Sunday 19 February 2012

Glorious Swan Song

It's Sunday evening and I don't have a song. Another chaotic week, but I did have a few hours on Thursday, which I spent on music.

But not on a weekly song. I decided to work on other stuff, and I ended up finishing two songs that have been buzzing around in some form or other for some time. And I'm much happier with either of them than I would have with a rushed, make-do-and-mend song. I enjoyed the process more too, feeling much more engaged in it, investing more of myself in it. No comparison.

The one thing I found useful about the song-a-week process was the necessity to set some time aside for songwriting at regular intervals. I think I'll keep that element going, but as for the rest, nothing has happened to alter the conclusions I came to last week.

I thought about quicky throwing together another song for the song-a-week, then I just thought: why? If I did that, it would just be another piece of rushed, cobbled-together crap. And I don't have 16,000 reasons to carry on regardless.

So balls to it. Expect another experimental project imminently. In the meantime, I'm going to abandon this method as fundamentally flawed and work on writing some tunes I'm actually happy with.

Sunday 12 February 2012

The Rhythm Method

All the songs I've done in this weekly giveaway have so far been fairly rushed affairs, utilising the 'B-Stock' ideas, and designed not to impact too heavily on my life or on my creative stockpile. Any idea I think is pretty decent gets shoved to one side. Only once did I have a borderline case, when I thought a chord progression was 'possibly worth keeping and warranted further work' but I used it anyway ('A Pat on the Back'). For the most part though, I've kept what I consider to be 'the good stuff' as far away from the weekly giveaways as possible.
Sometimes you land lucky and things fall out of your head practically in one piece. For the most part, however, songs I write are a result of several different musical ideas and lyrical ideas, drafted, left alone, redrafted, left alone, redrafted and honed. The hardest bit of writing stuff is deciding that it's finished. It takes quiet; it takes solitude; it takes contemplation; it takes a certain amount of inspiration; it takes time.
And time is in short supply with this project. Odd snatched hours, strict deadlines, no internal editing required. The emphasis is on quantity, not quality. It's a production-line approach. I'm aware that some of the best songs of all time were created that way, in the Brill Building or the rooms above Denmark Street, but a lot of crap came out of those buildings too; it just isn't the way I work.
Add to it the pressure of sidelining anything with any potential to actually be good, and you're left with very little to work with.
Instead of letting ideas gestate in their own precious time, they are jettisoned prematurely into a sort of 'Ideas Withdrawal method'. This method acts as its own creative contraceptive.
It was fine right at the beginning: perhaps the remnants of pre-project ideas were still swimming up the right channels. But within a very short space of time, things have become tough. Musically, the path of least resistance is the cliche, and that's something that is very difficult for an essentially lazy person like me to fight against within the constraints of the project. Lyrically, I just don't have something different and interesting to say, on demand, every week, week-after-week. You pluck ideas from the air; you can't harvest them on an industrial scale.
The only alternative to resorting to hackneyed standard formulae is to start letting the 'good stuff' through too, and I really don't want to give that away to prove a point. There just isn't enough of that to last a year anyway, never mind enough time in a week to knock it into shape. I have come to the conclusion that:
TO BE FORCED INTO BEING FAR MORE PROLIFIC THAN YOUR NATURAL CREATIVITY AND LIFESTYLE DICTATES IS NOT ARTISTICALLY HEALTHY, AND IS CREATIVELY COUNTERPRODUCTIVE.
It may initially seem to be creatively stimulating, but I can't see how it can be done on this scale without ending up running on empty and resorting to the banal and the throwaway.
Of course, I'm not saying that a little push doesn't grease the wheels occasionally, and a deadline can sharpen the senses, but this relentless pace is going to sap anyone.
And I mean anyone. Even people who have been paid $16,000 to keep that pace.
It does raise the question: if you were being paid $16,000 to do it, obviously you may spend more time on it, and you could keep the quality higher for longer. But either I don't understand international monetary value well enough, or you'd struggle to actually live on $16,000 without doing anything else. And I don't know if any amount in my wallet would actually stimulate ideas, musical or lyrical. And it's ideas that are drained. You could spend a little more time on dotting is and crossing ts, or getting the production values a little higher, but I'm unconvinced you'd have many more ideas.
Let me ask you this: who can you think of that releases five albums a year, all of which is quality original material?
I'm coming to the conclusion that this way of working can only ever produce 2nd or even 3rd rate results. I haven't written a song under it yet I've been happy to have my name attached to without the context of this blog to justify it's mediocrity. I've started to worry that people will hear the songs out of the context of the project, miss the point and think it's output I'm proud of. There's been a couple of good-ish ideas, but without the room available to develop their potential. I'm starting to worry that I've accidentally condemned myself to a year of producing rubbish, for a reason that will be lost well before the songs.
I find myself repeating the mantra: "It's all about the process, not the product," to myself as well as anyone else within earshot. But the product IS important. It's what will be left over at the end of all this, and it's the most important aspect of the project to some people.
The annoying thing is that I've got a backlog of music I want to record, but I'm stuck matching a banal project, song-for-song. The other annoying thing is that this project is only one of several projects I want to do under the 'No Packet Required' umbrella, and it's the longest commitment of time with the lowest creative return.
I know now that I could knock out a song a week with barely any effort, and without any financial outlay - so far it hasn't cost a penny - but I am starting to wonder if 52 songs I'm not proud of, and an obscure point proven really justifies deliberately spending an entire year prematurely ejaculating dubious material. For me, 'her' and her backers, there are probably more worthwhile avenues to pursue than this over-valued, wrongheaded party trick (unless it's all about the money).
I seriously doubt the validity of this project, both for me or my 'inspiration.' I'm really starting to wonder if it's worth it, or if I would be better served creating music that represents me more fully, free from time constraints and the impositions caused by the financial obligations of someone I've never met.
I don't think this works. But I can walk away whenever I like. She's stuck with it.
So. I'm on the horns of a dilemma. Do I keep on doing this for another 46 weeks, putting in less and less effort, making worse and worse songs, in order to reach conclusions I've already reached, a mere six weeks in? Or do I stop labouring the point, work on stuff I actually want to do and leave the battery-farmed, vapid rubbish to those who are contractually obliged to it?
It's obvious which one I'm leaning towards. I'll give it one more week, just in case this is a temporary blip, and if the song I produce gives me the same feeling the other six have, I'll let it go as an unworkable method for creating anything valuable. Because I can.

What'do you think of the show so far? ...

It started off as a rash decision on the back of a rant. As it's progressed, I've discovered some interesting (to me at least) things. It has made me think a lot more about the songwriting process, what it means to me and what it means to other people. I've tried to get into the head of the person who originally raised $16,000 in order to do an identical thing, and I admit I have occasionally wondered if she was feeling the same as me through the ebb and flow of the process, from the earlier enthusiasm, through the feeling of flexing creative muscles, to the realisation that coming up with something new every single week can be a pain in the arse, and wondering just how little you have to do in order to get away with it, and how much of a difference that sixteen grand has on the tidal level of enthusiasm.

Today I finally got a piece of feedback I've been impatiently waiting for. Someone finally said that the last two songs were very poor. I agree, and have been surprised not to have had a reaction to this earlier. I thought I was going mad. I was starting to think I'd have to fart in a bottle to elicit that response.

I knew last week's was poor, and I said so at the time. However, that may have come across as a 'fishing expedition' for compliments, and I took the compliments I received with a pinch of salt, just in case people were answering the fishing expedition by obliging and humouring me.

This week, I made no attempt whatsoever to make a good song. My target for this week was to create a song in the shortest possible time, with the minimum possible effort and disruption to my week, with no consideration given to any aspect of quality, creativity or precision whatsoever. The resulting song took just over half an hour and was pap.

But it was a song. It counted. No hypothetical refund required.

And when you've already got the money, there's no caveat that says the subscriber has to like the song, or even that the song has to be good.

This week's song is the worst yet, but, because it was done in half an hour on the last day of the week, I considered the week a roaring success.

Having given it some more thought, however, I'm not so sure.

It would be a roaring success if I'd set out to prove that you could just make any old rubbish and fulfil your obligation. But that wasn't what I was trying to do, otherwise I'd have spent five minutes a week thrashing out utter trash, but still complying with the rules.

It was supposed to be a balance, minimising disruption to my week, but still coming up with something of a minimum acceptable quality - multi-tracked, varied, considered, etc. By going below the minimum acceptable level (and I was probably pushing that last week - this week I dipped way below) I've broken the 'crap barrier' and been rightly called out on it.

However, it would be disingenuous of me to suggest that the fall in quality was entirely deliberate. Although I was interested in seeing just how little effort a person could get away with and still comply with the funding contract, there were other forces at play.

The first is the short one, so I'll get that out of the way first; the second probably deserves a post of its own.

The short answer is that I've been much busier, in my work and home life. In the first few weeks of January, the household was relaxed, I was enjoying the post-Christmas lull in the work calendar, the missus was back at work after the holidays, and I had loads of time on my hands. In the last few weeks, I've been touring much harder, the wife's work has been more demanding on the household, and my teenage son has been staying, bringing his noise and chaos with him. Writing songs has fallen way down the list of priorities.

If all goes to plan, however, by the second half of the week the Boy will once more be gone (though things rarely go to plan where the Boy is concerned), and after next weekend's gigs, Doleman domestic obligations have left a little hiatus in the tour schedule, so all may quieten again. It will be interesting to see if the quality improves again over the next two weeks. That depends entirely on how important this reason is compared to the deeper implication - you know, the one that deserves a post of its own.

Expect that before too long.

Saturday 11 February 2012

Only one solution

... when you've run out of time, and have to write a song, but have no ideas:
I've had to resort to the blues.
No disrespect to that fine genre, but you don't really have to think round that many corners to knock out a basic blues song, so it's perfect for my purpose, which this week was to get from blank page to MP3 link in the least possible time and fuss.
I decided to do each track as one take, warts-and-all, and not listen back to the whole song until doing the (very rough) mixdown. There are some trememndous clangers in it, but IT ONLY TOOK THIRTY TWO MINUTES TO WRITE AND RECORD. I'm quite proud of how little effort I made. $16,000? Really? (if you don't understand that reference, you haven't been paying attention to what this is all about)
And I've discovered that, although many years ago I was a reasonably tidy guitar player, I can't play for toffee any more. I'm not particularly upset about that though - I'm uke through and through now.
So here is the song, which we'll call, er, 'In Case of Emergency (Break out the Blues)':

Eek!

Well, nobody has reminded me. I was gigging on Thursday (my usual songwriting time), and I was going to write the song on Friday. I did the blog post, had some lunch, got distracted by something and missed my window. I woke late today, as I'm in Liverpool tonight gigging until late, so today and tonight's out. I'll have to do something tomorrow and sneak it under the wire, despite it being the weekend, meaning no alone time in which to sit and ponder.

Should be interesting. Or that other thing.

Friday 10 February 2012

Must. Stop. Whining.

Over the last two weeks, a bit of a pattern has formed. I've spent a while moaning about how little time I've had to give this project any attention, then I've moaned about the quality of the finished song, only to have other people say they liked it.

This could mean I'm one of nature's complainers (true), I'm not a very good judge of my own stuff (I suspect this is also true), or I'm fishing for compliments and reassurance (if this is true, it's subconscious, but I'm not discounting it entirely).

I think there was an intention of demonstrating how little effort or quality control all this required, and that a hastily dashed-off 'that'll-do' song was inferior to one that took real work and crafting, but maybe I'm wrong. I honestly don't know. If people are obliging me with compliments because they think I'm being self-deprecating in order to seek reassuring praise, nice as it is to receive it, that was never my conscious intention.

I'm trying to be as objective and honest about the songs as I can. I do write songs I really like, and others I think are less good. But my tastes don't always tally with the listeners'. I tend to favour linguistic, harmonic, melodic and structural complexity, little spun sugar confections that have been crafted slowly, with delicacy and intricacy. Listeners often prefer simpler, more rustic affairs, and I can understand that - I'm looking at songs from the perspective of what it took for me to make them, whereas others just listen to them for how they sound. And rightly so.

As a result of this, I've come to several conclusions:

1) We can take it as read that the one-song-a-week timeframe is not where I'm at my most comfortable, so they're always going to feel rushed and semi-formed to me.
2) There's no point in me voicing this any further.
3) From now on, I'm not going to make any personal qualitative judgement on the songs; feel free to say nice things by all means, but not to counter my own negative responses to the material. Compliments are better when they haven't been fished for.
4) I'm going to try not to worry about treading tired ground, and am going to embrace a bit of simplicity and rustic charm.
5) Actually, I'm not going to worry about any aspect of this. If I can knock out a song a week - any song - that's all I have to do to fulfil my end of the deal. It could be a repetetive 3-chorder about toenails; it really doesn't matter.

So. I'm going to do one now.

Thursday 2 February 2012

Hooray! It's Rubbish!

It's been a difficult birth. I was on the verge of ditching it and starting again, but I've decided not to, partly because I've run out of time, and partly because, as I said before, the finished song isn't the important thing. However, it is crap.

I quite enjoyed the 'direct input' solid-bodied method, and I'll probably use that again at some point- though I'd probably have to get a soprano if I was to use it more than once more.

I won't be using my teenage songwriting methods again though. Picking a relatively commonplace, simple structure might work for some, but not for me. The music ended up sounding like 'Ordinary World' by Duran Duran, and the vocal melody ended up reminiscent of 'Times Like These' by the Foo Fighters (which means, by extension, that Duran and Foos sound like each other. Who'dathunkit?).

It was derivative, adolescent, whiney, bland crap, and at any other time I'd have cast it into the abyss.

But I still have the bowling alley in my head, tomorrow I'm off to Cheltenham, and I'll be returning to a houseful. I don't have time to do anything else. So it'll have to bloody do.

I've done one. That's enough.

There:

http://www.box.com/s/pxtlx6sufq1cprzhnqin

'Stealth' Recording

As I've previously moaned, the writing and recording of this week's song has had certain restraints placed upon it. It's forced me into adopting methods of 'stealth' recording I haven't used since I was a teenage insomniac with easily rattled parents. The double bass is packed away, as are most of the acoustic instruments, and the only method I can use to get music down without disturbing others or being disturbed is to use solid-bodied electric instruments, plugged directly into the recording device.
This does mean, however, that I'm rather limited as to what arrangement I can use. I have an electric baritone uke, tuned re-entrant G, and an electric bass that was so bad, it only became vaguely useful once I'd ripped out the frets and sanded the bumps out of the fingerboard. I also have an electric guitar, but I want to avoid making guitar-based songs if possible: I don't want to fully revert to my teenage years. The electric baritone uke is quite guitary enough, thank you very much.
I'll be reverting to my teenaged vocal style too, out of necessity. Quiet, whispery, breathy. I won't be belting it out. That is also a product of the necessity of not disturbing anyone, whereas during my teenage years, it was only partly that, and partly terrible self-confidence issues.
At this point, I haven't written the song yet, but because of these constraints, and my ways around them, I have a fair idea of how the music is going to come out. It's likely to be down-tempo, introspective in tone, simple, restrained and full of space, probably based around a single chord progression, repeated, with two-finger chords and open string drones. The lyrics will probably end up reflecting that. They'll probably be folksy and impressionistic, rather than the more direct style I prefer nowadays. I just hope it doesn't revert too much to the proto-Emo style of my salad days - or the 'wallpapery dirges', as my punk brother used to describe them.
The style is also shaped by time constraints. instead of being able to put a chunk of time aside to do it, as I normally do, I'll be nipping back and forth doing little bits where and when I can. It's likely I'll be abandoning my favoured pad and propelling pencil and writing the lyrics on my phone, maybe even in the loo.
Hence, it'll have to be simple, or I'll lose the thread in the long gaps between short sessions.
I will miss having soprano uke on the track, but I don't have a solid-bodied, electric soprano anymore. Despite recently feeling that I have too many ukes, I'm feeling the absence of that specific thing. Even a cheap and cheerful bog-standard Eleuke, Clearwater or the like is mighty tempting at the moment, but I sold my last solid soprano when my son moved out. He's back now (albeit temporarily), and I'm suddenly realising how useful it was. I'll admit, I have been hovering over BIN buttons.
Anyway, I've got a few mins left, so I suppose I'd better start cracking on with that chord progression while I can. Just don't make me tidy my room, you horrible gits.

Wednesday 1 February 2012

Mad About the Boy

Last week, I moaned about being up against it because of time constraints and not being in the mood. What a fool I was. Karma then decided to deliver me such a bitchslap that my head has almost disengaged from my neck.

My 19-year-old son has temporarily (please God, let it be temporarily) returned to the loving bosom of the family, complete with the swirling miasma of chaos, noise and confusion that perpetually surrounds him. Suddenly, there is no room; instruments have been packed and stored to make way for bin liners full of rags. There is no time, as every waking moment is taken up by discussions on everything from his finances and his washing to his lovelife and his friends, Marvel and Tarrantino, Wild Beasts, the meaning of life, and how terrible Muse are. The bowling alley has been reinstalled into my head. There is no privacy; he is omnipresent.

Of course, this means that her son's presence in these environs give The Evil One a legitimate reason to begin calling the house once more. So she has been. A lot.

On top of that, the time constraints that were already there haven't disappeared. Time, space and headspace have all shrunk to a pinprick. Solitude, calm and quiet contemplation are rare jewels indeed.

If I manage to produce anything this week that consists of more than a random thrashing at an instrument, accompanied by a persistent howling noise, I'll consider it a miracle. I have an unexpected half hour to myself right now, so I'm doing this. I haven't got time to write this and a song. Hopefully, I'll squeeze in an hour tomorrow and do it then.