SpinTunes 2, round 4 (final round). I know I skipped a song but for once I’d like to be current on something. So…..I made it to the final round! I never thought I’d make it this far and I’m a little more than surprised. Loads of great songs and talent in this competition. It really is amazing. If you haven’t checked out SpinTunes yet, go to the link above and you can navigate to all the rounds, past and present. Thanks to Travis for running this and to all the judges for taking the time out to do that judging thing.
The challenge was to write a song about a video game character from a first person point of view. It had to be an original character and not one from a movie/tv show etc. I’ll make this one quick. The song, In Bright Falls, is about the character Alan Wake from the video game, Alan Wake. If you haven’t played the game then you probably aren’t sure what the song is about. A quick synopsis of the game, without giving too much of it away, is about AW, who is an author going through writers block for a couple years. He goes on vacation to Bright Falls with his wife, who eventually goes missing. We then journey through many twists and weirdness as AW desperately searches for his missing wife. The song could have gone on a lot longer, but I don’t really care for long songs, unless you’re Pink Floyd.
I was going to make this the last song of the year but I changed my mind and will write one more. Also, I have a bunch of other songs that I’d like to get on here from earlier in the year. Look for those before the year ends. There’s a possible project that could be happening next year. Look out for that too.
So that’s it. SpinTunes is sadly over. Good luck to everybody! Here’s the link to the entire album.
In Bright Falls
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The elf shot the food. The elf shot the food…………………………….
SpinTunes 2, Round 2 entry. The challenge was to write a sequel to a song that has been on one of Billboard’s top 20 hit lists over the years for at least one week. A lot to choose from huh? Since I’m not a big fan of today’s popular music I was able to eliminate the last decade or so and start from there.
The absolute main reason why I went with the song I did was because I needed to write something quick and simple due to the lack of time I had. I was working in NYC during this challenge and commuting in and out killed a lot of my free time, so I went with an acoustic guitar song. Being a big Simon and Garfunkel fan it was an easy choice but extremely difficult to nail. Guitar picking over an extended period of time, if you aren’t used to it, and I’m not (I should practice more) tends to cramp my hand. It was take after take after take until I finally had something I was satisfied with.
The song is simply about a guy who needs to get back out on the road to perform again, but this time, bringing his love with him…aawwww. Oh, and he’s also trying to quit smoking. It mirrors how I feel since I haven’t been performing for the past 3 years due to the job I have. One day I’ll get back out there.
Now to the nightmare that is and almost was. For some still unexplained reason, my computer decided to repeatedly crash 3 hours before the song was due while I was in the middle of heavy editing and mixing. I was then stuck in a loop of doing a couple minutes of mixing, saving and crashing right up until I got the song in at 11:57pm, 2 minutes before the deadline. Now the nightmare that still is. In the middle of the recording process, I got up to take a little break so I put my guitar on the office chair in my studio. Not smart. ALWAYS use a guitar stand. When I came back to resume recording, I clumsily went to grab the guitar and it kind of fell/slid off the chair and into the bottom of the stool I sit on while playing. The stool has this metal round part that goes around the legs. Crash! Now there’s a nice 5 inch crack above the sound hole. Still playable but still need to get it fixed before it gets worse.
Oh yeah I almost forgot (no I didn’t 
) I won the round! As usual, there were a lot of great songs. You can hear them all HERE.
Roadward Bound
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Here is my first entry into the SpinTunes song writing competition. The challenge was to write a song about your hometown. I’ve had a lot of them, but Fairfield, NJ is where I grew up and lived the longest so that’s what I’m going with. The main problem I came across in this challenge is what to cram into a 3 minute song about your hometown? Luckily for me, there’s not much in Fairfield that’s too exciting to write a song about so that made my job somewhat easy. Then again, I compare everything to Disney World so I could be wrong.
The song draws mostly from childhood memories and images from growing up. I’m not a big fan about explaining every last detail about a song but since this is about a place that I’m sure most of you have never been to, I’ll try my best to keep it brief. Ready?
The diner does have a name and it’s name is Versailles. The old library was somehow removed to build a new one across town. Whether it was blown up or zapped by aliens I couldn’t tell you for sure. I didn’t see it happen so I wouldn’t rule it out. The Ice Caverns is where scary animated Santas and Mrs. Santas stand and twist and turn and wave in different holiday settings. It was always FREE, until recently. Sniff… 
The bush with the hand was at my cousin’s house down the street from where my family lived. We used to hide in it as kids and wave to cars to see the reactions. Sorry to ruin the illusion for all you people that drove by and thought it was real. The song then goes on to reference the ongoing flood problem brought on by the mighty Passaic River during heavy long rainstorms. And yes I have a brother Davey that I was forced to watch play softball. Good Tymes was a bar in town that is no longer there and Calandras is the often mispronounced bakery. Stevenson and Churchill are the two rival grammar schools in town and we had arcade games where any kid would rather be than school. Whew!
You can check out the results of the contest here and also read the judges reviews.
The entire SpinTunes round 1 album can be found here. The #1 song, London, is by far my favorite of the round! Great job by everybody involved.
Fairfield
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It’s here! The next SpinTunes contest has started. I will be among the many many participants. 35 to be exact! Check out the profiles of those competing here. You’ll find a lot of really cool and talented people there. The first challenge will be posted tonight at 1 AM. I guess technically tomorrow but you know what I mean. I’m pretty excited about this and I hope it shows in the songs. I haven’t had time to do much lately except for the White Elephant Club’s Skultar challenge and a song for CureFight. I’ll do another post about those tomorrow. Better super late than never. The winner of the Skultar challenge will be announced tonight. For now stay tuned to SpinTunes. It’s going to be fun for everyone.
So………. it’s been quiet in here for awhile huh? I wasn’t slacking though. Most of my time was taken up by the Nur Ein V competition. I meant to put up each song here as the competition rolled on but obviously never got around to it. My plans are to remix each song and put them here and on Bandcamp. Each song needed to be written and recorded so fast that they could all use a better mix.
Also, I just signed up for another songwriting competition. This one is over at Spintown. It’ll be starting up over the weekend. You could check that out here. Over 30 people are in this one. Should be a lot of fun.
Keep checking back for the remixes of songs from Nur Ein and I’ll also have them for free downloads at Bandcamp.
You can go directly to Nur Ein V here and listen to the entire competition round by round. A lot of good stuff.