audiotthoughts on music

and wondering where it’ll take me. i guess it’s about time for an update on the new audiot projects. as you guys already know, there’s music in the making which was supposed to end up on an album called “traitor”. this became more of a working title and then ideas came up like crazy  – so here’s what’s happening right now:

i’m up to 19 songs so far, 7 of them are awaiting vocals. it seems there won’t be any instrumentals this time, but one never knows. those 19 will have my voice on them. so i’m gonna do some vocal-recording and then 5 of the above mentioned 7 can be mixed and thrown out into the world. the other 2 will need maybe a solo and maybe some fills. i’ll do that after the vocals.

and it seems there will really be two albums, one in the style of “corner” and one with more “regular band stuff”. and once again there’s a lot of experimenting involved, lots of flaws left in there and again it kind of scares me what my mind comes up with. so if for me “corner” was like standing in a forest at sundown, peeking through some trees at a scary little cabin – this next one will be like stepping through the door and have a look at what’s inside. and i really don’t know if i’ll like what’s in there – but at least i’ll find out soon. fortune favors the bold, right?

before the albums are actually released i might put out some sneak peeks to let you know what’s coming. i thought about this a lot but am still not sure how to do this without spoiling the surprise – we’ll see about that. and still no making of video i’m afraid – getting into video-stuff would delay this whole thing even more….

so now you’re up to date and thanx for staying tuned. and even if i don’t know how this new stuff will sound once it’s finished, i can already say: if you liked “corner”, then you’ll love what’s coming. but if you didn’t like it, then you’ll love what’s coming. how’s that for a slogan? :-)

woohoo!

this is soooo cool. who’d have ever thought something like this would happen? believe it or not, this is the 300th entry on this site! well, i did fail miserably in my attempt to post once a day – this site went online end of may 2008, but still 300 posts is really cool, don’t you think? thank you all so much for reading, for your interest, your time and your feedback! so here’s to the next 300! yay!

and if that wasn’t enough, the song “bankjob” won the 10th week of the people’s music awards in the category off the beaten track! hooray! and no, i was not the only contestant. check the charts out here and look around a little, cool music up there. this means i’m in the next round where there’s guest judges to decide if it’s any good. now, you and i know that it isn’t, but let’s keep it a secret, ok? anyway, i’m really happy about it and once again, thank you so much to those who voted for me! by the way, you can listen to the song by clicking play on the blue player to the upper right – but you already knew that, right?

that’s it. take care y’all.

audiot signing out.

now, it’s been almost a week since that last part, so you had plenty of time to clean up your studio, take a dustcloth and the vacuum cleaner, organize all those bits and pieces and be ready to work in a clean, tidy and well organized environment from now on.

i told you this series will have four parts, so what else can we clean up you ask. the second thing that needs some tidying is your song. believe it or not, chances are there’s a lot of dirt in there. ok, we’re not talking freejazz here, but everything that’s being listened to is kind of clean in terms of the songwriting. “clean” might be a stupid word to describe this, but i can’t think of a better one. the idea is to have the song (here it is again) cleaned up. that means no unnecessary licks, no notes that don’t really fit in there. the right chord at the right place and not just the standard chord because it’s the only one you can play. go through your song, note by note, and pick the chords that fit in the best – make them up if necessary. think of “sweet home alabama” for instance – quite simple, standard D, C, G chords, right? nope. listen to it very closely. on the one hand, the song is more complex than you might think – lots of important details in there. but on the other it’s even simpler than standard. you can find lots of songs that are really well cleaned up by listening to the eagles – this is of course just one example. good funk music is often exemplary when it comes to cleaning up, good hiphop as well. the thing is to do what’s right for the moment. if the song calls for a guitar solo, so be it – if not, leave it out. do you really need that b-section? correction: does the song really need that b-section? and so forth. it’s not about writing the most complicated song – more like the other way around. i always wanted to write awesome progressive concept albums with 20-minute-songs. today i’m in the process of writing two-part-songs, one part for the verse and one for the chorus. that’s it. and who’s to say which ones are better? i can’t, even if those are my songs. but i can tell you one thing, nowadays i can finish a lot more songs and record them instead of carrying them around in my mind for years without even bringing them to paper. and people like them, the 3 people that actually do listen to my stuff that is :-)

but this is not about my songs, simply because my songs have no hit-potential (i know, “hit” is one of those words today), they’re not for the masses. but they are clean. and if you want to come up with something people would want to hear, then it has to be clean. throw out anything that is not necessary. it’s like packing a backpack for a hiking-trip. you first make a list of all the stuff you’d like to take with you, then lay it all out on the bed, then go buy a mule and you’re ready to go…. the better way is to make a list, lay it all out, throw half of it away and put the other half in the backpack. it will be fine.

i love comics, especially ones that are simple, like those for instance (that’s just the current one, there’s a new one each day…) – because i love the way they simplify everything. their people are made out of a few simple strokes but still you know what it’s about. i really dig the simplify-idea and i think it’s very important in songwriting. a song still can be complex of course, but it has to be clearly shown what it’s about…

damn, i really felt my english sucked in this one and i sincerely hope that you get the idea. good luck with that :-)

working on “traitor”, my 2nd album (listen to the 1st one “corner” in the blue player to your right) provoked some thoughts about the future, actually the present as well, of the album as such.

looking at websites or profile pages of independent artists creates the feeling that’s it’s just about single songs instead of albums. songs are uploaded as soon as they’re finished and more often than not, they don’t even seem to be related to some kind of album anymore. now, is this so?

it would make sense, because people listen to music on their mp3-players, create their own playlists and pick single tunes from download-sites. so is this the switch from rug to patchwork-quilt? and if yes, would it be wise for an artist to jump on that train? there’s another point to this, it would be more web2.0-ish if an artist would release each song as soon as it’s done because that would mean more frequent updates to his/her page or profile. one more advantage might be that each song would be noticed and listened to equally (at least at first). with the release of a whole album there’s always songs that draw more attention than others.

but on the other hand, i do like the concept of albums. to me it’s a lot less confusing, especially if someone covers a wide variety of styles with his/her music. so the albums would be like folders on your desktop that keep the songs together that belong together and give you a better view at what the artist did so far, because you see the different phases of his/her work. and the artist has the possibility to group songs together, so the album is more than just the sum of its tunes.

that leads to another thought. is this just triggered by the market? do artists simply react to the new era of consuming music? or do they welcome this and like the idea of thinking in smaller units? as for me, i’m not sure. right now, i’m in the middle of creating what i thought of as my 2nd album. but as a matter of fact, it’s more like 2. one of them very much related to the first one, stylewise. and the other one a straight hardrock record (about 8 songs each at the moment). now, there’s a decision to be made – should i do 2 albums, write more material for both and release 2 full records when they’re done? or should i just mix it together and do one album with those 16 tunes, even if they don’t really fit together? or, should i just go ahead and release every single song once it’s finished and don’t care about albums at all? or do the latter and then group the songs together once all of them are out? but who would be interested in an album if all the songs were already released? or, release some of the songs, so people already know half of the records, but have to wait for the records themselves to hear the other half?

i guess the main question here is: does the rug really tie the room together?

at this point, i have no idea. and instead of helping me to get closer to a decision, writing this confused me even more. damn!

that is something i do all the time, since i wrote my first song – about 18 years ago that is. accidentally i should add.

for some reason, i always write stuff i cannot play or sing – and it sucks. breathing for instance is usually no big deal once you got the basics down. there’s of course – and always will be – songparts that are hard to do, but those are just a few. oddly enough, i managed to write songs, lots of them, that i myself could not breathe at all. how stupid is that?

and although i’m through with this “airless phase”, i still do this with other parts – like drum- or guitarpieces i simply can not play. now, today that shouldn’t be a problem, right? we have computers and such to do this for us. but this is just not how it works, at least for me. even though i do almost everything with the laptop, i still take pride in my music (stop mocking me!) and the things you hear are really played and recorded, not drawn in with some pencil tool. and this is important to give it authenticity, which is one of the most vital things in music – or any art, for that matter. so right now, while working on the second album, i spend a whole lot of time practicing – just to be able to actually play those things i’m making up for myself. it usually is about precision. when i come up with a drumpart, it’s something i am basically able to play – if you can think it, you can play it – so that’s not the problem. same with guitar or bass. the hard part is to play it clean and precisely, to make every hit or stroke count and equally important. to have no fingernoises or rimclicks and so forth. this is the big challenge for me, so it’s writing the stuff and then tracking a really bad version of it, so i can figure it out in detail. and once i know exactly what to play, i practice like crazy to simply not suck too bad on the real track.

and that’s my point. there’s this saying here (no idea if there’s something similar in english…): one grows with his challenges. or as i probably mentioned many times before: practice something you can NOT do, instead of playing something you already own over and over again. so maybe i should feel lucky to have such a freakingly perverted subconscious that throws all those rocks at me during songwriting, because it knows me all too well. but even if this makes me playing better, it still would be nice to come up with something i could do right away every once in a while…

a little later than expected, but here it is. the next point mentioned in the article i’m referring to is about reverb. as for me, i don’t need any effects during recording. as i mentioned before, i try to be as easy to work with as possible and that includes being able to give a good performance under whatever circumstances you’re facing. so i made it a priority from my early days on to not be spoiled by anything, which means i can sing a good gig without even having monitors and i’m able to record in virtually every situation that might come up. this is in fact no big deal, just a matter of getting used to it. and it pays off – big time. do you know a singer that complained about anything? i do. i know legions of them and i dislike them as much as their bandmates do (or the guys that record them). don’t get me wrong, there are things that i’m expecting and i’m quite prepared to get them, believe me. but complaining about not having that second olive in my martini or that special silver plate to hold my chewing gum while i’m working my magic isn’t one of them. i’ll get to that later… so if having reverb in your headphones makes you more comfortable, so be it – i’m just saying you should be able to give a good performance without it, just in case… and whatever effects you’re using, make sure they’re set up properly and work the way they should before the actual session. how to set up the reverb right is explained in all detail in the article – just don’t forget, it’s not going to be on the recording, it’s just for your pleasure.

which brings us to the next point, although this is the same thing as mentioned a few times already. everything should be ready to go before the session starts. that includes the whole signal chain as well as the recording device of course. your cubase (or whatever else you’re using) project should be set up and saved with the correct parameters in the correct location. the playback should be prepared and playing without any problems. there should be enough free space to record plenty of takes – and enough processor power of course. you might want to create enough empty tracks with the correct settings (input, mono, bitrate etc.). if you’re not recording on a daw (digital audio workstation aka computer) but something else, it’s basically the same. you just have to check more cables, plugs, buttons etc. instead of windows on your screen. if you encounter noise, humming or anything like that, you’re in trouble. this may take a lot of time to fix it, so again: make absolutely sure everything works perfectly fine before the session begins! i guess one cannot mention this enough…

now i’ll skip points 5-7 because they’ll make part 4 of this little series.

no.8 is no big deal, it’s the same with the equipment. have the songs ready before the recording session – this is quite a no-brainer, right?

that’s it for now…

now here is a little more detail and insight from the singer’s point of view. the following thoughts were triggered by this article i linked to 2 days ago.

first, i’d like to say that i fully agree with those 8 points and think that they’re a good help in preparing for a vocal recording session. however, there are a few things that need to be added. memorizing lyrics is absolutely crucial, at least in my book. there’s nothing more lame than a singer who doesn’t know her/his words inside and out. i never went to a recording session without being perfectly prepared. and that’s simply because i believe one of the most important things about recording is being as professional as possible. that alone could be an entry in itself and i believe i already wrote a little about this every now and then. let’s just mention two things here: 1. you’re not alone in this world. so being professional is showing respect to the people who work with you (and not only because you want them to hire you again…). and 2. not being professional means a waste of the currency time and this will result in less motivation and higher costs. that being said, this depends of course on the fact that you need the lyrics and the song itself in advance with enough time to prepare yourself. but, as harsh as this may sound, being a singer not only means hookers & booze but also being able to get into a song really fast, being able to memorize lyrics really fast and being able to come up with some melody really fast. that doesn’t necessarily apply if you’re just some kind of a backyard screamer – but even then i would expect a certain amount of professionalism from you. if you don’t take yourself seriously – why should i? now, it still is important to have the lyrics printed out and there (plus an adequate stand to hold them in place where the singer can see them without turning around. i always go the extra mile and set this up, even if i do not look at it once. it’s just part of the deal and who knows, maybe you’re giving the performance of a lifetime and then being carried away so far that you lost the first word of the 3rd verse… so just have the lyrics there, will ya? and do not count on others to bring them for you. take care of everything that involves you yourself – well, at least of the things you’re able to take care of. by the way, if you like to make notes on your lyrics or wherever, bring a pen and some paper yourself. they should have it there, but bring it anyway – it’s not that much to ask, now is it?

now, the second point in the article is about setting the microphone up (including the rest of you signal chain) and have it all ready and working before the actual session starts. there’s not that much more to say about this except how important this is! remember the part about being professional? as much as i ask this from myself, i ask this from others as well. it sucks big time to show up on time and then sitting around for an hour or so waiting until everything’s ready. huge motivation-killer. and although i believe in being able to give a good performance anytime, the vibes just suffer from something like this. if i’m recording myself i usually set everything up the evening before, tweak all the knobs and run a quick test or two. then i go home and have a good night sleep, knowing that there won’t be any technical issues spoiling the performance to come. of course, there is another quick test necessary right before the actual recording, but it’s just a great feeling to go there, knowing everything’s ready to go. if you’re recording somewhere else, but with your gear, be sure to plan enough time for the setting up and a short break. i don’t need to mention that you should be able to set up your own equipment even in your sleep, do i? now, if you have nothing to do with the setting up, it’s really not up to you. so the only thing you can do here is being prepared to wait. or better: count on it and then be surprised positively if it’s not necessary…

wow, it seems this makes for at least one more part – so check back tomorrow…

ok, i gotta run – so here’s just a quick update on how the work on the new album is coming along. there are no lyrics whatsoever yet. but the intro is finished – i’m thinking about turning the intro into a whole song, though…

the music for one song is finished, except for the solo which i will track after i’ve done the vocals. and the music for 4 more songs is written. this takes that much longer than expected, but this whole internet stuff is stealing away lots of time (not talking about writing entries for this place…).

on the other hand, i’ve got one song almost finished (again except vocals) but it won’t be on “traitor” because it’s a completely different style, more bankjob-like. i tried to combine it with already existing traitor-stuff but it sounded…..cough, cough…..not that great. we’ll see where that goes…

babysteps once again – but at least steps. and they’re in the right direction…

just for the heck of it…

woohoo! here it is. finally. about time. bankjob. yay!

the first song of the album “corner” and the one that plays by default when you click the play-button on the blue player to the upper right. and the one that made it to no.14 on the reverbnation-german-rock-charts – maybe i mentioned that already :-)

the funny thing about this tune is, it was never meant to be a real song, more like an intermezzo or something – if at all. i messed around trying to get a dirty but still defined sound that should go through the whole album. that was even before i started on any other song. just trying to figure out how the album should sound in general.  so i picked a drumset from the “vintage RDK”-refill (check out Peff’s website if you’re into Reason) and fell in love with the sound of the toms. messing around a little more, i came up with this tom-based drumbeat and recorded that for about 45 seconds. it sounds quite wacky if you listen to it closely – sometimes even off, but that’s what’s giving it this great feel and me the inspiration for the bassline, which is simply going up from one ‘c’ to the next and then down again – with very few variations. played with a cool acoustic bass-sound that matched the drums quite nicely, doubled by a saxophone and tripled by a harmonica. then i had the idea for this breathing sound on the ‘1′ and the ‘2&’ – i did this with a flute-sound transposed way down – giving the whole groove lots of drive. i was quite surprised how big a difference that flute makes. if you could listen to bass-sax-harmonica only, you would probably faint or throw up or maybe both. this is a timing-freak’s nightmare, sounds just horrible!

then there’s the saxophone playing this little melody at the beginning and the end. actually it does sound very real by itself – as a saxophone-player i was truly amazed. but i didn’t manage to get this very real sound into the final mix. for some reason it doesn’t sound that real to me anymore. i guess something else is stealing a few frequencies away – i didn’t find it though, so this was the best i could do.

as soon as i was done with this 45-second-piece, i knew this had to be a full song. so i came up with the break-part to make room for the voice. it would have been difficult to include vocals during the soundmess-section and those breaks seemed an appropriate and easy to do solution. so i played the drums for the rest of the song including the badass ending, played the other stuff as well – let’s be honest, it’s all just repeating itself over and over and over again, but it’s played NOT copy-and-pasted. and was done really quick. throughout this whole process, i thought about some old action-movie with cool car chases and gangsters and such. so it turned out to be a short briefing of the gang right before the job – lyricswise….

although the single parts of this song are, well, not really demanding :-) and poorly played without any correction whatsoever – it has this killing feel and it still blows me away every single time i listen to it. unbelievable – and i think rather incidental than on purpose but who cares?

oops, come to think of it, there was a correction. i had to clean up the snare-rolls at the end of the verse-sections because the midi-controller didn’t react as fast and precisely as i wanted it to….

that’s it! now you know all the dirty details about the creation of “corner”. i’m sorry if i destroyed your vision of me being a creative soundgod, i’m just stumbling around making weird noise that weird people seem to find….weird. yes, i guess that about sums it up :-)

and i’ll prove this to you. as you may know, the next album is in the making….

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