Use funny names
(I've been a bit under the weather these days so I decided to write something light today...)
The other day I was working in a song that has two bridges. In order to locate it easily, I named the second one "Bridge 2 acoustic" in the DAW.
However, at some point it dawned on me: a name like that breached the "don't make me think" principle; each time I read that definition, instead of quick mental access to the part, what I got was having to decipher a small puzzle first: "just a second, I'm up to my ears in keyboards right now - what part was that exactly?" "Lemme think, does the part I'm thinking of have an acoustic guitar?"... An invisible burden that adds each time.
The solution was easy. After all, I'm not a manufacturer or an engineer, mostly concerned about data accuracy; I'm a musician, a poetic being, fueled by thunder-like intuition and creativity; as a plus I'm a goofball, too, with a strong and healthy tendency to say all kind of random silly stuff at all times.
So the part was instantly renamed to "Bucolic bridge". Boom. Now I read that definition and know exactly, in a fraction of nanosecond, what part I'm referring to, where it starts and where it ends.
This kind of naming (un)conventions proved to be very useful in my band days, too. I remember once, discussing the arrangements of a song, the bass player said something like "...and then comes the Mötley Crüe part". We all burst in laughter. The part didn't sound like Mötley Crüe like... at all -it was a heavy and slow riff, closer perhaps to Black Sabbath-. Hell, I suspect that the bass player hadn't even listened to Mötley Crüe in his life... But the definition stuck -perhaps because it was so absurd?-, and from that moment we all referred to that part as the Mötley Crüe part. There was something tremendously right about calling it like that, and we all 'connected' with it instantly.
Fast forward to some years later, I'm not sure if any listener of my bridge would ever comment, right off the bat: "oh, how bucolic this sounds!" But it sure is working for me... I guess making music does not necessarily mean making sense :)
The other day I was working in a song that has two bridges. In order to locate it easily, I named the second one "Bridge 2 acoustic" in the DAW.
However, at some point it dawned on me: a name like that breached the "don't make me think" principle; each time I read that definition, instead of quick mental access to the part, what I got was having to decipher a small puzzle first: "just a second, I'm up to my ears in keyboards right now - what part was that exactly?" "Lemme think, does the part I'm thinking of have an acoustic guitar?"... An invisible burden that adds each time.
The solution was easy. After all, I'm not a manufacturer or an engineer, mostly concerned about data accuracy; I'm a musician, a poetic being, fueled by thunder-like intuition and creativity; as a plus I'm a goofball, too, with a strong and healthy tendency to say all kind of random silly stuff at all times.
So the part was instantly renamed to "Bucolic bridge". Boom. Now I read that definition and know exactly, in a fraction of nanosecond, what part I'm referring to, where it starts and where it ends.
This kind of naming (un)conventions proved to be very useful in my band days, too. I remember once, discussing the arrangements of a song, the bass player said something like "...and then comes the Mötley Crüe part". We all burst in laughter. The part didn't sound like Mötley Crüe like... at all -it was a heavy and slow riff, closer perhaps to Black Sabbath-. Hell, I suspect that the bass player hadn't even listened to Mötley Crüe in his life... But the definition stuck -perhaps because it was so absurd?-, and from that moment we all referred to that part as the Mötley Crüe part. There was something tremendously right about calling it like that, and we all 'connected' with it instantly.
Fast forward to some years later, I'm not sure if any listener of my bridge would ever comment, right off the bat: "oh, how bucolic this sounds!" But it sure is working for me... I guess making music does not necessarily mean making sense :)
