Rotten Cookies posted:

Helping a friend (drums) write/record an album. He wrote 11 songs while he's been working from home. Brought another friend (guitar/bass) and myself (keys/guitar) to help him flesh it out and make it real. He has a pretty good idea in his head of what he wants it to sound like, but decoding that into actual chords and notes is not his strong suit.

It's definitely a different experience. It's nice having material already semi-written, as opposed to everyone jamming for 45 minutes, saying "I liked that" and promptly forgetting it leading to songs never being written. Also a bit frustrating finding out where the creative control/artistic license line is. Some songs are fully fleshed out in his head and he really wants us to adhere to that vision. Some are very open, he says it could go anywhere, didn't have anything specific in mind but likes this/that.

We're almost to the point where we have the songs solid enough to start recording. The big thing is recording the drums. My friend is hesitant to go to a studio. He feels like he'd be under pressure to record when renting out time, and is uncomfortable recording with a stranger there. Otherwise, between the bassist and myself we have the equipment to record the drums, but finding the space and time to set up/breakdown is the big holdup there. We have out options, just a matter of debate and deliberation.


As a whole it's a new way of doing stuff for me. I don't hate it. But it's really awesome to be doing the music thing again.