Thread: Musicians Central

Leave a link here...to a tune or your music page (if it isn't in your sig).
Here are a couple of mine that are writing-related:
Dandelion Wine
Killer in the Rain
And one spoken-word collaboration with poet Emily Carmen: Drowning

Let us hear you!

well here are some recordings from a number of years ago, some of you have already heard these but i am working on new ones... i know ive been saying that for weeks but i swear it's true!

JAR on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Downloads

all of those songs were recorded with a simple multi effects processor plugged directly into the Line In feed on my motherboard at the time, and edited/mixed with a free demo of a sequencing program.

im not overly proud of those songs anymore cus i made them so long ago i feel i can do better now, but in the spirit of sharing, take a listen!

just listend to Dandelion Wine, when the electric drums busted in it made me smile.

interesting little guitar melody you got goin there, especially when the synth leads came in over top it.

boy.. sounds like something straight out of the 70's haha

EDIT : killer in the rain is a neat little jazzy song... awesome title by the way. reminds me of the doors for some reason.

Thanks...I started out in the 70s and that doesn't go away *laughs* no matter how much midi cheese I melt on top.
Riders on the Storm has that same rain/thunder sequence-the title is from Raymond Chandler.

This might be a great topic to ask.

What music do you like to listen to when you write?

Originally Posted by Ungood

This might be a great topic to ask.

What music do you like to listen to when you write?

it's a good question, but not really in the vein of this thread...

Originally Posted by Sigg

it's a good question, but not really in the vein of this thread...

fair enough.

Moderan, nice keyboard work and melodies! I enjoyed both those tunes.

Sigg, I'm impressed. Nice playing and really nice tunes!

Originally Posted by JosephB

Moderan, nice keyboard work and melodies! I enjoyed both those tunes.

Sigg, I'm impressed. Nice playing and really nice tunes!

thanks, back then i seemed to be less uptight about what was good or not. the way i recorded those songs was just record a few rhythm parts by playing them some arbitrary number of times without a metronome or anything and then play leads which were essentially improv/jamming on top. then mix stuff together to make it sound halfway presentable.

now it seems like it's holding me back, trying to add beats and all that. ive started and not finished half a dozen songs in the last few weeks.

I couldn't resit. I've posted what I'm fairly happy with already. But I have other stuff.

Here's a song I recorded with the guy I hope will be a permanent drummer. We recorded a few songs, but for some reason I can't fathom at this point, I didn't haul my amps or effects to the guys house and instead played through a Line 6 pod right into the sound card. I thought I liked it at the time, but now I hate the guitar tone! Too bad, 'cause I like the song. And the high harmony is too loud also. Oh well.

http://76.12.0.196/oh_hannah.mp3

now it seems like it's holding me back, trying to add beats and all that. ive started and not finished half a dozen songs in the last few weeks.

I did this for years! It was only when I started playing with other people that I was able to start writing whole songs and recording them.

Originally Posted by JosephB

I couldn't resit. I've posted what I'm fairly happy with already. But I have other stuff.

Here's a song I recorded with the guy I hope will be a permanent drummer. We recorded a few songs, but for some reason I can't fathom at this point, I didn't haul my amps or effects to the guys house and instead played through a Line 6 pod right into the sound card. I thought I liked it at the time, but now I hate the guitar tone! Too bad, 'cause I like the song. And the high harmony is too loud also. Oh well.

http://76.12.0.196/oh_hannah.mp3

I did this for years! It was only when I started playing with other people that I was able to start writing whole songs and recording them.

good stuff there mr.b, the guitar tone isn't so horrible, it kinda fits with the style of the song. i agree with you about the vocal harmonies being a little too loud, but it still sounds good.

i like the southern style guitar twang picking, nice solo by the way, very fitting.

Originally Posted by JosephB

Moderan, nice keyboard work and melodies! I enjoyed both those tunes.

Sigg, I'm impressed. Nice playing and really nice tunes!

Thanks, Joe. I try
I like your track too. The guitar sound is good. Mixing levels are easy to fix.

And agreed, Sigg...impressive, especially if they're slapped together as you say.

Originally Posted by Sigg

thanks, back then i seemed to be less uptight about what was good or not. the way i recorded those songs was just record a few rhythm parts by playing them some arbitrary number of times without a metronome or anything and then play leads which were essentially improv/jamming on top. then mix stuff together to make it sound halfway presentable.

now it seems like it's holding me back, trying to add beats and all that. ive started and not finished half a dozen songs in the last few weeks.

I get into that way of thinking periodically as well. It makes me go back to disciplined writing where I start from the beat and work my way through the rhythm bed, essentially deconstructing any tune, reducing it to its parts, and starting again.
Another thing I'll do is take a recorded riff or chord pattern and introduce it into Band in a Box. From there I can write a whole piece, print out the composition, and work with it that way.
I also use a usb drum kit to make my beats. Ozone Trash takes care of the drum sound.

that usb drumkit is pretty neat. yeah i understand your more methodical approach to creating songs, probably comes from doing it for a living. ive never really had pressure to create a new song so nothing pushes me to complete them other than my own interest. but my real problem is attention span... ill be recording stuff and then just start playing around on the guitar and before i know it 30 minutes have passed and im like 'oh yeah what was i doing' and by then ive lost interest in the rigidity of recording haha...

sometimes though i persist and get tracks laid down

Well, when I was playing bass for a living, we mostly did covers...but I've always been into the songwriting aspect and just taught myself how to crank stuff out (if I had to). For a while I had just one guitar and loops, and that really made me work with the parts.
Try something like The RPM Challenge - Home or Home | www.nasoalmo.org
I've done both successfully. Last November I did both nasoalmo and nanowrimo.

Cool pieces guys!

Some of my music can be heard here ETSounds on MySpace Music - Free Streaming MP3s, Pictures & Music Downloads (Beware of Myspace compression... my mixes really aren't that muddy )

My website is Freelance Lyrics ... it's about song writing and production mostly, but also serves as a base of operations for my ghostwriting business and soon my consultation services.

All of the songs on my myspace have been produced, mixed, and (mostly) recorded by me. The Jamaican sounding guy is a few states away so he records his vocals and sends them to me and I mix them.

One of my instrumentals was just featured on XXLmag.com as background music to one of their videos... so I'm pretty pumped about that! Good exposure for a relatively unknown person such as myself.

Doesn't surprise me that there is some musical talent here... creativity rarely confines itself to one art.

-E.