Sunday, April 07, 2013

Pray!

We live in a messed up world. Lots of people are hurting, sad, unemployed, sick. A heart and hand extended in love and grace to others has never been more needed than now.

Listen, really listen, to the people around you - friends, spouse, children. Pray for them. And just love them, put your hand on their shoulder, hug them, be there for them and talk when they need to talk.

This song was started in 2011. The lead guitars were recorded with a Jackson PC (Phil Collen) guitar with a Sustainer pickup into Sansamp PSA plugin in pro Tools. The vocals have TC Helicon Voicetone Doubler. Harmonies use the ElectroHarmonix Voice Box.

Pray MP3

Lyrics:
Pray Lyrics PDF
If you see that your neighbor's out of work PRAY – PRAY
If you see your boss is being a jerk PRAY – You gotta PRAY
Grandma's hurting but you know she's gonna try
Your friend is sick and you know he's gonna die
Do it always not just when you're gonna cry PRAY – You gotta PRAY
Pray - Lift up your voice

(© 2011-2013 Scott Miller - Pilgrimsprog Music).

Sunday, December 09, 2012

Satisfied

Another Sign of Jonah song. This has a lyrical twist.

Drivin' down the road in my Chevrolet
Wonder what problems I might face today
Everything seems to be goin' all right
So why can't I be satisfied?

Stoppin' by a light, see a guy by the road
He got no shoes and he barely got clothes
Walked up to my car don't know what to do
So I fumbled around for a buck or two
He started telling me about his Lord
Even though he got nothin' he don't need no more.
Started talking about the peace in his life
Funny how he can be satisfied

So basically the homeless poor guy tells the rich guy about Jesus (rather than the usual story where the roles are reversed).

Satisfied MP3

(© 2005 Gary Heitz and Scott Miller).

BTW - this is a difficult song to play live.

Refine My Heart

Another Sign of Jonah song from the early 2000's.

Sign of Jonah with Gary Heitz and with Mike Smith on drums.


lyrics:
Jesus is the life
Jesus is the light
Jesus is the way of salvation

Refine My Heart MP3
 
(© 2005 Gary Heitz and Scott Miller)

Saturday, December 08, 2012

The Sacrifice

So I have played in Christian bands since the mid 1990's. Some were outreach bands, some praise/worship bands.

In the 2000's I was in Sign of Jonah with Gary Heitz. We recorded The Sacrifice with Mike Smith on super heavy drums. Check it out.

The Sacrifice MP3
 
(© 2005 - Gary Heitz and Scott Miller)


Mike Smith on drums


Here I Am

Back before Pilgrimsprog, and before Crucible, in the '90's I was in a church outreach band called Beyond the Veil. This was band that played outreach concerts in the summertime, sponsored by Calvary Chapel in Wichita, which is now Calvary Chapel Christian Fellowship. We played mostly Maranatha Praise Band songs, and we also wrote some pretty cool originals and recorded a CD.

One of the songs on the CD was a song I wrote with Gary Heitz called Here I Am.

It is based on Hebrews 10:7 -
7Then I said, ‘Here I am — it is written about me in the scroll — I have come to do your will, O God.’”

The lyrics:
Here I am
It is written about me in the scroll
Here I am
I have come to make my people whole
Here I am
Sin will never take control again
For Here I am.

Here I Am MP3
(© 1997 Scott Miller)

Arise O Lord

I had the unenviable position of being unemployed twice in the last two years - in 2010 and 2011, both in the summertime. It is difficult being unemployed in this economy and it takes about 3 months to go through the hiring process, even if you interview really soon after being unemployed.

Like Dietrich Bonhoeffer, the German pastor who was martyred by the Nazis in WWII, I prayed the Psalms daily.

The thing I like about the Psalms is how David writes the perfect song. The verse is the cry to God - "I am in the mire. How long O Lord? Will you hide your face forever?" But the chorus is recounting God's deliverance in times past, and His promise of delivering, although David is still in the trouble he is in, God's rescue hasn't happened yet. I love this pattern, and it is my favorite pattern for writing music. I use it all over the place, especially in Ceiling of Brass.

While unemployed in 2011, I penned Arise O Lord, based on Psalm 13:

1How long, O Lord? Will you forget me forever?
How long will you hide your face from me?
2How long must I wrestle with my thoughts
and every day have sorrow in my heart?
How long will my enemy triumph over me?
3Look on me and answer, O Lord my God.
Give light to my eyes, or I will sleep in death;
4my enemy will say, “I have overcome him,”
and my foes will rejoice when I fall.
5But I trust in your unfailing love;
my heart rejoices in your salvation.
6I will sing to the Lord,
for he has been good to me.

In this Psalm, verses 1 and 2 are the cry to God. Verses 5 and 6 are the promise of salvation.
Arise O Lord MP3


(Arise O Lord - © 2011 Scott Miller - Pilgrimsprog Music)
(Ceiling of Brass - copyright 2001 Scott Miller)

Scandal

In early 2010, I was reading D.A. Carson's book Scandalous: The Cross and Resurrection of Jesus.
1 Corinthians 15:23 - 23 says -
but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles.
That word for "foolishness" in the Greek is "skandalon" which is the same word where we get "scandal". It gives it more depth of meaning if you read it this way:
but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and a scandal to Gentiles. Scandalous!
The message of the cross is that God sent His Son (Matthew 21:37) Jesus, fully God in the flesh, to die at the hands of men. God dying at the hand of His creation?
It is scandalous! And it demands a response.
The Scandal MP3

© 2010 Scott Miller - Pilgrimsprog Music - pilgrimsprog.com
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There is a story
You may have heard
One Sunday morning or out in the world
About a man
The Son of God, its said

Born of a virgin
Born as man
Said he was God's Son
that he had a plan
They took Him and killed Him
and hung Him on a tree
But He rose again!

Oh, it's a scandal
How God came to the Earth as a man
Oh, it's a scandal
How God died at the hands of all men

Now you have heard it
You must decide
What will you do with this one who's called Christ?
Others have died
But one difference I see
He rose again!

Thanatophobia - the Fear of Death

than·a·to·pho·bi·a [than-uh-tuh-foh-bee-uh] - an abnormal fear of death.

My philosophy on lyrics and song ideas is that I write about things I am thinking about, or struggles I am going through in life, or prayers, or whatever. Sometimes they are thought experiments. And music is the best way (at least for me) that I can attest to and share my faith.


In Spring 2011, I was amazed to hear several stories of people who were really afraid of death. On Easter Sunday morning one of the elders at church talked about how he was afraid of death, bordering on the irrational, before becoming a Christian.

That same week I read about a woman who had the corpses of her husband and twin sister dug up and kept the corpses in a spare bedroom. All because she had a fear of death. And she was very claustrophobic and could not imagine her loved ones being in the ground and not being able to breathe. (hello? they're dead!)

Talking to people, even Christians, I was surprised to find many people afraid of death. And I know a friend who is struggling because her son was killed in a car accident.

To which I say, why are you acting like there is no resurrection of the dead?

12Now if Christ is preached, that He has been raised from the dead, how do some among you say that there is no resurrection of the dead?13But if there is no resurrection of the dead, not even Christ has been raised;14and if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain. (1 Corinthians 15:12-14).

I also read about people in the cholera outbreaks of the 19th century who were buried with a string tied to the wrist running up to a bell that they could ring if they were buried alive by accident. (no one ever rang the bell).

This song was written in the Crucible days. I took a lead guitar idea from Kyle and the song Thanatophobia (the fear of death) was written in less than a week.


Thanatophobia MP3
 
Thanatophobia captured on a Youtube video

(© 2011 Scott Miller - Pilgrimsprog Music - pilgrimsprog.com)
 

I want to talk to you
Not tell you what to do
So you might find a better way
Thanatophobia
You're in its grip because
You might not see another day

As you get get older there's a fear of death
What really happens when you die? 
Deep in the ground, is that the end of it?
Try as you might you just can't get it out of your mind.
Thanatophobia
Claustrophobia
You feel you're locked down in the ground
Several cubic feet of dirt surrounding you
And not a living soul around
Tie a bell onto your wrist as a precaution
Ring it loud and they may hear
If they start to dig  - will they even find you?
Does it quell your ghastly fear?

All flesh on earth has died
But only one to rise
And by that act He made a way
Thanatophobia
Has lost its grip because
He rose again that sunny day




Post Pilgrimsprog - What's Next?

The main project for Pilgrimsprog - I could call it Pilgrimsprog I - was completed in 2010, after taking four years to write/record.

Next came the band Crucible with my friend, the shredmaster Kyle Kraft. Our plan was simple - to be a fun band playing music that rocked that happened to reflect our Christian beliefs. Our song list was a mix of amped-up versions of Christian covers like "My Savior", "God of Wonders", "and "Give Us Clean Hands", mixed with originals like "Thanatophobia", "On That Day", "Scandal", and "Arise O Lord", which you can listen to in the embedded app on the right of this page or on the Reverbnation Crucible page. (And I will also post here). We eventually moved to playing mostly originals.

Playing mostly non-church gigs outside church, at Troopfest in Newton, Lexi's Lamb fundraiser with Thryc3born, a car show, for example, which is a good way to make an impact in a non-Christian setting.

We played at Riggs park in Haysville, and when we signed up the next year to rent the band shell and play at the park they mistook us for an infamous punk band that wrecked the park shortly before. Annoying and funny at the same time. So we ended up having to have our concert with family and friends on the back forty in Sedgwick, which was captured on a Youtube video.

Crucible broke up after Kyle moved to KC for work and I moved to Lawrence (but can you say future reunion)?

So what now?

- I am working on a new prog song that is called Writer's Block, appropriately named because it is taking me forever to write. It also features multiple time changes. - I still am writing Crucible-type songs along the lines of Thanatophobia. - And new worship/praise songs like Rocks Cry Out, which is not mine but I like nonetheless.

My goal is to have a music catalog for different occasions and different audiences, to "be ready in season and out of season" (2 Timothy 4:2).

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Pilgrimsprog Project

All of the Pilgrimsprog Project songs:

My favorites are Dream and SOD.


You can also listen to them in the links on the right or the ReverbNation plugin on the right.


All songs © 2010 Scott Miller  - Pilgrimsprog Music - pilgrimsprog.com
except "I Believe" and "Confrontation" which are © 2010 Scott Miller and Gary Heitz

Act1

Dream - MP3

Seek the Gate - MP3

Slough of Despond (SOD) - MP3

Help - MP3

Gatekeeper - MP3

I Believe - MP3



Act 2

Overture - MP3

Beautiful - MP3

Beautiful Live MP3

Confrontation - MP3

Giant Despair - MP3

The River - MP3

Celestial City
- Celestial City MP3

- Celestial City Radio Mix MP3
Compline - MP3


Dream with solo

"Dream"


Dream has strings from Xpand, drum loops from Beta Monkey Music. Guitar is Rectifier from Johnson J-Station.


Solo is by Kyle Kraft.


Access the MP3 from the links on the right


A little Lord of the Rings Soundtrack inspiration at the beginning, then Dream Theater-heavy inspiration in the middle.

Celestial City

Celestial City is pretty much done. 10+ minutes long.


Over 10 minutes long. Many, many tracks.


Access the MP3 from the links on the right



This song has many many tracks. Uses Miroslav Philharmonik for orchestra, choir, flute. I programmed four part choir. EMU vintage keyboard in Structure for organ, as always Beta Monkey Music drum loops.

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Seek the Gate

Seek the Gate


I had a nice bit of happenstance on this song. I accidentally deleted the guitar part on the verse. So I recorded that part with organ I like it better!


I also re-recorded the background vocals in the chorus using the Antares Harmony EFX plugin. Drop it in and three or four part harmony. What's not to like?



Drum loops are Beta Monkey Music Double Bass II loops. Guitar is Rectifier from Johnson J-Station. Bass uses Sansamp PSA1 plugin in Pro Tools 8. Lead guitar is Eleven LE, organ is Structure with E-MU Vintage keys patches, Xpand for the other keyboards. Electro-harmonix Voice Box for vocoder.


Access the MP3 from the links on the right

Thursday, November 26, 2009

Using Pro Tools with Windows 7

Got a new laptop with Windows 7. Overall Windows 7 is good. I especially like hovering over the bar at the bottom and seeing a thumbnail of the screens of the apps that are running.


But I digress. I loaded Pro Tools 8 on the laptop (I use MBox2 for interface). Pro Tools does not *officially* run on Windows 7 yet.
Indeed, when I loaded up everything, which took a good chunk of an evening and the next, Pro Tools ran chunky and unusable on the Windows 7 laptop. Uh Oh, I should have bought that iMac...


Surely this can't be right. The laptop has 6 GB RAM and dual core processor. It should be much faster than my single processor PC. Maybe it just needs some tweaking.


Windows 7 tweaking suggestions aren't posted yet. But Digidesign does have Vista optimization instructions here. Although the screens are different, they aren't different by much. The tweaks involve turning off ClearType font smoothing and setting the performance settings to give priority to background tasks rather than programs. This was surprising. I would expect that Pro Tools would want its program to have priority. But this significantly helped performance. And now it is back up and working.

Monday, November 02, 2009

You have been working on this project HOW LONG?

Welcome to Pilgrims Prog. This is a progressive rock project that I started in August of 2006 - almost three years ago. And I have been working on it (minus a six month break in early 2008) for that entire length of time.


This project started as demos for a recording project for my band. Unfortunately the band didn't like it. They thought that some of the early songs were too dark, or too much of the "devil's advocate" spin, or my demos were too extensive and would require too much work to adapt them. So it has remained as my own project.


I use Pro Tools LE version 8.


This project has turned into a series of experiments. Many of the songs started as experiments, either with a technical idea - write a song in 3/4 (Vanity Fair), or 5/4 (Gatekeeper), or in drop D (SOD) - or I got ideas from plug-ins in Pro Tools (such as the XPand intro to Dream). And I get alot of ideas from blogs like Air Users Blog, then I have to go change things. These songs have lots of flaws (such as my voice), but the flaws have taken on a life of their own and represent the sign posts of the journey. The big challenge is that I learn new things in Pro Tools or I get new plug-ins (like Ozone4) and it changes the whole feel of the song, so I have to go back and tweak the old songs.


Please keep in mind that this is a hobby. My studio is my computer room. And these songs are demos, essentially. Although it is my plan for 2010 to assemble a band to play this project live at least once.