The Making of More Than a Half-Truth
By: Alex LaRosa,
Staff Writer
All across the internet, many musicians are releasing music in an online format, often making use of videos on sites such as YouTube, where they can reach many people with relative ease. I am pleased to announce one more addition to that crowded music scene, this one coming from one of your fellow iCademy students. Over the past few months, I have been working on songs and recording them, and now, I can present the fruits of my labor: an 11-song series of music videos, entitled More Than a Half-Truth.
Since the students of iCademy tend to be inquisitive by nature, I am going to assume that most of you would not be content to simply listen and then move on with your busy lives. Rather, I would wager that many students are wondering what exactly went into making this series of videos—which will henceforth be called an “album,” even if it is not technically a real CD. Well, I can tell you that much effort went into this piece of work, and although it is not perfect, I am very proud of it, and I hope that you will enjoy reading about it, as well as listening to it.
The making of this album started, interestingly, with a song that did not even make its way on to the album. I had been writing songs like I usually do, and I penned one called “Chocolate” that I thought would sound particularly good with drums and a solo that I had written for it. Seeing as I could not play both the solo and the chords at the same time, I decided that in order to enjoy my composition, I would have to record a demo version of it. So I did just that. I used the state-of-the-art recording device known as an iPhone 5s (okay, perhaps not as avant-garde as I may have thought, but it worked quite nicely) and loaded the files on to my Audacity software. From there, I lined up the parts, using drum software for the percussion and editing a separate guitar track so that it sounded like a bass guitar.
It started to come together well, and I came out of the session with a demo of “Chocolate.” Upon listening, I had to agree with myself: that solo was epic. Suddenly I had a brief moment of genius: I realized that I should do the same thing for all my songs that I was working on. And so thus, my album was born. I got busy writing new songs, and several ideas flashed through my mind. I came up with a set of goals for this album, which had yet to be named. Firstly, I would demonstrate how much better I was at guitar than the last time I made a CD. Secondly, I would show more intelligence in the words I sang (without losing the hard-rock edge that I enjoy). And lastly, I would record this in the best manner I could for exactly $0.
With my goals lined up, I got to work. The going was easy at first, as I recorded a few of my better tracks and wrote some that I liked a lot. But of course, I hit a mild writer’s block, coupled with a lack of motivation. I was able to solve that problem by going to an interesting place: my previous songwriting. I went back to some old tunes I had written, and began to play those again, mixing them in with new songs. From there, I got my songwriting drive back, and turned out some good ones. All the while, I was recording track after track, layer after layer, editing every lick, every riff, every solo, every breakdown, and trying new techniques along the way.
Some of the techniques would be a bit dry to explain, but they still fire me up. For example, I used Audacity’s envelope tool to bring my volume down in places where it got too loud and my voice became static-like. That’s not exactly exciting to the listener, but it saved many takes for me, as I did not have to go back and sing again! But amongst the boring techniques, a few stand out that are more exciting. For example, I connected with my inner Death Metal God and for one song, I utilized the growled vocal technique. As much as it sounds like an unearthly grumble, it is in fact me on those tracks, with a little help from Audacity to make it even deeper. Also, I mixed electric and acoustic instruments, used fancy music theory ideas, and even added a “hidden track” to the end.
At last, I had completed the album. But I wanted more than just that. The famous composer Franz Schubert was relatively unknown in his life, as he mainly played for his friends. I did not want to be like Schubert (popularity-wise, that is, as of course he was a brilliant musician and anyone who writes music must respect the classical masters), and thanks to the internet, I do not have to be. I began to make a series of lyric videos (really slideshows) that show what I sing, along with some photos that compliment the song. I used Renaissance art, guitar-playing shots, and even lightning storms to accent the songs. And for those who are curious, each and every one of the pictures in the videos either belong to me or is copyright-free, mainly public-domain government files.
And that is the story of how a song called “Chocolate” turned into a full-length album of videos. The whole process took months, and the hardest part, for sure, was making the videos. But now that it is done, I stand proudly behind my work, even if it is not exactly professionally made. I now invite you, dear readers, to listen to my work, and if you please, to let me know what you think in the comments section. Thank you very much for reading and listening!
Find the first track below, and click HERE for the rest of the album!