Category: Song Writing

One Day

Did I mention that for some idiotic reason I started a couple of new songs today?  Well I’ve finished one of them already.

When I woke up there was a dumb strummy little riff in my head.  It was a telecommute day so I was able to record it and turn it into a whole (kinda lame) song.  I recorded all of the rhythm guitars to a basic guide drum track.  At lunch time I wrote the lyrics and the melody and recorded the vocals and the lead guitar.  After work I replaced the midi drums with a GarageBand drummer and I added the midi bass.  In the hour or so before bed I mixed it and uploaded it everywhere.

Its not a very good song, but it’s kinda cool to go from nothing to finished over the course of a single day.  I did the same with another new song but didn’t get a chance to add the drums and bass or do a mix.  Everything that requires a microphone is done.  There is a third new song that is just bass, drums, and a piano melody with some lyrics.  I’m hoping I can get all of the recording for that one done before work in the morning.  There is also one other song that still needs a lead guitar.  Fingers crossed I get both songs finished before I have to leave for work.

Lots of Progress – #RPM2020

I did a musical ton today, including writing and recording two entirely new songs.  Why the hell did I do that?

I did a ton of guitar before work this morning.
173/365

I did vocals for the two new songs during lunch.
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I also did more guitars at lunch. I was burning through stuff really fast, which probably means it’s all crap.
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After work I mixed a song. It’s one of the songs that I am doing two versions of, so it isn’t “new” as far as the project is concerned, but it’s new in that it didn’t exist a couple of hours ago.

Song… Number Six, I think? And Seven too!

I think this is the sixth song I’ve finished.  Yeah, I have seven files and two of them are different versions of the same song, so that leave six.  Yeah.  I think the running time is up to round 19 minutes too.

I’m liking the guitar sounds.  The rhythm used the Klon KTR and I’m in tonal love.  The lead is the KTR after a Big Muff clone (Wren and Cuff Tri Pi ’70) and it’s just filthy and wonderful.

I think I knew what the lyrics were about at some point, but I don’t remember.

The RPM Challenge website is down.  Raise your hand if you’re panicking.

(Robbie slowly, timidly raises a panicked hand)

ADDENDUM:

I forgot to click publish on this post and went ahead and mixed the seventh song before I realized it.  So you get a bonus song in this post!  Aren’t you happy?  Free stuff!

This one is… meh.  Enough said.

Oh What a Relief – #RPM2020

This morning I packed my computer, a microphone, a pair of headphones, and a USB interface into the car and drove off to a parking spot behind The Loop in Methuen and recorded four songs worth of vocals.  I had the lyrics and melodies written already so it wasn’t too painful an experience.

When I was done (meaning, when the battery on my MacBook was approaching death and I had to go pee so bad I could taste it) I went home and started working on lyrics and melodies for the last four songs.  The first of the two were kind of interesting and one of them I purposely made pretty difficult as a bit of a challenge.  After those two I was really getting tired so I threw the last two together pretty quickly and they are just as bad as that sounds.

After that I hung out with my step son for a while, and made some late lunch/early dinner for the love of my life, and then (after double checking that the MacBook’s battery was back to 100%) I went back to The Loop (a different section of the lot behind the building this time) and cranked out the last four.  I got a little over confident for a bit and a couple of the songs have THREE part harmonies instead of my usual two.  Sick.

So where does RPM stand now… Four songs mixed, three songs ready to mix, three songs needing saxophone, and four needing lead guitar.  Once the full boat is mixed I am going to go back to six of the acoustic songs and add bass guitar, drums, and lead guitar and then remix them.  If I don’t finish that by March 1st I won’t worry about it, I just need to make sure I get a complete mix of each song before I start messing with alternates.  Well, more alternates.  I already have two different mixes of one of the acoustic songs.

I need to have all of the remaining guitar and saxophone finished before we leave for Disney World.  I will have my MacBook with me on the trip so I can sneak in a mix before bed each night, and if I am out of my mind crazy I might even sneak a couple in on the plane.  Then I will take full advantage of the leap year day and mix anything that’s left over once we’re home again.

Is any of this stuff good?  Well, no.  That’s not the point though.  The point of RPM, as always, is that it didn’t used to exist but now it does exist.

There’s still the issue of the half-a-song left for FAWM.  FAWM is 14 songs in 28 days, so for the leap year they say it’s 14.5 songs in 29 days.  Does that mean I have to sneak in one more?  If I do it’s either going to be simple, or 36 minutes of noodling and noise for the Blind Chaos thing I mentioned a few days ago.

I wouldn’t say I’m almost done, but I’m past the one humongous hurdle with time to spare.  I feel happy.

In closing, here is the view from this evening’s “studio.”

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Song #3

First, a picture from last night that has nothing to do with anything you will hear on the audio file…
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Right, now that that’s out of the way…

 

Now to the song.  Allow me to quote the description I used on alonetone, though I’ve written about all of this before…

Long story…
or, What the hell is a cajon anyway?

I listen to a podcast about cover bands. One of the hosts is a drummer and he plays in an acoustic group. He said he played his cajon at the acoustic gigs. I thought, what the hell is a cajon?

Google informed me that it’s this box thing that you sit on and smack with your hands. There is a hole in it somewhere and even some snares and depending on where you whack it you get a bass drum-ish sound or a snare drum-ish sound. It’s kinda neat.

Fast forward a few months and I’m sitting alone in Epcot center, just outside of Soarin’ (true story) and I was tapping away on GarageBand on my iPhone trying to come up with something different from my usual power trio arrangements. Turns out one of the percussion settings in the drummer function had a cajon. I started thinking like a hippie in a coffee house and thought, cajon, acoustic guitar, and cello. Well, GarageBand’s string sounds are crap and the cello was scratched in it’s place I thought maybe I could dust off my alto sax and use that as the soloist. I hadn’t played my sax since 2013 (I think) and it was time.

Nothing ever became of that Epcot Center song idea, but when RPM 2020 came around I came back to that idea. I decided to make half of my album the usual rock band stuff, and the other half this goofy coffee shoppe thing. If time permits I am going to do a rock band mix of the coffee shoppe songs too, but we’ll see.

This song is about how the US Senate gave the fascist in the white house legal permission to rig elections.

Isn’t that a great story?  I’ve still never seen a cajon in the flesh.

Two Songs, Three Mixes

First there’s this… A 12-bar blues in the verse and a chunk of a 12-bar blues in the chorus.  This is the only electric song that I didn’t double track the rhythm guitars, but I got to spread out the stereo thanks to running through two amps which is about as awesome as it gets.

Now the screwball part of the post.  This is the first song from the acoustic half of the project.  It’s the only one of the seven that I didn’t put any percussion on (what the hell is a cajon, anyway?) so it’s just two tracks of guitar, two (actually three) tracks of vocals, and one track of sax….

Now here’s the same song with the sax replaced by an electric guitar and bass and drums added.  I call the first mix the Coffee Shoppe Mix, and the second mix the Bar Band Mix although I don’t think I wrote that onto the file name….

….and with that, I have two songs complete.  I just have to decide which version of the acoustic song goes on the final album.

Mother Nature Hates Me

I just don’t get it.  Why does Mother Nature hate me so much?

I only telecommute one day each week, and I need the time between Jen and Harry leaving for work and school and me needing to punch into work to work on vocal tracks for RPM.  I seriously bank on that time to get through a lot of what I need to get done.  It’s really important.

Last week was the first Thursday in February and it snowed.  Harry had a snow day.  No singing on mic for me.  Today is the second Thursday in February and guess what… it snowed again.  We didn’t get a whole lot but it was enough for him to get a two hour delay.

What the actual….

It’s Mother Nature screwing with me, isn’t it.  This is all about me.  Two Thursdays, two snow storms.  I hate snow!  I really need my Thursday mornings, damn it.  Knock it off!

At least today I was able to get a little recording in during lunch.  Two more songs done, both of which had been started earlier in the week.  I’ve got that going for me at least.

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