Captain's log #40
Got to listen the whole Bandcamp thing. After giving it some
consideration, I think I'm going to scrap "Zombie barf". I believe in
the song, it doesn't deserve the poor audio treatment I've given it;
plus I don't want to ship junk. When I was in my 20s, it was enough for
me to get the song good enough so that others "saw what I meant", the
vibe I was aiming to, and the execution was only in second place. Now I
find that approach too lacking; I can do better than that and I know it.
I try to see it as a "failing forward"; I've created a new category for songs like this, unpublishable, but good as elaborated demos, to show to one's band when or if I ever get to have one again.
After this listening I've made a lot of reflection. "Zombie barf" took like 20 hours of "production" (the term including everything besides composition and rehearsal). AB tests in different speakers, all the different plugins... the works. "You're repulsive", on its side, took hardly 2 hours; the guitar is not layered. The drums are a simple loop. The voice is not layered either (hell, I didn't even use a pop filter!) And it sounds way way better. There's something fishy going on here. The technical disease perhaps?
I need more standardization and additional creative constraints. I'm still deciding how to go about it. A good beginning could be what I wrote about a couple of days ago; arranging things so that I can play or sing something every day. A computer screen is like a rectangular spotlight focused on your face and it doesn't have much to do with music making per se - as process I mean; of course it is a sensational tool, etc...
Perhaps I also have to admit that the genre of music that I do doesn't take too well the me-myself-and-i approach (although it is still possible; I'm listening to one of the proofs right now, in fact it has become one of my go-to albums...)
An idea that has been in my mind lately is adding a new filter to the song choice process: technical feasibility. It's something that I've never taken into consideration before; I just thought of the songs I wanted in the album, how well they would match with each other... With my humble resources maybe I should pay attention also to things like "this one is straightforward, but that one has 3 tempo changes", "this one has a crowd chant that is going to be hard to pull off..."
As a "bucket resolution", as a container while I figure out the rest, I've decided that in the final week of November I'll release what I've got. Like a game of "musical chair"; if it is an EP, good. If it is a maxisingle, so be it. If it is a single, it's ok too. If I don't even have the single I'll record a podcast explaining what happened... Something, I don't know.
I feel a bit "bruised" today, as sometimes facing the truth leaves you, but I don't feel sad for having gone through the whole process of the song only to discard it later; closing the cycle has its value too. The accumulated experience is useful and what I have to do now is try different working patterns. Today I'll simply play for a while at random, explore, wait for some spark to happen
I try to see it as a "failing forward"; I've created a new category for songs like this, unpublishable, but good as elaborated demos, to show to one's band when or if I ever get to have one again.
After this listening I've made a lot of reflection. "Zombie barf" took like 20 hours of "production" (the term including everything besides composition and rehearsal). AB tests in different speakers, all the different plugins... the works. "You're repulsive", on its side, took hardly 2 hours; the guitar is not layered. The drums are a simple loop. The voice is not layered either (hell, I didn't even use a pop filter!) And it sounds way way better. There's something fishy going on here. The technical disease perhaps?
I need more standardization and additional creative constraints. I'm still deciding how to go about it. A good beginning could be what I wrote about a couple of days ago; arranging things so that I can play or sing something every day. A computer screen is like a rectangular spotlight focused on your face and it doesn't have much to do with music making per se - as process I mean; of course it is a sensational tool, etc...
Perhaps I also have to admit that the genre of music that I do doesn't take too well the me-myself-and-i approach (although it is still possible; I'm listening to one of the proofs right now, in fact it has become one of my go-to albums...)
An idea that has been in my mind lately is adding a new filter to the song choice process: technical feasibility. It's something that I've never taken into consideration before; I just thought of the songs I wanted in the album, how well they would match with each other... With my humble resources maybe I should pay attention also to things like "this one is straightforward, but that one has 3 tempo changes", "this one has a crowd chant that is going to be hard to pull off..."
As a "bucket resolution", as a container while I figure out the rest, I've decided that in the final week of November I'll release what I've got. Like a game of "musical chair"; if it is an EP, good. If it is a maxisingle, so be it. If it is a single, it's ok too. If I don't even have the single I'll record a podcast explaining what happened... Something, I don't know.
I feel a bit "bruised" today, as sometimes facing the truth leaves you, but I don't feel sad for having gone through the whole process of the song only to discard it later; closing the cycle has its value too. The accumulated experience is useful and what I have to do now is try different working patterns. Today I'll simply play for a while at random, explore, wait for some spark to happen
