Live To Rock

Here’s a blast from the past. The first song we ever wrote (not counting the little dittys I scat about all the time) is up and living in the webverse.  Didier of course has a tasty guitar part, Slate’s bass line is fun and I’m singing lower that I usually do.  We performed this live in SF awhile back (RockIt Room, Red Devil Lounge and a club in Palo Alto whose name escapes me). Check it out:  Live To Rock

New Songs Update

Didier and I have been hard at work.  We’ve got 4 tasty new treats for you:

Simmering on the stove, still adding spices is our balad I Want You Here.

In the Oven is the head banging Dr. Evil. Which will surprise people, on many levels!

On the table and ready to enjoy is our rockin rendition of House of the Rising Sun.

Still in the mixing bowl is Just One More Night.  I had to do a happy “up” song after the intensity of Dr. Evil!

So, what’s up with the food metaphors since the studio is now back in the 2nd bedroom, where it belongs.  Humm maybe I should be using other metaphors (foreplay, climax, afterglow…doh, a missed metaphor!)

okay, it’s late.  Bottom line, we’ll put little teasers up on the web site from time to time, but not for long.  So, you’ll have to check back to see if you can catch a glimpse into the full length album project!!

nite,

j.

Long Distance Song Writing

All we can say is thank heavens for GarageBand, ichat (with Zoom H2) and idisk!  With those fine tools, Didier and I are still able to work together on songs.  Yeah!

I usually record a vocal track in GarageBand then pass it via idisk to Didier.  He thinks about it for awhile.

Long ago I learned that it was kind of a waste of time for me to come up with cords because he always hears something much more amazing then the 12 cords I know

We’ll work with it on ichat, but the problem is the sound only goes one way. So, while I’m singing I have to watch his hands for the cord change, stop for a sec and listen, then sing again.  We use the Zoom H2 recorder to pick up his guitar parts so that when we say “hey that was a cool bit”, we can remember what we just did!

Then he messes around with the cords, sometime morphing the melody…sometimes too far.  With one song I  had to say “Woa, I’ve had this song in my head for two years. This is the melody I want.”  But that doesn’t happen too often. Usually his tweakage is really interesting.

Anyway, back and forth…pausing…clipping…tweaking…lyric rewrites…guitar solos and then finally one day “hey, you know I really like this song.”

And there you have it.  We’re looking at January to have the full length CD done with all the new songs.

A tasty treat indeed,

Jenn

The Anatomy Of A Song – Part 4 Making The Music

Didier: I wake up one night and all I can hear in my mind is slide guitar. I know it’s got to be a part of Blacktop Shimmy.

The thing is, I don’t play slide guitar.

Jenn: Cut to midnight, sounds coming from the dining room/studio. What is he doing? Yawn…note to self – find out in the morning.

Turns out he was up all night rigging up his guitar and teaching himself to play slide. Impressive. Me like.

Didier: All I did was improvise a piece of metal between the strings and the fret board to lift the strings up ad then messed around to get the sound and feel I wanted…All in a night’s work, anything for the music!

Anyway, getting back to the actual song. The next step was to find the right groove then lay down this fun slide guitar part. The rest of the song just flowed out like butter.

Jenn: What!? Selective memory at work. Not butter yet. The first pass didn’t quite jell. (sorry for the food metaphors-but the studio is in the dining room after all!). But there was this really cool bit he had in there and after a bit of “discussion” and “pausing” we decided to build out the cool bit and leave the other bit for another song. <turns out, we do this on most of the songs we write together>

Didier: Now, it’s like butter. The song takes shape and form and the fills and bells and whistles get added.

Jenn: And the cool bass line too.

Didier: That’s about it. We got it done just in time to record the vocals at Studio D before I moved.

sniff,

Jenn & Didier 

The Anatomy Of A Song – Part 3 About What?!

So, we’ve got the chorus…now what’s the song about.

This one took more time to figure out. Why would we be on a rainy road in the middle of nowhere?

OK, imagine our character has just had a break up and they are on a road trip trying to get their head together.

Now, who is the main character? Who’s the evil “ex” that we’ve left behind? Why did they breakup? Do we need to know, do we care.

I worked with that for awhile, but it all seemed kinda whiney. Plus, I was in a very happy relationship so this is where my boyfriend kept saying “Is this about us?” (“Ah, no Honey. We’re happy and we’re in California”, “oh yeah”)

Plus, I’m thinking I’ve got enough whiney, ranting, stomp around the stage songs. People may start to think I’m just a bitter young thing!

Cut to the chase, and the story becomes about the road trip itself and the imagery our heroine sees along the way.

Next time, Didier talks about turning melody and lyrics into music.
TTFN,
Jenn

The Anatomy Of A Song – Part 2 Imagery

When we last left our story; we had a melody and lyrics for the chorus of Blacktop Shimmy.

What the heck was I thinking about?

Oddly enough, I was thinking about the blacktop roads in the Midwest – how they shimmer in the sun and create a mirage.  But “blacktop shimmer” just didn’t roll of my tongue right…sounded like I was drooling.  Now, I know with rock, it’s not a requirement to enunciate, but I would like people to know what the songs about. Especially since I do put thought into the imagery of the song.

So, “blacktop shimmey” popped out. When would you shimmy on blacktop…oh, when it’s raining.  Good…here come the rest of the chorus lyrics bam, bam, bam.

Now…what’s the song about in the verses?  Stay tuned for the next blog “About What?!”

Jenn

The Anatomy Of A Song – Part 1 Messing Around

“How did you write that one?”

“Is that one about me or _____?”

How does a song move from the ether into being? Inquiring minds want to know…and if not, click to the next blog entry

So here’s how Blacktop Shimmey came to life.

It was December 2007 and Didier and I needed one more song for our demo EP. We were sitting around the dining room/studio (see the Home Depot Youtube video if you want the visual!). We were just mess around with ideas, looking at some of the old songs and snippets I’d written to see what we wanted to build out. We got a laugh when the little melody “Yo baby you’re my Christmas ho. You put the ho in ho ho ho” spilled out of my mouth. But we didn’t feel that was a good fit with Africa and Asylum!

Then I started singing an old blues tunes and Didier thought that sounded lovely and we should do a blues number. The next morning, in the shower, in pops the lyrics and melody for the chorus. I had to rush out of the shower to the mini recorder so I wouldn’t forget it.

Stay Tuned for the next blog “Imagery”

After being in my mind awhile, you’ll understand how easy it was to write Asylum!
Jenn

The Making Of Africa

We were in the studio last week to record the vocals for two of our originals, Africa and Asylum. We shot some video and uploaded it so you could get a taste of what we’ve been up to and checkout the whole studio scene. The audio is not finished, it’s just a rough mix. We’ll be finishing the mixing in the coming months.

I kinda geeked out on the whole video thing. I found a little app that’s so easy. You load in your audio, video and jpgs, push a button and voila, you’ve got a nice, automatic video with transitions and a title and credits page. Of course, one can’t stop there! So I had to spend time looking for programs that had both this “automatic movie” feature AND the ability to edit every little thing.

I had to stop the obsession before it ran away with me (ie: the free trial period ran out). But then I found another app that changes video into flash so that I can put it directly on the urban fiction site. That was cool. Watch it here on myspace or on the UF site.

Enjoy.

Happy Holidays,

Jenn

The Urban Life

Howdy!

We’re in the studio these days working on some tasty new songs that you are sure to enjoy. We hope to have some samples up by the end of the month.  But you know how this goes, you tweek alittle here, you tweek alittle there, you get a new brilliant idea, you get a new song through the muse download line.

Or…you sit down to write a song and a book spills out.  Yes, it’s true. There’s a new book coming out from moi. More info to come.

We’re in a very creative phase and it’s much fun. You’re in for some sweet ear candy from Didier’s guitar, so hold on to your hats and stay tuned.  More to come about the new tunes, the new web site and yes, the book.  But…you must wait just alittle bit longer.

Anticipation….makes the heart grow fonder!

kisses,

Jenn

Musings On The Nature Of Song

I heard a story awhile back that has stayed with me. The story goes something like this: a young white guy was visiting Hopi Land and was struck by all the songs he heard. He asked an old man what the songs were about. The old guy replied that they are mostly prayers for rain. They love the rain. It nourishes the corn that gives life to the people. They drink it, bathe in it and enjoy the feel of it on their cheeks. They love and need the rain and want it to visit that is why they sing to it.

Then he asked the young guy what he sings about.

I thought about that; about what we sing about in this culture. At the time it seemed like all the songs I heard (or sung) were about love and mostly the longing for love…well and the whole “get me some” genre of rock song too. I kinda felt weird about that. That the Hopi were singing about the rain that nourished them on so many levels and we were singing about the lack of love and the desire for sex. It seemed a little shallow and also kinda negative…singing about the “lack” of something instead of singing about the love you have for it.

As time went on and I learned more and more indigenous songs, I realized that the songs really shifted energy and there were basically two types of songs: songs that called something in and songs that moved something out (catharsis). It seems to me that songs were really healing…including rock songs.

That may seem odd if you’re used to thinking of healing songs as something you’d hear at a church, spa or meditation. But consider this, the

• lyrics are absorbed by the mind
• music is absorbed by the heart and
• groove…well the groove is absorbed (and moved around) by the hips!

So even a rock song can effect and heal the entire body. Maybe it’s the movement of the hips that starts moving stagnant energy in the body that can wind up motivating change in other areas. Maybe a culture that sings about love (and sex) does so to draw more in, because that’s what nourishes our souls. We’re good on the water thanks, now turn up the tap on that love thing!

Groove On,
Jenn