10 Tracks 10 Weeks Archives

2010 – My Year in Review

Uber overlord of the blogosphere Seth Godin just published all he’s shipped in 2010, and asked us to publish a list of what we’ve got out the door this year:

“This might be a useful exercise. Doesn’t matter whether it was a hit or not, it just matters that you shipped it. Shipping something that scares you (and a lot of what follows did) is the entire point.”

Along with half the internet, I view Seth Godin as my personal guru; even though his blog is read my many thousands (maybe millions) of people, he has an uncanny ability to talk directly to me and inspires me multiple times per week.

So when he asks me to do something I do it. Here goes…

This website. I started working on version 1 of mikemonday.com in October 2009. That iteration didn’t do much that was useful, had an appalling design and hit the web in late January 2010. Since then I’ve done two major redesigns and numerous tweaks. I like it now.
10 tracks 10 weeks. This was the ultimate exercise in “shipping”. And I did it. I wrote my third album one track a week for ten weeks. I rarely had time to “make sure” and try out much more than my first ideas. This scared me senseless. But doing this made me physically experience what I’d suspected. It’s way more important to get it done than make it perfect.
My favourite blog posts. It often takes me longer to press publish than to write a blog post. That’s because I’m scared. Sometimes I’ll wait for days after writing a piece; the longest was about three weeks. But almost without exception, the posts where I felt most fear became my favourite.
The Music Success In Nine Weeks blogging challenge. This blog series vanished from this site when I transferred my blog to another service and I haven’t got off my ass and put them back up. Suffice to say that I read and implemented the steps in Ariel Hyatt’s book and blogged about the experience. For someone used to only writing and performing music, marketing myself was hard but talking about it in public was much harder.
Other music. 2010 was the year where I moved from from releasing music on record labels to doing it myself, and there were some bits and pieces that went out through traditional labels. Looking back, there are some advantages to someone else releasing my music, but these are completely negated by how disconnected I am from my audience.
My first YouTube video. I meant to do more of these but only managed one. I *hate* watching and hearing myself speak but I’ll just have to get over it. I need to work on my delivery because video is the ideal way for me to talk about and play my music to you. Expect much more of it in 2011.
You lot. Until recently this site has been largely about me broadcasting and releasing my shizzle. But I’m shifting my focus to your shizzle. After I got over my internal resistance to writing it, I finally sent out my first mailout yesterday and got an overwhelming response. I’m in the middle of answering all your wonderful emails and they’re still arriving (keep them coming). So far I’ve received replies from UK, Iraq, Kazakhstan, all over the USA, Canada, Australia, Germany, France, Russia, Portugal and Spain. And after just one mailout, this is the part of my business that excites me the most. I now have a much clearer idea of what you need and want me to do. I just wish I’d overcome my fear earlier and got on with it.
The birth of Harry. Not a work thing, but my review of 2010 wouldn’t be complete without a mention of the little dude. Although it’s more accurate to say that Mrs. Monday did the “shipping” on this one (I guess I “shipped” 9 months earlier in 2009 – ahem), becoming a Dad is easily the most scary and wonderful event of my life.

So that’s me more or less done with 2010. If I was to sum it up in a word? Transition.

How was yours? What did you ship this year?

Oh and have a very Happy New Year…

Festive Cheer – Mike Monday Styleee

Tis the season to be merry!

And I’m doing my bit to add to this merriment with my suitably festive remixes of four tracks from my third album.

Tried and tested last weekend where they almost caused a yuletide riot, these house mixes of Do Be Do, Robot Go Disco, Old Joanna and Contains Nuts are sure to get you dancing around the turkey, and the emphasis is most definitely on the “parrrtay”.

How To Make The Same Music More Effective – #7 of 100

The individual parts are great. They work together beautifully. But you’ve still got a niggling feeling that the finished whole is less than the sum of its parts.

Face it. It sounds flat and boring. Why?

Your music lacks contrast. There’s no light and shade. Contrast creates tension and release, the driving force of music. Without it your music will sound lifeless, no matter how brilliant the parts.

I learnt this from Nirvana. The first time I heard “Smells Like Teen Spirit” I was blown away. Two contrasting sections – the sparse laid back verse and the heavy distorted chorus. Extremely simple yet unbelievably effective.

In house and techno there’s often a slight nod to contrast in the form of a break. The rhythm comes out. Everyone’s supposed to put their hands in the air and then (usually with an almighty woosh) the rhythm come crashing in again. But there are more interesting ways you can create contrast.

Remove almost everything

Taking stuff out is often more effective than slamming in with everything you’ve got. Not only does it make for a huge moment, it gives you somewhere to go.

In my forthcoming club remix of Robot Go Disco I build the track to a point where it’s almost noise, then (with an almighty woosh) take nearly everything out leaving just the kick and bass:

Add chord changes

Create contrast compositionally.

If you’ve got a section which stays on the same note, add some chord changes. Or if you already have some, do the opposite (or change them).

I wait until almost the end of my Robot Go Disco remix to get to the chord changes, which after nearly six minutes on the same note, creates impact:

Change instrumentation

In week 4 of my 10 tracks 10 weeks album project I got completely stuck. But by concentrating on creating contrast I finished Crush, and it ended up as one of my favourite tracks off the album.

The early versions of Crush had two distinct sections – one with chord changes and one without, but sounded completely flat:

But in the final track I contrasted the two sections by changing much of the instrumentation:

Simple to complex

You’ll also hear that I didn’t just change the instrumentation of the two sections in Crush.

If you make one section that’s rhythmically, harmonically and/or melodically simple then make another that’s more complex. You’ll end up with a piece of music that sounds technicolour, not black and white.

What other music uses contrast to devastating effect? How much do you think about contrast when you write music? What techniques do you use to create contrast? I’m sure I’ve made some glaring omissions – feel free to share below in the comments.

Why Am I Giving Away My Favourite Mike Monday Tune For Free?

I scratched my head for ages. Which track from my recent album should I give away for free? My favourite? My least favourite? Something in the middle?

Despite writing the album in ten weeks, in hindsight it turned out quite well, with four of the tracks – Robot Go Disco / Crush / Lullaby / Do Be Do – ranking amongst my best work (in my not-so-humble opinion).

But more than that, after a few months and a number of listens, I’ve realised that Lullaby might be my personal favourite. Out of anything I’ve ever written. I get goosebumps every time (especially at the ridiculous “Whitney Houston” drum hit). This could be down to the subject matter, but even taking this into account may I rather immodestly suggest that it kicks some serious butt?

It feels weird to give away your best work. Despite all my big talk about the new reality, for someone who’s been a participant in the traditional industry for a good few years, there’s still a residue of attachment to the old model of ownership. I mean, I’m not giving away all my music for free (yet) am I? Doesn’t giving Lullaby away for free then devalue it and suggest that it’s worth less than the ones which cost something?

No. Because as a gift it has to be the very best of me. And I hope you enjoy it.

Download Lullaby for free

10 Tracks 10 Weeks – My Conclusions

Its been just over a month since I completed my 10 tracks 10 weeks project, enough time for me to draw some conclusions about the whole shebang.

(For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, through August and September this year I wrote and released one track a week for 10 weeks, you can read about the process and listen to the music here.)

As I can’t remember exactly exactly what my original hopes were for the project (it seems like such a long time ago now), I’ve gone through the original 10 tracks 10 weeks blog post, and will address each of them to see how I fared.

I wanted to find my distinct musical voice

I got 50% of the way there.

While I some of this album fits together as a whole, in my opinion other parts don’t. I didn’t have the luxury of writing more than 10 tracks and picking the best ones, and one of the points of this process was to discover the “real” me musically, so I am forgiving myself for the slightly schizophrenic nature of the finished product.

I still think its an engaging listen (which I guess is the most important thing), but I’m sure that if I’d written this album more traditionally, a few of the tracks wouldn’t have made it to the final cut. Not because I don’t like them (in fact I don’t hate any of them which is something of a surprise), but because they don’t fit.

Overall the exercise was very useful to me as a musician, because I discovered what feels right, and have got closer to understanding what makes me tick musically.

And for the record Robot Go Disco, Crush, Lullaby and Do Be Do are the tracks which speak most to my heart and make me happy.

I didn’t want to think about the market

Fail!

I found that the opposite occurred, but this wasn’t a negative experience at all. Quite the reverse.

While I wasn’t worrying about sales exactly (because it was all free) at first I became quite fixated on the number of downloads until I forced myself to stop constantly checking the figures.

But the direct response I got from all the comments, Tweets and Facebook messages was a revelation. I was much more aware and attuned to the reaction of my audience whilst writing the music than I’ve ever been in the past.

And I was surprised to find that instead of leading to insecurities and difficulties in my creative process, this connection sustained me in my difficult moments. I found them immensely energising and inspiring. (Thank you!)

I wanted to avoid “endless head scratching”

Apart from the experience of connecting directly with my audience, this was the biggest benefit I got from the process. I’ve always found writing any music to be singularly painful and somewhat excruciating, and 10 tracks 10 weeks was no different.

But after consistently hitting deadline for 10 weeks in a row, I’ve gained an enormous amount of confidence in my ability to ship. I’ve also realised that its much more important and artistically honest to get something out even if you’re unsure about it than go round in circles trying to make it perfect. “Prolific not perfect” is my mantra now.

So in general I’d say 10 tracks 10 weeks was an unrivaled success. The finished product is good enough, in fact something I’m proud of. I have thought about repeating the process, then choosing the 10 tracks that work the best out of the resulting 20 to make a finished album with, but I’ve decided to leave it as is.

Because for all its faults, 10 tracks 10 weeks is a document of a process and an experience which I want to preserve and remember for what it was – the most exciting and enlightening creative project I have every undertaken.

And anyway, now its time for me to get on with my next idea! 🙂

What do you think? How was it for you? What are your favourite tracks?