untitled (three stars mix)

I just noticed the music section here and decided to toss this up for a little feedback. It's the first cut I did with a new trio, and we're still trying to decide what direction we should take: get crazy composing for the studio, or write simpler stuff that can actually be performed by three people. So far the studio stuff seems to hold up better.

(Get Flash to see the track player.)
posted by waxboy (12 comments total)

reminds me alot of "the tallest man the broadest shoulders" by sufjan (with a dash of explosions in the sky), but i like where you're going for sure
posted by bonesy at 7:13 PM on October 9, 2006

Welcome, waxboy. Niece piece, very different to what has been posted here already, and that is always good. Keep 'em coming, yeah?
posted by micayetoca at 9:39 AM on October 10, 2006

Cool song, kind of relaxing-- good background music for MeFi reading.

I'm a pretty straightforward rock & roll kind of guy, so I'm tempted to say keep it simple so you can play live. But there's a lot you can do with technology these days to cover for a lack of musicians, you should write what you like best.
posted by InfidelZombie at 10:05 AM on October 10, 2006

The mellow b-part is really hitting my soft spot this morning. Very soothing, kind of quietly emotionally involving. I think the sort of drop in rhythmic stress level stepping out of the funky in-five feel of the a-part is part of that.

I like, is what I'm saying. And I agree with InfidelZombie's ambivilant statement—if you want to get out and play live, write for such an arrangement, but I often end up liking my own unperformably complicated recordings best.
posted by cortex at 10:50 AM on October 10, 2006

For comparison, this is a rough recording of a song we were working on for a performance. Never got around to doing a proper demo, and I can't find the live recording, but...

the mountain top yodel song
posted by waxboy at 1:23 PM on October 10, 2006

sweet, i like that one too, looking forward to hearing more
posted by bonesy at 5:37 PM on October 10, 2006

Wow, way to go waxboy! That was a beautiful piece. I hope to hear much more.
posted by snsranch at 6:07 PM on October 10, 2006

So, I've listened to both pieces, and they sound nothing like each other. I'm wondering how you folks work together. Do you "jam" or write together? I'm curious because that would be a real clue as to whether and/or how you could create performance pieces.

You can e-mail me if you like-see profile.
posted by snsranch at 7:15 PM on October 10, 2006

snsranch: might as well keep everyone in on the discussion and use this thread for now.

so, all three of us have been writing together, which has been interesting since we all write independently in rather different styles that end up getting mushed together and chiseled into something that we all agree works. the method so far has been: who's got an undeveloped idea for a song? then usually a chord progression or two gets tossed out there, played around with, perhaps mixed with another progression, then we basically jam with the result and find a melody. record, listen, discuss, modify, repeat. this is where the studio/live problem comes in, since so much detail ends up getting tacked on that it becomes really hard to arrange for three performers and retain the original feel.
posted by waxboy at 8:15 AM on October 11, 2006

btw, thanks for the feedback, everyone. glad y'all like it :)
posted by waxboy at 8:16 AM on October 11, 2006

wow, great! i really love that B part.
got more?
posted by The_Auditor at 6:39 PM on October 23, 2006

This is great
posted by Anything at 4:28 AM on November 22, 2006