FunkySoulJazzy

I'm trying to build up my songwriting momentum after being out of it for a while. Tonight I knocked out an interesting song request that I've been meaning to write for a while now. Here's what Dona asked for:

What is your song idea? I'm looking for something really funky and jazz like. I love the piano and guitar, so I'd like those to be in the rhythm. I want a really bassy song, so something with either electric bass, or tuba or trombone or some other bass instrument playing melody.
I'd just love for you guys to try, even if you guys aren't really jazz oriented.
Thanks a bunch! 

describe your song in one word funkysouljazzy

Well as much as I wish The Wiggly Tendrils were proficient in all styles of music, we aren't. I haven't a clue how to play jazz. And that's not for a lack of interest. My love of music started with jazz.

The first albums I bought with my own money were jazz albums: Miles Davis, Kind of Blue; John Coltrane, Blue Train; Chet Baker, Chet... And if I had to choose one album to listen to for the next year, I'd probably go with Stevie Wonder's Musiquarium compilation. Mr. Wonder is my favorite male vocalist. My favorite female vocalist is Nina Simone. My interest in songwriting really came after realizing I was never going to be good enough to play jazz... I mean not even close. I had so much trouble trying to learn other people's music that I just decided it would be easier to write my own.

...well jazz and the Beatles. I listened to a lot of Beatles growing up too...

In any case, for whatever reason, I never developed the chops to play anything much more complex than root position chord shapes on the guitar. So I really wasn't sure what to do with this request. Initially I planned to play the instruments myself... but then I gave up on that and worked with samples instead.

a young man learns he has no chops.

I went through the sample bank in logic and settled on an acoustic bass sample, a drum sample, a guitar sample and a piano sample. Each of the 4 samples are pretty short. No more than 16 beats. I created variety by cutting up the samples and playing them in different orders and having them come in and out at different times. You can hear clicks in some of the places where I've made edits. It's tedious work, and I tend to be a bit sloppy. After I finished the music, I threw in some crowed noises under the music on a whim.

sample collage. tedious but fun.

The request didn't ask for lyrics or mention anything about possible subject matter, so I left it as an instrumental. All in all I think the recording turned out well for a night's work. I just wish I could actually play it!

Like A Bird In A Maze

I took some time off from writing this past month. At first I was just procrastinating as usual, but then I really enjoyed the break. I feel like I have a bit of perspective now on the music I've been writing this past year.

Plus my wife, Deirdre, just defended her PhD so we've had more time to hang out together --which has been awesome!

This weekend I decided to start writing for TWT again. I browsed through the list of open song requests and picked this one:

What is your song idea?Previous request, Space Whales, was so good that I'm compelled to ask again.
My friend is writing a Metroidish 8-bit style videogame with a snail for hero, which has a maze room you have to shoot and break open the path to get to an item, which has no enemies in it.
Her bird enemies fly through all objects like Medusa heads in Castlevania, so I joked "that room with the breakable maze to the helix piece, you could have birds fly through there too. since they can already fly through the ground why not brick walls too."
Anyways can you write a song about Birds In The Maze Room. Here's the cover art:
http://i51.tinypic.com/w01hyo.png 

describe your song in one word birdsinthemazeroom

I had started this song last month, but abandoned it. Originally I was writing 8-bit style video game music... but then I looked a little closer at the request and realized I was supposed to write a song about Birds In The Maze Room, not music for Birds In The Maze Room. Doah.

screenshot of birds in the maze room

This was my original take:


Deirdre suggested that the song be in a 50s style similar to Rocking Robin. I used her idea as a starting point and came up with a simple guitar riff in a 1-4-5 progression. I recorded the riff on an acoustic guitar using my new pair of Rhode NT5 small diaphragm condensers. I wasn't wild about the sound so I ran it through an octave effect and fuzz and looped it about 4 times. I wasn't sure what to do next so I just added stuff: a second strummed acoustic, a synth bass, harpsichord, two tambourines, and two drum beats. It was a mess.

Video is glad to be songwriting again. She naps, I rock.

I spent the next couple hours muting tracks, planning when each instrument should drop in and out. I decided to start by featuring the strummed acoustic guitar, then moving to the fuzzed riff, then featuring the bass and harpsichord, then going back to the acoustic. Changing the instrumentation gave it some sense of forward motion, which it needed since the song was just verse-verse-verse-verse.  Starting and ending with the acoustic guitar at least gave it some sense of return and resolution.

I jotted down some words and recorded the vocals through my SM7. The lead vocal has a slap echo and a bit of distortion. The background vocals are dry and in three part harmony. Pretty slapdash overall, but that's not necessarily a bad thing.

Here's the finished song (which sounds nothing like Rocking Robin).

Bowie

Friend and fellow Tendril, D. E. Healey, recently contributed a new song to the wiggly tendrils blog. DEH is one of my favorite songwriters and I was interested in his thoughts on his latest song.

Here's they are:

T.W. asked me to write a little bit about how I recorded the song forrequest #129. Here's more than anyone could ever want to know: 

The request was simply for a song about, "How David Bowie is awesome." 

For me, one of the main things that makes Bowie awesome is that he givesteenagers who are weirded out by themselves a chance to embrace thatawkwardness, try on wacky outfits, and generally be drama queens.

Trying to imagine a song that would capture that quality, I was remindedof "Lady Stardust," Bowie's own tribute to Marc Bolan of T. Rex.(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkReR89J-gk)  I tried to use that song asa model for tone and arrangement.  I even appropriated the lines, "Oh, howI sighed when they asked if I knew his name," as my lyrical startingpoint. 

From that initial inspiration, I tried to adhere closely to the basicformula for a glam song that I've worked out over the years: 

0. Lyrics = Glam Mad-LibsGRADE: B. I tend to overwrite songs, but as my pal Stryker once pointedout, T. Rex lyrics are basically Glam Mad-Libs, and I think that holdstrue for most glitter rock.  I think I managed some relativelytossed-off-sounding lyrics. 

1. Make it catchy.GRADE: B-. I think the song turned out modestly catchy, mostly just theinstrumental bits.  The beginning of the chorus is sort of a non-event,sadly. 

2. Emote.GRADE: B+. I'm out of practice, but this vocal was fairly overwrought. 

3. MOST IMPORANT: Use the minor four chord a lot.GRADE: PASS. I leaned on that G-minor chord pretty hard. 

My attempts to ape '70s sounds were limited, as I'm not a skilledengineer, but I did put my wallet on my snare drum to try to deaden thesound; I remembered those old Bowie records having the hardest, tubbiestsnare sounds in the world. I used two overhead mics on the drum kit whichI panned hard to either side.  I notice now that the crash cymbal has alittle bit of phasing going on.  I think that's because I put theoverheads at two different heights above the floor; I think that'stechnically a no-no. 

In retrospect, my drum and lead guitar parts may owe more to T. Rex thanto Bowie, and my bass part isn't nearly nimble or groovy enough.  The songisn't a masterpiece, but I hope it's a fun bit of nostalgia and anon-embarrassing tribute.
Enjoy,

D. E. Healey

Enjoy the song here: