Off the Record - November Edition

Hi there! Once a month, Off the Record (virtually) kicks your arse & pushes you to create your best music to date.
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I have a life-long passion for minimalism. Hear me out, I’m not gonna try to Marie-Kondo your flat.

I’m a strong advocate of using only the necessary. I find a lot of beauty in that. Using the right tool. Fixing that tiny thing that made everything go out of whack.

It’s about balance. And making the smallest intervention possible.

Ever heard that story about Michelangelo? When asked about how he created the David, he replied that it had been there all along. He only freed it from the stone.

While that kind of story can sound like absolute rubbish to a beginner, it makes more and more sense to me as the years go by. Quite often, everything is there already. You only need to select the most interesting bits.

Pick what’s vital for the song. What does it need? What makes it work? Think of producing as using a highlighter on music. This we like, this we don’t. This is important, this we don’t care. Chipping away. Bit by bit.

Like sculpting a statue. Carving out the useless to reveal the greatness underneath.

It all comes down to that in the end. But you need some matter first. Can’t carve a statue out of thin air, can you?

Don’t judge your first draft. It is required. Needed. A lump of clay. It won’t be a gorgeous statue right from the start. It will just be matter.

Then, it is what you make of it. What do you see that no one else does?

But then again, what do I know…

Copy-paste-die.

The copying and pasting functions have been tremendously useful in the digital age. Yet we should have stopped at words and links.

It is one of the main reasons music sounds so boring these days. Many producers make an eight-bar section, then copy it for the next verse / chorus. If they’re in a good mood, they might randomise the velocity.
It eases their worried consciences.

Nothing kills a song faster. Even if the part is the same, you want different performances. You’re human, you cannot play it twice the same. There will be some subtle differences, in timing, in feel, in dynamics (hence, in tone)…
These subtle differences add up.

Why can we still listen to a Beatles record without being bored?

Is it the quality of the songs? Of course. The brilliance of the production? Obviously. The resourcefulness of the engineering? Sure.
But these only support the main act: the performance.

If the performance were terrible, we wouldn’t care about the quality of the engineering. Or the production. Or the song!

But their performances are so freaking rich that you want to go back for one more listen. You know you’ll discover a little nugget you’ve never heard before. A little nuance. A quieter lick. A ghost note. A fill rushing slightly to get to the chorus.

Performance. Not perfection. But human beings doing their best.

The Beatles broke up 54 years ago. More than half a century. Maybe your parents weren’t even born. And yet we still listen to them, learn from them.

Quit the copy-paste race. Practice your part and capture an honest performance. This will never go out of style.

Pull The Plug

Fare Thee Well

A few weeks ago, I had my last swim of the season. It was chilly getting in, but then it felt wonderful. I wanted to stay in the sea forever.

That’s life in a nutshell. The first few minutes of anything are painful and awkward. But they’re not only necessary. They are worth it.

Everything gets easier. The tough part is to start.

P.S.: if this newsletter has left you feeling inspired, do me a huge favour and forward it to a friend.