Richard Tracey

Cat Stevens - Father and Son

'They'll also be using vintage synths and tweaking them. I might have a go at something, see what I can do.

'Have they? - I knew she was doing some solo stuff, but didn't think they had officially split up. You need to change DAW - Abelton will help with this kind of music as this is what it is geared more towards. I have the Maschine Mikro and Maschine Jam from Native Instruments and they do packs where you can get all the sounds that would be used in this type of music. We should collaborate on something like this and get Gry to sing it

'Dek - you should do some music like this.... The Knife have a big following and that style is in vogue at the moment and has been for a while.

Cutting Crew - I Just Died In Your Arms Tonight

Hi all... currently working my way through everything I have started over the past 3 or so years and came across this.... I did this when I first heard that awful Sam Smith song for the new James Bond movie Spectre and decided to try and write my own as a laugh. As you can tell I didn't get very far or finish it, but I listened to it again tonight and thought I would post it (Dek I am not going to do anything with this, so it is not taking me away from trying to change up that other song!! ) Has anyone else written a song as a laugh? If you have, would you like to share it?

Steve - I do hunt down music, all the time - I love discovering new groups or albums that aren't getting the mainstream press. But not everyone does that. It is only a small percentage of people that go to clubs and listen to new emerging bands. A small percentage of people that scour the internet looking for new bands and music. The vast majority of people hear music on radio/tv and the video channels. That is what I'm decrying. People re being deprived of finding something new due to a monopoly and that is one of the biggest crimes to hit the music industry. Apparently most labels are owned by 3 record companies, that is sad. No more Factory Records, 4AD and Mute and all the others that were producing great music. The so called Talent Shows have been the kiss of death for the music lover. Just so everyone knows... I don't listen to the radio very often for music. One of the guys in my office puts it on and the rest of us sound like grumpy old men moaning about the music that is played.

John, that has always been there to an extent, but years ago, record companies would speculate and sign a lot of bands knowing that not all of them would make it, but they gave them a chance. The state of the industry now is that they want to go for the guarantee, instead of nurturing a rising band and letting them become as good as they can. Not everyone can make it as big as Elvis, or the Beatles, The Stones or Adele, but there are a lot of artists out there that probably could if they were given the chance. Some artists may take a couple of albums before they hit their stride and make that seminal album that changes people's minds. Will they get then chance to do that in this climate? That album is probably locked away now for ever more as the person/persons who would write and record it have packed it in as they no longer fighting against a juggernaut that lost control a while back.

Yeah, I get your point David and maybe I should temper my frustration a bit. The only good thing about this site is, everyone seems to be enthused about songwriting and making music and I haven't heard anything bordering on the music I am talking about. Likewise I don't have a problem anyone making music that's not to my taste, my concern is more what we are forced to listen to and it is getting worse every day. Again, I don't know what it is like in the US, but in the UK we hear the same music repeated over and over again on every channel, you can almost tell what song is going to come on it has got that bad. I used to watch the music video channels on SKY and would normally find songs I liked to listen to. Now it is feels like every channel has the same video and song and they repeat them over and over as well. There is no change, nothing original. I once spent 2 hours when I was off my work after an operation, bored out of my skull and doped up on medication. Turned onto MTV, which no longer plays music!!!!, but then went through about 20 channels, backwards and forwards and didn't find one song that I wanted to listen to. There was at one point on 4 channels, the same song/video playing almost at the exact same point. I hate being so critical as I do love music so much, but when you have Music Legends decrying the state the industry is in, someone should be waking up and smelling the coffee. And as for Kanye - I liked his earlier stuff, before his head got so big, he started walking at a slant.....

'I know what you're saying Justin - I think I'm just fed up with it all. I champion artists and music that are original, doing something out with the norm, but it makes no difference, it is a drop in a bloody big ocean. I listen to a lot of people who have been in the music industry for years and they express their fears about what is happening and where it is going. You have so many people who don't want to pay for music, or stream it (I'm guilty of this now as I pay for a family subscription to iTunes music), that the whole way musicians and bands make money now is from touring. Again, this is a slow process for a lot of bands to get recognised and a lot give up as it is not worth their while financially. Yet, a record company can put a group of 5 boys or girls together, produce an album and send them on tours and make a killing on the back of the teeny-bop coin. You have each member of One Direction supposedly worth £25 million each - how on earth can these guys feel like they have justified that. You have some bands who have been going for 30/40 years, produced critically acclaimed album after album aren't worth that. If they are each worth that, then how much is the record company making!!!!! It is easy money, so they won't want to change it. Look at how many boy and girl bands are formed each year... they are looking for the next one to hit it big, so they fire out lots of them, all looking the same and sounding the same - it's a conveyor belt of mediocrity. I've just realised I have had a massive rant on here today about this subject - can't believe one song would anger me so much (well not since Shaddupa ya face kept Vienna from the no.1 spot in 1981!!). I love music, I'm passionate about music, different styles of music, I listen to music all the time, always have done. That is why I fear for where we are going.

'That is partly true - without knowing there is anything else out there which could be better, they are brainwashed to like this music. It is everywhere, I hear the same songs about 10 times in an hour on the UK radio shows. Every so often you'll hear something else, but even then it is something that a record company are pushing. Years ago you could listen to the radio and discover new songs, new acts, those days are gone. You'll hear that now on podcasts and internet radio shows. Even watching YouTube and VEVO, you are pushed towards certain videos and music because it has the most hits, it has the most hits because they are pushing it. Radio in America is probably different than over here, but my god, the stations over here have gone down hill badly. If all you can hear is trash, you will listen to trash.

Thanks guys. Justin - it's good to know that not all kids are listening or want to listen to what is force fed to them. Alistair - I don't think of Holland/Dozier/Holland as a committe, to me they were a writing partnership. What I mean by committee is, a record company wanting to push a possible teen idol to make a quick buck, so they enlist a handful of writers or producers to make an album, using all the known aspects of a song that will grab people's attention and then put it out there, paying radio and TV to push it, as they want to make money. There are a lot of really good artists out there who will never get heard to that level. I feel as the music industry has changed over the years, it has become worse as the record companies are desperate for the cash. And I agree Death Metal is terrible, but it has a lot of fans for some reason. If I wanted someone screaming in my ear all day, I would just listen to the wife John - you are right, the advent of the computer has made it so easy for people to make music (thankfully in my case - or not), but I try not to use loops at all and play almost everything by hand (it's how you learn). Music has always ran in fads, but we seem to be in a bloody long run of this one, with no end in sight. I watch all the ToTP's from 1980, 1981, 1982 on TV and you forget how much crap was released back then, but there was so much good stuff to counteract that. Now all the good stuff is locked away behind tons of searching or word of mouth, coming across it, we are bombarded with bland, more than ever before. I try to get my girls to listen to decent, real music, but they would rather listen to the Pineapple Song!!!!!! and muppets with a mop of hair and auto-tuned out of their arse. Thankfully they detest Beiber, so they have something going for them. Until there is a change in the way Record Companies make money, I feel we will have to put up with this trash for a while. Oh, and I just don't find Sia interesting, her new song grates on my nerves. She has a good voice, I just wish she would stop making that stupid bloody noise, that Adele is prone to do as well. Tom - you are right, there has always been songs like that throughout the years, but there was always more to turn to, to make our ears sing with delight. Chumpy- to me the hit record producers are what is wrong with the industry, they sit with all their loops and beats in front of them and churn out the same bloody tune for lots of artists and the record companies want it because it is a hit!!!! That is why I believe it is by committee, it is someone sitting in an office thinking how to they can use some new boy or girl to make them money and getting these producers to write a song like such and such as it was a hit. I personally feel there is no end in sight, we have people making the decisions who aren't really interested in the music, they just want to make as much money as they can. That is fine, but give other artists the same chance. It can't be good for the kids who get the chance at becoming a singer and then getting dropped the minute they didn't make as much money as the company hoped. It cannot be good for their confidence or their mental health in general. Just look at how they abuse them to the point they get burned out within a year. They haven't risen through the ranks, learning their trade, playing to 10, 20 people in a pub/club and touring round the country, so they haven't been used to that lifestyle. Most of them leave mummy and daddy and get thrust into a life they can't handle.

Hi all... a quick question. Do you fear for the standard of songwriting, both in music and lyrics for the coming years. It is well known that the next generation are influenced by those gone before and generally, the artists they listened to as they were growing up. For me the standard has gone down hill so much, that we are accepting such poor music as being the norm now. I heard a song by Meghan Traynor on the radio and the lyrics were absolutely woeful (including the phrase 'blah blah blah'). The music was derivative and bland and the singing, well that is better left unsaid!!! That song isn't alone, there are so many songs now written by committee and there is no passion anymore. I hope that that this will be a fad, a bad fad, that will die out and we can get back to listening to decent music again.

I don't see anyone's signatures!

I downloaded a book from the Kindle bookstore called 'Making Music 74 Creative Strategies for Electronic Music Producers'. You can buy the hardback version from Abelton store and it is meant to be a good place for kickstarting ideas and understanding the fundamentals of music production and not just for electronic music. I read a lot of blurb and reviews and it got a really good write up. Not started reading yet, but if anyone is interested I can give an update once I've got into it.

'No need to hide your love for such a great song... I have to say I still like it a lot. Typifies that era for me.

The Jericho - Big Area

David, Dek, Rudi- see this is what I find interesting. The things you have mentioned are all about emotion, a feeling that hits you and stays with you. This is something I think is missing from most of the music made today and over the past 10 to 15 years or so. Now don't get me wrong, there have been a lot of great songs written and released during that time, but more often than not, we find out about them by searching, word of mouth, by accident. Kids today aren't getting the chance to listen to the wide variety of music we would have had growing up. We have the radio on in my office and we constantly comment that all the songs they play sound the same, with the same crap, mundane lyrics. Every so often they will play a song that you think, wow, that is good. I think I mentioned to Mahesh about Rag and Bone Man 'Human'. This is a new release, but it has captured my imagination. He sings it with passion and the song has a very interesting arrangement. That doesn't happen very often. All the recent stuff I have liked, I have found. I like how David and Dek mentioned about working with others has influenced them and given them an understanding of rhythm and pacing etc. You can certainly hear that in their tracks, something I don't have the luxury of. My friend was in a band and friends with the drummer for a while. I can hear this when he does his own tracks as he knows how to set up the drums the way you would hear them in a band. I have thought for a while about taking drum and guitar lessons (I have tried guitar in the house, but constantly get interrupted and lose train of thought). I feel this would help with my composing, give an understanding of structure and arrangement. Dek, I think it was great you worked in a record shop. It is one of the things I miss now, is going in and searching through all the LP's for a gem. One of my best finds was walking into Tower Records in Glasgow about 95 and heading up to the top floor. I had only popped in for a minute or so to kill time and just after I walked in, the guy behind the counter put on this song and it was amazing, hair on the back of the neck rising kind of thing. That song was Clubbed To Death by Rob Dougan and the guy had just taken the cd out of the box, thought the cover was cool and put it on. I bought it right there and then. Probably the first person in Scotland as it wasn't a big release and Tower tended to get the unusual stuff back then. The song did nothing. Then it was put on The Matrix soundtrack and blew up. I told everyone about that song for years and no-one was interested and then they played it in a movie and suddenly it was a fantastic piece of music!!!! I've also taken a bit of every song I have heard and can't remember how many times I have sang over a song with different words, changing up the melody and thinking, that is the song I would have done.....

Okay, lets kickstart the Lounge. As I said in a previous post, I love hearing about the bands/artists that have had the biggest influence on why you make music and the style of music you make. What is it about their music that inspires you and makes you feel that you would hate to go a period of time without listening to them. I'll start and I'm sure it won't be much of a surprise to some who have listened to the sounds I like to create.... My biggest influence on me has been Midge Ure. If you don't know who he is, he was a member of Ultravox and created Visage who had one of the most seminal 80's tracks ever with Fade To Grey. He co-wrote Do They Know It's Christmas and was one of the biggest artists in the 80's. To me the music, is very creative, powerful, dramatic and stir emotions. They are songs that I never tire of listening to and I sometimes wish he had received more recognition for his contribution to a sound that defined an era and beyond. Although the groups he has been a member of are my favourite, it was Midge that was my idol, he had a voice with incredible range and even now in his 60's he can still belt out the songs. When you listen to the songs, they feel like mini movies, very visual storytelling and even the sad and slower songs make you feel happy. I have written sad music before, that my family comment on as being sad and depressing, but to me I feel it is uplifting and makes me happy. Although Midge was my idol when it came to popular music, my other musical hero was John Barry. I'd like to think that I don't have to explain who he is, but if you don't know, he was responsible for most of the James Bond music you have heard, as well as numerous other soundtracks. He was a master of beautiful, sad and evocative soundscapes and I felt truly sad the day he died. I don't want to make this post too long, so I will end by attaching an Ultravox song, which is one of my favourite songs of all time - Dancing With Tears In My Eyes. I hope you enjoy listening to it.

Answer to last one is Young and Old...

'Is the connection - curved and sword? Or Queen being a female and men?

Love that TenPole Tudor song.. Here's mine, absolutely love this song and group.

Something to do with Martyn and The Sabbath?

Nancy Sinatra - These Boots are Made for Walking I take it the the link to the previous one is Tangled and Loose?

I don't know if there will be something in the content of the book is copyrighted (read the blurb at the beginning of the book), but taking inspiration should be okay, but if you have used whole sections from something that is written, you may not be able to use it. An example would be using most of the words/sentences from a parapgraph, but using the odd word to get the same feel in your song may be okay.