17

52:17 by ChristianLeBlanc

I've been putting in lots of overtime this week (tax season), which left me very little time to work on this week's song, or more importantly, spend any time with my wife. So, Saturday night, I asked Jill to help write a song with me.

She wrote the main guitar line on Jam Sessions, a song-writing tool on the Nintendo DS. (It's primary purpose is a guitar chord emulator, but I think it's just genius for being able to experiment with chord progressions - especially if the guitar and all it's chords don't come that easy to you!).

Then she wrote the piano line. All I did was come up with the drums and that crappy violin line :)

She can't take credit for writing the lyrics, though. She ripped them off of Pat Mills' and Olivier Ledroit's "Requiem" part 7, from the latest issue of Heavy Metal magazine o_O

She says she was going for something of a Smiths rockabilly vibe, somewhat. So that was informing the genesis of the tune.

Thanks Jill! <3 "You can kiss a nun once You can kiss a nun twice But you cannot get into the habit"

16

52:16 by ChristianLeBlanc

Can't think of much to say about this one. Used my friend Adam's old ZOOM 505 pedal for the guitar. Wrote the guitar and drums after making the mistake of having Tim Horton's one evening and couldn't get to sleep (not even Police Academy could knock me out!). Came up with everthing else this morning.

Um...the first bit is 3/4 time, then it's 4/4...I didn't really notice that until after I wrote the guitar part and was programming drums for it.

Lyrically: the first bit would work better if there was just a description of a lonely place (a field, space, a mood, whatever). That would have made "What did I fail to say?" seem more effective, I think; the way the words are now, it kind of makes things a little more obvious and one-dimensional; they can only be about one thing.

"I told you everything
You wanted to know

And after everything
You wanted to go

Later that night
Noone in sight

What did I fail to say?"

15

52:15 by ChristianLeBlanc

This is the 2nd time I've had an idea in my head for what I wanted to do with my song of the week, and the 2nd time I've felt the song didn't quite accomplish what I wanted it to (the first being "space bat"). I think a good song is meant to come naturally, without coaxing. A long, dark time ago, I used to write poetry, and came to roughly the same conclusion.

Now, I'm sure there's a lovely, brainy quote out there somewhere that expresses just that. And I'm also sure there's another, equally good quote about how that's bullshit, and you just need to roll up your sleeves and have patience and determination to see it through, in order for it to come out the way you wanted.

Personally: I think that forcing my work was part of what killed my interest in poetry. Also, if I can come up with a bit of music from out of nowhere, unexpectedly, I think that a pleasant surprise is worth more to me than a realization of any idea I can come up with. Is this an excuse for not having the skill of a master songwriter? Sure, maybe, whatever. That's not really important to me, actually. I prefer to think of my stance as just 'making peace with' or 'coming to terms with' my limitations.

"Songwriting is a very mysterious process. It feels like creating something from nothing. It's something I don't feel like I really control." -Tracy Chapman

Anyway, the idea I had: I just wanted a song to end on an uplifting crescendo with all the separate parts coming together, overcoming the gradually diminishing static in the background. A little beyond my means right now. But this project is all about learning, and in that respect, this week was a success.

14

52:14 by ChristianLeBlanc

Click here for "14 Synthy"
Click here for "14 Blue" (There's swears! Look out!)

Hey look, there's 3 versions of this week's song! I'll explain why.

I started writing this one on guitar, just coming up with the chords to use. After I was happy with that, I came up with the drums, and then started adding accompanying lines from the sequencer.

Next, I recorded the synth bits (one at a time) onto the computer. I then recorded two takes of guitar: one kind of plain, and one with distortion (note: I'm using software distortion, which makes it sound like the weakest, most impotent distorted guitar ever. I need to get my pedals back at the apartment).

Anyway, this is about when I started realizing that I need a lot more experience with mixing (I'm good with width, but with more sounds, I need to get better at depth). At first, the guitar pretty much overpowered all the other sounds, but I think it's a little all right now. "Noisy" is the version with guitar.

"Synthy" is the version without any guitar, and so it skips over the first little bit of the song. I really liked how it sounded straight from the sequencer, so I wanted to post this for posterity's sake, just to demonstrate how it sounds without any guitar. However, the whole point of this project is to learn and improve, which is why "Noisy" exists, and which I consider to be the official "14".

"Blue" is just a snippet, with a sample that I think is hilarious, but I admit feels too out of place in the song.

A first for me: the drum loop, I think, borders on trip-hop. Also, I threw some light distortion (from the sequencer) on the bass-synth, making it sound more 'analogue' or 'juicy' to me. No big deal, but for someone who's used to using presets and nothing else, these are some major steps for me! :)

"On moon-lit days
I see the rays
In outer space.

Your stupid face
Has been replaced
with oil and lace.

Confused for days
'Cuz what it takes
Comes from another place

One more delay
Give up the pace
Who cares who wins the race?

What a day to find you"

13

52:13 by ChristianLeBlanc

A tribute to that fuzzy hero, Space Bat (http://www.space-bat.com/). Sorry this was all I had in me, Space Bat.

"Don't laugh when I tell you how I feel
Don't tell me it's a joke when these tears are real

Space Bat
How could you face that?
We'll try not to be sad
Though you won't be back

Maybe we pretend
Like an imaginary friend
But every now and then
We need something to believe in

How can we not identify?
How can we not be inspired to try?
By digging in and holding tight,
You showed the earth how dreams take flight

(Space Bat)
You're much more than an internet meme
(How could you face that?)
You've achieved an impossible dream
(We'll try not to be sad)
You've reached the stars
(Though you won't be back)
You belong to the stars"

12

52:12 by ChristianLeBlanc

Click here for "12 Matrix"*

Again, I recorded two versions; one mixed straight off the computer, the other played through a filter on my mp3 player.

So it's been a while, but I finally have the guitar back at the apartment :) I've gotten EXTREMELY spoiled by how polished my QY-70 (and most of my keyboards in general) make everything sound. In terms of mixing my songs, it almost feels like I'm starting this project from scratch again. I think I need to study up a bit on compression, noise reduction (to get rid of guitar hum), etc.

Although the reverb makes the vocals quite hard to distinguish, I really like how they sound, especially some parts of the harmonization towards the end. Form over function, I guess!

I got really lazy with the drums on this one. I have no shame!

Lyrically, a trick I like to use is to take the words I start out with and just write the opposite instead, in the hopes of turning a cliché into something a little bit fresher. Here, I like to think it creates some tension between what the words are saying and the mood of the song. Not sure if it actually does, but I like to think that.

"In my life,
In my dreams,
What is right?
Everything.

In my life,
So it seems,
Daylight breaks
Constantly."

*Editor's note: because I needed to find a new site to host these songs on, and space was at a premium, I've decided not to bother re-uploading 'matrix' versions.

11

52:11 by ChristianLeBlanc

Something different this time. Thought I'd try my hand at remixing. The really really hard part: taking a completed mp3 of a song somebody did and trying to separate all the separate sounds through EQ alone. Let me tell you, it was all kinds of no fun. There were always leftover drums I didn't want, and the resulting vocals always lost whatever frequency they shared with the drum bits I was trying to get rid of. If I ever try something like this again, it'll be when I have access to individual .wav files so that I can actually remix things properly.

The only instrumentation I added was the strings and the extra drum track. I like how the reverse guitar part sounds, however, I couldn't really drop more samples into it without the leftover drum beat in the sample throwing off the tempo.

The original song, by the way, is by The Gear, and is called "Reckless Reasoning"; for the time being, you can listen to it here: http://www.aaapop.com/downloads.php