I just finished the April music project. All 10 songs mixed. Now I just have to figure out a running order (I’ll probably just use the order in which they were written) and make a playlist on bandcamp. should I make an April playlist and a March playlist, or should I make one for both of them and mix them all up in the running order. I waffle back and forth on that one.
So I only have three songs left from March right? That’s what I said last night when I finished playing the gitter for the night, right?
No. Idiot marked one song as finished when it still needs to be mixed. Idiot. I have four songs that aren’t finished yet. I should get the un-mixed oversight mixed tonight though. I think.
I finished the last lead guitar part from April. Now all that’s left for the month is to mix the last two songs.
March still has three that aren’t finished. Two have lyrics written but only have a guide track. The third has nuttin.
I broke one of my rules tonight. Twice. I have a rule that states when I record bad rock songs the lead guitars cannot be recorded until after all the vocals are complete. That is the law. I broke the law. I recorded leads for the two songs that only have guide vocals. That means March now has two vocals to record, one to write and record, and one lead guitar to record. Then those three songs need mixin’. That’s all that’s left.
One other note. I am having a really tough time playing the Stratocaster. I’m just having a tough time getting the feel of it. The neck is so different from the Gibsons. I knew it would take a while, but I’m getting frustrated. A little. Not much. Just a little.
I also need to put lighter strings on it, and soon. Ouch.
I didn’t have time to record a vocal this morning. I did manage to write a lyric and a melody though. I used my Apple Ear Pods. I listened through the headphones while recording a guide track with the built in mic.
It wasn’t much of a nerd moment, but it sufficed for the day.
My first real band was called Tempest Fero. We shoulda rethought that name. Anyway, this was one of the first four or five songs we wrote. There should be keyboard, but I don’t have the skill or the patience to try and pull it off.
Recordingly speaking, there are things to note about this turkey. First, it is the first time I ever used the tempo track in Garageband. There is a bonafide tempo change in this one that I didn’t cheat my way through by recording two separate files and then editing them together.
Second, all three of my electric guitars make an appearance. The rhythm guitar is my Les Paul Custom. The first half of the guitar solo during the slow section is my Stratocaster. The second half is the Les Paul Custom again. The two solo breaks toward the end should have been keyboards, but instead they are my ES 335 Pro. The guitarmonies at the very end are actually all three guitars. They weren’t part of the Tempest Fero arrangement, but I thought it would be fun to have all three gitters in harmony.
As for the old days in T.F., this song was monkeyed with often. I believe this is the arrangement (sans keys) we stuck with the most, but there were others. I remember at one point the slow section opened the song. I only found one old (ancient) tape of the song and I could not for the life of me figure out the lyrics in the last verse. What I have here is close, but probably not 100% right.
As for the lyrics, well… we never had a chance. It was 1987 or 88. I was really into Deep Purple. Our drummer was into White Snake and Iron Maiden. We all loved Led Zeppelin. At some point we were going to write a hooker song. None of us would have known a hooker if we had one sitting on our lap, but there was no way around it. We were going to write a hooker song.
I clearly recall three, maybe four, of us sitting in a fast food joint working on the lyrics. We created the character and threw the lyrics together while snaking on McD’s, or Burger King. I’m also pretty sure we got there on a high school band bus. It was a stop along the way on some competition or trip or something. I also seem to remember thinking it was pretty funny. Really, it was just kinda sad.
I haven’t been pushing the recording very much so far this month. I have one full week left to get stuff done before I take a week off from work. When I take that week off, I’m not going to want to do anything but relax.
There are a total of 20 songs. All of the basic tracks (drums, bass, rhythm guitar) are finished. What’s left?
Three songs still need lyrics, vocals, melody, and lead guitar. They are all from March.
Three more songs have vocals but still need lead guitars. Two from March and one from April.
Two more songs are fully recorded, but still need to be mixed. Both are from April.
The remaining 12 songs are all completely finished. Five from March and seven from April.
And that, dear friends, is where it stands. I suspect it will probably trickle into June. I still haven’t decided if June will get it’s own music month project. July won’t, as 50/90 starts on July 4th and I am planning on failing that one once again.
I have one song recorded that includes Fender guitars exclusively. A first. I also just recorded the use of a whammy bar for the first time. What a strange world we live in.
I mixed two songs last night. Let’s start with the bad news. This song is from April. You’d think it would be bad enough that after finishing the recording I realized that it’s awfully similar to a 2013 RPM song, but I had to go and put together this crap fest of a mix. I expect to be doing this one again.
On a slightly better note, I also mixed one from March. This is the first of the RPMarch songs, and one of the Christmas vacation things. All that’s left from the original iPad file is the bass, and even that is using a different sound. I like this one… sort of. The vocals were sung in the car while sitting in a parking lot waiting for the kids to get out of karate. The lyrics are about how weird it is that so many people get so wound up about RPM, and about how dumb the idea of doing a second RPM right away felt.
I’ll probably end up remixing this one too. I have no confidence in any of the mixing I’ve done. I’ve already redone two of these things. I have been using more plug in effects and some how I just get bogged down with the individual tracks and I lose the sense of the complete song. When I go back and listen a few days later, everything is swimming in reverb, or the bass is buried, or the lead is buried, or the drums are too loud. It’s always something. I might end up remixing everything.
I just made a list of all 20 March and April songs and color coded it based on the state of completion (or incompletion) in which each recording currently resides.
There are two that are ready to mix. Hopefully I’ll get one in tonight.
Here’s another song from the March 10. Back in December while the kids were on Christmas vacation I had a brief idea of writing and recording 4-5 songs as a Christmas Vacation project. It got as far as four Garageband files on my iPad consisting of bass and drums. When the dumb idea of continuing RPM into March came along I rolled those four ideas into RPMarch. Now we’re in May and here we have the first of those four to be mixed. This is actually #3. Not that it matters.
The lyrics are another @floridaman story. If I do 50/90, I might take the lyrics ideas for all 50 songs from that twitter account. It’s a gold mine.
While I was at it tonight, I also remixed the most recent April song. I brought up the lead guitar (duh) and reduced the sauce on the vocals. I don’t know if it made any difference, but here it is. It still doesn’t have the Highlander line. I guess I’ll have to remix this at least once more.
I mentioned yesterday that I was hoping to mix two songs tonight.
Every other Friday I spend the evening hanging out with my mom at my folks’ house while my dad does volunteer work. I get there around quarter to seven and leave about quarter past 10. My mother is usually asleep not long after 8:00, so I usually bring my computer and mess around with music while I wait for Dad to come home. The plan tonight was to try to mix one or both of the two songs that are ready.
This morning before I left I put my computer into my backpack (MacBook Pro, beetches). I had my awesome new blue tooth Bose headphones in their case sitting right next to the computer. I also had my awesome Sennheiser cans, the ones I used to mix last February’s RPM, and last November’s NaSoAlMo, and every thing in between, sitting right there on the desk next to the Bose headphones and the computer.
I forgot to put either pair of headphones into the backpack. I have an old pair of ear buds. Urgh. One of the songs that’s ready to mix is far and away my favorite of this month’s batch (meaning on a scale from 1-10 it’s a 3) so I will mix the other one first. I don’t want to waste the time, and I don’t want to mix a potentially decent song using ear buds.
Inside the Red Head's Head 