Composition Challenge #12 - Voting

Antique_Guitars

Hi Everyone,

This is the combined Voting and Discussion thread.

Thanks to all that entered the competition.

Please use this thread to cast your votes for your favourite entries to Fretboard Challenge #12.
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Voting System - voters can pick their top 3 favourite entries.

First choice gets 5 points - Second choice gets 3 points - Third choice gets 1 point

Entry with the most points wins.

Simply post in this thread your top three choices for winner in order, 1st choice first etc etc.

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(Note for Entrants of the competition: Self Voting is NOT Allowed)


The winner will be announced just before midnight on the 29th February, voting will close at 11.30pm on that day.

(you can edit your vote up to the time voting closes)

A reminder of the competition Guidlines:

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You just thought of the sexiest song ever in your head! Make it real!

No time limit!

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Please see all the entries uploaded on SoundCloud below.

steamabacus

I've just listening through to the tracks for the first time - excellent work chaps. I'll have a couple more listens before casting my votes.

It seems female vocal samples are popular!   I'd be interested in where people extracted these from.

I've done a 'making of' explanation of how mine came together - it's on a Word file at the moment so I'll post it a bit later when I have some time.

ElectroDan

Great efforts all around chaps!

I see that most of the entries "> came in ) at about 2m 30s )

I will have another listen to 'em later and carefully consider my vote.

thecolourbox

steamabacus said:

It seems female vocal samples are popular!   I'd be interested in where people extracted these from.

I searched on youtube for French Whispering for mine. Interestingly when I played my track to my good lady she said, "Does that French you're whispering actually mean anything?"

steamabacus

Right, so this is how mine came together...


The stitching together of ‘Sexy Pants’

I started with the vocal samples that I remembered I had prepared for another project about 10 or 11 years ago - these were actually just innocent ‘umms’ and ‘aahs’ extracted from Zappa’s ‘Civilization Phaze III’ album (and originally recorded back in the 60s by covering an open grand piano in drapes, mic’ing up the inside and getting various freaks to poke their heads inside and talk random bollocks). The samples were stored on an old Zoom Sampletrak loop sampler so I dug this out, located the correct SM card (I’m good at keeping records of projects so it was fairly easy to track down the correct one) and played the samples (which were sampled at the Zoom’s ‘high’ 32k sample rate!) onto my computer (using my trusty old Cool Edit Pro). Also on the Sampletrak was the string squeak sample - I decided to record a copy of this as well.

With the atmospheric ‘textures’ sorted, all that remained was to actually write a tune.

So, I started by finding a suitable drum groove using Addictive Drums in Cubase SX - I found a preset pattern (with a couple of variations) and tweaked the tempo, kit and mix until I had something that felt right. Next came the basic rhythm guitar parts, firstly a basic plucked 4 chord progression (just something off the top of my head, I couldn’t tell you off-hand what the chords are). I then came up with a couple of arpeggiated  parts on top of these basic chords - one is accented on the down beat and one is accented on a later off beat and the two kind of interlock together. You can hear all three of these rhythm guitar parts playing at the same time in the intro section.

Next came the bass line, recorded direct via a Trace Acoustic TAC-1 compressor and then processed with Amplitube. Later on in the mixing process this got ‘printed’ as audio since Amplitube takes up more than half of my elderly computer’s processing power. I tend to mix as I go along so I tweak the plug-in as I go until such time as the processor starts to groan under the strain of the growing mix. By that point I’ve got a pretty good idea of the bass tone needed and mix down to audio and disable the Amplitube plug-in, thus freeing up the processor for further mixing (compressors, reverb, etc).

So that’s 3 rhythm guitar parts and a bass line, no real arrangement as yet. Next was the main melody using a free Mellotron vst (written in using the mouse as I don’t have a midi keyboard controller) which can be heard at 1‘15“ in the final mix. All these parts fit together but at this point I started sketching out an arrangement by cut-and-pasting parts, layering up various combinations of the three rhythm guitar parts and chopping out and simplifying bits of the bass line. At this point I also tweaked the drum parts here and there, added the odd cymbal splash, etc. After this the arrangement was pretty much there and just needed to be fleshed out with a few more parts.

About this time I came up with the title ‘Sexy Pants’ (inspired by the vocal samples) and, one evening, started searching for a suitable image to go with the tune. I stumbled across this old ‘Cooper’s Y-Front’ advert which made me laugh - it would later inspire the whole middle section of the arrangement (which had originally been envisaged as a lead guitar break).



The fleshing out began with a couple more Mellotron parts, originally written to harmonise with the main melody but which ended up standing alone in the opening section at 0’ 49”. Next came the muted guitar part that comes in at 1’40”. This was originally envisaged as a background part behind a guitar solo but I liked it so much I brought it further forward in the mix and rethought out this whole section.

I then had the idea to use the text from the advert pic as a kind of ‘sexy voiceover’ (I was thinking Barry White) but baulked at the idea of setting up a mic and trying to emulate the Walrus of Love myself.

I use these challenges as a way of motivating myself to try new things and I wondered whether some kind of voice synthesis program might work (again, I think it was the Zappa influence: remembering The Crab-Grass Baby from Thingfish). So I did a bit of searching online and found this site …

http://imtranslator.net/translate-and-speak/

I typed in the text and selected a voice. It took a bit of tweaking of punctuation and spelling (the American pronunciation of ‘hygienic’ with a short ‘e’ was really not doing it for me) but I was really pleased with how it came out - voice synthesis has really moved on since Zappa’s day! I recorded the section from my laptop (really Heath-Robinson - a cable out from my laptop’s headphone socket into a little portable recorder), imported it into the track on my studio computer (which isn’t connected to the web) and then cut and edited it a little so that it fitted in rhythmically with the backing track.

Next came the last section (2’28” onwards) which now became the place to put a guitar solo (you gotta have a guitar solo, right?). Before playing a solo though, I put down a ‘backwards’ guitar part - originally intended as a psychedelic background for a more melodic upfront solo. This was played ‘forwards’ but using a Line6 DL4 reverse delay mixed to around 80% wet.

I recorded a final solo and also planned a lead part at the beginning reinforcing the Mellotron lines but I really wasn’t ‘feeling it’ that day and when I listened back to the solo I recorded it wasn’t doing anything for me. I removed it but then realised that maybe the track was fine as it was. The Mellotron and backwards guitar could come forward in the mix a bit and it would work - ‘less is more’, maybe? (But don’t tell Yngwie).

So I stuck with what I had and used the time remaining (this was before the deadline was extended a month) to concentrate more on the mixing. As I mentioned before, I do a fair amount of mixing as I go along but it’s amazing what a bit of concentrating on the finer details can bring out. Also, due to some noise issues in my flat, I have bought some decent reference headphones (Shure SRH1440) and this was my first mix using them.

All the guitars were recorded direct using my pedal board (Boss PH-1r prominent on the rhythm guitars), A Blackstar HT-5H amp and a pair of Award-Session JD-10 preamps for speaker emulation. I tend to record guitars ‘wet’ (reverb from my Lexicon rack unit) - erring on the side of too dry and adding a bit of extra reverb during the mixing if necessary. Mostly though, the mixing of the guitars is just panning, eq and compression.

Most of the guitar parts are my Ibanez Artist with the pickups split to single coil (SD Alnico II) with just the backwards guitar part using my Lag Jet (SD stacked ‘single coils‘). Bass is a Squier Precision P/J (Tonerider/Seymour Duncan pickups). Plug-ins used are Focusrite Scarlett compressor and reverb and Cubase VST dynamics.

thecolourbox

As I always enjoy reading other people's methodologies to see their creative processes, and to be honest I also enjoy writing mine out for all to see, I thought that like steamabacus above I would write a detailed and insightful description of how I arrived at my piece of music. However as the creative process was neither interesting, detailed nor insightful, I'll just list it here instead:

I always find moody droney music quite darkly amourous, so i thought I'd copy the style of a couple of the slower tracks on the Dead Weather's Horehound album (seek out So Far From Your weapon and 60 Feet Tall and you'll see what I mean).

I'm a simple man, so I stuck with pretty much one chord all the way through. Also, only one guitar (through the Vibro model on the Zoom G3), which also has only one barely working neck pickup in it - computer drums from a free plugin (I forget which), a shed load of stereo delay and soaked in reverb. No bass, bass is for losers, man. I whacked in the Rat model on the G3 for the climax, trying to sound like a Big Muff because the Muff model on the G3 doesn't much. Just did a line on the tempo track to increase the speed from the start of that to the end.

I thought it needed some vocals, but I couldn't sound alluring enough. So instead I downloaded a youtube video of a French woman whispering about...erm, I've actually no idea what she's on about, I don't speak French - I let my funky music do the talking (ten points for whoever knows what I'm on about there). 

The structure of the track I think would be fairly obvious trying to play it cool and dark to start with but then getting all over excited to climax once the big muff is in play.

It's not all that sexy, but I don't own a wah and I can't sing like Marvin Gaye so I was unable to get it on in that respect.  

Fretwired

@steamabacus ; should get 5 points for his explanation and for the use of Y-fronts. Highly original.

I wasn't going to enter as I had a mental block. To me sexy is James Brown meets Chic via Donna Summer. However inspiration came after listening to an old Ronny Jordan CD - I love a bit of acid jazz.

The whole thing was rushed and is basically an E-minor vamp. The girls are Steely Dan's backing singers talking about the bands music; the drum is a sample; the bass was my guitar synth on an upright patch; the wah guitar was a Strat into Amplitude with a Roland Jazz Chorus, a compressor and an auto wah; the main guitar was a Les Paul into Amplitube with a Fender Reverb amp, compressor, and rack reverb; the synth and keyboard was from Kontact and the male vocals were on an old Computer Music CD. All recorded into Cubase with standard Cubase plugins for mastering.

Fretwired

I've listened, cogitated, deliberated and have come to the following conclusion.

Y-Fronts aren't sexy, but then we're British with a stiff upper lip and a tongue in cheek view of the world so ...

5 points to @steamabacus

3 points to @kin

1 point to @Fnpt

@thecolourbox I liked your track, especially the awesome riffage towards the end, and on any other task I'd have given you points, but I didn't think it sexy.

Cabicular

Christ I'm almost glad I didn't manage to enter this month
I'd have got mullered!
Mine started with the lyric
'I fucked you and I fucked your mum, I even got a blowjob from your uncle John. It was cold in his cabin but he kept me warm
It's the kind of thing that turns me on'

I'll do voting when I've had a proper listen

viz

That was an amazing collection and each of them had different things about them that I really liked. I struggle with ranking, so I'm afraid I won't follow the rules. I'd say that, of them all, I thought Steam Abacus yours was absolutely outstanding in terms of both its sexiness and its layering. Just two chords, yet you seemed to be able to make a journey and movement out of it. The other 4 I enjoyed very much indeed. If I had to be pressed for a second I'd probably go for Fretwired's but they were all so brilliant that I'll just leave it at that.

fnpt

Not much to say about my entry which started as a poor funk attempt which was replaced with fingerpicking as a consequence of my lack of rythmic skills. The spoken parts came from musicradar's free samples.

I'm still listening to the remaining entries before I cast my vote.

fnpt

Also, bass was recorded with an 11r patch and the drum track was a preset in ezdrummer which I adjusted to the feel of the track. Guitar into my Laney cub 12 and all recorded into pro tools.

fnpt

Ok, so here goes:

@steamabacus

@Kin

@fretwired

stratman3142

SteamAbacus: So creative and a great imagination. I also like the imagery and your (in effect) sleeve notes (The stitching together of 'Sexy Pants'). Reminds me of the experience of buying an old vinyl record and experiencing the words and artwork as well as the music. And the sticky guitar at 1:40 - daren't ask how you went about getting that sound.

The Colourbox: Brings to mind Mogwai, then it turn into a Jack White vibe for the guitar climax. The sexy female voice is definitely a vote winner.

Fnpt: A nice 'Johnny A' guitar feel on this one. Another sexy female voice

Kin: A very atmospheric John Martyn type feel to this one

Fretwired: Sexy jazz. Have you been listening to Ronny Jordan? It's got shades of his track 'Get To Grips'. Very tasty.

I'm inclined to go with the tracks that have the sexy female voices, but I need to be more objective and think with my mind not my...
Can't decide yet.

kin

I'm gonna go for..

5 point @thecolourbox ; A French whisper evokes sex and chocolate to me, immediately makes me think of a certain  Alan Partridge episode, The climatic ( not sure that's a word ) riffing made my other half giggle  ( bonus points for that.)

3 points @Steamabacus ; inventive, interesting, great playing and production as usual, not sexy but very funny

1 point @Fretwired  musically I enjoyed this track the most. Lovely laid back tune.

Nice to see a few new faces getting involved , thanks for your thoughts and votes , hope to see you all in the next challenge.

kin

My effort was knocked up when playing about with the new garageband update, drum beat and upright bass were straight from apple loops

then it was a case of mucking about with piano and synth apps until something sounded alright. Musically, the whole thing took about an hour and a half in total, Which seems to be a pattern for me, if it doesn't flow straight away then I don't have the discipline to thrash it out.

That also makes for a good excuse for the sloppy playing and production, I'm far too artistic to worry about the finer details darling

The original lyrics I had to this were about euthanasia  and got re-wrote , Luckily, " Gazing in the half light " fits quite well with either subject . 

guitar, iPad, Alesis iPad dock, cheap Behringer mic and various apps 

eSully

5. @Kin - Great tune

3. @Fretwired - That's a cracking song, got a bit of Dj Shadow about it

1. @steambacus - Very chilled and polished sounding. 

They were all really good, not what I expected - I was waiting for the Wah pedals and Barry White vocals , Really liked the crescendo in @TheColourbox song and @Fnpt, great riff but I thought it was missing a little something, perhaps a bit more singing or audio samples.

I will try to enter something for the next composition challenge. This time around was too busy.

Cabicular

OK

5 @Steambacus - The production and composition were excellent and I liked the humour of the peice

3 @Fretwired - great groove great use of samples and some old school scratching

1 @Kin - good tune and a bit different from the others 

A challenge too far for me. I couldn't have come up with half the ideas shown here. 

Excellent work chaps

steamabacus

Thanks for the comments everyone. @stratman3142 - 'sticky guitar'? It's all in the fingers. Oooh-err. 

It's been a really tough one for me to judge, not least having to pick 3 from 4. So @Fnpt , I'm afraid it's Thursday nights in the Europa League for you.   Nice tune. Up against the competition though, it felt a little more 'unfinished' than the others. As someone else pointed out, a bit more time on it could really bring it to life - just simple stuff like background string pads, doubling up parts, etc could go a long way in bigging up the arrangement.

Of the three remaining, I really could put anyone in any position - all have their strong points. But at this exact moment my guts tell me ....

3rd (1 point)   @TheColourbox  ; Joie De Vivre
Definitely gets the prize for sexiest vocal sample - although she could be reading out a shopping list for all I know? Arty/punky vibe with a definite sense of building tension and release. Jack White meets Serge Gainsbourg?

2nd  (3 points)   @kin ; Gazing
Much kudos for not retreating into irony/humour.  Excellent vocal and a groovy laid-back arrangement that keeps it progressing.

1st  (5 points)   @Fretwired  ; Slo Motion Baby
I love that smoky, dark lead guitar and that fretless guitar-synth line - mmmm, sexy! What guitar synth setup do you have exactly?

stratman3142

Very difficult. On another day I might vote a different way, but I'll go with:

@thecolourbox  5 points

@steamabacus  3 points

@Fretwired   1 point

thecolourbox

Blimey thanks everyone, hope your PayPal bungs were all received