Author: Thomas Marvel

I’ve posted 27 songs so far and I think I’m up for some time off for good behavior (!) so…I’m not posting a song this week. I have one on the go and it’s too good to rush so please wait patiently. You’ll hear about The Lion’s Den next week…

A bit rushed this one – perhaps this influenced the title? Another try at weaving guitar with the electronic sounds.

The lyric, “All I know is who we are,” comes from mishearing a Nirvana song, sorry for that! I try to layer a couple of guitars on this one to see if I can blend them together. Also, I tried using a simple riff that is initially pleasing but then becomes irritating so I remove it at what I think is the sweet spot. What do you think?

More experimenting with robot voices…

It comes across a bit disjointed this one but I think it’s because I had too many ideas whilst making it and trying to gel them all together didn’t work out so well. The end product is interesting but Ms. Swift can rest easy because I don’t think this one is going to knock her off the charts anytime soon.

I apologize for the indulgent guitar solo but stick with it and I do something fruity with it towards the end. Although now I’m wondering if I went too far because upon repeated listening it’s more painful than pleasurable – you’ve been warned!

What better to layer over a simple rhythm track than slam on my cacophonic guitar. I finished the song by experimenting with the limiter – how far can you push the loudness before it distorts? Click below to find out – if you dare!

Bit of a short song this week but there’s no point belaboring the point. In contradiction to the title I didn’t use a snare drum in this track…it seemed a funny joke at the time.

I went a bit more conventional on this one with a verse/chorus structure and some lyrics. I tried the less is more approach and resisted the temptation to widdle all over it with my guitar (widdle is a technical term for “slide your fingers around the guitar fret-board until you think you’re playing in the right key”). I did capitulate to a splash of synth but it’s only a tiny bit! I wrote this song whilst waiting for a van that was to pick up a washing machine – oh the rock and roll lifestyle!

There was a storm here recently which gave me the opportunity to incorporate my own sample in to a track. I tried a ‘breakdown’ section in the middle of this track which sort of adds to the anticipation for the end with it’s escalating tempo. I fiddled about with compression to optimize the loudness of the track but now I’ve come away thinking I know nothing about compression. Well, better to realize you know nothing and that you have the opportunity to learn something than to know everything and have nothing to learn… I digress, here’s today’s track: