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Friday Influences Thread 6-26-15

Lee Knight

By Lee Knight
in Songwriting Workshop

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Lee Knight Rookie

Lee Knight

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Hi. It's been a while...

 

Here's something I've been listening to a lot. I like him.

 

I know I'll do it again

I know we're gonna collide

I know we'll call it the end

But it's always always a lie

You wear your heart on your sleeve

I wear my blood on my tie

But it's only love underneath, this disguise

 

[video=youtube;2S42Gy6weA8]

 

If you don't bleed it, you don't need it anymore

If you don't need it, get up and leave it on the floor

No more believing like it's a voice you can't ignore

If you don't need it you don't need it no

 

[video=youtube;PjCqsWxIg9k]

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mbfrancis Newbie

mbfrancis

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Welcome back, Lee!

 

This song is amazing and brand new, want my stuff to sound this good: Tear in My Heart by 21 Pilots.

 

[video=youtube;nky4me4NP70]

 

I think Taylor Swift is a great pop songwriter: You Belong With Me, Fifteen, We Are Never Getting..., 22, Blank Space, etc - wish I were that annoying. smile.png

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Lee Knight Rookie

Lee Knight

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I like that ^^^ track a lot. I heard it on Sirius and had to go track it down.

 

So... I don't know Adam Lambert from... Adam (except that my wife did cut his hair a few years ago and came home and said, "I cut and colored this adorable gay kid's hair today from Poway ((whitebread suburb of San Diego)), says he's a singer and is going to be huge!" We both smile at the youthful delusion. Next year he almost wins one of those vocal competition TV shows and releases record and is now big and famous blah blah blah).

 

So, I don't care if Lambert wrote and produced this (most likely didn't, I'm sure) or simply showed up, tracked, and went back out on a tour sponsored by Office Max. Regardless, what it does for me is remind me of how little structure we have to adhere to today writing current pop music. The walls, in a lot of ways, have been toppled. For the worse for sure. But in some ways for the better.

 

Justin/Bee seems to be full aware of how one can deviate from accepted structure. Very much for the better in his case. Justin clearly knows structure and uses it, until... he doesn't want to, cause, "I want it to sound like this right here right now." Following that sound in his head. Structure and trad arrangements be damned if necessary.

 

I went scouring the charts, literally listening to every Billboard charted tune from all the main charts. I was searching for a hit's drum mix to reference for a Bee3 mix. The thing is... there are no traditional drum tracks. For better or worse, if it's a full natural kit, today they'll skip the full hit snare and use brushes or just the hat. Or more commonly, just use samples and machines ETC. Better or worse.

 

Now check how far from normal this soon to be smash wow hit is. Skip the typical critic perusal we all perform, us in our infinite songwriterly wisdom, and just note how far from tradition the structure and arrangement are. Personally? I love it.

 

[video=youtube;Ix8ocFEMa1o]

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mbfrancis Newbie

mbfrancis

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I like that ^^^ track a lot. I heard it on Sirius and had to go track it down.

 

So... I don't know Adam Lambert from... Adam (except that my wife did cut his hair a few years ago and came home and said, "I cut and colored this adorable gay kid's hair today from Poway ((whitebread suburb of San Diego)), says he's a singer and is going to be huge!" We both smile at the youthful delusion. Next year he almost wins one of those vocal competition TV shows and releases record and is now big and famous blah blah blah).

 

So, I don't care if Lambert wrote and produced this (most likely didn't, I'm sure) or simply showed up, tracked, and went back out on a tour sponsored by Office Max. Regardless, what it does for me is remind me of how little structure we have to adhere to today writing current pop music. The walls, in a lot of ways, have been toppled. For the worse for sure. But in some ways for the better.

 

Justin/Bee seems to be full aware of how one can deviate from accepted structure. Very much for the better in his case. Justin clearly knows structure and uses it, until... he doesn't want to, cause, "I want it to sound like this right here right now." Following that sound in his head. Structure and trad arrangements be damned if necessary.

 

I went scouring the charts, literally listening to every Billboard charted tune from all the main charts. I was searching for a hit's drum mix to reference for a Bee3 mix. The thing is... there are no traditional drum tracks. For better or worse, if it's a full natural kit, today they'll skip the full hit snare and use brushes or just the hat. Or more commonly, just use samples and machines ETC. Better or worse.

 

Now check how far from normal this soon to be smash wow hit is. Skip the typical critic perusal we all perform, us in our infinite songwriterly wisdom, and just note how far from tradition the structure and arrangement are. Personally? I love it.

 

[video=youtube;Ix8ocFEMa1o]

 

Hey Lee--

I'm not sure it's as different as you suspect: verse, chorus/refrain, repeat bridge, chorus. I love the verses, smart lyrics - maybe too smart for the genre (e.g., love is satire). But to me it sounds like a song where they took a an acoustic song, did an EDM remix of it, and for the final they switched between the versions. The challenge is it lives/dies on the whistle hook + electro bassline, rather than a vocal chorus..."my heart is a ghost town" is all we get, with no real variations. If you don't like the whistle, or you get tired of it (it doesn't change, or evolve), the song dies or you. Definitely a remarkable recording though, a creative mix, and a smooth production - I was kind of in awe of the vocal quality, even on a YT clip.

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Lee Knight

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Good observations. I was mildly aware that I was being inaccurate regarding uniqueness of "structure". However... being immersed in mixing of late, I tend to blur the lines in what the definition of structure really is.

 

 

 

Structure, in the end game, when that new baby of a song of ours, is finally being massaged into its final and ultimate form... the record, the recording, it's really all about forward motion. Facilitating the appreciation and comprehension of an idea. An emotion. An intangible mood and feel.

 

 

 

Over time.

 

 

 

Songs are linear. Like Barbasol signs on a desert road revealing themselves... over time. Pushing, pulling, tugging... stalling...

 

 

 

all in an artfully crafted means to an end, communicating.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey Lee--

 

I'm not sure it's as different as you suspect: verse, chorus/refrain, repeat bridge, chorus. I love the verses, smart lyrics - maybe too smart for the genre (e.g., love is satire). But to me it sounds like a song where they took a an acoustic song, did an EDM remix of it, and for the final they switched between the versions. The challenge is it lives/dies on the whistle hook + electro bassline, rather than a vocal chorus..."my heart is a ghost town" is all we get, with no real variations. If you don't like the whistle, or you get tired of it (it doesn't change, or evolve), the song dies or you. Definitely a remarkable recording though, a creative mix, and a smooth production - I was kind of in awe of the vocal quality, even on a YT clip.

 

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mbfrancis Newbie

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Actually, Lee, I think I stand corrected. On my way into work this morning I heard the new Justin Bieber (Skrillex & Diplo) - which is actually amazing and wonderful - and I heard it in a whole new light given your post. I meant to post when I got in but forgot, and away the day went. (Funny LCK posted Justin Bieber.)

 

The track has the same format: standard verse followed by massive pounding EDM hook, which carries the weight normally held by the sung chorus. This *is* new, I think, although honestly, I'm not crazy about it - give me a hooky chorus anytime. smile.png I think this drove my reaction to the Adam Lambert...such great verses, left unpaid off (for me).

 

[EDIT: the question is, why do I like the Bieber track but not the Lambert? Dunno.]

 

Anyway, sorry for popping off. Here's the wonderful Bieber track:

 

[video=youtube;nntGTK2Fhb0]

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Foose31 Newbie

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I've posted this Peter Rowan video before and in my opinion it's that good to post it again.

 

 

[video=youtube;5p0AryAE6Bw]

 

 

Well I married me a wife, she gave me trouble all my life

Left me out in the cold rain and snow

Rain and snow…………

She left me out in the cold rain and snow

She came down the stairs holding back her long yellow hair

And her cheeks were as red as a rose

As a rose………………..

And her cheeks were as red as a rose

Well I’ve done all that I can do to try to get along with you

And I ain’t gonna be treated this old way

This old way……………

Now I ain’t gonna be treated this old way

We’ll she came in to the room where she met her final doom

And I ain’t gonna be treated this old way

This old way………………

Now I ain’t gonna be treated this old way

She left me out in the cold rain and snow

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LCK Newbie

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Marc Jordan, "Slow Bombing the World."

 

[video=youtube;oy6j4TtEUO0]

“Slow Bombing the World”

 

There’s a hotel in Paris where

the windows look out to sea

So many people stay there,

some dead and some like me.

 

I saw Chet Baker’s name on

the wall of the restaurant

and “Timothy Leary” carved on

the window in 503.

 

It’s not in Algeria.

And it’s midnight on the midnight express.

It’s all part of evolution, babe,

slow bombing the world.

Slow bombing the world.

 

I walked on the bricks of heaven,

saw the boats on the Seine,

met an old friend I used to talk to

till the morning came.

 

He’s livin’ with Evelyn,

and he paints stuff and walks around town.

All cigarettes and magazines

and I know I’ve lost what he has found.

 

Slow bombing the world.

Slow bombing the world.

 

And it’s written on the subway walls:

Russian girls love China boys.

 

There’s a hotel in Paris where

the windows look out to sea.

A girl with a candle burning

and playing for free,

and her face is like an angel

lookin’ up at me.

 

Slow bombing the world.

Slow bombing the world.

 

© 1999 by Marc Jordan

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LCK Newbie

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That's the one. We have a hair salon and I see those blue disinfectant filled Barbosol jars all the time. It got stuck in there. But yeah, Burma Shave!

 

You have a hair salon?

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