Tag: Fawm

Two Songs Down

I mixed my second RPM song tonight. I liked it a lot more before I realized that the guitar part was stolen from Tanya Donelly’s song “The River” from the absolutely Earth shatteringly brilliant Throwing Muses album House Tornado. I feel like a tool now.

One Song Down

The RPM Challenge has kicked into gear and I have one song complete. Not sure how I feel about this one as the guitar sounds fishy in the chorus and I’m frankly too tired to know if the mix is any good or not. This might get some additional work.

50/90 is Underway

I have officially gotten further on 50/90 than in any years past.

In other words, I’ve done something. There are three things going, one of which is already fleshed out. I’ve even set up a soundcloud account to hold any works in progress.

So far so good, but there is so much further to go.

March Music… In May

When I did RPM this year there were two songs that just came out ridiculously bad. I couldn’t stand them. Neither was that bad, but the recordings were pretty crummy. One of the songs was okay as it was, so I decided to just re-record it for March. It’s better than it was… I guess. I changed the key from E to D, swapped the acoustic guitars for heavier electric guitars, and just sort of rocked it up a bit.

Here is the February version:
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/jen-and-me.mp3%20

Here is the March/May version that I just finished mixing:
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/jen-me-version-2.mp3%20

The Final RPM Challenge Post of 2014

Here it is kids, the (now) annual last official RPM Challenge post of the year.  I have uploaded this year’s stuff to my official RPM jukebox page.

Robert Parker’s RPM Challenge Music.

So there it is folks.  That page has three little flash playlists that contain my three officially submitted RPM Challenge projects.  This closes the book on February 2014.  I had a good time, despite being less than pleased with the end results.  There are a couple of decent moments.  One of the songs that I was really disappointed with is actually getting some love on alonetone.  I find that very weird.  Oh well.

I will keep plugging on more album-in-a-month zaniness, but RPM itself is over until next year.

RPM Challenge – Day 28 – FINISHED

The clock struck midnight as I was typing this. My MacBook battery is down to 13%.

The last songs are finished. I even added a new song while I was waiting for the kids to get out of karate. It’s just a really silly 90 second long 12-bar that I probably should have left off the final CD but didn’t.

Here’s the playlist at alonetone. I’ll get it to bandcamp and add it to my music page some other time.

ADDENDUM:
The alonetone playlist is displaying but it’s not playing, so here is the same playlist on soundcloud. This will be deleted eventually, but the alonetone one will live forever (so long as the site stays up).

RPM Challenge – Day 27

Something happened last night that sort of sums up this year’s challenge for me.  I went to bed after finishing the lead guitars on the last two songs.  While sleeping, I had a dream.  I was digging around in my ear for ear wax.  I found something else though.  I was able to grab it and pull.  What came out?  Dust.  A dust bunny about the size of a quarter.  When I woke up my first thought was, so that’s why everything sounds like crap this year.

I mixed two more songs before work this morning.  There are only two left.  I will finish them both tonight if it kills me.  Then I need to figure out a running order, burn a CD, and mail it off.

Here is one of this morning’s mixes. It’s the 7/8 rocker with the terrible leads.
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/bad-guy.mp3%20

The other song is in 6/8. It was an eighth note kinda morning. It was supposed to be the big quiet/loud/quiet thing but the loud parts are kinda pointless.
http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/that-certain-someone.mp3%20

It is February 27th. The end is upon us.

RPM Challenge – Day 26

I have finished recording all of the parts I need. I have four more songs to mix. I’m going to finish on time and have something in the mail by noon on Saturday. It just won’t be all that good.

The music is repetitive and clunky, the lyrics are crap as usual, the singing is worse than ever, and the lead guitar playing (which is normally weak at best) has been at times dreadful. I just don’t have it in me this month. I could probably take four or five of these and combine them with three or for from November and end up with a decent collection of songs, but this one on its own is pretty pathetic.

I mixed two more last night, for a total of 10 finished songs. I’m not going to post one of them because the vocal performance is the worst of my life, and despite recording the whole thing multiple times (dumbing down the melody each time) I still can’t pull it off.

The second mix from last night is better though.

http://alonetone.com/robertjames1971/tracks/yes.mp3%20

My hands are too tired to perform, my voice is too tired to perform, and I think my ears are too tired to perform too. Everything just sounds sort of… mushy.

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