted things, often times things there were a LOT of. I indugled privately in rituals and routines, mostly small and unelaborate, but highly repetitive. And I looked for and created patterns, often very subtle and complicated ones. I was not a slave to these indulgences. In fact, I rather enjoyed them, but I kept them very much to myself. I was, if a little awkward, at least fully functional. I got good grades… at least until girls and music became more important.

Now I know that OCD doesn’t just go away. So where did it go?

I think, in my very early teens, I realized that I had to choose between indulging it and having a normal life. In short, I became its master. It got trivialized, shunted off to the far reaches of my brain and left to run in the background.

But I realize that this little subroutine running in the back of my head is where my love for (and unique skills at) music are rooted. Not that the act of making music is in any way either an obsession or a compulsion. Rather, in repetition and pattern recognition, there are ideas to be found. Ideas worth exploring. And I sometimes wonder how much better (or at least more interesting) my music might be had I allowed my childhood compulsions to go unchecked into adulthood. In short, what if I hadn’t chosen a normal life? What if I had been unable to choose for myself?

I have known (and still do) adults who are full-blown OCD. Quite frankly, it looks like unshirted hell to me. Or at the very least, it looks exhausting and unproductive. But having escaped a not so mild case of it myself, it also looks like a prison cell with its doors wide open.

I certainly have no desire to spend my adult life counting steps and looking for patterns, or worse, but I often shudder at the works of art I have failed to imagine.