Tag: Fawm

RPM Day Five

Twice yesterday I found myself sitting alone waiting for something and made use of the time by working on new song ideas on my iPhone. One is probably as complete as can be for right now. The other is going to need some more work. On top of that, I snuck in another just-before-bed idea on my iPad, although its not terribly good.

I think that puts me at eight works in progress in only four days. The slow down is going to come, but for now I’m feeling pretty good.

Thinking positive.

RPM Day Four

Today is day four of the RPM Challenge (and FAWM too, but somehow that always takes a back seat) so let’s recap yesterday.

I added rhythm guitars to three of the five current projects. I can’t call them songs yet, because they are still just phrases without any arrangement. One of the projects is the one that lives on my iPhone. For some reason, using my telephone to record my guitar just tickles me. We have come a long, long way since my days of working the 24 track studio at Northeast Broadcasting School.

Last night before bed I also started on project number six, which is another bass/drums/electric piano noodle. I finally caved in and used the key of E minor, but I put this one in 6/8 time to avoid at least some of the rawk cliches.

I may not have a chance to get anything done tonight, so it’s a good thing that I am way far ahead of the usual RPM pace.

Keep thinking positive!

RPM Day Three

I’m actually losing track of how many things I have in the musical pot right now.  I think I have four on the iPad and one on the iPhone.  Yesterday I added some pieces to the piano melody I had on the phone.  I like it significantly less now than yesterday, but it’s still alive.  I added two new things on the iPad.  One is a quiet little electric piano thing that I’m not sure what to do for the guitar.  I can’t do anything without a guitar part, ever.  What would be the point, right?  But this one… kinda doesn’t need a rhythm guitar.  I’ll squeeze something in somewhere.  The other thing I played with will probably be dumped.  I was testing the lightning cable adapter by plugging in my guitar.  I recorded the first thing that popped into my head.  At the time I was pleased, but now I think it’s a riff that is awfully similar to one that became an RPM song a couple of years ago.  I’ll try to salvage the idea somehow.

Is it possible that I might have five songs in the works and it’s only February third?

Wicked!

Two Days, Nine Hours, and 54 Minutes

Two days, nine hours, and 54 minutes to go until the start of the 2013 RPM Challenge.  I have done nothing to prepare.  Here is an off the top of my head to-do list to prepare for my sixth attempt at completing the challenge:

Practice my guitar.  I have no calluses on my finger tips.  Pain is inevitable.

Decide on the platform I want to focus on.  Last year I ended up doing the whole thing on my iPad.  I think I want to go back and forth between the iPad and the Mac this time.  I expect the bulk of the writing and rhythm section tracking to be done on the iPad, but I also think I want to expand a little in an attempt to make the drum tracks sound a little more adventurous.  On the Mac I can move stray notes around so that they sound in time without messing with the quantize settings.  I want drum fills that are faster than just 16th notes.

Put the MacMini in the cellar back together.  I had moved a lot of computer equipment around a few months ago and the MacMini was taken apart.  I plan on using that to record vocals at least.  I still want to run my mic through my Mackie board so that I can EQ my crappy voice.  I’m not able to do that if I plug directly into the iPad.  I went through the board into the iPad last time and it worked, but I would like the added flexibility of working on a full GarageBand for vocals.  In Theory at least.

Clean the workspace in the cellar.  It’s a mess down there.  Really.

Test the lightning cable adapter on my New iPad.  Wouldn’t it suck if the adapter didn’t work and I couldn’t plug external sources into the New iPad?  Yes, it would suck.

If I plug into the JamUp app, can I record into GarageBand?  I’m 99.999% sure I cannot, but it is still worth looking into.

Sign up for FAWM.  Really.  I signed up for RPM last week, but the FAWM website is not going to open until tomorrow.  It’s going through a complete redesign.  While I’m on the topic, the website is fawm.org.  NOT fawm.com.  You don’t want to go to fawm.com.  Trust me.

Find some inspiration.  I was thinking about using the founders of the towns of Methuen, MA and Salem, NH as characters somehow.  I doubt I will though.  I’ll probably just write another 10 songs about my cat.

I’m sure I’ll think of 100 things to add to this list between now and the start of February, but for now this is enough.  And by enough I mean enough to make me start musically panicking.

February Music

January 23, 2013. We are eight days and a wake up away from the start of album in a month month. Otherwise known as FAWM and the RPM Challenge. I don’t feel mentally prepared. I felt the same last year when February arrived and yet managed to finish both projects on time for the first time ever. Maybe not being ready is a good thing.

If that’s the case, then maybe it’s a good thing that the 2013 version of both websites still hasn’t launched. Looks like I’m not the only one who is unprepared.

I plan on giving both challenges a shot, as always, but after finishing both on time last year the drive is lessened by quite a large amount.

We shall see.

February is Music Month

Today is January 8, 2013. Three weeks and four days from now will be February 1, 2013, and you all know what that means…

Robbie starts blitzing you all with bad homemade music. It’s still far enough away that both rpmchallenge.com and fawn.org are not even up yet. That doesn’t mean I’m not already thinking about them.

As always, I hope to come up with a lyrical concept to tie all of the songs together, but usually all I get is songs about how my cat is really a super villain out for world domination. No one has ever accused me of being the next Bob Dylan. Maybe in terms of my singing, but never my lyric writing.

I’m looking forward to this once again. If I write one song that doesn’t suck then I will have out done every other February writing project attempt in my past.

Rock on!