SpinTunes 8 Round 4 Rankings and Reviews

So, the process is a little different for this round: the finalists are ranked by popular vote and the vote of previous contestants. So I'm off the hook, a bit, for trying to decide which song of the final four is the best. I still need to write reviews, and I will rank the four. There are also twelve shadows this round, including five by the Boffo Yux Dudes. Wow.

The challenge this time was interesting: the contestants were required to use a simple I-V-vi-IV chord progression, and to write about physical pain.

Just a quick note of thanks before the reviews. This was a very enjoyable SpinTunes for me. I've been very impressed by the way every contest seems to result in better and better work. Good job, everyone! I hope I can be involved in the next one too, in some capacity. It's just too much fun not to be part of it.

1. Jenny Katz, Clear

Very few songs ever submitted to any round of SpinTunes or the old Song Fu contests have had the ability to make me sob like a little baby. Jenny Katz can do it. These lyrics are gorgeous and moving. They could apply to a wounded soldier, a loved one dying of cancer, or various other scenarios, and so have a universal feel. Lines like "traitor hope has left us wary" make me shiver. A great vocal performance, and a beautiful doubled guitar part. Just beautiful.

2. Edric Haleen featuring Heather Zink, I Wanna Go Dancing

I could quibble about "physical pain" -- yeah, I know very well that emotional pain can cause physical pain; I've certainly been there, so I guess it's OK. But this is a really lovely synth-pop song. Edric really put on a very different style for this and I'm impressed. Heather's vocal performance is sweet and light, although, I hate to say it, just a little pitchy on some of the verses (this may be partly because I'm just so used to hearing auto-tuned vocals on pop tracks). The instrument sounds are a little canned, but not bad. There are some original but very poppish and fun rhymes, like "I wanna go dancing / I wanna get lost in the noise / Be surrounded by boys / Who aren’t anything like you." Nicely done.

3. Ryan M. Brewer, Christ Speaks

This is impeccably produced but I find myself with some reservations about the way it toys with the subject matter. Can you use the crucifixion as a metaphor for being the one in the relationship that took the brunt of the pain when it ended? Well, of course you can, but I have to ask myself, should you? It's a bold choice but I can't help but feel it's a little off-putting. There are some other ways to interpret it, like a literal Jesus who is talking to his actual lover as he goes to his death, but that's even more provocative and also a little off-putting. So, nicely done, but this lyric just doesn't quite work well for me. I'm not offended per se; I'm a big fan of The Last Temptation of Christ, but I just feel like I can't quite click with the song. If it's going to take on such a provocative idea, it seems like it should take it a little more seriously.

4. Jutze, The Bleeding Dragon

Oh, cool! Wow! Nice music -- yet another different musical style by the incredibly versatile Jutze... wait... what is this song about? Wow, that's dark... happy but sad... wait... what? WHAT? Jutze! WTF! LOL! hahaha ewwww gross hahaha wow...

Shadows -- as time and inspiration allows, I will add brief comments on the shadows.

Glen Raphael, Hangnail (Shadow)

A piece of effective, but completely deadpan humor. Aside from a little looseness in the backing vocals and the guitars towards the end, it is really quite musically lovely, too.

Dr. Lindyke, Relief (Shadow)

The vinyl record sound effects and tinny recording are interesting -- is this supposed to sound like an early blues recording? I'm not quite sure what it is channeling. I like the vocal performance, though.

Caravan Ray, Pain (Shadow)

Not a bad tune, a bit like a live jam, but doesn't really stick with me.

Zoe Gray, Apologize (Shadow)

Musically this is very clever and enjoyable. The lyrics leave me a little confused. I don't think this is about physical pain? Maybe in the sense that Edric's song is about physical pain, but then it gets a bit graphic, which doesn't entirely make sense for me.

Jailhouse Payback, Back Pain (Shadow)

A fun jam. There's something going on with the lyrics but I think I may be too tired and spaced out to get it just now.

Red Watcher, Change (Shadow)

This is really beautiful, musically. The lyrics seem like they are more about the metaphorical pain of change than physical pain.

Boffo Yux Dudes, Is there a Doctor in the House? (Shadow)

Took me a moment to get what this one was about. Very clever. I suppose regeneration does involve physical pain! I like the way it borrows just a couple of notes from the Doctor Who theme music, and a vintage synthesizer waveform.

Boffo Yux Dudes, I'm in Love with the Pain that you Give (Shadow)

This sounds like a Tom Lehrer song. Is Dave singing with the Dudes?

Boffo Yux Dudes, Pain (Shadow)

Erm. Not their finest work. The music is nice.

Boffo Yux Dudes with TC Elliot, Put the Hammer Down (Shadow)

Musically, a very enjoyable song. The joke in the lyrics is just a bit one-note though.

Boffo Yux Dudes, Window Pain (Shadow)

Sounds very nice. I'm going to call this one "WHEN HOMONYMS ATTACK!" Too long.

Dr. Lindyke, Gotta Pee (Parody) (Shadow)

Very nice... I was laughing so hard I almost... well, you get the idea.

SpinTunes 8 Round 3 Rankings and Reviews

So, onward. The number of tracks is going down and so the pressure on the judges is going up! I've been listening to the album this week and procrastinating about actually ranking the songs because it is tooth-grindingly stressful to me -- the quality of these songs is really quite high all around, and I hate to have to think that I will be helping make someone go home sad. But I signed up, so there's nothing to do for it except call 'em like I hear 'em to the best of my ability. So... in order from best-rated on down:

1. Ryan Brewer, Jesus Christ's Biographer Gives a Guest Lecture

Ryan gets my vote for best song of the round. It stands out from the pack here for several reasons: the lyric is sophisticated, funny, subtle, and occasionally dark and chill-inducing; the vocal and musical performances are terrific; the mix and mastering job is beautiful. It has just a bit of the tone and mood of the song "One of Us" recorded by Joan Osborne. It's also almost five minutes long, but impressively, it doesn't drag at all, no portion of it feels too repetitive, and it ends at just the right moment.

2. Dr. Lindyke, A Historical Account of the Life and Accomplishments of Abraham Lincoln of Which Every Word is True I Swear

A rambling blues ballad by Dr. Lindyke? Yes, please! I think this is my favorite Dr. Lindyke song of all time. I love what Dave and Denise did with the vocal performance. The lyric is funny and a little dark, and can be taken as a serious comment on the tendency towards historical revisionism about the Civil War, with some great near-rhymes and striking turns of phrase. I wish I had been able to try recording a guitar track or two for this song! The main rhythm guitar part is a little repetitive and doesn't _quite_ have a convincing blues guitar tone. The mix feels just a bit rough, and it's just a touch long. Maybe taking out the "tar baby" lines and condensing the last three long verses into two might help.

3. Felix Frost, Cloudy

This is my favorite F. F. song to date. The band-in-a-box accompaniment sound goes really well with a more upbeat and bouncy vocal performance here, and the lyric is head-scratching and funny.

4. Edric Haleen, A Brave New World

Edric's piano-playing and singing really come together nicely on this one, and it's clearly a subject he's pretty impassioned about.

5. Jenny Katz, Liars Cheats and Weasels

This is really nicely done, and funny -- Jenny is being an equal-opportunity misinformer here, and the lyric brought a big smile to my face. I think there is a bit of a problem with a song like this that has such a _specific_ context: while it has hilarious relevance this week in this context, it's not actually going to be very meaningful to anyone after the fact. So I find myself dithering a little bit on whether I think it is really a good song because of that. But I'm reminded by what Peter Schickele says: if it sounds good, it is good.

6. Jailhouse Payback, Maritime Archaeology

The music is quite well-done, a gruesome story that sounds like it could have come out of a William Hope Hodsgon short story from a century ago. But the lyric never seems to really pop, with some weak rhymes and odd word choices, and it feels like the happy music isn't quite in alignment with the story.

7. Jutze, Banjo (Rejected Wikipedia Edit)

This track also brought a big smile to my face. I may have LOL'ed. I really appreciate the way that Jutze changes things up -- just last round, he had a death-metal growl on top of crunching electric guitars. The silly music actually gets really pretty in the last bit when he is singing over it. But overall the song just doesn't have much meat to it, so the replay value is a little thin.

8. Zoe Gray, The Truth About Homeschooling

I wish I had been homeschooled! Fortunately my kids are, at least partly. This is funny and mostly terrific. There are some lines that don't really jump, and the piano part is a bit rough here and there, and just doesn't feel like it has enough variation to it.

9. Governing Dynamics, Because

It sounds like a certain Travis has been watching the History Channel. This song is a little frustrating because the music is really nicely put-together, with quite a complex mix with a lot of stuff in it, but it seems to suffer a bit from an everything-including-the-kitchen-sink effect, and doesn't seem to really come together for me this round.

10. Adam Sakellarides, Why the Sky is Blue

Good things about this song: I like the fast guitar rhythm part and the percussion; I like the blend of backing vocals. It's funny. But Adam's voice is a little pitchy and the song as a whole doesn't seem to land on a good hook.

11. Ross Durand, How to Write a Hit Song

I love hearing Ross rap. This is quite funny and very misinformative. His specimen chord progression and melody is definitely a counterexample of some sort. A bold effort but musically, the whole thing just doesn't work that well for me, and I can't really just take the whole thing ironically and still enjoy it that much. I can't believe I'm ranking Ross so low. Sorry, Ross.

Shadows

Trader Jack, Free Your Credit.com (M. A. C. D.)

This is definitely a piece of misinformation! I found it quite hilarious. The music and mix is a little rough, but the idea really has potential... or something...

Menage a Tune, A Simple Set of Rules

This is a "filk" song, something that would be sung at a con. I like the concept of writing a song based on a very funny scene in an old Star Trek episode. This needs some real editing to make it flow better, with more clearly delineated verses and choruses.

SpinTunes 8 Round 2 Rankings and Reviews

I found this challenge and the variety of responses to it very interesting. Once again we had a number of songs of very high quality, which made the ranking difficult. I think that I would have found myself uncomfortable and "stretched" trying to meet this challenge myself, so I have sympathy to the contestants who met it. I also think it was a good challenge, in that it forced people to go outside their comfort zones in some cases. Most of us don't want to think of ourselves as "haters" or even people who occasionally indulge in hate when provoked, and so contestants found a variety of ways to take the challenge and turn it: it became about self-hate, it was about hating humorously, or hating someone for impersonal reasons, or hating one's own weakness, or hating one's own inability not to hate(!)

There were a couple of songs which the judges felt did not express any form of hatred and therefore did not adequately meet the challenge. Personally I tried to keep quite a loose definition of hate, but I still just could not find "hate" expressed at all in three of the songs. At the time of writing, I don't think the final decisions as to disqualifications have been announced. I think Spin is going to edit our final rankings to reflect the DQ'ed songs.

Anyway, assuming that all made some sort of sense, or even if it didn't (I've been drinking rather enormous amounts of coffee here in my cube in the midst of a blizzard), here are my reviews, ranked from best to worst, followed by the shadows.

1. Jenny Katz, Voodoo Doll

This is the finest song of the round. It represents the best of what SpinTunes is all about. It is simply gorgeous song, plaintive but melodic, with a very fine lyric. The lyric is a marvel. It is absolutely free of excessive sentimentality, cliched images, or hackneyed rhymes. The vocal performance is lovely, emotive without being overwrought, tuneful without being flashy. The instrumental accompaniment is tasteful and uses very well-chosen chords. I'm impressed with the song in every single respect. It conveys a very "adult" mood of introspection and self-criticism, but without seeming excessively precious or narcissistic. It reminds me quite strongly of song such as Joni Mitchell's "Blue Hotel Room." If I had to be ultra-picky, I'd point to an occasional imperfectly muted string in the guitar part, but that's really barely noticeable; I just mention it by way of "constructive criticism," since I wanted to find something that I felt could be improved.

2. Ryan Brewer, Fear [of Failure] and [Self] Loathing in Las Vegas

I really enjoyed the darker mood of this song, damning the antagonist with faint praise. I'm not usually a big fan of what passes for country music these days, but the pulsing bass line and vocal style reminded me of some of the great country-rock acts of the 1970s, tracks such as "Ghost Riders in the Sky" and "The Devil Went Down to Georgia." This song has a tremendously enjoyable voice performance and I really like the way it is doubled; the instruments are very well-done as well, especially the ear-candy bits of backing keyboard. The drums are a little artificial-sounding and monotonous in places, such as the pinging cymbal during the bridge. When the song gets to the portion that is sung in a round, "there's a part of me that hates part of me," I'm completely hooked, and then it checks out at the perfect moment. Nicely done in all respects.

3. Ross Durand, Sometimes

This is a very appealing song. Ross is continuing to demonstrate that he's an old pro at this. The lyrics make it clear that the hate is a transmuted sense of loss, and that gives it a little more emotional weight. There are some great lines, like "set 'em on fire, just to watch you burn." The vocal performance is just a touch too loose with pitch here and there. The backing organ sound is gorgeous and lifts the song up very subtly from the background, reminding me of "A Whiter Shade of Pale."

4. TurboShandy, Stoic

This is a nicely recorded song with a great vocal performance and excellent use of harmonica. In mood, you might call it a happysad song, or a happyangry song. The layered nasal vocals against the chugging acoustic guitar lines move the song along very well. The howling hound at the very end is a nice touch.

5. Sara Parsons, Who Am I Kidding?

Parsons is doing something very nice with the vocal harmonies here and I love the way the song kicks off the vocal just a beat or two into the song, without an extensive intro, and the cold end works really well too. The lyrics feel a little abstract to me, not conveying a definitive story or set of images, and so I'm not really feeling the hate in any form I can recognize.

6. Dr. Lindyke, I Hate Myself For Loving You

This song grew on me the more I listened to it. The musical layers are roughly recorded but nicely done in a tango style, and there are some bits of ear candy like the triangle that add interest to the instruments. While the vocal performance is very fine, the vocal track leaves something to be desired -- besides boxiness, I hear compression artifacts, like this was recorded over Skype. The way the lyrics are structured and set to music, as far as rhyme and rhythm scheme, is very nicely done, but the lyric feels a little under-done, with a narrator who is a bit muddled. I'm reminded a bit of Portishead's song "Sour Times," because of the lo-fi sound of the track.

7. Governing Dynamics, Trump Card

This is moody even by Governing Dynamics standards. The lyrics suggest an elaborate back-story here, but it feels at times like a personal story that isn't adequately explained in the song, except for bits and pieces where the lyric really breaks through and becomes universal, in lines.like "a finger on the pulses of frivolity and vanity and greed." It conveys a lot of convincing angst, but there isn't quite enough of an arc -- that is, it starts angry and stays angry. The song drags a bit in the last third or so but ends nicely, and we get one of Travis's trademark mournful guitar solos, with some gorgeous effects strangling the life out of the tone and making it very fitting to the mood of the song.

8. Felix Frost, Steely

As soon as I heard those challenging chords in the somewhat long introduction, I knew I was hearing Felix Frost again. F.F. pulls out all the technical stops, creating a complex tapestry of tracks here, and I like his grotesque, angry word choices in the lyrics. I have a reservation, though: it sounds like there's a complicated backstory going on here, about a boss or former business partner, but I feel like I'm not sufficiently privy to this story to understand it emotionally. I think it's a bit of a problem when a lyric is too personal to the author and doesn't succeed in telling enough of a story to engage the listener. As in the last challenge, I feel like F.F.'s style can be, well, a little emotionally chilly, and leaves me feeling a little indifferent to the narrator.

9. Caravan Ray, Disdain in the Refrain

The lyrics here are hilarious, even borrowing a phrase from the challenge and then running with it. The bass line is a lot of fun. I have some very slight quibbles with the backing vocals here and there (the first "dance behind your hearse" sounds a half-step flat to me). The rhythm guitar work is excellent the whole song has such a bouncy ska feel and infectious energy; I'd call it not happysad but happymad. The tracks and mix could use some punching up with EQ and compression. I have some minor gripes about the way the percussion feels over-emphasized throughout the track, particularly that ringing ride cymbal sound that the song ends on -- it doesn't sound quite in key and right for the track.

10. Jutze, I Hate You

Jutze pitches his voice to sound like Cookie Monster and brings the layered, crunching metal guitars. The lyrics are quite funny and the narrator found a good reason to comically hate someone -- the person putting him through his hoops in writing the song! A really enjoyable bit of half-serious homage/mockery of the "black metal" genre.

11. Adam Sakellarides - Damn You

A nice reveal here and we have a good take on the challenge, where it's an impersonal sort of hate towards a celebrity who is preoccupying the women in his life. The awkwardly forced rhymes made me smile, with a twist as the narrator realizes that he is actually enjoying himself more than he'd like to admit. A fun song. I'm imagining it with a wailing saxophone solo in the middle, and a video with a chorus of soccer moms in sweatshirts and yoga pants, kicking their legs in the air, singing a backing vocal part consisting entirely of ooooohhhhs and aaaaahhhhs, from the leather sofas where they've been binge-watching season two on Netflix.

12. Edric Haleen, Born of Hate

This definitely has a dark and relevant story about hate, and demonstrates the way that hatred destroys the person that hates. But it is so emotionally wound up, from beginning to end, that I find myself not wanting to listen again. The whole "oops, I just got shot in the chest and I'm bleeding out -- whelp, better leave voicemail for the wife" just doesn't feel convincing to me (can you get Verizon service in Kandahar? Someone will probably explain to me that yes you can, and yes this really happened, and then won't I feel like a boob...) Also, I can hardly believe I'm saying this, but I think Edric is over-using the f-word in this song, almost to the point where this deadly-serious song veers into Book of Mormon-style satire.

13. Brian Gray, Stupid Face

Is this another song inspired by someone's personal story about a boss or co-worker? The beat-boxing is hilarious and so are the gross lyrics, and then as if it wasn't already weird, it gets _really_ weird. I love the way Brian layered the vocal parts, despite a mix that could use some punching-up. But ultimately there isn't all that much substance to this song.

14. James Young, I Hate You

A fairly simple take on the song, with a twist in that the person receiving the hate doesn't seem to be emotionally deep enough to understand or care. A soaring guitar solo can't entirely compensate for the weakness of the lyrics, with forced rhymes that don't quite work (rhyming "problem" with "autumn," for example). There are some strange popping artifacts on the lead vocal track. The recording sounds band-limited and a little tinny. The tracks could use a good compressor and the final mix could use a good mastering job.

15. Army Defense, What Can I Do

There's some really nice instrumentation here -- it sounds good, especially the doubled guitar tracks and keyboards, but it's hard to get a handle on the story and it doesn't convey a strong impression of some sort of hate. The vocal performance is quite good, although there are some odd artifacts (auto-tune gone wrong?) While I like the lyrics, I think overall there are too few lyrics, even for a short song, which makes it feel like it emphasizes musical style over meaning too much. The vintage keyboard sounds towards the end of the song are cool but at that point it is getting a little over-complicated, sort of a musical everything-including-the-kitchen sink.

16. Zoe Gray -- Black with You

The bridge really makes this song; the rest of it feels a little too long, repetitive and one-note by comparison. I feel like I understand what the lyric is getting at, but the phrase "fallen into black with you" just doesn't quite seem like it is going to take off as a catch-phrase. Maybe it works better in a different language, like the way "we will bury you" makes more sense in Russian?

17. T.C. Elliott - You Cheated On Me

Serviceable but a little drab, with some bad rhymes (heart of glass, alibi). Competently done but doesn't really break ground.

18. Jailhouse Payback, Clippedcorners

Musically, this song is beautiful. I love the use of the banjo here, and there seems to be a story implied, but I was not able to discern what it was about. I can't detect any sort of coherent mood of hate in the lyric or music. Is the antagonist dead? Has the protagonist forgiven him, or not? Is this a song about a song? It all comes off a little frustratingly vague. There really nice instrumental backing, especially towards the end, although overall the song is just a touch too long (the banjo riff is very nice, so let's play it over... and over...)

-----------

Heather Miller, You Make Me

A hate song about winter personified! As I'm writing this, it is supposed to hit sixteen below zero in Saginaw this evening and I nearly slid off the road driving in blizzard conditions. Yesterday as I came in to the office for a meeting I noticed that my knuckles were bright red and nearly bleeding where the skin had nearly split, just due to the extreme cold and dryness. This song has really fun lyrics and a nice sultry vocal performance, with a bass line that propels the song along. The guitar line tends to drift off the beat here and there. If it had been in the running, it would have been towards the top of the rating.

T. C. Elliott, The Kitchen Table

Some funny lyrics and a lot of anger, but there's not much to it beyond a contrived storyline and general feeling of misogyny. The timing drifts somewhat aimlessly against a canned drum track.

Menage a Tune, Wevenge

I think this would work perfectly as an animated children's video if the narrator's performance were much more over-the-top, and the quoted bits were actually in Mel Blanc's voice. That would present some copyright issues. The emotional tone of this song seems muddled -- it features real death in a way that the cartoons never did. Remember, kids, meat is murder! Overall it is pretty amusing, but towards the end the overlaid second keyboard part seems to wander off track in a few places.

Boffo Yux Dudes, Suitcase Full of Hate

This sounds like something very different from the BYD. I like the music track. Some very amusing rhymes. It sounds kind of like the Dickies, Ramones, or a similar early punk group. This one would have been mid-pack if it was in the official running.

@suspiciousden, to dust

This tune sounds like it should be performed in the background of a David Lynch movie, on an glowing, antique console radio set. A very nice mood is established and maintained through the whole song, with a beautiful vocal. It reminds me a little bit of the last track of Annie Lennox's album _Diva_. It works so much better than her round one song. I wish Denise was still in the contest!

SpinTunes 8 Round 1 Rankings and Reviews

I am judging entries for SpinTunes 8. There are two basic requirements for a judge: I'm supposed to provide some sort of review for each song, and I'm also supposed to rank them in order from best to worst. The review part comes naturally to me; the ranking is a bit harder.

I find it especially hard to explain my criteria at ranking. I'll take a quick shot at it. Every day this week, I've listened to the whole album (almost two hours) Starting day three, I started making notes as things occurred to me while I was listening, and I've also come to remember the songs and I know which ones I'm interested in hearing again, and which ones I wish I could skip over (although I'm not actually skipping over any).

What makes me want to hear a song again? Well, first, lyrics that interest me and move me, and especially lyrics that don't make me wince because they use easy, cliched rhymes or phrases. (In 2014 you can only rhyme "moon" with "June" if you are doing it ironically). I appreciate clever wordplay and a song that tells or at least implies a real human story.

Then there's vocal performance. I don't expect perfection. Lord knows I don't achieve it in my own songs. I can be moved by a singer who isn't technically very good, but if you're really pitchy and your performance is not very moving, then that's a weak track as far as I'm concerned.

Then there's the music. I like a lot of different genres, but I don't really enjoy playing that is all flash or deliberately bombastic. Keeping it short and sweet is pretty important (and yes, I know I've failed at that in some of my own songs as well). I can't give you an exact time that represents a perfect song; it depends on the song. I know when I'm listening along, I know when I _feel_ that a song should end. If the song agrees with my feeling, that seems like the right length to me. A pop song has to be unusually interesting in its structure or lyrics to keep my interest for longer than four minutes; Don McClean's _American Pie_ is 8 minutes long, but it has a truly epic lyric.

Production counts for something too, but there's not just one kind of production I appreciate. A live track with just a singer and guitar can be just fine. So can a full multi-tracked song with all the bells and whistles.

I will review and rank a cappella songs, but I must admit that I find these a little problematic at times. Someone like Billy Bragg can hold an audience rapt with a song like "Chile, Your Waters Run Red Through Soweto," but he doesn't do an entire show a cappella. Very few pop acts can pull off a wonderful and moving a cappella song that consists of just one singer with no accompaniment. In general, I'll rank you on whether it seems like you know what you are doing with the recording. If you can only achieve a simple live track, record a good simple live track. If you want to record 24 tracks of instruments, feel free, but they ought to be well-mixed. If it sounds like a train wreck that way, maybe you should have used a simpler arrangement based on what you can achieve technically. And yes, I've _definitely_ attempted mixes that were technically beyond me, so I have sympathy for people who are learning as they go. One last thing: if you do use instruments, they shouldn't sound completely generic. If it sounds like you just hit the "demo" button on a Casio keyboard and sang along with it, I'm not going to really appreciate the music portion of your track.

Finally, if a song doesn't meet the challenge at all, in any sense, it would be disqualified, but subjectively, I will still rank songs on how well I think they meet the challenge. That includes whether songs take a very obvious, conventional approach, or have fun with the challenge. In this case the challenge is pretty simple. There's nothing wrong with just writing a simple song about a lost loved one. But I do appreciate the songs that took a special twist on the challenge.

I'm not going to assign numeric fractions to these general categories because I don't really believe I can make rankings somehow more objective that way.

All right, here we go:

1. Ross Durand: Sitting Right Here

This is a great take on the challenge. My stepfather suffered from an Alzheimer's-like form of dementia so this song speaks to me. The happysad approach is touching and the lyrics are powerful.

2. Sara Parsons: Guilt

I tried not to tip my hand too much in the listening party by making a lot of comments as I heard the songs for the first time, in part because I didn't want to praise a song in that context and then have to decide later that maybe it wasn't all that good. In the case of this song I couldn't really help myself -- I think I typed "Wow!" or something similar. This is a very strong song. The accompaniment is simple but I like the way Sara's pedal base notes (or sometimes alternating bass notes) keep a rhythm going and propel the song along. She should learn more elaborate Travis picking if possible at some point, but this works fine. The lyric is quite strong. She has a very straightforward take on the challenge but manages to avoid all traces of false sentimentality and cliche. The only real weakness I see is that the line "stroll up and down the lines" doesn't seem quite right to me, and the details of the story feel just a little unclear. But even in the listening party, even on a first hearing, this song brought tears to my eyes. Nicely done!

3. Brian Gray: The Child I Left Behind

Just when I was prepared to be fed up with a cappella songs, someone like Brian comes along and sings an a cappella song that is really beautifully done and moving. I appreciated in particular the use of reverb to thicken up a single voice. Brian mentions Mandy Patinkin in his song bio and I can certainly hear that. The twist on the challenge -- that the narrator misses his own younger self, his inner child, is a nice take on the idea.

4. Caravan Ray: Missing You

Well, you could not argue that the song doesn't meet the challenge. The arrangement is a lot of fun and the twist is the funny bitterness. I enjoyed the silly falsetto backing vocal parts. It is a short and sweet song and quite funny.

5. Governing Dynamics: Song to Stay Awake (700 Miles)

Travis has produced another moving and sad song. I particularly like the keyboard in this track. If I understand the story, the narrator has awakened from a dream in which he imagines that his absent girlfriend has shot herself, and he decides to jump in the car and drive to her side, whether she wants to see him or not -- although there is some real ambiguity here; maybe it's already happened, and he's just convinced himself that she is still alive? ("At one in the morning I'd reached the end / of the elaborate game of pretend.") In any case it's a beautiful lyric, and the whole song is one of the very best this round.

6. Turboshandy: Torch Bearer

I read Turboshandy's song bio about the very minimal and low-budget approach to recording this song. It's impressive that this was done with just an SM-58 and a couple of very basic instruments, and open source software. The simple but not simplistic lyric, a very straightforward take on the challenge, and some well-crafted lyrics, and the basic approach to melody and harmony, all make this a strong entry.

7. Jailhouse Payback: Hey Eugene

This is also one of my very favorite songs from this round. The mix and accompaniment are very nicely done. The vocal performance is understated but works very well. It seems like a happysad song, but then becomes an angrysad song. There's an undercurrent of bitterness to it that blends beautifully with the very upbeat music. The challenge is met adequately, although like several of the songs this round, the story feels a little hidden and vague. There's just a bit of a guitar train wreck at the end but that's only a minor distraction.

8. Dr. Lindyke: Why

Dave's vocal performance on this track is quite lovely and nuanced, although the harmony "aaaah" seem to be a bit off-pitch here and there. The lyrics are up to Dr. Lindyke's usual high standard. It's touching that Dave dedicated the song to RC. I've listened to this song at least five times, and I'm still a little unclear about how I feel the drums. Sometimes they seem just a little too busy to me, particularly the kicks, but then on another listen they seem just right, and they seem to keep the song propelled along. I can't quite decide. It's an interesting choice. This is one of the stronger tracks, but maybe not quite in the very top few.

9. Jenny Katz: Secret Love Life

Jenny's take on the challenge is one of the most positive. The song is beautifully performed and recorded, with some subtle vocal harmonies, marred only by some slight pitch trouble. I'm strongly reminded of some of my favorite chill-out dance tracks, particularly songs like "Future Love" by Presence. I was impressed by this song in the listening party, and after listening repeatedly it still sounds beautiful. The lyrics are uneven, though. Lines like "spinning like a maple seed" are gorgeous, but lines like "I know that nothing is ever gonna change" don't really make for a strong story.

10. T.C. Elliott: Broken Mind

I like it when a lyric can do things that are a little unexpected, with concrete details: "corner grocery or Japan" is a nice detail. Some of the rhymes like "changed/rearranged" aren't that strong. The electric guitar part is nicely done, and the acoustic breaks especially are very nice, and the rhythm has a "broken" staggering quality that fits the song well. The twist on the lyrics here is that the reason for the separation is that the narrator has "a broken mind" and I can certainly relate to that.

11. Felix Frost: Cat's Eye

I read the song bio with some interest. The challenge is met perfectly well, if with a strange conceit. I like what F.F. is doing with a real story, with a lot of concrete detail and very specific odd details. There's no denying that this song is very pretty. I wouldn't mark a song down because the lyrics were odd, or surreal, and this song's lyrics definitely are. The performance is not just fine but quite good. But the song is complicated, both in the imagery in the lyrics and the shifting beats and tempos. Somehow in that complexity it starts to feel a little emotionally detached, and fails to really sell the story as an emotional ride. I'm still scratching my head, but F. F. definitely gets extra points for creativity.

12. Edric Haleen: On the Matter of Bullying (Part 3)

The song clearly meets the challenge. In Edric's song bio he writes that "...this seemed far too aligned [with the concept of the previous parts] to consider writing any other song this round." I'm glad this challenge gave him that opportunity. It is again a very moving song and I know this is an issue Edric is passionate about. It's very nicely done technically. Edric has tied everything together in a way that feels very convincing. I feel a little bowled over, though, by the intensity of both the subject matter and the performance, and it's not entirely a comfortable feeling. I'm not sure there's an argument to be made that this subject would work with a little subtler or lighter approach, but if there is I would prefer it.

13. The Orion Sound: Without You (A Valentine's Stalker Song)

This is quite a thing! I'm impressed by a song that sounds like an extended piece in a musical theater production, although it isn't really that long. Musically, it is quite elaborate, and creates a real story arc. It definitely meets the challenge, and in a very creative way. The recording is a little fuzzy and distorted in parts, which is a shame, but not painfully so.

14. James Young: Never Coming Home

The lyric sounds boxy and that's somewhat distracting, although it's lessened because the performance is good. The twist on the challenge seems to be that it isn't entirely clear why the person in question is gone, and you never quite find out, although it does not sound like the person is dead ("your story remains untold/will you get to grow old?") I like that ambiguity. The lyrics are quite unsentimental and well-done and I always appreciate a good guitar solo. Overall the song feels just a bit long. I would not drop the instrumental ending or the guitar solo, but perhaps the verses could be tightened up.

15. Spencer Sokol: Burdens

A plaintive song and the lyrics have some nice parallels and interesting wording that leaves a lot of room for interpretation -- it tells a story quite elliptically. It sounds to me like the narrator is talking about several different people he's missing rather than one, so I suppose it technically meets the challenge, but not really in a strong way. There's some distracting crackling in the mix. Overall a good effort and this song reminds me of songs such as "Lightning Crashes" by Live.

16. Jutze: Nancy (Please Don't Go)

The lyric is very boxy and that's a bit distracting. The accompaniment tracks work fine, with a happysad approach (a very upbeat melodic figure) with sad lyrics. The twist on the challenge is that the song is a boy singing about losing his favorite teacher, which is funny and surprising.

17. Trader Jack: Doom Dah

I cringed when I first heard the vocal part, but it has grown on me because the narrator character is just so funny and weird. I wound up loving the creative twist on what seems like it could either be the drunken muttering of someone with a broken heart, or maybe someone having a psychotic break. It doesn't meet the challenge strongly, in my opinion, but I still enjoy it because it's just so goofy and weird, while still conveying the feeling of heartbreak.

18. Zoe Gray: Ginger Twins

This piano needs tuning and I have a hard time listening to an out-of-tune piano. The vocal performance is very nice. It seems to meet the challenge, although I'm not clear on the details of just who the narrator is missing -- a childhood friend? A literal twin? In any case the lyrics are still fairly strong. The song feels slightly too long, as well.

19. Menage a Tune: The Box Feeling

This is a 4 minute a cappella song. The lyric is a bit of a mixed bag. Rhymes like heart/apart and too/you are too easy, but other parts are better, like the way the verses end with five-syllable lines where the mood turns a bit each time. The song feels slightly too long and slightly too slow. JoAnn's vocal performance is touching if a little loose on the melody. I think the song would have been better with some simple accompaniment, because the vocal performance isn't quite powerful enough to really hold me rapt for four minutes. I did like JoAnn's twist on the challenge -- missing someone she can no longer talk to _online_. Overall this is a good effort that probably would have been better with accompaniment and a little more polishing.

20. Taylor R: Missing You

The raw-sounding guitar and bass here remind me strongly of Joy Division's classic track "Love Will Tear Us Apart." The lyrics have that raw feel as well. It's lacking just a little bit of something I can't quite put my finger on. Maybe it's just that the mix is too low and lacks proper compression and mastering.

21. Army Defense: Phil and Don

I like the arrangement and the vocal performances here -- there's a lot going on. It feels like an unsettling blend of E.L.O. and Sly and the Family Stone. This song seems to meet the challenge only by the skin of its teeth, though. The narrator misses his brother who has left -- in some way. In what way is not clear. Overall the song just doesn't have enough of a story; there aren't enough lyrics. So despite the fact that I like the music a lot, and the production, and the vocal performance, it gets knocked down for feeling incomplete.

22. Adam Sakellarides: Right Place, Wrong Time (The Time Traveller)

This is a great twist on the challenge: the narrator can't be with his love "right now" because she's a freakin' time traveller! I love the lyric, and the vocal performance fits the mood of the song. The bass line is muddy and the piano sound is not well-done, unfortunately, especially in the solo. A good effort but just a little too rough, musically.

23. Ominous Ride: When I Lost You

It's unclear exactly how the narrator lost his love, but the dark music suggests that there is something dark at work. I enjoyed the lyrics and the vocal tracks but the music is a little overpowering, and some of the keyboard tracks seem to fight with the guitar slightly. The vocal performance seems like it was very good but suffered a bit from a muddy mix. At almost five minutes, the song drags a bit.

24. Sid Brown: Who You Used to Be

Another pretty straightforward take on the challenge. I appreciate the garage band feel of this track, and the repeating acoustic guitar figure. The vocal performance is not very strong, though.

25. Ryan M. Brewer: Burn Out or Fade Away

The production is very nice here -- it's an interesting combination of very real-sounding and very artificial-sounding instruments. It's just the right length. The vocal performance is very strong. But the lyrics in many places seem to be more about the rhyme and sound than the meaning, which is disappointing (what does a line like "a moneyball boiled a bastard" actually mean?) and it does not feel to me that this song meets the challenge very convincingly, so unfortunately I have to mark it down for that.

26. The Boffo Yux Dudes: Dead Wrong

I sigh when I see that the song is under three minutes but the lyrics don't start until 30 seconds in. The lyrics are not strong. The challenge is technically met. The lyrics don't make a whole not of sense to me; it seems to suggest a few funny twists on the words "missing you" but doesn't really jell.

27. Hudson and Day: I Tried, Okay

This is a very conventional take on the challenge using a very unconventional song structure. Denise often uses these very unstructured, free-form songs that ebb and flow in a very organic way. I feel like from about 1:45 to 2:10 it is starting to come together and have some beautiful harmonies, and there are some sweet sounding parts here and there, but at least to me, the song fails to really come together as a coherent whole and the looseness in this case means it doesn't build up to much of an emotional peak.

28. Dex01: Monster

The mix is not good: the tracks feel like they are all at the same level, over-compressed, and the mixed track is too hot and filled with clipping and crackling. The lyrical take on the challenge seems fine. The vocal performance is a little disappointing; the song seems to me like it needs more of a Violent Femmes-style sarcasm.

29. Wait What (the Band): Without You Here

I don't really understand who this song is for. It's too dirty for minors -- I wouldn't want to play it in front of one of my boys, because he'd run around at preschool singing "stick my dick in peanut butter" and giggling. But it seems to me that anyone older than sixteen would not think it was that funny. So is it targeted at a Junior High School audience? That's when I thought Austin Powers was funny. So, the song clearly meets the challenge. The music is nothing to write home about. The vocal performance is actually pretty good, especially the backing vocal. I just don't like the adolescent lyrics. I don't think using "negro please" as an alternative to saying "nigger" is very funny, but what do I know; my wife and kids are black, but I'm white. I don't think the narrator hoping his wife or girlfriend's "gina" is intact is that funny, given how many female soldiers are raped over there. Honestly, this lyric just wants to make as many gross jokes as possible, and Wait What, Imma let you finish, but Philip Roth wrote the best scene where a guy masturbates with food -- in his novel _Portnoy's Complaint_, in the _sixties_ -- and that book was actually banned in Australia and pulled from libraries. In 2014 it's old news and has little in the way of either shock or comedy value.

SHADOWS -- I did not include shadows in the ranking (because I'm not supposed to). The fact that they are down here at the end doesn't mean they are "below" all the songs that are official entries. All three of these, if I ranked them with the others, would come somewhere from upper-middle to middle of the pack of songs.

Heather Miller: Greatest Generation (Shadow)

Sometimes simple is best. This song has quite a conventional style and structure while managing to avoid obviously cliched rhymes. It is one of the few songs that took, I think, a completely straightforward approach to the challenge. Heather's vocal performance is low-key but touching; it reminds me slightly of Stevie Nicks.

Andy Glover: What's Making Me Sad

This may be the most straightforward breakup song and the most basic take on the challenge in the whole bunch. It's a good effort, a basic but serviceable guitar part, and a vocal style that suits the song. Really I've got nothing to criticize, although the song also doesn't stand out strongly amidst a number of good entries.

T. C. Elliott: Will You Run Away with Me, My Love (Shadow)

Nice use of percussion. The guitar part feels a little busy to use as a continual backing. The vocal performance is good but not really strong. The lyrics feel a little cliched here and there (rhyming new/you), but the chorus "will you run away with me" feels very straightforward and honest, and I like that about this song. It's a straightforward take on the challenge.

Five More Gone

Yesterday I took five more guitars to Guitar Center to sell. They were this beautiful Peavey T-60, a less photogenic and slightly older T-60 with an oil-finished ash body and rosewood fretboard, a Peavey Limited VT with a tiger's eye flame maple top, my Firenza with Duncan P-90 pickups, and my Ovation 1778T Elite with the purple, orange, yellow and green "Tribal Flame" finish.

I also sold my Boss DD-20 digital delay and my old Digitech Talker. I tried to unload a couple of Grunge distortion pedals but they didn't want to give me more than $5 or so each for them, so I kept them. I might have use for them eventually. Guitar Center didn't want my Radial JS-3 microphone splitter, although it's a nice piece of gear, because they just don't move items like that. I also sold my matched pair of Rode NT-5 microphones.

It's hard to get excited about selling off gear. The things gone are a load off my mind -- I don't have to store them, don't have to worry about keeping them in the proper temperature and humidity, or getting stolen, or getting broken. But some I will miss. The Limited VT is a very scarce guitar with incredible tone -- made in the Peavey custom shop in Leakesville, Mississippi, with 3 hand-wound single-coil pickups. And yet these guitars get very little respect. But the flame finish isn't my style -- it's too flashy for my taste. The T-60s are starting to become vintage and arousing interest from collectors, but although I wanted one very badly when I was about sixteen, and they are beautifully crafted guitars, built like tanks, with classic looks, I have to acknowledge that I no longer really like the way the skinny necks actually feel in my hands. The Firenza (C profile) and Ovation (soft V) and Limited (C-ish, asymmetrical, flat fingerboard) feel a lot better. The Ovation is actually kind of garish -- the finish doesn't really fit my personality all that well, especially as I get older. And while the Talker is cool, I just wasn't using it, because I haven't been performing live. All this stuff was made to be used, and it should be used more than it has been.

Oh, I've used it all some. The Synapse fretless bass provided the bass line for several of my songs: "Polly," "I.O.U.," and "Falling." The Firenza and one of the Venus guitars were on my parody of Jonathan Coulton's "Re: Your Brains," called "Re: Your Grains." The Firenza also provided the main guitar riff for "I.O.U." The Parker Fly was the lead guitar tone for a couple of songs, most notably "War Criminal" and my cover of "Today's the Day." The Limiteds have been on various tracks going back to my early collaborations with Joe "Covenant" Lamb. The Ovation acoustic is in several of my covers and instrumentals and it always gets comments because of its flashy finish.

Of course, it wasn't strictly necessary to have all those different instruments to chose from, to make those songs. Honestly, I had too many, and the guitar-collection-as-investment idea wasn't actually going to fly, at least not the way I put it into practice. It also fed into some of my less wholesome personality traits; it felt uncomfortably close to hoarding, and maybe a little compulsive. But it was a lot of fun, and I really liked being able to pick up a few guitars and try them out while recording a song, and let the particular feel and tone of a specific instrument tell me what to play.

While I was waiting for the staff at Guitar Center to process all this stuff, I toyed with a few modern instruments. It mostly served to remind me of what I liked about my older instruments. While modern USA-made Stratocasters have decent fit and finish, the wood hasn't aged to that point where they resonate beautifully -- they just don't have as much tone or as much mojo as the old T-60s from 1979, or even the Limited VT, which isn't yet truly "vintage."

What's sad about all this is that this load of gear, re-sold, won't even pay for one month's expenses. It'll cover a mortgage payment and part of a heating bill. I got out of this gear well under half of what I put into it. I might have been able to get a little more on eBay, but I just don't have that kind of time to put in. And it's just hard to get excited about being able to pay Consumer's Energy for another month.

There are a few pieces left. I'm not guitar-less yet. There are a few more in salable condition, and then some "fixer-uppers" that might be harder to unload, which I might have to list on eBay as "project" or "parts" guitars. There's even one ukulele.

If I have to sell almost everything -- if I only can keep one -- I'll (sadly) sell the Babicz acoustic (made in Indonesia), the USA-made Steinberger XP and the American/Canadian Godin nylon-string SA, the sparkle blue Super-Sonic, and the flame-top Peavey Limited, and keep the American flag Limited.

I don't want to let that one go, because all the American flag guitars you see these days are made overseas, and I could never bring myself to buy one. I'll keep it in memory of a time when people like me were paid to make things here in America.

And if I can't keep even one -- if I still don't have an income again, and we're selling off everything we possibly can just to get through the winter -- well, then God help us.

I leave you with this.

More Guitars Gone

The Parker Fly Refined Classic is gone, and the Godin LGX-SA. I also sold the Godin LG. I have now sold ten instruments. I sold my Apogee Ensemble.

My T-60 with a maple fretboard is still up for sale at Elderly Instruments in Lansing -- see this link. If it sells, I will eventually get a check. If it doesn't sell in another month or so, I think they will want me to go down and get it.

The most valuable guitars are gone now. There are some more I could sell. There are some others I probably can't sell at any price, because they need too much work, or aren't worth anything. I'm thinking that over, considering what I might keep. It's a hard choice. I'm considering Operation Rip Off the Scab, which would involve selling all but three instruments -- my favorite bass, my favorite electric guitar, and my favorite acoustic guitar. Also, some of my loose gear and pedals -- pretty much everything I might be able to get a little money for, some locally, and some on eBay. There's also Operation Guitarpocalypse, which is like Operation Rip Off the Scab, except I don't keep anything at all.

Operation Guitarpocalypse assumes that within six months to a year I'll be able to get back into music. But what if a job still doesn't come around? My last few guitars will only net me enough to pay our energy bills and other expenses for maybe another two months at the outside. They won't pay the mortgage. They just keep us from sliding into debt before the end of September or October. That's no way to solve a problem, just kicking it down the road for another two months. I've played guitar on and off for almost 35 years. It's been a very important hobby to me and I've hoped to do more with music, not less-- more performing, and more recording.

Honestly, I don't actually need a collection quite like the one I had. I had sort of a mix of goals with that -- some of them I was planning to hold and attempt to re-sell after they had appreciated in value, some were for different tones for recording, and some were honestly just because I wanted to try different kinds of instruments. The re-selling thing has not worked out. Even though I bought them used, and made lowball bids, and bought them for as cheaply as I could, mostly on eBay, I will be getting less than half of what I paid for them, on average. So I guess I mostly have to chalk it up to experience and maybe learn something from this.

If I'm really going to play guitar, performing live or recording, I need a handful of well-chosen instruments and gear that sounds good. Is the best way to eventually get to that point to get rid of everything now, in the faith that I'll be able to set up a new studio and get some different instruments in the future -- maybe better-chosen stuff, making choices informed by my experience with the current gear and instruments? Maybe. Really, it comes down to my faith in the future -- my ability to get a good-paying job, to have a little free time and a little extra money, and to make better decisions. Dear reader, what do you think? How do you come to grips with giving up things you love? And are you feeling sanguine about your future, these days?

Shrinking the Guitar Collection

So, during this period of unemployment I have taken the opportunity to turn some instruments into money.

Initially, I took three guitars down to Elderly Instruments in Lansing for appraisal and/or sale: a USA-made Peavey Limited, a T-60 with a maple fretboard, and a black Squier Venus. The T-60 is now on consignment, up for sale on their web site now. If you buy it, I should eventually get a check.

They did not want the Limited -- in the sense that they would only offer me a very small amount of store credit for it, and no cash at all. I realized when I read their evaluation that the tech had not noticed that it was a USA-made guitar -- made in the Peavey custom shop in Leakesville. He thought it was one of the Korean EXP models. When I pointed that out, they did offer me slightly more store credit -- but I think it was still under $100. And I just had to sigh. That instrument listed at perhaps $1,200, and sold for perhaps $900, and I bought it for something around $400. It was another example of an American manufacturer who employed American craftsmen undermining the perceived value of their instruments by, basically, selling authorized knock-offs. The Limited models are respectable guitars, but no one respects them. I have a few more but I will be trying to hold on to them if I can, in the hopes that maybe they will gain some vintage value like the T-60 did -- but mainly because I like the way they sound and the way they feel to play.

It was a similar situation with the Venus. They offered me a tiny store credit. I think it was under $75. Now that really is a guitar made overseas -- in Japan. It's not a great guitar, but it is an interesting design, of historic interest, and fun to play, with some nice tones. They just really just don't seem to want to deal with lower-end, less-vintage guitars. I guess that's understandable. But I didn't really like the way they dealt with me over the T-60. It left a bad taste in my mouth. To even put it up for consignment, they required me to pay for some work on it -- fret leveling and dressing, and setup. Since I had come all that way, I did this by trading them the Venus for enough store credit to pay them to do the setup. So it seems, essentially, as if I had to bribe them for the privilege of having them put it on consignment and (if it sells) collecting a percentage of the sale price.

I wish I hadn't given up the Venus like that, since I could have gotten a lot more for it elsewhere. It was just another case of how my expectations have been beaten down. I set up my own instruments, and the T-60 didn't really need fret work. Yes, it had some very slight wear, but the wide jumbo Peavey frets last a lot longer than vintage-profile frets, and they weren't badly notched anywhere, and it wasn't buzzing. They make the case that they want instruments in their showroom to reflect professional setup. I'd be a lot more convinced of that if their showroom wasn't loaded with crappy new Asian guitars with sharp fret ends poking out and bad setup. So I do hope you will buy my guitar from them, but I don't think I'll be taking Elderly any more used instruments to sell. If it doesn't sell, I'll have to go back down there to pick it up.

So that's one instrument gone, and one on consignment. I took the Limited to our local Guitar Center and got $200 in cash for it, which was not stellar -- I could have probably gotten more on eBay, but it takes a lot of time and effort to sell guitars on eBay, and I'm trying to spend my time on things more relevant to my job search.

Since then I've taken a few more guitars to Guitar Center. I sold my Vista-series Jagmaster. It wasn't my favorite of that series -- if I ever get another of the Japanese-made Jagmaster, I want one with the truss rod access at the headstock, so I don't have to remove the neck (even partially) to adjust it. I took one of my three Super-Sonics -- a silver one. I took them one of my other Venus guitars, one of two sunburst models. I took them my Steinberger Synapse five-string fretless bass. They bought all those. I also took them a "Music Yo" era Steinberger XQ-4 fretted bass, and they passed on that, saying it seemed like it had a truss rod issue. I will have to look into that. My son was playing that one, and if he tried to adjust the truss rod without asking me, I fear the worst -- it takes some practice to learn how much force you can use. If you've never done it, you should practice on a junker!

So my collection has shrunk by, let's see... Venus, Limited, Venus, Synapse, Jagmaster, Super-Sonic, and (if it sells) a T-60. That's six, maybe seven. The instruments I've got left tend to fall into two categories. There are a number of fixer-uppers. There's another Venus that needs some wiring work. There's another silver Super-Sonic that needs some wiring work as well. There's another T-60 that has a loose output jack. There is a broken Newburgh Steinberger bass that needs some bridge rebuild work -- probably several hundreds of dollars including shipping it off to New York. Should I bite the bullet and pay for repair work on instruments just so I can sell them? Then there are some that I really want to keep because of their quality or tone or rarity. I'm not sure how hard I should fight to hold on to them. What it comes down to is whether the money I could get for them is worth more than the value to me in having them around to play or re-sell later. Maybe it's time to only keep instruments that are really "pulling their weight" -- the ones I use to record with or play regularly.

We'll see how long this period of unemployment lasts. My priorities could change. I feel a little lighter for having gotten rid of six of them. The broken instruments feel like a bit of a mental burden as well -- projects I keep meaning to get to. Maybe it really would be best to get them back out there, fixed up, so that someone can play them. After all, that's what they are for.

The Heil PR-40

I purchased a used Heil PR-40 from an eBay seller to try it out and consider whether I wanted to get a couple of them in my home studio. It's a nicely-designed mic; the sound seems quite impressive; I'll test it out on a podcast. But to set it up properly, I'll need a boom, a shock mount, and a pop filter. The problem with all that is that it's approximately a $300 mic. But the shock mount costs another $100, the boom costs $120, a base for the boom costs $30, and a pop filter that mounts on the shock mount costs about $60. So there you have it -- a $300 microphone where setting it up costs as much or more than the microphone. If it works out well for podcasts, I'm considering a whole second mic and boom so I can do live broadcast-style conversations easier... but at $600 for the setup I may want to wait on that. I should clarify -- I don't believe the prices for these parts are actually that far out of line. It isn't like Neuman's $80 plastic thread adapter. But it's still a little daunting.

The Steinberger Synapse XS-15FPA 5-String Fretless Bass

I have what is apparently a somewhat exotic electric bass -- so exotic that it seems no one makes strings for it. It is a 5-string fretless Synapse. I purchased this thing used in (I think) 2008. Gibson still lists the fretted version for sale but the fretless models seem to be as rare as hen's teeth.

The Synapse instruments are pretty cool, and what I like about this bass is the wide, flat freboard, and the tone that one can get out of the piezo pickup. However, they are built in Korea, and for a Korean-made instrument, overpriced. It has the fit-and-finish of a slightly unfinished prototype, with a number of little details that don't quite seem right, such as the battery compartment. I've also heard horror stories that the truss rod is very flimsy -- a couple of owners have described online how they were unfortunately able to break them, without what seemed like an excess of force. So I am being very careful when I adjust the truss rod on mine. It isn't a great instrument and I can't actually recommend them for either live or studio work. I am thoroughly disgusted by the damage Gibson has done to the Steinberger name; this isn't my first Gibson-era Steinberger bass with issues. In an era where manufacturing has made such incredible advances it is just heartbreaking that one can't just buy a Steinberger bass that lives up to the original and justifiably loved Brooklyn and Newburgh instruments.

I had ordered a second fretted one, in white, through Sweetwater, thinking that a black fretless and a white fretted bass would pretty much cover all the, er, basses, and look really cool if I ever played out and switched between them for different songs. However, Sweetwater reported that the instrument Gibson sent them to fill my order did not pass their quality control and so they had sent it back. It didn't seem like Gibson was going to get around to making a good one, so I cancelled the order rather than wait indefinitely.

Because this model isn't popular, and because it is quirky, no one seems to make strings that will fit it. I think this bass still has the original factory strings. La Bella does not make a set designed for this bass. The ball-end strings it uses are similar, but not exactly the same, as strings for the old Newburgh or even Music Yo Steinbergers.

The instrument supposedly gives you some flexibility about strings since you can use either double-ball-end strings or single-ball-end strings; in the case of single-ball-end strings the idea is that you can clamp the top of the string in a little clamp. But in practice the strings have to be exactly the right gauge to fit, and none I've tried are.

A few years ago I ordered some La Bella black tape-wound nylon strings from Just Strings Dot Com. They did not fit: the low B string was too fat to fit in the channel at the top of the neck, and the winding did not extend far enough down the string to allow it to sit properly on the bridge. Just Strings Dot Com has a strict no-return policy if a pack of strings has been opened, even if it hasn't been actually put on an instrument or played. As a result, I will no longer buy strings from them.

La Bella offered to take them back, and I had a tentative plan to ship them my bass and the strings and have them make a custom set, but I never followed through with that plan, and wound up getting some older Newburgh Steinberger basses instead.

The Synapse sat mostly unloved, and the black tape-wound strings went on my son's Peavey 5-string bass.

Anyway, these things come around again. I've recently been playing the Synapse again. I've used it on a couple of original songs, including "I. O. U." and "Falling: A Nightmare in Three Acts" and with my Radial JDV direct box and some tweaked compressor plug-ins, I really do love the sound of this bass, and so I've been practicing and working with a book, trying to improve my fretless skills, and the string issue is back on my mind because the original strings just can't sound as good as they should anymore.

I ordered two string sets from Status Graphite in England. They say that they hand-make their strings and that they have the widest variety of double-ball-end strings. They say "They will work perfectly on all Steinberger and many other headless basses." I ordered both a black nylon tape-wound set and a flat-wound set thinking that I'd like to try both. (One of the advantages of the Steinberger system is that it is very easy to change strings, assuming no change of setup is needed, so you can take off one kind of string and put on another for a specific recording session and the ones you took off will not be damaged by this treatment like they would be if you had to wind and unwind them on peg heads).

The Status Graphite strings showed up today. Here's Joshua holding one of the sets:

Here's a close-up to show which set it is:

Aaaaand, unfortunately, after all this, they also don't fit the Synapse so I will be getting in touch with them to see if I can return them. I would use them on one of my other Steinbergers, but they are all four-string basses. I will inquire whether Status Graphite thinks they can make me some that will fit. Maybe I can send them the original strings to use for reference.

In the picture below (sorry it's blurry) the bottom string is the original, at the bridge end, and the top is the SG string. Note the wrapped fat portion. The SG string doesn't sit properly on the bridge.

Here is the odd headstock of the Synapse. The SG string is the right length but it is too fat to fit into the channel. Also, the wrap again may start in the wrong place, although it's not as dramatic as the difference on the bridge end.

I'll see what Status Graphite says. I know from some message board discussions that there are other folks out there with this same problem, although from what I can tell there may be fewer than a dozen of these fretless 5-string Synapse basses in existence. Perhaps they were all made for a NAMM show and then sold without ever having full-scale production runs.

Meanwhile, if you have had any success finding strings for a Synapse 5-string bass, please leave a comment. Note that round-wound strings are no good for fretless playing as they will chew up the fingerboard quickly; I need flat-wound or black nylon tape wound. (I'm thinking the black strings on the black bass would just look cool as hell, too).

UPDATE: June 8 2013: I have sold this bass. If I can afford one at some point, I hope to buy a NS Radius fretless bass to replace it at some point if finances allow.

I.O.U.

This song is my SpinTunes 4 round 3 entry. For this round, I took 3 days off work to record, like I did for my round 1 song. There's a video here.

The challenge was interesting: "Choose seven letters of the Roman alphabet. Now write a song using ONLY words that begin with those seven letters. No exceptions will be made for minor parts of speech or vamping at the beginning of the song or the end."

So... I was an English major and an essay and short story writer and poet, and I've been paid to do technical writing at times. In these contests, the writing of the lyrics themselves has usually come relatively easily, and I can generally start out by writing a lot of verses or rhymes and then trim them down. But this challenge turns that strength into a weakness, like a golf handicap -- it makes it extremely painful to write _any_ lines that don't sound forced or stilted, and writing normal rhymed lines is almost impossible. Almost as if -- that were the point of the challenge, perhaps? ; )

Initially I thought on the challenge for a day or two, but I didn't really come up with anything. My mind was pretty much a blank until I happened to sit down on the toilet (yes, really) and the first phrase popped into my head: "I owe you my life, my love." From my scribbled notes it looks like my first five letters were going to be I, O, Y, M, L, but at first I was going to use A and F. I wrote some lyrics using the F to write lines like "find another year of laughter," but there were a lot of really, really contorted phrasings, that barely made any sense, so I set the lyrics aside and on my first day off work, started on the music.

The music is quite different this time. You might notice I don't have any real chords in the usual sense. Oh, there are some implied chords, but here I am, a guitarist, and I'm never actually _strumming_ a chord. The approach I took for the music was inspired by a band called The Books. This song really doesn't sound much like the Books, but there was something about the way they recorded traditional instruments, especially the way they were equalized and featured as solo instruments, that appealed to me and was in the back of my head. The use of the ringing reverb on the percussion was also directly inspired by a Books song. (In fact, I wouldn't be shocked to find out that they used Logic's Space Designer plug-in).

In recording this I started with the electric guitar. The whole song started out as a phrase of a few notes ending with a harmonic. I doubled this and messed around in this vein for a while soon had four guitar tracks of repeating, overlapping phrases. Then I did a similar thing with fretless bass, and then ukulele. I had no basic structure in mind except for these repeating patterns, with the idea that I would then do a lot of mixer automation or editing to bring the overlapping parts up and down in interesting patterns. I have no idea why I thought this was work; I'd like to claim that I had a finished track in my head but in fact it was stone soup.

So right off the bat there was a very large number of tracks. Then when I felt that I had enough stringed instruments, I recorded a lot of little percussion bits: some real instruments, like shaker, a small guiro, triangle, and finger cymbals, but also an empty plastic cottage cheese container, some stainless steel measuring spoons, a meat skewer, a light bulb that I hit (gently) with a triangle beater, two metal rasps, and some tearing and crumpling paper. Grace was somewhat bemused when she saw me rummage through the kitchen drawers for things that would clink and clank.

At the end of the first day's recording, I had those instruments and percussion sounds all playing in one big mix, and listened to it downstairs on my PA speakers. It sounded kind of cool, and promising, but it was overwhelmingly busy, and nothing was evenly leveled. But still, it sounded like progress.

On day 2, I hacked and slashed and mixed and edited the tracks from the previous day, then started working on recording vocals, and got a chorus and a few lines of verse down. I had then run out of lyrics, so that afternoon I spent a few painful hours with a dictionary and rhyming dictionary. I finally settled on using W, so I could write "When we met long years ago you welcomed me with love and laughter." I managed to grit my teeth and write about ten new lines, plus a short coda, using the seven letters I, O, Y, M, L, A, and W. (If this doesn't sound hard to you, try it; maybe I just picked bad letters).

Ideally, given enough talent and skill and work, one could write a song that uses a constraint like this, and the result would not seem like a strange novelty, but just a good song. If it was done well enough, the listener wouldn't even realize there is something strange about the lyrics unless he or she really sat down and looked at them written out. That was my goal; whether I met it is for you to decide. But it's also the real reason the lyrics are sung the way they are -- repeating and overlapping -- because there just weren't enough lyrics to sustain a whole song unless I did something to recycle them and stretch them out. After I did it that way, though, I was very pleased with the results, and realized that a lot of my favorite songs don't have very many lyrics at all, or at least not very many unique lines - for example, Pink Floyd's song "Goodbye Blue Sky."

You might also notice that this song doesn't go verse, chorus, verse, chorus; it goes chorus, verse, chorus, coda. That's a bit different. I think it's because the first lines I came up with seemed to be a chorus, and I recorded those scratch vocals first, and just went from there. But then of course it needed verses, and it was so _hard_ to write verses.

Anyway, by late afternoon on day two I had the two-line chorus, the coda, and ten lines of what seemed like verse material. It seemed reasonable to cut those ten verse lines down to eight lines, which would have naturally broken into two verses of four lines. That would let me do chorus, verse, chorus, verse, coda; a pretty conventional structure. I recorded those so I had a reference scratch vocal and made a mix to send to Joe "Covenant" Lamb so he could sing it and send me a lyric (he's five hours ahead in Scotland, so it was quite late in the evening there; this sort of collaboration would be easier if he were five hours behind; I could hand him off something to work on when I knocked off for the day, and he'd have it done in my morning). But Joe is kind of a night owl so he did in fact have something for me before I went to bed. But unfortunately what he had for me was bad news: he was having problems with his recording setup, and his recorded vocals were full of crackling noises.

So, day 3. I started out working on stems. Oh yeah, stems. A "stem" is a partial mix in which you combine tracks into a single track to make them easier to work with. I also was up to almost 30 tracks just for the instruments and percussion, which was becoming unmanageable, so I bounced the bass parts together to a single track, the guitar parts, the ukulele parts, etc.

Of course I don't really know what I'm doing, and so I sound up deleting the original source tracks with their mixer automation, which means the stems are now not really changeable. I made a "basic" percussion stem, I put the reverb effects on that group of percussion into a separate stem, in case I wanted to adjust its volume, which turned out to be a wise move.

Grace came into the studio at this point to listen and offer suggestions. Of course one of my her very good and sensible suggestions would have involved changing the guitar stem. She pointed out that the song is too slow to get going and wanted me to remove one of the building "repeats" of the introductory guitar part. But that stem had become unchangeable due to my poor planning. It was at this point that I had a mild nervous breakdown...

Anyway, sometimes you just have to sort of cover up mistakes a bit, or feature them, instead of correcting them. I did what in screenwriting they call "hanging a lampshade on it." If there is an obvious plot hole, rather than ignoring it, sometimes the screenwriter will have a character specifically comment on how odd it is. This sort of makes the audience nod along and say "yes, that is odd" -- but because one of the characters thinks it is odd, it becomes more acceptable. My version of "hanging a lampshade" was to add some extra off-beat percussion hits on a slightly unwanted extra repeat of the introductory guitar phrase - basically making an awkward phrase more awkward. It also serves to introduce one of the percussion sounds that is otherwise kind of low in the mix when it is used elsewhere.

Joe was still having troubles, and it didn't seem like switching sample rate was going to help, so I realized I had to record my own vocals. This in a contest where I'd been specifically criticized by multiple judges for my weak singing! Did I mention I have a mild head cold?

So on to recording. But I knew, and Joe had also pointed out, some of my my ten lines sounded kind of clichéd or otherwise dumb. I had:

When we met long years ago, you
Welcomed me with love and laughter

I'll melt with willing obligation
*I'll make mad love with only you

My incandescent love I owe you
Another year's improvisation

I offer you my lullabye
You are my moment's inspiration

* Once more my love I'm all about
* Making myself all about you

I cut out the ones I've marked with a star, so I was down to seven. Then I had to throw out one pretty-good sounding line ("you are my moment's inspiration") simply because I couldn't find another decent line to go with it (and I didn't want to get into odd numbers of lines). With a little rearranging that left me six verse lines I felt pretty good about:

When we met long years ago, you
Welcomed me with love and laughter

My incandescent love I owe you
Another year's improvisation

I'll melt with willing obligation
I offer you my lullabye

There's that word "incandescent" -- a strange word choice, it sticks out a bit, but I like it. With very little time left, I had to stop there - but honestly, I'm not sure I could come up with better lines given the challenge, at least not without throwing out my letters and starting from scratch. It's a poetry cliché that you have to be willing and able to kill your children if they are deformed or just unnecessary, but it was especially hard to throw out these lines - so what if some of my children are a little goofy?

There's another aspect to the song structure, though -- the overall arc. I couldn't get those ten lines to tell a sort of story. With six acceptable lines the three pairs of lines do form an arc from the past to the future and back to the present.

With just six lines, it seemed more natural to put them together and repeat them against each other to make a sort-of-round. Again, the challenge was forcing me to create a more unusual structure, but when I listened back to my improvised melody in the scratch vocal track, I was very happy to hear that it seemed like the melodies would mesh pretty well against each other (this is where having essentially no chords in the accompaniment  -- where the melody doesn't drive the accompaniment to "take a stand" on a given subset of notes of the scale -- allows some flexibility.

Anyway, to my ear it kind of works like so: the first chorus builds up to 3 parts, then the sort-of-round of all the verses (or one big verse, however you want to think of it), then the second chorus sort of scales it back down, then you get a little dessert of the coda, fadeout, done, badda bing, badda boom.

I learned today (the end of day 3) that when it is cold and my singing muscles are tired I have an unwanted and automatic vibrato on some lower notes and not others. Sometimes no amount of retakes can make a take perfect, but you can kind of hide it by doubling it and harmonizing against it. Pitch correction can help a little bit but it can easily sound unnatural, and you've got to get within striking distance of the right notes and stay there. So again, the general deadline-based frustration, knowing that I probably could sing slightly better, but knowing that I wasn't going to have time to do so.

Grace's other suggestion was that when the vocals kick in, the accompaniment needs to go "up" another notch -- to get another instrument or shift one gear up. I considered adding some autoharp, but mine doesn't have a D major chord (and it also takes forever to tune). She was thinking the song needed to embrace a calypso feel. I thought it was a little like that already, but by "calypso feel" I meant something like the Laurie Anderson song "Blue Lagoon," or the Suzanne Vega song "Calypso." She meant something like a Calypso steel drum solo, and asked me if I had any good horn sounds. It was at this point that I had my second nervous breakdown of the day. After hyperventilating for a while I settled on bringing back in a shaker and some other bits of percussion. And then I spent a couple of hours tweaking mix levels, and mastering settings, and compressor ratios, and gains, and then decided it was mostly done.

Oh, also, this seems to be a love song to my wife of ten years, Grace. I am not a very romantic guy and I did not set out to write a love song. My idea of a love song is Gang of Four's "Anthrax." So imagine my surprise when THIS came out!

The lyrics before last-minute revisions read:

I owe you my life, my love
All I am and all I own is yours

When we met long years ago, you
Welcomed me with love and laughter

I'll melt with willing obligation
I'll make mad love with only you

My incandescent love I owe you
Another year's improvisation

I offer you my lullabye
You are my moment's inspiration

Once more my love I'm all about
Making myself all about you

Adieu, my lady love
I owe you my life

The lyrics in the finished song are:

I owe you my life, my love
All I am and all I own is yours

When we met long years ago, you
Welcomed me with love and laughter

My incandescent love I owe you
Another year's improvisation

I'll melt with willing obligation
I offer you my lullabye

I owe you my life, my love
All I am and all I own is yours

Adieu, my lady love
I owe you my life

Update: after submitting my song and meeting the deadline, I discovered that I do in fact have all the stem sources with mixer automation, since I was smart enough to save a separate project file for that. I also discovered that my bass stem was a little bit screwed up -- it had some excess distortion, as well as one of the ukulele parts mixed in with it, and had been bounced with the mastering plug-in turned on, meaning that in addition to the EQ on the track itself, it had aggressive mastering EQ and compression applied _twice_ in the final mix. That's no good, so I fixed that, and uploaded a revised version. The revised version also has some tweaks to the mastering so it is a little bit less aggressively bright and more natural sounding. Honestly, you might not notice these differences unless you do a direct A/B comparison and you're listening on something better than laptop speakers, but it was important to me that the track not have noticeable distortion in it. There is some noticeable "beating" of bass frequencies as the bass lines overlap, due to variance in the intonation of notes on the fretless bass, but I'm not going to fix that; consider it character. I'll just try to remember not to blend low notes on the fretless bass. The effect isn't nearly as noticeable in the higher registers, at least to my ear.

Many thanks to everyone who gave me praise and encouragement when they heard this track!

Update 2: well, it turns out I flubbed the challenge. In the process of recording my final vocals, I accidentally sang "I offer you this lullabye" instead of "I offer you my lullabye," and then repeated it on the doubling and harmony lines. And so I used an extra letter. Oddly, I had a dream early Saturday morning the day before the challenge was due -- a dream in which I was listening to my draft song and realized I had blown the challenge. I woke up in a panic at about 4 a.m., but could not remember exactly what the issue was. I read over my lyrics carefully, couldn't see anything wrong, and went back to bed. I should have listened to what I actually recorded; my brain did. In any case, I wasn't too broken up, because I received a lot of very positive feedback about the song, and I had tried to keep myself somewhat unconcerned about winning the contest. I feel that the judges' decision was fair; I did screw up. In the midst of working full time and raising 5 kids I don't need more stress. But still, I am curious whether I could have won the whole thing.

Credits: Paul R. Potts: Steinberger Synapse 5-string fretless bass, Peavey Firenza P-90 electric guitar (with Ernie Ball Slinky 11s), Ovation Applause tenor ukulele, plastic cottage cheese container, steel meat skewer, steel measuring spoons, paper, finger cymbals, light bulb, steel beater, triangle, rasps, sleighbells. Oktava MK-319 condenser microphone, Radial JDV direct box, Apogee Ensemble audio interface, Apple Logic, Izotope Ozone.

A Brother's Valentine

I wasn't sure I'd manage to finish anything for round 2, because I lost one day to illness and didn't schedule any time off work. But putting in a little time Friday night and Saturday afternoon, here's what I came up with (the link is to the song page on Bandcamp where you can download a high-resolution version). I also made a quickie video in what seems to be turning into a series of videos involving drawing or writing (you might call it the "no budget series," although art supplies don't grow on trees!) I didn't have a great idea for the drawings; they are doodles I had put in a new notebook over the course of the past week, with the idea that I might try animating them or otherwise turning them into a story for the video. The story part didn't really come together but I thought they belonged in the video somehow. I'm experimenting with some other drawings that I hope will eventually become low-frame-rate stop motion animation. iMovie is not really set up to do anything very elaborate with a series of stills. You can string them together but they have to be individually cropped (I think) and that's pretty tedious.

I don't have any chords to post. There is a melody, but it's pretty simple, and not very tightly played. There's a second synth part, but it is just some pedal tones. The song is in Bb. There's a repeating bass riff which is basically a little blues thing with some chromatic notes. It's all in one simple position.
Song Notes

The challenge for SpinTunes 4, Round 2 was to "write a musical Valentine's Day card to someone OTHER than your significant other."

I started thinking about ideas that have been kicking around in my head for a while -- about how hard it is for adult men, maybe with wives and families -- to maintain supportive friendships and creative partnerships with other men. There's the context of competition, of course - in sports, even playing on the same team, but what sort of role models are there for support and creative collaboration? Even talking about it seems suspicious, and immediately brings up the idea that such a desire is something only a closeted gay man would express.

If there seems to be homophobic anger in the song I hope the listener will understand that it is not intended towards gay men, but towards the society that has made connecting with men platonically taboo. I hope that comes through.

On paper this song was a mess, and I wasn't making much progress. It filled several pages in my notebook with ranty paragraphs of text that weren't really rappable verses. I could sort of read it and it was funny and made some sense, but it was much too long and didn't have a workably rhyme scheme. Only after going into the studio and recording the first verse did it start to come into shape. I recorded the chorus very roughly following a melody I laid down with my guitar synth, and screwed around with the pitch using some plug-ins, and that's where it pretty much stayed. At the end of a couple of hours the Friday night before it was due I had the first verse and a chorus and that was what I had to build on. It was weird, but I kind of liked it.

I was much more pressed for time on this track than I was on the last one; this one represents a total of about eight hours of work in the studio. There is much that is sloppy and that I might have liked to do better, but I'm also trying to just complete more tracks, imperfections and all. While I was recording rap sections today my three middle kids were down the hall in the bathtub having some sort of screaming contest, as kids do. I kept hearing the screaming in my headphones and finally just took my digital recorder in there and captured them screaming, and worked that into the lyrics and the audio. Lemons and lemonade... it was freezing cold in the studio today -- layers, chattering teeth, and stiff hands. The heat was on constantly so no chance to get audio takes without the heating system in the background; no time left for extra takes anyway. Oh, well!

I intended to record this one at 24/96 like the last one, but somehow my Logic project got set back to 24/44.1. If you don't know what that means, don't worry about it. I had to master myself this time using Ozone 5. It's not like having a real mastering engineer but it can still do some pretty cool things.