I’ve played music for as long as I can remember and, even though I don’t have a drum set with me in Beijing (yet?), I still referr to myself as a drummer from time to time. That does seem to be changing, however, since I now work with more than just percussion. With the continual development of digital audio and visual production tools, things are even easier than before to create just about anything. It’s with that thought that I thought it might be fun to start off the new year with a new project or challenge of sorts. And that’s where “Jamuary” comes in.
The idea behind Jamuary is that you write one song a day for the entire month of January. The idea originated, or it at least attributed to Jonathan Mann. You can read more about his idea on his website: https://www.jonathanmann.net/jamuary. Apparently he’s written a few viral hits along the way because of faithfulness in writing a song every day.
So I thought, why not? But my aims will be a little bit different than his.
Although I’ve always considered myself to be a drummer or percussionist in the broader sense, I am looking to branch away from that label and expand my reach into some more melodic elements. It’s an area that has lagged my development in music production and has often held me back in getting some things together for my video production work. I figure if I spend some time on developing some melodies I might actually create something worth listening to that isn’t just percussive.
So that’s the first goal: work on melody.
The second goal will be to drastically increase my workflow or audio production speed. Last year (2020) saw me start a podcast with the idea of learning Logic Pro X and other audio production tools. To say the least, I’ve learned quite a bit along the way and, if I may say so myself, the podcast sounds good enough for what it needs to be. (Have a listen here.)
But the podcast consists mostly of vocal tracks and, though I still tweak things here and there, there isn’t much beyond putting my Zoom H4N on “Auto” and using a standard application of some plugins in Logic Pro X (Expander, Compressor, DeEsser, Limiter).
That’s where this project comes into play: I want to learn more about working with instruments in a DAW (digital audio workstation). So that’s the second goal.
The third goal I have, which, if I successfully complete, will eliminate a massive roadblock to my publishing a lot of the video work I have sitting on multiple harddrives in my apartment. And that goal is to create a series of soundtracks that I can use for video production. I might be cheap or I might be too egotistical for my own good, but I have trouble reconciling the idea of paying someone else for a royalty-free track when I consider myself to be a musician, or at least musically inclined.
I know the stock music libraries and I know of several websites that offer royalty-free tracks, but given my musical background, can I not create these things on my own? And why haven’t I until now? What would it take to learn these things, the necessary tools and necessary elements of song production, in order to create a good soundtrack for my drone videos?
So that’s sort of the crown of the project: making music I can use in my own videos.
I’m not looking to create a viral hit. I’m not looking to create an album. I’m not looking to buy anything more than I already have to do this challenge. I’m not looking for wide-spread appeal. I’m not looking to do anything more than challenge myself to actually create and publish within a short period of time. I want that deadline similar as if I was working for someone else on a project.
Simplicity is key. Portability and ability to be done while not in a studio environment is key. Publishing every day is key. It’s already 5.30 pm on January 1st and I still haven’t done anything yet! Getting it done is key.
What will I create? Will I be directionless?
No, Mr. Mann has published a chart of ideas for those who need it:
Okay, 5.37 pm, I literally just recorded a track in one track. I’ve titled this one “Hands on Table” and it is pretty much what you’d except from a drummer who writes a song with such a title. I figured if I don’t do it right right RIGHT now, who knows when I’d actually get around to doing it. Further, if I then spent any amount of time setting up a microphone or whatever else I might lose the idea or the impetus to get it done. It must be done RIGHT NOW! It’s kind of like when you’re sleeping and wake up for a bit. If you simply go right back to bed then you’ll likely be fast asleep again in short order. But if you decided to check your phone, drink a bunch of water, go piss, or whatever, you might need more time to get to bed (unless, of course, you have to pee that badly that doing so would actually help you relax more and thus fall asleep again peacefully.)
This latest track needs me to clarify one other goal: I’m not looking for completely, properly, club-ready, CD-printing tracks. I can and will settle for “good enough musical note” instead of bogging myself down with the details of proper recording technique. More and more, especially as our lives speed up and technology blitzes past reasonable learning curves, I’ve found that if you don’t publish then you simply don’t learn. Publishing gives you, gives me, that visual confirmation that I’ve done it and I can move on to the next thing. Who knows, you might find out the idea is shit or that whatever you published is literally all it was worth. Cell phone recording of hands slapping a table? Maybe that’s all I’ve got for that idea. An album? Who would want to listen to that anyway?!
The other thing I’d like to do with this challenge is, of course, document it as much as I can. From writing about it to making videos about it to posting the actual audio files online, I’d like this to be documented if only for my own reference for having done it. As it stands I’ll be using this website to post everything as I have completely neglected to creating any other online presences. Soundcloud would make sense and is the most likely other platform I’ll use (they also have a great recording feature on their APP.)
So that’s it. The first challenge of 2021 is to write a bunch of songs. I think this is more doable than learning Japanese in six weeks or trying to create a transcription program in Python! Let’s see how it unfolds!