Christopher Hunt-Watts

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 6

If has been a while since my last entry, Christmas has a way of derailing life. Despite that, we have not been idle. In the week leading up to Christmas, we have recorded Drums, Bass, Rhythm and Lead guitars and I am blown away by the quality of the capture. Having worked in the studio a lot over the last two years, Courteney, Chris and myself have never spent so much time over instrument tonality and mic choice/placement as we have for this original. In my opinion, that extra effort shows in the capture as simply putting the stems in a DAW and pressing play gives us just about the song we want. We still have the vocals to record but will be giving them equal if not more care than the instruments. We will be releasing this song around mid-January on all major platforms.

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 5 - The Event

Our event on the 17th was far more successful than I could have hoped for! All three bands, us The Joey Bill and Indigo Haze, played very well, and we had some very positive feedback as well as some great pictures such as the ones attached. As well as booking the equipment and playing a major part in its transportation, I took on the roles of sound engineer and artist liaison for our launch gig. We played our first original at our gig and, although it has yet to be named, we are all very happy with it. We want to put a few more finishing touches on it but are almost ready to hit the studio and get recording! I will be booking rehearsal and studio times over the next two days to work on songs and keep our momentum going.

Band’s Next Steps • Finishing touches on the first original • Record/produce original • Rehears and audition to play on the university trip to Copenhagen • Work on some more originals • Share some of the above activities on social media • Start thinking about single cover art

My Next Steps • Organise band rehearsal times and book the room • Work on new originals

Photos by Jonny Nolan 

[christopherhuntwatts]

Advanced Production #1

For this project I will be producing three artists in three contrasting styles. This will require a lot of research into the genres I will be working in to ensure both my capturing and production techniques are in keeping with established methods so that the end results fit the market they are designed for.

In the past weeks I have found all three of my artists whose genre are as shown below.

1. Solo - Acoustic Blues Guitar Male Vocals

2. Four-Piece - Garage Rock Female Vocals Rhythm Guitar Lead Guitar Bass Guitar Drums

3. Band – Dark Synth Pop Male Vocals Bass Guitar Rhythm Guitar Lead Guitar E-Drums Synth

[christopherhuntwatts]

Arts #1

After considering a number of concepts for this project I have decided that I am going work with virtual reality to create an immersive horror experience. I still having a lot to decide about the story line and practical execution of the project but working with VR will give me a lot of room for the researching and creation of music and sound effects.

Here is a link to a Pinterest board I have been working on for this project - https://www.pinterest.co.uk/huntwatts/music-for-arts/  

Here is a link to a rough presentation outlining this project - https://drive.google.com/file/d/1PwPGuBhDFNLVPmwLW594B4tnIdavJDpM/view?usp=sharing 

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 4 – Originality

Event I announced event information on Sunday the 4th of November and in two days we have received 12 responses of going and 16 of maybe on Facebook.

Social Media Unsurprisingly we have seen a bit of a drop in Facebook likes as we many of our invited friends have already liked our pages. My hope is that our event and cover posing will help to gain some more likes as many of the first-year university students will see and support us.

Demos The band went into a rehearsal room this evening and, after agreeing on our setlist for the 17th event, started the collaborative work on our first original. Picking one of the rough demos I’d been working on, we shaped the instrumentation into something that we were all happy with. It was a very collaborative process with me and Courteney Yeoell brainstorming the various progressions and in the end, changing up the whole feel of the song. Our drummer, Rob Grady’s input was also key in turning the song from a slow, relaxing track to something lively and far more in keeping with our target genre.

Next Steps • Push the event • Release the cover • Rehearse individually and as a band for the 17th • Work on the original’s lyrics and vocal melody

Promotional poster by Chris Flynn

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 3 - Picking Up Motion

Event 

With our event just over two weeks away (17th of November) I have organised the backline and contacted the two acts we want to play alongside us, getting confirmation from both. 

Social Media

I have also made our social media live and we have gained just over seventy Facebook likes in our first week. While social media is live, we have not been pushing too much as we want to have a little more content ready to go, such as our cover and the event announcement poster, before starting our social media push in earnest. (At the end of this post there are links to our main social media pages)

Demos

While I have been doing the bulk of the demos up to this point, both Chris and Courteney have been key in whittling down what they like and dislike about my demos as well as bringing new ideas to the table that have, more often than not, shown to be great starting points for tracks.

Name

As a group we have gone with the name Gremlins, something we all thought fit the often two sided image of the band, a little cutesy and a little vicious. 

Lastly, once we our cover is released we will be applying to play on the Copenhagen university trip, something we are all very keen of doing.

Next Steps

Release our cover.

Apply to play in Copenhagen

Release event poster/information.

Start social media campaign.

Get to a rehearsal room and pool song ideas

Social Media Links 

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/Gremlins-167217647555777/?modal=suggested_action¬if_id=1541000013525261¬if_t=page_user_activity&ref=notif

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/gremlins_the_band/?hl=en

Soundcloud - https://soundcloud.com/user-929631293

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 2 - Baby Steps

MD6311 - Major Project (Entry 2)

With the concept for our project at an early but definitive stage, we had a meeting on the 11th of October and came up with a list of the key points of planning. This is can be found below, followed by a short explanation of each and an update on their progress. 

• Find a drummer • Arrange gig • Start the writing process • Photo shoot • Set up social media, email address etc.

Find a Drummer For our garage rock style music, we will of course need acoustic drums, an instrument that none of us are very well versed in. This being the case, we advertised for a drummer interested in the kind of music we will be making. After receiving two responses, we had a rehearsal with each and made a choice based partly on skill level but most importantly on which one we thought would best fit with us personality wise.

Arrange Gig We made the decision to put on our own gig rather than apply to play as an opening act for a local show. This is to gain extra interest in our band as it won’t just be another local gig but more of a ‘mates fest’ style gathering. Something a bit unique will gather more of a local interest particularly among students as we will be able to put on acts from multiple year groups and have an event which is equal parts gig, party and socialising/networking event. Since the 10th of October we have had written conformation from one third year band and verbal conformation from a first year one. Date is set and will be announced when social media goes live along with the location which is also confirmed. Our backline is sorted and we have decided on at least half of our set list.

Start the writing process A more detailed projection of our original material’s release and quantity will follow in later posts but we know we want a minimum of one single and a three track EP on all major streaming services and in physical formats by May 2019. To this end we have begun work on demos and now have five that are strong starting points. Our next step is choosing which demo we want to work on first and take it to a rehearsal room. This will give us the chance to collaborate on the track in an organic setting and pool our ideas while getting use to each other’s writing styles, strengths and weaknesses.

Photo Shoot As aesthetics are a key part of this project, our social media needs to be interesting and engaging. To this end we booked a shoot with a media student named Jonny Nolan and got some promotion material of the band. here is a link to some of his work - https://www.facebook.com/JonnyNolanPhotography/

Set Up Social Media Social media is an obviously and integral part to this project so we wanted to make sure its activation is clean and professional. To this end, Chris Flynn has been editing pictures for profile pics and cover photos. We have also been into the studio to record a cover which will be up on our pages very soon after their activation. On a side note, Courteney Yeoell has been mixing and mastering our cover as this is an area she wants to gain more knowledge and experience in. The main reason for our recording a cover, as well as to get used to working together in the studio, is that when I have see local bands start up in the past I have noticed that it is often very difficult to get an exact idea of the kind of music you can expect form them, something I wanted to avoid with this project.

Next Steps • Announce and promote gig • Get 100% conformation from the first year band for our gig • Take a demo into the rehearsal room • Decide on a band name • Make social media live • Mix, master and upload cover • Decide on a full set list for our gig • Rehearse our set list

[christopherhuntwatts]

Gremlins Update 1 - In the Beginning

Major Project - MD6311 (Entry 1)

What it is all about?

The idea of this project is to create a band loosely in the genre of garage rock. The artists that have inspired us to create this project include Wolf Alice, Bully and Black Honey (a link to our first influences playlist can be found at the end of this post). While music will of course be our primary focus, we plan to have a heavy focus on aesthetics, a memorable on stage performance/look and a striking social media presence. Even with a lot of research still to do, the resurgence of the retro culture indicates there is a place in the modern music industry for physical products such as vinyl and cassettes. While we are not yet (or ever) aiming for our aesthetic to be retro, this interest in physical and collectible products will translate to our heavy focus on image.  

Link to our first influences playlist - https://open.spotify.com/user/kiff2/playlist/6mMQeDQe50fFZqbSrvAmdZ?si=1S_Ix1JeRJuCq51v6AXTgQ

[christopherhuntwatts]

MD5317 - Observe 

This video along with its audio was created by me. 

Read more about its creation and reason for being here -  http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174112228420/critical-evaluation-md5317

[christopherhuntwatts]

More About My Brief - MD5317

I wanted my brief to be one that I could feasibly see getting from an external/commercial source. To this end I created it to have a purpose which, as you can see from the brief itself, it is to showcase dark poetry. The written word is still the main medium for poetry today although livening up the experience is something a number of writers and artists have done. Patti Smith and Kevin Shields are a good example of this as they combined spoken word poetry and music to create a cohesive works of art. While I used visuals and music with text to be added by my client, Smith and Shield’s was defiantly an inspiration in my brief design.

Here is a link to some of their work The Coral Sea - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aN34KSuo9fs

Here is a link to my full brief - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174109069950/observe-independent-brief-md5317

[christopherhuntwatts]

Critical Evaluation - MD5317

Observe When first approaching this project, I wanted to try something I’d not done before, and so in preparation I went out with a friend and shot over nine minutes of drone footage that I knew was versatile and could be applied to almost any brief I set myself. It was then that I quite accidentally stumbled on this YouTube video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmRSIgPJPKw. After hearing it, I decided I wanted to create a brief that would allow me to write in an atonal style, something very new to me, follow this link to find the full brief I set myself for this project – http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174109069950/observe-independent-brief-md5317. Once I’d decided my stylistic direction I started doing some research into the unsettling genres of music and sound and found the video ‘Second Syndrome’, found here -  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGbEkgEyt8k. I took a lot of inspiration from the instrumentation in this video which is particularly evident in the first 1:30 of my piece where I used the izotope vinyl plug-in to give the instruments an old creepy tone. I loved the relationship between the piano and violin and thought it would suit my brief in terms of the music being unsettling and noticeable but still background. The images in ‘Second Syndrome’, along with music video for The Wyches’ song, Gravedweller (found here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bdp3NvKyUi0), gave me the inspiration for the muted grey/black and white filter which innately works with atonal, creepy and unsettling music. With requirements for the piece to be between four and five minutes long, I felt piano and violin alone wasn’t dynamic enough to meet my brief and keep the backdrop interesting. To liven things up and avoid getting stuck with a repetitive musical motif, I added percussion, synth and vocals which come in at around 2:30. The inspiration for this addition came largely from the track Sikiliza Kwa Wahenga, found here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbvnvweeSR8&t=24s. This midsection in which these instruments are most noticeable starts at roughly 2:31 and adds to the dynamics and unsettling feeling of this piece by syncopating the hits and messing with the established tempo. The percussion at the beginning of the 2:31 section is one of the key points that puts almost 100% of focus on the music and serves to bridge the introduction of synth into what has by that point, been a piano and strings piece.  I found the intro and outro audio, from some YouTube found footage, and chose it to counterpoint the darker musical style I was going for. The piano piece, which is a cover of ‘They'll be bluebirds over the white cliffs of dover’, already evokes the feeling of flying as its composter Walter Kent would have intended because of the lyrical content. This is a very wholesome piece of music with deep historical, patriotic and nationalistic connections. Along with the use of coloured images behind it, I was aiming to create semiotic confusion when that song fades into static (using the izotope vinyl plug-in) is replaced with a more atonal piece on the same instrument and the grey/black and white footage. This works in revers in the outro section where end text appears, and the colour of the drone footage is restored.

While I met my brief of making an unsettling piece of video/audio, I would now like to contact a couple of poets I know and see if they would be interested in having some of their work overlaid on Observe in the way my imaginary client would have.

Restrict The first step I took when starting work on the sound for Restrict was to watch it from beginning to end until I had a rough idea of the different sections. As show in the picture attached, I categorised the video into five sections and the moods that I wanted to covey in them.

I kicked off my composition by working on the dynamics, making place holder synths to show the level of power and intensity I to bring out in each scene. After my first real introduction into creating synths in a number of previous projects (which you can find here - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/tagged/MD5317), I found it fairly easy to make a good dynamic synth ground on which to build and begin to zero in on which instruments and sounds I wanted for the different moods. High strings were an obvious choice for section 1 and 4 as a life time’s diet of Hollywood and cinema has conditioned us to associate them with moving scenes. After some twiddling, I also went with deeper strings low in the mix for some of the intense and dark moments as, when put atop a heavy synth pad, they gave movement without removing the audience from the visuals as, for example, brass or electric guitar could have.

To move further into the dynamics, I didn’t want to be scared of leaving silence if I felt a scene wouldn’t benefit form music. The main examples of this can be found in section 4 into 5 where the protagonist’s final decision to end her life is such powerful imagery that the music being absent leaves 100% of our attention of on her emotion. A couple of examples of this happening in famous movies is this 4:58 scene in Wolf of Wall street (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idOQXlHVrQE) and 3:49 scene from the first Hunger Games (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3PJ3Du_zDc).

A very present sound in my final video is in fact an example of real world sound I used. This was made from my Di-ed bass guitar which I palm muted and plucked before pitch shifting down an octave and adding compression, EQ and reverb. Varying in volume and note value, this worked very well as a rhythmic beating, similar to a cinematic heart beat that is present throughout a lot of the video. I also used a bass slide with these effects on for the moment the protagonist realises she is trapped in the dark at the beginning of section 2 (1:55).

The Conclusion In the final analysis of my audio interpretation of restrict and my own brief, I can say that I have learned a lot about synthesisers, MIDI instruments, sampling and adapting real world sounds and how all of that can be used to bring out or subdue emotions in the visual medium.  

Here is a link to my brief - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174109069950/observe-independent-brief-md5317 

Here is a link to my Observe video I created - https://youtu.be/ZsmqKhN0ThE

Here is a link to more information on the construction of my brief - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174112902950/more-about-my-brief-md5317

Here is a link to my sampled audio - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRxtx3PMX_Q

Bibliography 

• Sikiliza Kwa Wahenga - Get out  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CbvnvweeSR8&t=24s

• Second Syndrome - Peter Edward Burg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OGbEkgEyt8k

• Atonal Music – Youtube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RmRSIgPJPKw

• Gravedweller – The Wyches 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bdp3NvKyUi0

• The Hunger Games 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3PJ3Du_zDc

• Wolf of Wall Street

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idOQXlHVrQE

[christopherhuntwatts]

Observe – Independent Brief - MD5317

Create a backdrop against which the words to our client’s poems can scroll. The visuals and music should be unsettling to reflect the dark style of the poetry. Examples of the kind of poetry that will be featured can be found in this link -   https://www.bustle.com/articles/175398-5-creepy-poems-that-will-give-you-serious-chills. The backdrop should be between four and five minutes long and leave space for the written word to be the main focus of the piece. That said, the backdrop should contain a couple of key points where the audio and visuals take priority to break up the lines poetry. 

More on the creation of this brief - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/174112902950/more-about-my-brief-md5317

[christopherhuntwatts]

Here is the run down of the Gomme UK tour.

Link to corresponding post - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/169539288250/gomme-uk-tour 

[christopherhuntwatts]

Tea Rex Events Inspiration - MD5212

The idea behind our Tea Rex all-day event originally involved a large empty space, possibly a warehouse, in which we would create a central stage. This idea was largely inspired by this video of one of our favourite bands, Slowdive - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tWhPv2U6aQ&feature=youtu.be. 

The artists being in the centre of the room and being able to be seen from all angles appealed to me personally as it blurs the lines between audience and performer. While it is not a new concept, it is a little unusual as most established venues are not able to accommodate a central stage set up. After doing some research into what availability of warehouses around Cheltenham, we found that pricing and audience accessibility would make a warehouse a little difficult to pull off, so we went in search of a more feasible location.

Moving our event concept from an industrial estate and into to a more residential setting gave us more hope of attracting locals and families and this is when we found the inspiration for a more family friendly, living room style event. Videos from NPR Music were a great inspiration as, using the link here (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eB4oFu4BtQ8) you can see how our final setup, with plants, games, tea etc, was shaped by our research. While showcasing very different music than our wholesome and family friendly event, the vibe of this video was very influential when planning the living room style set up -https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G3MBv5-H9oE&feature=youtu.be. Holding an event in an unusual way was a running theme through our planning stages. As our goal with the event was legacy, we knew that a location and set up that would be stand out and be easily remembered would is what we wanted.

For our broadcast event we wanted to continue the homely vibe that had been so integral to our all-day event. Going further into that concept, we spent some time looking at venues and locations and researching what other events have done. Finding videos such as these, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl8WHk1JkHo, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPgGhPelBG4, we decided to go with an even more relaxing setting than the main event by holding it in a bed room. The videos above, while very in keeping with our relaxing theme, don’t have any dialogue, something that we wanted from our broadcast event. This was to make the stream more entertaining but also gave us the opportunity to hear about the artists, their music, their pasts and future plans. While this was to make the artists feel like we wanted more from them than to just turn up and play music, it also helped to make the stream have a more friendly feel, more like some nice people having a sing and a chat than a standard gig. To that end we had the artists play a couple of songs and punctuated each change over with a short talk show style question prompted convocation. The inspiration for this came from the thousands of talk shows we are all so familiar with although here is a link to one an an example - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qvPdhbA_-1c  As I said in event report #22 (found here - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/173682494885/event-report-22-md5212-the-broadcast-event-is), the only issues we faced in the live stream was in the artists transition which felt a little clunky. That is something that is however, largely unavoidable when doing a live stream in such a small location.

Looking back on both of our events, although they differ slightly from our inspirational material, I am very pleased with how they turned out and am very much looking forward to making events happen in the future.

Link to the corresponding post - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/173888124595/event-report-22-md5212

[christopherhuntwatts]

Event report #23 - MD5212

With all our module events over there are still interesting things happening for Tea Rex. First of all is the Tea Rex highlight video that Conor made out of footage from our planning stages and the events themselves. There is a link to that at the end of this post.

The second interesting thing came form a Facebook message from a band based in London who requested being hosted by us in Cheltenham. I will keep the band anonymous for now but with over 22K likes on Facebook and over 350 monthly listeners on Spotify, we are very excited and planning has already begun!

Link to the Tea Rex highlights video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i3pRR7HjkpE

[christopherhuntwatts]

Event Report #22 - MD5212

Please note that the link to my events inspiration post is at the end of this report.

The broadcast event is over and fun was had by all. Other than a few minutes delay as the Facebook stream got itself together, there were no hiccups on the day. The transition between artists could have been smoother but issues like that are very difficult to avoid with a live stream as people need time to get on and off camera and set up. In the end our artists all played wonderfully and were engaging and responsive with the interview questions. The stream did have a home-made, DIY feel to it but that was very much our aim with Tea Rex from the beginning. Conor and I were delighted that all of our artists stayed for a little impromptu after party when the event was over.  

The decision was made to remove the stream from the Tea Rex pages as, wanting to make this more of a professional enterprise, we felt the stream was a bit rough and ready. The full and unabridged stream is available in the link at the end of this post and Conor has already begun to create an after video using the footage captured.

Taking a look at the broadcast event as a whole it did exactly what we wanted, both working as promotion for the Tea Rex brand and serving as a legacy boost for Tea Rex #1. In retrospect there were no avoidable issues in the planning stage with only the unfortunate incident of the theft of Cut the Cord’s equipment to as a set back.

With the module that brought Tea Rex about drawing to a close both Conor and myself are very keen to pursue Tea Rex and hold more events in the future.

Link to the full and unabridged Tea Rex live stream - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgEqyEq74Ss 

Link to my events inspiration post - http://christopherhuntwatts.tumblr.com/post/173888595865/tea-rex-events-inspiration-md5212

[christopherhuntwatts]

Production Project - Market Research #4 - MD5311

Once again taking inspiration from my Chill Motion playlist, decided on the attached image for the Abate EP cover. There is quite a mix of covers in the playlist but I noticed quite a lot of them were colourful although a little subdued and understated. 

While it was only a snap on my phone, I feel this image perfectly sums up my aim of relaxation, inspiration and wholesomeness while being visually interesting.