Happy Holidays!

It’s that time of the year again. It’s the Holiday Season! Whoop-dee-doop and dickory dock, don’t forget to hang up your sock…

Sorry, I’ve been listening to a lot of Christmas music lately so random lyrics will pop into my head at the slightest provocation. And I’m very familiar with Christmas music. Honestly, I can listen to it all year long. Does that make me a freak? Perhaps. But that’s neither here nor there.

The reason we’ve gathered here today is to celebrate the holidays LFTI-style! So let’s get to it.

First, since it’s not on lifefromtheinside.com yet, I thought that I would post the latest LFTI Holiday Video Greeting here in the blog! Pick a present from under the tree, pour a glass of eggnog, shove a candy cane in your mouth, make a snowball, hang some mistletoe (if you can find it, seriously they don’t sell that stuff anywhere this year! Just because it’s poisonous for pets?! So is Drain-O, but I haven’t seen them pull that from the shelves…) light a fire (safely in the fireplace), split a yule log, trim the tree, hang garland, deck halls and get ready to get into the holiday mood with LFTI!




And now that you’re of a generous spirit…BAM! I’m gonna hit you with New Music Wednesday!

And what, you may ask, is the melodious offering this week? Why it’s the soundtrack to the LFTI Holiday video of course!

So, here it is, the less-compressed version of You Could Teach Santa (a thing or two):

UPDATE: The embed doesn't seem to be working. You can hear the song here:

You Could Teach Santa (a thing or two)

As you can see, it has hit about 98 in the Holiday Music category over at OurStage.com. Believe it or not, it has jumped from 170-something overnight. So that’s good. It only has 6 views as of this morning. So, if you want, feel free to play it everyday until Christmas. That might help the standings. Of course, you can also go to OurStage, create a profile and partake in the arduous judging process too, voting for this song all along the way (really, judging over there is no joke. It’s quite the process). But just playing it is fine too.

A little history about this song:

A few years ago, two Christmases in a row in fact, Tanya and I made Christmas albums for our families for presents. For the first album we recorded 10 original songs and for the second album we recorded 11 original songs. It was quite the undertaking (I had a lot more free time back then).

This song was on the first album and was written for my mother who really could teach Santa a thing or two about generosity, love and, as of last night, how to give his oldest son grief about his new Blackberry.

Now, so that you don’t feel cheated about receiving a “recycled” song, I painstakingly re-recorded this tune for the LFTI video. I mean painstakingly. The original was recorded on a smaller scale. In fact, I recorded it on my old computer with sample software (only 4 tracks) and the little plastic computer mic that came with it.

Oh, you know what, here it is, for the first time on the internet, the orginial version of You Could Teach Santa a Thing or Two:

Here is the link (embed not working)

You Could Teach Santa a Thing or Two (Original Version)

Have a Happy Holiday Season!

The New Year will bring all sorts of interesting stuff!

ROBB

Goin’ Nuts

Peanuts that is.

It’s time for another “New Music Wednesday!” This week I’ve got something that I’m pretty proud of.

If you’ve watched LFTI you probably already figured out that I (and Tanya and Steve, and Kathy when she was producing) like to create little “homages” to other works and styles (and if you don’t watch LFTI then what are you doing reading this?! Go watch!). Most of the time they’re not very specific, but in last year’s Halloween special and this year’s Thanksgiving special the tributes to Charles Shultz’s Peanuts are pretty obvious.

For “It’s the Great Pumpkin, Mason” I did a little Vince Guaraldi-esque theme and incidental music (and there was a tick-or-treater wearing a Charlie Brown ghost costume). We also created a “wall scene” at the end with cutout images from the short.

This year there were plans for another wall scene. But I wasn’t happy with the quality of the cutouts. They just weren’t right. So I got the idea to Peanuts-ize the cast. I think it was fairly successful. Especially since I was really rushed. In fact, in order for it not to turn out a total shambles, we pushed back the launch of the Thanksgiving short by a day.

The music was again a very important element and one that I looked forward to doing. Of course, once I actually started writing the music I had second thoughts. This kind of thing always seems so breezy, but I have to tell you, it’s incredibly stressful. Anyone who has ever stared at a blank page or lump of clay or white canvas or jeans that don’t fit anymore will know what I’m talking about (that last one may just be me). There’s the excitement of achievement mixed with an almost overwhelming despair that the result won’t meet your own expectations.

Incidentally, I think that initial feeling of despair is the reason that most people don’t do things of an artistic nature. It’s a high hurdle. In fact, in my opinion, it’s the only hurdle. How many times have you heard people say “I can’t draw (or whatever)! Nothing that I do ends up looking (sounding…) like it ‘should’!” What those people don’t realize is that almost everyone has the same thought. Even great artists (I’m not including myself here). The only difference is that they went ahead and did it anyway (and then, in some cases, tortured themselves for not living up to their own impossible standards).

Okay, so the music: Luckily, I was able to get over the early speed bumps and get the music done. It always helps to have a deadline.

This is pretty much the same type of deal as the music for ITGP,M. Only this tune is more upbeat. I once again incorporated a portion of the LFTI theme Fine Print. This time I used the bridge of that tune for the “b” section (or chorus, if you will) of this one. Now I think that I have culled all of Fine Print, so I don’t know what will happen when I write another special! I cross that bridge when I come to it I guess.

I’ll do another side-by-side comparison for you and you can hear for yourself. If you know the LFTI Theme then you may recognize what I mean. It’s the section that goes “They never told you the catch, some restrictions come attached…” You can hear a repeated and transposed cycle of that basic melody in the middle of this song.

So, without further ado, New Music Wednesday, Life from the Inside and I are proud to present the theme song from Thanks for Nothing, Mason, aptly titled…Thanks for Nothing, Mason.

Fine Print:

And also for your listening pleasure, here is the theme from It’s the Great Pumpkin, Mason:

As always, check back here for other exciting blog posts and new music!

Just so you know, I only yesterday received a new recording interface and it pretty much kicks ass. So the music quality will only go up (at least the recording quality, I can’t vouch for the content)! In fact I predict that the music for Episode 8 will rock. Some may even say it’s bodacious, bitchin’ and/or rad.

Stay tuned…

ROBB

Holiday Speciality

We're in the middle of prepping to shoot this weekend. Should be fun and weird - now I understand when actors talk about how odd it is to shoot holiday stuff way before it happens.

See, we're getting ready to shoot a little holiday special - which is going to be very funny, but still, it's like 87 degrees here today and we have to get in the mindset of the holidays. Which I guess shouldn't be too hard since it's always still around 87 degrees here during the actual holidays. Ah Los Angeles, sometime I really hate your lack of "weather".

One of the hardest parts of getting a holiday special ready was trying to find all of the correct food type stuff without getting hosed on the prices. At least all of the stores already have decorations in stock. I know everyone makes jokes about the stores getting holiday stuff in earlier and earlier every year, but Costco has Christmas decorations up already! And while that may make Robb really excited, it just makes me sad. Of course you don't see me complaining when the Halloween candy is in the stores early.

Also, who knew it was so hard to find someone that owned a gravy boat? I mean, I don't own one, but I figured I must know someone who does?! Of course, I only asked 2 people, but still, I thought my odds were pretty good.

I will be able to tell you more about the special after it airs. It's been fun to get ready for this one, we even had a cast bar-b-que on Labor Day to hang out and make some props. Yes, we can multitask with the best of them! Unfortunately Corrie had the stomach flu on Labor Day, so she was sent home from the last rehearsal with supplies and told to make her own prop. I can't wait to see how it turned out!

Tanya