11/15/1999 5:33 PM

1. Take more of a macro view of what the primary voice is doing, there is no need to shadow everything it does.  
2. When playing an ostinato, don’t ‘play in time’, but instead groove.

11/15/1999 5:33 PM - One thing that I have realized is how much the life that my father led and things that he exposed me to has influenced my music. He lives out in the middle of nowhere on the river. As a child when I would go visit him I would lay at night and listen to the frogs and crickets spray the air with audible dust. At first this was seemed very loud and disturbing, but after a time I started to notice rhythmic patterns. I would spend much time trying to focus on either the frogs or crickets. In doing this I was struck when it became apparent to me that at times they would synchronize***. This is what I have come to notice in many areas of these recordings (MBQ). I never noticed it before and it is not deliberate. As a matter of fact, the areas that it takes place in I generally disliked what was happening musically. All along it was the most natural truth. I am glad that I don't get in the way of the music as much as my hindsight would have me.
.MAtt Butler 

***After noticing that I became enamored with the sounds around me and would listen to car brakes, dryers (hair and clothes (the doppler effect from a sisters hair dryer in the morning...)), literally everything that made any kind of sound. This was years before I started "studying music" at the age of 16. By that time I was well on my way to driving myself crazy.