Circle of Titles IV

Discuss the many little competitions/projects that spring up amongst the Song Fight community.
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JonPorobil
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by JonPorobil »

jast wrote:
Generic wrote:Here's the official site!
And my song is missing... well, it's listed but the link is broken. Should I start taking this personally? ;)

(The link goes to jankrueger_... but the file is currently named jast_...)
This is fixed now. My apologies. I set up the html file with the links before I had received some of the mp3s.
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by HeuristicsInc »

hey, jon, eric, please, remove, the, comma, from, my, band, name, thanks!
-bill
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JonPorobil
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by JonPorobil »

Oh, kay, Bill.
"Warren Zevon would be proud." -Reve Mosquito

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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by Paco Del Stinko »

I listened yesterday and was very pleased with all of the songs. Glad to hear some regulars, who don't SongFight! regularly these days, put forth some new music. I will write some comments soon. Good job, peoples!
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by cookie »

I just sent my entry, "Barley Wine" to Jon in a PM. Sorry I couldn't manage to finish the song earlier. I hope you guys will like it anyway. :)
come to the dark side.
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JonPorobil
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by JonPorobil »

Thank you, Cookie!

Everybody! Cookie Blue's song, "Barley Wine," from the title provided by yours truly, has now been uploaded to the site. Our final straggler is Caravan Ray (who I suppose thinks that now that he's Nur Ein, he's too good for other sidefights). Enjoy!
"Warren Zevon would be proud." -Reve Mosquito

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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by Caravan Ray »

Generic wrote: Our final straggler is Caravan Ray (who I suppose thinks that now that he's Nur Ein, he's too good for other sidefights).
Yes - I probably am too good for other side-fights - but here is one anyway.

Possibly a bit of a cop-out - but I managed to combine my title with the first round of the current Spintunes competition (Round 1 - write a national anthem for a fictional country). So, here is the Lonelystani National Anthem - aka. "Occasional Song":

http://spintown.bandcamp.com/track/the- ... nal-anthem
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by jast »

Reviews!
(There's no method to the madness.)
If you require/desire more details, please let me know.

Anyone else want to post reviews? We'd all appreciate it. Don't be shy!

Bad Boys at Bat Mitzvahs: No sense in (explicitly) bashing your potato recording, I suppose, so let's focus on the writing part here. Interesting place you chose to take that title, kind of inverted. I like the pacing of the lyrics quite a bit, and it's a nice little melody you've got there, but I'm a little sad that there's no development in the song's structure, just straight ABAB. Oh, and the next time you make a potato recording, perform it like you mean it. Okay? ;)

Mike Lamb: Surprisingly tidy for a potato recording. My playing is a lot looser than that. I'd be very interested in hearing what polish you might add to this, though. Hey, those vocals are pretty darn good! Processed a bit, though, right? Cool song, just the right amount of major sevenths for this kind of thing (any more and it'd be annoying). I'm not going to comment on the arrangement due to potato-ness; no idea what you were going to add, after all. Solid foundation, though. Vote held back until I hear the un-potatoed version.

Jon Eric: Pot calling the kettle black here, but... couldn't you have played to a click? :P Lead vocals are a little too forward in the mix IMO, and personally I'd bring the bass up more, right now it's pretty much only hinted at. Nice use of the stereo field. That's all I've got for the mix. Good job with the vocals -- in the past I've complained about your sustained notes being pitchy a lot, but there's only a teensy bit of that in here. Easy to forget, really. Cool background vocals, too. Lovely composification and arrangement and all (the way the organ part ends is a bit harsh, though)... interestingly I find the second line of the chorus much more rememberable than the first. And there's always a place for positive vocals. Vote!

Cookie Blue: You know it's okay to use higher bitrates, right? :) I like the mix (by home recording standards), the playing is good, and all that really bothers me is the massive overuse of falsetto singing. There's plenty of room between the edgier singing that you did in the bridge thingy and falsetto... worth experimenting with IMO. Oh, and I also like the chord progressions and all that composing stuff. I can't really think of anything else, so... vote!

Nick Soma: You favour the right stereo channel a bit... both jangly guitar in intro and ride cymbal feel hard-panned to the right when listening on headphones. I'd tone it down a bit. In fact I'd make the drum kit more narrow in general. Aaanyway... the bass notes run into each other quite strongly and that detracts a lot from the bass lines IMO -- the comparably strong distortion doesn't help. All in all the arrangement isn't very exciting and the composition doesn't keep me engaged that much either. I mean, it's okay, but that's about it. Protip: don't write lines that go beyond your vocal skills. Nice lyrical direction, though the third line of the chorus puzzles me. Even with your explanation it kind of doesn't conjure up any insight in my mind about what that says about the relationship. Well, I guess I'm not terribly bright.

Sockpuppet: Everything adds up here. I don't really understand it, but that's a minor detail. Only two small annoyances: when the beat comes in it suddenly starts sounding like the timing is off. I wonder, did you record the guitar part before adding the beat? I find this happens to me, too, when I do it that way, but when I play with the beat already laid down I usually find my way towards it. But I digress... the other small annoyance is that, in the first line of the last part, the vocals are more forward than in all of the rest of the song. Everything else I like. Nice work on all the background vocals in particular. Vote!

Paco del Stinko: Hey Paco, remember the lyrics forum? ;) Strong intro! In fact, strong arrangement all the way through. Trademark Stinko writing... not one of your more memorable songs IMO, but definitely easy on the ears. I don't really have anything else that would be worth mentioning. Vote!

Zack Facco: Hmm, the intro feels a bit tacked on. Is that different tempo? Because it sounds like it, and I'm not convinced. I like your melody and chords and all, and your metaphors are above-average-for-Song-Fight. Acceptable performance, save for the whistling. Don't write things you can't perform! Or, you know, make someone else perform those things. All in all, good enough for a vote, I suppose.

Heuristics Inc.: The sub bass hurts my ears. The rest of the backing hurts my aesthetic sensibilities. I kind of like the vocals, though, and nice metre.

Jan Krueger: I found it hard to make something for this title, possibly because there are two existing songs with the same title and I wanted to avoid both of them (wouldn't have wanted to go in that direction in the first place, really, but explicitly avoiding stuff is tedious). Ended up going with the paedophiliac and/or helpful driver at night. All the rest is just me doing stuff I felt like doing. No big plan or anything.
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by fluffy »

jast wrote:Reviews!
Sockpuppet: Everything adds up here. I don't really understand it, but that's a minor detail. Only two small annoyances: when the beat comes in it suddenly starts sounding like the timing is off. I wonder, did you record the guitar part before adding the beat? I find this happens to me, too, when I do it that way, but when I play with the beat already laid down I usually find my way towards it. But I digress... the other small annoyance is that, in the first line of the last part, the vocals are more forward than in all of the rest of the song. Everything else I like. Nice work on all the background vocals in particular. Vote!
I was having trouble with my recording interface being all screwy with latency and I didn't do my usual surgical timing correction because I was getting pretty peeved by the end. I also didn't spend as much time on the mix as I should.

I don't understand the song either.

Thanks!
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by josh »

Thanks for the review! I was thinking this fell by the wayside for everyone. I still need to go back and listen to yours. I went through them before it was posted. Oh and your question about the intro. It's all one live take so it's not literally tacked on, but I can understand how it feels that way since it's at a slower pace.
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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by JonPorobil »

josh wrote:Thanks for the review! I was thinking this fell by the wayside for everyone. I still need to go back and listen to yours. I went through them before it was posted. Oh and your question about the intro. It's all one live take so it's not literally tacked on, but I can understand how it feels that way since it's at a slower pace.
Yes, it fell by the wayside for me, too. I wrote a bunch of reviews then forgot to post them. Someone did an "Occasional Song" to cover for the straggling Caravan Ray, and I have yet to upload it... Argh. I don't really have an excuse. I'll get to all this shortly.
jast wrote:Reviews!

Jon Eric: Pot calling the kettle black here, but... couldn't you have played to a click? :P
I was definitely not expecting to get this comment. This was played to a metronome, which I programmed meticulously. I spent hours getting the click track to match the tempo I wanted, and then getting the timing correct for the performance. Which parts sound out of pocket to you?
"Warren Zevon would be proud." -Reve Mosquito

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Re: Circle of Titles IV

Post by josh »

Okay, finally listened to Jan's!

Jump in My Car (Jan): Very catchy and pop-y sound. Light airy mix. I think it works well. The vocals are a bit tentative at times and often pitchy... but oddly enough, when you get to the really difficult screaming part towards the end, it comes off really authentic. I like that whole section, it adds some needed tension. Good stuff, an enjoyable listen.
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