April Morning, with Bitter Orange Pickle Juice (prefight)

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Fri Feb 10, 2006 6:36 pm

nyjm wrote:
jolly roger wrote:I read a bunch of the reviews about my first song, and I'm trying to change a lot of the new one to fit what people wanted in the other one ... it has more chords, etc. but I won't say much ... just don't want to get your hopes up in case you don't like it. I'm doing Bitter Orange.
never change just to fulfill what you think are other people's desires. contrary to the idea that the voting thing may give, the heart of songfight isn't a popularity contest.

make the music that you like and want to share with others. if the reviews give you constructive criticism that you want to incoporate inyour songwriting, cool. but don't go chasing your tail trying to win the folks on the message boards over.

I guess I didn't word it quite well enough. What you are saying about the constructive criticism is more what I was going for. If people want me to be something I'm not, whatever. But I wouldn't be playing anything today if I had never built on what I started with. I sent in another cover for the monday morning peach one. Hope it gets up.

jeffhenderson · Post by **jeffhenderson** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 1:00 am

jolly roger wrote:I sent in another cover for the monday morning peach one. Hope it gets up.

Did you make a cover for "Monday Morning with a Peach"? Because I think it is "April Morning with a Peach".

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 11:19 am

JeffHenderson wrote:
jolly roger wrote:I sent in another cover for the monday morning peach one. Hope it gets up.
Did you make a cover for "Monday Morning with a Peach"? Because I think it is "April Morning with a Peach".

Okay. I'm just retarded. I did send in a cover for April morning ... I was just a bit tired when I sent it in. It does have the right name though.

nyjm · Post by **nyjm** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 12:53 pm

Spud wrote:
nyjm wrote:
jolly roger wrote:I read a bunch of the reviews about my first song, and I'm trying to change a lot of the new one to fit what people wanted in the other one ...
never change just to fulfill what you think are other people's desires.
I have a different point of view. Sure, you can't please all the people all of the time. Also, I think changing a bunch of things at once is difficult and not very productive. On the other hand, when we first came on board, we got a lot of negative reviews. Rather then try to please everyone, we picked one item that seemed to come up a lot and worked on it. Once that particular item stopped appearing in the reviews, we picked another one and so on. Maybe it's production for a few weeks, then structure, then technique, etc.

that sounds quite a bit more reasonable. i did the same thing, over the process of a few weeks that really helped me: learned how to stop clipping vox, put more effort into enunciation, learned how to record and pan an acoustic guitar nicely.

Spud wrote: We also target individuals. "Let's try to get a good review from Frankie". It is a good learning experience, and made us more versatile. Sometimes things just come out the way they come out without real intention or control. Attempting to appeal to someone's perceived taste helps give you a definitive musical goal, and teaches you to have control over your output. This of course, you can use later on to meet your own musical needs and artistic vision.

that's rather interesting. certainly a good way to expand your musical boundaries. i might have to try that sometime, if i get the time to actually analyze a certain poster's remarks. i suppose more often for me it's random bits. i remember dan-0-from-five-0 talking about panning a doubled guitar really wide; j$ wanted to hear a shaker in a song a while back. this week, i have wide-panned guitars and a shaker.

jolly roger wrote:I guess I didn't word it quite well enough. What you are saying about the constructive criticism is more what I was going for. If people want me to be something I'm not, whatever. But I wouldn't be playing anything today if I had never built on what I started with.

well, there we are. seriously, i think the semi-anonymous feedback is one of the best things about songfight. you have the freedom to completely bash someone's song, or the freedom to deconstruct what you don't like and help them really improve their craft.

and as a closing note, i'm in for "bitter orange" (as well) with a tune that suprised me. i wasn't sure about it until about half-way through and then she really took off. (yeah, this one's a she, that's for sure.)

- njm

p.s. i wonder how many (other) songs are going to make the "orange = rhymes with nothing" connection.

philtr · Post by **philtr** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 1:17 pm

SXV is back in with Bitter Orange.

I know that will make some of you cringe, and I apologize. But I feel this is better than my other entries. We'll see about that...

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 2:07 pm

I'm pretty much done my Bitter Orange, but before you get your hopes up, I don't have a good drum machine to help build up the song ... Other instruments can, but as a drummer, I just wish that I could add drums. The only drum machine I have is Hammerhead, and that's only good for techno. And this song is not techno. Not even close. I sing in this one, but I've only been singing for a little bit so it's not great, but I think it goes well with the music. Also, it looks like there's tons of people doing Bitter Orange so good luck!

Denyer · Post by **Denyer** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 6:09 pm

i am doing the optional challenge and pickle juice

nyjm · Post by **nyjm** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 6:20 pm

jolly roger wrote:The only drum machine I have is Hammerhead, and that's only good for techno.

you should check out leaf drums:

http://www.leafdigital.com/software/leafdrums/

and use the drums samples from natural studios with it:

http://www.naturalstudio.co.uk/ns_kit7freedownload.html

that's what i do... ;-)

Lyricburglar · Post by **Lyricburglar** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 8:36 pm

nyjm wrote: you check out leaf drums:

http://www.leafdigital.com/software/leafdrums/

So...Leaf isn't really some bloke from Canada. He's just a piece of software?

That explains a lot

jack · Post by **jack** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 9:28 pm

nyjm wrote: you should check out leaf drums:

you should check out leaf drums

gert · Post by **gert** » Sat Feb 11, 2006 10:20 pm

Gert also uses Leaf drums. Leaf pleases Gert.

GlennCase · Post by **GlennCase** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 2:37 pm

Chuck the Bear is in with a song about an April Morning, written in the middle of February.

ROCK!

Glenn (DR FUNK)
http://glenncase.songhole.org

nyjm · Post by **nyjm** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 4:35 pm

jack wrote:you should check out leaf drums

this is awesome. my programming skills are so weak.

[slinks away in shame...]

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 4:39 pm

I just got told about some hookups for Hammerhead, and they sound great. If you want them, just go to Hammerhead's website, get the machine, and find the plugins. The three acoustic ones sound really real.

johnsonic · Post by **johnsonic** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 7:44 pm

UGH. I'm not really sure I like songfight anymore. Every fight I listen to has 1/2 the entries centered around non-musicians with garageband or other loops and their resident "supplied with the computer" microphone. It was more enjoyable to me b/c you'd: A) hear some awesome songs, B) get input from people who knew what they are talking about.

Sa'll good, but jeeeezus. New guys... Seavers rox. One or two other new people rok Like I posted a year ago, I think I'll spend more time with the band, and not be here so much.

See you all when I'm posting a song a week in 3 months.

[edited to be less mean]

jeffhenderson · Post by **jeffhenderson** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 8:22 pm

Well I'm out this week, but feel free to steal this fraction of a lyric idea:

A bitter orange
At the grocery store
My heart was torn
Just the day before
I was born
Just to lose this war

The whole idea is that it is an ABAB rhyming scheme, but you carry the "J" sound from the word "Just" to the word before it so you get some thing that sounds like "tornj" or "bornj", which rhyme wiith orange.

I don't know if anybody thinks this idea is worth doing, but feel free.

erik · Post by **erik** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 8:46 pm

A bitter orange
In my shopping cart
I like porn
Just the dirty parts

Rabid Garfunkel · Post by **Rabid Garfunkel** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 9:33 pm

Whilst naming the mp3, I got a good laugh out of "rabidgarfunkel_bo.mp3".

Thank you Deep Throat, for the bad joke.

Oh, and I'm in for Bitter Orange. I've been away too long. Nice little regional song, which will be incomprehensible to those across the seas.

Welcome to SoCal, Sober! Heh.

Game... ON.

Reist · Post by **Reist** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 10:14 pm

johnsonic wrote:UGH. I'm not really sure I like songfight anymore. Every fight I listen to has 1/2 the entries centered around non-musicians with garageband or other loops and their resident "supplied with the computer" microphone.

Here's the thing. I'm 16. I'm in two bands, I play 5 instruments, I have played music pretty much since I was born. I have next to no recording options. I am a drummer, but since I don't have drum mics, I can't record real drums. All I have is a computer microphone and a crap drum machine. Pretty much everyone at this site is in this situation, and if you are saying that the people who pull decent music out of basically no materials are not musicians, you must be deaf. I have huge respect for anybody who can put together a decent song and has the balls to post it on the internet. Thank you.

johnsonic · Post by **johnsonic** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 11:50 pm

put together a decent song

thank you

jack · Post by **jack** » Sun Feb 12, 2006 11:56 pm

brody welcomes our newest band member this week, t-money, a true man of skill on the drums.

Eric Y. · Post by **Eric Y.** » Mon Feb 13, 2006 12:20 am

jolly roger wrote:All I have is a computer microphone and a crap drum machine. Pretty much everyone at this site is in this situation

great to hear from somebody who really knows what he's talking about, thanks dude.