Mega-Fight Album

frankie big face · Post by **frankie big face** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 5:05 pm

roymond wrote:I think this is an area that labels are missing big time...artists releasing demos or live versions of new songs that they can post to a website or release through podcasts, giving insight to the songwriting/thought/production processes.

XTC certainly have gone to that well time and time again. Each of their last two albums were eventually released in "homespun" versions that featured the demo of each song and they released "Rag 'n' Bone Buffet," a collection of B-sides and demos. Those three records were actually pretty good, as is the Fountains of Wayne B-side collection "Out of State Plates." But most of the time those B-side records are disappointing (sticking with XTC, Andy Partridge's "Fuzzy Warbles" series should have stayed a secret), in my opinion.

roymond · Post by **roymond** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 6:38 pm

Well, they (XTC) also had to deal with the fact that they hardly never played live and had a small but enthusiastic fan base who would eat up whatever they put out, and suffer the bad ones.

frankie big face · Post by **frankie big face** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 6:58 pm

roymond wrote:Well, they (XTC) ...had a small but enthusiastic fan base who would eat up whatever they put out, and suffer the bad ones.

a.k.a. ME!

roymond · Post by **roymond** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 7:03 pm

frankie big face wrote: a.k.a. ME!

Yeah, me too. And I saw them twice. I even heard they're celebrities or something

HeuristicsInc · Post by **HeuristicsInc** » Mon Aug 14, 2006 9:19 pm

Speaking of which, I was just thinking today that I'd buy a Roymond CD if there was one.
-bill

JonPorobil · Post by **JonPorobil** » Tue Aug 15, 2006 4:05 pm

On the other hand, XTC innundates people with demos. They put out Homespun and Homegrown, demo albums for the two volumes of Apple Venus, but with a few exceptions, most of these demo cuts are devoid of interesting revelations; many of them are already almost done. I mean, yeah, it was cool that they changed the words "One kiss you gave me" to "That longing look you gave me" in "Harvest Festival," but there's another forty minutes of material on that album that I've already heard in slightly more polished form.

But the booklet (at least the one I got with the big box set that came out last month) is stellar.

I suppose it's simply a matter of taste. As for me, I'm working on an album; the writing is finished, the recording hasn't even started yet. I'm not ashamed to say that I wrote (and I do mean that I wrote them, chords, melodies, and lyrics) sixteen songs for it, but decided before even hitting the studio to cut four. That's how it happened. Maybe those other four will be "B-sides" (as I pretend that someone cares enough about my music to release singles), maybe some of them will appear on a future album, or maybe I'll just never get around to recording something for which I can't find a definite home.

The world may never know.

BenKrieger · Post by **BenKrieger** » Sat Aug 19, 2006 7:23 pm

hey all...

been out of it for most of the summer...spent some time working on my record and a week in Mexico. probably won't be joining any fights till the fall, but it seems like I've missed some great ones!

As far as songs/song abortions, the one rule I have is this: write a song every day. you don't even have to record it, but engage in the process. You might be in the car in a traffic jam and you make up a song about how you have to take a crap but you're stuck in traffic...for the day, that's your song. record what you have when you have the time. stockpile the ideas. never ever ever STOP writing a song because you think it sucks. finish it as much as you can. that's what i do, anyway. and i am not even a judge of my good material. i have a bunch of musician friends and every few months i'll hand em a CDR with 20 or 30 new songs/ideas and get their thoughts. half the songs of mine that people like are ones i had shit canned until someone heard 'em.

if someone like kelly clarkson says she wrote 40 songs, i don't get very excited. but richard thompson, bob pollard, mccartney...different story. they could do it.

anyway, my two cents... i need to go shake some more of that mexican sand out of my ears.

Bee K

king_arthur · Post by **king_arthur** » Fri Sep 15, 2006 7:41 am

Well, I had hoped to get back to JBs original question here, but I still haven't gotten around to listening to the "Tiny Town" songs yet, and... stuff has come up, and songfight is going to have to go on the back burner for me 'til December at least.

The six of us who did all eleven songs accounted for just about half the songs in the eleven fights, but were clearly underrepresented in terms of fight winners. If you add up votes, I think the six of us probably pulled down around half the total votes, and if you consider the Seamus Collective who, what, entered four fights and won them all? then multiple-fight fighters did fairly well.

My best finish was a tie for third, which is probably about where I come in if you look at any eleven fights I'm in, so I don't think I did any WORSE than I would have if I'd only done one song. And the reviews of my songs were positive enough that I think... well, I don't feel BAD about sending in songs for all the fights.

I also felt like... for me, there were more "keepers per fight" in the megafight than there are, on average, for regular fights. I'm really glad that hostess and paco, especially, were in all the fights, because I found a lot of new songs that I liked. In terms of server and fightmaster bandwidth, I totally understand the "one song a week" limitation (when there were multiple fights).

Charles (KA)

Anyway... just wanted to close the loop on my end of this discussion.

Paco Del Stinko · Post by **Paco Del Stinko** » Fri Sep 15, 2006 9:52 am

KA - Good post, I look forward to your return.

Mostess · Post by **Mostess** » Fri Sep 15, 2006 10:49 am

king_arthur wrote:well, I don't feel BAD about sending in songs for all the fights.

I kind of do. I learned a lot and it was fun, but I feel like we ran Hostess Mostess into the ground. Couldn't quite get up the resolve to enter the last couple of fights. Lots of idle talk around the Hostess Mostess household of laying the band to rest and starting something new. The eleven entries stretched us so thin, like an overused Stretch Armstrong---we may never glob back into our original shape.