What doesn't kill you.... (Silver Birthday reviews)

[Pigfarmer Jr]

Oh, the Silver City birthday celebration day
Silver sequins flashing, they goin' my way
Maybe if I talk to her, then she'll wanna stay
Help me to enjoy the Silver City birthday celebration day

Lyrics: viewtopic.php?t=12897

[Lunkhead]

Songs posted!

[sleepysilverdoor]

heine: I feel like intermittently torturing your neighbors is part of the songwriter experience! Structurally this doesn’t really take a lot of risks, but that would be at odds with the sort of song it is anyway. I don’t know your history (beyond being a fellow longtime songfighter), but this song is kind of bittersweet and ambiguous. She’s gone but…did she die? Did you all separate? You don’t sound too upset about it and that puzzles me a bit, but maybe leaving that wide open is the entire point. WHAT HAPPENED TO HER. Doesn’t seem to matter, you’ve got music, and that’s great. Doo do do dee doo.

IXTXI:
CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA industrial metal \m/. Bring up the vocals in the mix a bit and EQ the bass down a bit. I can barely make out what you’re saying and the low end is so overwhelming it goes straight from “heavy” to “MUD”. Goodness I do love the spamming of the pinch harmonics. The song just kind of bludgeons you and ends though? Needs another verse or at least a chorus. Right now it’s kind of static…CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA CHUGGA.

Lillly: So many references to so many things but I’m too dense or too lazy to figure out exactly how a lot of them tie together. Maybe it’s because of of the main 3 you’re referencing, I’m only particularly familiar with Silver Jews, not so much Sparklehorse or Ursula K Le Guin. Well Kurdt, we all love Kurdt. A little treble boost or an amp sim or some thing other than a dry DI fuzzy guitar signal would sound a little bit better in the mix. I feel like the song also kind of loses momentum. It comes in with a lot of energy but spends a lot of time kind of hanging out in the riffing. Especially the bit before “this world makes martyrs of people”. Too long without much. Maybe a solo should be there. Or something…Maybe it needs drums? Or a faster tempo. Or maybe it’s just the production. A good start, lots of cool imagery…and I’m not sure what it needs, but it’s missing something.

Phlebia feat. Sweeney Toad: I’ve been SongFighting more than half my life at this point. That’s insane to me. Since it’s the 25th anniversary, I thought it would be fun to recap my history of entering here. And of course, SWEENEY TOAD, my favorite collaborator gleefully jumped on the track the second I sent him the instrumental. Chord progression is I-^m6-^M3-^^I-vM6-IV-V-I.


roymond: Oh, twinkly! And then so much reverb and chorus. We’re in this dream pop soundscape, until suddenly…trap-infused drum beats? Very adventurous structure here and I want to give points for that. Cool chord shift starting on after “within you” for sure. I find myself more intrigued by what you’re doing with the song that I’m kind of forgetting to pay attention to what you’re actually saying. And it’s quite nebulous. But you definitely found gold, which is a good thing. I like the shift to the a capella vocal at the end. You’re searching. Maybe that’s all you need. I’ll search with you, this was my favorite of the bunch.

[roymond]

roymond: Oh, twinkly! And then so much reverb and chorus. We’re in this dream pop soundscape, until suddenly…trap-infused drum beats? Very adventurous structure here and I want to give points for that. Cool chord shift starting on after “within you” for sure. I find myself more intrigued by what you’re doing with the song that I’m kind of forgetting to pay attention to what you’re actually saying. And it’s quite nebulous. But you definitely found gold, which is a good thing. I like the shift to the a capella vocal at the end. You’re searching. Maybe that’s all you need. I’ll search with you, this was my favorite of the bunch.

Wow! Instant reviews…
Too often I hide behind nebulous lyric, for better or worse. In this case it was born in the days after witnessing 9/11 from my street when I took up looking for a musical community again. I’d gone through a decade attempting to find momentum in songwriting/producing on my own. I stumbled upon Songfight via Somesongs. But I’ve woven in some more recent personal struggles just to make me feel better. I didn’t have high expectations. Instead I’ve found some of the most real people I could imagine. Yes, I definitely found gold.

[sleepysilverdoor]

It's wild, SongFight's just kind of one of those things that's constantly there in the background. It's easy to take for granted but sometimes having it around is just the best. Good people and just a great excuse to write something (especially for those with zero aspirations of commercial success).

[Heine]

My Silver Birthday reviews

IXTXI:
This sounds very industrial. It has great accurate chord playing and sound wise it is a great recording. I am a bit sorry that this genre isn't my cup of tea. But maybe you'll catch me next time if you hide a nice little melody line within this chugga chugga. - What to expect from a guy who loves kitschy Moody Blues tunes?

Lillly:
It's not perfect, but I really like it. There are a lot of nice melodies buried in this song. I like your voice, it's not perfect, but it really fits. It has a nice colour. I'm really curious how this would sound if it was produced properly.

Phlebia feat. Sweeney Toad:
Collabs are always a nice thing and this one works very well.
It is interesting, very interesting... Is this microtonality? It sure is interesting – from the artistic point of view. But I must confess that I am still not getting used to it. Listening to it, it still twists my mind which is trying to put the "wrong notes" into the familiar and beloved places. It gets better with each listen, but it's still a challenge..
Lyrically it is such a heartfelt ode to Songfight! I really appreciate the lyrics. "The community here is the very best thing." Period!

roymond:
I love the line "I was searching for silver and found gold". Yeah, sometime life is better than you expect it to be. This tune is very dreamy and still grows on me.

heine:
I shouldn't have done it that quickly because now I find that the strings (BBC Symphony plug-in) sound way too cheesy. Not my best one but I had this catchy cheerful doodeedoo melody and I had to do something with it. – Thanks to sleepysilverdoor for this nice and instant review! So sorry that I left you confused, but well... if my true love had really died in this song I'd rather tend to choose a minor key. I'm not that heartless kinda guy

[sleepysilverdoor]

It is interesting, very interesting... Is this microtonality?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_temperament

Also I made one of these out of a damaged Laurel Canyon acoustic I got for free. https://www.kiteguitar.com/

[roymond]

It is interesting, very interesting... Is this microtonality?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_temperament

Also I made one of these out of a damaged Laurel Canyon acoustic I got for free. https://www.kiteguitar.com/

Love that! I’d heard of Kite but never played one. I’m curious how well it blends into Indian Raga. Or Harry Partch, I have to look up his designs of the instruments he built.

[sleepysilverdoor]

It is interesting, very interesting... Is this microtonality?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_temperament

Also I made one of these out of a damaged Laurel Canyon acoustic I got for free. https://www.kiteguitar.com/

Love that! I’d heard of Kite but never played one. I’m curious how well it blends into Indian Raga. Or Harry Partch, I have to look up his designs of the instruments he built.

I hadn't played one either, but I figured since I found myself unexpectedly found with a free guitar with bad fretwork anyway, I might as well try a DIY conversion job so at least I'd know whether or not it was something worth pursuing further. As it turns out, they're very interesting to tinker with. However it's such a foreign way of making music that you really have think and figure out what still works the way you'd expect and what doesn't. Case in point -- instead of stacking 3 major thirds to get to an octave, you stack 3 to a 12th. The minor seventh you get by going down a major third from the ninth is different from the one you get by stacking two perfect fourths, which is itself different from the barbershop seventh. And they're all available.