00:00
00:00
View Profile SMA

Age 52, Male

St. Joseph, MO

Joined on 4/20/08

Level:
6
Exp Points:
320 / 400
Exp Rank:
> 100,000
Vote Power:
4.64 votes
Rank:
Civilian
Global Rank:
> 100,000
Blams:
0
Saves:
4
B/P Bonus:
0%
Whistle:
Normal

SMA's News

Posted by SMA - June 7th, 2009


Some time ago, I volunteered to mix an album for my friend Helen Robertson, and it is now available as a free download.

Helen Robertson: Speedwritten

The musical styles on the album range from acoustic, to folk punk, to good old rock and roll, and there's even an a cappella piece.

From the liner notes:

All songs by Helen Robertson apart from "Love, lies and climate change" by Helen
Robertson and Gawain Little and "Screw you, orange!" by Helen Robertson and Stephen
Wort.

All instruments and vocals by Helen Robertson apart from:

Taylor plays violin on "Circus side show freak" and "Love, lies and climate change" and
plays violin and does backing vocals on "Teetotal".

Paul "Hoops" Turrell, plays drums, bass, slide guitar and backing vocals on "Mississippi",
drums and backing vocals on "Teetotal" and backing vocals on "Screw you, orange!"

Nancy Rost plays banjo, harmonica and backing vocals on "Mississippi" and backing
vocals on "Teetotal" and "Screw you, orange!"

Deborah Linden does backing vocals on "Screw you, orange!" and also helped with the
track-listing

Sam Hills does backing vocals on "Screw you, orange!"

This album was recorded all either in my home, or in the homes of the people listed above
and was mixed by Lynn McLeod somewhere in Missouri.

Helen Robertson: Speedwritten


Posted by SMA - July 21st, 2008


My brother Matthew recently made a short film featuring his battling room-mates that uses my Home Cooking, also used as the menu music for Sprite a Day 11.

Watch Matthew Slade's Nerd Fight!


Posted by SMA - June 12th, 2008


If you're a songwriter looking to push your creative limits this Summer, the Yahoo group 50 Songs in 90 Days starts 4 July and runs through 1 October. From the group description:

"This is a group whose purpose is to challenge members to write 50 songs in 90 days. Between July 4 and October 1 of any year, in the company of others, you can engage in some harmless songwriting mayhem. The prize is the pride in writing songs that may never have been written otherwise.
Come on and give it a go!"

Moderator David Van Camp explains:

"This group is a continuation of the challenge originally started by a
Nashville exec (David Robinson, is/was VP of the Paramount Group which you
might have heard of.) The stated idea was to give people the approximate idea of
what it is like to be a staff songwriter for a Nashville publishing company.
If that's your goal, then GREAT ... if not, GREAT as well :) The most
important thing is to challenge yourself and have fun.

The idea is to write 50 'songs' in 90 consecutive days. However, that opens
the question as to what counts as a 'song' :) The original challenge defined
a song as words + music + performance. However, for most people, writing &
recording 50 completed songs in 90 days is quite out of reach. Just because
there are a few amazingly talented people here that can actually do this,
this is not the expectation of the challenge. Do the best YOU can with the
talent you have ... don't worry if someone else seems better. This is a
personal challenge, not a competition.

Valid entries may be lyrics only, music only, simple vocal + guitar / piano
/ whatever, or a full-fledged song recording (or anything in between.)

The only 'ROOL' is that the posting is intended to be a 'song', so
lyrics-only shouldn't be pure poetry and music-only shouldn't be pure
instrumental. Most (popular) songs follow one of the standard song formats,
e.g. have verses and a repeated chorus or refrain, etc. There are many books
on songwriting that discuss song formats, etc. you may be interested in
reading ... feel free to suggest your favorites if you like!

Collaborations are encouraged and count as a valid entry for each
participant.

Songs may optionally be finished-up (eg. lyrics composed & recorded, etc)
after the official end of the challenge and posted here. Indeed, in the
original challenge, the standard expectation for most people was that they
would post 50 lyrics, then pick the top 10 or so and finish them up later
(presumably for submitting demos to publishers, given the orientation of the
original challenge organizer - another completely optional goal you can
shoot for if you like :)"

If anyone here decides to participate, my user name in the group is Mal. Hope to see you there.


Posted by SMA - May 25th, 2008


I've set the current songs at my Fuzz account to be freely downloaded. In addition to their being podcast safe, flash developers are welcome to use them for animations and for games.