The Song Fight Bulletin Board

Thanks For The Frisbee wrote: Adam adamant! :Your voice sounds great in the choral bits.

Thanks but I'm pretty sure it's not me your hearing. I am on there but very quiet on the left, the louder voice on the right is my friend who is a much better singer, but he does have a similar tone (?) to me.

I'll do some reviews soon, but a couple of thoughts. To FBF, your song was one of my favourites this week, it'd be a crime to put you out for it. And Octothorpe, 'coral' voices? Fantastic!

Ross wrote:I hope to get a complete set of comments out tonight - but since it is so quiet here I thought I'd say...

Bryan Kandel - I think you've got the best song this week, graceful, poetic, everything in the right place.

I apologize in advance that so far the judges' picks for number one haven't matched mine, so I hope I didn't Jinx ya.

Great song.

Thanks Ross. I know that the judges have many different tastes (a good thing). So if I get booted this week, I won't blame it on your jinx.

I suppose this is a good time to propose my theory that competitors who win immunity should be honorary judges for the next round.

In my opinion there is not enough reviewing going on - I will now do my part to help with that.

Round 3
The Blitz
Use of Choral Voices

Again a pretty strong group of songs - with high and low points. Here are some comments. Good - Bad - Challenge. Ranked roughly in order of preference - purely for the fun of the game.

BK - Good: Word structure framing each verse and relating the themes of each verse. Tune. Guitar texture. Arrangement. Sentiment. Bad: If I had to pick - your voice is not as strong in some parts as it can be. Challenge: (B+) very nicely done - I wish it hadn’t only come in at the end - but nice to hear you do some harmony.

FBF - Sounds straight off of London Town or Venus and Mars. Good: Nice chords and tune. Arrangement is great, but does sound a little referential or derivative - but heck it list at references good stuff. Bad: Not a big fan of the way the rhythm/words come out the backside of the chorus. Also the words/theme don’t quite stand up to the musical grandeur. Challenge: (A) nicely done and incorporated into the overall arrangement.

KEN - Good: Guitars/Tune/Arrangement. Keys (is that a keyboard or a softsynth?) Bad: the words don’t do that much for me - but they’re not really bad either. Challenge: (B+) Nicely done, but not as strongly incorporated as some others.

BLT - Good: The way you play them geetars. Groove! Bad: some vocal moments. Acoustic guitar sound. Some of the lyrics are a bit round about. Challenge: (C-)I’m not sure this is much different than your usual vocal stuff with a few extra voices - but I hear that you tried it in that context.

ADD - Good: Tuneful craziness, or is it crazy tunefulness. Groove changes. Singing. Bad: not sure about the music/word pairing. Challenge: (C-) I guess it’s the keys - sounds cool, I guess I wish it had been a bit more prominant.

JBB - Good: Vocal stuff is awesome. (I wish I had a cool voice). Spirit of the song. Theme of the song. Reminds me a bit of La Valse, high society dancing itself against a background of decay. Bad: Clipping. Spirit of the song - it drifted from jubilant to in-my-face - deliberate? Challenge: (A) JBB featuring the swingle singers.

WSA - side note: Pete’s voice, british accent and all get this started out great as a story of british kids sent to the country during the war. Then Melvin’s voice couldn;t sound less british - funny, but I can’t fault you for it. Good: Title take. Arrangement/performance. Rockin’ break. eBow solo (is that really a different instrument though? Seriously ) Bad: doesn’t live up to it’s own ambition. A bit repetitive of the key motif for me both lyrically and tune-wise. Challenge: (A) unfair.

JT - Good: I’m glad you sent for the a cappella. Story approach. Thanks for giving me a break from WWI. Singing. Bad: I wanted a break from the same 8 bars over and over, Tune wise (I know it had two different phrase endings, but still, a change would have been nice). Challenge: (A) - you went for it!

GnR - Good: Nice take - I almost wish you had gone straight for writing a jingle for a drink called “The Blitz” - almost there, but not quite. Tuneful chorus. Bad: I seem to be the only one who thinks this, but Rachel sounds a bit out of tune in spots to me. Goes on a little too long. Challenge: (A) I like the counter melody approach.
TB$TDH - Good: I get what you were going for here, and it’s almost Tom Waites-ish. Pretty well pulled off. Bad: I’m not sure I get the german bit paired with the gospel bit - in fact, Im sure I don’t get it. Arrangement - at some point I really wanted the choral piece to bust out and for it to kick up a notch, although I don’t doubt that this is just how you wanted - it’s jsut my preference. Challenge: (A-)

PDS - Good: Guitar playing. Groove change. Bad: the words seem a little heavy handed - I didn’t get sucked into this one. Challenge (B+)

SF - Good: arrangement - nive chorus pad. I like the delay. Groove change. Bad: Hard to describe, but despite everything going on, the song felt sort of static to me. Challenge: (C+)

# - Good: Sillyness. Choral/coral pun. Your commitment. Bad: I don’t get Octothorpe - honestly, I enjoyed Spud solo more. Choral/coral pun. The Title seems weekly tied in unless I’m missing something. The final rhyme. Challenge: (B)

AAA - Good: Build in arrangement. Bad: clipping and the drums got to me a little bit. Challenge: (C-) hmm - I guess it goes to what “Choral means” I felt that your vocal doubling was your attempt at choral, but it didn’t really get very choral for me till near the end.

Good stuff. Given how Songfighters tend to want to find a creative take on a title - I was surprised how many songs were about “The” Blitz. Not a bad thing, just surprised.

It will be interesting to say what the judges say, and I’m anxious to be back in the fray with so many great musicians.

Ross wrote:
# - Good: Sillyness. Choral/coral pun. Your commitment. Bad: I don’t get Octothorpe - honestly, I enjoyed Spud solo more. Choral/coral pun. The Title seems weekly tied in unless I’m missing something. The final rhyme. Challenge: (B)

Hey thanks for the nod on the solo stuff. I realize that you didn't' say that you actually enjoyed it, just that you enjoyed it more, but I'll take what I can get. It was fun, but lonely. Although we do try to tie in the title weekly, I think you mean weakly, and you may be missing something (or not).The Blitz is the fishermen (the dry-landers) coming to catch all the fish and eat them with the final non-rhyming lemons, which Mad Dog tried a little too hard to push into a rhyme, which it wasn't supposed to be. And while I agree that the pun figures into both sides of the good/bad equation, it, together with the title, pretty much generated the story line, assuming I am interpreting Stubs' lyrics correctly, which is always dangerous. And so is using that many commas in one sentence.

Ross wrote: AAA - Good: Build in arrangement. Bad: clipping and the drums got to me a little bit. Challenge: (C-) hmm - I guess it goes to what “Choral means” I felt that your vocal doubling was your attempt at choral, but it didn’t really get very choral for me till near the end.

Thanks, though I am curious about this whole choral thing. I don't know much music theory or history, I kind of hoped that having a few people singing would satisfy the chllenge. What do you, and others I suppose, feel "choral vocals" means? It seems to be pretty loose, and I wouldn't mind, but if my attempt gets such a low score on the challenge from you I wonder if it will from others (judges).

Ross wrote:

eBow solo (is that really a different instrument though? Seriously

Although that is E-bow bass on the 1st half of the song, the guitar solo is just slide guitar. I should tell you that I like my right hand vibrato with a slide much more than my left hand slide vibrato. So I played the solo left handed (left hand picking, right hand sliding/fretting) with my guitar on my lap (I'm a right handed guitar player). It's probably my personal favorite solo I've submitted. Thanks for the high marks!

Ross wrote:JBB - Good: Vocal stuff is awesome. (I wish I had a cool voice). Spirit of the song. Theme of the song. Reminds me a bit of La Valse, high society dancing itself against a background of decay. Bad: Clipping. Spirit of the song - it drifted from jubilant to in-my-face - deliberate? Challenge: (A) JBB featuring the swingle singers.

The mix did turn out hotter than I thought, and is definitely too loud. It doesn't quite clip on my nearfields or even my ipod earbuds, but it's a close thing. I'll have to remix to fix that, but I'm going to wait until I've upgraded my hardware. This song maxed my computer-- the Cubase CPU-load meter was juuuust below the orange, and when I had everything turned on it stuttered like mad making it impossible to truly mix the song with all the effects loaded. I couldn't even freeze the effects, because all my effects were applied to group tracks and not individual tracks-- you can't freeze groups in the version of Cubase that I have. Like most of us, that's one item on a list of things I'd like to fix if I ever remix the song.

I like writing history songs (see my "Wrath of God" about Abelard & Heloise or "Listen Close" about Phidippides), and this is one of them. The lyrics are about kids during wartime wanting to be kids, and the necessity for life to go on to a certain extent even though you might be killed at any moment, or what're we fightin' for anyway. They were inspired by this woman's personal account, which I discovered while trying to come up with an angle for the song. That story moved me to tears. I was definitely trying to be more poignant than subtle this time.

Thanks for the thoughtful review, Ross. I will follow up with some of my own soon.

JB

adamadamant wrote: Thanks, though I am curious about this whole choral thing. I don't know much music theory or history, I kind of hoped that having a few people singing would satisfy the chllenge. What do you, and others I suppose, feel "choral vocals" means? It seems to be pretty loose, and I wouldn't mind, but if my attempt gets such a low score on the challenge from you I wonder if it will from others (judges).

Those who have been involved in the last few Ein!s can you tell you that I tend to be kinda harsh on the challenge end. In the past it seems to me that as long as the fighter clearly took on the challenge thats good enough and the rest of the ranking is for the song as a whole.

As far as "choral" it tends to me to conjure a relatively large group of voices (like larger than 3 ) usually a bunch. Many opera "chorus" pieces have all the syllables lined up, as opposed to counterpoint (like most of the Halleluja chorus from the messiah (an oratorio), but a high school Chorus might sing more than only "chorus"s. It is a fairly flexible term, but usually relates to a large group of singers. If I had not been immune this week I probably would have toaken the time to double the number of voices in my "choral" bit.

Ross wrote:KEN - (is that a keyboard or a softsynth?)

Softsynth. The A1 synth that comes with Cubase. I had originally used a Rhodes patch for this part and then when I moved the project to my laptop to record the drums I didn't have it and used this bell/DX7 sound instead. I liked it so much better I kept it for the final track.

Ken

Ross wrote: BLT - Good: The way you play them geetars. Groove! Bad: some vocal moments. Acoustic guitar sound. Some of the lyrics are a bit round about. Challenge: (C-)I’m not sure this is much different than your usual vocal stuff with a few extra voices - but I hear that you tried it in that context.

Yeah, I had a nice choral thing going, and I fricking ruined it with too much everything. Then as a last minute attempt to keep it from drowning out the chorus vocals, I cut it way back. It started out so nice with just my son Cody and his new wife Itzel. Then everyone watching us wanted to sing too, so I recorded 4 other voices all at once including my wife, which was horrible. So I tried to add more and more reverb to get it sounding right, but I over did it.
I wish you were doing my acoustic guitar, you get such a nice sound.

jb wrote:The lyrics are about kids during wartime wanting to be kids, and the necessity for life to go on to a certain extent even though you might be killed at any moment, or what're we fightin' for anyway. They were inspired by this woman's personal account, which I discovered while trying to come up with an angle for the song.

Wow, thanks for posting your inspiration. That's a scary, amazing story. I'm so glad that we have sites that collect stories like this, so that they are not lost to the mists of time. I have to admit I haven't heard your entry but I'm going to have to download it now...
-bill

We are having a case of missing judge syndrome. Hopefully it will clear up soon.

I predict the following people will be dropped, though this prediction is not a function of how much I enjoyed the respective songs: jim t, myself, paco, #, tex

reviews:
adam adamant: i like the beat and the various sounds, but the
song is a bit repetitive.

add: super catchy. i really enjoy the synth sounds you've been using lately. this is great.

BLT: sweet riff. the vocals veer into nasal territory, but they sound good!

Bryan K: i like the mix a lot. it's very encompassing. the song is a bit repetitive though, lyrically and musically

frankie: this has a timeless sound to it.. especially that upwards
progression during the "very first time..." sections. the marching
band accent is awesome, but when the choir comes in the similar role
later, the monotonicity(?) is a bit of a letdown. mixwise, the lead
vocals sound kinda detached from the rest. but still this is great.

G&R: the guitar sound against that huge bass sound is a bit weird in
the beginning. R's solo vox are a bit offputting, but I love it when
the 2 of you are singing together. G's solo vocal part sounds like
some older Michael Jackson song. i like the lyrics. this is really good.

jim t: wow! great singing.. it's a bit repetitive, but it sounds great.

JB: like frankie's, this has a timeless sound to it. some classic
anthem. it's great (though as noted the mix is too hot or
something).

ken: awesome! such attitude! everything sounds great.

#: definitely a better opening sound than an alarm clock. this is
the # I know and love... that mechanical drum riff cracks me up
every time. zany and super. is that harp(?) a sample?

paco: the G&G intro goes on a little too long. the choral voices
sound good though. this sounds like some renaissance festival
minstrel. i like the change into the rockin part, but the snare is
too loud. definitely a cool song though.

ross: you and king arthur make this kind of music sound easy. it is
good, but not something i would listen to a lot. i really like the
choral part!

tex: i like the "negro spiritual" vibe. and the weird pitch
shifting delays.. it's a cool dichotomy. the song does reek a bit
of loops, however. the german talking is a bit out of place, and
definitely too loud! some really neat ideas here.

WSA: that guitar tone is sweet. the staccato vocals at the
beginning are not really pleasing. i'm not that into the lyrics.
the second half is a nice change a pace.. throughout the song, the
sound of everything is really neat, but i'm not sure the sum is
greater than the parts.

starfinger wrote:I predict the following people will be dropped, though this prediction is not a function of how much I enjoyed the respective songs: jim t, myself, paco, #, tex

reviews:
frankie: ...when the choir comes in the similar role
later, the monotonicity(?) is a bit of a letdown.

you are absolutely right. I tried to do some things with stereo separation to make up for the monochromatic sound (!) and I couldn't get it to work. My choir samples were also not exactly what I needed either, unfortunately. I thought about switching the verses around, but I wanted to get that snare drum in there. very astute observations, my friend. perhaps you'd like to be my producer?!

frankie big face wrote:perhaps you'd like to be my producer?!

sure! while i'm not sure you need an extra producer, i do have a lot of sounds at my disposal over here...

-craig

starfinger wrote:I predict the following people will be dropped, though this prediction is not a function of how much I enjoyed the respective songs: jim t, myself, paco, #, tex

Only four entrants will be eliminated this round.

http://www.songfight.net/forums/viewtop ... =26&t=5303

I’m halfway through proper reviews at home, but really quick what I think:

Adam Adamant- Great song, worried about challenge fulfillment.
ADD- Great song! Safe! (bit of a cop out on the choral voices sample)
BLT- I don’t like the song, hate the lyrics, production is great. Worried.
BK- Fantastic, possible winner, certainly Safe!
FBF- OK song, weak on the challenge, slightly worried.
G&R- Good song, great diminished chord, safe!
JT- Great singing, does harmony = choral singing? Worried.
JBB- AWESOME, probable winner. I expected nothing less for this challenge. Safe!
Ken- Great song! Challenge met. Safe!
Octothorpe- Enjoyable insanity. Very worried.
PDS- Great song!, I fear the judges don’t realize your genius, worried.
Starfinger- Patch fufills challenge, cool weird song. Worried.
Tex- OK song, enjoyable. Meets challenge. Worried.
WSA- I can’t believe this doesn’t knock everyone’s socks off, but I’m not objective. Worried.

glennny wrote:does harmony = choral singing?

We'll find out. I tried to do what seemed to serve the song best. I don't always succeed in that, and it certainly isn't always in my best interests points-wise. But the alternative usually leaves me with a song that either sounds forced or plays it too safe. I dunno.

I am just about to go out of town for the weekend where I will have no internet access until Sunday. I was hoping the results, and more importantly the next challenge, would be posted by now. That way I could at least be putting together some ideas while I'm away. I guess if I'm in the next round, I'll just have to put together a song pretty fast next week. The next round's song isn't due on Monday again, is it?

The eight day schedule causes it to move forward a day each round. It should be due on Tuesday morning. Good luck making the cut.

SPUD

bck15 wrote:I am just about to go out of town for the weekend where I will have no internet access until Sunday. I was hoping the results, and more importantly the next challenge, would be posted by now. That way I could at least be putting together some ideas while I'm away. I guess if I'm in the next round, I'll just have to put together a song pretty fast next week. The next round's song isn't due on Monday again, is it?

The deadline for entering round four is supposed to be Tuesday, according to the schedule in this post:

http://www.songfight.net/forums/viewtop ... =26&t=5303

I don't know how/if this delay will affect that.

ADAM ADAMANT - I like you. I have no reason, other than you make interesting and quirky music. It would be easy to pick apart this song, but I find it to be charming. I think you're going to get slammed for not addressing the challenge, but that doesn't mean you don't have a good song.

ADD - This reminds me of a strange pseudo-Christian band I used to enjoy in the late 80s called Daniel Amos and late just DA. Despite being the furthest thing from a Christian, I couldn't resist their music. Why? Because it sounds JUST LIKE THIS AWESOME SONG I AM ENJOYING RIGHT NOW. I haven't listened to your re-mix yet, but this is a fucking good song and makes me ashamed to be in your company.

BLT - I couldn't get into this song. Just not my thing I guess. Some good innuendo, though. I also don't think you fulfilled the challenge, so you may get zonked for that.

BK - Maybe my expectations were set too high based on other reviews, but I didn't enjoy this song as much as everyone else. There's nothing wrong with it per se, but there's nothing particularly special in my opinion.

G&R - I like the lyrics to this song. I can live without the music. See, these sound like "choral voices." You pass the test of the challenge. By the end, I liked this song more than I thought I would.

JT - This is well-done, but I just can't take a song about a football player seriously. There's a Fountains of Wayne song called "All Kinds of Time" which has a verse about a quarterback and I can't enjoy that song either. But you did a good job with your vox, even thought I also don't consider this to "choral voices."

JBB - This challenge was obviously made for you, given your love of the harmony vocal. And you brought it--I'll give you that. My favorite thing about this song is the sound of your voice on the verses. It's a little raspy and there's some nice distortion in there. I know this is a song you would be really happy with and so I am happy for you! (I like it too, in case that last sentence made it sound like I didn't.) Interesting lyrics--I'm not going to read the back story.

Uh oh, I can't get any of the songs all of a sudden. I'll continue this in a few moments hopefully.