MOVIES & MUSIC // 1
ISSUE 1 - MARCH 9, 2017
It’s March, I’ve released two new singles on iTunes, Spotify, etc. and I’m two months away from graduating from college with a degree in theatre from WVU. Things are going very quickly, including my finances, but they are also starting to take shape as well. Next month I will be performing in the ensemble of the Gilbert & Sullivan opera The Pirates of Penzance at school, two weeks later I will be shooting an original feature length film that I wrote and am going to star in, and then on the 27th I’m performing in the third Day One Lifestyle April Showers concert at 123 Pleasant Street—so yeah April is going to be busy.
Anyway that’s the future, we will get to that another time.
Let’s talk about the evolution of the music. It started four months ago when Nicco (NeekAttack) and I recorded “HABITS,” which we now look back on as the transitional period for my music. It was simpler, it had a catchy hook that was layered with autotune, and it had us both very curious about the future. When all of my friends started to support this song more than any I had ever made, I knew this was something special. Nicco had been getting way better with autotune, and mixing in general, so I knew I had more room to experiment with future music.
I remember when I first had the idea for the parallel choruses in “BECKHAM.” I told a couple people about it, and they though it was cool but nobody was super sold on the idea. I started thinking about writing the whole song, recording a rough, and trying to sell it to more legitimate artists. I told C-Trox about this, and he thought it was a good move. So I went home over winter break, found that Penacho beat and just kept writing. Sned would be pissed if I didn’t shout him out for giving me the first line of the song: “Your Hail Mary that’s a screen pass!” So when I laid the song in the studio, Nicco was immediately smitten with this new Woody Pond vibe. Once I had shown a couple more people the track, I knew that I had to release this as my first official single. And now with this under my belt, I started to keep pushing the boundaries of this poppy sound I was finding for myself.
One Thursday night after a late rehearsal, I decided I was just going to occupy the studio and write a new song. I called up Kay, who I knew would be out and about but easily persuaded to come roll up in the stu—he was there in maybe 15 minutes. I had already found that crazy Young Taylor beat, and I had begun writing the opening verse to “BAD LUCK.” I showed Kay the melody I was using and he started freestyling along with it. All of a sudden he started repeating something about “feelin’ good” and I knew immediately that was gonna be the hook. We decided to say fuck it and record something rough, so I had Kay run a session while I laid that verse. Suddenly Nicco returned from the bar and kicked us off, a reasonable request lol, but a couple nights later I showed him the verse and he threw the autotune on it and we just sat there with our jaws dropped. He said “lay this hook…you know, just so we can see what it sounds like.” The original rough master of that song probably got played by me and several of my friends over 100 times before I even dropped it hahaha.
Unfortunately both good and bad luck seemed to strike me as I tried to release the song. First off, Nicco hooked me up with a post from Sam at Promoting Sounds, which really took the song’s exposure up 5-6 notches. But, every time I tried to upload the song to the stores they would reject my artwork. My incredible designer of a friend Nick Turani and I talked back and forth for 2 FUCKING DAYS before we finally got the shit to work. We changed the black cat image, we changed the resolution, but FINALLY it worked when we changed the image size (Nicco suggested that originally and I blew him off, sorry bro) and now it’s available everywhere. So unfortunately Sam’s post didn’t help my Spotify catch fire, but it’s just another step forward for me as I continue making attractive sounds for the masses.
So yeah. I got some more music in the vault that I’m super excited about, as well as a couple awesome collabs in the works (John Wolf where you at?) so the rest of this spring and summer should be an exciting time. As long as I can stay focused on all 18934237 things I have on my plate. Opera, film, writing, album, SCHOOL. Busy but fun.
Stay tuned for more movies and music. Much love, stay gold.
Woody Pond
