Upbeat Guitar Studio
En conversación con Dan Loughrin
El Barco
It might have been twelve years ago when I first met Dan Loughrin, sitting on a bench in the back of a boat.
Our friend’s parents had just left town, and a number of us were invited to their house for a night of eating and drinking and smoking.
Their foyer had all the typical characteristics of your average Southern Ontario suburban home: The staircase that leads to the second floor greeting you upon your arrival; the family room directly to the right; a short walk straight into the kitchen; and to your left, through a small laundry room, a door leading into the garage. And although there was the entirety of the house to choose from, this lefternmost path was the path most chosen. For in the garage there sat a boat, patiently waiting to be launched into an undisclosed body of water once again.
But the boat’s watery fate was far from fruition. Would it not have been rude to exclude this unlaunched boat from our festivities, to wallow, instead, in it’s waterless state alone? It certainly would have! So, there we sat, the number of us, in the boat, eating and drinking and smoking*.
And the nachos were eaten, and the drinks were drunk, and the smokes were smoked, and that one night of partying seeped into the next day, into the next night, until the third day arrived, where we finally dispersed, biked home and took much needed showers.
As stated above, it’s been roughly twelve years since that three-day voyage. Since then, I have had the pleasure of working with Dan on many musical, as well as illustrative projects. Below is a discussion between Dan and I, in which he goes into detail about his history with the guitar, opening a small business in Downtown Guelph and his escapades in community outreach.
Please, enjoy!
La Primera Edición
What did I take away from the first post of CONTIGO? Other than a clearer understanding of the amount of work Dan has put into becoming one of the greatest and most creative guitarists I know, as well as a significant figure in the Guelph music scene? quite a bit!
Before this video, I had never ventured forth into Premiere Pro lands, doing all my video editing exclusively in After Effects. The raw footage of our conversation had a run time of around two and a half hours, so with the amount of trimming that was needed, Premiere Pro was a must.
As I dabble more with the software, I’m sure my editing will become less choppy (although I think it might work with the visuals), and the workflow will become faster and smoother. Oh boy, do I look forward to that day!
Whether I should upload the video in parts or as one long-form discussion was also a point of contention. Although I have only uploaded the hour-long version (as seen above) thus far, I have decided that I will upload three smaller morsels in the coming weeks to YouTube, to satiate the YouTube algorithm’s hunger for content! I’m a YouTuber now, get at me Dollar Shave Club and SurfShark VPN!
In regards to my “performance”: I am a critical man, and much like you all probably are, I am most critical of myself, and watching the footage countless times over was a bit discouraging.
Going into the discussion, I felt nervous, but overall, I thought I was prepared. I was not as prepared as I should have been, however, and there were several times where I found myself stumbling over or searching for words. I also found myself saying “umm” and “like” too much, and if having an everyday conversation with me is like this, I apologize.
To fix this, I plan to keep a journal by my side while conducting these discussions, so that I might be able to figure out the questions and the words prior to asking them.
Anyways, I hope you enjoyed CONTIGO’s first newsletter! If you have any comments, critiques or suggestions, I’m all ears. Have any tips to become the world’s greatest interviewer? Were the visuals too much? Were the visuals not enough? Were you bored? Should there have been a backing track for the discussion? Was the title card music too loud? For the love of The Lord, Our Father’s God, please let me know!
Thanks again, and I’ll see you in the next one.
CONTIGO
* Now, if anybody is a boat aficionado, you probably know that it is unsafe to smoke in the type of boat we were sitting in. If you’re a boat aficionado, you would know that we were sitting right above a motor filled with gasoline. Luckily, the worst possible outcome never transpired, and that is why I’m here today, able to regale you with story of when I first met Dan Loughrin.
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