Well. I got a new drum machine and I've been trying to get my lern on. It's a pain programming this thing, but, I came up with something today while I was noodling around, so I pursued it to the end, and here tis.

www.blindslim.com/music/birding.mp3

Yes. It's another cover. Right now, it's just easier to learn a new thing by recording a song you already know. And I can't even take credit for the arrangement - it was done by a singer in New York named Lian Anderson I think. This version is a little more boppy than hers.

And yes, the guitar is supposed to be jazzy, and instead, it's more like "assy".

But that's my opinion.

THIS SUCKS.

Ha.

heh.

I'm foolin. just playin. you know me.
[This message was edited Fri Aug 13 14:09:02 2004 by otan]

drums sound very real!
Good feel to them.

Like your guitar work. Can't say I ever want to hear freebird for the rest of my life though. (nothing against your version)

But...

THIS IS THE BEST SONG EVER POSTED HERE!
today anyway. (then again, I think it was the only one posted today... Hardy har,har)

Hears My Families verdict: FLUX; Yes i agree ;no.1 priority is more sleep mate i did enjoy it though!
MAREE(Mother): Ermmm, singing and playing technically good, but have to say
that I got pretty bored after the first ten seconds and I'm sure Mr. Van Zant, deceased
singer of Lynard Skynard would be turning in his grave( tee hee ) .
NICK:boring .....i prefer linkin park they're much better

Well there it is, a family post.(excuse Nick, he's only ten!!!!) Maree's my ex so what more can i say, i'm not gonna defend her!

Not going for the exciting song process here. I was shooting for more of a jack johnson thing. But, listening to it with semi-awake fresh ears this morning, it do sound slow and boring.

And what up with the bass. Why me. I need my own recording studio out in the garage. This basement thing is just PHEW.

otan said:

or a MAC

FLUX said:

This is the coolest review ever. People in the room, what a great idea.

Back to the tune.

I almost didn't want to open it because you guys said it sucked.
After I got over that, Beau I just have to say fuck the song, your voice is AWESOME, a little sketchy in the falsetto area but I'm feeling some soul and I LIKE IT.

Having a mellow background really makes the listener have to hear your voice.

Thanks for sharing this and why be so hard on yourself?

Wasn't being hard on myself. I was posting the obligatory, "This song sucks" before anyone else. And listening to it this morning, I'm let down by the guitar playing. I had really high hopes for the tune, and when it was just me and the drum machine noodling around, I was finding some really interesting stuff to put in there, and, now, I've dumbed it down to some sort of stoner jam thing... it's just not what I was aiming for, thassal.

otan said:

It was cool, but in the middle it started 2 get a lil' dry. Need sum mo shuga in it.

hey otan, i really like your voice on this tune - what kind of vocal chain are you using? You have a nice warm sound on my headphones. What kind of drum machine did you get, it sounds pretty good also. Questions, questions.

Freebird...

I always liked the first part of freebird, but then it turns into classic rock at it's worst. I think they were shooting for the lynard skinnard version (or whatever) of stairway to heaven. They didn't quite make it there to me, but what do I know. This is a cool cover.

Thanks for sharing.

Vocal chain is from a Oktavia 319 large-diaphragm mic into the Zoom MR1044, using whatever they had in the preset (compression, eq, pre-amp coloring) and then I used the "air" effect, which gives the vocal a real nice ambience. I rolled back on the high end of the effect so it wasn't so prevalent.

The drum machine is the Boss DR3. It's pretty cool as far as writing songs go - for any given group of patterns, ("styles" is what they call it) you program the intro, and three key patterns, and three different alternative fills, and then an ending.

So as the song is playing, you push the fill button, and the machine just inserts the fill at the end of the current pattern. Since they're paired up (A pattern, A fill, B pattern, B Fill, etc) if you're in "A Pattern" and you push "B fill" the machine plays the B Fill and then goes to the B pattern. Makes it very easy for songwriting, you can develop your ideas more completely, instead of just jamming over a looped pattern.

Also, the drum kits are customizable which is something that I've been missing in the recent drum machines I've had. You can adjust the volume, panning of each pad on the kit.

It seems really good right now. Two weeks ago I hated it because the interface is insane. But it just took time to sit down and learn the thing.

AND HEY - a really cool thing about this machine is the snare-dribble sound at the very beginning of the song... sounds like an accidental hit? which is SUPER prevalent in funk music (well, the kind I like at least).

Glad you liked the song.

Yeah, this is just a demo. I'm going to go back and polish it up this weekend. Refine refine refine.

Good stuff man!

Very soulful!



Jshua

I'd like to add that this Down feeling perpetuating Otan's recent post's is not at all indicitive of his major body of work.Those of us who've listened to his stuff; (personally only the last 6 months or so), know that his musical knowledge and standard of playing is totally outstanding.Hey who can in one evening consistently put out a recording that's satisfying? What a suck ass i'm sounding, but it's intriguing what does get posted in this Forum when the boiler room is fired up. Seems, myself included...bit of a trough happening at the moment.Would like to hear what this N.F.O., CD is like and when it's available for listening. Better get off my ass and login and check the site .

hmm.... once again.....

FLUX said:

Yeah, well, for ME, the big wall between me and producing something less than SUCK has been the drum machine issue. Lately, most of what I've done has just been working over a loop because I'm not happy with the drums on the recorder I have... and then, the process of learning this machine.

So, now, the next thing in my way is organization. I need to sit down and finish about twelve sets of lyrics... and then start recording. I'm hoping to knock some magic out this weekend, but, you know how that goes - best laid plans of mice and men are rendered useless by the delivery of your new baby. Um. Or something.

At some point you've gotta explain this fascination with Freebird.

Maybe just a southern thing. I know many years ago when I did more college frat parties than i'd care to remember in the south, we had to play Sweet Home Alabama at least twice a night.

Btw, I saw Lynyrd Skynyrd play at the Univ of Florida in Gainesville when they were just a good straight-up rock group. Before they adopted the whole "southern-rock" persona.

Nice track.

tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...rmusic.htm

Dude, Freebird is the end-all, be-all Southern National Anthem. Tis the Alpha and Omega of Anthem Rock. Led Zeppelin came close, but with their mamby-pamby "lady who's sure all that glitters is gold" Lord of the Rings lyrics, they got lost under the weight of all that olde english talk. Fuckin Skynard puts it out there:

If I Leave here Tomorrow, would you still remember me?

And while at the time, he might have been talking about a hump-an-run, in the end, it ended up being a symbolic epitaph, not only for him and his bandmates who died in the flames of the fire, but for all of us who lived happily thru the 70's, who once adorned ourselves with mullets, knee-high moccasins and sleeveless t-shirts. The time may have come and gone, but we will always be remembered, and now we're free to, uh... now we're free to go do, uh, now, um, now we're free to go flip the Bird to old Kerry and them weakass pinko liberals.

hmm.

So, now that I think about it, that song sucks.
[This message was edited Fri Aug 13 17:19:37 2004 by otan]

I can't say it was the greatest thing I've ever heard, but I thought it was a totally worthwhile cover. I like covers that are different from the originals, and this certainly qualifies. You mentioned Jack Johnson, and I think you nailed that. I could easily hear this on one of his records.

The song is hit or miss. It's so popular that some people will be excited by it, some will be sick of it before they've ever heard your version.

The drum programming is great, too. I think you mentioned the fill buttons, which make a big difference with drum machines. I suppose you might get sick of the fills eventually (I don't know how many there are) but it made the drum track much more interesting than a loop would've been, and much less work than programming all those fills.

otan said:

I figured that would bait you into a funny-ass explanation. Success

tA

Tribal Disorder

http://www.soundclick.com...rmusic.htm

This is RAWat it's best.
You made it your own and I always love that.
To me, that's the best testament to a cover tune.

On the Topic of Covers i find that i often try to cover something, get bored with the process,then end up shuffling things around and creating 'my own composition'.Not stealing ideas as such, but as there's so many permutations of your basic rock/pop menu i find interesting things evolving from the mistakes i make trying to work on a cover.Also great to pin a song you'd like cover,so as to have something readily available & recognisable when publically performing.

This is the closest to real drumming I've ever heard coming out of a machine. Bravo, Beau! Your guitar work is very good, as usual, and the vox are fly too. I have to agree that your falsetto isn't your greatest strength, I think you should stick to the lower registers of your voice...

otan said: