6 Reasons To Release Fewer Songs More Often

How many songs should I record?

This isn't a question I get asked very much, but I wish it was :) There are a lot of bands coming into the studio recently recording 10, 12 even 15 songs. That is good news for me and the studio, but not so much good news for the bands. As soon as I find out a new band wants to record more than 4-5 songs especially a new band, I immediately try to talk them out of it. I'm probably the worst recording studio salesman in the world - hahaha - but it really doesn't help to record a large amount of songs these days and here's some reasons why:

1. You need to develop your sound
New bands and bands which have gone through major member changes especially need to develop their sound. There is no better way to develop your sound than recording 3-4 songs and then really analyzing them. Usually a band's first songs are all over the place without any strong cohesiveness or style. This is good because you (or even better, your audience) may gravitate to one or two songs more than the rest. This gives you the opportunity to explore what makes those songs more appealing and try to introduce more elements from them into your other songs.

2. You need to develop your songs
Many times if there is a cohesive style, the songs themselves may be rather flat and under developed, either from the point of view of you, as a band/artist, or from the perspective of the audience. At last count there are exactly 1 gazzilion active bands/artists on the planet right now. To stand out, you need to make your songs as good as they can be. Maybe there are 'holes' in the song - parts which don't hold the attention of the listener - parts which perhaps need re-writing or additions. Issues like these are much easier to address when dealing with a smaller batches of songs. Trying to fill out and refine even 6+ songs is a major undertaking both from the creative side and especially from the budget/money side if the problems don't crop up until after the recording process begins.

3. Most people don't listen to LPs front to back anymore
The way people consume music has changed radically in the past 10-15 years. Spotify, Pandora and YouTube have changed the way people are listening to music. They are hearing mixes of various artists and not just jamming a whole record as much anymore. This is especially true if the artist is new or more unknown. You'll have a decent shot at getting people to hear 1 song. If the song is good and keeps the listeners attention, they might listen to 2 songs. If after those first 2 amazing songs, you become their new favorite band, they might listen to 3-4 songs, but almost nobody will listen to 6+ songs in one sitting from a new or local band.

4. Stay more in touch with your audience by recording fewer songs more often
Writing, practicing, recording and releasing songs takes time, especially if you are refining them to be as great as they can be. This process for 8+ songs could easily take over a year. In that case you have only one major thing to talk about on the Facebooks/Twitters/Internets for 12-18 months. If you record 3-4 songs every 3-6 months you will have 3-5 'big' things to talk about in the same amount of time. More things to talk about = more opportunities to stay fresh in the minds of your listeners/likers/followers/fans.

5. More releases means more feedback
You always want to be flexible. Its harder to tweak your style into something that could ultimately  prove to be much more successful if you're entrenched in a 12-18 month writing/release process. I believe the most important thing that the immediacy of the internet has done is given a voice to listeners/likers/followers/fans, whether that means something like public outcry changing the ending of a major video game release like Mass Effect 3 or gently guiding a local band into a more appealing direction, this public feedback mechanism is unique to this time and should definitely be taken advantage of. I'm not saying you have to 'beta-test' your songs by posting works in progress for critique (though that is pretty cool), but by having a shorter release schedule you'll have more opportunities to get feedback to tweak to (or ignore ;) )

6. The dark side
There are a lot of pressures and emotions that go into being in a band. Maybe the band chemistry changes and a member becomes problematic, maybe someone has to move away, maybe you don't like the way someone smells anymore, maybe life just happens and someone has to leave or worse yet the whole project disbands. Even if you are on the same page with goals from the beginning, doesn't mean it will stay like that. This creates a much, much larger problem if you're working on a 6+ song release on a 12+ month schedule. There is a lot more wasted time and money chucking out an LP that has a lead vocalist that just quit compared to just adapting a new member to the next set of 3 or 4 songs. Just remember bands are like having a relationship with 2+ more people and has the same kind of volatility that goes along with any other close relationship.

The Most Important Thing You Can Do To Make Your Band Successful

The most important thing you can do to make your band successful is both obvious and deceptively simple: Keep your band together.

You and your fellow band members don't have a lot of control when it comes to who likes your music or which blogs will write about it or if it gets any kind of airplay. What you do have control over is yourselves: how you interact with each other, what your individual and collective goals are, and most importantly how you treat each other.

Its so obvious. I mean if the band isn't together of course it can't become successful :) I have a strong belief that if 4 people who hadn't ever played instruments came together with the same goals, focus, and good communication they would be eventually become a famous band (if that's what their goals were ;) )

Here are a few ways to get and keep your band together, focused and strong.

1. Everyone in your band should be on the same page.
The best way to do this is with clearly defined goals - especially ones you can break down into numbers. Don't let people get away with answers like 'I don't know' or 'I guess, I'll have to see how it goes'. The more specific you can be the better.
- How many shows do you want to play now - Twice a month; every weekend all weekend?
- Ideally how many shows do you want to play or CAN you play - is a 60 or 90 day tour too much?
- How much is everyone willing to contribute monetarily to the band - how much money can you contribute of your own/month $0? $1000?
- How much personal time is everyone willing to contribute - 10 hours/week; 20? 50?

In addition to clearly defined goals with numbers you should all talk about what the ultimate goal for the band is. Is it 'have fun'? If so, what does 'have fun' mean to everyone? Try not to have answers that are open ended - "Dude, I just want to have fun, but if something happens, you know, that's cool." Those answers tend to create a lot of problems down the road.

A lot of bands ask this question and answer it with "I would like the band to get to a point where it breaks even money-wise." Fine. If that's what you want, write songs in the basement and don't play shows. No recording budgets. No gas for shows. No merch costs. BAM! You just broke even - goal met! The problem is people want some form of success in addition to 'breaking even'. They want to record and play shows and have merch. If you really want to have all those things AND have your band  break even, its a good exercise to define some costs so you have a better understanding of how much you should be looking to make in return to break even. For instance call some recording studios and get realistic budgets for how much it is to record. Call merch vendors and find out how much it is to get shirts pressed. If you know your recording will be $1000 and shirts will be $500 and you know how much you plan on charging for shirts and recordings, then you know you have to sell 'x' amount of recordings and shirts to break even. Having that 'x' number is KEY. It gives you something to shoot toward while you're trying to 'spread the word' (market) yourselves.

2. Be not only cool with one another, but be a family.
Have respect for other members and try to find ways to talk with each other that are not incendiary or cause flare-ups. If someone has a problem with something try to use "I" statements to approach the other person(s). For instance try approaches like "Maybe its just me, but I feel like that part you're playing is not totally on. Can you show me what you're doing?" instead of "Dude, you're totally fucking up that part like ALWAYS! WTF!"

A lot of people just use the latter way and play the "Dude, I'm just being honest!" card, but there are ways of being honest without insulting someone or damaging their ego - and ego damage control is key to communicating with other musicians/artists.

Being a family also means being there for each other no matter how bad things get. In the Nirvana video below (at 2:00), Kurt is having problems with a bouncer. Watch how FAST Dave and Chris throw down their instruments to come to his aid. Amazing solidarity!




3. Sometimes its best to love the one you're with, not the one you want.
Everyone has their own idea of what they would like the band to sound like. With that sound comes individual styles of play. If you find that you have a member whose personality fits in well with the band, but his playing style is a little different than what you would like, its best to try and modify your vision to match the members you're playing with. For instance, The Smiths almost didn't use Mike Joyce, because they thought his drumming was too aggressive at first, but in the end I think the aggressiveness of his style adds something to their sound, they maybe wouldn't have got with a mellower drummer. Same with Andy Hurley from Falloutboy. Falloutboy would sound totally different if Hurley's drumming was a more poppy style instead of the hardcore background he came from. Also when people play to their strengths they feel good about what they're doing because they're doing something they are confident with.

Being in a band is like having 4 (or more) girlfriends or boyfriends and they're all different and all have different quirks and personalities. If you can find ways to focus yourselves, communicate better, and appreciate one another for who you are, your chances of survival AND success as a band will be much greater.

- Shane Olivo
The New Loud
Bobby Peru Recording

2+2=5 is D.O.N.E.

The New Loud has finally finished up the Radiohead cover we've been hard at work on for the past few months. This will be the last blog dedicated to it EVER!

Before the final blog, Jessi has a quick message in reference to her last video:


There you have it! Back to 2+2=5!

This week the focus will be on the vocals. Because Thom Yorke has such a wide range to his vocals from his lower voice to his falsetto-ey upper register,
we decided to split the vocals up between Jessi and I with Jessi handling all the upper register parts and me taking care of the lower parts.



The Radiohead song is separated by 4 parts in 2 distinct halves. The first half is drone-y and quiet while the second half is loud and aggressive. In order to differentiate the 2 halves even more we decided to split the singing in half between Jessi and I.



For the end of the song we decided to do some crew vocals with all 3 of us shouting. Radish ends up getting a little TOO into it - LOL!!!




So without further ado. Here is The New Loud's complete version of 2+2=5 by Radiohead:



Special thanks to everyone who checked out all four blogs!!! If you haven't yet, you can still do so. They show you step by step how the song came together. Hope you enjoyed it! Please take a moment and check out the links at the bottom.

thankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyouthankyou

***OUTTAKES***
Radish Beat gives some additional insight into how he perceives the lyrics to the song and America in general:



If you're not familiar with the original Radiohead song, 2+2=5, check it out here:



Here's a link to the Radiohead comp page:
http://www.ftcrecords.com/

Here's a link to the good blokes that hooked us up:
Mr Russia - http://www.myspace.com/mrrussia

Last but definitely NOT LEAST - Subscribe to The New Loud's vlogging mentor:
Miltownkid - http://www.youtube.com/user/miltownkid

2+2=5 Keyboard Is DONE!

The New Loud has finished up 2+2=5, the Radiohead cover we've been hard at work on for the past couple months. This week we're going to tell you all about the keyboard parts and give you a little insight into the parts.

In order to really put the focus on the keyboard, we decided to remove the guitar and vocals from the mix of the audio examples.

In our minds - as I explained in the blog about the bass and drums - 2+2=5 has 4 distinct parts that make up 2 halves of the song. I'll take you through each part and explain the keyboard ideas.

SECTION 1



Verse 1 starts out with a very spazzy arpegiated keyboard part. We have it mixed lower mainly to create tension.


After verse 1 we have a little melodic line to fill in the space. Toward the end of verse 2 a sustained organ comes in to support the vocals harmonies.



SECTION 2
The vocals in this section are very light and effected so we decided to make a really edgey keys part to counter the floaty-ness. The part is basically made by changing the tuning on one of the synth layers with both course and fine pitch adjustments. We feel that jacking everything up at the end gives it an almost guitar-feedback-like blast before the aggressive part kicks in. The keyboard is a Nord Lead 3.



SECTION 3



This section is definitely weighted more toward aggression than melody. We decided to use a synthy pad with a stronger attack. Toward the back half, a 2nd keyboard doing sustained organ comes in to build on the aggressiveness more.

SECTION 4


We decided to add some melody key parts in place of the effected guitar from the original.

WHOLE TRACK - Drums, Bass, Keyboards


Next week: Vocals!!


If you're not familiar with the original Radiohead song, 2+2=5, check it out here:



Here's a link to the Radiohead comp page:
http://www.ftcrecords.com/

Here's a link to the good blokes that hooked us up:
Mr Russia - http://www.myspace.com/mrrussia

Last but definitely NOT LEAST - Subscribe to The New Loud's vlogging mentor:
Miltownkid - http://www.youtube.com/user/miltownkid

2+2=5 Drums, Bass and Guitar

So, The New Loud has been hard at work on our cover version of 2+2=5 by Radiohead. This week we finished up the drums, bass and guitar.

As most of you know, all our bass is sequenced. We tried a bass player - couldn't really find one that stuck, so, like so many other aspects in our lives - we left it to the machines.

In our minds 2+2=5 has 4 distinct parts that make up 2 halves of the song. The first half is building and somewhat floaty. The second half is very aggressive. When we were working on the bass we kept in mind the 2 halves. We retained a heavy/sub-bey low end for the first half and then made an abrupt switch to a very abrasive/sawtooth sound for the second half.

Here's the complete drums and bass parts:


Next up was Guitar!!


Here's my first stab at the guitar parts - a lot of which I kept on the final::..




If you're not familiar with 2+2=5, check it out here:



Here's a link to the Radiohead comp page:
http://www.ftcrecords.com/

Here's a link to the good blokes that hooked us up:
Mr Russia - http://www.myspace.com/mrrussia

Last but definitely NOT LEAST - Subscribe to The New Loud's vlogging mentor:
Miltownkid - http://www.youtube.com/user/miltownkid

2+2=5 Radiohead - Introduction

Here's a little audio clip of some initial beats Radish worked out for the drums. It was just recorded with 1 stereo mic at our practice space which also doubles as my recording studio - how convenient.



The song is separated into 4 distinct parts:

-The first part is in 7/4. We decided to make the rhythm a bit more aggressive than the original.

-The second part has kind of a floaty feel. The New Loud incorporates a lot of electronic drumming, so, we thought this 2nd part would be a good place to showcase that. The electronic drum roll definitely ramps up the tension just as much or more so than the original.

-The third part is the explosive part. We needed something quite aggressive here so we chose this beat with a lot of cymbal crashes.

-The last part is rhythmically aggressive, but not in a rock sense so we'll scale back the crashing and have the rhythm be tighter here.

If you're not familiar with 2+2=5, check it out here:



Here's a link to the Radiohead comp page:
http://www.ftcrecords.com/

Here's a link to the good blokes that hooked us up:
Mr Russia - http://www.myspace.com/mrrussia

Last but definitely NOT LEAST - Subscribe to The New Loud's vlogging mentor:
Miltownkid - http://www.youtube.com/user/miltownkid