Dance of the Broken

this is the song of a lonely man
everyone knows the words
they've been singing it out since the world began
but it seems like nobody has heard

if you think back
it wasn't that long ago
but remember when we were so cool?
oh, our classmates were under our command
and we had the run of the school

   this is a dance with no partner
   you dance by yourself in the dark
   you can choose to go any direction
   but you still come right back to the start

   this is the dance of the broken
   still waiting for love to come home
   a cry that has yet to be answered
   a dance that is danced all alone

this is the song of the broken heart
everyone knows how it goes
love comes in the spring, but in wintertime
the petals will fall from the rose

wasn't it just only yesterday
that love felt so strong and so true?
now the best days in life are long gone away
i can't believe love is so cruel

   (repeat chorus)

Instruments:
Male Vocal: SynthesizerV (Archie)
Female Vocal: SynthesizerV (Felicia 2)
3546:Bass, Electric, AmericanaSlow12-8SteveAB Sw 040
3088:Piano, ElectricVintage, Rhythm AmericanaSlow128Mike Sw 040
2874:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm AmericanaGrittySlow128Brent Sw 040
2875:Guitar, Electric, Rhythm AmericanaTremoloSlow128Colin Sw 040
3054:Guitar, Acoustic, Rhythm Folky68Brent Sw 050
2876:Fiddle, Background AmericanaSlow128Andy Sw 040
2171:Mandolin, Soloist Country12-8Andy Sw 065
RealTracks in song: 3086:Organ, Rhythm AmericanaSlow128Mike Sw 040
RealDrums in style:AmericanaSlow128Fred: a: Snare, HiHat b: Snare, Ride


Effects:
Main Buss: Curves AQ, UAD Sound City (room), Hornet ThirtyOneMK2, Lurssen Mastering Console (Americana Loose)
Vocal Buss: Ghz Vulf Compressor (Bus Glue), UAD Capital Chambers (Capital Vocal Main)
Bass: Curves AQ
Drums: Curves AQ, UAD Sound City (Intimate and Round Corner Drums)
Fiddle: Curves AQ, SoundToys Little Plate
El. Gtr: Curves AQ, TrackSpacer (for vocal)
Ac. Gtr: Curves AQ, TrackSpacer (for vocal)
El. Pno: Curves AQ, TrackSpacer (for vocal)
Piano: Curves AQ
Mandolin: Little Plate
Organ: UJAM Finisher Retro (Rotary Verb)

The Story:

Short Version: Any comments welcome!

Edit: I put a strikethrough on changes I made since the first post.

I'd waffled about writing a song for too long, dragging my heels and coming up with some lyrics, but making no progress.

Then I picked up two new SynthV voices - Amara and Archie, so figured I needed to get around to writing a duet for them to justify the money I spent. (Amara got bumped for Felicia).

I found a BiaB song demo I liked - BANDAGE. I'd been intending to do a waltz for a while, and 12/8 is close enough, right? I modified the chords a bit so it wasn't an exact copy. Yes, there are some interesting chord changes, but mostly secondary dominant stuff so it's functional harmony. I then rendered it, and imported the backing track into SynthesizerV to come up with melody and lyrics using the piano roll.

The 12/8 time signature took a bit of work for my old brain to figure out, but I got there eventually.

As I started putting down the notes, I decided to write in lyrics - something I rarely do because I rarely get any song ideas. Since this would have a male and female and singer, the easiest thing to do would be to give the first verse to the male, and the second to the female. And if there's one thing I'm a fan of, it's the easy way. wink

The lyric - "this is the song of a lonely man" - was gender specific, which I figured was going to get me into trouble when I got to the second verse, because "lonely woman" didn't scan the same. Of course, it did.

I also used the line "when we were cruel" (thanks, Elvis Costello), and that also got me into a bit of a pickle trying to come up with something in the second verse that didn't end in "fool". A bit of rewriting and shuffling, and problem solved.

Once the song was pretty much done I noticed that despite the chords being different, the melody of the verses and chorus were awfully similar. Ah, well... I wasn't about to rewrite it. I decided that varying the melody and harmony a bit would made up for that. Feel free to tell me otherwise. wink

I'd done a short bridge and couldn't come up with any lyrics, so I left it with "la"s. Those eventually replaced it with a fiddle part. (I decided to add them back in).

There's a lot of repetition in the lyrics, but I decided not to worry about that at all.

I added automation to the volume envelopes, and kept fiddling with it until it sounded like it had some ebb and flow to it.

Then I listened to the lines over and over, finding lots of places where the melody and counter-line could be improved. There were more than a few places that needed some adjustment.

I was going to re-render the backing in BiaB and add an instrumental fade, but decided it was easier to just to have a simple ending. The final vocal cadence could probably use a bit of adjustment.

I had intended to perhaps put some additional instruments on via MIDI, as I'd gotten some stuff recently. But floyd jane says all you need is BiaB, so who am I to argue?

I probably should have spent more time working on it before posting, but I'm trying to practice getting songs done faster. I'm sure there's something you can find that needs fixing. If nothing else, I should go through the vocals so they singers aren't at the top of their lungs throughout the song. laugh

Edit 1: I worked on the dynamics of the voices, and put back the "la la la" in the bridge.
Edit 2: I added a fade with the vocals, just because I thought it was cool. Again, feel free to disagree.

-- David Cuny
My virtual singer development blog

Vocal control, you say. Never heard of it. Is that some kind of ProTools thing?