Mad-Mike (solo)

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soundclick.com/madmikesolo

Seattle, Wa USA

Rock • Instrumental Rock

May 05, 2017

477 plays
4,362 views

My solo project is a merger of Post-Punk and Hard Rock with a sonic visual twist to it.  It follows the concepts of music being "places" and listening to it is to travel those places in your mind.

Band/artist history

It's basically me solo.  I started off doing a different quasi-solo project called M.J. from 1996-2012, it had a bit of a similar feel, but I decided I wanted to do something a bit more aimed at the kind of music I'm into doing nowadays.

Early demos started in 2013 right after the "Back to the Mower Shed" demo was done - There was "Laryngitis Rough" - when I was still planning to do vocals on this project - maybe if I build a good vocal booth that will stop my neighbors from calling the cops on the screamier numbers, I'll do some songs - I do have some good poetry to put to music.

Another demo was made in 2014 called "Anger Strategies" - which will likely be reused for a full album.  Right now I'm working on the first Self-Titled Release which should be out sometime next year

Have you performed in front of an audience?

I used to with my other projects - places like The Hard Rock in Seattle, The Central, The Fuel, Club Motor, used to be a regular at Flights and Hayley's in Everett for a long time.

Your musical influences

Well, there's the old stuff, people who know me know my go-to bands are The Cars and Nirvana - has been since I was 12.  I know it sounds weird but video games are still an influence as well, anything from Pac-Man to Five Nights at Freddy's - I can get some REAL inspiration from video games sometimes in sort of a "I think this would make a good atmosphere for this place".

The biggest influences on this project I'd say has been getting into Post-Punk bands from England in the late 70's/early 80's more recently, such as The Comsat Angels, The Sound, and The Chameleons - and then mixing that with the guitar driven side.  That whole chorused/reverb/washy vibe - I love that.

What equipment do you use?

On guitars, I use a huge collection of about 30 guitars, most of em' cheap clunkers or home-built parts mutts and custom ideas.  Most of the time I use my main squeezes - a 1995 EMG Equipped Fender Jag-Stang nicknamed "Nikki", a 1998 Fender Jaguar known as "Bettie", a custom home-built Jazzmaster, the Hempfest Musicmaster with custom pickup, a custom Memphis Fat Strat my wife picked out, the 07' Squier Affinity Butterscotch Tele,  and a 1983 Hondo Paul Dean II.  

Currently I'm running these through a Digitech RP250 for my main sound, setup to sound like my Bugera 333XL.  I use a few pedals as well, usually a BOSS DD7 Digital Delay, Digitech Whammy, and a Behringer PH-9 Phaser.

For bass I use the same effects just a different virtual amp setup to sound more like a Bassman 410 with a bit of grit on it.  

For synthesizer, drums, and synth guitar, I use a Casio DG-1, a Casio DG-10 (soon), and a Roland Juno Di with a MadKatz Fender Mustang Pro Rockband 3 controller setup as a MIDI Guitar controller.

All these run direct into one of my crazy old PC's, recorded with whatever multitrack software I can initially download for free.  Currently I use REAPER as my primary DAW.

Anything else?

Not really, check out the tunes, buy em' if you like em'.