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Today I sat on the floor in Room 9 of Brighton Electric with a Roland keyboard and experimented with different chord sequences. I already have a song that I have been working on (and submitted for the first term of this year) but I knew it wasn't quite the kind of music I wanted to be releasing.

The route I wanted to go down was slightly more moody and meaningful.

A couple days before I was leaning some Paolo Nutini songs on keyboard and loved his use of major 7 chords, so I wanted to put at least one of these in my chord sequence.

After some playing around I came up with a simple A, Am7, F, G sequence. I liked the energy this sequence gave, and could hear a lot of possibilities for the song in my mind. I have attached a quick voice memo that I made upon writing this chord sequence, with some vague vocal melody that I was experimenting with.

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I went home from the lesson and immediately made a little demo on Logic Pro, because I was pretty excited as I though this song had potential (in my head anyway).

I layed down some synth, and came up with a hook to follow the verse (D, D7, A, A7). This created a nice build up for a little climax in the song.

I programmed some drums and added a bassline for a bit of groove, then improvised some lyrics until I was happy, made a note of them and layered some vocal harmonies to create a nice feminine, ethereal-ish feel to the song. I really like the build up at the end of the clip I have attached, I feel that the long drawn out words, and the bassline, guitar and keys all building in pitch captures the sense of longing and excitement that comes with the feelings of infatuation.

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See attached my timeline for my release plan.

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Today I played my demo to my class, and to Hannah and Sam Clines. I got some really nice feedback, and were told of some songs that my peers found had a similar energy. One of which was a song called 'Little White Dove' by Jenny Lewis. (Have attached song)

I completely understand (and enjoy) this comparison, because I can see the resemblance in terms fo the chilled energy, relaxed drums, hi-hats cutting through the mix, and somewhat funky bassline creating a saucy head-bopping groove. This song's middle eight includes a guitar solo, which makes for a nice break from the vocal, and brings forth a nice bit of variation within the song. This inspired me to include a guitar solo in my song too, but probably at the end.

After having listened to 'Little White Dove', I realised that, as lovely as the song is, it was very chilled the whole way through, with no real energy switch/tension build and release. This helped me decide that I wanted my song to build towards a big guitar solo at the end, to end with a real climax - representing the voice's loss of control brought on my such a deep infatuation.

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Jenny Lewis - Little White Dove (Official Audio)

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Now that I had a little section of the song written, and a pretty strong idea of where I wanted it to go, I thought it was time to start thinking about how I was going to present the song for my FMP (single release).

I first thought about the single cover. There are many options for a single cover; a picture of me, a picture of others, a picture of an object, a drawing, etc. So there was much to think about.

I decided to do a picture of myself, based on three reasons.

1 - It's my first ever solo single release, and I want people to know who I am when they listen to my song. I want them to be able to easily put a face to the music, as I think this will be the best way of getting myself known as an artist.

2 - I like album and single covers best when they have a person on them, particularly when it is the artist who released the song.

3 - In my digital presence class, I learned that the human eye is drawn to faces more than anything else, particularly eyes.

I started to brainstorm my ideas for my single cover. My mindmap is attached.

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I started creating a mood board for my single cover.

I also contacted some of my film school friends, who were happy to help me. I was really grateful as they were able to arrange to borrow some lighting equipment from their uni, and I even was able to hire a makeup artist to make me look the part.

We arranged a date to shoot (26th February) and started discussing our ideas.

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The day of the shoot was upon us. I gathered some bits and bobs from my flat; trinkets, jewellery, instruments and plushies, to create the feminine clutter I was striving to capture in the image.

The set was my friend Erin's house, as she has a very feminine, Y2K-esque bedroom that I thought would be perfect for the setting of the picture.

Ben brought some lighting stuff, including a coloured LED strip light that I thought was really cool and unique.

We played around with angles, poses, set and lighting to create a selection of images. We ended up taking over 900!!!! See the next entries for my favourite unedited candidates for the cover.

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Today I finished writing the song. I decided to call it 'On the Low', as my favourite part of the song is when I sing the lyrics 'and I should probably try to keep it on the low'. I also figured this worked as a title because the song is all about a secret infatuation that may not be reciprocated.

I structured it quite unusually - intro, verse 1, verse 2, hook, verse 3, hook, solo/outro. The reason I say 'hook' instead of chorus, is because the only thing that is the same about both choruses is the instrumental, the lyrics are completely different. Attached is a quick write up of the lyrics of said hooks.

I added some little drum fills and flares, as well as some instrumental pauses to incorporate some variation and keep it interesting.

I got my talented guitarist friend Lewis to do a big beefy solo at the end of the song, just like I wanted. He did an amazing job, although I'm not sure this is the solo I will be going for when it comes to recording in the studio as it is done on a baritone, and we tried adding baritone to the rest of the song and it stuck out weirdly in the mix, so I deleted it but kept the solo. I want there to be guitar all the way through so I will probably add that in with a normal guitar and replace the baritone solo with a new one, but try and keep a similar amount of power behind it.

In my next entry you can hear the demo as it stands at the moment.

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A couple of days ago, I decided on the photo that I wanted to use for my cover. I went with the one where I am sat on the bed looking up, with my legs in front of me. (attached). I though this one was the best lighting wise, framing wise, and I liked the way I looked best. I also enjoy the fact that you can see all of the clutter on the bed.

I sent the photo to Ace (the photographer) who started on editing it. We had to bring the light up a bit, particularly on my face, as it is a little shadowed in the unedited version. There is also some brands on show, such as the Jurassic Park DVD and the Dire Straits record, so I asked if Ace would be able to blur them a bit.

In my next entry you can see the edited version.

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Olive Jane single cover (click for full image)

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Here you can see the edited and cropped version of the single cover. I have added the text as a reference to spacing, but have contacted a lovely artist friend whom I met on a video shoot for my band, to design me a logo that I can use for this and all future releases. I have asked her to just write my artist name 'Olive Jane' in a way that suits the cover, feminine and dreamy. I sent her the picture and left a lot of it up to her creative vision, because she said she had a few good ideas.

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Today I went to Small Pond studio and recorded drums and vocals.

The session was three hours, giving me enough time to record the drums for the track, as well as the main vocal line, deciding to add the harmonies at home.

However, after going home and listening to the track with live drums, I actually found that I preferred the programmed drums for the most part. I liked the way they created such a tight, punchy sound so the sound, and I also feel like programmed drums suit some songs better, particularly those where the bassline and the vocals are the main feature of the song. To use a mainstream example, 'Attention' by Charlie Puth has a distinctive bassline that carries the song, and I feel that live drums would cause the bassline to be swallowed somewhat, and the punchy, tight feel of the song may be dampened. But hey, maybe that speaks more of my skills as a drummer, and some would be able to mimic the exact sound of programmed drums. But not this drummer (lol) Either way, I knew what I preferred the programmed drums. Up until the final section with the guitar solo. This is because this part is far more loose and grungy, with a strong ride and lots of noise for the finale of the song. I hate programmed rides anyway, so it bodes well that this part sounded great with live drums.

At first I thought I was experiencing a nasty dilemma of programmed drums v live drums, til I realised it was my song and I could do whatever I wanted. So I eq'd the live drums to make them sound a bit punchier, so the change from programmed to live wasn't as jarring, and I felt I was on to something (not to mention sprinkling a tough of innovation onto my track).

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Now it was time to replace Lewis' barritone solo, so I could have just one guitarist on the track with a strat.

I got my housemate Harry to help me, and he nailed it (not that I was surprised). I also gave him some direction as to what kind of guitar elements I wanted throughout, and that I wanted there to be guitar kicking in properly by the time the quiet intro is done and the main instrumental and funky bassline kicks in. We also decided to add a really cool couple of guitar bits in the intro as almost a teaser of what's to come, and to make the song sound a little funkier.

Harry redid my shoddy bassline as well, and made it a million times funkier. I'm very lucky to have his help.

I have attached the song and the changes we have made. The vocals are the ones recorded at Small Pond. I am currently very ill so not a huge fan of some of the vocal. So just take it with a pinch of salt. I also haven't added in the vocal harmonies yet, and you can still hear the click in some of it so I've gotta figure out what to do about that.

There's a good chance I might just re-record all of the vocals (or at least most of them).

Also one more thing, I tried out beginning the song with bass chords and I hate it, sounds far too muddy. So I still need to figure out what I'm doing on that front, I might just have to do it with a synth like the original plan.

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Today I sat in my room with Harry and added a lot of fun midi instruments.

There are now a number of synths to add sound effects and make the song sound far dreamier, I also added some percussion and a shaker to keep the energy of the song up throughout.

I'm really happy with how it's turned out. It's kind of experimental and funky, and it's exactly the kind of music I've always wanted to make.