NIGHTblog

2007_0420 : MY NATURE

Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:40:52 -0800

This came up again on the almost exactly 10-year anniversary of the original demo, when I found myself planning for a song to contribute to the American Idol Songwriter’s competition.
The only two parameters I gave myself for the piece were that it would have to be finish in exactly one week, and that it must be a new, or otherwise unfinished song that I could imagine being performed by another (probably, though not necessarily) male vocalist. That season I had my money on Blake Nelson, the beatboxing virtuoso, so I left the possibilities open to interpretation, choosing a more homogeneous arrangement than I might otherwise decide upon, featuring my vocal for the demo over acoustic guitars, synth bass and beats, and piano.
I'd written the “I want to feel love” chorus on a dictaphone exactly 10 years ago and it was sitting around getting moldy on my hard drive. The melody went through about three dozen subtle variations to get it right, which made it hard for me to remember perfectly when I performed it live during the Artist’s Way Open Mic night, much as I'd given myself but a week to do it all. And the final words for the verses didn't come until I'd plugged in all the vowel sounds first...
Basically most of my tunes these days (including the Walking Against The Wind “lullabye”) came about phonetically first, formed around the “oo” and “ee” and “ah” sounds, then the words arrived like a special delivery at the end via automatic writing. And very last, I have to make perfect sense of them and understand what they mean, so that I can even begin to interpret them. Perhaps it's a vaguely suspicious way to work, especially when I listen to brilliant lyricists like Andy Partridge and imagine he does the words and music all at once, they click so well.
I put in the guitar solo in the middle 8, at the very end when everything else was completely done... (partly an homage to Seven Seas by Echo and The Bunnymen perhaps?) Originally there was a mellotron playing a flute solo, replaced by a distorted guitar bit playing about 2 notes over and over, then a piano banging out chords, then eventually a trumpet bit like the one at the very end, which sounded more like Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. None of these approaches worked until I chose to embellish further upon the song’s already “jangly” acoustics.

“MY NATURE” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2006_1028 : DARK PORK

Sat, 28 Oct 2006 00:59:24 -0800

"Dark pork; a title my wife came up with; confirming her ability to come up with better ones than me quite often. Inspired by a little Tom Jenkinson here and there and an idea I started back in January 1999."

“DARK PORK” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2006_0928 : THE STENOTELEGRAPHER

Thu, 28 Sep 2006 01:08:00 -0800

"A very satisfying little piece, and based upon a simple idea and working methodology.

As an hommage to my friend Pete Moraites and his fondness for composing using a set of Redrum modules in Reason, I also issued myself a basic set of parameters while composing The Stenotelegrapher, to see how far I could get. The goal was to work across a horizontal timeline and to curtail the building and exporting of loops for once; and although the piece was allowed to generate over numerous sessions, while listening to the vibraphone’s easy repetition, I found myself comfortable with this track, in knowing at exactly what point to stop.

(Ironically, the title was conceived at a completely different time and under separate circumstances. I found it while hunting through my list of potential track names, while trying to better "Zitherimba."

“THE STENOTELEGRAPHER” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2006_0527 : SIENNAPODS

Sat, 27 May 2006 01:14:27 -0800

"Another Krautrock influenced piece, replete with trippy Tony Levin stick-slapping effect... The chugging rhythm guitar makes it more proggy than I’d originally anticipated and took it in another direction..."

“SIENNAPODS” [ Mix 1 ]
from Kunstfabriken "Ja Ja Nein" Day 072.cd
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2006_0314 : DEAF IN ISHEN

Tue, 14 Mar 2006 01:26:55 -0800

"I can’t count the number of times I’ve woken up from a dead sleep in the morning, only to hear music playing in my head, and for it take the better part of ten minutes of humming it before I realize that I’ve been producing and arranging in my sleep.

This one is no exception; I could see a red velvet room, adorned with gaudy tinsel, streamers and flashing 60-watt lightbulbs, with a one-man “band” playing a euphonium, a bass drum and micro-drumkit, strumming a white Vox teardrop guitar and singing in a high, abrupt-but-crooning falsetto. The man was Ron Howard, dressed as his Richie Cunningham character from Happy Days, and singing like Roy Orbison. He wore Buddy Holly glasses and a red-green-white plaid shirt with a bow tie. Every so often, he would gyrate for effect and a sort of “bendy” dance, and an invisible audience of teenage girls would go wild and scream. I was standing somewhere in the room watching him -- perhaps producing the performance for television.

The music was clearly meant to be very staccato and obtuse -- the kind of non-funky whiteboy beat that Outkast achieved so magnificently with “Hey Ya” -- so I had that as a point of reference by the time I awoke.

I think the full arrangement of string synth and organ was meant to contradict the punchiness of the opening beats.

Either way, it’s a personal favorite to this day."

“DEAF IN ISHEN” [ Mix 1 ]
from Eric Scott "Vigilant" Day 026.cd
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Start

Wed, 28 Dec 2005 00:13:31 -0800

Announcing New Music Uploads! Finally, our chance to share the music produced in-studio every day – to keep our attendees up-to-date about what happens during the apparent lulls between landmark postings announcing album releases on the Day For Night imprint and web site launches.

Our decision to post new work, MP3s and Podcasts as they happen is a culmination of the long-drawn out inner monologue about why Day For Night went online in the first place.

Visit NIGHTblog [ Day 082 ]
>> http://www.dayfornight.com/iblog

2005_1006 : SOMETIMES WHY

Thu, 06 Oct 2005 01:50:11 -0800

"This one’s made up of voice samples from the VO track we produced for Silhouettes and Shadows. A ‘vowel movement’ -- produced by stringing only the most guttural fragments together resulted in me also building the full arrangement around this track around vowel sounds. I attempted to inject some other ideas (“the eye / the heart”) out of the nonsense this produced.

There was the added challenge in that it was created for background use in client/investor presentation by OneMedia, and was intentionally left open-ended and flexible, as the cues in the presentation were spoken over -- live -- using a DVD player’s loop feature to allow certain beds to go on playing while the presenter talked over it."

“SOMETIMES WHY” [ Mix 1 ]
from Rhythm Factory "Music For Targeted Television Advertising" Day 052.cd
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2005_0729 : THE INVISIBLE BOY : EDIT

Fri, 29 Jul 2005 16:06:00 -0800

"I’m really pleased with this one, given that it was composed in a 5-hour long session under a deadline given to me for the Invidi DVD project. The minor-major key guitar makes this track my favorite of the bunch..."

“THE INVISIBLE BOY” [ Mix 1 ]
from Rhythm Factory "Music For Targeted Television Advertising" Day 052.cd
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2005_0719 : MOVIN' YOU AHEAD

Tue, 19 Jul 2005 16:10:19 -0800

"This track -- unused in the final Invidi mixes, was my contender for a chapter on Smart Tags -- but due to the one blue (minor scale) note in the lead sequencer pattern, the track was deemed unsuitably morose, and was replaced by “The Invisible Boy” instead."

“MOVIN' YOU AHEAD” [ Mix 1 ]
from Rhythm Factory "Music For Targeted Television Advertising" Day 052.cd
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2005_0701 : BREAKDOWN

Fri, 01 Jul 2005 12:01:05 -0800

"This is a good slow, downtempo track – and I'm not exactly sure where it came from. Came from a session cooking up some loop soup, upstairs in the studio right before dinner."

“BREAKDOWN” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2005_0630 : SILHOUETTES & SHADOWS

Thu, 30 Jun 2005 11:59:56 -0800

"Music inspired by the recent paintings of Andrew Lakey and targeted for the Japanese market. It's a track in progress for use in underscoring the DVD for Japan, simply entitled "Lakey"... Feedback is invited – this one is the mix without the robotic "Victoria" voice."

“SILHOUETTES & SHADOWS” [ Mix 4 ]
from "Music For Targeted Television Advertising" Day 052.cd
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2005_0619 : LAP DOG of LUXURY

Sun, 19 Jun 2005 11:58:49 -0800

"A sort of electroclash Missy Elliot thing of a track. Not exactly what it was intended to be at first, it basically just grew out of a melody I heard in my head during a dream. Woke up, tried to articulate the idea, but it was mostly gone, except for the melody, and the arrangement simply followed through on its own."

“LAP DOG OF LUXURY” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2005_0617 : OKAPI

Fri, 17 Jun 2005 11:55:20 -0800

"Originally the backing track for a Latin track, the thing got infused with African rhythms instead, which frankly, sounds a lot better."

“OKAPI” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2005_0615 : ABOVE THE TREETOPS

Wed, 15 Jun 2005 11:49:52 -0800

"This one has guitar-track written all over it. The first mix is just a confluence of all the main background elements, a really live bass line and feel."

“ABOVE THE TREETOPS” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
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2005_0611 : YELLOW No. 5

Sat, 11 Jun 2005 11:47:54 -0800

"Sweeeeeeeet."

“YELLOW NO. 5” [ Mix 1 ]
Not yet assigned to a release
>> LISTEN NOW