Day 18’s progress was exactly the same as day 17. I started a new song and got it far enough along that it is ready for rhythm guitars. It is the 17th song started and it is another in a lifelong series of attempt to write something in 3/4 time that is worthy of head banging. It’s probably going to suck, but I’ll have fun with it while it lasts.

Other than that, I mixed a song. Of the 17 songs in the pipeline, 10 are now finished with a reasonably not-terrible mix of a demo. If my math is correct, 10 songs complete out of a the goal of 50 puts me at 20% done with this year’s project. Given that 90 days is approximately three months, I need to be at about 33.3% complete by the end of July. How many songs is that? Doing the math again, 50/3=16.67. Round up you get to 17. Huh. If about one third of the project is 17 songs… how many songs did I say I had in progress? Heh heh.

Day 17 was a Monday where I had to work in the office. There wasn’t a lot of time for anything other than work, but I got a few things done.

First, while sitting in the car in the parking lot before starting the work day, I came up with a couple of bass guitar riffs on my iPhone. I labeled them song number 16 and then went inside to start my day.

After I got home I was sitting in the living room watching the tube with my wife and my step daughter and I just casually slipped on a pair of headphones and mixed another song. That brings me up to nine songs complete. For the record, I define “complete” as a fully arranged demo with a not-too-terrible mix.

After that I spent a little time messing with the riffs I started that morning. I came up with a song structure and usable bass and drum tracks using software instruments in GarageBand. Nothing special, but it’s ready to add some guitars now.

The current state of the project has nine songs finished, three songs ready to mix, three songs have rhythm guitars and need lyrics and vocals, and one that is ready for rhythm guitars. Doing the math… yes, that’s 16 songs.

I got a nice chunk of work done, but it was a lot less than I wanted to do. Chalk it up to laziness, I guess.

I mixed one song. That brings the finished song count up to eight. Hey, eight out of 50 is 16%… I am 16% done on day 16. What does that mean? Nothing. It means nothing.

I wanted to mix another song or two but instead I started working on new ideas. I ended up with two new songs. I worked out the structures, finished the MIDI instruments (bass and drums) and added the rhythm guitars. That brings the total count up to 15.

That’s all. I mean, two new songs with the guitar tracks done is a pretty good haul for a Sunday in July. I should be pleased, but I also feel like I should have mixed another song or two at least.

Oh well. Let’s just move on.

As is often the case when I do a lot of work in a single day, I lose track of exactly what I did. When I sit down the next day to write these pointless, stupid recap posts that are meaningless to the entire population of the planet Earth besides me, I have to try and piece it all together again.

What the hell did I do yesterday?

There were six songs still in progress. Three had lyrics written, two others had their full rhythm section recorded, and one other only had MIDI bass and drums. I started my Saturday sitting in the car with my MacBook, a USB audio interface, and a Shure SM-57 with a little pop filter on the end of it. I recorded the vocal tracks for the three songs that were ready. All of them had at least one section with two-part harmony (which pretty much every song I ever write has a two-part harmony somewhere) but one of the songs had a chorus section with three-part harmony because I am out of control.

With that done I stayed put in the car with the laptop and all the stuff and wrote the vocal parts for the other two songs that had guitars done. Years ago that was how I did things. These days I record the melody with a keyboard and then sing along. I’m kinda digging doing it the old fashioned way, but I don’t think I will change the workflow permanently. Every now and then is fine.

From then on it was a guitar playing day. I don’t have much in the way of calluses on my left hand so I knew I was in for some pain. Recording lead parts hurts more than rhythm parts (because of all the bending strings, I think) so I recorded the leads for two of the songs and then took a break and recorded the rhythm tracks for the one remaining song. It’s in 5/8 time and my brain hasn’t wrapped itself around that weirdness the way it has with 7/8 time so it was a bit of a struggle, but it went okay. After that I cranked out the last three leads. By the time I was on the last song I was almost completely out of gas and my finger tips were killing me… so the playing on that song probably sucks more than my usual, normal level of suck. Oh well.

Later on I tried to mix one of the songs but every time I opened GarageBand something would come up to take me away from it. That’s not a complaint, they were all good things that I was happy to be involved in. I’m just saying that I tried to do more yesterday but did not.

So that leaves me with seven songs finished and six songs still in progress. Five of the six are ready to mix and the last one is ready for lyrics and a melody. Here’s hoping I get to a lot of that today.

Given that day 14 (yesterday) was a work day, I somehow managed to get a lot of music stuff done.

First, before work I was able to record rhythm guitar tracks for three songs. I played my Gibson SG again. I played pretty poorly overall but I don’t care. I usually manage to sneak in two songs in these pre-work sessions and yesterday I managed three. I’ll take the win.

After work I wrote lyrics and melodies for two songs. I was hoping to do more but that’s all I managed.

So after two weeks I had 13 songs at various levels of completion. Seven are mixed and done. Three have the rhythm section done and lyrics and a melody. Two have the rhythm section done. One is just MIDI bass and drums and is waiting for real guitars. Checking the math… yes, that is 13 songs.

Right then. That’s better. After two days with very little progress (days 10 and 11) and one day with absolutely no progress (day 12)… I had a pretty good day.

Yesterday, day 13, was a telecommuting day so I had some time before work to try and get stuff done. I added rhythm guitar tracks to two songs. You probably heard my sigh of relief at having gotten something (anything) done.

After work the progress continued. I had three “songs” that were just a few bass riffs without any structure. I worked out the song forms for all three of them and finished the MIDI bass and drums tracks. All three songs are now ready for rhythm guitars. Next I added another song. The form, the MIDI bass, and the MIDI drums are all set. That brings my count up to 13 songs. Seven are complete and six are in various states of incomplete. I didn’t stop there though. Next I added a melody and lyrics to the two songs that got rhythm guitars that morning. I now have two songs that are ready for vocals.

There, now don’t we all feel a little better about the state of things?

Yesterday was day 12. Days 10 and 11 both had very little progress. Day 12 was worse.

Nothing.

Nada.

I didn’t have time for anything before work and when I got home from work I was dead tired so I had dinner and went to bed.

That’s it.

Spoiler alert, Day 13 has already been a little bit better.

Day 11 (yesterday) was as close to a complete bust as one can come without being 100% progress-free.

I noodled a couple of bass riffs into GarageBand on my iPhone. I made it to work a little early and brought up the app while sitting in the car in the parking lot at the office. Better than nothing though, right?

That’s all.

After cranking out a ton of work on days eight and nine I considered blowing off day 10 entirely but in the end I didn’t. I noodled out a couple of songs worth of bass riffs just before I fell asleep. Not a lot, but enough to say I’m up to 11 songs in progress now. One of the ideas from last night is in 5/8 time because having one previous song in 5/8 wasn’t mental torture enough.

First, a little back story. The 50/90 Challenge used to be run by the same folks who run the February Album Writing Month challenge (fawm.org). That’s the one that dares you to write 14 songs in 28 days in February. I do that every year without really thinking about it. I do the RPM Challenge, record 10 songs or 35 minutes of original music in February, and I always just make sure I write at least 14 new songs. When I do that I complete both challenges. Hooray.

50/90 didn’t originate with fawm. They took it over at some point and spun off a website all its own. Then last year they shut down the 50/90 website and stopped playing along. I decided to just do it on my own and failed miserably. This year I decided to try it on my own again and we’re on day 10 now. Also this year, in place of 50/90 (which is HUGE), they have started a new thing which is sort of a mini-50/90. Write five new songs in nine days. They kicked it off on July 4th, just like they used to do with 50/90, and yesterday was the ninth and final day.

Was I successful in this new challenge?

Oh yeah, I was.

Did it take a huge rush at the finish line to get it all done in time? Yes. Did I actually over do it and end up with more than five songs? Why yes, yes I did.

So back to the main topic at hand. What did I do yesterday to get it all done on time? When I woke up yesterday morning I had four songs ready to mix. I needed one more but I didn’t have anything close to done yet. I had two songs with rhythm guitars recorded, two songs with just fake bass and drums, and one song that was just a few bass riffs. Notably, that one that just had the bass riffs also had a fake guitar that was meant to be a guide for when I recorded the real guitars.

So what did I do? I just got busy. I drove out to the parking lot I go to when I want to record vocals (so no one in the house can hear me yellin’ at the microphone) and I wrote the melody and the lyrics to the two songs that had guitars while I was recording the vocals. Then I got weird and took the idea that wasn’t really a song form yet but had the guide guitars and just wrote lyrics and a melody and recorded the vocal over each of the three riffs. Sure I would end up using the same recording any time that riff was repeated but so what. It’s my song, I can do whatever the hell I want with it.

When I got home the first thing that I did was make a quick and dirty mix of two of the songs that were ready to go. Then I went down cellar where my guitar nook lives and put lead guitars on the two songs that just got vocals, worked out a rather repetitive song form for the idea that had vocals but no song yet (funny, eh?), then put down the rhythm and lead guitars. Now I had two songs done and five more ready to mix.

Over the course of the rest of the day/evening/night, I mixed ’em all.

So where does that leave me? The five songs in nine days thingie is a resounding success. The 50/90 Challenge is in a state that I don’t think I’ve ever seen before. Nine songs in the production pipeline. Seven of them are complete and two are just a song form with MIDI bass and drums. That’s everything.

Now the question is, do I take day 10 off because my brain is still fuzzy after cramming so much in over the last two days, or do I start another five songs in nine days mini-challenge and see if I can crank it out again? I guess I’ll let you know when I post day 10’s recap tomorrow.

The Great Decline
Don’t Be Gentle
Go Far
Full Scale
Regression
See Right Through
Cling