Task 1: Three Minute Song Production (70%)

Task 2: 1000 Word Write-Up (30%)

My chosen song, ‘STAY’, is an original song that I wrote around a month ago. The songs lyrics deal with themes of emotional confliction, homesickness and a feeling of being lost in the uncertainty of the future but eventually coming to term with that, and embracing the uncertainty. Therefore, I knew, from a production standpoint, before recording anything, that I wanted it to be relatively minimalistic and relaxed, focusing more on the emotion from the lyrics, and not distracting from that with a complex and overpowering instrumental. The song was written on guitar, so going into it, I knew that the guitar a lead vocal would be the main focus, but that I would aim to decorate the background of the song with various accompanying layers.

I recorded virtually every element of this song in a single studio session, with the help of my friend Lucas, who ran the session while I recorded, and gave additional insight and opinions into the production. The first thing we recorded with guitar and vocals together. I wanted to song to feel very raw and honest, almost like a live performance, so rather than recording section by section, overdubbing the verses and choruses, I instead wanted to just record the whole song in one take, guitar and vocals together. This meant that it was much more difficult, because, for example, if I made a mistake a minute and a half into the song, I would have to go back to the start and re-record. I also then decided that recording with a click track would make it easier to get into a rhythm, and also to double the guitar and vocals later.

Once I had two solid takes of the whole song, I went back into the control room, made the decision to play both the same time an hard pan them, listened through, before finally deciding that even though the two takes together, panned, sounded nice, that we needed one more definitive ‘lead’ part. So, I went back into the live room, and recorded the whole song, just on the guitar, without singing, so that I could focus on getting the perfect guitar recording. Once I had finished that, I then recorded the vocals again, overdubbing the existing vocals, with slight rhythmic variations on certain lines. My idea was that the ‘lead’ guitar and vocal takes would take centre stage, would not be panned, and would be the main focus when mixing i.e be much more processed and focussed on than the previously recorded guitar-vocal takes. The rhythmic variations would also create a slight call and response, with the panned vocal takes now being slightly behind the ‘lead’ vocal, feeling less like a double, and more like a supporting, backing vocal. This was now the foundations of the song completed, and I was very pleased with what we had so far, but knew that the song had more potential. I felt that the next step was to record some additional vocals, harmonizing with the existing lead vocal. However, I didn’t want to go through the vocal, thinking about where there should and shouldn’t be harmonies, or which exact notes would harmonise best. Instead, I asked Lucas to create a fresh audio track and play the song from the beginning, and I went though and improvised harmonies on practically every line, some a little behind, to emphasise the predetermined ‘call and response’ effect. After doing one take of improvised harmonies, I then played the track back, deleting certain harmonies where I felt space needed to be left for the lead vocal, and leaving harmonies in where I felt they complimented the lead part.

This concluded the vocal production for the track, and I wanted to explore some possible use of synthesizers. Lucas and I patched in the two synths in Room 109, and experimented with different sounds, looking for something that would juxtapose the guitar and vocals, but also be able to sit happily in the background texturally. A sound that I landed on was a very simple square wave lead sound, that I could control the emotion and intensity of by simply lowering and raising the cutoff. Additionally, Lucas spontaneously found a very interesting sound, while going through different presets, that, when its pitch is raised from 0 to 100 while playing a note, it will bend two octaves up, which is relatively simple, but because the sound itself was so complex and interesting, and it was so oddly distorted, it immediately caught my ear, and I knew that this sound would be perfect to transition from the chorus into the more energetic instrumental section, and back out of it. Once we were happy with the sounds, we, again knew that there was no use in trying to overcomplicate it, and we simply played the track from the beginning and both improvised at the same time over the whole track.

A week or so after recording all of these parts, having spent some time away from the track, I wanted to revisit it to tackle the challenge of incorporating the use of a sampler into the track. After listening through many times, it occured to me that the track needed something rhythmic, something to drive the song. To solve this problem, and to also use a sampler, I sequenced a short percussion loop using some one shots of tambourines and shakers, and then put that very loop into a sampler, chopping the original loop and creating a new rhythm from it. I then ran it through some effects but made sure to turn the whole track right down, because I didn’t want this layer to impose on anything. I knew that it had to be something that wouldn’t be too obvious and noticeable, but would still create a repetitive rhythm.

Finally, I felt that something more atmospheric was necessary for the quieter, first half of the song, and I wanted to re-incorporate the use of sampling, so I found a recording that I took from inside a train, that I had thought sounded very melodic. I took the sample, pitched it up slightly, used the EQ to find the harmonic of the root note of the song, chopped the sample so that the rhythm aligned with the percussion, and played it over the whole song. I really liked this added layer. It felt very nostalgic and added to the overarching theme of the song.