Since 2005, I have been playing second guitar and keyboards and singing with a local amateur covers band.
What do we have? Well let me tackle that question a different way but listing the things we don’t have:
- a stable line up
- a name
- a shared vision of what we want to do
- a regular gig (or any gig, in fact)
- a demo CD
- a web site
…and the list goes on.
In other words, my fellow musicians seem quite content to lark around for a couple of hours in a rehearsal studio every week, but are totally resistant to those annoying, non music-making activities that we would need to do to make the thing work. Yes, I’m talking planning, organisation, promotion, marketing, networking, advertising, selling ourselves.
We held a poorly attended crisis meeting last week at which not much was decided and discussion was pretty well limited to what songs to include (or exclude) in our repertoire.
Furthermore despite intense lobbying on my part, the band has steadfastly refused to have a go at any of my songs, although pretty well all of them are well suited to our line up.
You could say that as we don’t ever play anywhere, this doesn’t matter. Which is true, but I would still like to hear what these songs sound like played by a real band, rather than a PC sound card.
On the plus side, we are all competent musicians united by a love of good rock and pop. We really should be doing better.
So as you can see, moving into 2009, the band is not the potential source of pleasure that it should be.
Still it is –as they say- the only ball game in town as regards to playing music with other people, so for the moment I’m sticking with it.
Monday 22 December 2008
Dream of the hobby musician
It’s not easy trying to combine the strains, stresses and constraints of an ‘ordinary life’ i.e. full time job, family, house and PCs to maintain…with the role of home studio musician and songwriter.
There is some time available, of course, but it is usually at the end of the day when creative and musical facutlies are not at their best. Also, for many parts of the process, an hour or two is not enough. You need a larger chunk of time in which to experiment all options and then pick the best one, without having to put it all away and start again.
So that’s decided, then, I’m giving up the day job! (moving out would be a little bit too drastic).
There is some time available, of course, but it is usually at the end of the day when creative and musical facutlies are not at their best. Also, for many parts of the process, an hour or two is not enough. You need a larger chunk of time in which to experiment all options and then pick the best one, without having to put it all away and start again.
So that’s decided, then, I’m giving up the day job! (moving out would be a little bit too drastic).
Tuesday 9 December 2008
The Greats
How do you react to hearing, say, a Motown tune written by Holland/Dozier/Holland or a Burt Bacharach classic? Does it make you want to run to your piano and emulate the almost perfect sound you have just heard?
Does it make you roll your sleeves up and say “I could do all that, and more?”
Well, I wish this were true for me, but more often than not it has the opposite effect.
I wonder to myself how anyone could have written anything that good and resign myself to the fact that even if I were to write the very best song I could, it could not even be measured on the same scale as what I had just heard.
But what can you do. Lower down the food chain, us mere mortals have no choice but to plug away, borrowing a chord sequence here or a rhyme there, and hope that no one notices.
Perhaps Smokey Robinson wrote some absolute stinkers. But somehow, I doubt it!
Does it make you roll your sleeves up and say “I could do all that, and more?”
Well, I wish this were true for me, but more often than not it has the opposite effect.
I wonder to myself how anyone could have written anything that good and resign myself to the fact that even if I were to write the very best song I could, it could not even be measured on the same scale as what I had just heard.
But what can you do. Lower down the food chain, us mere mortals have no choice but to plug away, borrowing a chord sequence here or a rhyme there, and hope that no one notices.
Perhaps Smokey Robinson wrote some absolute stinkers. But somehow, I doubt it!
Over half way there
On the basis that I probably need 10 songs for an authentic debut CD, I am now over half the way there having just recorded song number 6.
When you think of all the professionals who contribute towards the production of a CD – songwriter, lyricist, musicians, producer, sound engineer, mastering engineer...it is astounding to think that the home studio musician can now do all of this alone.
This would never have been possible a few years ago but is now thanks to the various technologies which have emerged in recent years.
Indeed, there is a risk that the home studio musician spends more time tinkering around with the hardware and software tools than actually making music. There comes a point where you have to say to yourself “this is the gear I’ve got. I’m going to learn how to get the best sound I can from it, although I know that some of it is pretty obsolete and all of it could be upgraded”.
Fortunately, help is at hand. I have found that fellow home studio musicians are, almost without exception, generous, supportive and kind spirited. At any rate, the ones I have met through the PG Music (1) and Audacity (2) member forums fit this description. There is a strong norm that if you have any useful knowledge or experience, you share it with others.
Of the various aspects listed above, I find that the most critical is song writing. The hardest part is to find the key idea, whether musical or lyrical, that you want the song to focus on. From that point on, it’s ‘just’ a matter of giving concrete form to that original idea. It may take time and effort, but I find that most things kind of fall into place once the song has its direction.
There have been 2 particular moments of euphoria to date. The first, obviously, was when, in 2007, I completed work on my first ever composition. The second was the overwhelmingly positive reaction I got to a “Power Ballad” I wrote in the first months of 2008. Since that time I have been trying – so far, unsuccessfully – to sell this song to a music publisher.
I should also mention how much fun it was recording my daughter on backing vocals on one of my compositions.
My dream is still to make music my livelihood, but I know that this is not likely to happen any time soon. But I can still dream!
In the meantime my musical output can be found here
(1) PG Music is a company which makes and distributes music software
(2) Audacity is a digital audio editor application
When you think of all the professionals who contribute towards the production of a CD – songwriter, lyricist, musicians, producer, sound engineer, mastering engineer...it is astounding to think that the home studio musician can now do all of this alone.
This would never have been possible a few years ago but is now thanks to the various technologies which have emerged in recent years.
Indeed, there is a risk that the home studio musician spends more time tinkering around with the hardware and software tools than actually making music. There comes a point where you have to say to yourself “this is the gear I’ve got. I’m going to learn how to get the best sound I can from it, although I know that some of it is pretty obsolete and all of it could be upgraded”.
Fortunately, help is at hand. I have found that fellow home studio musicians are, almost without exception, generous, supportive and kind spirited. At any rate, the ones I have met through the PG Music (1) and Audacity (2) member forums fit this description. There is a strong norm that if you have any useful knowledge or experience, you share it with others.
Of the various aspects listed above, I find that the most critical is song writing. The hardest part is to find the key idea, whether musical or lyrical, that you want the song to focus on. From that point on, it’s ‘just’ a matter of giving concrete form to that original idea. It may take time and effort, but I find that most things kind of fall into place once the song has its direction.
There have been 2 particular moments of euphoria to date. The first, obviously, was when, in 2007, I completed work on my first ever composition. The second was the overwhelmingly positive reaction I got to a “Power Ballad” I wrote in the first months of 2008. Since that time I have been trying – so far, unsuccessfully – to sell this song to a music publisher.
I should also mention how much fun it was recording my daughter on backing vocals on one of my compositions.
My dream is still to make music my livelihood, but I know that this is not likely to happen any time soon. But I can still dream!
In the meantime my musical output can be found here
(1) PG Music is a company which makes and distributes music software
(2) Audacity is a digital audio editor application
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