Jody Whitesides

Tag: Store

  • Vocal Experiments

    Vocal Experiments

    Now that I’m back in the studio, there’s been a desire to do some vocal experiments on my part.

    Signal Chains

    One of the things that producers worth their salt will do is experiment with different combinations of gear. Though there’s still some bronchitis to deal with, I have been getting a few hours here and there to try out some new signal chains and see how they affect the sound of my voice.

    Thanks to modern technology, its actually extremely easy to try out a much wider range of gear without the insane costs. Thank you Universal Audio and the Apollo system!

    Vocal Experiments

    There’s a project for TV music where we’re in the final phases of recording and mixing. In this project I’m spending some time to run some vocal experiments to hear the differences of what comes out. My most recent chains have included and API vision strip into an LA-2A. Then the absolute newest chain has been a Neve 1073 into a Studer Tape Machine followed by an LA-2A. Each lends itself to a different vibe. Don’t think I don’t realize that those gear terms likely all sound greek to you. They’re all geek to me!

    vocal experiments

    The image above is of my current favorite. What makes it strange is that when I solo a vocal recorded with this chain, it actually doesn’t sound all that great to my naked ear, but in the right track… It causes the vocal to sit like I can’t believe. The ultimate in vocal experiments, when you think the sound is bad, but its oh so right for the song.

    Daring Covers

    Along with the plethora of original tunes for this project are 10 cover songs that are so different from the originals that it may blow your mind. Hell not even may, they will blow your mind. A few of them are very different vocal experiments for me. It all comes down to figuring out the right way to present each song so that it has the right twist to give the song a double entendre.

    And therein is my one reason to ever do a cover, to give it a new meaning!

  • How To Call Attention To Your Music

    How To Call Attention To Your Music

    logoThe age old dilemma for musicians going it alone without a record label often wonder how they can call attention to their music. Musicians working on surviving in today’s music business are attempting to figure out where things are going. The biggest issue is often what happens after they get the music written, recorded, and are ready to release.

    If there is someone who had a more direct line on what did and didn’t work for musicians forging a path without a record label, I don’t know who it would be. The best source for such information is Derek Sivers. He created CD Baby. He helped to usher in the paradigm of the music industry with allow non-signed artists a platform for selling CDs away from their shows.

    Derek ushered in another change when he gave CD Baby artists an avenue to get their music onto iTunes (albeit, he had a little coaxing from me as well). Which is still one of the better platforms to use for most non-signed artists to get their music onto iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, etc.

    Derek wrote a book called “How To Call Attention To Your Music” and put it up on his website sivers.org as a free publication for any interested musicians. I recently decided to take a look at it and realized this book is in PDF format. Great format for a wide range of portability. However, many of us are now using more modern devices like iPhones, iPads, Kindles, Kindle readers, eReaders, etc. Thus I took a few minutes out of my day today to convert the book into EPUB format. That way, everyone who is interested in Derek’s sage advice can now read it in iBooks, Kindle, Nook, etc. Like it was a real book that can be paged through on an electronic device.

    Grab “How To Call Attention To Your Music” EPUB format.

    As per Derek’s page for getting the book, I’m making it available for others to have as well. I would really appreciate it if you would sign up on my email list (http://hearjody.com) if you grab this copy of the book in EPUB format. Mostly because it’s a cool thing to do for someone that took the conversion step out of making it easy to read on your favorite eBook reader.

    Now go forth and rise above!

    p.s. – welcome to May!

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