Help required..(melody & chords)

[frances]

oh, by bridge i meant the wild noisy part, i'm fine with the c ,am part. just saying the first prog. could start to drag around the third verse. we'll have to see if it does before trying fix it.... oh you were posting when i was posting....ehh..well when in doubt there's always 1-4-5 .... in other words, thinking like that can be a real minefield 

[diademgrove]

oh, by bridge i meant the wild noisy part, i'm fine with the c ,am part. just saying the first prog. could start to drag around the third verse. we'll have to see if it does before trying fix it.... oh you were posting when i was posting....ehh..well when in doubt there's always 1-4-5 .... in other words, thinking like that can be a real minefield 

Hi Frances,

I see this thread as our rehearsal room. It may be virtual but who cares if it works. If we were in the same room we'd try different arrangements. All I'll be doing tomorrow is trying different endings. 10 minutes work in a real band room, a bit longer in the virtual world.

It may help if I set out where I think the lyrics go.

Verses 1 and 2 go over the acoustic guitar and your arpeggio. The wild bit is the instrumental break or solo, the bridge (Man in the Suit) comes after the solo and the third verse ends it.

The first two verses may be slower than you thought, which is why I increased the tempo to 109 for the bridge and final verse. I see the wild interlude as free time. By the time we get to the third verse the listener would have been turned upside down by the interlude and the increased pace. They will be so impressed the last thing on their mind will be the slow tempo of the first two verses.

I should be recording at about 12:00 noon UK time and have the demos up late afternoon. If you've worked out some musical ideas for the C Am bit let me know before I start and I'll leave them in. If not I'll take them out and we can put them back in later if we think its a mistake.

I see our rehearsal room as a very democratic place all ideas are valid, even 1-4-5. Although its going to be hard if we have to consider it, after your arpeggio and chord sequence.

I think if we hear 4 or 5 different structures the right one is going to stand out. It may even be the one already up.

We'll see what tomorrow brings. I've a feeling our song will turn out more than ok.

diadem

[frances]

I see our rehearsal room as a very democratic place all ideas are valid

Well, ok. 

i couldn't get the arpeggios to work today. here's noise. 

(is a bwaahaha apropriate here?)
https://soundcloud.com/user4528050/cynestasia-w-violin-noise

[diademgrove]

I see our rehearsal room as a very democratic place all ideas are valid

Well, ok. 

i couldn't get the arpeggios to work today. here's noise. 

(is a bwaahaha apropriate here?)
https://soundcloud.com/user4528050/cynestasia-w-violin-noise

Forgive me, but what does bwaahaha mean? I haven't come across the term before, maybe a sign of my age.

I love the noise. Not sure it should go over the whole track though. (Slight digression, I hear another collaboration in my head based on your violin playing which could go over the whole track. Have a listen   http://youtu.be/YkNZCA5HzTQ a classic someone introduced me to recently. 13 minutes of aural bliss. Of course that's only if you want to do another after this.)

The arpeggio and acoustic guitar seem to blend well together and suit the song. I like it and would like to see if we can complete it. I presume the problem is my additional chords.

Could you put just the electric violin wav track up on soundcloud so I can download it and have a play with it in Cubase. I think we have the made the first step to completing the solo. I must admit I was a bit worried your idea of noise wouldn't fit with mine.

I'll record and put up the different endings after 12 noon.

I did mean it when I said all ideas are valid. As Justin says if it sounds good, it is good. Of course what sounds good is all down to personal taste. If our tastes coincide what we produce will be good. We may not get many Eagles fans liking it, but, what the hell, life is full of small disappointments.

diadem

[diademgrove]

I've removed the C to Am interlude in the first two verses. I didn't really miss them.

The first new demo remains in Dm ( chords are Dm A# A Gm (x2) repeated once for the bridge and Dm E Gm7 Am repeated a number of times for the last verse. Not really all that keen personally.

The second demo moves from Dm to D. The bridge is the same chord sequence as the Dm demo followed by a repeating pattern of D Bb G Asus2. I like this a lot better. I would say its between this one and the more complicated first demo.

Please ignore the gap for the instrumental break, we can make it as long or short as we want.

Time to make our minds up I think. If we pick which of the demos works best I'll sart getting the acoustic guitar part recorded properly.

I think we now have the first two verses sorted. We just need to decide on C to Am and try and put the arpeggio parts together.

We have started the instrumental breakdown. The violin to me is the lead instrument. I'm sure I can do some weird things with it once I get the raw track into Cubase. Not sure we need anything else unless somebody wants to add anything. I'll post the progress up as and when.

The bridge and final verse needs bass, drums and electric guitar.

Finally we need a melody and singer. If it would help someone (Pat?) I'll provide a spoken work version of where I think the lyrics fit in relation to the beats later this week. Unfortunately hot weather and me don't mix.

diadem

https://soundcloud.com/diademgrove/cynestasia-dm-demo/s-4kygJ

https://soundcloud.com/diademgrove/cynestasia-dm-to-d-demo/s-NTP6X

[frances]

  Hey, i've uploaded the two stems of the violin part, i can upload them sans effects if you want (cringes at people actually hearing what i'm playing)
 
 you"re right about c am thing, it's better without it. i like the second one best. the demo from yesterday was good but this one keeps things moving better and is easier to understand.  so i guess let's  do that?
 
...oh, good morning mr. vega..

  i'l give the arpeggios another whirl today, maybe i will go looking for some picking patterns to steal or something.

[diademgrove]

Hi Frances,

I liked the original pattern if that's possible. The violin parts will be fine with the effects. I'm just going to mess them up anyway. I hope you don't mind.

Its time for my tea (evening meal). I'll post my first draft of the instrumental later tonight to see if you like it. Dm to D it is. I worked out what D to Bb sounds like. I'll not post it until we've finished it may affect how the melody goes.

Good luck with the arpeggios.

diadem

[diademgrove]

Hi Frances,

first rough draft of the wild instrumental piece. I add some weird D notes from Cubase. What do you think?

diadem

https://soundcloud.com/diademgrove/cynestasia-guide-mix-1/s-xLLxA

[frances]

wicked awesome, how'd you do that? we need to get an electric guitar on there to smooth things over, as it is it sounds kind of like a comedic low fantasy where a person from the regular universe gets in a different dimension and something really messed up happens and the person native to the other dimension is all like, "oh, don't worry about it,that happens all the time."


  I don't think the arpeggios are going to work out. it sounds good with the chords not being in key but with the notes picked singly it's awkward to get from one chord to the other. i'm sure there are plenty of tricks to get around this but i don't know them. if the A were an am, E a em7b5, and the am an A, things would be easier...maybe.
  i have to clear my head and look at other options....don't they teach good judgement on the internet somewheres? 

[diademgrove]

Hi Frances,

I'm glad you like it. I'll let you know how I did it next weekend. It was a lot easier to do than explain. I'm a mad cook. I just keeping put spices into the pot until I like the taste, followed by, another spice won't do no harm. Cubase is good as it allows you to withdraw the spice if it spoils the soup.

I agree about adding the electric guitar. Do you fancy a go?

I think what your saying is that the transition to the violin part is too abrupt. Which is what I thought last night. It needs something to connect this dimension to the next and keep us on the ground. A drum pattern from the last two bars of the verse may work. I'll have a play and see what it sounds like.

Shame about the arpeggio. I don't suppose you have a piano or keyboard? Failing that we may be able to devise some wonderful alternative tuning for the guitar. In the meantime I'll see what an em7b5 sounds like (if I can play it).

Good musical judgement is in your ears. You don't need the internet, just the confidence to let your ears say this isn't working, what can we do to make it work? In my case that is limited by my playing ability, but that is getting better, but there are many roads to Rome. I usually sit down and do something else, like last night when I found out that the move to the electric violin part didn't work. Then the idea of the drums came to me.

I think the transition from the violin to the bridge works.

Time for breakfast.

We are getting closer to the final major decisions, the electric rhythm guitar, bass, drums and last but not least the vocal.
 

[diademgrove]

Hi Francis,

em7b5 is a bit of a stretch in first position. I'll think about it and have a practice.

This altered tuning would put all the notes as open strings or within reach of four fingers. Starting on the thickest E string, E A D A C# F. If you wanted to put D as the lowest root note, you could either change the thick E to D or put a capo on the 5th fret and use the 5th and 4th strings to play the roots.

Not sure what it would sound like over the whole progression as the 3rds, 5ths, etc will be in a different order for each chord. You could put them in the same order, but that would involve a lot of string skipping and some notes would go up and others go down. Either way, it may sound horrid or it may sound funky.

If we sort out the E major chord, is the A/Am that much of a problem? The arpeggio you put up first sounded good against the acoustic rhythm, including the A major chord.

[diademgrove]

Hi Frances,

shall we start a thread with the heading Cynestasia as the track starts to come together. That way people can follow, if they want, how we get to the final track. It may be helpful for people considering doing the same thing.

diadem

[diademgrove]

I've added a bass (kick) drum to the song to link the first two verses to the instrumental. I've also put the drum on the bridge and the outro. The hot weather was getting to me and I wilted, so they may not be on the beat, but as a guide they are fine.

I tried to put a drum beat all though the instrumental but the increase in speed made it difficult and I gave up. The drum at 80bpm could go on a little longer, seemed a bit abrupt for me listening back.

Alternatively we could forget about the drums in the first part and use the guitar as a link to the wild violin. Have a listen and let me know what you think.

I'm back at work tomorrow (booooo), so my time will be limited until Saturday.

diadem

https://soundcloud.com/diademgrove/cynestasia-rough-drum-mix/s-Wx1Tk

[frances]

i definitely don't want to keep the clapping part in the beginning, i thought they were there as a rhythm guide.

 i wandered off in a direction today because i wanted to see if that em7b5 would work in any way, tired of playing it so played faster and ended up with this:
 https://soundcloud.com/user4528050/faster-with-electric

  so thats a possible thing to do, but now i've heard the chord i was trying out too many times and can't tell if it sounds weird. the electric is more an example of a sound to have than what notes to have. i was unaware of how different it got until i listened to the original.

.....Hey! drums aren't confined to what's physically possible, cut and paste, man! cut and paste!

 if we somehow got the end of the guitar part like the last note and kind of warped somehow to pull it into the instrumental that would be cool.



 













 

[diademgrove]

off to work, I'll have a re-listen when I get home.

The clapping is a guide, its awful and won't be staying.

When I played em7b5 it sounded too close to Gm7 for me.

I never cut and paste or use quantise, I prefer human error. Although I do admit to slightly moving some drum beats.