On the way to the studio today I found myself at the coffee shop talking to Michael who is part of the Psychedelic Robot show. “Psychedelic Robot is an immersive, 360º visual storytelling experience with interactive exhibits”. At the end of the conversation, another man came up to me and asked me how I could be wearing shoes and socks in this weather. It seemed like a rather banal question, not quite as interesting as psychedelic robots. I told him I’m in an air-conditioned studio all day, he seemed satisfied with that answer. My point about sharing this is that it’s America, it’s really easy to talk to people in a casual way. A man pushing a bike asking odd questions or a corporate managing director, the bloke from the valet parking or the Seven Eleven, the woman in the Bentley, or the man in the McClaren, Americans will give you the time of day.

We had to rerecord some acoustics when we arrived in the studio as we noticed there was quite a loud buzz on one of the channels. Brian actually played the parts better, probably because it was earlier in the day, rather than late at night. We went on to one 12-string acoustic part and then nylon string before getting into the electric guitars. We had John’s sixties Fender Super Reverb and Kevin’s Bad Cat amp, Brian’s Archer pedal on the pedalboard, his 1966/67 Rickenbacker 6-string, and the Ibanez UE 405. What could go wrong?

I was actually feeling a little under the weather today, I never quite got going but that’s ok because Brian did and I figured out some musical parts in his songs that needed looking at and he played a mixture of arpeggios, chords, and solo parts. Brian’s music is quite complicated and consequently, it has to be played well otherwise it would sound messy, so it takes some time to record, plus there are a lot of guitar parts. It’s a fascinating journey making records. When you think about sitting on your bed with an acoustic guitar and an idea and the stages you have to go through to get to a finished album, it takes a lot of skilled people, a lot of time, a lot of investment.

The moon was bright tonight, not full, maybe not even half but it shone brightly in the sky. I always see planes flying by and tonight a helicopter which sounds extremely scary, being in a helicopter at night. Olivia went to Guitar Center to return a string from her expensive set as there was an issue, they gave her 25% back, from there to a luthier who made it work after all. Later on, before we left, with the moon shining into the room, she had a quick spurt of bowing that attracted the attention of the next-door neighbours who demanded more lit up from the heavens.

Music today is sticking with the quintessential American album, Don McLean’s American Pie (1971). It features the famous title track and one of Olivia’s favourite songs, Vincent. I once went to his house and met his wife because my bassist Hannah’s mum was working with her on some photography. It was a mansion in Maine. This song came out as a seven-inch single and because it had so many verses Side 1 faded out, you flipped it and Side 2 faded in. Those Were The Days, wait, that’s Mary Hopkin.

Music Of The Daze