Details of the summative assessment: Sexual by Neiked

Details of the summative assessment: Sexual by Neiked

The original version of 'Sexual' by Neiked, is in a dance/electronic style, in the key of D and is at 108 bpm. The instrumentation that was used in the song was:

•  Bass Guitar
• sound effects
• Synthesiser
• drums
• tambourine

the structure for the song is:

1. Introduction (4 bars)

2. Verse 1 (8 bars)

3. Pre-chorus (8 bars)

4. Chorus (8 bars)

5. Verse 2 (8 bars)

6. Pre-chorus (8 bars)

7. Chorus (8 bars)

8. Instrumentation (8 bars)

9. middle 8 (8 bars)

10. Chorus (8 bars)

11. Outro (8 bars)

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My cover version:

Band members:

Me - Lead guitar

Jacob Vallance - Rhythm guitar

Alex Hancox - Bass guitar

Max Crawford - Drums

Alice Millburn - Singing/vocals

Karina Ballagova - Singing/vocals

The instrumentation that we are using for the song is:

Lead guitar

Rhythm guitar

Drums

Tambourine

Singing/vocals

Structure:
1. Intro (16 Bars)
2. Verse (8 Bars)
3. Pre chorus (8 bars)
4. Chorus (8 bars)
5. Instrumental (2 bars)
6. Verse (8 bars)
7. Pre chorus (8 bars)
8. Chorus (16 bars)
9. Breakdown/middle8/solo (16 bars)
10. Chorus (16 bars)
11. Breakdown (32 bars)
12. Outro (4 bars)

what we will be using (effects):

Me-

Dunlop Cry Baby wah pedal

Ibanez Tubescreamer Overdrive/Boost pedal

Reverb

Jacob Vallance - Rhythm guitar

Compressor

Max Crawford - Drums

Overhead 1 - Gate

Overhead 2 - Gate

Kick drum - Gate

Snare - Gate

Alice Millburn - Singing/vocals

Reverb

Karina Ballagova - Singing/vocals

Reverb

To achieve our sound, we have taken inspiration from other Funk bands such as James Brown, Earth Wind and Fire, Stevie Wonder and the Red Hot Chilli Peppers to some extent. What we have picked are all common traits used in funk music that make it what it is.

Changes we have made to make it Funk:
-The utilisation of guitar licks and riffs, unlike the original song

-Changed it to a quackier, groovier sound
-thick thumping baselines with different grooves than the original song
-We changed the Tempo to a faster 130 bpm

-We took inspiration from other funk bands by playing up to a fast stop and start in sections

- thicker drums with different layered grooves as you progress throughout the song

- Faster vocals

- Guitar solo and guitar lead lines throughout the song

Changes that we have made to the song:

Structural changes:

We made structural changes to the song such as adding in new parts and taking out parts that didn't work. I really feel that the introduction work particularly well as it is a good build up of tension before the big release when all of the band break into the verse. It then progresses from the verse into a very funky chorus, yet still remains true to the original song with the original chords. I feel this also works really well as it shows that we have still taken the original song into consideration and not just rewritten the whole of the song. We then also have a solo section where we do some call and response. this works really well as a lot of funk artist use this technique, James Brown is a good example of this.

Live lounge task - rehearsals (3)

2/3/17

Today, my band worked on stage presence throughout our rehearsals as i have really bad stage nerves when under pressure and don't move much throughout the performances. I feel that this session helped me work better with the band and interact more with the other members. I feel that the band has now got to the point where everyone knows their part really well and are able to play it confidently. The producers also made an appearance throughout the practice, which was really convenient as we could update them on any new changes. We also worked on getting our instrumentation really tight with each other, and i feel that this has paid off really well, as we have all got really deep into the groove of the song and now can play it really we with no problems what so ever.

what could we improve upon:
i feel that we could improve upon getting even tighter (as there is always room for improvement.)
I mentioned this to my band members throughout the rehearsal and they all agreed, so we are looking into booking a rehearsal on Monday. I feel that this would greatly improve the chances of getting chosen for the radio.

Live lounge task - rehearsals (2)

Last Wednesday, we were trying to figure out a finished structure for our song. our idea was to have an introduction of funk music (with me soloing over the top of it) and then go into the song, however we decided to scrap that idea as we didn't deem it very effective. We also decided to change the tempo to a faster bpm. I feel like this is really effective as funk is generally very fast.

Last Thursday, we then booked a practice room to rehearse in the morning with the whole band. we made some big changes to the whole composition. Here, we decided to add in different sections in the song inspired by funk artists or funk songs. We took inspiration from the Red Hot Chilli Peppers and how they stop and start the song in different sections. so we decided to add these sections throughout the verses of the song. Both me and Jacob also came up with the idea of have a guitar part that goes had in hand with each other and i think we nailed it, as when listening to it, the guitar parts sound really full and thick but kind of weak when only one of us is playing. This makes using dynamics and layering of the different instruments easier, as you can hear all of the parts of the song. This is also good as it is typical in standard funk, and used a lot of the time.

throughout the day i also completed my stage plan for the concert.
this took me quite a long time and we all sat down and worked it out as a band.
the first picture is of my stage plan, in which we have planned this out really well with all of us having space to move around.

the second image is of all of the channels that we will be using and the different instruments. All of these different channels are all of the requirements for the all of the musicians.Here this list the microphones that we will need and the effects that we would need to apply.

Live lounge task - rehearsals (1)

today, we met up in POD 3 to rehearse from 11 to 12:30. I found that this rehearsal went very well as we spent quite a lot of time reflecting on what we should do. originally, in band skills we decided that we were going to do a slow jazz version of 'sexual'. However, now we have settled on a disco/funk style. When rehearsing, we managed to get the guitar, bass and drums really tight with each other so that made it sound really funky. We also managed to change some part and improvise but still retain the same rhythm and beat of the song.

what to improve on:
i feel that we need to improve on remaining really tight and less busy with the parts that we are playing. I also feel that we need to change the layout of the song as it starts to get too repetitive.

Live Lounge task - Meeting with the producers

On Thursday, my band decided to meet up and discuss with the producers. After my lecture i went down to POD 3, where we all met up. It only took about 3 minutes for the first producer to appear (Our other producer didn't appear for the session as he was ill). We then discussed what we would be covering and how we would do it. We were only talking for a fairly short time as we had only booked the POD for 30 minutes, however in this time we did cover almost all of the important topics that we have been planning to discuss with the producers. So, the meeting went very well.

Project 2: Task 1b: Cover Song Research

'In my time of dying' by Bob Dylan (covered by Led Zeppelin)

My first song which i will be analysing is 'In my time of dying' by Bob Dylan (recorded in 1962 for his debut album), this song was then covered by Led Zeppelin on February 24th 1975. The instrumentation throughout Bob Dylan's version is very raw with just his guitar and vocals throughout the whole of the song compared to Led Zeppelin's version with their very lush instrumentation, including electric guitar, wailing vocals, thick, heavy drums and thumping bass.

Both are in a standard blues style with a slide guitar playing throughout the whole song. The way in which Dylan plays is very basic, with very sloppy playing, in which he very occasionally misses a note or doesn't complete a chord. The way in which jimmy page plays compared to this is very different, as he plays very elegant and slow. Here, Page lets the notes ring out. Led Zeppelin's version then progresses from a slow bluesy intro into a fairly hard rock song, with overdriven guitars and crashing, heavy drums, creating a very thick and dark sound. The Led Zeppelin version then later progresses into almost a jam session between the band and turns into a completely different song. This is also very different to Dylan's as the instrumentation doesn't progress at any point in the song.

The production also differs dramatically, with Dylan's being very bad quality and basic with no other instrumentation apart from his singing and guitar. Here, he lets some notes ring out louder than others and occasionally plays an incomplete chord. As stated before, the recording is very raw, however I personally feel that this captures the whole feel in the song as it sounds like it could have been recorded in the 1920's (with all of the classic blues artists like Robert Johnson). Their is also rumour that Bob Dylan was unprepared for the recording and used his girlfriends lipstick holder as a slide and turned down any second takes in order to save money.

This just proves that Bob Dylan was not very concerned about the production and instrumentation in the song, but rather just the message. Bob Dylan recorded this song at Columbia recording studios.
Unlike Led Zeppelin's version in which they were at the height of their careers, so they would have had the best equipment at their disposal. In my opinion, the production of this song is very good quality and still sounds as fresh today as the day i first heard it. Led Zeppelin recorded this cover at both 'Hedley grange' (a high quality studio in which both the Rolling Stones and Zeppelin recorded their songs) and olympic studios. The length of the song also differs dramatically between the two artists, with the Bob Dylan's being just a measly 2:39 compared to Led Zeppelin's at a massive 11:06.

bob dylans version:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TDOFFO9Bx3k
Led Zeppelins version:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZgblTKscX0




'Mr Tambourine Man' by Bob Dylan (covered by The Byrd's)

My second song which i will be analysing is 'Mr Tambourine Man' by Bob Dylan (recorded on 15 January 1965 for his album 'Bring it all back home'), this song was then later covered by The byrds (on January 20th 1965). the original by Bob Dylan is again, very raw sounding with very basic instrumentation. Unlike The Byrd's cover, with great instrumentation to the whole song, almost creating a wall of sound for the listener. The instrumentation through out The Byrd's cover is also very well produced with some very jangly guitars and thick basslines. The drummer also holds the beat really well with it being steady and perfectly matching the styles that the guitars are playing.

Both songs are in completely different styles, with Bob Dylan's version being folk and The Byrd's version being early an form of psychedelic era of the 60s. the production style of The Byrd's version is very different to Bob Dylan's despite being recorded in the same studio just 5 days apart, with The Byrd's version being very lush and large sound with the reverbs and 12 string guitars used throughout the whole song. Unlike Bob Dylan's version, being very basic with next to no production techniques added to the song. The arrangement of the cover does not change, with it still being the same structure throughout the whole song. Both of the songs have a completely different running time with Bob Dylan's version being 5:29 and The Byrd's version being 2:18.

i couldn't find a studio version for this song due to youtube copyrights so i have a live performance instead

bob dylans:    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OeP4FFr88SQ

The Byrd's cover:    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NyOzGPbn2tg

'Twist and shout' by The Top Notes (covered by The Beatles)

my third song that i will be analysing is 'twist and shout' written by The Top Notes (recorded in 1961)  the song was then made famous by The Beatles for their album 'please please me' (recorded in 1963).

The version by The Beatles was composed in a sort of rock and roll style with the same kind of instrumentation as The Top Notes apart from the singing and the saxophone that is very prominent throughout. The singing done by The Top Notes was sung a lot faster than that of The Beatles. I personally prefer The Beatles style as they made it catchier than the original while still retaining the roots of the original songs. At the time of The Beatles recording, John Lennon was suffering from a severe cold. This gave the song an almost gravelly quality to his voice, which later made it onto the actual studio recording. i feel that this is one of the reasons why the song was so popular. Both songs have roughly the same running time with the Top Notes version running at 2:05 and The Beatles version running at 2:32.

The Top Notes:    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsDpc-8iR8g

The Beatles cover:    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qr7JFmKoSCA

I couldn't find a studio version for The Beatles due to youtube copyrights, so here is live version

Live Lounge task - Song choice and rehearsing

so far my live lounge band have decided on playing 'sexual' (or 'sensual') by NEIKED. i feel like this song will be really good to change as it is really catchy and simple so we could probably do a lot of alterations to the track. So far i have managed to find out the chords annam currently working on a basic lead idea, however my group still haven't developed it enough to know how we will change it.

rehearsing:
We did not manage to rehearse last week as an inconveniently placed incident on the track, meant that the trains did not start running until 1pm, so i could not get to college as it was ending at 1:30pm. This was on Thursday, when we booked pod 3 to practice at our break between lessons. Currently, we have struggled to practice other than in our lessons, however we are working on booking a room sometime this week. This is due to the fact that we all have varying timetables so sometime we cant practice all together.

Live Lounge task - My 'live lounge' band

My 'live lounge' band consists of:

me - lead guitar
jacob vallance - rhythm guitar
Alex Hancox - bass
Max Crawford - drums
Alice millburn - Backing vocals
Karina Balagova - Main vocals

My producers consist of:

Calvin Allen-jubin
Callum

i have currently been looking at 'Starboy' by the weeknd and '24k magic' by bruno mars. i feel that these two songs have a really clear outline of what to work around as they are straight forward, simple and catchy. I feel that these two songs are perfect for my group as we have two female singers who have a good vocal range, so we will be able to mould the song around their chosen style that they would want to perform it in. My group also has some very good musicians, so i feel that it wouldn't be a problem if we were to be doing something fairly odd and hard to play.

Project 2 - Task 1A blogpost

As part of our tasks for this term, we have been set with changing the genre to a modern song of our choice, to sound like it was part of a 'Live lounge' set. This popular trend swept the nation with lots of bands gaining major exposure by doing this and posting to social media sites like Youtube and Facebook. shown above is my action plan, in making on of these, it enables me to know when all of my assignments are due and (roughly) how many days i will need to complete them. I believe that this will make working quicker and more effective, as i will have a clear outline for when i have to complete assignments. You can also see that i have colour coded it to make the events clearer to read from the start to the end (there is 1 block that i cannot colour code).

my tasks include:

Analysis and research (Task 1)
1. writing a paragraph of 200 words about that summarises the project (this)
2. an action plan of the project in a gantt chart format (this)
3. researching a minimum of 3 songs which have been reworked into cover versions or sampled tracks.

planning and organisation (Task 2)
4. choose a song to cover from the current top 40 chart to rework into a style of your choice.
5. rehearsal phases, meeting with the producers and writing 3 reflective blogposts.
6. stage plan and tech spec sheet.

presentation and performance (Task 3)
7. perfromance

reflection and evaluation (Task 4)
8. blogpost of approximately 500 words that reflects on your research, rehearsal and an evaluation on the overall performance.



 for my next task i will have to research a minimum of 3 songs which have been reworked into cover song or sampled tracks. so far, i have been doing some research into some bands that rework songs on youtube, the band 'postmodern duke-box', have been gaining millions of views for their reworked covers of modern songs such as 'drunk in love' by beyonce and 'last Christmas' by WHAM. this band has been reworking their covers into old style, big band swing songs. I am particularly inspired by them as they are really well thought covers. I have also been watching some BBC Live lounge sets. I am particularly inspired by the cover of 'call me maybe' by Ben Howard.