Thanks for joining me. – Ben McKenzie

My band consists on Me, Sion, Victor, Dylan and Phoenix.

We are performing the song Wake me up before September ends by the band Green day.

I shall be performing on the acoustic guitar, Sion is on drums, Victor is on electric guitar, Dylan on bass and Phoenix on vocals.

the genre of the song falls into the punk rock sound.

two of the band members including me didn’t know the song at first so rehearsal was spent mostly just learning how the song goes, and practicing together in general. we did manage to get the intro of the song down. Since the first rehearsal I have learnt the songs chord progression and picking pattern so the next rehearsal should be far me beneficial. the song is quite challenging mostly due to the fact of my short exposure to the style but the picking pattern is fairly repetitive so shouldn’t be too difficult with practice.

The song is about the death of Green day’s lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong‘s father. who died on the first of September in 1982. The title of the song was actually a line Billie Joe once said after his fathers funeral whilst grieving. The song was released in 2004 as a track on one of Green day’s album’s American idiot. 

 

                              This is a live performance of the song by Green day.

 

 

                              This is a guitar cover of the same song I found on Youtube…

 

 

 

Evaluation:

For the next rehearsal we will play the song on a phone into the microphone and try and all play together with the song. if successful we will remove the track and try and play the whole song together. I think we will try and match the song with the original except for the obvious differences such as a female vocalist. we may also mix the solo up keeping the key the same. On a whole the rehearsal went fairly poorly as I didn’t already know the song so was at a disadvantage. we did practice playing as a group so this helped our teamwork skills, knowing how the other band members like to practice.

 

Get Lucky – Daft punk

 

The second song we are working on is Get lucky by Daft Punk. with everyone in the band continuing to use the same instruments as our first song. I was playing the famous funky riff to the the song while Victor shredded on his guitar for backing and the solo. Sion was drumming, Dylan on Bass and Phoenix singing. we managed to play the whole song all the way through. This was achievable because its very repetitive with its chord progression. I was playing the riff with the capo on the 2nd fret, just playing easy chords; since then I have learned the riff on the 7th fret which is the same as the original track. Because of this I feel the next rehearsal will sound a lot more like the DaftPunk.

This is the original version music video.

 

 

 

The awesome guitar pattern that Nile rogers is strumming is what I have Been attempting to recreate in rehearsals. This style of funk guitar is very challenging to play despite the song only being a four chord sequence. Bm, D, Fm, E. the song is difficult because you have to play very lightly, quickly with lots and lots of correctly timed palm muting. you also have to mute the lower notes onsite of the chords while only playing 3 strings in parts. with more practice at home and another rehearsal I think the song will take shape better.

Our singer Phoenix was happy to do Get Lucky more than our first song as she feels her voice is more suited to that style of music. The whole band knew the song before we started rehearsing it together. this helped as everyone was already aware of the way the song should sound. we then changed it up a bit. I let the chords ring out in the pre-chorus, Phoenix vocally improvising to increase the interest in the song and Victor adding another guitar to the mix and a solo to the song which is absent in the original.

Some of the techniques used within my band… 

Sion was drumming, playing it straight. He also changed the signature change by involving double hi-hat in each bar. The song was played at 116bpm.

Dylan was doubling the guitar riff on bass. Plucking the strings and keeping the song funky like the guitar.

Phoenix was singing. Obviously her being a female singer switched the song up a bit. She also improvised a lot around the later choruses and coda.

Victor used the Major pentatonic scale behind the bass and guitar riff to add originality and fullness to the song. staying lower on the volume until the solo and ending chorus.

Ben (me) I was playing the guitar riff for the song on a clean amp setting, using lots of muting and strumming. letting the chords ring for the pre-chorus and building until the finale chorus.

This is a Guitar lesson I found on youtube the was really helpful in my progress.

 

 

This is the structure of get lucky we are using – the is not exactly the same as the original…

Intro —– Verse 1 —– Pre-chorus —– Chorus —– Verse 2 —– Pre-chorus —– Chorus —– Solo-bridge —– finale Chorus —– Coda

The key and chord progression stays the same throughout.

The Intro has 16 bars. my guitar starts the 1st bar, the bass comes in for the 4th bar, then the other guitar and drums begin on the 8th bar.

The verses and chorus follow the same chord progression of Bm, D, F sharp minor and E.

 

This is a podcast of my band and I evaluating after a rehearsal… 

 

 

 

Our Latest rehearsal… Our rehearsal yesterday went quite well. I printed out the lyrics with the amount of bars played next to hem to help us all know how the structure flows. The song is very repetitive with my guitar part; so that was what we needed. We also worked to try and speed up the tempo. After scrutinising the song by daft punk we all agreed our version was to slow and a bit too dreary. Sion sped the drums up to a faster tempo more like the original for us to practice.

All in all the daft punk one is nearly completed with us all knowing where and when each other comes in.  We also tried a new vocal sequence where Dylan repeats the line “we’re up all night to get lucky” over Phoenix in the pre-chorus. Once perfected the song will have more depth and be more powerful as it builds to the finale chorus.

The Green day song – Wake me up when September ends, is not going as well. we do need to work on timing and the structure of the song towards the later sections and the ending. We ended up trying to play it a bit more funky. speeding up the tempo, strumming my own version of the melody and the vocals happier. We have also began listening to our next song which we have not yet attempted. We will play at Live lunch in a couple weeks so hopefully both our songs will be ready then to perform confidently.

This is a video recording of some of our last rehearsal.

We are usually quite focused in rehearsals and will try to stay true to the songs we are learning. sometimes we go off track when we am improvising. We try to be accurate when we practice but there are always slight changes from time to time which we always attempt to resolve. for example the tempo. usually we start we rehearsing with a slower tempo than we should. so we need to practice keeping the beat consistent throughout the whole song. This is quite difficult because the song has quite a fast tempo with a hard strumming pattern.

We do do some improvising in the song. For example Victor improvises the Solo section. Phoenix improvises her vocals throughout the instrumental parts and I take a break from the same strumming pattern during the pre-chorus to mix the song up. I usually either let the chords ring out or pick through them.

Some of us are more confident performing our songs than others Victor and Sion are pretty confident with their parts. The others and I are not fully confident yet with these songs. I think all we need is more practice as a band for us all the solidify our understanding of the structure and timing. apart from that we sound really good in parts. We try to be expressive with our songs. For example Daft punk should be played happily with movement whereas Green-day is a more emotional song about death and pain so should be played with the correct dynamics. Letting the song build up through the verses and hammering out the frequent choruses.

we are defiantly in tune with each other most importantly Dylan and I use the same strumming pattern for guitar and bass guitar. So making sure we are in sync is probably the most important thing to mention. The song would sound well out if we worn’t in tune with each other or the rhythm wasn’t synchronised. We also practiced our movement. swaying together in time with the beat. If you are able to do this on stage it shows the band has interaction and collaboration.

 

Here is a cover of Get lucky on youtube. Lets see how it differs from our version…

 

This version uses more orchestral instruments such as a double bass, cello and violin. we use classic rock band instruments so the overall sound is very different. we have a female singer also. I believe they keep the tempo the same as the original which is what we are trying to do. There is lots of parts in this cover where they play their instruments differently.

 

We were rehearsing today and decided to change up both our songs to make them more interactive. with the bass starting get lucky, with acoustic clapping and we fade the song out now over around 12 bars of rhythm. We are cutting take me up when September ends so it doesn’t drag on for too long. we also are comfortable with how and when the song ends which in prior rehearsals has been fairly difficult.