Hi all,
Good assignment!
Unfortunately, my band knowledge is a couple of decades out of date, so I had no idea who Fall Out Boys were. According to Google they're ‘punk' and ‘emo'. Punk means Sex Pistols to me (although I never did get around to listening to anything by them either) and I've no idea what Emo means. I found a clip, and they didn't look too punky to me – in fact they looked as slickly contrived and carefully dressed as The Village People. But I supposed your video clip image is a big deal these days.
So this is my song written for what I imagined the Sex Pistols and punk bands in general might have sounded like. My impression was that it should be as rough and offensive as possible, with sloppy musicianship taking a backseat to ‘bad attitude' and lyrics about unpleasant and anti-social topics. In other words, as long as your parents instantly loathe them and want them banned, anything goes.
I also think of pounding head banging beat being a good thing punk-wise, so I wrote a rhythm track first and fitted everything else around it. I'm currently looking for a drum teacher, so that I can learn how to play my son's abandoned drum kit – so my complete lack of drum skills should suit what I think punk is right down to the ground. Believe it or not, the drum track was slightly more complicated than you can actually hear... :cry:
So this is a song about the dangers of getting careless about your personal grooming - perhaps from drinking too much coffee. The chords are roughly built around Am, Dm and Em with a string or two deliberately a bit out of tune. There was going to be scraps of a bass line played on a sax instead of a bass, but – hey – who gives a toss if you finish a punk song or not… I think it probably gets far too forgiving and hopeful at the end, so I may need to re-write that and have the singer taunting that he's sleeping with the guy's girl now instead.
In the spirit if starting out rough on Tuesday and hoping to improve by Saturday (or maybe get worse in this case) - here's a rough cut of three verses. Believe me, you won't want any more. I started out sticking roughly to the chord progression in verse 1 and then just thrashed away at whatever I felt like after that. I couldn't get the balance or mic volume working properly on the singing, and the enunciation was complete crap - but so what. Us punks are like that. If you don't like it, p*ss off.
Click here for a BaAd experience
If any of you punks out there have any advice about the song - well screw you, why would I care - but tell me anyway. Who knows... :mrgreen:
Here's the provisional lyrics:
Hey hey hey hey –
crackface with the crazy eyes
wasted thighs, acid lies, monkey cries
Where the hell you think you are?
Where the hell you think you are?
Where the hell you think you are?
Dark, down, deep, dry
coldscream, deadbrain, gutter crash,
Empty stash, bonecold flash, fire to ash.
Why you waste your life like that?
Why you waste your life like that?
Why you waste your life like that?
Yes, you, yes, you,
Crawling through the pavement cracks
bloodscab tracks, flashing backs, meathook racks,
Do you think it's only you?
Do you think it's only you?
Do you think it's only you?
Burnt, blind, blank, blurred
how much lower can you slide,
Fused and fried, broken eyed, one-way ride,
Ego crushed or too d*mn big?
Ego crushed or too d*mn big?
Ego crushed or too d*mn big?
Freeze frame, freeze frame
snatch a breath of nightbright air,
lose the stare, junk despair, fire a flare,
Show her how your spark survived
Show her how your spark survived
Show her how your spark survived
Stand up, stand up
Self-hate's not the only road
you're not owed, crack the code, drop the load,
Her body's warm and so's her bed
Her body's warm and so's her bed
Her body's warm and so's her bed
Get off your knees and walk back brother
EDIT: Un-punklike reference to "Love" removed from the last verse and replaced with "body" - some Celtic Punk frettened to kick me teeff in if I didn't give it the knife... so it's cut and gone... I musta been drunk or summat... maybe it was the bluddy auto edit thing, I'm sure I meant body anyway..
:|
KriZZ - for tHiZ wEEc OnLi
I clicked the link and expecting a bad experience , I was very disappointed as I was looking forward to a bad experience instead I heard something very similar to "The Clash " ..
Don't put ya self down like that Chris ,"Thats my job " :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
I liked it mate , I didn't expect to hear what I heard , but I enjoyed the experience ....
Keep Em coming mateyyy
Trev... :wink:
Here is to you as good as you are
And here is to me as bad as I am
As good as you are and as bad as I am
I'm as good as you are as bad as I am
I don't know that much about punk/grunge
but I have this perception.
And you nailed the perception.
(I've heard that 90% of reality is perception anyway . . . who keeps these statistics?)
The lyrics are brilliant.
Actually, probably too good for the . . .
nevermind, I won't go there.
I'd say, job well done on the lyrics assignment.
Isn't profanity endemic to this species? If so, I commend you on your restraint.
The music?
Even if you performed punk perfectly I probably wouldn't like it.
So don't go banging your head too hard on my account.
It's the rock that gives the stream its music . . . and the stream that gives the rock its roll.
I know i don't post here ever so take this with a grain...
it sounded half-speed compared to my experiance of punk clubs in the 80's
other than that it was spot on, good job Chris.
#4491....
it sounded half-speed compared to my experiance of punk clubs in the 80's
Very possibly - but as a skit on 70's punk it's pretty much spot-on! Sounds almost exactly half-way between the Pistols and the Clash, although possibly the lyrics are a little TOO articulate.
Too, too funny Chris - I was cracking up listening to this!
:D :D :D
Vic
"Sometimes the beauty of music can help us all find strength to deal with all the curves life can throw us." (D. Hodge.)
I agree with whoever said that this had something clash-esque to it. Very well written.
Jack
Hi all,
Thanks very much for all the generous and supportive comments. I think I must have struck lucky on what I thought it was supposed to sound like. I certainly learned a lot along the way. I normally play very genteel accoustic rhythm guitar with the group I play with, and I put the recording gear (which I never mastered) away along with the electric stuff, about 6 months ago. So it was just lucky that the assignment more or less called for something rough and sloppy. :mrgreen:
I'd never tried recording 3 separate tracks before and BOY is it hard to get your timing right or even HEAR when the hell you're supposed to come in!!!!*%$#* I played the guitar straight into the recorder, with no amp, using some kind of built in distortion, and once the distortion cut in I couldn't hear (even with headphones) what the heck the chords were doing musically at all, just the pulse and drive they were being played at. As for the "singing" - after yelling at the recorder for half an hour during the other takes - I had no trouble getting the angry rasp in the voice, but the volume, timing and articulation was completely woeful. A pity, because I'd been reasonably pleased with some of the lyrics. Just fine for punk though I guess. Anyway, it has encouraged me to do a LOT more practice - preferably with something a bit quieter next time..... :)
Chris
Hi again,
Just noticed a nice bit of accidental irony.
During this thread I apparently posted my 2000th post and officially became a "Guitarnoise Addict" :wink:
welcome to the club Chris
Addicts alike we are :mrgreen: :mrgreen: :mrgreen:
Here is to you as good as you are
And here is to me as bad as I am
As good as you are and as bad as I am
I'm as good as you are as bad as I am
Chris
At first I was going to agree with Twisty that is seemed slow
but after another listen I think it works well.
The vocals are dead on for punk and the lyrics work well
with one exception.
Stand up, stand up
Self-hate's not the only road
you're not owed, crack the code, drop the load,
(her)Love's still warm and so's her bed
Love's still warm and so's her bed
Love's still warm and so's her bed
What's with all this LOVE crap? No self effacing punk would give a flip about Love.
Maybe something more like
Stand up, stand up
Self-hate's not the only road
you're not owed, crack the code, drop the load,
Her body's warm and so's her bed
Her body's warm and so's her bed
Her body's warm and so's her bed
As long as I get mine who cares about LOVE.
Start thinking like the addict you are and I'll be joining in Rehab
in 8 more post.
John
:mrgreen:
I have to agree John.
I started out with "(her) Heart's still warm...." and thought that sounded altogether too soppy. More pink than punk. By coincidence, my next choice was exactly the lines that you've written: "Her body's warm, and so's her bed", but then I started to wonder about the whole tendency of the last two verses to offer positive advice anyway. I did consider going for an all out kick him while he's down ending, but then kind of wimped out and went for "love".
I'll go with your suggestion..... although maybe - being a punk - I should just put "Her ****'s warm, and so's her bed" and let the reader fill in whatever they think fits... :|
I noticed that you were getting very close to the GN Addict line now too - scary eh?
Chris
First off....
Congratulations Chris and John for your slide into addiction 8)
Chris.... Being a Pistols influenced Socialist/Anarchist; I really dug it!
As far as speed goes; If we were talking Johnny Ramones Buzzsaw guitar.... You were a bit slow.
For the Pistols type thing though, you were right there!
And I'd have to agree with Vic that you just might have been a bit too 'in time' and articulate yet!
WARNING: Lyrical Content
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qrTKGFEE2Mk
Good job.... I rather enjoyed it.
Will you be making that a band staple????
Ken
"The man who has begun to live more seriously within
begins to live more simply without"
-Ernest Hemingway
"A genuine individual is an outright nuisance in a factory"
-Orson Welles
