el deth

Posts Tagged ‘cover’

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unidentified art, New York City, NY

“Edge of Memory”
“Mouse”
“Be My Baby” (The Ronettes)
“Sell it on the Weekends”

In our second Never Sorry session without Katie and Megan, we decided to forget all our songs and start from scratch, at least for this one.  We also abandoned the full instrumentation to go acoustic once again.  The aim was something of a brainstorm.  The result is off the cuff improvisation that sometimes veers into straight dialogue.  There is also a Ronettes cover.

I almost didn’t post this one because I thought it might be just a bit too loose.  The subject matter also ranges from questionable to offensive.  Enough to make me chop out a good chunk of “Sell it on the Weekends.”  I realized it was going to have to be done before we even finished playing the song.

This is us at our most carnal and immature.  It is also riddled with confusion and a little frustration.  Sometimes, though, it just works.

Dane Hill – acoustic guitar, kick drum, vocals
R.J. Hill – auxillary percussion, vocals
Arrison Kirby – acoustic guitar, vocals

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“Dead (As Disco)”
“Afraid of the Ghost”
“Faux Elephant”
“Stand By Me” (Ben E. King)
“Dead (As a German Military Rock Band)”
“Anemone” (Brian Jonestown Massacre)
“Reading Rainbow” (Horelick, Kleinman & Weir)

This session is called Busted Shit because that’s what it is.  It’s all over the place.  A disheveled mess of sound.   It’s also the first session that Nathan Brown sat in on as part of Never Sorry.  He only played on two of the songs:  “Afraid of the Ghost” and “Reading Rainbow.”  They were the longest documented versions of each so far.

I really wanted to post up just one more session before the show.  This is one of four recorded in the past several weeks, but the other three pretty much are the show (in a few variations, of course).  So this, being the earliest of the four, was all I could spare without much ruining the show we have planned.  Here’s a hint, though:  we’re not playing “Stand By Me.”

“Dead” – Two versions on this one.  A minimalist, dance oriented one (maybe dance the way goths dance, though).  As for the other one, I really think “German Military Rock Band” really kind of speaks for itself.  I’m playing synth bass on the first and fuzzed out bass guitar on the second.  That’s Katie on the keys in the second one.

“Afraid of the Ghost” – The first take of the first song Nathan sat in on with keys and electronics.  It slops around a long and winding road.  The longest version of this old favorite for sure.

“Faux Elephant” – Dane was bugging out on some synthetic sitar.  That’s Katie on the drums.  Everyone else assuming their usuals.

“Stand By Me” – This was just one of those “sure…let’s do it on a whim” kinda songs.  Obviously it had been in our mutual music echospheres for a few weeks.  Yet every time I hear any version except the original, I can’t help but think to myself, “meh.”  Our version is no different in these regards.  Whatever though.  Someone out there might enjoy it.  I don’t think I really care about ever playing this song again unless we rock it out really bad and rough.

“Anemone” – We began with another version initially.  I was playing drums.  Dane on guitar.  Katie on bass.  It was really chill until I stuck in a drum part that kind of threw some of us off.  So when we stepped back from it, I sped up the part that was messing us up and played it over and over and over again.  And that version is this version.  It’s super raw and bouncy.

“Reading Rainbow” – Another version with Nathan.  This one meanders into some insanity at the end.  I considered chopping it into two parts:  “Reading Rainbow” and “Reading Rainbow (Reprise).”  But hey.  I didn’t.  So suffer out the slop of the first part because the slop of the last part is well worth it.

Katie Collins – omnichord, ukulele, drums, bass
Megan Driscoll –  flute, vocals, harmonica, tambourine
Dane Hill – bass, drums, guitar
Rachel Jae – auxillary percussion, vocals
Arrison Kirby – guitar, keys, bass, drums
Nathan Brown – keys, electronics

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“What is This?  (David Dalton Returns to the Sea)”
“Life is Terrible”
“Party USA or Something”
“Stand By Me” (Ben E. King cover)
“Forecast: Marked”

This session began as a semi-regular Never Sorry set without Dane.  The girls and I were having some trouble breaking out of the mediocre, though we did get some newer versions of things in line for a good future nail down.  Basically, though, it was a short night that was more building than interesting.

Katie and Rachel cut out relatively early, each for their own reasons.  Not content to leave a record of practically nothing, Megan and I pressed forward with beat, bass and vocal improv.  DJ Modifi, again, was not present in person, but we used his beats for the final track.

The recording, itself, could have been better had I ran Megan’s microphone directly into the board, rather than into a board into a board as we usually do.  Here, it’s just too minimal for that and the result is this terrible hiss that persists throughout.  Eventually, you may forget that it’s there as you listen…but it drives me crazy.

“What is This? (David Dalton Returns to the Sea)” – Megan didn’t have much to say at first, what with me all but shoving a microphone in her mouth and demanding she say something.  I covered it myself by the second half, though.  David Dalton is one of my personal heroes.  I used to play in a hip hop band with him.  It was called Flashmob.  We used this beat relatively close to the end of Flashmob’s brief but powerful tenure.  So it’s natural that my own vocal musings would begin mentioning that.  Eventually it builds into exactly what it says in parenthesis up there in the song title:  David Dalton returning to the sea.  He is, after all, David Dolphin:  The Porpoise with a Purpose.

“Life is Terrible” – I may have to make an executive band decision that Megan doesn’t talk about her job anymore at sessions.  When such dialog bleeds into the music, you get this.  It’s nicely sung…but very depressing.

“Party USA or Something” – I let someone secret hear this one and they remarked that it sounded like a Miley Cyrus song.  I have to concur.  That sample is from the song “Dime” by Cake.  Also note my only vocals on this one:  an interpolation of “Sweet Jane” by the Velvet Underground.

“Stand By Me” – A cover of the Ben King classic.  She’s singing a lot better than I’m playing the bass.  For whatever reason, I thought it would make some dumbass artistic statement if I played the whole song on mostly open strings, focusing not on variety, but cadence of simplicity.  In the end it works…but I might should have actually stopped and thought about it somewhere in the five or so takes we did.  That’s the same beat from “Free Day.”

“Forecast: Marked” – This beat was created by DJ Modifi and I love it.  This is a mostly instrumental track and probably the best of this bunch.

Megan Driscoll –  vocals
Arrison Kirby – beats, bass, vocals
DJ Modifi – beat composition

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“Creep” (Radiohead cover)
“Move Her Aside”
“House of Satan”
“Translucent Corpses”

The instrumental tracks border on uplifting, as we continue down the experimental path we carved out in the last session.  The two with lyrics run kind of dark.  I almost thought about calling this session Apocalypse Light but I didn’t want the word “light” to diminish the gravity of “House of Satan.”

Katie is not on this session, as she was still visiting Peru at the time.  However, we were able to rope in contributions from Augustin Brally and DJ Modifi.  We also tackled a new cover song, but you can read all about that stuff below…

“Creep” – Ah.  Radiohead’s classic breakout jam.  It worked pretty well when I recorded it with David Davis.  So we got to talking about it and decided to give it a try in this arrangement.  Dane played bass.  Megan played the omni.  I trashed out my guitar.  Rachel sang, of course.  The beats come to us courtesy of DJ Modifi.  He wasn’t at the session, but he was the composer of those beats.

“Move Her Aside” – This one is well paced.  Punk rock stoner rock or something.

“House of Satan” – A song about the devil having a heavy heart, spilling it to you in the wee hours of the morning, after a night of partying with him.  The lyrics were complete improvisation, yet I think it came out perfect, but for one line.  I won’t say which, but it will be changed on subsequent recordings, most likely.  For the most part, this song sits very heavy.  The creepy theremin is being played by Georgia inhabitant, Augustin Bralley.  He also does a wee bit of knob turning around some of the synth effects.  This sounds like the song you play as the city you are in is burning.

“Translucent Corpses” – This was the pretty much immediate follow up to “House of Satan.”  It really let’s the air back in, thankfully.  I like the idea of translucent corpses following the devil’s moments of…uh…darkness.  This song is like a spaceship out of all that mess.

Megan Driscoll –  flute, omnichord
Dane Hill – drums, bass
Rachel Jae – vocals, auxillary percussion, omnichord
Arrison Kirby – guitar, beats, vocals
Augustin Bralley – theramin, effects
DJ Modifi – beat composition

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photo by McKenzie Michaels

“Creep” (Radiohead cover) – David Davis & Arrison Kirby

David Davis (the red cloud, Mar) has been hanging out around the studio recently.  We haven’t really pushed a session yet, though we did end up shitting out this cover of the Radiohead standard.   We did use the session set up to record it.  Unfortunately, so much usual pre mixing was neglected because of the spontaneity of this track.  The iffy result is a few vocal lines mixed a bit too quietly.  (We can’t fix it because it’s mic’d with the omni.)  It’s especially evident at the beginning, but the projection increases into form by the end of the song.  All in all, it’s a tolerable flaw.

David is singing and playing guitar.  I’m accompanying on Katie’s omni.  It was my first time actually joining in on a full song with the omnichord.

David Davis – vocals, guitar
Arrison Kirby – omnichord

Yay!  The band has a video!

This song and the video were recorded on 12.1.10 at a session that only included myself, Katie Collins and Megan Driscoll.  It’s cover of the NWA song, “Automobile,” (as they reformed from the original by Parliament) from their highly misogynistic, but wonderfully produced Niggaz4Life .  It’s different than the version we did in the last session.  That one was rockin’.  This one is more chilled out and electro.

Lots of offensive language on this.  Again, I’m no fan of standard camp.  But this isn’t camp…these are gangstas!  They mean it!

And as always, if you’d like to download the MP3, here you go:

“Automobile” – Never Sorry

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photo by Annie Leibowitz

“Opening Bell”
“Give Peace a Chance (Seriously)”
“No Destination”
“Jumble Bumps”
“La Tee Dah (Give Peace a Chance)”
“Locked Doors in Mexico”
“Failed Fire”
“Afraid of the Ghost”
“Give Peace a Chance (Or Something)”
“Achey Breaky Heart”
“A Double K C”

This is, so far, has perhaps been my favorite session.  It’s loose and dirty, but flows quite merrily.  Definitely fun to play and, hopefully, listen to.  The use of the keys with the larger sound is new to this arrangement of players.  Instrument swapping also continues.  And everybody’s favorite…cover songs!  [kind of]

“Opening Bell” – One of our traditional, improvisational, come-from-nothing, random openers.  It begins with the beat and ends with Dane’s live drumming.  The latter is the better.  Pretty happy shit.

“Give Peace a Chance” (John Lennon cover) – Oh yes.  Three different versions.  Everybody knows the chorus, for sure,  but everybody’s talking bout…what?  So I just made up new verses.  It’s the giving peace a chance part that matters, after all.

“No Destination” – Dane on guitar.  Katie using the omni to add a really nice, easy going vibe – especially at the beginning.  I’m drumming.  I felt pretty on top of my shit with drums that night, too.

“Jumble Bumps” – This is probably my favorite song from the session.  I believe that I made very good choices with the keys and the guitar solo.  The only problem is that I did not necessarily do this at the same time.  There is one very particular aspect of this one that is like nails on a chalkboard to me…but it runs alongside the really really good aspects.  I’m not going to point out anything beyond that.  Hopefully your ears will hear it differently than mine.

“Locked Doors in Mexico” – This one is just Dane and I.  He on guitar.  Me on drums.  That dude is a great communicator, musically.  I love the last third, in particular, where we drop it low and bring it back.

“Failed Fire” – This is just Dane and I again.  It’s kinda like one of those “musical comedy” deals that tend to manifest themselves sometimes.

“Afraid of the Ghost” – I don’t know why I want to do this song so much.  I guess because it’s so simple to work within.  I still want something more ideal for the 1st half or so.  Tried it with some low organ sounds on this one.  I dunno…it’s okay.

“Achey Breaky Heart” (Billy Ray Cyrus cover) – Hence the Cyrus part of the session name.  Once again, this is another one of those songs where you totally know the chorus, but only get the general idea of the verses.  In this case, however, that circumstance may vary from person to person.  I know it’s kind of scary, but some people out there probably do know this song word for word, beginning to end.  We are simply not those people.

“A Double K C” – Me on drums.  Katie on the keys.  A little bit of night magic.

Katie Collins – omnichord, keys
Dane Hill – guitar, drums
Arrison Kirby – guitar, keys, drums
Megan Driscoll – tambourine

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“Anemone” (Brian Jonestown Massacre)
“New Beginnings”
“Clap Hands Jam” (improv on Beck)
“Untitled as Yet (Down)”
“Really Horrible Shit is Popular”
“Single Politician”
“Family Affairs”
“Untitled as Yet (Up)”
“Hymn”

This session was primarily practice for the Pilot Light show with Katie and the Bass Drums coming up on August 25th, as some – if not all – of the players in this session will be joining me that day.  This is also the first session recorded in which Rachel Jae and Dane Hill were present.   It was interwoven with a lot of surprise sounds coming to the forefront. Ideas too.   Some of those surprise sounds and ideas are as follows:

“Anemone” – As noted above, this is a cover of the Brian Jonestown Massacre song. The first or second time we got together under musical pretense, Katie gave me a mix CD with the original version as the starting track. I immediately loved it. It’s not too complicated of a song. So Katie, Megan and I picked it up really quick and then laid it down after Dane and Rachel had left for the night. The first take wasn’t too bad. This was the second and it’s slightly better.

“Clap Hands Jam” – This is just one of those goofy little segues that sometimes rise up when live recording. Dane and the girls had a good little percussion section going. I tried to enter with Beck’s “Clap Hands” but could not remember the order of the notes right off. So I bounced around between them, hence being but a “jam.” I did actually find the correct order, but only momentarily before we decided to send itg to its grave.

“Untitled as Yet” – Two versions here. The “down” version was actually recorded immediately following the “up” version. I reordered them and spaced them out in the track listing for the sake of flow. The down version incorporates no electronic beats, only minimalist percussion from Dane and Rachel – plus a little off kilter theremin from me. Also, notice that both versions contain “lyrics” now. We needed some way to signal when we wanted to do the key drop. Looking at each other and nodding is fine, but not always so interesting or reliable. Rachel suggested we all say “Make a wish” right before the drop. We all were in agreement, but then we did not know how to signal the wish, itself. We worked that one out too.

“Single Politician” – Dane is playing a full kit on this one and it sounds grand. We went through a few different alterations to get to this version. Mostly based around the drums, as Dane had two different modes for this song, both of which worked well. With two drum modes and two sections of the song so far, we decided to try a different mode for each section, but run them together. I think this is the best version of this song yet.

“Hymn” – If you are offended by this song, then you might want to consider downgrading your church. Perhaps to a model without an ATM machine.

Katie Collins – omnichord, ukulele, words
Megan Driscoll – flute, omnichord, vocals
Rachel Jae - shakers, wood blocks, words
Dane Hill – drum kit, hand percussion, wood blocks, words
Arrison Kirby – guitar, beats, vocals