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Post by Kapitan on Mar 14, 2019 23:25:52 GMT
We should have a thread in here, don't you think? So now there is one, even if it's just a visitation of sorts. I used to write and record songs, but haven't really done that in a while. However, a few remain online. They're mostly the sort of pop you might expect from me, with a few anomalies.
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Post by eilish on Mar 15, 2019 0:22:22 GMT
hey your stuff is pretty good! i'm currently listening to your soundcloud and i'm enjoying it do you have any finished albums or anything like that?
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Post by Kapitan on Mar 15, 2019 12:57:43 GMT
No albums, just a hundred or so more or less finished songs and as many unfinished.
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Post by Kapitan on Dec 19, 2020 18:35:37 GMT
Spent a few hours this morning and yesterday recording my first song in (4?) years. I wrote this almost 20 years ago, but not having anything recent that's ready to go, I dusted it off, changed a few lines, newly arranged it, and recorded it anew. Very rough going as I both try to learn how to record properly and get my fingers and voice into shape.
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Post by B.E. on Dec 19, 2020 19:38:31 GMT
The bass and drums chug along nicely. I really liked the guitar lick(s) at 1:00.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 17, 2021 15:22:10 GMT
Yesterday I did another new recording, again of an old song. (Written in late 2000, based on my old notebooks.)
I really wish I were good at mixing, but I'm really, really not: I fumble and fiddle, but for example, when I play the tune through my Bose speakers, it sounds boomy and muffled in the (very prominent) low end; while through headphones or the MacBook speakers it's more or less how I imagine it. And that's just big picture. There are a million little things I just need to learn more about.
I might, for the first time in my life, actually look into the technical aspects of how to do a proper mix rather than my decades-old method of just, as I said, fiddling and fumbling.
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Post by jk on Jan 17, 2021 21:54:33 GMT
Cap'n, I just gave your two new songs a listen (it took me a while to get here). They're your first in four years, I see. I remember enjoying songs of yours ages ago in Smiley times.
I don't hear the imperfections you mention, just two beautiful and solid songs. I'll put your SoundCloud page in my signature at Hoffman -- to echo BrianBSMedley, your music deserves a bigger audience!
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 18, 2021 12:37:36 GMT
Mighty kind of you, jk.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 22, 2021 16:29:24 GMT
Another new recording of another older song...though this one was mostly written in '12, so we're getting more modern after a couple of 20-year-olds!
"And Never Say" was newly arranged this week, as I've never really arranged and recorded it before. My scratch version was just piano and voice, so this guitar-based arrangement (with twists and turns in the bridge) was fun to do. What was originally a little keyboard idea is now a full-fledged riff!
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 25, 2021 14:03:12 GMT
I haven't yet posted, but I'm so excited I wanted to post about a new tune. I sent a somewhat standard (variations on a I-vi-ii-V7 verse, though some interesting changes throughout) ballad to an old friend of mine to add piano and/or organ to, as he's better than I am on keyboard instruments.
Friday night we talked about it. Saturday morning I awoke to a string ensemble arrangement he'd written and recorded overnight, very much in the style of Van Dyke Parks. It's remarkable--especially for one overnight session. Rather than continue in the more standard instrumentation I had in mind, I'm just going to go with a single-tracked vocal and strings. I think the tracking is done and just needs to be mixed.
I'll get it done this evening, most likely.
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Post by Kapitan on Jan 25, 2021 23:15:06 GMT
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 3, 2021 20:39:16 GMT
I'm trying to keep up roughly a song a week at the moment (which isn't going to be possible on an ongoing basis). It's possible so far because I'm refurbishing and recombining and recording old songs that I've never properly recorded, never finished, etc. Along those lines...
Somewhere around 2014, I wrote a song called "Cardamom Coffee" that included both the refrain ("bacon and eggs...") and the outro found in this new version of a song by that name. The verses come from an idea I had around that same time but never fleshed out into a song: it was mostly just the opening line "I used to write songs about you and say that they weren't (ha ha)."
Most of the lyrics are new and the arrangement and recording are entirely new, with my favorite part of the arrangement being the clean-toned, delayed electric guitars that dominate the instrumental part of the coda (but are also foreshadowed earlier, including the intro).
Anyway, I hope you enjoy this new recording of this largely new song.
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 6, 2021 21:25:31 GMT
Keep on keepin' on. I recorded a song I first wrote about 6-8 years ago. On the first stab at it, I had played drums. Bad idea. This was done yesterday and today with the new setup. Organ introduced to the party. Probably the most like punk or raw garage rock sounds I get.
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Post by Kapitan on Feb 13, 2021 22:24:08 GMT
I recorded another new one, in keeping with my song-a-week goal. I wrote this in 2008; this recording is totally new, done over the past few days, with a few 2010 lyrics and a few new lyrics added in. I usually don't write fiction, but this is an entirely fictional narrator and situation.
(Except that the day I wrote the chord progression, I was indeed drinking tequila from a coffee cup. And I did [and do] own a stolen goblet.* It held margaritas at the now defunct Don Pablo's chain of Mexican restaurants. Those things are true.)
*Actually three. Two from Don Pablo's. IDK about the third, I don't recall. Oh, my silly youth.
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Post by Kapitan on Mar 6, 2021 22:20:03 GMT
This one uses for the basic tune something I wrote around 2008 (though the middle 8 is entirely new). I'd never really recorded it except for myself as simple demo. This has almost entirely new lyrics--everything except the first line of the refrain--and a generally new arrangement. I kind of like it, don't love it. Very intentionally nodding to "Getting Better," which I had just been discussing in the Beatles thread, for the intro and end of each refain.
Hope you enjoy "Bring On the Summer." I think it's a pleasant little song.
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