Hi everyone,
I wrote this song starting last summer while working security for the San Diego Padres baseball team. It really could resonate with anyone who ever worked a job from the shadows or in the background.
Ballpark Blues
This song is about the chaos I experienced in 2025 from losing my career to my mom dying suddenly. This is the first verse. Hope to get the chance to add a recording of the second soon.
https://youtube.com/shorts/dmQS2BtoEag?si=fi3jVbU-0GBWxCq7
Feedback is welcome
Jeff
@SDKissFan
These all sound awesome! Thanks for sharing!
Thanks so much for listening and sharing your thoughts.
Good stuff, Jeff! Great blues feel in the first song, and I really like the intro rhythm to Disarray.
That’s great, Jeff, enjoyed your lyrics and the rhythm, tone and feel was excellent.
I watched the second version. Sounded so much better.
So I am curious, how did you make that recording? Perhaps there is a way to use that to feed into Zoom? I suspect a lot of your troubles was down to what I imagine was running Zoom on your phone rather than a PC/laptop.
That’s promising Jeff, particularly like some of the Lyrics. Your personal experience reflected in them.
Hi David,
Yesterday was disappointing for me due to the technical issues. I was looking forward to that for a long time and was upset it didn’t work out. Part of it was zoom on my phone and another part was that where o live there are lots of hills and affects cell signal. Lesson learned to use a laptop and no background for future opportunities. I just used a cell phone to record all of my videos and perhaps that day I had better signal.
As far as the original music, my friend and co-performer Ciaran is always pushing me to expand outside of my comfort zone to grow on musicianship and explore new techniques. I never really liked blues so he suggested to write my own blues song instead of doing a cover of a song I didn’t fancy. For the disarray song he suggested o move to power chords or barre chords with a downpick rock strum to not sound so folky all the time. After 2 months in Ireland he’s back here and is trying to arrange for us to get that old town gig back again. Those shows really helped me improve as do the open mics so thanks for having me.
Jeff
Hi Colin,
I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts. The ballpark blues was something I wrote while working at the stadium over the summer, originally just for a few laughs about my typical work day. The rhythm didn’t really find me until November when I revisited Justin’s blues lessons and thought to use a Johnny Cash style 12 bar blues melody. For disarray, my friend Ciaran told me with the style of music you like to cover you should write a more rock and roll song and try fast downstrums. The second verse and bridge are done, but been working 14 hour days mostly so difficult to find free time.
Jeff
Hi John,
Thanks for stopping by. I hope the lyrics were good for a few laughs for the blues song. The other song is more of an angry rock song about a stressful 2025. The chords I used are just A-D-and G power chords and the thought process was AC DC style riff. Work in progress but promising.
Jeff
I can appreciate and empathise, Jeff. I am glad you stuck with it.
And you can take the learnings and be better prepared next time.
For the purpose of recording videos the signal would not come into it. And the quality of the video, both visually and audio, is a reflection of both the quality of the phone camera and mic plus the recording camera app.
Signal strength obviously plays a part when it comes to the Zoom meeting.
So what I suggest you do in prep for the next OM is this. Get Zoom running on your laptop. Start a meeting with yourself and record with the laptop camera (assuming it has one) and mic. Remember to update your Zoom Settings to use Original Sound with the sub-options all deselected. Then you can assess the quality of the recording.
If that is OK then you cannot be better prepared and are at the mercy of the signal. I know you are comfortable moving around so perhaps there is some opportunity to relocate with laptop to a place with better signal?
If not OK, then you can consider a webcam. I use a pretty cheap webcam as I join on a PC. But I use my Audio Interface etc for the sound, not the webcam mic. If that is not an option and affordable, then probably a better quality webcam may have a decent mic.
Wonderful to have such a friend. And your blues was enjoyable.
That is a pleasure. And have to say Jeff, I have known you from when you first joined the Community and began to share. I recall the challenges with rhythm, and those are now well behind you. Wonderful to see how you have grown and developed over the years.
Here’s wishing you a blessed festive season and may 2026 be a fabulous year after the trials of 2025
