...And all I got was a tie? (World's Greatest Dad reviews)

[JonPorobil]

Get crackin'.

And a better gift might not hurt, too.

[JonPorobil]

Is it just my speakers, or are just about everyone's vocals mixed too low? Full reviews forthcoming.

[ElaineDiMasi]

Rat Tail - Listenable once but no trip anywhere interesting.

Steve Durand - As usual, you put thought into the story, and it certainly does get told. But everything sounds forced - melody, lyrics, horns, everything.

Paco del Stinko - Nice backing track. I love the 3+3+2 feel, it's like comfort food.

Signboy - A high point. Wall-of-sound design, anthemic melody. I'm running to the forum to see if the lyrics are written down because I can't understand them all. [not there] [listens more carefully, again twice] Ok, this works for me! At first I wanted more development but then I figured I was wrong, the instrumental bit before the last chorus is all it really needs. Joyful noise and all that. Vote!

Ford's Theater Disaster - Pacing change after the little intro doesn't work; makes me forget the first bit. But the groove it gets replaced with isn't bad. The rather tuneless vocals aren't working for me here. I can see the point with respect to the mood but lack of distinct melody is making the accompaniment seem arbitrary instead of musical in a lot of places. The take on the title is twisted but kinda cool. Definitely a FTD song.

Pathetic Wannabees - Random and not a larger-than-life experience of randomness.

Weakest Suit - "So they lick that stamp" is a great closing line for that first verse. "I let the coffee mug speak for me" is another vivid one. The lyrics around them are kind of slow-moving, and the chorus doesn't get me singing along.

2dogs - I don't know what this is saying, so it just goes around and around. It doesn't help that the verse melody itself has little looping repetitions within the larger repetition. Sounds heartfelt, so I hope it works for you as a personal song.

Crank Radio - [shrug]

DJ Master Exodus - The complaints about the bad dad here are mostly trite. I do like the way the "and my brothers" bits are tossed out there. Makes it spookier, to match the backing.

Semolina Pilchards - Sounded like a band was coming until the child-voice, off-putting, but then real vox and a five-meter so - do I like it? I like this about every 12 bars then I dislike stuff - kind of a patchwork. I think this is a maybe-vote just because I want to hear you do more fights, more music, even if nothing-lyrics have to come along. I'm checking you out in the archive, anyway. Yeah, more later!

[2dogs]

I'm surprised to see only 11 entries. Mine was in french to make sure the old man could understand it. I hope some of you will understand some of it. If not some wine will help. See if you can pick out the swear word Oui !!!!! With only two hours to slap mine together, I kept it simple and to the point, mixed it real quick and then left for a week long road trip. Oh well. I will eventually have enough time to do a good job.

Thanks for the effort everyone. I enjoyed each one. Here are my thoughts;

Steve Durand. Great story. Made me smile. Nice instrumental variety that suits the style.
Signboy, nice guitar play. I would have liked more volume on the vocals. I think this would be a real killer.
Weakest Suit. I liked the guitar tone and the meaning you conveyed in the lyrics.
Pathetic Wannabees, cool tune with the effects in the background.
Crank Radio, that was cool also. Reminds me of days gone by spending hours meditating before kicking some ass in the dojo. I really liked the ending.
DJ Master, nice beat, the lyrics are meaningful, it would be cool to hear this one with echo/delay in strategic places instead of all over.
Paco del Stinko, nice melody, good lyrics and the mixdown is good mate.
Ford's Theater, I like this tune, nice buildup and I really like the effects on the vocals in the chorus. The mixdown is well done with effective stereo spreader to create interest and the bridge is very good as well. The instrumentation is well executed. Strong contender for my vote. Almost made it.
Rat Tale, a cool tune with something that reminds me of a kind of live acoustic Beatles composition.

Samolina, brother, you got my vote this week. The melody is strong, lyrics are good AND involving the little one is a nice touch that clenched it for me. You placed her vocals exactly where they needed to be. Damn, I knew I should have borrowed the neighbor's kid. The mix is good. Very nicely done. Just a great tune and I really enjoyed it.

Have a good weekend everyone and happy fathers day to all of you who are someone's "World's greatest dad" !!!!

[glennny]

Elaine said:

....I want to hear you do more fights, more music, even if nothing-lyrics have to come along.

If we sound familiar it's because Semolina Pilchards are a sub-set of the Berkeley Social Scene:

BSS= Ken, Glennny, Martyr, Lunkhead, Erin, Ryan, Geech (missing anyone?)
Semolina Pilchards= Glennny and Ken and sometimes Ryan
Older Brothers = Glennny and Martyr
Zinkline= Glennny, Martyr, Ken, and sometimes Lunkhead (like all the really good songs), and lyrics by mostly by Niveous
Tiny Robots= Ken, Erin, Lunkhead
Merisan= Erin and Lunkhead

anyway thanks for the review.

2 Dogs wrote:

Samolina, brother, you got my vote this week. The melody is strong, lyrics are good AND involving the little one is a nice touch that clenched it for me. You placed her vocals exactly where they needed to be. Damn, I knew I should have borrowed the neighbor's kid. The mix is good. Very nicely done. Just a great tune and I really enjoyed it.

Thanks very much! The kid vocals are none other than my daughter Annabella, she turns 4 tomorrow. She was born on Fathers day in 2005! Just like my sister 17 years earlier.

She's such a ham, hopefully I'll use some of the recording footage and get a video together, one of these days.

[Mike Lamb]

I'm rocking out.

[ElaineDiMasi]

....I want to hear you do more ...

If we sound familiar it's because Semolina Pilchards are a sub-set of the Berkeley Social Scene:

Maybe that subset does the dreamy 5/4 beat more often?

[ujnhunter]

Hey look! It's Mike Lamb!

[glennny]

Maybe that subset does the dreamy 5/4 beat more often?

For some 5/4 check out the regular fights:
Semolina Pilchards- For the Time Being
Berkshire Social Scene- Love Me a Little Bit More

Side Fights:
Nur Ein II -Thank Glennny for the Frisbee- Brownie Points: http://www.newzeromusic.com/nurein/Than ... Points.mp3
Zinkline 1st FAWM album-Sky is Falling: http://www.last.fm/music/Zinkline/_/Sky ... ?autostart

Then there's the songs with 5/4 sections:

Zipline- Anamoly : the intro and outro has a 5/4-5/8 riff
Berkeley Social Scene- Come Down Where you Ought to Be: The 2nd Verse is in 5/4
Zipline- Wedding Song- The 2nd section is in 5/4 ( the tapping and side stick instrumental part)

[DJ_Master_Exodus]

DJ Master Exodus Here Just Droping in to Say thanks for the Reviews Im vary new and I hope to be entering more.
Full Reviews Comeing Soon!

[Paco Del Stinko]

It appears as though the 2 Dogs song doesn't open in the stream all. Opens up on its own, however. Just didn't want to start a new thread, Spud, so hopin' you see this.

In other news, I was surprised at how few entries came in, I thought this would be a bigger fight. Bigger and stronger. No, not faster, Steve Austin was not involved. I'll review later. - Oscar Goldman.

[Spud]

It appears as though the 2 Dogs song doesn't open in the stream all. Opens up on its own, however. Just didn't want to start a new thread, Spud, so hopin' you see this.

Saw it, fixed it. Thanks.

[Rabid Garfunkel]

Ya spaced out, didn't'cha?

[Albatross]

Rat Tale - Neil Thrun, is that you??

[Spud]

Ya spaced out, didn't'cha?

uh...yeah...that's it.

[Caravan Ray]

Rat Tale - Neil Thrun, is that you??

Let him go Al. It's over. Just let go

[nyjm]

Pathetic Wannabees
+++ lyric concept +++
+++ cool-jazz-café-lounge vibe +++
--- needs more dynamism ---

2dogs
/// mais quel accent, eh? non, je rigole... ///
+++ très sincère... +++
--- ...mais également cliché ---
--- mec-et-guitaire manque d'intêret ---

Crank Radio
--- wuh? ---
/// cool tones & vibe - where's the rest of the song? ///

DJ Master Exodus
--- buried vox dripping with reverb ---
/// seems like a sketch more than a song ///
/// there's some neat prosody lurking about here, but it's buried in very uninteresting music ///

Paco del Stinko
+++ southern fried rock vibe +++
--- "aa-aa-aaa-aaint" ---
/// I'd like to hear more full/less falsetto on the backing vox ///
+++ way to channel Hank Williams Sr. and Johnny Cash; this is the same guy who named his kid "sue," isn't it? +++

The Semolina Pilchards
+++ kid vox really make this +++
--- slow or lacking a really driving force ---
+++ chorus +++
/// verse needs more differentiation from chorus ///

Signboy
+++ arena rock +++
--- vox are low in the mix ---
/// I'd trim off some reverb for the verse or the chorus (I'd go verse) and pull up the vox ///
/// I can't tell if this is sincere or a slick parody of God Rock ///

Steve Durand
+++ your lyrics always make me laugh +++
--- uncertain melody rhythm ---
--- the end of the story lacks a cool punch ---

Ford's Theater Disaster
+++ chorus ROCKS +++
/// try to rip off Nirvana and you get mixed results without Cobain's talent and Butch Vig's production skills ///
--- vox are low in the mix and need more snarl ---
+++ dynamics +++
/// that left-pan harmony guit needs to come down in the chorus ///

"Iron Man" Bobby Graham - Rat Tale?
--- singing from the back of the van across the street through a pipe ---
/// recorded fdrink? ///
--- very sideways take on the title ///

The Weakest Suit
+++ unassuming +++
/// lyrics would be better if they didn't explicitly state "World's Greatest Dad." There's some untapped potential for a great metaphor and would tie into the idea that you can't say it outright ///

[signboy]

/// I can't tell if this is sincere or a slick parody of God Rock ///

heh.

[nyjm]

/// I can't tell if this is sincere or a slick parody of God Rock ///

heh.

Right. Parody then. Should've known. Spot on for the genre.

[2dogs]

2dogs
/// mais quel accent, eh? non, je rigole... ///
+++ très sincère... +++
--- ...mais également cliché ---
--- mec-et-guitaire manque d'intêret ---

Thanks NYJM. I really appreciate the feedback. I only had 2 hours to slap it together unfortunately so its a bit thin. I wouldn't mind some tips on creating interest if you have any thoughts on that. I'm relatively new at this and I'd like to learn as much as I can.
Cheers,

[signboy]

Right. Parody then. Should've known. Spot on for the genre.

the funny thing is, I can't tell if it's a parody or not either.

[JonPorobil]

2dogs
/// mais quel accent, eh? non, je rigole... ///
+++ très sincère... +++
--- ...mais également cliché ---
--- mec-et-guitaire manque d'intêret ---

Thanks NYJM. I really appreciate the feedback. I only had 2 hours to slap it together unfortunately so its a bit thin. I wouldn't mind some tips on creating interest if you have any thoughts on that. I'm relatively new at this and I'd like to learn as much as I can.
Cheers,

"Creating interest..." Whoo. That's one we all struggle with. It seem that NYJM was mainly complaining about the lack of interest due to the simplicity of your mix, as it's mostly just the guitar and your voice. And for us non-francophones, you've got the added handicap that your lyrics can't draw us in (if you could post a translation, that would be wonderful!).

So the question, then, is how to keep a guy-and-guitar song "interesting," or at least not boring. I suggest first turning to those who've done it well. There are large gaps in my Songfight knowledge, but the best guy-and-guitar song I can think of on Songfight is JB's "Unless I Change My Mind."

There are many factors in a recording, but to reduce it to simply a singer and a guitar also reduces the number of such variables. It also means you need to positively nail the ones that are there. So, for instance, when the guitar is the only instrument, it needs to be played flawlessly. The voice also needs to hit every single note. There's no cushion of other music to absorb the error.

Part of what makes JB's track so great is his gorgeous voice, and obviously, you're stuck with the voice you have, but you sound in your song like you're straining to hit some of the higher verse notes.

And then of course there's the melody. With only a minimal arrangement, you've only got the guitar and your voice. They should ideally both be doing something interesting. Listen to the melody in JB's track; it goes all over the place, but never feels forced. It draws our attention with its complexity. I can't tell you how to write a good melody. If I could, I'd be rich enough to give everyone here a studio-quality microphone.

Which brings me to my next point: recording quality. Because the guy-and-guitar song is such an intimate form, in general, one wants the recording not to sound like a recording at all. Both the guitar and voice should sound very crisp, clean, and present. In your track, the guitar sounds thin, and your voice sounds overprocessed (mainly too much reverb, I think). Both of these draw attention to the fact that it's a recording. On JB's recording, I'm sure the guitar and the voice both have some effects on them, but the paradoxical effect is that it makes the whole track sound "dry." I feel like I'm in the room with JB, and he's singing to me. It's nice.

If you don't like JB's track, there's tons of alternatives. Martin Sexton and Colin Meloy have both recently released guy-and-guitar live albums. And there's tons of great videos of people doing good solo performances on Youtube. I'm sure other people in this thread will be able to point you to their favorite instances of guy-and-guitar done really well.

None of this advice is guaranteed to "generate interest" where there's not already some interest present. But hopefully, if you're able to remove the things that are making it harder for people to actually hear the song in your song, then it'll keep people from missing out on the interest that's already there.

It's tricky, I know. I've been doing this for six years, and I still don't think I can pull off a good guy-and-guitar song.