sing it again, sir, sing it again...

after about 2 weeks of fairly constant work at vocals and guitars for three songs, i'm forced to admit that it's all garbage, and will all need replacing.

in a way, there's nothing more frustrating, but in a way, it's a huge relief as well. i managed to do vocals for 3 songs at work the other night. i spent the week working on them, cleaning them up, comping, tuning, editing, and mixing to see how everything fit. the problem is that i get into a zone and i'll work for an entire night...but when i come back the next morning and listen again, i realize that the original source was just plain sub-par, and any amount of work just makes everything sound second-rate. something about the environment at work just gave me a hard time with pitch on the vocals... i was always scooping into everything or not even hitting my notes at all. as a result, i have to compensate by over-tuning, and the whole thing ends up sounding robotic and unnatural. anyway, when i'm in a situation like that where i'm having trouble with pitch, performance goes out the window and i just start singing for the pitch, waiting for the next note... which leaves the vocals sounding lifeless and unconvincing, no matter how in tune.

then on the weekend, i did guitars with the world's last true gentleman. matt had me down to track with his american tele. in the end, i was able to discover that my songs will, indeed, do well with some electric guitar, and that the energy boost is very welcome. similarily, however, upon arriving home and listening to everything we'd done the next morning, i was forced to conclude that i can't tune my way out of a wet paper bag, and all but one of our tracks was unusable (sorry matt!).

as i said, though, i'm taking this as a blessing. i came into this process intent on taking the time to get it right. when i'm in the heat of it, though, it becomes increasingly harder to not settle... i have such a desire to hear the end product that my mind is able to trick me into believing that something is 'good enough' in spite of the fact that, being honest with myself, i know i have better in me.

and so, i'll tear it all down. the vocals will all be redone, as will the electric guitars. i'll give these songs some time, though. i need a new perspective on them, because i'm starting to just listen to them as notes and chords, frequencies and time signatures, as opposed to thoughts and ideas.

i was back to writing last night. i'll work to have one more on its way by the time the holidays arrive. if time permits (and i'm hoping it does) i'll have the holidays to do drums, bass, and electrics to the 4 tunes throughout that week-or-so.


warmly, and with a carrot muffin in hand...

J