FAWM Over and Out

Fawm is an annual songwriting event, where several thousand musicians try and write an album of 15 songs in 28 days.  This year being a leap year, it the idea was 14.5 songs in 29 days.

I'm happy to say, I failed to complete the task again.  Having achieved 3,6 and 9 songs, in previous years, officially, I achieved 12 this year.  Though in reality, it is less than that.

I managed :-
     three sets of partial lyrics, (without music)
     two instrumentals, that require lyrics *
     seven instrumentals for my solo instrumental project, Sineglider.
Why so many instrumentals?

Simply, I'm currently suffering from lyrical writers block and low confidence in my lyric writing. I was hoping FAWM would have given me the necessary kick to finish some lyrics, but it wasn't to be.

That with work commitments and the fact that I wanted to learn to use some of the soft synths and effects I haven't got around to using, meant that I was a lot more interested in experimenting with sounds, than finishing lyrics.  So instrumentals were the way to go.

* of the two instumentals, one was picked up by another songwriter, who put lyrics to it.  Hopefully, you can her it Here. 

I took part in another Exquisite Corpse task.  (one person writes a song, passes the last 10 seconds to the next person who carries it on, etc etc.  Someone when chains all the songs together).

here is my section of the song.  Called Gabina.






As I stated before I was trying to experiment with synths and effects this year. One of the challenges this year was to write a 30 second song. I used that as an excuse to play with effects within my recording software, much like I would have done with physical guitar effects. What I came up with was a little more than 30 seconds and is two guitars, one take each. I will re-record this later and expand it with further instrumentation, I think.
As you can tell, I seem to have been in a more heavier mood, song writing wise, than I have been for many years.
This is noticible in this track. When I first started playing guitar in the mid 1980s, I was really into thrash metal. It is nice to go back to my heavy roots now and again, now that I have some wonderful distortion plugins. Plus the guitar in this (my old B.C. Rich Warlock) was tuned to DADGBD.

Lyrically, since the last blog, I have started one set of lyrics.  Whilst doing Fawm, I was also (semi) attempting a free songwriting course.   The idea was to write a song about your hometown.

Given I had already written a song about my hometown called Strang Familar World, the thought of writing another was not appealing.  But I did start some.  I will rework and finish this, since I think there are some nice lines in this, but it is rough and needs a lot of work.

Hometown Heart

Chorus
Like a Mistress
I keep coming back to her
She might not have my love
but she will always have my heart
Though distance means
we're constantly apart
Please when I die
take me back to the start
My Hometown heart
My Hometown heart

----
I feel the sea calling me
Through broken sleep
Too long land locked
Miss the warm salty breeze
Though I left half a life ago
She makes me believe
a smalltown boys dreams
and great things to achieve

The course has been pretty good and I did learn some new things, which might help me out of my lyrical hell.  We shall see over the next couple of months.

The two songs I think need lyrics, I have passed to E to see if they have any mileage and whether they will be Hair Thieves songs or not.  So not sure if any song this year will become Rollasoc songs.




So that was FAWM 2016.  I'm quite happy with my musical output this month, but slightly disappointed with my lyrical quantity.   Oh well there is always next FAWM!

So now FAWM is over, I can start concentrating back on the album. 

After discussion the other night in the pub about Spotify and getting music online, I think my next post will be on the companies I have used to get my music online and how I have got on with them.

So more on that soon.

Not Feeling it.

Had an indifferent week with Fawm.

This is mostly to do with issues I have had with Cubase not playing nice with my hardware as well as issues with it playing with some plugins.

It slowed me down and frustrated me.  Hopefully, I've sorted it out now.

I have managed to finish two instrumentals.

An experiment in electronics.

Every sound is from some Native instruments VST.

Drums from Battery and Kontakt

Synths from Rounds (Reaktor), Kontakt (Gamelan, Evolve, Evolve Mutations), Absynth, Massive.

Barely mixed. Some reverb added to some sounds. General panning, slight EQ, some compression.

This is in 3/4 time. 

Pick up sticks.




The second is a little ditty called Resident Wevil.

Being traditionally a guitarist, I thought that two weeks into Fawm, I should record some guitar.

All I knew is i wanted something distorted somewhere.

Drums are from groove Agent.

Badly played bass (through ampeg amp in amplitude)

3 guitar parts. All telecaster. One through Amplitude, one through Guitar Rig and one through Shuffham amp.

Synths are a mixture of Kontour and things I found in reaktor and rendered to audio, so don't know what they are anymore.

Title is due to liking the word Weevil.




Been struggling with lyrics.

I had two attempts.

Mother
I have my mother's worry
I have my mother's eyes
I have my mother's wicked tongue
I have my mother's sarcastic replies

I have my mother's humour
I have my mother's tact
I have my mother's money luck
I have my mother's quest for facts.

I have my mother's darkness
I have my mother's fears
I have my mother's lack of grace
I have my mother's attractive veneer



Just Don't Know
Fed Up with checking sources
on the news I see
Lack of faith
in the strories they feed
But a puppet has a master
holding the leash
Subjugate the masses
with the tales released

Chorus
and I just don't know
What to believe
Truth or lies
Are we so Nieve
Are they Criminal or just
A Friend or foe
well you just don't know
You Just Don't know

Elected government monkies
are they corporate whores
Telling lies
to they people they swore oath to
Who's the puppet, who's the master
who's pulling the string
as the elite get rich
leave the masses begging

Not sure if I will use either lyrics.

Still have a couple of other songs on the go.

No Hair Thieves tunes so far, we have been experimenting with melody writing with existing lyrics, which isn't the sort of thing that is part of FAWM.

I'll show E the lyrics and see if he wants to use them / finish them.

So onto week 3.  Still playing catch up.

FAWM 2016

It is that time of the year, when several thousand songwriters, attempt to write 14 songs in 28 (well 29 days this year) days.  It is time for FAWM. (February Album Writing Month)

I've done this challenge for the last three years, managing 3, 6 and 9 songs respectively.  So getting closer to completing the challenge with each passing year.

Last year, my 9 songs were split between this project (2 or 3 songs), the Hair Thieves (2 songs), which is my main musical project and my occasional instrumental Sineglider project (3 songs). The other songs were abandoned, since not deemed up to scratch.

As I write this, early, on day 7, I should have 3.5 songs written, if I am to achieve target.

So far, I have finished two demos  of instrumentals, (thus Sineglider tunes).     

The first is called Koleti

Named after a star system, I am currently in, in the game Elite Dangerous.

This is a free form (ie to no time signature), is totally improvised and was an experiment on creating something ambient, in an hour.  I also lmited myself to only using synths by Steinberg.





The second is called El Sol
This was a challenge on Fawm, which was to write a song based on the South American Loteria cards.  I was given El Sol (the sun).

Thinking of Holst's The Planets, I used this as an excuse to play with some orchestral instruments.  To learn more about programming them and use of articualtions.  

I think this is quite unfinished.  I will revisit it later in the year and flesh it out.  Maybe add some woodwinds and brass, to make it more orchestral rather than the current string sections and percussion.




I am also currently working on finishing two other songs.

The first is musically written, the challenge was to write a song with the title "Playing with fire" in an hour.  I managed the music, but not the lyrics.   I may stay with the title, I may not.

The second song, is untitled, but driven by me wanting to learn more about some synths I have.   In a mad two minutes, I ended up with a dance drum kit in 3/4 time.   So a kind of modern Waltz.
Hopefully, this will have lyrics, it is early days, so I will see how this pads out.

Regarding the current state of the solo album.

"A Winter's Memory" is finished and ready to be released once I have another track to go with it and finish the video.  It won't be this month, due to FAWM.

A couple other tunes are ongoing.

Two of the songs I have music for, which I really like, have both been given back to The Hair Thieves.   They started as Hair Thieves songs, got abandoned, I picked them up years later and worked on them some more and decided they should be Hair Thieves material, so have submitted them to E.

One will be on the next Hair Thieves EP.  The other probably the one after, depending on how other songs pan out over the next couple of months.

So the solo album is on going.  Hopefully, FAWM will give me a couple of new songs for it, or at least the b-side for "A Winter's Memory".

I'll post another FAWM update next week.

Fawm - Week 4 and Round up

Fawm (http://fawm.org) is an annual event to write an album in a month.  The idea is to write 14 songs in 28 days and release an album.

Week 4's plan was to wrap up the songs I had been working on and not necessarily write any new ones.  I'd always said I would be happy with nine songs.  So in order to not stress too much,

I ended up with ten songs / lyrics at the end of the month.  So I am more than happy.

On the Sunday of week four, I did my last skirmish.  Another title I really wasn't interested in writing lyrics for.

The title was "Because of You".

V1
Many words are spoken in jest
Because of you, I've feelings repressed
Can't state no fact
Without a third world war
Can't critique, just silence
Like I never was born

Chorus
And banging my head
Against the bedroom wall
Feels less painful than
talking to you some more
Because of you, our happiness left
Because of you our lives in a mess

V2
Many a lip bite, blood tastes raw
Because of you, my battles not won
Can't air a grivence
Without a denial of facr
Can't shout, just silence
like I'm caught in a trap.

Chorus
And Banging my head
Against the bedroom wall
Feels less painful than
talking to you some more
Because of you, our happiness left
Because of you our lives in a mess

Bridge
And my conscious is clear
This is not about sides
I'm always wrong and
You're always right
Oblivious to my feelings
Oblivious to my plight
And you won't heed this warning
as I sing this tonight

Bonus bridge.
Obnoxious and rude
Trumps the meek and hallow
A bully's no better than
the sh*t that you prattle
It's not a sign of strength
But a sign of the fear
Pity for you
and the things that you do

Now I like some of the lines, but this is probably not a keeper.  So I didn't bother writing music for it.

However, in week three, we (The Hair Thieves) started writing a new track.    This week, I have put some guitar to it and some lyrics.

The song is called "Love is Overdrive" and it is probably the most pop song we have ever recorded.

The vocals, need a lot of work and the lyrics need tweaking, but it is getting there.  (and nope it don't rhyme).

Been torched by love
Burnt and scarred
Drawn to a flame
My hearts desire
Never learnt
Always back for more

Heart on my sleeve
Love lies scorned
Cos when I fall
I fall so fast
Never learnt
Runing back for more

Love's infectious
Love is overdrive
Love is infectious
Love is over drive

Played the long game
Battles fought
Lost more than won
My soul devoured
Never learnt
Heading back for more

Love's infectious
Love is overdrive
Love is infectious
Love is over drive

Bridge / breakdown

Love's infectious
Love is overdrive
Love is infectious
Love is over drive
Love's infectious
Love is overdrive
Love is infectious
Love is over drive



The final song I worked on, was the one I started in week one.

It has ended up with a working title of "Beside Me".

Rivers of blind emotions
Tearing strips to the core
Lead me down, don't fear the dark might see
wilt and whither, the damage taught.

When all things pass
and dies are cast
Will you still walk beside me
When dreams are sold
and battles fought
Will you still walk beside me

Drown me in dark seductions
Smother me in warmer shores
Lead me down, don't fear that god might find
Things of value are seldom bought.

When all things pass
and dies are cast
Will you still walk beside me
When dreams are sold
and battles fought
Will you still walk beside me

I think it needs another verse and bridge to be written.  A better chorus (musically sped up) .  The vocals are terrible on this.  It was essentially a couple of takes and I haven't worked out the melody totally yet, (nor practiced it).  So it is all over the place. 

As someone else pointed out, the rhyming scheme for this is across verses, so the line ones rhyme etc and the rhymes are not within the verse.

Like most things done in great haste, I can't remember if this is intentional or not.  (it probably isn't).

But it is a promising start.



Finally, if you have been following this blog, you may recall, that I wrote a one minute instrumental for an Exquisite Corpse challenge.

Since the month is over, I will present the demo of it here.   I'm still waiting for the final piece to go live.  I will blog that when it turns up.




So that is it for Fawm 2015.  Ten songs in varying states of completion.

I might post a blog next week, with all eight demos that have music. 

I have really enjoyed this month.  It has been very productive.  I can see me  finishing up the three Sineglider tunes.  Both the Hair Thieves songs and probably two of the others for my solo project, (unless E wants them as Hair Thieves songs).

I am looking forward to Fawm in 2016.  I am going to go for the 14 songs.  You heard it here first!

Fawm - Week 3 Summary

Fawm (http://fawm.org) is an annual event to write an album in a month.  The idea is to write 14 songs in 28 days and release an album.

Musically a mixed bag this week.

I decided I didn't want to put any effort into writing music for Sunday's skirmish, entitled "I found my happy place".  

I decided I would try and finish the song I started in week one.  The one in 5/4 time.  So I have spent some time re-working it, so now the verse music is the chorus and the chorus the verse.

As a demo I am happy with it.  I just need to write some lyrics for it.  I tried yesterday, but my muse wasn't having none of it.

During the week, I met up with Ian, the other half of The Hair Thieves.  He had started working on a synthy instrumental for Ep7.  Even though we already have a instrumental for the EP.

I had a listen.  There was a part of it, which was screaming out CHORUS to me.  So we re-arranged and recorded a few bits, until we had a proper song structure.

I have worked out a vocal melody.  Added some guitars since.  I just need to write some lyrics. Again, I tried yesterday, but my muse wasn't having none of it.

I have however started a new Sineglider instrumental.  Called Onionhead.



It still needs a bit of work, possibly a lead guitar, more synths, in the intro / breakdown.

But I'm quite pleased with it so far.  A bit more upbeat than my normal songs.   Plus I got to use the new bass guitar I bought during the week.

So current state of play.
6 songs Demo'd
1 set of lyrics I probably won't use.
2 songs with music needing some lyrics.
1 week to go, until FAWM finishes.

There is a skirmish, I believe tonight.  So I will have a go at that.

At the start of the month, I was never really planning to have fourteen songs at the end of it.  I believed I would get at least six and really would be happy if I could get nine songs done.

So with a week to go, I am very close to achieving that.

Then I can concentrate back on which of these new songs will make it on the solo album and crack on and get the first single out sometime before the summer.

I want to get the album released before March 2016.  So much more work to be done (as well as Hair Thieves EP7 / EP8 to complete and a Sineglider EP in 2015).

I'm excited.

Fawm - Week 2 Summary. (and a bit of week 3)

Fawm (http://fawm.org) is an annual event to write an album in a month.  The idea is to write 14 songs in 28 days and release an album.

Mixed week this week.  I was happy to have done three songs in the first week (after only managing six during Fawm 2014).

So week 2 should have started with an instrumental on Sunday morning as part of an exquisite corpse game (each participant writes a one minute tune.  The first person writes there and sends the last 10 seconds to the next person, who carries on the tune. etc.  When the last person finishes, it is all stitched back together into one long song).

However, the person in the list before me, didn't manage to do theres.


So on sunday, I finished the demo for "A Winter's Memory".



Starting to really like this.  There is more guitar parts recorded than ended up here. I will re-work this after February.


On the sunday there was another skirmish.  This time the title was "The Devil's Highway".

So I wrote a quick song about my love affair with the M6 motorway.  So glad I don't have to drive down that each day (like I did for 5 years).


Originally, I wasn't going to put this to music, buy some people on the forum said they wanted to hear it.  So here it is.  The demo was made using EZKeys to come up with something really quick.

I'm quite happy with how it turned out.  Not sure if I will re-record this for use later.  Maybe it will be a b-side or bonus track.

During the rest of the week, I struggled with starting a song from the drums upwards.  Spent far too many hours trying to import some .rex files into Cubase.  Cubase seems intent on importing files that are in 5/4 or 7/4 in 4/4 time, regardless as to what the song's time signature is.

After several nights of trying, I gave up and went back to using Ezdrummer.  

On Friday, I was told to start the Exquisite corpse song.  So in three hours, I wrote a one minute instrumental called "Lorana".   I have sent the last ten seconds off to a chap called Tim in Australia to carry it on.

Obviously, I can't yet spoil it for everyone, by posting the song.  I will post the song once the Exquisite corpse is finished.
So Saturday I was home alone.  I re-recorded the devil's highway vocals, since the original second verse didn't work for the melody I wrote for verse one.  Added the music to the bridge (which I thinks needs an instrumental adding before the final chorus.

I then had a go at the failed song.  So far I have some chorus music in 5/4 time, with a guitar riff.  I then proceeded to write a verse chord progression in 4/4 time, that seems far too happy.

So this needs re-working further and lyrics writing.

So the scores at the end of the week are five songs demoed.   One song on the go.


So this is the start of week 3,  I wrote some cliched lyrics for a skirmish entitled "I found my happy place".

Really insistant that I won't write music for this and will use the rest of the time to finish the other song in progress.

"I found my happy place".

In a world of fears and regrets
Wars and famine
Children distressed
All of the illness
and all the duress
I've found my happy place

In a world where we ain't equal
race and creed
hatred begats evil
All of the pain
And all of the suffering
I've found my happy place

Because
In you, I see a shining sun
In you, I see love for everyone
In you I see hope and a reason to be
In you I see courage and the will to be free

I've found my happy place

In a world of rich verses poor
Terror, disorder
Banks rotton core
In all of the sadness
And all this disease
I've found my happy place.

Because
In you, I see a shining sun
In you, I see love for everyone
In you I see hope and a reason to be
In you I see courage and the will to be free

I've found my happy place


So at the end of Sunday at the start of the third week.  I have five songs, one set of lyrics (not) needing music and a partial song musically.

So with two weeks left, I think I will improve on last years total of six songs written.  

So happy with how February is progressing so far.

Fawm - Week 1 Summary

Fawm (http://fawm.org) is an annual event to write an album in a month.  The idea is to write 14 songs in 28 days and release an album.

It is now the start of day eight, so I thought I would update my progress so far (given in 2013 I managed 3 songs and 2014 I manged 6).

Well, the scores on the door is currently sitting as 2.5.

I started off on February 1st, whilst everyone else in the house was asleep.   So it was headphones on, leave the noisy guitars alone and work on a new tune for my Sineglider instrumental project.


This is based around the Alchemy plugin by the recently defunct Camel Audio.  Shame, given I like their plugins.



As with all songs I am going to demo this month, it will be very rough and will be re-worked over the coming months.

In the afternoon, I went to visit E from my band The Hair Thieves. I challenged him to come up with a song in the three hours we had.  

To speed things up, we used Toontrack's EZKeys piano plugin.   So over the course of three hours, we chose some piano patches, re-worked the chords.   Sorted out a rough beat and started the lyrics.

At the end of the day we had a rough tune and some partial lyrics.

On the Monday I recorded the lyrics, before reconvening back at E's on the Tuesday to finish the demo.

So after deleting the vocals for lines that didn't work (either melodically or scan).  We reworked the lyrics, added bridge lyrics and recorded some more vocals.

We then called it quits in the demo and released it onto the world.

This song will probably be on The Hair Thieves EP8, so we will rework this sometime later in the year. We will possibly throw away the piano and using the chord structure re-write for guitar.

Overall we are pretty pleased with the song.

The third song that was started is called "A winter's memory" the title was given as a skirmish (where you have one hour to write and record a song, with a given title or subject).

I managed to write the lyrics in under an hour, but never finished the music.

Idea came from a conversation I had with a friend at Uni.
We was talking about his girlfriend and he said something along the lines of,

"I love her, but sometimes, I wake up and look at her and just want to punch her in the face."


A Winter's Memory

Waking from a long sleep
A vision of you
Head under a pillow
I was never so cruel
It was so easy
though I'm not thinking straight
Why is it love, comes with such hate

And the winter remembers
The ghost of you
The coldness, the darkness
The screams and untruths
And the memory sparkles
as the nights draw near
Into my silence
you're worshiped and revered.

Snow falls on the landscape
On coats of blue
Ice breaks and dredgers
Still looking for truths
It was so easy
To make them understand
The love of a woman, can melt a man.

And the winter remembers
The ghost of you
The coldness, the darkness
The screams and untruths
And the memory sparkles
as the nights draw near
Into my silence
you're worshiped and revered.


I have started the music for this.  Initially, using EZKeys again.  I am currently in the process of replacing the piano with guitar and bass.  A the moment, this is in the tuning of DGDGBD since that was the guitar to hand.   So this will be a song for the Rollasoc project.

I will try and finish the demo in the coming days.

So on to week two.   I have signed up for an exquisite corpse game.   This involves several people, with the first person writing a minute of music and then sending the last ten seconds to the next person.  This process repeats until the end of the line is reached.   The first person then stitches all the snippets together into one long song.

I did this last year and got the Sineglider tune Foxtrot 4 out of it.


So another one minute Sineglider tune will be on the way this week, given I am second in line in my corpse.

Until next week's update, I'd best crack on and write a couple of new songs.

Fawm - Day 1

Fawm (http://fawm.org) is an annual.  Write an album in a month.  The idea is to write 14 songs in 28 days and release an album.

It is a great way of kick starting a project, collaborating with people and generally being challanged to come up with songs under tight deadlines.

Now given, my primary concern is writing for The Hair Thieves, then for my solo "Rollasoc" album as well as my instrumental persona "Sineglider".  I'd be happy for one or two songs for each of my musical personalities.

I attempted this in 2013 and managed three parts of songs. I have just listened to two of the songs and think they might need resurecting, since I really like them.  (One will be a Sineglider tune in retrospect)

In 2014, I attempted it again.  This time I managed six songs. A few of which have been released into the world.




One made it on to the last Hair Thieves EP.

Original Demo
The final released version.



The others are in various states of completion / abandonment.

So I thought I would attempt Fawm again in 2015.  The aim this year, is for possibly nine new songs at the end of February.  One every three days.

So at the end of day.   How am I getting on.


Well,I started the day at 9am.  With everyone else in my house asleep, I felt it best to put the headphones on and write an instrumental.   This will be a Sineglider tune.   I wanted to use my Alchemy synth, since the company has recently stopped trading.  So it is synthy.  It started as an ambient tune, but got a bit noisy towards the end.

I'd arranged to meet with E from the Hair Thieves in the afternoon, with the intention of thrashing out an entire song.   We pretty much managed to write a song in four hours.  It will need a little work to finish the demo, later in the week.

Finally, I did the first skirmish tonight.  A Fawm skirmish, is,  given a topic, write and record a song in an hour.  The pigs (demo) above was from a Fawm skirmish.

Tonight's topic was "A winter's memory".  Which is a title I liked.   I managed to write two verses and a chorus in 31 minutes.  Which is pretty fast for me.   But I failed to finish the demo in time to post it at the end of the hour.

So at the end of day one.  I have three songs on the go.    So I need to get them demoed by Friday, if I am going for 14 songs this month, or just over a week, if I'm not.

So expect some demo links over the coming week.