Day 30. One third of the way through the project. Still so far to go, but at the same time… it feels like it is just flying by now.

Yesterday I wrote about how I started an album in a day thing on day 29. An attempt to write and record at least 20 minutes of music within one 24 hour period. As if the insanity of trying to write 50 songs in 90 days wasn’t insanity enough, right? So where did I leave off when I fell asleep Saturday night? I had four songs underway. None of them had any real instruments, guitars or voices, all four had MIDI bass and drums, a MIDI guitar guide track, and a melody played on a MIDI piano. Three of the four songs also had lyrics.

The album in a day rules that I followed encourage you to not sleep during the 24 hour period. I’m too old for that shit and I went to bed at about 10:30pm. Unfortunately for me, but probably fortunately for the music, I woke up four hours later thanks to this friggin toothache that won’t go away. It was about 2:30am and I was in too much pain to be able to fall asleep so I did what any idiot in my position would do. I sat up, put on some headphones, and started a fifth song in GarageBand on my iPad. Eventually I was able to fall asleep again but not for long. By 5:00am I was awake for good. I started the morning off by kicking off a sixth song in GarageBand on my iPhone.

I was estimating that I had about 20 minutes of music at this point so I went down cellar to my music nook and skipped my daily exercise in favor of recording guitar tracks. I started with song number six and worked backwards from there. First I came up with a song structure and a melody, then I recorded a rhythm guitar track. Normally I double track the rhythm guitars, but in the interest of saving time I only played one take. I’ve also been using two amps for my 50/90 demos this year but for this day’s sub-project I chose to only use one. It’s all about saving time. After I added the rhythm guitar track I immediately added a lead guitar. Normally I like to wait until the vocals are down before I add leads (why? Because, that’s why) but this time I just did the two guitar takes together.

When song six was done I did the same for song five. I worked out the format, added a melody, added a rhythm guitar track, and added a lead guitar track. Now all I had were the four songs from the day before. They already had the structures and the melodies so I just cranked out the rhythm and lead guitars on all four of them and then the guitar tracking was done. Next, I packed up my laptop and my mic and a USB audio interface and drove to the movie theater parking lot for some car music.

All six songs had a melody recorded on a piano track so I had something to follow along with. The first three songs all had lyrics written as well so I started with those. I had originally told myself I wasn’t going to add harmony parts. It was just going to be one vocal track per song and that was it. Of course I recorded a harmony part on the piano for song number one, immediately breaking my rule. I eventually added harmony parts to most of the songs (I can’t remember if they all had vocal harmonies but I don’t think so. I think at least one song stuck to the one track rule). When the first three songs were done I was out of lyrics so I had to write them as I went. For the second batch of three songs I would write the lyrics to a verse and then immediately record it, then write another verse and record it, then the chorus, and so on until the song was done.

When all six songs had their vocals finished I drove home and started mixing. I would mix the song in GarageBand on my MacBook Pro, bounce it as an uncompressed audio file to the Apple Music app formerly known as iTunes, convert it to mp3, and upload it to alonetone where I officially declare my demos finished. Song number one is actually okay. Song number two is probably almost okay. Songs number three, four, and five, are garbage and I’ve already forgotten all about them. Song number six might almost be okay too but probably isn’t. In the end I think I had about 22 minutes of music finished with about an hour to spare. Not an album’s worth at all, but enough to satisfy the results of this particular little internet challenge. What’s more, the six new songs brought my 50/90 total up to 27 finished songs. One third of the way through the 90 day project and I have 54% of the songs complete. That’s nuts.

And that, my dearest readers and only friends, is the recap of day 30. I am writing this on day 31 and I have yet to do a single musical thing today. Given that my whole family is going to see the new Spider-Man tonight and that we are leaving as soon as I punch out of work, I suspect that there won’t be a single note written or recorded today… and that’s okay. I’m pretty far ahead of things right now. I can manage to skip another day.

Day 29 (yesterday) was a Saturday. I’m still on vacation until Monday and we didn’t really have anything on the agenda for the weekend beyond some chores and a little home improvement tasks. Lots of free time had me thinking about the 50 songs in 90 days challenge and how I could spend a good chunk of time on it. In fact…

What if I rolled an Album in a Day project into the larger 50/90 thing?

There are a few places online where you can find challenges to write and record an album in a day. I always find myself on this page. I did one years ago following those rules and there have been many, many times when I’ve thought about doing it again, but I don’t think I’ve ever considered doing one while I was already working on another writing/recording thing. Then I finished the month of July with all of the song ideas I started completely finished and I had a totally clean slate as far as 50/90 was concerned. August 1st being a Saturday when I don’t have a lot going on for the weekend meant…

Sure, let’s do an album in a day. The rules define an album as 20 minutes of music. That’s way too short. That’s an EP, not an LP. I don’t make the rules though, so off we go.

I started at 3:30pm on Saturday so I needed to write and record 20 minutes of new original music by 3:30pm on Sunday. The rules encourage you not to sleep during the 24 hours but I am old so that definitely wasn’t happening. By the time I went to bed last night I had four songs with MIDI bass and drums done, a MIDI guitar guide for when I record the actual guitars (or if I had to record the vocals before the real guitars), a MIDI piano playing what would eventually be the vocal melody, and for all but one of the songs, lyrics. I didn’t record any actual guitars or vocals and I think I had 12-13 minutes of music so… yeah, it was a pretty piss poor showing I think. I wanted to have a lot more done before sleep. I was thinking that I probably wouldn’t be successful in this little sub-project (spoiler alert for tomorrow’s post, I was totally successful).

Come back tomorrow to find out how the last 15.5 hours of the 24 hour day went.

I went a little nuts on day 28.

When I woke up yesterday I looked at my Trello board (the place where I keep track of all of this music stuff) and saw that I had three songs ready to mix, two songs ready for vocals, and one song that was just a couple of bass riffs. It was July 31st. I wondered to myself, could I finish all of these todays and then start August with a clean slate?

Interesting…

First I went to the song that wasn’t a song yet. It was just three eight bar phrases consisting of just a MIDI bass and MIDI drums. The drums weren’t good and needed to be replaced, but we’ll deal with that later. I added a MIDI guitar to act as a guide and then added a little melody to each of the three sections. After that I packed up the laptop and a mic and headed to the movie theater.

Car music. That’s what I call it when I go to the empty movie theater parking lot to record vocals without annoying the hell out of everyone in the house and also without feeling soul crushing embarrassment over my lack of singing skill. I added the vocals tracks to the two songs that were ready. Then I wrote lyrics to fit the melodies for the thing I’d noodled out earlier and recorded those vocals as well. At that point every song still in progress had vocal tracks.

When I got home I took the un-structured thingie and worked out a song form and redid all of the MIDI drums. It was now ready for rhythm guitars. The other two songs were ready for lead guitars. I then went down cellar to my music nook and plugged in my Les Paul Custom and added the rhythm tracks. Since the vocals were already done I was able to then immediately add the leads too. Next I put the leads onto the other two songs from the car music experience and at that point it brought me up to six songs ready to mix. Look at me being all out of control and shit.

I next went upstairs to the comfy chair in my bedroom, put on a good pair of headphones and started mixing. It took hours, but I managed to crank out all six songs. Done. So as July came to an end I had 21 songs and they were all finished. There is nothing in progress right now. 21 songs in 28 days. How the hell did that happen?

So now that July is over and the 50 songs in 90 days challenge moves on to month two, what do I do next? I’m thinking about this. Write and record an album in one day? I’ve done that once. I came up with one half decent song and 5-6 utterly forgettable pieces of crap that I never thought about again. I promise I am not going to do 24 hours without sleep. I’m 55 years old. My days of all nighters are over. I’m thinking about starting at around 3-4:00pm today and seeing if I can get 20-30 minutes of new stuff to the point where it is all ready for vocals. Then wake up early tomorrow morning and go do some car music, then spend the rest of the morning finishing the tracking and doing quick and dirty mixes. That could be fun.

We’ll see how it goes.

I did a little bit of work on day 27 (yesterday) but not as much as I had hoped. Spoiler alert, day 28 is way more productive.

Anyway, what did I do? I wrote lyrics and melodies (and harmonies) for two songs. That leaves me with two songs ready for vocals, three songs ready to mix, and one song that doesn’t have anything other than a couple of bass riffs. Oh yeah, and 15 songs are already done.

That’s it for day 27. Like I said, day 28 is way better. You have to wait until tomorrow to read about that though.

With all the traveling home from New York that was going on yesterday I expected a second day in a row with no 50 songs in 90 days challenge progress. I was wrong though. Just before bed, while I was about 93% asleep, I brought up GarageBand on my iPad and noodled out a couple of very simple bass riffs. I filed them as song number 21 and then fell asleep.

Better than nothing, even if it is just barely.

Day 24 was light on progress. I mixed one song. That’s all.

I had a dentist appointment that I was hoping would go a long way toward putting an end to this fucking toothache that’s been killing me for about a week. Wouldn’t you know it that as I was pulling out of the driveway they called to reschedule. The dentist called in sick. Fuck fuckity fuck fuck fuck. Now I have to wait three more days.

I don’t expect any progress from day 25 (today) or probably tomorrow (day 26). We’re leaving for New York in a couple of hours to go and see Rush at Madison Square Garden. We’re coming home tomorrow but regardless, it’s going to be a full couple of days.

What’s a good word to describe day 23… hmmm… let’s think about this.

Productive.

Successful.

Crazy.

So I am up to 20 songs. The goal, as implied by the title of the post, is 50 songs. To still be this early in the challenge and already be up to 20 songs in the works is just nuts. Of those 20 songs, 12 were already finished. Six of the remaining songs had lyrics written and the rhythm section recorded and were ready for vocals. The remaining two songs just had basic tracks, (MIDI) bass and drums. They were ready for rhythm guitar tracks.

Of those eight songs, how many of them did I work on during day 23 (yesterday)?

All of them.

First I grabbed my MacBook and hopped into the car and drove to an empty parking lot so that I could record vocals without bothering everyone in my house. Normally when I do this I shoot for working on 4-5 songs. That’s usually all I have before my voice gets really tired (I am most definitely NOT a singer) or I have to pee or something. Yesterday I made it through all six songs. Every line of lyrics that I had written was sung and recorded. Many of them twice because I sang in two part harmony. I felt really good when I packed up and drove home. I could have stopped there and called the day a success. I did not, however, stop there.

Once I was home I took some time to help my wife with some chores around the house. Eventually, before lunch, I had some free time and was able to head down cellar to my music nook and start recording guitars. I started with one of the songs that needed rhythm guitars. I figured that would be a good warm up. I am absurdly out of playing shape these days and figured I’d be smart about things. Once that was done I moved over to leads and cranked out three songs. In my current state of sucky guitar playing, recording leads wears me out quick so I planned to take a break and record the rhythm guitars on the other song that still needed them. I was going to try to follow that with the other three leads but my wife needed help with another chore and I needed lunch and also needed to go to the grocery store to get something for dinner, so I took a much longer break.

After I returned home from Market Basket with the fixin’s for dinner and a big bottle of Extra Strength Tylenol (because the toothache is still kicking my sorry ass), I was able to head back to the cellar music nook and finish off the lead guitars on those three remaining songs. So over the course of the day I put guitar tracks onto all eight remaining songs.

But wait, there’s more!

After dinner we were just hanging out in the living room watching the tube and I slipped on some headphones and mixed this song and then mixed this song. The first one is my second attempt at 5/8 time for the month. It’s okay. The second one is rare for me in that I kinda don’t hate it. It feels weird.

And that, my friends and neighbors and readers and only friends, is that. Six vocals, six lead guitars, two rhythm guitars, and two mixes. My brain was definitely ready for bed.

What’s in store for today, day 24? A Dentist appointment. Likely that will be all for the day. I don’t handle Dental visits well. I expect to be thoroughly traumatized. WOOHOO!

I had some good progress on day 22. The first thing I did was add a new song. Song number 20, to be precise. It’s in 9/8 time and it is going to suck trying to put guitars on it, but odd time signatures make me happy so… yeah. Next I took song number 19, which was just a couple of riffs, and worked out the structure and finished the fake/software/MIDI instruments (bass and drums). After that it was all about lyrics and melodies. I think I had three songs that needed lyrics and I finished them all.

That was it for day 22. That left me with six songs ready for vocals and two songs ready for rhythm guitars. On to day 23!

This post is recapping day 21, which was yesterday, but today is day 22 and I really should be in the car recording vocals but I’m just overcome with laziness right now. I’ll do it tomorrow, I promise.

Not a lot of progress on day 21. I had a lot of stuff to do before work in the morning and I had a lot of stuff to do after work too. I didn’t have dinner until after 8:30. Fortunately I was able to sneak in some work after that. I wrote the lyrics and the melody for one song (song #18). I now have three ready for vocals. I also, just before falling asleep last night, came up with a couple of bass riffs that I have labeled as song #19.

That’s all for day 21. As mentioned, I should be doing some vocal recording today on day 22 but… nah. I’ll do that tomorrow. Today I hope to write some more lyrics and write some more melodies and figure out the structure for song 19 and maybe add another new song idea (or two?) and maybe record some rhythm guitars. I think it’s time to switch from my Gibson SG to my 1978 Les Paul Custom. Yeah, it is time for a guitar swap. Having said all that, I am feeling kinda lazy right now (I’m on vacation after all) so maybe I won’t do squat today.

I’ll let you know how it goes when I recap day 22 tomorrow.

20 days down, 70 to go. It feels like it should be a big deal, but this year it really isn’t. Maybe I am ahead of my usual pace, but this time around I am not feeling day 20 stress. Weird.

I put rhythm guitars on song number 18. That was the only song that was ready for a guitar part. Everything else in the pipeline already had the rhythm guitars. I could have done more, but there was nothing left to do.

Other than that, I mixed two songs. I’m up to 12 songs finished now. I mixed this one and this one. Neither of them are terribly good (just like everything else I’ve ever written in my entire life) but they exist now and that’s the important part of this little game.

The state of the project after 20 days is:

• 12 songs finished.
• Two songs have lyrics written and are ready for me to record vocals
• Four songs have the rhythm section finished and are ready for me to write lyrics