TonightsLastSong wrote…

Howdy boyos, I know I'm in and out of here a lot like the wind through a broken window, but I spend a lot of time trying to apply the feedback I get about my music.  It's hard for me to just sit down and fabricate something based on principles and theory, but I'm taking things to heart as I iterate on my style.

November was national novel writing month, which immediately meant that all I could think of was song ideas instead of story ideas.  I managed to do both luckily, and "Stellar..." is one of them.

This is part of a concept album (separate from the one that Far-Flung was on) that depicts the event told in the story I wrote for this November.  I find that I have a slam dunk of a time writing music for my stories, rather than trying to pull inspiration out of my butt and play at being deep and thought-provoking.  I love those things, but I'm too on the nose when I have to write out a line like "I'm sad that nothing is going right despite my best effort" instead of painting you a picture of a fictitious someone who might actually feel that way.

So in this track, the adolescent girl Ro is admitting in something of a daze that her mentor Cshavi is probably going to be the death of everyone around them, such as her father who lays dead and bleeding out right that moment.  She knows the mission is important, so she'll keep pressing forward, but Ro's needing some encouragement if she's going to make it through all this turmoil.

verse
You, you're in my head
If you're here to stay,
then I want out
At least tell me you didn't mean to catch a problem
We're taking a beating for one of those choices somebody insisted that I stay persistent
Oh I'm holding something together alright
I can't be sure of much right now,
let alone what's left of this pawn of yours

chorus
Take one good look and tell me things are okay
Haunted looks I'll have to think about every day
At night your reconnaissance will keep my senses distracted,
So hey... hey...
Isn't that just... stellar...
Alone, all right,
Dead bodies around again but I'll just sit tight
All these thing are pointing me straight ahead
Don't worry about them pesky cliffs,
no one that fell was important
Anyway, no matter how you slice this,
nobody's more fantastic than who they, like, took is

verse
Drenched,
So soaking wet
Delicately we pray to our secret Queen
Hush, don't let Goddess know
I remember something about not angering the worshiped,
lest she send the war ships
Here's hoping luck be a lady contender
or at least some strength for this pawn of yours

chorus
(repeat)

bridge
Sit back,
Hang tight
Oo, um, no, I'm not cut out to fight
Stand back
Don't crack
Oo, um, no, one more fall and that's probably all
Eyes up,
back straight
Oo, um, no, I won't allow her to go

chorus
(repeat)

TonightsLastSong wrote…

Thanks, the good fish.

I'll be the first to admit I'm just making shit up for how to EQ this stuff, especially the low end.  Any suggestions for workflow to make room for multiple instruments are of course welcome.  I understand it in theory, but I'm not confident I'm doing it very well.  Sidechaining compression seems to do things that hard hard to measure, so I don't use it very well, I'm sure.