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To download the mp3 or listen to Gina’s Place (Rainy Day Mix) in your browser, Click Here.

Sixteen years ago today, on Cinco de Mayo 2008, I was hanging out at the local Clicks where I shot 9-ball on a pool league. I went to the bar for a refill and found a twenty-dollar bill on the ground. The only other person around was the woman sitting at the bar, so I asked her if she was missing any cash. She wasn’t, so I put the twenty on the bar and ordered a round for both of us.

She later told me she thought I was lying about finding the money as an excuse to hit on her. Maybe after sixteen years of my sticking to the original story, she might believe me.

Anyway, there was a simple melodic idea in D Major I would play on acoustic guitar when I stayed at her place. At the time, she had trouble sleeping — and no one needs to tell me what it’s like dealing with sleep disorders. But when I’d play guitar, she would peacefully drift away. Even when I was playing absolutely insane shit on my electric Ibanez Iceman at three in the morning, it was like a tranquilizer.

I took the first idea and added a second bit in E minor, which became the first part, and I experimented with looping both parts, adding multiple layers to the loops, and even running them backwards using the Boss RC-20XL pedal I used to go nuts with. And that was Gina’s Place.

One afternoon, in my livingroom jam studio in Phoenix, I switched on a single microphone and made the only surviving recording of the piece. I opened the windows and doors to capture the ambient sound of the rainstorm that had kicked up out of nowhere. The result is my favorite single-take improvisation that never got a studio-quality recording. The timing on the E minor loop is imperfect, the overall warbly quality sounds like warped magnetic tape, and the performance is obviously off the cuff.

But it was an awesome rainstorm, and I had a blast playing a duet with it. Near the end of the recording, the sun has come out and is pouring through the windows.

Cheers.