My Sonic Eccentricities:
 

One hot summer day during my seventh year on earth, my mother honked as she pulled into the driveway after work. I knew the routine:  the crunching of the gravel and the honk meant it was time to go outside and help her carry something in the house.
 

I threw on my shoes and, like a Pavlovian bell triggering in my head, jumped off the porch. I walked to the back of her tan ’79 VW Rabbit. Pop the hatch, and there they were: my first “bass” and a small, sky-blue single-tube “amp.”
(Yes, she had rescued them from the trash.) 
The bass was in pieces, and the amp was a literal shocker that barely functioned.
 

It took a few weeks, a few burns from a soldering iron, countless turns of a screwdriver, and some help from a friend of my mother's, but we finally reconstructed my first instrument. The moment I heard that first amplified sound wave hit me, a sense of utter awe cascaded all over me—one that has never left.

Shortly after, I scored my first electric six-string: an early-sixties Gibson hollow body of some sort.
 

For years, I plunked away, learning everything by ear. I struggled to emulate the classic tones of Hendrix, Clapton, and Page, before my world was blown wide open with British punk, goth, jazz, and reggae.
 

By the time I was nine, I started "composing"and experimenting with different sounds.
Alas!! The trash gods smiled upon me once more, delivering a tape-based RadioShack karaoke machine with two inputs and a microphone.

I quickly discovered that if I recorded on one tape while playing another, the record side would capture the playback. I had accidentally stumbled into the world of lo-fi multi-track layering.
 

My obsession with recording was born.!!

From that day, to this, I remain completely captivated by soundscapes.

Ever ongoing, is the learning of the mechanics of tracking, songwriting, and lyricism.

This art has shaped the very core of how I think, feel, and interpret the world. Even as a kid, I knew music was the only thing I had to cling to. It felt as though music had chosen me to be part of its majesty.

Your Engineer, 

-Chris Blank.

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