NEWS 2011

12/31/11:

There have been two, count 'em, two new posts at The Blog Of The Phantom Airship since the last update here. Happy New Year, let's see some increased activity in 2012!

10/29/11:

Don Campau has posted a one-hour "Music of Greg Segal" special as part two of a recent "No Pigeonholes" podcast. Thank you Don!

9/28/11:

Last weekend saw the beginning of transferring 24 track Paper Bag session tapes to multitrack digital format. There is a lot to transfer and this will most likely lead to some rad primo gnarly archival releases. Click here for the full story.

9/19/11:

Just added an "Unused cover art and promo photos" section to the galleries.

9/2/11:

Two major downloads to report: Paper Bag's "Music To Trash", and Bret Hart/Greg Segal "Duets 2". These are the complete albums. More to come soon.

8/23/11:

Did some minor changes to the notes for "In Search Of The Fantastic" and "An Awareness Of Frameworks", as well as various other tweaks.

 

8/22/11:

A new era has begun: at last, we are off of dial-up and on to high speed. The site is also now hosted at a spiffy new space, where our available headroom is gigantic in comparison to our previous piddly 100MB. Be on the lookout for all sorts of changes and improvements. Ditto for the Paper Bag site, coming soon back to the Phantom Airship fold. Also on the way: a whole bunch of free music downloads.

 

7/28/11

Recently heard from Daniel Simon, the engineer who recorded my first multi-track studio sessions back in...'82? He worked at a large, pro 24-track studio and stole me some time in the middle of the night. I did a version of "Nothing New/Pandrona". I've only had a cassette copy of it all these years, and assumed that was all that existed. But no; Daniel had a half-track copy. I'd completely forgotten that we'd mixed down to that, and the cassette was from it. I don't know if he has access to the 24-tracks; he hinted that he may. If so, I don't know what the chances are of getting them transferred to digital. But about 10 years ago, he did a digital transfer of the 2-track master. He has just sent me a copy. I'm excited to hear it.

 

6/3/11

Not a whole lot of music news. I am doing a bit of cleanup work on this site, as time permits; you may notice a few things missing or different. Equipment purchases/creation has continued, slowly. Music writing/brainstorming continues as always. Study continues, as always.

The hangar still stands. Consider this a period of dormancy and restoration. The factory doors are shut, the dock doors padlocked. No one goes in, nothing comes out; but lights occasionally burn late behind the filmy, dusty windows, uninteligable voices are heard, strange sounds emanate and fade. The future, no doubt, remains a mystery; but things continue.

2/26/11

Got some airplay recently c/o Don Campau's "No Pigeonholes EXP" show, which included "The Museum at 20,000 Fathoms", from "Episodes".

Updates of any kind- whether here or at the sadly neglected blog- have not been easy to get to. Nonetheless I managed to move off udpates from 2010 onto their own page, and hope to do more blogwork in the near future. Maybe even some more release notes- I've been getting to work on some for "Standard", and have been editing an older set for "Water From The Moon" .

As for actual work, I've managed to do a bit of recording here and there. I've been studying up on instrument making, and have graduated a few pieces from the garage workshop to the (temporary) drum area. Chimes, mostly; aluminum bars and thin plate aluminum, rescued from throwaway pans.

1/26/11

Got the finished version of "Mr Axolotl", featuring Bret Hart, Eric Wallack, Peter Zolli, Don Campau and me. Bret Hart has made this and our two duets CDs available from Lulu.com. I went looking for an easy link to put in here and they're all like two pages long. So, go to the site and search on Greg Segal, and those three CDs will turn up. May I also suggest you spend some time searching through Bret's store? (Search there on Bret Harold Hart.)

1/23/11

Finally finished the notes for the 2010 remaster of "In Search Of The Fantastic".

1/11/11

You might think I did an update today just to enjoy the date. No; but it doesn't hurt. Today's update is to announce the next of the Nods, a little mini-tribute to the work of the late great Vincent Crane.

1/8/11

Finally have the "Nods: or, influences and appreciations" page up. I've been meaning to get this going since I started the site. Only one piece written thus far and it's on Roy Wood. Hope to have more soon, even if they're short; I can always beef 'em up later, and better some mention than none at all.

I should have mentioned last time that the entire Paper Bag band has been interviewed by Abe Gibson for an upcoming book called "SST- The Blasting Concept". Normally I might not have been too excited by this, but Abe's an improvisor and, judging by what's in his back catalog, one with avante garde leanings. This will be one SST history where the guy writing at least gets what we were about, which is nice for a change. I had a blast with the interview, and wish Abe well with his book.

 

1/1/11

Not exactly on top of the updates lately, but this is not exactly new either. Big news: Chrissy and I had our second child, also a girl, in November. Are we busy? Er....yep. I have used this metaphor a lot to friends and acquaintances: it's like waking up behind the wheel at the Indy 500, when you're only used to regular traffic. It'll take us a while to get to our new normal. Meanwhile everyone's fine. Lux (munchkin #2's nickname) was a bit ill at first, but she got over it. Lulu loves her little sister and is very protective- got between her and the pediatrician on Lux's 2 week checkup.

On to some music news: on 12/12, Jerry Kranitz played "What Once Was Is", from the remastered "In Search Of The Fantastic"; a CD called "Mr Axolotl" was finished, featuring yours truly, Bret Hart, Eric Wallack, Peter Zolli and Don Campau.. I'm not exactly sure when that one will be available but it's a fun disc.