Spotify

On the advice of a friend I have been giving Spotify a go - an online music streaming programme. It has the backing of the major record labels and therefore a huge catalogue of some of the biggest names is available. U2’s new album was available to listen to well before the official release date. I’ve registered for the free account which occasionally places adverts inbetween songs but for £10 a month this can be removed. The interface is very similar to itunes and allows you to stream music, search for songs, create playlists and share them with other users. It is good to see the majors testing the water with the free / almost free music business model. So why buy music again?

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No more Guitar Heroes anymore?

Recently a friend challenged me to a game of Guitar Hero as he viewed me as a worthy opponent given that I can play the real thing. Surprisingly to him I was shockingly bad at it.

I’ve been aware of this game ever since an 11 year old kid that I taught guitar to kept proclaiming how good at it he was. The game had sparked his interest in learning the guitar as well as helping this youngster to discover some classic rock songs. This is all good in my book. The problem is he had a hard time differentiating between a real guitar and the computer game. Frequently I was met with “I can play this on Guitar Hero so I don’t need to play it on guitar”

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Plectrum 48k

 

Much of the last week has been spent working on the artwork for the new CD using my 2 ageing computers, both of which quivered in fear and belched smoke at the prospect of file sizes of up to 1gb, despite this the job has just been completed and the artwork has now been passed into the safe hands of the manufacturer. Phew!

Fingers crossed it will be ready for the launch night.

The design process was taking a considerable amount of time mainly due to it taking so long just to open up the files. However this was not a major problem as having once owned a Spectrum 48K (not a Plectrum 48K as was once thought by an old school friend as he merged the world of personal computers & guitars) I was well experienced in this time lag so used it constructively and proceeded to loose my temper with my Rubik’s Cube.

Despite the blue screen of death experiences with the computers I take a great deal of enjoyment out of designing artwork for this type of thing. I find it a refreshing change to songwriting although a lot of the creative process is similar, they both start with a blank page and an idea.

Whilst I know my way around the various ways of digitally manipulating photographs for design purposes when it came down to it I mainly just clicked on different buttons, and hoped that some sort of cool effect is created.

I’ve tried to capture the feel of ‘Rain For Sale’ and have gone for the weathered look of a photo that I took in a vineyard in the Waipara Valley region of Canterbury, New Zealand. Hopefully this feel has been captured and I am looking forward to seeing the finished product.

Meanwhile I am on the hunt for a new computer and a solution to the Rubik’s Cube.

Songwriting & The Number 38 Bus

I have been that busy with getting stuff together for the new album I had lost focus on writing new songs. I was aware that I hadn’t come up with anything constructive since 2008 which being last year was far to long.

So over the last week or so i made a concerted effort to open my songwriting book and to get creative. Initially this resulted in me staring at a blank page on my songwriting book for a while (See 21st January photo)

Songwriting is a black art. There is no guaranteed way in allowing it to happen. It’s not a case setting aside 15mins to write a song, although in some times that’s all it takes. I wrote ‘Sway’ in about 15mins at around 11.30pm but other songs such as ‘Skin’ come together over a number of months.

It is important for me not to force the process. I have to be ready with pen and paper and in my case guitar as well in order to catch the song as it happens. If anything is missing it could be gone for ever.

Reading about other writers techniques and struggles helps to reassure me that I am not the only one that finds the process very difficult. David Bowie famously cuts out words from newspapers and magazines and then mixes them all up in a bowl, which could be quite amusing depending which section of the paper you use. Obituaries? Lonely Hearts? Pets?

Recently, I have been using my phone for capturing song titles and even snippets of guitar ideas – the problem being I got absolutely soaked at the weekend and the pocket my phone was in filled up with water rendering my phone useless. Hopefully these ideas can be salvaged and all is not lost. That’ll teach me for abandoning my notebook.

My favourite place for writing songs at the moment is in my kitchen. This has several advantages –it has close access to the fridge and the kettle, and it also helps with enclosing the sound so as not to disturb the neighbours too much. So the other night I set myself up in the kitchen with coffee, guitar, pen and paper and stared at 1 verse I had scribbled down earlier in the week. After playing the riff and going over the same verse again and again for about an hour, all of a sudden a flood of lyrics came to me and I finished the song. I then turned the page and got a good way through another new song. Whether these songs will see the light of day is another issue but it felt like a great achievement and i set off on my 2009 songwriting journey.

Songwriting seems to be much like public transport - you can spend all day waiting on the number 38 Bus and then 2 come along at once.

If anyone has any interesting songwriting tips or thoughts on how the process can be improved please leave me a comments.

Some good ideas can be found on the bbc web site www.bbc.co.uk/radio2/soldonsong/guide/

John Martyn

I was shocked and saddened to hear of the loss of John Martyn yesterday. His style of playing and songwriting has had a great influence on my own style and I have included a number of versions of his songs in my own set. I admired his ability to transmit raw emotion in song and I feel there is a definite Glaswegian soul to be felt in his songs. His affinity with Glasgow was clear and he continued to perform regularly here and I am gutted that I missed his November show.

His talent will be sorely missed.

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=TkcmB8a1cn8