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[Lucky Rathen]

I need some advice from bands/sound guys etc. or even gig-goers who know a bit about music. I have a conundrum.

I've got a bunch of songs that I've written over the last couple of years, maybe 8 or so. I don't really think they're that good, though that may be down to not having the confidence to play my self compositions to other people, a problem I've always had. But I like them. Recently it's occured to me to maybe bite the bullet and record them and pass a few copies out to see what people of think of them, and possibly put a band together to play a few of them if the feedback is good.

BUT

The problem is that they are all completely different styles. There's a couple of sort of slow, haunting acoustic numbers, a couple of heavy, rock/grungey kind of songs, a couple of stupidly cheerful folk numbers, and even one tribal sounding instrumental thing. Obviously on a CD or at a gig the songs aren't going to sit properly together each other due to the vast change in sound, style and tempo. I've sort of tried making them all a bit more uniform to sit in together, but it just doesn't work - they lose their edge. Thus my question really is, does a band or artist need to have a "Sound"? If you go to see a rock band you hear rock, if you go to see a folk singer, you hear folk - I'm going from Nirvana to Cat Stevens in one move! So what do I do? Record them all, see which ones come out best and drop the others and go for a specific trademark sound? Or do I go from heavy palm muting in one song to major jazz chords in the next and just confuse everybody? I didn't intentionally go out to be eclectic or offbeat, the songs just generally reflect the mood I was in when I was writing them, and I have a huge array of influences that all seem to have got muddled in with each other.

Any advice?

[Afro Droid]

Sounds ace, I say go for it, regardless of how it all hangs together, the common thread will be you and the other musicians performing. Good luck.

[HateEvent]

There shouldn't be any limitations on what you write. Sounds cool that you have such a vast array of influences coming together in your writing scheme.

I can't think of a round about way of saying what I basically mean which is that you should just go ahead and put the stuff out there no matter how varied it is!

It *may* be slightly more difficult to find people that would share interest in all these contrasting styles but it would certainly be something to see!

[Bodast]

If it came to anything, you could always try to separate your styles into two (or more..?) groups so you could pursue them separately, maybe with different people, without having to try to dampen the ideas into one style. But for now, I'd say the same as the others, go for it all and good luck

[scottyboy]

i agree just to stick them all together, since you're just after a bit of feedback. if you were to form a band, the other members would bring on board their influences anyway

[Diesel]

Originally Posted by Brother Elwood

I need some advice from bands/sound guys etc. or even gig-goers who know a bit about music. I have a conundrum.

I've got a bunch of songs that I've written over the last couple of years, maybe 8 or so. I don't really think they're that good, though that may be down to not having the confidence to play my self compositions to other people, a problem I've always had. But I like them. Recently it's occured to me to maybe bite the bullet and record them and pass a few copies out to see what people of think of them, and possibly put a band together to play a few of them if the feedback is good.

BUT

The problem is that they are all completely different styles. There's a couple of sort of slow, haunting acoustic numbers, a couple of heavy, rock/grungey kind of songs, a couple of stupidly cheerful folk numbers, and even one tribal sounding instrumental thing. Obviously on a CD or at a gig the songs aren't going to sit properly together each other due to the vast change in sound, style and tempo. I've sort of tried making them all a bit more uniform to sit in together, but it just doesn't work - they lose their edge. Thus my question really is, does a band or artist need to have a "Sound"? If you go to see a rock band you hear rock, if you go to see a folk singer, you hear folk - I'm going from Nirvana to Cat Stevens in one move! So what do I do? Record them all, see which ones come out best and drop the others and go for a specific trademark sound? Or do I go from heavy palm muting in one song to major jazz chords in the next and just confuse everybody? I didn't intentionally go out to be eclectic or offbeat, the songs just generally reflect the mood I was in when I was writing them, and I have a huge array of influences that all seem to have got muddled in with each other.

Any advice?

Well Bro, I've got two things to say to that - Led Zeppelin III & Physical Grafitti. Two extremely eclectic albums that somehow work beautifully - go for it!

Music doesn't advance one iota without variation and courage.

Look at Queen's early work, Blues Rock, Metal, Folk & even Vaudeville - all on the same album - and it worked.

[Hogisbald]

All I can say is that it is refreshing for a local musician to make music that is so varied.

My fave musicians...

Ulver- black metal, orchestras then ambient then retro 70's surrealism.

Devin Townsend- Death Metal, acoustic ballads, waltz's, dark ambience.

Hmm, I don't think comparing his idea to Queen or Devin Townhend is likely to inspire him too much.

But I would agree that the best artists are often the ones that don't get tied into a particular genre, look at Beck, lots of cool different stuff going on on his records.

[Diesel]

Originally Posted by DustyDeviada

Hmm, I don't think comparing his idea to Queen or Devin Townhend is likely to inspire him too much.

*Adopts stuffy attitude* I was merely quoting examples of albums that weren't tied to any specific genre and at yon time the morning (couldnae get tae sleep), that was the best I could come up with....hmph!

[RockAustin]

Sounds really interesting. I prefer that kind of song writing myself, go for it.