Category: the eleventh hour
Writing a Song PART II
Spent another morning working on the new song. Therefore with no further typed words necessary I present you with the second part of the documentary!
Writing a Song PART I
Okay… here’s a new one. I thought it would be interesting to any aspiring songwriters out there to show how I create a song. I intend to show how I produce a song from an initial idea right through to the final product. This could work… or it could be a complete disaster!!! Ha ha!
Anyway… I picked up the acoustic guitar this morning and tried to come up with the foundations for a new song. The difference this time was that I recorded the process every step of the way. I will try and do this every time I work on this particular song. Then… it will be interesting at the end to watch them one after the other – especially if you have heard the final piece.
Until then… here’s part 1. The recording of the first idea. The bedrock of any song!
Feel
I proudly unveil a new Eleventh Hour track. This song is a slight departure in the way it is skewed a tad towards the lord of the dance – but give it a listen… it has all the hallmarks of the Eleventh Hour. This tune punishes. Pure, unadulterated energy – a necessary contrast on an album that is shaping up to be chocker block full of hits!
Was taken out by my auntie and uncle today. Had one of the best meals of my life! Seriously impressive!
Great food. Then came home to finish the mix of Feel. It has been a good day. The Eleventh Hour album is now 9 tracks long. I have it playing as I type this and it sounds like a greatest hits collection! Ha ha! I know – I’m full of it! Well… literally actually. Completely bloated. I forgot to take a picture of the starter but it was a homemade fish cake with Hollandaise sauce. Really scrumptious.
I’m really accomplishing things this year. 2010 will be a year that sticks in my head. I can for various reasons remember likewise 1995, 1997, 1998. This year will be the year that I nearly completed an album start to finish. Also, not just any album… but an album that is wrapping up a love of music and delivering it to anyone who wants to listen with a hug and a kiss. I am flowing, embracing the moment, producing a stream of music. It has helped greatly that Bill has taken some of the weight off my shoulders lyrically, but I am also expressing my feelings through the music. There is joy in some of these tunes. And gold in them there hills!
An accumulation of all that I have heard and all I have experienced. There has been no need to jump on any bandwagon or pay any attention to the current fad. I am just giving you my heart and my soul (knowing wink to any Mitchell and Webb fans out there!). This music is proving to be so original. I have, in my own humble opinion produced a few classic tunes over the years. I would place Out of the Low Times and Purple Planet Place right up there. My lyrics to an old song called Feeling New also bring a tear to my eye when I hear them. But this new collection of songs – this new Eleventh Hour album is just something else. It is exciting. It rises above the mire. There’s no Oasis clone here. No-one’s trying to be the next Kaiser Chiefs or Arctic Monkeys. There’s no Dubstep going on. These songs have no interest in whether Cher or One Direction win X-Factor. These songs stand alone. I give them my total and utter respect. The best music of my career. And I have in Bill perhaps the best lyricist in the world. Now, as I’ve said before… I believe that when I want to, I can write a lyric as good as anyone – but with Bill on board I don’t have to. I can put emotion into the music. Emotion is something that can be lost in the modern era. Seriously. The everyman out there probably doesn’t realise how soulless music production has become. We’re not talking about the Beatles recording a whole album in a day anymore. Or Led Zeppelin knocking their debut off in 30 hours. Modern music production is a machine. In fact, while you’re reading the next paragraph stick on Pink Floyd‘s Wish You Were Here.
Okay, (hopefully Welcome to the Machine is now playing in the background) modern music production is a machine. Watch old documentaries on Abbey Road with the Beatles messing around, or Jimi Hendrix recording anything. Beautiful era. I didn’t live through it… but like many of my generation we have grown up listening to a lot of Beatles and Stones. Those documentaries are what we got into music for. Well… let me tell you… it’s all gone. We live in the Pro-tools/Logic age. For those of you who don’t understand I can put it simply: Music is now made just as you would type a Word document. Music is recorded into a computer and displayed on the screen. You can then cut and paste to your heart’s content as quickly and easily as a student cheating with his essay! This whole process has made music as sharp as glass. You can cut yourself on the cleanness, the precision. But the side-effect is that it is a little too tidy. Like a really annoying neighbour’s front lawn!
Well… I have produced a collection of songs in my little studio that I feel knocks aside this assessment of modern music production. I have my own style. I reckon I can call myself a “Music Producer” now. My songs have warmth, vitality and intensity. I’m perfecting the wall of sound that I have been building for years. Unlike me today, my wall of sound is not a bloated beast. It is full, yet nimble. And so endeth my rant about whatever I’ve been ranting about. I wish you all a full, yet nimble week!
…and straight back on board
I’ve been working on this new song. A really quite upbeat, heavy little powerhouse of a song. I intended it as the latest song for my Confession of the Whole School – All Monsters and Dust album. There is now the possibility that it will actually appear on the Eleventh Hour album. Nothing’s confirmed – we haven’t signed anything in blood yet… but I look forward to hearing Bill’s ideas and seeing where we can take the song. This Eleventh Hour album is coming on in leaps and bounds. It’s practically writing itself. Ha ha! Who am I kidding – I’ve worked my arse off!!! (Bill has of course worked his …butt off too!) Ha ha! In fact Bill made a comment today that I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t mind me sharing. He said if only we’d met ten years ago just imagine how many albums we’d have made. So, so true. I’d even go so far as to say I reckon we’d be household names. I’m not sure which kind of households… but let’s just imagine they’re trendy ones – households with lots of money to spend on merchandise. My face could have been on a million baseball caps!!! 😉
on the fiddle
I was listening to Wogan on Radio 2 this morning. Okay… my girlfriend was listening to it, I was hovering nearby making toast. But anyway, Seth Lakeman was being interviewed. He also performed a few of his songs – including another spectacular rendition of Kitty Jay. Well, it took me back to the times we played together, and then to the songs I was writing around that time. This is a site that is documenting the creation of my new album. In fact it is currently documenting the creation of two albums. I find it interesting to reflect on the intervening years. What has changed in my approach to crafting a song?
In those heady days of the early noughties I felt I had the world in the palm of my hands. I wanted to create lush soundscapes, beautiful walls of sparkle. I wanted to take your breath away. I wrote from the heart, but I did write the lyrics in a slightly cryptic manner – I wanted to take you with me, but I wanted you to have to hear, to listen, to think.
So, what’s changed? What are my songs about today? Hmmmm. Well, I want to create lush walls of sound. I want to take your breath away. I write from the heart. But today, I don’t so strongly feel the need to hide behind the lyrics. I am who I am. I say what I say. I feel my music has come on in leaps and bounds. I am producing music that surprises me. Music that can hold its own with anything out there. But the most important thing is that the music ebbs and flows.
I have been working on the latest Eleventh Hour song today. Bill and I have a winning formula. I tend to write the music and Bill tends to write the words (with a little overlap here and there). When it comes to this album the ability to concentrate on the music has been a revelation. I have produced a collection of songs that I feel are up there with the best. I have been able to create emotions and stories with sound. And I have been so lucky to have Bill as the other half of The Eleventh Hour. He is the best lyricist I have worked with bar none. Okay, he’s the only lyricist I’ve worked with ’cause I’ve always written the words myself before – but I mean that I read his lyrics and I just think “wow”. Seriously good stuff. He’s up there with the best of them! So, I listened to our ‘album so far’ through today and it just blew me away. My music and his words are the perfect fit. The album flowed by and in a split second it was gone. Half an hour of the most intriguing, intricate, exciting music I’ve heard in a long time. And it’s mine!!! Ha ha.
So, as I was saying… I was working on the latest song today. I’ve pretty much mixed it. It has a beautiful ending. A real “heart fluttering” ending. An ending which probably places the song at the end of the album. The final track. I was mixing the song, mixing in Bill’s contribution of multiple layers of chimes and whooshing sounds… and the song became something else. Not just a song that we’ve created… from nothing. No. The song became its own entity – right before my ears. A truly gorgeous massage of sound, swirling, rising, falling and dying. Music has to die. The perfect end to what is shaping up to be my perfect album.
Anyway… I buttered the toast, Seth played Kitty Jay, and I raised a cup of tea to him. We have both come a long way in those years. A life in music is one of trials and tribulations. Of great ups and depressing downs. But one thing always remains a constant. Music is you. You are your music. Everything life throws at you becomes your music. There is no spoon. But there is always a guitar. People may ask what ‘inspires’ you to write a song. But that isn’t the right question. The question should be “to what extent does the song write you?”. It’s a loop. Chicken and egg. All the clichés. My life is laid bare via music. The new song will be posted soon. Don’t you guys let me down.
cuts cuts cuts
Everywhere we look, all directions… cuts cuts cuts. No money for anything. Bleak times. Time then for uplifting songs? Time for lyrics that are fuelled by the gloom? There is a place for all comers.
The new song is really progressing. It should actually be a refreshing surprise for you all. I can reveal (if I haven’t already) that it is the latest track in my collaboration with Bill Ryan. The Eleventh Hour as a project has been a revelation. Nearing 8 songs in, I’ve got to say that it has been a joy to construct a collection of songs that are so focussed, intelligent and rocking. While the country around me is taking part in a reckless gamble it is with a certain reassurance that I now ponder what The Eleventh Hour has so far achieved. The songs are powerful, modern, forward-looking and distinctly retro. I like that. A set of songs that feel like the future (garlic bread don’t you know) and yet could be considered retro. Oxymorons and other such strange words. This is the world Bill and I inhabit. And it comes naturally. This has been a most constructive year for me. I have written songs which I rank among my personal best. It has been great to work with such a fine lyricist as Bill. Before our collaboration I felt I had probably written all I had to say. I could pick you a song I had written which could sum up most emotions. But I realise I was wrong to feel that way. You can never ‘be done’ with writing lyrics. There is ALWAYS something to say. Which leads on brilliantly to the subject of the new Eleventh Hour song. It very much feeds on these ideas. Can you ‘be done’ with music? Music itself. Music and lyrics. The song will help answer the question. I don’t necessarily think it’s a question that any of you out there are asking. But it’s a question that for me very much needs to be answered. This is the song that needed to be written. Most songs are accidental. Plucked from the ether. This song is a necessity. Wait till you hear it. You might just understand what I mean. And if you don’t, the X-factor will be on the tv for your eternal enjoyment.
confessionofthewholeschool.com 