Nick-dhodge-gnease collaboration

ah-hahahhahahaha

rotfl

Not brilliant and talented, "The Ultimate in Funky*" or "Super Cool*"

* Names assigned to me at various Riverside Jams by obviously drunken audience members

Wow, Im speechless guys :D This is eloquent and beautifully done!!! I don't think this could have turned out better if you had recorded it in a pro studio!

cool stuff guys...u use a volume pedal to make it sound like a violin gnease?

Nice song. I wonder, how do you make that chunk...chunk... sound.. :D

Who did the vocals? Excellent work!

It sounds great, except the vocals are just a bit too hard to understand. But the song flows well. Gives me some hope and inspiration to try recording songs without worrying about drums.

Steeleye Span had a song called Alison gross that was pretty cool, no drums but had a strong bass line with some nice guitar parts. in fact a lot of their music was without drums, you might want to check them out, they were a popular English folk -rock band in the 70's(popular in England) but most of there music is still available.---the dog

Ah, understanding the lyrics... I don't blame you, it isn't often you hear "formaldehyde" in a song.

David is singing this.

Just doing this from memory so bear with me.

One by one

Put the tape in and push play
stretch out and watch what used to be
hit the remote, rewind the time
to friends that are just memories

Kodak moments stuck in books
a shutter clicks to catch the light
formaldehyde for those who pass
and fade away without a fight

Chorus:
I remember all your names
all the dumb things we would say
under the lights on any stage
'til one by one you went away

Even though I'm not like you
we all were brothers of the stage
sharing the laughs, applause then tears
as one by one you died of AIDS

As this show comes to it's end
I refuse to wipe my eyes
I just rewind the tape again
'cause I refuse to say goodbye

Chorus:
I remember all your names
all the dumb things we would say
under the lights on any stage
as one by one you went away

©Nick Torres 2003

Thanks for the comments, guys.

I thought David's vocals and acoustic work were right on. In fact, he's made a second version that is more polished, but this original just captured the emotion and tone so well, I preferred it. Any lack of clarity in the vocal is a combo of my mixing and possibly the fact that the vocal/guitar was transfered as an MP3, converted to WAV for further multi-tracking and mixing and then re-MP3ed for posting. I've probably listened to it more than anyone while playing with the mix and never realized that "formaldehyde" was in there -- it's a very nice lyrical turn, Nick.

Effects?

I tend to do stuff on the fly and not keep track, but IIRC, I was lazy and used soft-attack envelope shaping (form of compression). A bowing sound is a favorite of mine from way back, when I was poor and used my volume knob to do it. The goal was to get a sad, crying emotional sound to complement the loneliness of the acoustic guitar and the stabbing anger/pain in the electric guitar chords.

By chunk ... chunk, I think you are referring to the ring modulator -- very atonal and eerie. A little goes a long way.

Drums: Bass carries the rhythm on its own, because I tried for the life of me to come up with a percussion accompaniment and decided it would just clutter -- especially considering the whole tune could easily stand alone on just acoustic guitar and vocal.

-G

gnease, I generally don't use a lot of effects out side of reverb, maybe some delay, and once in a while my beloved cry baby but I really loved what you did :D It really added to the mood of the song , well done!!--the dog

Nice work. Proof that music has no limits regardless of complexity or simplicity. Very soothing. Aside from the lack of drums I thought the production was fine if not very good.

A++++

Great stuff, really cool

Hear! hear!

Is it just me or does David have a very Neil Youngish-thing going during the chorus? (I mean that in a good way)