Mac's Musical Musings

This time last year...

2010-10-03T04:38:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I begin my second and final year of the MA Songwriting course at Bath Spa University. (now renamed MMus Songwriting). On a typical British Autumn morning (cold, grey, overcast, howling wind and rain spattering the windows) it seems an appropriate moment to take stock and think of what has changed in my world during the last 12 months.

The new Corsham Court campus

This time last year - well, I was about to begin the course, obviously. I'd just given up my job, a typical 9-5 office job on an IT Helpdesk. It was a decent job with a reputable firm; reasonably well paid with good benefits, but every minute spent resolving some tedious computer problem was a minute of my life I felt I was wasting. I'd already concluded that I wasn't the office job-type - having done a couple of similar jobs in the previous 3 years, I'd gone way past the itchy feet phase. I was bored, uninspired and needed a new challenge.

Since I was really young, making music is all I've ever really wanted to do. I learnt piano from the age of 8 and taught myself guitar in my teens. I did a Music Tech degree in my early twenties, but like so many people didn't use my qualification and knowledge to further my career. I got stuck in a rut - did a few medial jobs, did some travelling and then, of course, settled into my cosy office job. Zzzzzzzz.

Thank goodness for the course. It was a bit of a gamble financially - I took a part-time job as a postman to (just about) cover the bills, freeing up my afternoons and evenings to concentrate on my studies. When I started the course, I'd come to a bit of a standstill musically. I'd been playing a few acoustic showcases around Bristol, but never anything serious. I wrote a few songs here and there, but I didn't have a focus, I'd lost all the drive that I had when I was younger.

I wanted to improve my songwriting skills, and start making lots of music again. One of my ambitions had always been to start up a collaborative pop music project under an alias, but I'd never put enough time or effort into it. I didn't know exactly what I wanted out of the course when I first walked through the door, and was hoping that it would become a little more clear - and it certainly did.

A year on, everything has changed for me. I'm writing prolifically again and all my enthusiasm has returned. Once again, I love making music, I believe in what I do and I'm confident that I'm finally heading in the right direction. It's hard to describe how much I've learnt on this course. Purely in terms of songwriting skills, having advice and tuition from successful, experienced writers has been invaluable. The guest speakers have been just as helpful in terms of advice, and getting an insight into what you really need to be successful in the big, bad world of the music industry.

I was lucky to meet a like-minded individual on the course in the form of Mr. Mark Vallance. Mark is an incredible singer and a gifted writer, and we instantly clicked. We were both looking to collaborate and write for others, rather than write solo material, so began working together towards the end of last year. We instantly had good results, and realised quickly that we'd stumbled across a good combination.

At the moment we're building our portfolio. We've been lucky enough to collaborate with some very successful, influential people. We've written two songs with a massively experienced writer who is currently pitching our tracks to some very big names in the industry. We also have another track which has been forwarded - it all looked very exciting for a while but then went a little quiet. At the moment, it's all about "sowing the seeds". We're still two very small fish in a very large pond!

So, to sum up. It's been an incredible year, and I can't wait to begin the course again. I've met some amazing people and learnt more than I could've ever imagined. Most importantly, I've finally realised that if you have a dream then just go for it, don't let anything stop you. Dive in headfirst, give it your all, and you never know what might happen.

MA Songwriting - year one done and dusted

2010-06-13T04:07:00.000-07:00

I may live to regret the title of this post, as I've not received marks for my assignments yet. A mark of less than 50% would mean working over the Summer and re-submitting them. However, I'd rather be positive and assume that all is fine and dandy!

I haven't really blogged about the course this year, and that's mainly down to the fact that we've been pretty swamped with work. Even us part-timers had a fair bit to do, so I really feel for the full-timers who had an extra double module and will be doing their recording plan assignment over the Summer. Mind you, there are more tedious academic tasks out there than recording music! I love this course :-)

So for me, this term has been all about collaborating and re-writing. It's been a funny kind of term because it's been all about self-study and doing things off our own back, rather than having set tasks. So basically, we had to write with a minimum of five other collaborators and re-write at least four solo songs, then document the process and learning outcomes in the form of assignments at the end of term.

The collaboration module was great fun, everyone threw themselves in head first! Of course, the natural tendency was to write with other MA students, but there were some other very interesting collabs; for example, I wrote with someone who had never written a song before and another student wrote a song with their 4-year old daughter! I'm sure there were some other crazy collabs too that I'm not aware of - the essays must've made fascinating reading!

Rewriting was a much different task, one that a few people (myself included) found fairly awkward. We received a collection of critique after last year's solo songwriting module, and the challenge was to implement suggestions made to improve our songs. I made a bit of a hash of my first rewrite - I made the error of listening to too much critique and trying to implement everything. After that, I learnt the lesson that you must pick out only valid and constructive points - and always keep the focus of why you wrote the song in the first place.

It's an interesting task for any songwriter if you've never tried it before - seek a load of critique about one of your songs and try and rewrite it based on what people say. It can be really difficult to detach yourself from the song, but you may just find that you get a much better result. If the finished song is better, it doesn't matter how you got there!

Here's a couple of other little songwriting tasks that people may find helpful, especially if you're stuck in a bit of rut with your writing. You may find that some of these help to get you over writers block, or just get you back into it if you haven't written for a while:

- take a really old song that's long forgotten about (maybe the first one you ever wrote) and rewrite it completely. There's bound to be something in there you'll want to keep. Maybe use the concept and write new music, or keep the music and write totally new lyrics. It's an interesting idea - I did it with a track called 'Communication Breakdown' for the course. The original song was one of the first things I ever wrote - very average singer/songwriter stuff - so I turned it into an RnB pop song. You can hear the result here: http://www.myspace.com/patrickmcintyremusic

- take someone else's song and rewrite it. Again, you may end up changing little bits or creating a completely different song. This was one of our tasks this year; we had to rewrite another student's song. I loved this task. I chose Rebecca Cullen's song "You and Me", and didn't change it massively - just rejigged a few lyrics and did it in my own style. I don't think she has the original online but you can hear my rewrite at http://www.reverbnation.com/patmcintyre

So that's just a little taster of what us MA Songwriters have been up to this year. It's been great fun and the quality of music has improved massively since last year, especially some of the collaborative work. There is a school of thought out there that believes Songwriting can't be taught. This course is positive proof that it can be taught, in my opinion. The fact that every single person on the course is writing better songs than they were this time last year tells it's own story! Bring on year two :-)

I'll end with a little group photo of the MA Songwriters (unfortunately there's a couple of people missing). A diverse group of people I'm sure you'll agree, but with a reassuring bond of madness! I'm the one with the freakishly small head. I'll miss meeting up with everyone on a Tuesday, but look forward to staying in touch and making lots of music with them in the future.

PS - if anyone reading this is interested in the Masters course in Songwriting, I highly recommend it! Check out the Bath Spa website http://www.bathspa.ac.uk/courses/postgraduate/songwriting.asp and get in touch with Mr. Andy West, who will be more than happy to answer any questions.

Over and out!

Sorry!

2010-05-13T00:19:00.000-07:00

Hello there internet,

Just an incredibly brief blog to say sorry for the lack of updates. I know there's a link to this blog on the Bath Spa website somewhere; so if anyone has found this page hoping to get an insight into the Songwriting course, my apologies! At the moment us Songwriters are bogged down with very unmusical-like tasks such as essays. But in a couple of weeks they'll be over and done with, and I'll properly recap what has happened this year. For part-timers like me, it's been all about rewriting songs (new songs, old songs, other people's songs) and being involved in all sorts of collaborations. It's been a whirlwind few months - so check back here soon and I'll reflect on all that's been happening!

P

Back to school

2010-02-17T08:08:00.000-08:00

I write this whilst battling with seemingly incurable man-flu. Only the male readers will be able to truly empathise here. It took it's grip a few days ago and just doesn't want to let go. If this is my last ever post, and the man-flu finishes me off... well, I had a good run!

Anyway. Sympathy fishing over. I've got loads to talk about, and lots of things that should be taking priority over this! Our University term has started back up, and I think we're all relieved to be back. It's been a long old break - term ended mid-December, and we frantically worked on our assignments which were handed in during the second week of January. Then we had a month's break, so it's been ages since we had lectures and tutorials.

We all reconvened this week - full-timers started on Monday, and us part-timers came in on Tuesday. It's been interesting to hear what everyone's been up to. Lots of musical projects and collaborations have been flying around it seems.

Me and Mark took our collaborative project to the next level on Monday evening, getting a talented singer in to lay down some vocals for two of our new tracks. Marika turned out to be a gem - a true pro with an amazing voice, and bags of energy and enthusiasm. We got some great vocals recorded, and look forward to working with her again in the future. We now will be mixing and producing the tracks, before sending them to some of our new industry contacts (made through the course), to get them critiqued and to see if our confidence in the songs is correctly placed.

Tuesday was a fun day, catching up with all the fellow songwriters. I can't put into words what a great bunch of people are on this course. Such a positive, inspiring collective, and I realised how much I'd missed seeing everyone. For us part-timers, this semester will be all about re-writing our solo tracks from last term, and collaborating.

We were given a task yesterday - pick one of four songs (as written/recorded by Commercial Music undergraduates), then go away in groups to re-write and try to improve the song. I picked a song called "Bitter End", and in my group were Mark, Kim, Annie and Miles. In just over an hour, we managed to completely re-write the song, and I reckon it sounded really good. As a group we gelled really well, and it was such a fun experience. So much so that we've decided to write a song from scratch as a five-way collaboration. Should be interesting!

We have also now received all our song critiques. Jez Ashurst and Paul Field have critiqued all the songs we wrote last term, and we have also been critiquing each other's songs, as part of last year's Solo Songwriting module. I received five critiques from my peers for four different songs. It makes interesting reading, and I'll definitely be taking everything on board! For next Tuesday, we have to re-write one of the songs critiqued by our peers. I'm looking forward to getting stuck into that.

I've also got another music-related project going on, albeit nothing to do with songwriting. A chap from sonicstate.com contacted me through the course, asking whether I would fancy doing some music tech equipment reviews for their website. I jumped at the chance, and am currently in the process of reviewing a Yamaha DTXM12 drum module. My review will be filmed, and if it makes the grade then hopefully I'll be appearing in an internet browser near you!

Ciao for now,

Pat

The formula for a hit record

2010-02-02T08:15:00.000-08:00

Going back a couple of posts to the 3rd December, I talked a little about what makes a great record. I mentioned that if there was indeed a "formula" for creating a hit record, then computers would be writing all our pop music by now. Well, funnily enough, it would seem that the technology already exists! I stumbled across this fascinating article, published in The Guardian in November 2006.

It talks all about the analysis of hit records, and there's some interesting stuff about "clusters" - apparently about 80% of hit records share a small number of underlying structures. That's probably not a massive revelation to be honest, but it's interesting that this hit analysis software groups together Norah Jones, Vanessa Carlton and Van Halen in the same cluster!

I won't ruin the article, but I will say that thankfully us songwriters won't be going out of business in the immediate future by the looks of things! While we wait for computers to write the next Hey Jude, I'll pass on this link that Jez Ashurst shared with us the other day. It seems writing a hit record is simple after all, you just need these four chords...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMshvUReunc

Quick techie blog...

2010-01-30T08:15:00.000-08:00

I mentioned in my last blog that I'd invested in some new equipment, so thought I'd do a quick blog about it, because I love music tech chat! There might be an element of geeky music talk coming up, so if you're the kind of person that thinks Pro Tools sounds like something for fixing up shelves, it might be worth looking away now!

I was previously working mostly in Cubase SX3 on a ropey old PC, so was very pleased to get a shiny new MacBook about a month ago (on loan from the University). I'm now running Logic Pro 9, which seems to be a great piece of software. Very intuitive, and now I'm getting to grips with it, I'm finding it very easy to get creative with. The only thing I miss about Cubase was how easy it is was to manipulate audio, but overall the advantages of Logic far outweigh the disadvantages I'd say (saying that, Cubase 5 looks pretty awesome - anyone tried it at all?)

I was a little concerned that the MacBook may struggle a little, being the lowest spec Mac on the market, and knowing that I'm a little bit plug-in crazy. However, it seems to be coping admirably so far. I've just mixed a song with about 16 tracks, each having at least 2 or 3 inserts, with loads of automation and some mastering plug-ins on the output. The CPU usage was barely registering most of the time - pretty impressive. However, I've found that it pays to save REGULARLY, because Logic has crashed on me 3 or 4 times for no apparent reason.

One area where I've compromised in the past was with microphones and hardware. Not sure why I didn't splash out previously, because good equipment makes all the difference. I still remember that eternal phrase that our studio technician at Uni used at least 5 times a day: "s**t in, s**it out - you can't polish a turd!". Never a truer word spoken.

So I've invested in a new condenser mic and a decent audio interface for the Mac. Unfortunately my budget is pretty limited, so I ended up buying an SE Electronics Titan mic and an E-MU 0404 interface. I was also going to buy a preamp, but after reading up on the subject it seems that £500+ is the ball park for a decent one. I'd be interested to hear if anyone had had good results with the budget preamps that are on the market...

So far, the results are pretty good. Check out my new recording of 'Shivers' in the music player on the right, recorded with the new kit. The Titan mic sounds great on acoustic guitar. I was hoping for a little bit more warmth on vocals - I recently tried an AKG 414 and an SE Z5600a, both of which produced much better results for vocals. However, for what I'm doing it's fine, and it seemed a steal at under £240 from Digital Village. I read some reviews which thought it was good value for money, even when it was priced at nearer £1000, so it definitely seemed a good buy!

Ok, enough geek speak for the time being. If anyone else finds this sort of thing exciting, and spends hours drooling over the Dolphin Music web site like I do, please post a comment and let me know your latest bit of kit!

Over and out.

2010 - A pop-tastic year...

2010-01-26T06:56:00.000-08:00

2010. A new year - indeed, a new decade. I for one have not been so excited at the prospect of the year ahead for some time. I'm thrilled to be diving head-first into the vast, scary sea that is the music business.

I've dabbled around with music in the past, but this year it's time to start taking it seriously. There always seems to be an excuse for not following your dreams. For me, it's always been "other commitments". Work, travel, relationships, etc. I don't want those excuses to come back and haunt me in 30 years time, so I'm going to give it a real go from now on. At least then, if it doesn't work out, I can say that I gave it my best shot.

The MA Songwriting course has broadened my horizons further than I could've ever imagined possible. At first I wasn't too sure exactly what my aims were for the course, but now I'm 100% focused. I want to write a hit record. I want publishers to sit up and take notice. I want to get that foot in the door that is so essential.

I created an 'Industrial Plan' for one of my assignments, and although I thought at first that it might be one of the less exciting elements of the course, it turned out to be quite the opposite. It's a real eye-opener in fact, and it's really allowed me to get my priorities straight. I've now got myself a part time job, which pays the bills but also allows me to dedicate most of my time to music. I've forked out some cash on some new equipment, which I was desperately needing (see next post).

I've also found a great writing partner through the course. We're constantly bouncing ideas off each other, and have already started writing some tracks which I think have massive potential. It's pure pop writing - we're aiming directly at the Lady GaGa-type market. Edgy, highly synth-based stuff which we hope will stand out from the crowd. We're in talks with a number of vocalists, so hopefully that will be the final part of the jigsaw to get our tracks sounding impeccable.

I'll be posting a few previews of our new stuff on here when it's ready. As for the solo material - well, it's not entirely forgotten, but it is on the backburner.
I've written a new tune called 'Running On Empty' recently (sketchy YouTube vid available here), and I'm re-recording some of my old tunes to update the Myspace. However, that all has low priority at the moment. It's all about pop for the time being! Time to study that Beyonce CD...

What makes a great song?

2009-12-03T14:51:00.000-08:00

Ha! What a question.

I was reviewing some of my earlier posts on the blog, and it occurred to me that I've not really talked about the writing process, and what constitutes a truly great song. It's strange that I haven't talked about it, as it's something that I think about constantly!

I'm relatively new to the world of songwriting. I don't think I've written a truly great song yet, but I do believe it's in me. I wish that seven or eight years ago I'd had the knowledge I have now, then maybe that great song would be out there. But I think that just shows how far I've come in just a couple of months.

I'm studying for a Masters in Songwriting, as you will know if you've read any of my previous posts. When we first began the course, we were told how we would be assessed. For our Solo Songwriting module, rather than being assessed on the quality of our songs, we are assessed entirely on our critique of each other's songs! We were all handed a printout at the start entitled "But I don't know how to critique!". For me, this hit the nail squarely on the head. I've never had to critique songs before - where do I start? Who am I to judge other people's songs?!

But week by week, it has all begun to make sense. I think now that I can give useful, constructive criticism, and I can quickly identify what is "wrong" with a song. As an example, something that continually crops up is fundamental lyrical mistakes; mixing up tenses, or switching between 1st person/3rd person. This instantly makes the song more difficult for the listener to relate to.

When you think about it, every single person that listens to music critiques it. Whether this is a conscious thing or not, we all do it. For example, it could just be someone in work that hears the latest Lady GaGa song, and says "that's crap" or "I love it". If you asked that person to explain their reaction, you may well get a shrug of the shoulders. It's our business as Songwriters to realise why music inspires such a strong reaction in people.

So what constitutes a "great song"? Well, that's the elusive goal, and part of the reason why Songwriting holds so much appeal for me. No-one can truly answer that question. If there was a formula, there would be a supercomputer somewhere writing the Top 40 every week. Occasionally the operators would alter a few variables to create the latest trends, and pop music would be entirely controlled by machines. Adjust the "female kooky artist" setting a little, or the "male sensitive songwriter" control and Bob's your uncle.

Thankfully, that will never happen, as the beauty of music lies in the ideas of the people that make it. All we can do as songwriters is keep learning, be open to everything, and have supreme confidence in our own abilities. If you keep thinking "there's a million people better than me", you'll never succeed. Each time you write a song, try and make it the best thing you've ever written, and always learn from your mistakes. Accept all criticism, even if you don't agree with it. Don't ever think that your songs are perfect straight away, because they won't be.

I'll leave you with a few common things that are nearly always present in a hit record - a lot of this may seem obvious, but if you are a songwriter and you have never really tried analysing the songs you love, have a think about how many of these are in your favourite songs:

- a catchy lead melody line (normally a strong chorus for pop music)
- a great vocal
- strong instrumental and vocal hooks
- a great, memorable title
- a subject matter that is universal, but unique in it's approach
- a great "groove" and flow
- an interesting and distinctive atmosphere to the track
- an interesting song structure which makes you take notice
- great production - the song may have lots of energy and really demand your attention, or it could be very subtle but equally engaging
- a unique and fresh sound, maybe using a very distinctive choice of instruments or a great arrangement

Of course, your favourite record may have none of the above, and that is what makes the world of music so fascinating! I'll leave you with these thoughts... please feel free to leave a comment if you have any views on any of my meandering thoughts!

Pat

A time for reflection

2009-11-21T01:35:00.000-08:00

A month or so left of our first semester on the Songwriting MA course. A decent time for reflection I think, especially since we don't have to write a song this week. For our solo songwriting module, we'll be concentrating on past papers this week, so we have a brief reprieve from writing.

However, if anyone else is like me, they'll have continued writing to try and get ahead of the game a little! Thankfully, I've had at least one song idea every week so far, and have begun writing for my solo songwriting module. Not too sure where my current idea is going, it's a bit stop-start, but I'm determinedto finish it off and get a song out of it. I think that's the main way in which I've changed writing-wise - previously I'd start an idea, lose interest or inspiration and abandon it after half a day. Must have hundreds of those kind of ideas knocking around. Now, I want to finish every idea I have - even if it doesn't come out the way I want, chances are there will be something in there I can salvage at a later date.

I've also started work on some collaborative writing. I've acquired some cunning musical tools for my computer recently and have been having a good play around with those. Got a couple of decent pop ideas on the blend at the moment so am interested to see where they go. All I need now is a young, stunningly beautiful vocalist who sings like Aretha Franklin to sing on a couple of demos. Know anyone?!

So anyway - I'm yabbering already. I was going to reflect on a couple of the guest speakers that we've had come into our University, as I realised I haven't really talked much about them. I did mention Will Hicks and Jez Ashurst briefly in a previous post. These are two guys who are right in the thick of it pop-wise at the moment, and have their proverbial fingers in plenty of pies. I was gutted to have missed their lecture/group discussion, as it was fascinating stuff, especially for what I want to do. I've listened to the recording of that session twice already...

Next we had a guy called Andy Graham, who is currently working as a manager in the industry. He came across as a straight-talking, honest kind of guy who was obviously fairly hardened by the music biz! Tremendously useful stuff from Andy - we talked about the benefits of having a manager or a publisher, rather than trying to go it alone. It may be hard to get discovered, but once you have someone like that behind you, the benefits are enormous. These guys have the contacts to get you where you want to be, and that's what the music biz is all about of course - who you know. The main two things that Andy stressed, in order to get noticed, was a/ get your demos up to as high a standard as possible - make them sound like a commercial record and b/ you just need a bloody good song! Obvious but true. Always make sure that demo you send out is the best thing that you've ever done. I guess that's why I've always hesitated to send stuff, and maybe I was right to do so.

Had a good chat with Andy after - a few people gave demos over and exchanged contact details etc. I don't know if anyone's had any response. I'll be sending a demo or two over when I know that my stuff is the finished article. Andy even came down the pub with us after, which was great! We had a good old chat about all things music, and he shared some interesting views on various industry-type figures, including some interesting views on Louis Walsh's association with John and Edward (X-factor contestants, if you're lost)! I won't go in to that.

The next week we had a fantastic lady called Kim Richey visit us. Kim really has been there and done it - she's been writing, recording and collaborating for years and she was a fascinating person. She mentored our Solo Songwriting sessions; of course, I chose the week to bring my worst song ("Too Bad"), and was a bit embarrassed to play it to her really. She was ruthless (but brilliant) with everyone's lyrics. She'd look at them, then say "take this section out. swap this around. take that word out, and that one, and that one. what does this section mean? it's not relevant. re-write this. but this bit is good!". She would be your perfect "lyric doctor" - she's from the Nashville school of writing, so was particularly good with that side of things. Not to say that she wasn't very strong with melody also.

Kim spoke at our Industrial Context lecture too, and she was very friendly, helpful and down-to-earth, with a wicked sense of humour! A breath of fresh air, I'd say. I think the lecture was far more useful for aspiring solo artists, being that Kim herself is, of course, a tremendously successful one. Nevertheless, a lively and fascinating couple of hours, and hopefully we'll stay in touch with her.

And so my reflection ends (not literally - I can confirm this because I am sat next to a mirror). Plenty more great guests due to come in, and being that I am doing two years of this course, hopefully I'll get to meet next year's guests too. Next step for me is writing, writing, writing. Getting every idea down, no matter how small. Ideally I want to get a fresh, current-sounding pop track mostly finished by the end of the year. Need to start circulating those demos! I guess I'd better start on those essays too... damn!

Over and out.

Trying to stay afloat in a sea of music...

2009-11-16T05:21:00.000-08:00

How time flies... we're already into week 7 of the course! That must mean that I've written seven new songs. It only feels like I've written a couple to be honest, maybe that's because there's only a couple of them that I'm happy with.

At the moment I feel like I'm making up for lost time. I'm wondering why I never spent more time on music; I mean, it's basically all I've wanted to do since I realised that I could strum a guitar or twinkle the ivories on a piano. So why have I spent so many years of my life not doing much about it? I should've written a couple of hundred songs by now. That's what I mean by making up for lost time.

Improving your craft as a songwriter is all about experimenting, taking risks, and making mistakes (as long as you learn from them). I'm making a lot of mistakes at the moment! But also getting better in so many ways. I'm realising what I'm good at, where my weaknesses are, and by playing music every day I'm improving as a musician too. I was even brave enough to put a piano solo in my latest song :)

So it's all good! Everyone keeps asking me "how is the course going then, are you still enjoying it?" - I can't really put into words how great this course is. I've never felt so musically inspired in my life. The tutors on the course are brilliant, the guests are equally great, but the best thing about the course is the other students. We're such a close group and so many close friendships have been formed already. There's a real unity about the group and we give each other a lot of support.

For example, the other day Bex played her first ever live acoustic set. She was pretty nervous, but played and sang brilliantly, as we knew she would. A big group of us came down to egg her on and it was really great to have a good old musical chinwag with everyone!

So down to the nitty gritty then. Assignment time is getting closer and we'll be feeling the pressure pretty soon. For our 'Industrial Context' module, we have to write an essay about where we think our place is in the music industry. Thankfully, I think this is starting to become a little clearer for me. My main focus in the immediate future is going to be on getting some top-notch collaborations going. I want to write a classic pop tune - the cheesier and more commercial, the better. I want to have a go at making some money out of this business, and much as I enjoy writing and performing my own music, I don't think there's necessarily a market for it - not without a massively lucky break anyway, and I need to make the odds a little better for myself.

So for me, I'm going to be studying the pop market intensely, trying to get my tunes to sound as edgy and 'in-your-face' as the records being released at the moment are. I know I can do it, and the deeper I venture into this sea of music, the closer I'll get. Hopefully.

I do feel a little like I'm trying to stay afloat at the moment. I'm absolutely loving the challenge of writing a new song every week, but it is taking over my life a little! When I get an idea, I just want to get it finished as soon as possible. So that means the ideas swim around in my head constantly, and I've probably being walking around in a daze quite a lot lately. My mind is elsewhere, trying to write that killer hook or re-jigging the structure of a song.

It's even been affecting my sleeping, I need to find a way of switching off from music! I'll work on an idea until the early hours, finally pack it in, then lie in bed wide awake for an hour or two, rewriting the lyrics and playing around with melodies in my head. Then I'll wake up early, think "damn, I need a C sharp minor 7th in that middle 8!" and go straight to the computer and carry on where I left off. As a result, I feel knackered half the time. But it's all for a good cause... I think!

A couple of new songs to talk about then, and I think a classic example of a musical week going very well, and a week going very badly.

Starting with the bad! The song, appropriately, is called "Too Bad" and indeed, it was almost "Too Bad" for me to even upload. Seriously, I really do hate it. I think the basic idea is strong, and I may even keep the hook line in the chorus - otherwise it needs a complete re-write. The lyrics are rubbish, the melodies are average and it's too long. However, one positive I can take from this song is that it was a bit of an experiment for me - I wanted to write a song without touching a guitar, and I succeeded in doing so. If you want to hear it, click the player on the right hand side bar and find "Too Bad" - I've put it right at the end :-) You can see how much I struggled with this one by looking at all my scribbles - I must've re-written the lyrics about 5 times and they still came out rubbish. Anyhoo!

Onto the good. My week 7 tune is called "Wasting Time" and I'm really pleased with it. I think it's probably the best thing I've written for the course so far. Again, it's on the player on the sidebar, it's the first song on the list. Interestingly, I wrote this tune pretty much entirely on piano and added guitars later, but it wasn't a conscious decision this time, it just happened that way. The idea came to me while cycling home from Uni last Monday, and I think I pretty much knew exactly how I wanted the whole song to sound then. The lyrics came easily, then I just spent a bit of time getting the sounds right for the track. I think it came out nicely - please add a comment if you have any opinions!

Ok, I realise this entry is going on a bit! I had plenty more musings on songwriting, etc. but I'll leave them for a later date. I'll leave you with a couple of pics from an acoustic gig I played last week.

P

Week 4/5 - quick update

2009-11-03T01:09:00.000-08:00

As I suspected I probably would be, I've been pretty lame at keeping this blog up-to-date. As always, I have an excuse lined up and my latest one is that I've been in France for a week. Me and my lovely lady Fae hopped over the water for a mini-break, ending up in the La Rochelle region and generally having a lovely time, mostly focused around eating lots of fabulous French food.

So it's back to the course with a vengeance this week (well, it's back to the course anyway.) Firstly, an update on last week's song which is available via the player in the sidebar on the right. It's called "Just A Phase", a song I wrote after initially coming up with the chorus. I had a nice harmony and decent hook, so decided to write the song around that. It was clearly going to be a pop song, so I went all out to write a true 3 minute verse-bridge-chorus-verse-bridge-chorus-middle 8-chorus song.

Got some decent stuff laid down and some passable lyrics, but when I recorded my vocals it sounded awful. After a day's toil with Cubase SX (I really need to get one of those Uni Macbooks with Logic on...), I nearly abandoned everything I'd done because I hated it. Thankfully, Fae came to my rescue by agreeing to lay down some vocals for me. We changed the melody for her voice, wrote a second verse and voila, it was pretty much done. I think it's pretty decent. Maybe not 'current' enough to be a chart hit, but it's a start. I've got plenty of ideas for future improvements, so that's all good.

I also realise that I've come across a fantastic female vocalist with the perfect voice for pop songs... side project alert!! Watch this space...

Missed last week at Uni then, but fortunately got a recording of the 'Industrial Context' lecture. Absolutely fascinating stuff from two people who are right in the centre of the music industry at the moment - Jez Ashurst and Will Hicks. I'll write a bit more about these individuals at a later date, as I am a bit pushed for time at the moment. Anyway, every second of the two hours I listened to was like audio gold dust.

A lot of what these guys say is obvious stuff, but it makes so much sense to hear it from the horse's mouth, so to speak. It can be dispiriting to hear how incredibly difficult it is to break into the industry, but also equally encouraging and inspiring to hear that the industry is not this dark beast that everyone makes it out to be - labels do actively look for artists, they do listen to demos and encourage new talent. It seems that to make it in the industry, the key points seems to be networking, of course, and good honest hard work. Of course you have to have the talent to write a hit song!

Like I say, I'm a bit pushed for time at the moment so will cut this short in a mo. Just wanted to do a quick update really. I'm looking forward to getting back into the thick of it this week, and submerging myself into a sea of music.

I had a spurt of creativity yesterday and started writing two songs. I was listening to what Jez and Will were saying about how in pop these days you need an edge. Stuff like the Sugababes that used to be considered 'edgy' pop now sounds out-of-date and pretty average. The Girls Aloud-type stuff is fading away. It's all about the Lily Allens, the Florence & the Machines, Little Boots etc. at the moment (although that's not to say it won't all change in 6 months!). So I've written a big, brash synth riff (the 80's are back, didn't you know?), a simple drum beat and a hook for the chorus and I'm going to take it from there. My other idea is more likely to be compatible with my solo stuff, although it's also quite poppy - tried to write something piano-based rather than always starting with guitar.

Aaaaanyhoo. Another quick note to say that I've posted my week 5 song on here, called "Running". I had about half a day to write this after returning from holidays, and I guess it shows. It's a musical experiment rather than a lyrical masterpiece... I started with a funky guitar riff and wrote a few lines about escaping the humdrum. Then for whatever reason, I incorporated a sort-of subliminal breakdown in the middle where the acoustic guitar moves to 7/8 time and I layered a load of vocals and slide guitar, awash with effects creating a sea of bizarre noises. I kind of like it. Whether anyone else will is another matter :) but hey, they say songwriting is all about breaking the rules!

That's it for now. More musings soon.

Winter approaches and I'm getting shivers...

2009-10-24T01:53:00.000-07:00

Aloha,

Just a very quick blog to let you know that my week 3 track, entitled "Shivers" is now available online to listen to. It's a fun, upbeat, light-hearted love song and so far has gone down well with everyone I've played it to. I'm pretty happy with it - I guess I'd say it's my classic 3-minute pop song! Click the play button below if you want a listen...

That's it for now, hope you like the tune. I'll endeavour to do another update before I head off on a mini-holiday for a week, as of tomorrow!

Pat

Week 2 (slightly belated)

2009-10-19T03:36:00.000-07:00

Hi there blog fans,

Apologies that this post is a little late, as I'm now into week 3 of the course - but hey, I'm a musician; always fashionably late. At least, that's my excuse.

So, after the first week fun - meeting everyone, getting to grips with each other's styles, playing our first songs - we got down to the nitty gritty of writing songs every week. For many of us it will be a tough discipline to get to grips with. Personally, I hadn't written anything new for a good while - maybe one song in the last six months or so for me. Writing a new song every week is a challenge, but one which I'm relishing.

It's great to be in the company of such an enthusiastic and talented group of musicians, and we're in such beautiful surroundings. All these positive factors have really inspired me to get back into writing music, and suddenly the ideas have started flowing. I probably could've written 3 or 4 songs in week 2. Maybe I should've - when the ideas are drying up in week 5/6, I'll regret not doing so!

Onto my submission for week 2 then. During my bike ride home from Uni in week 1, I had lots of ideas going round in my head. The one that made it into a song was called "The Girl Who Couldn't Be Seen". It was written about an anorexia sufferer during her teenage years, and the title seemed perfect for the subject matter.

Usually my songwriting process involves getting a catchy melody, developing a memorable hook, then writing the song around these ideas. However, I'm trying to write in as many different ways as possible during this course (lyrics first, concept first, etc.). I've always thought my main weakness lied in writing lyrics - however this week's idea was really refreshing in that I think I could've happily written eight or nine verses.

So I picked up my guitar and got down to the writing process. I really wanted to play on the idea of "The Girl Who Couldn't Be Seen" - it's written about anorexia and how someone can just fade into the background. I wanted to draw literal parallels of the girl actually "not being seen" - i.e. getting physically smaller and weaker; but also to use this as a metaphor, i.e. the girl's problems going unnoticed by family/friends until it's too late.I also really wanted to put a twist into the tale, to trick the listener a little. Basically, the conclusion of the tale is that the girl ended up okay and overcame her problems, but the first half of the song deals with what may have happened had she not have done.

I was fairly happy with the final song, but was well aware of it's shortcomings. I don't think I managed to get the 'twist' across properly, and maybe I cut the song short before I'd got all my ideas in there - I was a little aware of the song running on too long, and losing the listener's interest. I also didn't really manage to build up the visual images of the girl who "couldn't be seen".

When I played the song to my group on Monday, it got a mixed reaction - I think everyone liked it on the whole, but there was plenty of scope for discussion! Many of the points that I had already thought about were raised. Andy (course leader) suggested that it would be interesting to re-write the song and write completely around the subject, rather that dealing with the issues head-on. This idea really appeals to me - I think by doing this I could make the song much more visual, as I had first hoped. When we get on to the "Solo Songwriting 2" module of the course, we will be re-writing all of our songs, so there is plenty of scope for future progression with this one.

If you want to hear the demo, click the fast forward button below and play the track named "The Girl Who Couldn't Be Seen".

My songwriting group has dropped from 6 to 4 people - I believe Andrew is now going to be doing the course next year and Mark has moved to Tuesday, due to the fact that he has to travel from Birmingham each week. So that leaves me and three fantastically talented ladies! What a tough life I lead. First up to play her song last Monday was Kim. Her song was more of an idea - she told us that she struggled to get something new ready in time for Monday, and in fact she forgot the chords when she played it to us! We gave her a breather, and thankfully she remembered what she'd written. Just a starting point for a song so far, but another really great idea which has bags of potential.

Bex played her new song "The Doctor" - a dark song in a similar style to her previous week's submission. More beautiful, haunting vocals and a great story. This song spurred a lot of discussion, we all seemed to have different ideas for where Bex could go next with this one. Andy in particular had a lot to say, and in fact advised Bex to drop about three verses out of it. It will be fascinating to see what Bex does with that one when it's re-written.

And last but certainly not least, Heidi played us her new idea (working title "Opening Night"). Awash with uplifting harmonies and great lyrics, this song again has great potential. We particularly enjoyed Heidi's pre-chorus, where she sang some very melodic gibberish, as she had not written the lyrics for that part yet! Great song though - we have some amazing talent in my group (hopefully I'm not lowering the standard!)

So that's about it Songwriting-wise for week 2. All the other students are now uploading their tracks to our University system, so we can all hear each other's work. There's so many different styles - it's going to be a tough job critiquing every song. For this module, our grade is awarded on the quality of our critique, so there's a lot of work ahead...

Ok, signing off now. Week 3's song is already written and recorded, so I'll get that posted on here soon. I'll leave you with a couple of views of the campus, taken from the window of our rehearsal room.

Pat

Listen to "New Beginning"

2009-10-09T09:35:00.000-07:00

Ok, intended to have this done a couple of days ago, but what with one thing and another, I've only just finished it. So, the acoustic demo for my week 1 song "New Beginning" is now online. Head to:

http://www.last.fm/music/Pat+McIntyre/_/New+Beginning?autostart

I've also added it to the trusty old Myspace:

http://www.myspace.com/patmcintyre

Enjoy :)

Pat

Week 1 - a new beginning

2009-10-06T01:46:00.000-07:00

Monday 5th October, my first tutorial session. Not a tutorial session like any other I've ever had! From my undergraduate days I recall scores of students sat around in a muggy lecture theatre, trying to stay awake through the pain of Freshers hangovers while a tutor rambles on about timetables and attendance. This couldn't be much further away from my first session.

We'd already had our first assignment - prepare a song over the weekend and either play a recording or perform it live to the group. After meeting everyone on Friday and learning what we would be doing over the coming two years, I was feeling inspired to write something. Andrew West, our tutor, didn't give us any guidelines as such; he just said "you've probably got something knocking about" - so we had a free reign to do what we wanted.

I woke up on Sunday and picked up my guitar - I'd had a little riff running through my head for a few weeks and had written a few words, but had abandoned them pretty much as quickly as I'd written them. I strummed the first couple of bars and words suddenly started flowing. Within half an hour I had a couple of verses, and a decent chorus followed. It's quite a while since I've felt that creative flow, so I made the most of it. I had the whole song pretty much written 6 hours or so later. Subject matter was fairly predictable - new starts, turning points in life etc. In fact, the song is called "New Beginning". I wanted to write a really upbeat, positive song, and hopefully I've managed to achieve that.

I got a rough recording down that night and in the morning had a little recap of what I'd done. Of course, I was not happy with it - anyone who knows me will know that I've never been happy with anything I've written. But that's the aim of this course - to improve as a songwriter and work on my weaker points.

I got myself ready for the journey into Uni - since I don't own a car at the moment, my only options are bus or bike. Since I hate buses and I love cycling, the choice was obvious! The route is ideal - I can join the Bristol-Bath cycle path half a mile or so from my house, then the track is traffic-free for the next 10 miles or so. After getting off the cycle track, it's a couple of miles extra to get to the Uni itself. Works out to be about a 30-mile round trip, through the beautiful countryside of the South-West. After leaving Bristol, I saw more squirrels than I did cyclists!

Door-to-door, it took me just under an hour. If I'd walked to the bus station then hopped on a bus, it would take at least as long, probably longer. And it would cost me an arm and a leg. The only problem is that I can't bring an instrument on the bike, but that's not a problem as there's plenty of guitars and pianos around that I can use.

The Newton Park campus is absolutely stunning. It's set right in the middle of the countryside, with a large lake and nature reserve, and some amazing buildings including a 14th century castle. In fact, I believe one of our tutorials takes place in the castle! When the weather brightens up a little, I'll take a camera down and post some photos on here.

So onto the tutorial session then. I think I was the first there, as I wanted to give myself plenty of time to get my breath back and have a good shower. I bumped into Mark, who was also early, and we grabbed a coffee and sat in one of the practice rooms. The other members of our group arrived steadily, and I was glad to find out that they were all as nervous as I was! A couple of people had written new songs, whereas others relied on recent pieces of work that were still in the development stage.

In our group of six, we sat in a circle and one-by-one, played our songs. First up was Andrew's piece, entitled "Put A Little Song In Your Heart", if I remember rightly. Andrew writes songs for children's choirs, which are then performed in a gospel style. So it was very big and bold, there was a lot of production in there - in fact, this song was the finished article already, really. Totally not the style that I expected, and a great way to start the session. We added our thoughts and moved on to the next artist.

Next up was Kim, who performed a song that she'd written at the weekend. It was beautiful - just acoustic guitar and voice. Quite folky and very heartfelt. It was fairly flawless, and only Andy really managed to pick any holes in it.

My turn came next and I was pretty nervous. I decided to play live, mainly because I'm not keen on listening to my own recordings! I borrowed Mark's guitar (thanks Mark!) and played my one day-old tune. Everyone was really positive about it afterwards, both the music and lyrical content were praised, so I was really pleased. I honestly didn't know what to expect, I kind of imagined the reaction to be "it's ok, but...". So I'm really encouraged by that, and it's absolutely inspired me to get writing more and more. Got some great feedback on how to improve the song too, so I'll be re-writing that one this week. I'll post the demo of "New Beginning" on here later tonight.

Next up was Bex, who played a recording of a song she'd written at the weekend. It was a beautiful entanglement of haunting vocals and one simple repeated guitar riff. Reminded me of Portishead or Massive Attack. It was a rough recording, but this gave it it's character. The challenge for Becks now is to recapture that feel when she comes to record it properly. Amazing potential to that song though.

Heidi came next - playing keyboards and singing beautifully, although she was nervous and didn't seem confident with her song. She had no reason to feel that way, as it was a fantastic piece of music. Her real strength was in her lyrics, although musically it was strong too. She conjured up some amazing visual images through her clever use of words, and we all agreed that we couldn't wait to read the lyric sheet back, and really analyse it properly.

Last but certainly not least was Mark, who played a catchy acoustic pop song called "Wish I Could Read Your Mind". Mark's style was probably most similar to mine, and we agreed that we must get together and work on some material. It was already a great song in it's own right, and perfectly publishable, but we still had plenty of scope to suggest improvements.

Overall, it was a tremendously productive session. I feel comfortable with what I'm doing musically again, which was a barrier I was struggling to overcome. There are so many different styles within our group; it's great that I can write and play in my style, and not feel like what I'm doing is too clichéd or predictable.

I'd better run now as I have to get on my bike (literally), but I'll get some music on here very soon. Ciao!

Welcome to MMM!

2009-10-02T15:39:00.000-07:00

Hello and welcome to my first ever blog. I've considered writing one before, but this is the first time it's actually got past the consideration stage. I've tended to avoid blogging until now, mainly because a lot of blogs I read are self-indulgent and fairly uninteresting. The only thing I've done recently that might be of any interest to others was a trip around South-East Asia, and I knew there was no point doing a blog for that, as I'd never keep it updated.

So why start now, you may ask. Well, I think most people tend to begin writing a blog following a major change in their life. Maybe they've had their first child, and they want to share their experiences. Or maybe it's one of the thousands of travel blogs, where people decide that they want to abandon their comfortable 9-5 job to experience new cultures and broaden their horizons.

For me, I feel like I'm at a turning point in my life. At least, I hope I am. For those of you who've known me since I was a young'un, you'll know that I've always been involved with m usic. Ever since I first plonked a couple of notes on the old out-of-tune family piano, or realised that I could make a guitar sound reasonably tuneful, I knew that music would always be a part of my life. And it has, to some extent, but never really to the extent that I would have liked.

As of today, hopefully that will change. Today I enrolled onto a Masters course in Songwriting; indeed it's the "world's first and only Masters degree in Songwriting", according to the online blurb. It's aimed at people like me (I think), who know they have the potential to succeed, and really want to dedicate themselves to giving it their best shot.

I am like so many other musicians. I can play the guitar, piano and perform to a reasonable standard. I can write what I consider to be decent enough songs that people seem to like and enjoy, but yet I find myself playing the same old sets in same old dingy little venues. It hardly inspires and gets the creative juices flowing. I hear songs on the radio and see musicians on the tv and think "I could do better than that!", and friends and family are always saying "well if such-and-such can make a number one record, then I'm sure you can!".

I'm guess I'm stuck in a musical rut. I remember when I was a kid, I used to write songs every day. Admittedly most of them would be complete nonsense; my old school mates will remember a tape that went around called "Tractor yn dod" - Welsh for "Tractor is coming". Many of the songs were written in Welsh. I'll never forget the eternal lyrics "Tractor yn dod, tractor yn dod, mami dadi mami dadi tractor yn dod". Or the track on there which was an Oasis song, but backwards. I wrote all the lyrics out, then learnt to play and sing it backwards. I was an odd child (see pic!).

Anyway, my point is that somewhere along the line, I guess I lost focus of why I was writing music. I'm an incredibly self-critical person. This can be a good trait, but not to the point where you let it stifle your creativity completely. If you're always worrying about the credibility of your lyrics, or the technical quality of your instrumentation, you'll probably end up writing something pretentious and inaccessible. The best songs I've written are the simple ones that come together in an hour, where everything just clicks into place. At the end of the day, music is something that you write for your own enjoyment; if you don't enjoy what you do, chances are others won't either. Hopefully this course will help me rediscover what I'm good at, and help me focus on what I really want to do. My music will be criticised every week, which is nerve-racking, but it's exactly what I need.

I realise that at the start of this blog I complained about self-indulgent ramblings. I'm only one post in and already it's headed that way. For that I apologise!

So anyway, today I registered at the University and met the other students who are beginning their songwriting journeys. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was pretty much a 50/50 male/female split, and there was people there of all ages. There's only 28 of us, but they range from twenty-somethings like me, eager to advance their craft, to fifty-somethings who have toured with large bands and had commercial success, but want to further their own songwriting careers. A really interesting, diverse and enthusiastic group of people, and I'm fascinated to hear the music that they'll be coming up with.

Already we have our first assignment. We have the weekend to prepare a song, which we'll present to our newly-assigned groups on Monday. Daunting, but a great way to dive in at the deep end.

That brings me on to the main point of this blog. It's not all going to be about me (thank god, I hear you say). As well as keeping track of my progress, I'm also going to be talking about the other musicians, and share my thoughts and views about all the music that is being created. I'm also hopefully going to post all my musical ideas on here, so that as well as my music being critiqued by my peers, I can put it out to a wider audience. The more viewpoints, the better!

Ok, I'm going to leave it there for now. Thanks for reading, and please leave a comment if you have anything to say. Over and out.

Pat