prow ca4 journal

prow ca4 journal

for this assignment, i wanted to try making a building in a minimalistic approach. for the song choice, i was actually pretty lost because i did not really know what to do. i made up my mind when i was having a talk with my band keyboardist dayang about bernice's music.

i learned that she learned some of her songs, i asked her if she's down to cover one of bernice's song.
and she agreed.

i recorded her vocals and acoustic guitar at her bouse, everything was recorded with a sm58 mic.

we were being casual during recording and they were some small talks inside the track. i thought of keeping some talks that were recorded. i feel that it suits the DIY indie folk sound i was going for.

prow ca3

We had many try and errors during our time producing the two songs. To be honest it was pretty challenging to brainstorm ideas out of nowhere.

We had many ideas for the 2 songs that we needed to produce. However, it clashes with our different style of playing.

Figuring the middle ground for the prow assignment is probably the hardest part. But once we found the sound, it was easy for us to do songwriting.

We thought of producing for an artist but we feel that it was hard to connect with someone we barely know to create music. So we decided to create a group instead.

In the beginning we wanted to produce for our own band that we formed for this year's DMAT show which include Zidann, Bernice Lee, Zhi Yi, Vincent, Jun Heng and myself. Everyone agreed to the idea but as time progresses, it was harder to communicate as Bernice Lee and Zhi Yi are committed to other assignment too.

The three of us agreed to make a new group which consist of a smaller circle, the three of us with Jun Heng and Raizel. With this line up, workflow was actually pretty smooth.

The first demo we took was taken from sheer procrastination when Zidann, Vincent and I had were skipping class and taking naps in one of the classroom.

We had an idea of just booking a studio and record some song. We booked Studio D and borrowed some drum and guitar mics and start to record ideas.

All of the drums recording were all recorded in Studio D as the acoustics of the room fits the sound that we are all going for.
Also it was easier to book it as not many students will book that studio for recording.

I find it easy to record in that studio too as I'm very comfortable using the QU 24 mixer over the SSLs.

From that day onward, we keep having ideas after ideas where we just take 2 ideas from the collection of demos we wrote. We took Leon's idea and just write songs that we all enjoy.

The first song is a lo-fi idea that blends with Vincent's math rock guitar playing skills and zidann's inspired J Dilla's backbeat which makes the track catchy and technical at the same time.

The second song is our first demo the we ever recorded, we took different drum recording for this one. We decided to use the first drum recording as our final take.

Our song writing structure is actually pretty simple, we get to a studio and we show ideas that we have and we work from there. Once the idea is taking shape, with the confirmed arrangement we took a video or audio recording as reference so we could listen to it again.

Once we have a complete demo, we record the drum track first as the instruments are following the drums. We send Zidann a click for him to make sure he is in a right pace.

After that we record the guitar and the bass. We record the prominent instruments first before we layer the tracks with vocals and keys.

Prow week 11

We used the previous task as a reference and we track a bass and guitar in school. Vincent used a melodica in the background. I feel the production had the lofi sound like what we intended in the first place.

prow week 3

plan- finish arrangement

do- figure the arrangement, try and error if need to

check- double check i dont overdo it.

reflect- i tried my best to use the smith influences on this track

prow week 2

reflect- i had a vision to re-create the smiths vibe while adding my own twist to it. Leon said i pull i off well, maybe i dont have to redo it. the only problem im facing at the moment is to arrange it to a full song.

plan- i have send my tracks to my friends and ask for their inputs which would help me which direction to take.

do- i plan to start doing the arrangement with the guitar first as it was the main instrument i used to create the track.

week 1 prow 6 degrees

Lyrics are dramatic and bleak, influenced by kitchen sink drama
Lyrics tends to avoid mentioning the genders

Influenced by cilia black and her northern England accent
And mixed it with his baritone vocals

Vegetarian since 11 and grew up to be an animal right advocate
Can be shown on the album meat is murder