Peta Girl now possibly less painful but stranger.
I spent all day messing with the tune Peta Girl because parts of it were painful to me, mostly the vocals, but also some distortion or clipping or something I just couldn’t seem to eliminate. It’s so strange how you can like something you do one day and then find things you can’t live with the next.
So all day I had horrible adventures — crashes without saves eating two hours of work, unknown sounds of my computer in the actual music, hard drives hiding from the network. And the result I have here now, well, I’m not sure it’s better than the old one overall, but some things are better.
First it’s four clicks faster. I think that helps because it’s less time you have to hear me sing in a key that’s very uncomfortable. Then I added, and I can’t say why, a drunken horn section. My thinking was it would distract the listener from the rough vocal patches, and then I just liked the idea of a sax doubling the lines of a 12-string electric. You don’t see that every day, and this mix might prove why, for all I know. I can’t tell, since I’ve been listening to it all day.
Anyway, here’s what the day did to Peta Girl. If the new one sounds better or worse than the old one to you, let me know.
UPDATE: And following the handy commentary from Ana and Kymber, I’ve here taken the path of glorious compromise by picking a tempo midway between the old and new. It’s a rough mix, yet strangely better. I have a good feeling about this one and can smell the finish line, which is good ’cause there’s another on the back burner. So, here’s the great Peta Girl tempo compromise.
Thanks for the ears, you two! (not to mention the kind words) Now off to some passive TV non-action for a bit.
December 3rd, 2007 at 8:12 pm
The other version was love at first sight.
This one is a bit too fast for my taste (you asked for opinions!) - and I thought the the slower version would be less stressful on your voice (?).
Overall thumbs up.
I’ve also showed it to Owd and he liked it
December 4th, 2007 at 12:39 am
Thanks for the listen and the opinion, Ana. Rest assured there’s no stress on the voice. I can just enter a tempo and the software hustles it up for me. Glad both you and Owd like the tune. Now I’m gonna try to split the difference tempowise
December 4th, 2007 at 12:54 am
I’m a *BIG* fan of the faster tempo. I’ve totally got the song in my head now.
December 4th, 2007 at 6:43 pm
December 4th, 2007 at 9:21 pm
Woohoo! My first international focus group is a success (assuming Kymber signs off. If not, she can be bribed, possibly with frozen peas.)
Honestly, thanks for the ears. Listening to the same song over and over is so fatiguing. Pretty soon you start having ear mirages, then you don’t know *what* you’re hearing. It’s very much like repeating the same word for an hour, a common word like “where.” It gets so familiar it’s foreign. Go ahead, try it, and report back