Nur Ein III Round Four "Ties of Blood and Water"

[Ross]

Any chance the judges have all made their decisions, and they want to give us back our weekend to work that was once projected, before the tardy (though accurate and just) judge delayed everything a day?

Ummm. You still have your weekend this round. The results come out tomorrow at 1PM EST. That gives you half of a Saturday and all of Sunday.

Not that there's anyone like this - but this also makes it fair to anyone who might just be waiting till tomorrow to check the boards for the results and title.

[glennny]

I believe all rock songs and country songs agree that the weekend begins at quitting time on Friday night. Also we still have Mr. Adamant and Furry Pedro in the UK.

As for fairness to Ross, we could certainly seek contestant approval before posting such. Remember the free BLT movement of June 5th?

Anyway, it was just a humble request, contingent on some star aligning circumstances, for the benefit of all. I don't mean to be a pain to Niv or the judges or other contestants.

Happy Nur Ein Everyone!

Off the top of my head, I wanted to give a couple shout outs.
Ken- you had me with that 1st measure of 5. Awesome track!
JB- Love the song!
Paco Del Stinko- Another excellent Stinko track!

[Ross]

As for fairness to Ross, we could certainly seek contestant approval before posting such. Remember the free BLT movement of June 5th?

I was not lobbying - it was just a thought, and I posted it after Niv posted his decision. I'm more than willing to go with the flow if there is one. HEck - I'm just hoping it ends up mattering for me.

Nur Ein!!!!1/2

[glennny]

I hate to get on anyone’s bad side with a criticism, but we’re all SF vets, and the reviews are my favorite part of the site. Keep in mind we’re getting to the elite stages and all the entries song good to my ears, the criticisms are really all just nit picks.


Adam Adamant- Well you fully embraced the challenge. I don’t think the song is very inspired. It’s a tough title to do something with, but I think you could’ve done much better.

Bryan Kandel- “Water into wine” gag. Guitar is gorgeous! Transitions are very well done. Voice is always top notch. No matter what you’re singing there’s a full throttle affectation. You do your earnest voice very well, but it’s like 100% no matter the lyric. I’d like to hear more affectation dynamics. This is an enjoyable entry!

Frankie Big Face- Man I love your voice. I think much of that love was earned by Bowie himself. Some instruments are far superior to others. Piano is played very well, while the drums are sloppy. Excellent songwriting! I don’t feel trapped in a challenge with this composition, though the drums are distracting.

Glenn & Rachel- I am trapped in the challenge here. All the bits are great pop brilliance, I don’t like the transitions. Still, all the bits are so good, writing-wise; there are a lot of weird choices for guitar tones, but nice playing.

JBB- Wow! This is good. Beautiful vocals, well played guitar. I think you took the easy way for challenge, but it is very well executed.

Ken- So loud. So good. 5/4 rules! Let’s do our Semolina Pilchards album with no 4/4! The melody reminds me of Polly by Nirvana. I don’t like the guitar solo. But I love everything else about this track. I don’t like the way we Americans sing “R’s”, I much prefer the Brits approach. It just sounds Hickish to me to hear “..harrrt” as opposed to “haht”.

Paco del Stinko- Freaking awesome! Reminds me of whimsical Zappa songs like Gregory Peckary or Let’s Make the Water Turn Black. This is my favorite (other than ours) of the week.

Ross Durand- Music rocks!!!! Your vocal line rubs me the wrong way. You’ve got a great voice, I think it’s the note choice in the melody that bugs me. This is delightfully proggy. Yeah, I wish you’d re-think the vocal melody, the rest of it is great.

The WSA- This song gives me goose bumps. It evokes that late 90’s Sunny Day Real Estate Pink album darkness and beauty. Gosh my band mates are talented!

Billy’s Little Trip- Yes! Bring the rock thou hast! Very good entry, I’m glad I finally got to hear it!

Tough to rank, all of them are good!

WSA is immune, and I’m not objective.

If I were a judge:

1-Paco del Stinko
2- Ken
3- JBB
4- Frankie
5- BK
6- BLT
7- Glenn & Rachel
8- Ross Durand
9- Adam Adamant

[Billy's Little Trip]

Remember the free BLT movement of June 5th?

I remember it like it was yesterday.

[frankie big face]

Addendum to my reviews:

BLT - I like the music right out of the gate, but the vocals in the first verse seem a little too out of tune and a little disconnected from the instruments. More important, I don't think you fulfilled the challenge. I count only two unique tempos, the slow one and the fast one. And if I tap my finger the way I hear the tempi, I only hear one! (But I acknowledge that there are two.) I fear you may be eliminated on that basis. Good playing, btw.

[Ross]

Chris take note.

I'm okay with it but damn I'll be pissed if he eliminates me by one spot

1-Paco del Stinko
2- Ken
3- JBB
4- Frankie
5- BK
6- BLT
7- Glenn & Rachel
8- Ross Durand
9- Adam Adamant

[frankie big face]

Frankie Big Face- Man I love your voice. I think much of that love was earned by Bowie himself. Some instruments are far superior to others. Piano is played very well, while the drums are sloppy. Excellent songwriting! I don’t feel trapped in a challenge with this composition, though the drums are distracting.

I'm totally firing my computer for fucking up those drum parts. Thanks for the compliments. I'll try harder with programming the drums next time. I was trying to make it sound loose and human-like, but not like a 7th grader.

[Billy's Little Trip]

Addendum to my reviews:

BLT - I like the music right out of the gate, but the vocals in the first verse seem a little too out of tune and a little disconnected from the instruments. More important, I don't think you fulfilled the challenge. I count only two unique tempos, the slow one and the fast one. And if I tap my finger the way I hear the tempi, I only hear one! (But I acknowledge that there are two.) I fear you may be eliminated on that basis. Good playing, btw.

Use a beat counter, you will see three significant tempo changes. It's just the way I delivered the two fast tempos, maybe. I was having a very tough time tying them together and keeping the flow, so I changed the vocal delivery.
My three significant tempos are:
70 bpm
140 bpm
200 bpm

Hindsight. I wonder if I would have had an easier time if the fastest beat was at 210 bpm?

[glennny]

Ross wrote:

Chris take note.
.....

Don't worry Ross I'm only 8 for 11 on eliminations, and 0 for 4 on winners. However since you can make stats say anything, you might say by trend i will only get 25% correct. ( round up to 33% with the 3 as the denominator) Since round one I was 100% 3 for 3, Round 2 I was 75% 3 for 4, and round 3 I was 50% 2 for 4.

And besides those are my opinions, not my predictions. My issue with your track, I think might not bother any of the judges at all.

Anyway good luck all, great fight!

[Rabid Garfunkel]

Hindsight. I wonder if I would have had an easier time if the fastest beat was at 210 bpm?

But's he's not wholly his father's son

[Billy's Little Trip]

Chris take note.

I'm okay with it but damn I'll be pissed if he eliminates me by one spot

1-Paco del Stinko
2- Ken
3- JBB
4- Frankie
5- BK
6- BLT
7- Glenn & Rachel
8- Ross Durand
9- Adam Adamant

I know you're just goofin', but I don't think you have anything to worry about. My song does have some punch and cookies, but in all honesty, I think your song came out better.
Besides, Glennny is always wrong.

edit: Just saw the results. See, nothing to worry about. Congrats all.

[adamadamant]

Congrats everyone who went through, Nur Ein is tough and I feel honoured to have made it so far. I don't think I can argue with unanimous last place, it was a pretty bad song and especially with such good competition.

TTFN

[Paco Del Stinko]

Way to go, Ken! I can't believe I snuck through, but am excited to have made it this far. Tip of the cap to those that got cut, it could just as easily have been me. Nur Ein!!!!!

[Rabid Garfunkel]

Notes on this round's songs. Now with an unwelcome peek into how I'm judging, heh. Looking at three different aspects, and scoring each with a maximum of five points. In order: Performance; Production; Pleasure. I figure this way if a song is technically very good, but I don't enjoy it, it'd still have a chance to get to the next round on its own merits. Ties are resolved by challenge and pleasure.

I'm listening to these songs on multiple systems, across the spectrum of sound reproduction quality.

These are the notes, straight off the paper. Not quite reviews. Heard a lot of familiar-ish music in these songs which are mentioned in the notes, usually in quotes.

AA: Challenge killed you. "Duke of Earl"
Performance 1; Production 2; Pleasure 1

BLT: Pathos! Get female singer for mother. Best tie of music to mood, lyrically & tempo pocket soundtracky. If Jane's Addiction and The Offspring had a child that didn't suck.
Performance 3; Production 5; Pleasure 5

BK: "Santeria"! Lyrical hook not there. Rambling feel.
Performance 5; Production 4; Pleasure 2

FBF: "Rainbow Connection"! Vocal vibrato distraction. *Hooky* chorus, but song more a buffet than a prepared meal. Elements, signified by different tempos, need more than just the lyrics to hold them together.
Performance 4; Production 5; Pleasure 3

G&R: Glenn & Rachael's "Need Stilts" (fast tempo)! Slow tempos, Rachael's voice buried in mix (non "doubled").
Performance 4; Production 3; Pleasure 3

JBB: Simon & Garfunkel and Morricone (whistler)
Performance 4; Production 4; Pleasure 2

KEN: Dynamics? Sticks in head, hooky as hell, accelerondo! Sweet keys/patches. "Solo," not so good for flow and mood. Outro keys/patch groovy, but abrupt in re: song.
Performance 4; Production 4; Pleasure 4

PDS: Pixies "Where is my mind?"/Beatles' "That Buffalo Bill song off the White Album". Mix too much drums, vox *ding* (translation: vocals knocked points off). Slow tempo seems to want psychedelia.
Performance 2; Production 3; Pleasure 4

RD: Zep. Sweet ELP synth & period wah. "Deep track," b-side. Backing vox, shrill (but brief). Didn't feel like 5 minutes (felt shorter).
Performance 5; Production 5; Pleasure 4

TWSA: Super extra treble agony, guitar melody too hot in mix. Sounded best in car, home stereo (w/subwoofer) revealed lack of bottom end.
Additional note: The reason it sounded best in the car is that the car stereo's set up in favor of trebly music. I like treble heavy music. Ask Albatross, he's always bitching about my car stereo, especially when we're listening to cds of his.
Performance 4; Production 3; Pleasure 2

[Billy's Little Trip]

BLT: Pathos! Get female singer for mother. Best tie of music to mood, lyrically & tempo pocket soundtracky. If Jane's Addiction and The Offspring had a child that didn't suck.
Performance 3; Production 5; Pleasure 5

Wow, a 5 for pleasure? Cool!
And yes, this would have been great with voices for each part. I actually gave some thought to this. I would have loved Paco's huge robust thunderous voice for the Father, the Mother's voice would be Anti-M's angelic cuteness or another sweet voice I love is Rachael Lin, then for the son with his nasally pubescent full of angst punk voice, would be Andrew Reist, without a doubt.

By the way, this song was over 6 minutes long and I had to cut it down to around 3.5 mins for contest purposes. It had a second verse for the son and a finally with all 3 singing together. The reason I ended this song the way I did, was because this song drove me to the edge of madness. I've found that rhythmical screaming keeps a grasp on my sanity. Kind of a "let the demons out before they eat their way out" kind of thing.

[Billy's Little Trip]

Oh, by the way. I TOTALLY want to give Judge #4 a happy ending!

[jb]

Looks like I triggered Pat's genre bias on that one. Dodged a bullet! <kisses NTK passionately>

[Ross]

And also I like Ross's guitar tone.

Ok, I don't know if you're talking about the distorted sound under the first verse and synth solo - but just in case you are, here's a little story.

A couple-a weeks ago I ask Reist about his guitar sound and he was like "just simple distortion...." So this week I thought I'd pull out my first distortion box, that I got on sale in 1983 or so for 9.99 a the local guitar shop - cheapest thing in there and it was not Boss or DOD, but I needed a distortion box. I used it for quite a awhile and always kinda liked it. Anyway - so I used it this week and it has a bitchin vintage sound.

Tonight I go online to see if I can find any images of it to put in my avatar (you can see why) and I find this thing selling for $150 and up - no joke - on eBay someone's asking like $250.

So anyway - a little trivia.

[Lunkhead]

Adam Adamant
The challenge really hit you pretty hard, it sounds like. That first slowdown feels really out of place to me. The different instruments just aren't blending well for me, and the vocals aren't doing a lot for me either. Overall this is kind disjointed feeling.

BLT
Aargh, plugged in acoustic guitar. I like what you're going for overall. You've got some really strange dissonant melodic moments in certain sections that aren't working for me. The part with the "oh oh oh oh oooh" backups is a little generic sounding. I guess the different parts just don't flow together very well for me, it all feels a little less cohesive than I'd like. And it feels at the end like it should go on for a couple more minutes or something.

Bryan Kandel
Nice guitar. Vocals are alright. I wish you'd bring in some other elements. Song is OK, but not terribly remarkable, I guess.

Frankie Big Face
Your vocals sound kind of tenuous this time for some reason. I think there's a bit too much reverb on them for my tastes. Nice drums. Did you program those? I've found it hard to program decent sounding brushed drums, but if you programmed those you did a really good job. I like the first couple of sections through the first couple of repeats. The "only love" part doesn't really work for me. The tremolo guitar and the backup vocals don't really blend well together for me. I could have done with the guitar part being played on a mellower/softer sounding instrument, or without effects. And it would have been nice if the background vox were spread across the stereo field more. Lyrics starting with "only love" seem likely to head into dubious or at least very well worn territory for me. I really liked the rest of the song other than that part, though.

Glenn and Rachael
Interesting chord choices. First tempo change goes over alright. I like the faster part a lot. Sounds like some pitch issues with the vocals right before the super fast chorus. I really like the chorus a lot. The switch back to the verse is a bit abrupt for me. I really liked the lyrics throughout. Maybe it would have been cool to have Glenn sing the pre-chorus stuff. I like the way you've arranged your vocals for the chorus. The song feels a little underdeveloped to me, though, in terms of the structure. Maybe you could have added an instrumental bridge/break then another chorus at the end or something.

John Benjamin Band
Sweet whistling. Nice finger picking. (Did you double the guitar, or is it two copies of the same recording delayed and panned apart?) I really like the lyrics, and the singing and melody are really good, though there seem to be some odd pitch or recording issues with your vocals at a couple of certain spots. Maybe it's just modulation on the echoes? Anyway, I really like that you kept it simple and just wrote a good song.

KEN MAHRU!!!!!!!!!! SO LOUD!!!!!!!
The intro's a bit long. I like the 5/4 a lot, starting in the verse. It really keeps things rolling along. I like the bass lines. Cool chorus. Good bridge. That solo, though... um .... it's just kind of so so. It could use more variation in rhythm, like more syncopation, and maybe some rests. You also might want to try to cover a broader range of notes, to mix things up more. Nice accelerando outro.

Paco del Stinko
I like the music of your verse a lot. The vocals feel a bit off at spots, though, at least in the first part of the first verse. You do a good job switching to and from the faster chorus. I like the recorder in the chorus, but it gets kind of distorted/dissonant and painful when it's playing over the verse music after the chorus. Nice backup vox in the second verse. It might have been cool to have some backups during the chorus, or doubling, or something. The bridge (before the vocals come in) reminds me of Led Zeppelin for some reason. I like the bridge. More good backup vox there. I kind of wish it hadn't just ended after that part.

Ross Durand
Speaking of Led Zeppelin, this song is so Led Zeppelin sounding to me, style-wise. Or at least some other similar band. Nice drums and guitar, though the bass seems a little sloppy or too busy sometimes. I think I also hear some distortion/clipping during that first short little guitar solo. Whoa, break it down, take me to the stairway to heaven dude. Keyboard solo starts out good, but maybe goes on twice as long as it should or something before the backing music changes. Wow, more different sounds. Ah, I get it, it's watery sounding. I feel like I'm on acid. I guess this isn't really a Led Zeppelin sounding some but some earlier more psychedelic band. Wow, this song is epic. Nice outro groove. I wish the backup vox that were spread out in the stereo field more. I like the right channel guitar sound, and the bass playing in this last rocking part. Oh wait, there's more! More outro. OK, this song is probably too long, but at it least it changes things up enough to stay interesting the whole time, unlike many overly long SongFight! related songs.

TWSA
I'm not really into the mix during the first part, with Frisbee's vocals. The vocals and guitar sound kind of muffled, and the drums and bass are too loud. The next instrumental bit is super pretty, though. The next bit with more of Frisbee's vocals is nice. Sounds much better. Hm, I wonder which one of you plays bass? Always the same person? Different for each song? Anyway, I like the bass in this song, it's simple but effective. Is this one all just Frisbee singing? I like his voice a lot, but I kind of miss the interplay between your different voices. Ah, maybe this is the song that Glen was telling me about that was mostly done by Frisbee and Furry Pedro? Anyway, I'm getting distracted. I guess the song just kind of flows by without any part really grabbing me very strongly.

[furrypedro]

I guess the song just kind of flows by without any part really grabbing me very strongly.

This is always the problem Carpetburn tends to have. I understand, but all I can say is that for full enjoyment these kind of tracks demands you to (Rafiki voice) listen harder.

Frisbee does indeed do all the singing. Dodgy mix is because this was the one song Melvin didn't mix. Bass is also me. Drums are synthesized. I hijacked the second section and let my love of American Football run wild. Lucky we had immunity this round eh? This is the reason I don't bother entering Nur Ein alone, I like it but my taste is skewed.