A Rant about Music

Today I have stuff to do and don't really have too much time to write this, so forgive me if it comes out a bit ranty. For I will rant.

I'm currently building a costume on a doll. It's for a contemporary music piece I will be performing with a colleague at What ever Works!-Contemporary Music Festival in April. To work I usually need some babble or music, and for that purpose I was searching for something new. I searched for a band in Bandcamp that I've heard much praise about and took a listen. 

It was nicely produced, modern sounds especially in drums, cool modern picture as an album cover. Vocals are nice too and as a vocal coach I can't really help having critical ears there. The vocals actually sound a bit Grunge-like to me, although there's that dark tone that suits Goth Music so well naturally present in the singers voice. 

Everything is balanced. Everything is done well, just like modern standards would require. Apparently it's produced by the band itself, so way to go! At least I can't no record label. And the feedback the album has received is positive, judging from what the band put on their page. Even the words "genius writing" are mentioned. 

There's just this slight teeny weeny feeling of too much cleanliness. It's the current trend in metal, I hear said, and hear myself in the music as well. Everything is clean. In fact everything must be so clean in most today's metal genres, that the living parts have been cut away and replaced with samples or straightened with autotune, and then the whole package is compressed to the roof. And I hate what it does to the music. Maybe it's just me, and me liking the sound of Eighties Goth and generally the more analog sound of past ages. Maybe it's false nostalgia. It's a whole another debate, though...

Anyway, the more I hear, the more I'm glad that there's not too much of this over cleanliness in this band. The natural tone of the singer can still be heard and I like that. And I can hear the slight variations in tempo and dynamics a bit somewhere, which in my opinion just makes the music living, played by actual people. The aesthetics in producing must be due to the genre, I conclude, and if you like the more Doom/Metal side of the wide Goth genre, then this stuff is worth listening to. 

What bugs me the most, and is the reason I can't really listen to this and genuinely enjoy it, is the arranging. It's the fact that most of the time everyone is playing the same thing, and on top of that, the vocals do exactly the same. I mean, the bass, the guitar and the synths are all playing the same melody and then the singer sings that same melody. To me as a singer, a song writer who writes the songs mostly based on the vocal melody and melodies around it, and yes: as a contemporary classical music composer, that is the one thing I try to avoid. It is in fact one of the basic things they teach you in music theory: Everyone does not need to play the same thing all the time. That kind of writing is not genius. 

Now, I'm not completely guiltless of this phenomenon. I'll tell you a story: before Hateful Chains ever existed I used to play synths in a Christian Metal band. As you can imagine, this placed a lot of boundaries to what you could sing about and where you could play, and that's one of the many reasons it never really took off. So, once we were playing at a Christian teen happening, and the guy who organised the event mixed the show. After it he gave us some feedback that really stuck to me: All of you don't have to play the same thing all the time. It makes the music muddy, hard to hear in a live situation. 

And what was the reason for this? In my opinion it was because the songs were based on guitar riffs and chord progressions first. And vocals or song melodies second. It's actually hard to come up with a good melody and lyrics on top of that, when the song is already stuffed with guitar parts. It is hard for me, and that's why I appreciate the true geniuses who are able to do that. What usually happens, though, is that the singer ends up singing the chord progression or even the bass line. In the worst case, it's everyone playing the same thing all the time. 

Now, in the case of this particular band I'm happy to say that there were also nice synth ideas and guitar melodies that were more independent from the whole. There were also some cool moments of tension. And the guitar sounds are nice, especially the beginning of the last track. I also like the way it continues throughout the whole song. The overall blending of Metal and Goth sounds is attractive and cool too. And what's most goth about it might just be the lyrics, the usage of religious imagery and the twists and double meanings there in.  If this band continues, and I hope of course that they will, they'll surely develop into something beautiful. 

And did you guess it? 

Yes, it was Her Despair and their EP Mournography (2018)

Now, off the internet cave and into the cave of handicraft. Maybe I'll do a post about it later.

Sweet dreams, Hypnosis

Good and Bad News

There's a saying here that goes about something like this: Nothing so bad without something good as well, which in English would be "Every cloud has a silver lining". Many things have happened lately and I'm going to tell the good news first.

We made it to round two in Emergenza 2019! That means that enough people apart from our friends (Thank you for showing up!) liked us enough to vote for us. My sincerest thanks to all of you! I would have thought this to be such a marginal music style that it wouldn't have been many a persons cup of tea, but maybe it was? And maybe one factor is also the other musicians from other bands who could be voicing their genuine appreciation for the songs, even if it's not within the boundaries of their specific favourite genre. I don't know, and it might be useless to think about that. The important part is that we're in the next round, playing in a bigger venue in about a month, and we'll have to up the performance and really show what we're made of.

The beautiful thing about Emergenza is that there are no limits to style of music your band is playing. There was even a rapper and a dj ob the last night of the first round, even though this might be considered more a contest for bands. Also, there are no age limits, like there are in many such contests. I like that. I think it gives a more accurate picture of the music scene in a not very big town. 

Most band members I've seen so far are I would say 25ish to their fourties and play in bands alongside their day job and family life, not having the opportunity to be a full time musician and tour the world. They do it for the love of music, and I think it's great that there's a place for those bands too, to appear on stage. As well as those tiny teenagers! There was one band like that as well, full of attitude reaching comic levels, players getting tangled in guitar cords and everything. But they kept playing and held it together. Skill doesn't ask for age.

The next round will happen in just about a month, so we have lots of time to prepare and practice to make our performance tight and gripping. However, one thing hinders our progress so far: Our bass player left the band. We had to do the first round without him and used a backing track. It felt quite awkward as we already had the synths as a backing track, but it couldn't be helped. The other option would have been to quit Emergenza altogether. It seemed to be the safer and easier option, but after all, we decided to do it anyway, and here we are, luckily so! 

So we asked around and since we know many people, a bass player was soon found to assist at least in the upcoming shows. I'm not sure yet, but I think he might stay after that too. We might have to practice some extra, but I'm pretty confident that we'll get our act together in time. These three people that I now have with me in this have played together in various forms since childhood, and I have sung with them in other projects as well. I'm really looking forward to play with this formation, although it is sad to see the original bass player go. 

Meanwhile the collaboration with the small record company has been going forward. New mixes were done of the song we were about to release independently a while ago. What the final version will be is yet to be decided. Still, nothing is written down yet. They would like us to sign a publishing deal with us. That's why lately I've been searching and finding out about publishing deals and pondering on whether or not it would be a sensible thing to do. There are upsides and downsides to it, but then again, that's how it is with remaining independent too. 

But, after a month we'll be playing again and that makes me happy, what ever the future then holds for us after that. Please join, if in the area. Tickets are available from the same link as before:

buyticket.link/hatefulchains