slow happy south

I put this together days after being given a banjo as a gift. It is made up of the one roll and four chords I knew at the time (about a year ago). It doesn't really kick in for like :40 so give it a bit. (horn stabs at the end are sampled.)

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posted by RobertFrost (4 comments total)

I don't know how I missed this when you first posted it, but it's fantastic. Very, very cool. I just found it today, when you posted bent+acoustic and I really liked both.

I hope you start posting more often now. Congrats on these.
posted by micayetoca at 8:19 AM on March 22, 2007

I downloaded this song a few days ago when I first found it, and I've been having it play at random in iTunes. I wanted to say I really, really like it. How did you do it? What do you play and what is sampled? What did you record it with?

I'm sorry to flood you with questions, but I think it's a really cool piece of music.
posted by micayetoca at 6:58 AM on March 28, 2007

No no, thanks for taking a listen. The whole thing was recorded through a single, crappy SM-57 - even the drums (which came out pretty well, I thought).

The track consists of a banjo, keyboard I found in my basement, pots and pans, a toy marimba, drum set, a single horn stab from a piece of vinyl that I've since lost and myself for vocals.

A few days after I recieved a banjo as a gift, I decided to try recording the first roll I had learned to see what I could do with it. The rest of the song just kind of formed itself around that roll. I probably recorded the whole thing in a matter of hours.

The way I make music has with time time evolved into shotgun sessions of recording - where I sit down with the intention to record some sounds and end up five hours later with a finished track and a sore ass (I need a new chair badly). Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. Because of this wierd method of recording, I rarely ever write down or plan what is to be recorded and most tracks end up being (sort of) improvisations.

If you have any questions about specific parts of the song, I'd be happy to see if I can remember how I did it. Just let me know :)
posted by RobertFrost at 1:59 AM on April 2, 2007

I got curious mainly because the drumkit sounded real, and it's very rare that one-man-bands have a real drumkit. That caught me at first, but then I started "discovering" the rest of the sounds, everything in the song sounds played, not sampled, and that is quite nice.

I set it to play while I wrote this and I gotta say every time I listen to it I like it more. The "break" with the hand claps, the keyboard and the "lalalalalas" is pure brilliance.

So, basically I just wanted to say it's a great tune. I hope there was a way to bring it to the attention of more people here, 'cause I'm sure a lot of people missed it like I did when you posted it, but they would love it if they discovered.

Also, props for the "electrograss" tag.
posted by micayetoca at 8:43 AM on April 3, 2007