PERSONAL PROJECT

PLAN: 

I'm recording a 14 track album of my own original songs. I will record all of the instruments whether MIDI or real other than the drums which will be programmed by my dad although I will always have the final say and direct him in the way that I want the drums to sound or how much I want them in specific parts of songs. I will record at home using a focusrite and a free DAW called Bandlab. I'll record ghost tracks for all the songs and then this will be the basis for the drums, MIDI and all the recordings. I'll then mix the tracks and add any plugins/effects that I think enhance the sound and then I'll use the AI mastering feature offered on Bandlab for the finish. I plan to release it at the end of October using Ditto Music and then I will use social media (Facebook, Instagram and Youtube) for promotion. I want to create and release an album because I want to create a career in recording and performing my own music and I also would like to move on to university after college and so this album will act as part of my portfolio of work. The way that I will manage my time is by using a weekly diary where I can write in what I plan to do on each day in order to achieve the longer term goals of the project. 



I found an old video from a year and a half ago of me playing a short thing on the piano that I'd made up and I kind of liked it so I taught myself how to play it and then added a slightly more developed bit on the end and then I was bored so I recorded it and added a string synth and a 'jazz' piano sound that I had on my keyboard and then mixed it and I thought it sounded quite encompassing and full and so this inspired me to use this as a similar technique on some of the tracks on my album. Below is a recording of the short piece I made. Doing this, despite being just for fun, inspired me to think about adding this type of thing to some of my tracks. 

Piano Experiment - recording



DEMOGRAPHIC - young people who like indie pop and about mental health stuff. Although my YouTube says it's mostly middle aged men.


I was worried about the violin that I added for Robot as I wasn't sure if it sounded slightly wrong and my dad assured me it didn't and that's the way strings sound and, to demonstrate this, he played Eleanor Rigby and this inspired me to add strings onto more songs and to make it all epic because the strings in that song are amazing, providing bass and rhythm to it and I love the atmosphere and details and the feel it supplies the song. This makes me want to have more use of strings within my music - it could be a defining factor for the listener of my songs. 


Spent time with Alfie working out guitar lines and what works. Went more bluesy with it and communicated about guitar adding to vocals and not fighting for space in the track with them. I am very happy with this session and I think it went very well. We worked on Robot, Hey Mister and Laura and had simple but effective guitar lines.  

After doing some recording, we decided to leave Robot for now due to the complexity in adding guitar into an already very full track. We recorded some bits for Laura and Hey Mister however I'm thinking of changing them as I feel like what I want is more to do with riffs.

Originally, to give him an idea, I sent him three tracks (Dear John, All Too Well, Last Kiss)

But now I'm thinking of things more like indie band riffs. I've searched up on Google "best indie band guitar riffs" and now I'm listening to them. My list of songs I've found include: There She Goes, The Unguarded Moment, You Must be Prepared to Dream and You'll Never Get to Me. To clarify, I don't want as much distortion as these tracks due to my songs not being as heavy - I've chosen them because of the riffs specifically. We mainly only used There She Goes.

Part of me is thinking of having Alfie listen to these songs separately and then spending time coming up with things for my tracks so that he can perfect them a bit more as otherwise, it sounds improvised because it is improvised. I reckon I'll use this session to show him some riffs that I found, get him to "jam" a bit and record some ideas and then send him the tracks so that he can either build off those ideas or play something different and be able to get it to fit and enhance the track. 


I hadn't done the album for a while and felt overwhelmed so I listed all the tracks I need to do and listened to them all and made notes about what I need to and this allowed me to break it down more and made it more manageable to get back into the swing of things. This is what I wrote:

Gravity - electric guitar too loud, just electric guitar chords during verse? Timing on electric guitar, no electric guitar during verses after c1, add strings? (Not oomphy enough - chorus - MIDI for lower), keep electric and acoustic guitars on bridge but have electric more ethereal, vocal (last bit of last c bit weird - check whole thing though), no weird ending note electric guitar   

Laura - Electric guitar pick chorus? Pick one note per bar for ethereal effect? Write string parts (maybe just MIDI if all low?) Vocals, Alfie part doesn't fit, add ooos 

Luna light - Record strings (utilise MIDI for low) Vocals maybe? Last chorus, weird note), need strings in verse? Maybe not or maybe more subtle, prominent strings in bridge 

Mirror Maze - electric guitar timing, record strings (utilise MIDI for lower) Vocals (breakdown 1st pc), electric guitar stick to pick (no strum), last few months Vocals, end strings ascend 

Robot - rerecord lower violin to ascend towards instruments coming in, edit Vocals, electric guitar on bridge for impact 

If you were here - rerecord bass, bass come in pc?, Vocals thin? 

Hey Mister - mix, redo guitar, as much as it pains me - redo the vocals (not all of them?), rerecord bridge with distorted electric? 

Used to Be - write strings, rerecord bass (2nd half 1st c), vocals check, rerecord piano (and add small bits to enhance), add electric guitar (pick!), lead up to outro 

Stitch by Stitch - perfect timing on everything (guitar, bass), big vocal check, electric guitar maybe? Might not need it, better vocal bridge 

Hey Stranger - rerecord guitar


I was concerned with my monthly listeners going down and me having to push back the deadline of my album due to the unforeseen inclusion of Alfie. My parents mentioned to me about releasing something to keep up momentum so I don't lose my listeners and suggested I release a single of a song I wrote recently called "Wrong Number". After consideration of time, resources and stress, I decided to do it. I recorded a ghost track which only took 9 minutes and then I recorded the guitar and bass the next day. My dad also programmed the drums and then showed me and we worked together to perfect them for the song, after a bit more time, I'm still slightly unsure of one bit but I think that's because it's new. Another aspect is I realised about how much I don't like the lyrics of the choruses and bridge because they're so literal and so I rewrote them, keeping elements of the old lyrics - I think this also played into my struggle of the new drums as I was also trying to figure out how the new words fit into the melody. 


Below are images of my planning diary with  plans on everything I need to record and when:


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