Worst. Song. Title. Ever. And darn close to my FAWM song "That's My Fly-Cathching Logic Bear" that I had just written a week or two earlier. Thanks SongFight!. I had three or four (edit: turns out there were five) separate ideas for this one.
1. Write a love song along the lines of...you can get me the stupidest birthday card in the world and I'd just love you more. I was not planning on actually using the title in the song, it would just be implied that it referred to the birthday card.
2. Submit "That's My Fly-Catching Logic Bear" with a badly dubbed "Robot Ninja Zombie" recorded over the "Fly-Catching Logic" lines. I like my original song too much to condemn a hacked-up version of it to the SongFight! archive.
3. Write a j-rock inspired anime-theme type song, probably in badly translated Japanese. Someone already posted lyrics in Japanese on SongFight!, so I decided not to be a "me too" and tried to find a more unique approach.
4. Write a not-so-flattering song about a girl comparing her to each adjective in turn, i.e. "you look like a robot, you love like a ninja, you look like a zombie, you smell like a bear". The next part would involve other ideas like priate, princess, etc. Again, I didn't get very far with this concept because someone posted something similar to the lyrics page on SongFight!.
5. My final idea (melody and all) came into my head on Saturday night. Basically, the lyrics would be about writing a forgettable song about a forgettable girl and giving it the stupidest name possible so no one would remember what it was actually about. This is the one I went with. I wrote and recorded it Tuesday afternoon, after listening to The Pillows all the way home from work. I was originally intending to end the song with the title, but ended up with kind of a punchline by ending the song with another rediculous, but ultimately cooler, title from the songfight archives. Two other ideas for this song were concidered and discarded. Originally between each line about "writing a forgettable song" I was going to insert a line from a previous SongFight! that I had written. Then, the idea morphed into inserting lines from songs that I had not written for and ending with the first line of my first SongFight! song. This didn't happen either, but that's how "Living At The Corner Of Dude And Catastrophe" got in my head.
- For the final song there are two guitars, panned mostly, a bass, and an effect that I originally wanted to do with multi-tracked vocals, but forgot when I was recording it and then ran out of time. There are also four vocal tracks. A doubled lead, and a doubled background. I was making the lines up as I recorded, so the singing is weak in places. I also cut down on the amount of drum fills on the ol' drum machine, in an effort to not make them sound so fake. The whole song was written, recorded, and done between 5:30 and 8:00 p.m. on 16-Mar-2010. I like "That's My Fly-Catching Logic Bear" infinitely better.
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
Thursday, March 4, 2010
FAWM Wrap Up - 4/4
Songs written and recorded in the 4th week of February for FAWM 2010:
11. Auriform – This was a title left over from my attempted Album-A-Day. This song was written for the Week 3 Challenge: Neither Major Nor Minor. I tried to stick to that concept with my chord choice and I incorporated the challenge name into the first line of the song. The lyrics are about my affection for Yoko Kanno’s music. I mention her band “Seatbelts”, but really, I am speaking to her whole musical catalog. There is not a more creative person currently living on the planet that I have heard of. This song is a three chord throwaway song, but I find it catchy.
12. Constant One – This song was written for the Week 4 Challenge: Time. For awhile, I tried not to use the word or concept of “time” in my songwriting because when I first started writing songs, I completely overused it. For this I wanted to write a major-chord-love-song, and I think it came out pretty well for what I intended. The verses seem a little lazy to me and the falsetto parts were added at the time of recording, adding a little variety to the soundscape. This one was recorded hastily and the verse lyrics were improvised at the time of recording. For the second vocal track, I had to stop after each line and listen to the next line from the first vocal track to remember the exact wording. Again, the title and lyrics could point to another song written about the television show Lost, but that really wasn’t the case specifically.
13. Double Take – This song was written for a Songfight!. It was also, surprise, another Songfight! title that I didn’t like. I had the idea of a somewhat debasing song about getting too excited around someone of the opposite sex. The first lines I had for this song were: My eyes did a double take/My dick did a spit take. This line was changed to be less graphic, but the spirit of the song remained. Neither of the three mini-stories that make up the verses were based on any real events from my life, but more from what I would consider the cliché stories that center around the event described in the chorus. Personally, I find this song a bit gross, and I don’t plan on keeping it around where I can listen to it for very long (pun intended).
14. Your Westness Is Upsetting – Last song for FAWM 2010. This song was written and recorded on the last day of FAWM 2010. The title is from the group of 15 titles I got together for the third week of FAWM. Personally, I don’t care about all the celebrity trash gossip that comes out of California. I also don’t care about California’s problems. All states have problems. I can’t find any energy to care about the wild fires, energy crisis, water shortages, budget shortages, gay marriage, or illegal immigration. Everyone has a choice in where they live, and if you want to live in a state that’s in that state, don’t bitch about it. I would think all that misery would somehow be channeled into really great movies, but no. All we get are remakes and sequels. Again, like so many other songs, the verses were improvised at the time of recording. There is quite a bit of energy in this recording, and it was done really quickly, so I am a bit surprised.
That’s it. FAWM is done. If I were to rate my FAWMs in order of quality:
1. 2008
2. 2010
3. 2009
4. 2007
Now, what’s next???
11. Auriform – This was a title left over from my attempted Album-A-Day. This song was written for the Week 3 Challenge: Neither Major Nor Minor. I tried to stick to that concept with my chord choice and I incorporated the challenge name into the first line of the song. The lyrics are about my affection for Yoko Kanno’s music. I mention her band “Seatbelts”, but really, I am speaking to her whole musical catalog. There is not a more creative person currently living on the planet that I have heard of. This song is a three chord throwaway song, but I find it catchy.
12. Constant One – This song was written for the Week 4 Challenge: Time. For awhile, I tried not to use the word or concept of “time” in my songwriting because when I first started writing songs, I completely overused it. For this I wanted to write a major-chord-love-song, and I think it came out pretty well for what I intended. The verses seem a little lazy to me and the falsetto parts were added at the time of recording, adding a little variety to the soundscape. This one was recorded hastily and the verse lyrics were improvised at the time of recording. For the second vocal track, I had to stop after each line and listen to the next line from the first vocal track to remember the exact wording. Again, the title and lyrics could point to another song written about the television show Lost, but that really wasn’t the case specifically.
13. Double Take – This song was written for a Songfight!. It was also, surprise, another Songfight! title that I didn’t like. I had the idea of a somewhat debasing song about getting too excited around someone of the opposite sex. The first lines I had for this song were: My eyes did a double take/My dick did a spit take. This line was changed to be less graphic, but the spirit of the song remained. Neither of the three mini-stories that make up the verses were based on any real events from my life, but more from what I would consider the cliché stories that center around the event described in the chorus. Personally, I find this song a bit gross, and I don’t plan on keeping it around where I can listen to it for very long (pun intended).
14. Your Westness Is Upsetting – Last song for FAWM 2010. This song was written and recorded on the last day of FAWM 2010. The title is from the group of 15 titles I got together for the third week of FAWM. Personally, I don’t care about all the celebrity trash gossip that comes out of California. I also don’t care about California’s problems. All states have problems. I can’t find any energy to care about the wild fires, energy crisis, water shortages, budget shortages, gay marriage, or illegal immigration. Everyone has a choice in where they live, and if you want to live in a state that’s in that state, don’t bitch about it. I would think all that misery would somehow be channeled into really great movies, but no. All we get are remakes and sequels. Again, like so many other songs, the verses were improvised at the time of recording. There is quite a bit of energy in this recording, and it was done really quickly, so I am a bit surprised.
That’s it. FAWM is done. If I were to rate my FAWMs in order of quality:
1. 2008
2. 2010
3. 2009
4. 2007
Now, what’s next???
Wednesday, March 3, 2010
FAWM Wrap Up - 3/4
The third week of FAWM coincided with a day I called in sick from work due to snow. I decided try for an Album-A-Day, but ended up running out of steam after three songs. I also wrote and recorded a song for Songfight! that week. This is the first week where all the songs were recorded right after they were written, so the creative magic is preserved a bit more. These songs also run the gambit lyric-wise from being improvised at the time they were being recorded to being meticulously plotted out. In my opinion, sometimes, the lyrics aren’t that important; the melody and feel of a song can be so pure that over-thought-out lyrics can ruin the purity if it. Other songs, though, can be built solely around clever lyrics.
07. A Night Without Moon And Stars – To prepare for my supposed Album-A-Day, I did what I did when I wrote my first one; since you are not supposed to start with any preconceived ideas, after the time started, I got on three websites and pulled 5 potential song titles from each. The websites were a random quotations site, modplug’s random song title generator, and leon’s random lyric generator. That’s where I got the titles for songs 07, 08, 09, 11 and 14. In this stint of songwriting, though, I just wrote 07, 08, and 09. Moon And Stars revolves around a set of 6 harmonics played over and over. I wanted to get the feel of the beginning of “Pilgrim Snow” by Yoko Kanno mixed with some song from Escaflowne I can’t remember the name of. The lyrics were an afterthought added after the entire song was recorded. The “so dark” part ended up sounding a lot like a song by Low, who I also enjoy quite a bit.
08. Someone In Some Dark Café – This was another one with lyrics improvised at the time of recording. I wanted to write a song about the people who sit in coffee shops with their laptops and try to look really cool. I don’t usually build songs around riffs, but this time I did. I also added a guitar solo, which is not something I do often. At first, I was disappointed that the music wasn’t more brooding, but I don’t mind it that much now. It sounds more musical and complicated than a lot of my other stuff, so I guess that’s good. The main guitar was recorded with an external mic instead of lining in the guitar to the recorded. I guess I forgot that because you can hear me mumbling in the background at the starts of the verses. I was trying to keep track of where I was in the song. To kind of hide this, because another take was not an option, I put the background vocal track in.
09. That’s My Fly-Catching Logic-Bear – If you have this title in front of you, how can you not write something for it. This one is basically what I wanted; a high energy pop song. The music was recorded with only a vocal melody in place for the verses and a one line chorus. When I was recording the verses, I was in a bad mood and made the song about someone who likes to annoy people for no reason, and doesn’t like to follow social norms. The Fly-Catching Logic-Bear then became someone who is completely politically correct and has no real independent thought. Of course this meaning was completely retconned in later after the whole song had been recorded and I was trying to figure out what I was trying to say. I wish the lead guitar at the beginning was a little lower in volume. Oh yeah, this song features some more rare lead guitar work.
That’s pretty much as far as I got. There was another title called “Spinescent” that I recorded a distorted full band song for, but balked at putting lyrics on because at that time I had written three nonsense songs and had no ability left to form random lyrics and pretend they meant something.
10. Please Stop – This song was written for a Songfight!. There were three different version of this song conceived by me during the week that the title was up. My first version was a pop/rock number where the “please” would sound kind of like the “please” in the song “Go” by Pearl Jam (that I have not listened to in maybe a decade). I actually recorded an instrumental version of this and again balked at putting meaningless lyrics on it. I didn’t actually have a story for the song. The next version was going to be an alternate take on the “Romeo and Juliet” story with the first line being “Where for art thou, Juliet?”. The feel would have been like “Jack and Diane” by Johnny Cougar. I think I was still focused on Juliet’s demise on Lost at the time. I also didn’t have the drive to develop this idea beyond the vocal melody of the verses. I tried to combine this idea with the first as well. It didn’t work. On the last day before the fight deadline, I got an idea to use things that kids are taught as the central theme: stop, drop and roll, stop, look, and listen, and don’t swim for an hour after eating. At first I planned to make it a full-on kids song, but I got a flat tire after work that night and after getting home real late that night I knew I only had time for a live acoustic number. I also knew that I had to be witty at least or no one would like it at Songfight!. So, I wrote some graphic verses and made the song more of a cautionary tale, describing in detail the deaths of three kids (one was hit by a car, one was drowned, and one was burned to death). Once I had worked out the lyrics, which took awhile, I thought the song could be more than what it was and wanted to do something akin to my “Rattlesnake” song, but I didn’t have the time. So the live take was what I ended up with.
That ends my third week of FAWM. It was the most productive and the most creative so far. I’m kind of bummed that I didn’t get a full Album-A-Day done, but I really didn’t have it in me.
07. A Night Without Moon And Stars – To prepare for my supposed Album-A-Day, I did what I did when I wrote my first one; since you are not supposed to start with any preconceived ideas, after the time started, I got on three websites and pulled 5 potential song titles from each. The websites were a random quotations site, modplug’s random song title generator, and leon’s random lyric generator. That’s where I got the titles for songs 07, 08, 09, 11 and 14. In this stint of songwriting, though, I just wrote 07, 08, and 09. Moon And Stars revolves around a set of 6 harmonics played over and over. I wanted to get the feel of the beginning of “Pilgrim Snow” by Yoko Kanno mixed with some song from Escaflowne I can’t remember the name of. The lyrics were an afterthought added after the entire song was recorded. The “so dark” part ended up sounding a lot like a song by Low, who I also enjoy quite a bit.
08. Someone In Some Dark Café – This was another one with lyrics improvised at the time of recording. I wanted to write a song about the people who sit in coffee shops with their laptops and try to look really cool. I don’t usually build songs around riffs, but this time I did. I also added a guitar solo, which is not something I do often. At first, I was disappointed that the music wasn’t more brooding, but I don’t mind it that much now. It sounds more musical and complicated than a lot of my other stuff, so I guess that’s good. The main guitar was recorded with an external mic instead of lining in the guitar to the recorded. I guess I forgot that because you can hear me mumbling in the background at the starts of the verses. I was trying to keep track of where I was in the song. To kind of hide this, because another take was not an option, I put the background vocal track in.
09. That’s My Fly-Catching Logic-Bear – If you have this title in front of you, how can you not write something for it. This one is basically what I wanted; a high energy pop song. The music was recorded with only a vocal melody in place for the verses and a one line chorus. When I was recording the verses, I was in a bad mood and made the song about someone who likes to annoy people for no reason, and doesn’t like to follow social norms. The Fly-Catching Logic-Bear then became someone who is completely politically correct and has no real independent thought. Of course this meaning was completely retconned in later after the whole song had been recorded and I was trying to figure out what I was trying to say. I wish the lead guitar at the beginning was a little lower in volume. Oh yeah, this song features some more rare lead guitar work.
That’s pretty much as far as I got. There was another title called “Spinescent” that I recorded a distorted full band song for, but balked at putting lyrics on because at that time I had written three nonsense songs and had no ability left to form random lyrics and pretend they meant something.
10. Please Stop – This song was written for a Songfight!. There were three different version of this song conceived by me during the week that the title was up. My first version was a pop/rock number where the “please” would sound kind of like the “please” in the song “Go” by Pearl Jam (that I have not listened to in maybe a decade). I actually recorded an instrumental version of this and again balked at putting meaningless lyrics on it. I didn’t actually have a story for the song. The next version was going to be an alternate take on the “Romeo and Juliet” story with the first line being “Where for art thou, Juliet?”. The feel would have been like “Jack and Diane” by Johnny Cougar. I think I was still focused on Juliet’s demise on Lost at the time. I also didn’t have the drive to develop this idea beyond the vocal melody of the verses. I tried to combine this idea with the first as well. It didn’t work. On the last day before the fight deadline, I got an idea to use things that kids are taught as the central theme: stop, drop and roll, stop, look, and listen, and don’t swim for an hour after eating. At first I planned to make it a full-on kids song, but I got a flat tire after work that night and after getting home real late that night I knew I only had time for a live acoustic number. I also knew that I had to be witty at least or no one would like it at Songfight!. So, I wrote some graphic verses and made the song more of a cautionary tale, describing in detail the deaths of three kids (one was hit by a car, one was drowned, and one was burned to death). Once I had worked out the lyrics, which took awhile, I thought the song could be more than what it was and wanted to do something akin to my “Rattlesnake” song, but I didn’t have the time. So the live take was what I ended up with.
That ends my third week of FAWM. It was the most productive and the most creative so far. I’m kind of bummed that I didn’t get a full Album-A-Day done, but I really didn’t have it in me.
FAWM Wrap Up - 2/4
In the second week of FAWM, I wrote three songs. They were all written pretty much on the same day. Each one was a semi-improvisation that I recorded and later went back and smoothed out the lyrics and changes in places where I didn’t know what I was doing. Then I listened to each for a bit and re-recorded them as follows.
04. Lost Again – Written like the song says on a Sunday afternoon. I was focused on television when I was writing this one. Lost and Parks & Rec. are mentioned specifically, but I was really trying to write a commentary about a life that revolves around work and watching television. As I started writing it, I was reminded of that old Lemonheads song that starts out “That pencil smell reminds me of school…” and I tried to write a song with that feel. I would have scrapped the whole thing, but I the chorus is fun to sing.
05. Penny – This song was written for the Week 2 Challenge: Inanimate Objects. Obviously, this song is about a penny on the ground. This song is capo’d on the 10th fret of the guitar and is pretty fun to play the chords. After I improvised a take, I sat down and wrote out some painfully obvious lyrics about the lost penny being found by a boy and has worth again because he can spend it on candy or something and called the song “Currently Currency”. Listening back to the improvised demo, I really liked the rambling nonsense of the original lyrics, so I switched back to them. I was also really getting sick of coming up with “catchy titles” for songs and decided to go minimal on this song and the next one. This song was recorded in 4 sections on 2 different tracks because I couldn’t do the whole thing in one take because I hadn’t learned how to sing the last quarter of it. It is just me and the acoustic, live.
06. Games – A third improvised song and a second song with a minimal title. The improvisation really shows here in the phrasing of the whole song. In the recording, I really like the way the guitar sounds like it’s a egg-shaker instead of a string instrument. Listening back to the improvised acoustic demo, I like that one better, especially, the “it’s all right” ending part. This song is really about nothing except some arrogant lyrics in the verses.
So. That concludes my second week of FAWM. These songs weren’t fully recorded until the last two days of the month. I was in a real hurry to get all songs demo’d by then. The recordings are rushed and full of flaws, but they are done.
04. Lost Again – Written like the song says on a Sunday afternoon. I was focused on television when I was writing this one. Lost and Parks & Rec. are mentioned specifically, but I was really trying to write a commentary about a life that revolves around work and watching television. As I started writing it, I was reminded of that old Lemonheads song that starts out “That pencil smell reminds me of school…” and I tried to write a song with that feel. I would have scrapped the whole thing, but I the chorus is fun to sing.
05. Penny – This song was written for the Week 2 Challenge: Inanimate Objects. Obviously, this song is about a penny on the ground. This song is capo’d on the 10th fret of the guitar and is pretty fun to play the chords. After I improvised a take, I sat down and wrote out some painfully obvious lyrics about the lost penny being found by a boy and has worth again because he can spend it on candy or something and called the song “Currently Currency”. Listening back to the improvised demo, I really liked the rambling nonsense of the original lyrics, so I switched back to them. I was also really getting sick of coming up with “catchy titles” for songs and decided to go minimal on this song and the next one. This song was recorded in 4 sections on 2 different tracks because I couldn’t do the whole thing in one take because I hadn’t learned how to sing the last quarter of it. It is just me and the acoustic, live.
06. Games – A third improvised song and a second song with a minimal title. The improvisation really shows here in the phrasing of the whole song. In the recording, I really like the way the guitar sounds like it’s a egg-shaker instead of a string instrument. Listening back to the improvised acoustic demo, I like that one better, especially, the “it’s all right” ending part. This song is really about nothing except some arrogant lyrics in the verses.
So. That concludes my second week of FAWM. These songs weren’t fully recorded until the last two days of the month. I was in a real hurry to get all songs demo’d by then. The recordings are rushed and full of flaws, but they are done.
FAWM Wrap Up - 1/4
Well, I got really disgusted with my songwriting mid-way through FAWM and stopped posting here.
Here is a kind of FAWM wrap up though...song by song.
Songs from the first week of FAWM:
01. Unemployed Astronaut - This was written for the Week 1 Challenge: Careers. In the news at this time was the cutting of NASA's budget by Obama. So, I wrote a song about a disgruntled/fired astronaut. There are a few good lines in this song, but the demo is just me and an acoustic in a live take. I didn't even use a click track so I couldn't add drums.
02. Let's Get Bloody - This was written for a Songfight!. Right off, I hated the title. I wrote two songs that made fun of the whole teenager/vampire thing going on now, but that seemed kind of pedestrian. So, I wrote a quick punk song about getting trashed and breaking the law. I like the swing drums at the start. Not the best song, though, overall.
03. Reboot - This was going to be my theme. I was going to change my songwriting and evolve it to a new level. That didn't happen. I recorded a full-on rock version of this song, but didn't have time to get the vocals right, so I ended up doing another live acoustic take. I added a background vocal for the chorus to give that part a bit of depth. I was literally singing parts of this for the first time on the recording, so the vocals are kind of weak in places. The demo for this was also recorded much later in the month.
Overall, with the disappointment of the Reboot song and hating the title for the Songfight! song, my FAWM-love was running pretty low. I was hoping to kind of start over for the second week. Also, at this point, I abandoned my FAWM-plan outlined in previous posts. I wanted to write fresher songs and not ideas that I have been kicking around for months.
Here is a kind of FAWM wrap up though...song by song.
Songs from the first week of FAWM:
01. Unemployed Astronaut - This was written for the Week 1 Challenge: Careers. In the news at this time was the cutting of NASA's budget by Obama. So, I wrote a song about a disgruntled/fired astronaut. There are a few good lines in this song, but the demo is just me and an acoustic in a live take. I didn't even use a click track so I couldn't add drums.
02. Let's Get Bloody - This was written for a Songfight!. Right off, I hated the title. I wrote two songs that made fun of the whole teenager/vampire thing going on now, but that seemed kind of pedestrian. So, I wrote a quick punk song about getting trashed and breaking the law. I like the swing drums at the start. Not the best song, though, overall.
03. Reboot - This was going to be my theme. I was going to change my songwriting and evolve it to a new level. That didn't happen. I recorded a full-on rock version of this song, but didn't have time to get the vocals right, so I ended up doing another live acoustic take. I added a background vocal for the chorus to give that part a bit of depth. I was literally singing parts of this for the first time on the recording, so the vocals are kind of weak in places. The demo for this was also recorded much later in the month.
Overall, with the disappointment of the Reboot song and hating the title for the Songfight! song, my FAWM-love was running pretty low. I was hoping to kind of start over for the second week. Also, at this point, I abandoned my FAWM-plan outlined in previous posts. I wanted to write fresher songs and not ideas that I have been kicking around for months.
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