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https://soundcloud.com/kybordr/my-friend-miguelhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wmpnqd7mtco&feature=youtu.beThere are so many great songwriters on this forum, and probably most of you have or could do a song about the innocence of your childhood. This one is mine, prepared for this week's Song A Week Challenge on the theme of Friends. Bass and drums courtesy of Band In A Box: ****** Song Summary ************* Title: My Friend Miguel Key=G , Tempo 70, Length (m:s)=4:27 Style is C_90BAL.STY (Country 90's Ballad) Style MIDI Instruments are : Finger Electric Bass (34), Acoustic Piano (1), Acoustic Guitar (26), Electric Piano 2 (6), MIDI Drums :1 Standard Drum Kit (1) ******************* Vocal harmonies are also from BIAB. My Friend Miguel My friend Miguel and I first met by the big tree in my new front yard, there was a shed in the back, we found some funny old flags, only had 48 stars. There was train tracks on Pamona back then. When the train would come, put a penny on the track, watch it get smashed flat, sittin on the curb, chewin gum. Seems like just about every summer day, we was down at Pamona park. Had a yellow slide about a hundred feet high, we could stay till it got dark. Touchdown was past this line of palm trees, second base was where the grass grew thin. There was a jungle gym but we didn’t use it much, it was for little kids. We didn’t know it and you couldn’t have told us, it was all a magic spell. That’s just how we lived our lives, me and my friend Miguel. We got our first stingray bikes, man we was born to be wild, poppin wheelies all the way down Murietta, we had those babies dialed. Later on we all got 10 speeds, didn’t need no sissy bar. You could ride ‘em to the Vine, watch a show for a dime, didn’t need no car. At night on Glorietta we’d go fishin golf balls out of this dirty old water trap, take ‘em back to the 10th hole the very next day, sell em back. They built that bridge and all the grownups said, y’know no good will come. Hell we didn’t know and we didn’t care, we were surfin in the sun. We didn’t see it and you couldn’t have shown us, it was all a magic spell. That’s just how we lived our lives, me and my friend Miguel. I kinda lost my friend Miguel somewhere around 7th and D. I guess I just got too old for him, maybe he was too young for me. But we sure did some crazy things back when, in vacant lots and that old haunted house. Stuff Miguel and I used to do back then, you sure couldn’t do now. And I guess it don’t make me sad, I know you can’t go back, that was then and this is now, that’s just a cold hard fact. We didn’t know it and you couldn’t have told us, it was all a magic spell. That’s just how we lived our lives, me and my friend Miguel. I see it now and I understand it was all a magic spell. That’s just how we lived our lives, me and my friend Miguel. That’s how we lived our lives back then, me...and my friend Miguel.
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Fabulous.
I remember the pennies and reselling golf balls.
Ha Ha.
Thank you for revisiting Some childhood adventures I had forgotten.
Cheers.
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Love it! Great storytelling and production.
Bob
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Love this! Great write, enjoyed the story and the spoken word delivery.
I see you are using midi drums, what are you using to process them if you don't mind my asking?
Well done!
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Wow, what a engaging and incredibly unique tune! The spoken word verses really help it hit on a more personal and emotional level. Your talent for story telling here is very apparent. The unique use of this type of lyricism here really took it to the next level for me. Fantastic job - thanks so much for sharing 
Cheers,
Deryk
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Very cool.
This is very Van Morrison.
Great job!
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Excellent write! Well spoken, nice arrangement.
My only nit (and it's minor) is that the auto-harmonies on the spoken word come out a bit creepy.
Good job taking me back to a childhood I never had.
-- David Cuny My virtual singer development blogVocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?BiaB 2025 | Windows 11 | Reaper | Way too many VSTis.
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Thank you (and everyone) for the nod, much appreciated.
About the drums:
Short-winded answer: that was BIAB rendering the drums using its standard drum kit.
Long-winded answer: Funny about the drums. I started off picking C_90BAL.STY (Country 90's Ballad) because it fit the song and I wanted to explore using RealDrums which are part of that style. (Believe it or not, I have never used RealDrums before.) But as I went along, and probably due to my own inexperience with BIAB, I just could not get the fills to come exactly how I wanted them in a few spots. Running out of time (Song A Week), I switched over to MIDI drums in the same Style, and that seemed to work. Then as I was rehearsing the song in BIAB, I thought those drums actually sounded pretty good, so I just copied the WAV over from BIAB to Cubase. There is some EQing in Cubase on the drum track.
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dcuny: thank you (and everyone) for the kind words
About the vocal harmony: I completely agree. I (and or my band mates) normally do harmonies on "studio" recordings. Here, Rob-the-BIAB-neophyte was trying to use a new (to me) BIAB features for the chorus harmonies, possibly as a place holder. I should stop using "it was for Song A Week" as an excuse, but I did in fact run out of week and had not done better harmonies myself. So I left them and I thought/think they have a certain distinctive sound, but "creepy" could certainly describe that distinctiveness. :-)
We are planning on performing this original in the band I play in, so hopefully when we get that together, the live vocal harmonies will be better, fingers crossed :-)
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This was a very cool tune. Sure brought up memories from my childhood. Can totally relate.. Excellent vocal
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Very expressive and absolutely packed with great imagery.
Enjoyed the journey....
J&B
Our albums and singles are on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Pandora and more. If interested search on Janice Merritt. Thanks! Our Videos
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This is pretty cool. We don't get too many songs that have spoken verses. It worked really well.
I liked the sung choruses. Just a thought.... the harmonies sounded too "perfect" with the way you did them. I'm guessing you used a harmonizer of some sort or another. Here's a suggestion. If the harmonizer gives you individual tracks or you can separate them into individual tracks.... take the time to learn the tracks one at a time and sing them yourself. It makes for a more realistic backing.
Loved the writing of the story.... made me think back to doing many of the same things and oh yeah.... those stingray bikes with the banana seats.... mine didn't have a sissy bar either and yeah... I recall it had 10 speeds.... what fun.
You can find my music at: www.herbhartley.comAdd nothing that adds nothing to the music. You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both. The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.
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Now this is a great song, so real, I was hooked from the get go. !!!
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This is a song that goes straight to the heart of all us old farts! We all had friends that we did crazy stuff with back then! I really loved this line "Stuff Miguel and I used to do back then, you sure couldn’t do now." That is so true in more ways than one.
This brought back many excellent memories from my past so this is a keeper.
Principal: Your child always causes trouble in school.
Me: My child causes trouble at home, do I ever call you?
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Nice song about the good ol' days. Lovely story with lots of great imagery and the video you put to it adds to the music and takes us on a nice journey. Well done.
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This song sounded so personal! I'm always curious about where people pull their inspiration from. You mentioned this was for the theme of Friends, right? I think you definitely met that theme head on!
Also, the album art you chose really reminded me of the old park that used to be by my place. Wonder if all childhood parks just looked like that. Only reason why I realize it wasn't was because of the trees in the background not being maple trees, haha!
Thanks for sharing!
Cheers,
Ember
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Wonderful storytelling!!! It is a gift, and you have it! This is wonderfully crafted and delivered. Not sure if I've heard anything by before, but DEFINITELY looking forward to hearing more! Really nice!! Take care. Greg
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