COMPOSITION CHALLENGE #21
Time for round #21 of the Fretboard Challenge, courtesy of me (!! - I'm adminning these now, in place of AntiqueG's who's now swamped at work) and
@TTony
Every few months there'll be a composition challenge. It revolves around individuals or groups of forum members composing or covering songs based on a set of rules or guidelines laid out for that particular challenge.
No prizes for this challenge. It's just for fun, a spur to creating, sharing, discussing music/recording and learning. Plus a way of testing the water with your creations and getting some feedback.
GUIDELINES
The theme for this music composition challenge is as follows:
***A New Year: Time to set new trends or update music from the past by putting a new spin on an old style***
Interpret the theme as you wish.
If you're stuck for ideas on how to start, below are some rough indicators on how the theme might be interpreted, but I'm sure others will take a different slant on it.
- Do a guitar based rock style dance track
- Do a heavy metal disco style track
- Do a electro synth blues style track
You could ignore the theme completely but, in general, people give more votes to the entries that relate to the theme. But who cares about winning anyway
Picture: In addition to the music, try to create your own picture that relates to your interpretation of the theme. This isn't mandatory but, as a small incentive, those that provide a picture will be awarded a free point to add to their voting score. Note the picture can be anything from a hand drawn sketch, photo, photo edit or something generated in a graphics package.
DATES AND VOTING
Fretboard Challenge #21 starts NOW! - Submission deadline - Midnight 28 February 2018
Voting will start soon after the submission deadline with each voter selecting their 1st, 2nd and 3rd choice.
First choice gets 5 points - Second choice gets 3 points - Third choice gets 1 point
The entry with the most points wins.
Voting ends 11.30pm 14th March 2018
The order and scores of the three people with the most votes will be announced soon after the voting ends.
SUBMISSION DETAILS
All recordings and pictures need to be sent via email to Compositions@theFB.co.uk
Songs to be submitted in mp3 format.
Pictures to be in jpg or png format.
It's not a competition.
Comments
Shout if either of those aren't OK with you!
"You don't know what you've got till the whole thing's gone. The days are dark and the road is long."
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!
“Theory is something that is written down after the music has been made so we can explain it to others”– Levi Clay
I find a period of 'thinking about it' isn't necessarily a bad idea.
Also I need to solder some repairs to my board/setup as I currently don't have a true clean sound available. I've been procrastinating over that as well.
"You don't know what you've got till the whole thing's gone. The days are dark and the road is long."
"It's just for fun, a spur to creating, sharing, discussing music/recording and learning. Plus a way of testing the water with your creations and getting some feedback"
and
"You could ignore the theme completely but, in general, people give more votes to the entries that relate to the theme. But who cares about winning anyway"
I had this initial idea of combining military marching rhythms with reggae, but I've since gone off at a tangent. I'm currently experimenting with rhythms and sounds but everything I come up sounds unoriginal in terms of style. I guess it's all been done before. But having a germ of an idea at least helps me create something. I'm not sure my end result is going to have an obvious link to the theme yet, but I'll still put it out there
When I'm looking for a melody/hook, I try to hear things in my head but often resort to randomly jamming over the track until I hear something I like that I can build on.
btw: I should point out that I got the lowest number of votes in the previous (End Of Year) Challenge. So what do I know.
I've transposed the main melody from major scale to harmonic minor (ish), changed the time signature then had a play around to create original riffs/licks around it with both harmonic and dissonant sections. I'm not going to just do a literal transposition from major to minor.
Prog metal isn't a genre that I'm totally at home with so I don't know if it will be anything other than a series of badly played old school metal clichés with no prog but we'll see. I've got a demo of the verse and rough drums for the chorus and hopefully record the chorus riffs this weekend. I'm still unsure if I'll keep it entirely instrumental or add vocals as I'm not a metal vocalist.
This is my first ever composition challenge. I'm very new to recording and I know nothing about drumming or bass but I figure is the best way to learn is by jumping in balls deep. Expect some silly questions over the next month or so.
Guitarist of band Vendelinus: "this is our last number tonight"
Audience (four fat blokes and a dog called Colin: "boo .. you've only played for 15 minutes"
Guitarist of band Vendelinus: "don't worry it lasts two hours and we 'll throw everything at it - the song's called kitchen sink"
:-)
I bet @steamabacus gets 100 tracks laid down ....
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!
Personally, I try not to 'overthink' it. I wait to see what spark of inspiration/interest arises and then run with that, often with no clear idea of how it relates to the 'theme'. If I'm lucky It'll start to make sense as the track grows.
I leave it to intuition, mostly.
If a possible title occurs to me, I save the Reaper file with that name. See the picture below for a possible title I considered yesterday.
https://i.imgur.com/wdSduvc.png
This task melts my brain. I mean surely "a guitar based rock style dance track" is a rock track and "a heavy metal disco style track" is a metal track?
That said, metal disco is probably what I'll do ... falling a million miles outside of scope but hey. Will try and do something this weekend, wanted to play with my new plugins anyway.
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!
That's true ... although I'd've said they were either metal tracks with a lot of wrong notes ... or jazz tracks with distortion. Probably the former
That said ... that example in particular is about as metal as Bieber.
I saw him perform that material on the London pub circuit. Amazing stuff. I've still got the album on CD.
Sorry. I've just realised you won't. You'll just sound like Ghost.
I can see your quandary.
Remember, it's easier to criticise than create!