I'm With The Band
Advisor: Christian Brady
Internship Location: Milpitas Guitar Lessons
Onsite Mentor: Phil Johnson
My favorite band, Måneskin, was started when the members were in High School, busking on the streets of Rome. I have been to two of their concerts in Pomona and San Francisco, containing 1,400 and 3,000 fans respectively. Last year, they played at the Oakland Arena to an audience of nearly 20,000 as part of their world tour for their fourth album. While this level of success won’t be easy for every up and coming band, my project seeks to replicate the conditions. My overarching goal is to create an environment where budding musicians can experiment with genres and combine ideas without being forced to adhere to binaries of popular music.
Through Instagram, I am getting in contact with various High School musicians, who I group into bands based on the genres they are interested in playing. I am using social media to gauge public opinion of these bands, through posting backstage content, clips of music, and advertising upcoming events. The creative portion of this project involves me sitting in on rehearsals, aiding with the musical process if necessary, finding areas for these bands to perform live, and giving them the opportunity to professionally record songs they create or cover. With the help of my outside advisor, who has written, recorded, and produced music, I am being shown the ropes on how to polish songs straight out of the recording studio. The final result is an album or anthology consisting of all the songs that my bands create.
Project Blog
Week 1: Debut
Hello all, and welcome to my Senior Project: I’m With The Band! The overarching goal of this project is to foster the creativity of budding High School musicians. I hope to encourage them to experiment with different styles and genres, without the pressure of adhering to popular media.
Research Question
In this project, I want to investigate the following: What contributes to the success of bands started by High Schoolers in San Jose? Does the genre of music or the venue environment affect the popularity of the band? Is it possible to record an album with all the songs we create?
Methodology
My project has already changed from what I had intended. A significant portion of my time will be dedicated to forming bands from independent artists I have found, instead of promoting existing bands formed by High Schoolers. It has become easier to be an independent artist as opposed to being part of a band, largely due to convenience and available technologies. However, I want collaboration to play a large role in this project. This adds another step to my intended methodology, grouping artists into bands based on their instruments and musical interests.
I plan to create an Instagram account to track likes, views, and shares of content. I’ll use social media for finding artists, publicizing and advertising live events, and sharing content and messages from the artists themselves.
After forming a few bands, we will start running rehearsals. I will sit in on rehearsals to gauge the progress of the bands, and I won’t intervene in the creative process unless I am needed. Writing original music would be our next step. While covers of existing songs can be creative (just look at Marilyn Manson’s cover of Sweet Dreams, originally by Eurythmics), original songs would be fun to have when comparing popularity.
So far, the music has been behind closed doors, so I plan to organize live concerts for my bands. While small (and eventually larger) venues are preferable, busking (performing on the street) is a viable option for some live performances. These will be advertised and videotaped and the audience turnout will be included in my data collection. Lastly, my bands will record a few of their songs professionally in a recording studio. A part of my research involves learning how to produce music, which will be necessary throughout this process.
Progress
This week, I have been working on launching my project’s Instagram account (@im_with_the_band_sj). I dedicated the first post to finding musicians and urging people to follow the progress of the project. By next week I hope to put together a couple bands, have at least one finalized, and potentially start rehearsals. Be sure to check back in then!
Week 2: Hypotheticals
“Obviously, we're at the beginning of something
I don't expect you to know how it's gonna go
But I believe we might be onto something
And I just thought maybe you should know
I've been playing out a lot of hypotheticals in my mind” - Lake Street Drive
I was surprised by how well the lyrics for the song “Hypotheticals'' by Lake Street Drive fit the overall mood for Week 2 of my senior project. On that note, welcome back to I’m With The Band!
Through a mutual friend, I got in contact with a band who does covers of some songs, and they were working on Hypotheticals. While the band name still needs to be decided, the group consists of a drummer, pianist, bassist, guitarist, and two vocalists. They play mostly modern R&B music, and I loved witnessing their creative process. I attended one of their rehearsals where they played a previous set for me, and then continued on experimenting with more songs, while I took some videos. My hope for this band is that they create some original music, and experiment with covers of songs that are originally in a different genre.
I’ve been getting in contact with a recording studio (through Mr. Perez), because this band is ready and keen to record at least one of their sets. All instruments will play together, which will make the recording process easier in the upcoming weeks.
This week, I was more active on I’m With The Band’s Instagram account, and so far, I have found more artists willing to participate. I grouped up three students from BISV to join a band, which led me to think of a way to categorize the data I will collect. I currently have one band who formed themselves, one in which the members know each other, and the rest of the bands I form will have members who are unfamiliar with each other. Another part of my data analysis can include taking this effect into account.
My outside advisor, Phil Johnson, creates and has released his own music. I met up with him online this week to get some tips on recording and producing music. He provided me with his “Pre-release Checklist”, which includes all the steps he takes to market and release his music. While it is extensive, I have been marking out the steps that will be relevant for this project.
Next week, I plan to contact and group up my remaining artists and start rehearsals for my new bands. Stay tuned!
Week 3: Join Together
"You don't have to play
You can follow or lead the way
Oh won't you join together with the band
We don't know where we're going
But the season's right for knowing
Oh won't you join together with the band" - The Who
The song “Join Together” by The Who perfectly sums up this week’s progress. I have a total of three bands now, working on this project with me, two in which I have hand picked the members. “Hand picked” seems dramatic, in reality I grouped them based on proximity and musical interest. One band (consisting of BISV seniors) had their first rehearsal this week as well!
As for my personal background research, I have been reading the book “How Music Works” by David Byrne, and he poses interesting ideas about music. For centuries, music has been shaped by its surroundings. Folk music from areas in Africa, for example, rely heavily on percussion, because it is played outdoors. Classical compositions played in cathedrals had simple melodies, as complicated ones would be messed up by the acoustics of the place. As performance spaces and sound technology changed, music, too, evolved.
If you have ever been to a concert, you must have noticed how different the music sounds from the recorded version. As technology improved over the decades, and music recording became possible, there was a definitive change in the sound. The artist no longer needs to get your -- or the crowd’s -- attention; you are actively listening to their music from the comfort of your own home. There are now more background voices, melodies, or even whispers from the vocalist which can all be heard on recording. Music had become both more intimate and experimental.
Practicing some new songs during rehearsals. Recording covers or even original songs in the studio. Performing popular songs in front of a crowd. Each of these acoustic environments require different techniques and will result in a different energy. As the project progresses, I hope to document the differences between music produced in these areas.
Today, my first band (we’re still thinking up a name) got to record three songs in the studio! They played live, which means that all instruments and the vocalist were playing into mics at once, while being recorded. It was a quick and easy process and we got some nice takes of three covers: "Fly Me to The Moon" - Frank Sinatra, "Cherry Wine" - Grentperez, and "Nothing" - Bruno Major. Tune in next week for more!
Week 4: Peace of Mind
“I understand about indecision,
But I don't care if I get behind,
People livin' in competition,
All I want is to have my peace of mind” - Boston
I had a conversation with a member of one of my bands, who was concerned that the first original song they were working on was a ballad. The band was worried about creating marketable songs, and I immediately shut down that narrative. One objective from this project is creative freedom for my artists, while I manage the marketing aspect. Even if I have to beg people to stream their music.
That won’t happen, as the project’s instagram is gaining traction with 58 current followers! This week, I edited and posted two more reels, which significantly increased my follower count. I split last week’s content into two videos: one containing clips from a rehearsal, and the other with clips from the recording studio.
There were slight differences in the content from this week. I spoke to my external advisor about promoting my project, and he gave me a piece of advice. First, complete what must be done, which was in reference to the first video I posted. Next, improve and learn as you go along. Filming vertically and creating shorter videos appeals more to the audience, which I incorporated while filming and editing. Additionally, I got to show off my band in the recording studio, as I used their original audio in the reel!
Some ongoing orders of business include: 1) brainstorming band names, 2) organizing new members into a band, and 3) finding ways to interact with the audience on social media.
1) Band names are important, not only for ease of organization, but also to book live shows. Earlier this week, I saw someone with a guitar performing on the streets of Willow Glen, so busking will probably be our first step as well. However, a name is needed when booking a band in a venue, which can hopefully happen next week.
2) Completely by coincidence, a girl who knows two people participating in this project contacted me because she was interested. She only found out about the project through a video I posted. If we can find more artists to participate, I hope for this (fourth!) band to be an all-girl band, as feminism in the music scene is incorporated in my research.
3) I want my account to be more interactive, so I plan on sharing other content I find interesting. I’m currently saving videos of creative covers, performances, or even funny content that I can share on my account as well.
I will be out of town next week, but I still want the account to be active. I’ve told my bands to keep up rehearsals, but I still hope to churn out content remotely. See you (not really) next week!
Week 5: Changes
“Strange fascinations fascinate me,
Ah, changes are taking,
The pace I'm goin' through,
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes” - David Bowie
This week surrounds “Changes”, specifically the change in time zones between California and India. Midway through the week, my family and I flew to India, and it has been slightly difficult to communicate with my bands with a 12.5 hour time difference.
Additional changes for this week includes a new band member, a completely new band, and some new venues to perform.
We had our second rehearsal for the “Basis Band” (a tentative name, but not if I can help it). We added a new member, and the guitarist and bass role might switch around. The creative process for my two formed bands are different, due to how they were brought together. Since I manually grouped this band, the creative process is slightly chaotic, as it includes hashing out covers and giving up if they don't work.
Now, this isn’t a bad strategy, since people with different musical talents, but similar musical interests, will come together to find a comfortable medium.
I’ve spoken to and staked social media accounts of some venues where my bands have a shot of performing. These places usually don’t require bands to sign up in advance, and are instead first come, first served.
This brings me back to band names, which are proving to be more of a hassle than expected. My first band came up with a few ideas, including “Say Less”, “Piece of Mind”, and “End of August”. They settled on the last name, as they speculate that their band will probably cease to exist by the end of August when everyone leaves for college. As sentimental as the reason, I could not allow the band to take this name, since it already exists. Nearly every variation of these three words has been taken by some band or the other, ranging from a trash metal Canadian band, to a group of three Norwegians playing indie-folk music.
After I got frustrated with several band name generator sites, I decided to focus on what I could control: marketing. Since social media is the main platform for my project, I focused my research on its effect on the “buzz” new music generates. A paper I read scared me when its results proclaimed that social media has an insignificant and often even negative effect on music sales. The reasoning was that social media has caused an overwhelming influx of new songs, diminishing its effects on physical media consumption.
Thankfully, that paper was from 2014, and the pandemic has certainly changed things. “Profit driven music” arose which has almost replaced popular music. Industries use a certain formula to churn out songs that will inevitably become popular because that is the music’s only purpose.
The pandemic also changed the indie music scene, as people who were not professional musicians, or music majors, decided to spontaneously brush up on their instrument. A new wave of indie arose as people started experimenting and allowed creativity to dictate their music, without the expectations and intention of it becoming famous.
The scary paper did mention, however, that niche songs were predominantly discovered on social media, while popular music spread through the radio. If time permits, and my bands create original songs, I would like to get at least one song on a local radio station and test our luck.
I’ll be in India for one more week, and hope to hit the ground running when I arrive back in the States. Till then!
Week 6: Cherry Wine
"Dance the night away,
Baby, we could try to,
Make the world spin slower,
We could take our time and,
Get to know each other over cherry wine" - Grentperez
I was in India this entire week, and it was my first time visiting in 11 years. I thought the chorus of “Cherry Wine” by Grentperez was fitting, as I would have loved to stay in India for longer, since I felt like I had just started to get used to it before we had to leave.
Sounds are constant in India, which is music in itself. I thought I would list out all instances of “music” I encountered on my trip:
1) The koel bird’s song, waking me up at 5 in the morning.
2) Traffic sounds. People honk at every convenience, ensuring that the roads are never quiet, not even at midnight.
3) Drums at a parade. They were deafening, but nearly 15 drummers managed to have the same rhythm, and start and stop in synchrony.
4) Laziums, at the same parade. This is a wooden instrument with small metal cymbals. A group of young girls were playing these instruments while performing a traditional dance.
5) Music playing in stores. Usually, bollywood music was played in small street stores, and popular western songs were played in large malls.
6) Salesmen, constantly asking questions, on the street. I think I’ve picked up some new words in Hindi due to asking retail workers questions.
7) Meeting relatives. While we were singing a song, an old family member remembered some of the words and started singing along.
Overall, India was a wonderful experience, and did introduce me to new definitions of music. It was almost jarring to return back to the quiet roads of the USA.
While I was MIA, some progress still did occur. I contacted someone who is part of a piano quintet, who would like to record an arrangement. Additionally, we have one recording finalized for our first band! Their cover of “Cherry Wine” has been mixed and mastered, and I hope to release that recording sometime next week. Listen in then!
Week 7: Sweet Child O' Mine
Where do we go?
Oh, where do we go now?
Now, now, now, now, now, now, now - Guns N’ Roses
I am a firm believer that every song has a “best part”. Generally, after listening to a song a few times, I can pick which part -- it can be a lyric, solo, or even single note -- I think is the peak of the song. In the movie “The Half of It”, our gay main character explains to her crush that she believes every song, movie, or story has a best part. They then listen to a song together and her crush realizes what she meant with a smile. While this romantic scene adds to the yearning of the movie, all songs (including Sweet Child O’ Mine by Guns N’ Roses) have one special part.
One and a half years ago, I was convinced that I would start a podcast talking about and analyzing some of my favorite songs. Once I realized copyright issues with that idea, I was left with a google document detailing my favorite parts of 43 songs. This project should allow me to show off all the information I have collected, which I will start doing on Instagram.
Additionally, I spent this week finding interesting music content on Instagram that I hope to share on my account next week. These include creative covers, interesting facts, and tips for performing live.
Speaking of, I hope to get my bands into venues as soon as possible. Currently my most prepared band is on a tour with their orchestra for spring break, and many other members are busy. With overlapping spring breaks, coordination has been a bit rocky.
One solution for that has been seeking out solo artists. One of my friends writes her original music and has always wanted to record in a studio. She is extremely flexible with genres, so I thought she would be a valuable asset to a band. However, the other members I paired her up with are busy for the next couple weeks, so I asked her if she wanted to make music solo until they join her again.
She agreed, and next week, I hope to have a rehearsal with her. Recently in popular culture, independent artists have been doing better than bands. I understand now that it is easier to coordinate with less people. However, having an independent artist can be an important part of my data.
I had planned to have 3 different types of bands. My first one already formed themselves, are independent during rehearsals, and only need me to help connect them with the recording studio. The members of my second one know each other, but still need a little guidance during rehearsals. My third band contains members who don’t know each other or their styles, and we haven't managed to have a rehearsal yet. There is a chance I’ll have a fourth band with a dynamic similar to the first.
I want to see how much music each band can churn out and chart their individual progresses, as likes on social media are relatively stagnant. This data will probably be more useful and can be compared with what genres each of the members prefer and play.
Between catching up on editing videos and starting the youtube channel, this week kept me busy even though my bands have been unavailable. Keep listening for next week!
Week 8: Blue Hair
And I guess I'll just miss her
Even though she isn't even really gone
But things are just different
Ever since she cut her blue hair off - TV Girl
Personal Musings
I have a mildly unhealthy habit of discovering a song and listening to it over and over again until I hate it. This week, that song was Blue Hair by TV Girl. As I was sitting in my room making corsages for Prom, this song was playing on loop. The meaning behind this song is pretty clear; it’s about someone changing. I interpret it as a metaphor for adulthood, but that might just be me projecting.
Some other songs playing on repeat recently have been Judas by Lady Gaga, Heroes by David Bowie, and FEEL by Måneskin. I hope I don't get tired of these (or Blue Hair) anytime soon.
Whenever I’m alone at home, or sure that I won't disturb anyone, I love playing music aloud. While I’m usually content listening to my favorite albums on my blue wired earphones, playing it aloud has its charm. I recently bought a record player, which sounds much better than my phone. My extensive record collection consists of two vinyls: “The Dark Side of the Moon" by Pink Floyd, and “The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars” by David Bowie. Both albums were gifts from friends but I have hope that my anthology will grow.
Surprisingly, as much as I love playing music aloud, I can’t listen while studying. Working on projects is another matter, but I need silence while studying. The main issue is that I end up focusing too much on the song rather than whatever I need to be learning. Rather than understand rotational motion, I think to myself, “woah, that was an interesting choice for the background guitar. How did I not notice that before?” So maybe it was a good idea to grind for AP exams in silence.
Another habit I have developed is walking my dog with a different playlist in my ears every day. No matter the mood, I tend to walk on beat with the songs, which might just be the musician in me. In fact, some studies have shown that rhythm might be ingrained in the brain.
And Now, Research
I read an extremely interesting article on NPR (linked below) which examined differences in the brains of musicians and non-musicians relating to rhythm. Two specific findings intrigued me. First of all, our brain waves essentially sync up with the beats of some songs we listen to. And there was one main difference between musicians’ and non-musicians’ brains. Musicians had more of a tolerance to slower songs, and had more accurate synchronization of brain waves to slower songs than non-musicians did.
Now, this is mainly attributed to many years of musical training, which allow musicians to group slower rhythms into a coherent pattern. This, however, can expand to many different scenarios, including a higher sensitivity to specific voices in a crowd, or a natural preference of slower songs. As a musician with varying preferences in song tempo, this is food for thought. When picking out piano pieces to learn, I do gravitate to slower, romantic period songs. But I can still enjoy the faster tempo of songs such as Blue Hair.
Here is the link to the aforementioned article: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/12/19/460191654/the-neuroscience-of-musical-perception-bass-guitars-and-drake
Next week, I hope to release some songs and my artists will continue scheduling times to rehearse. I just received some cover art for our first recorded song, and plan to have a YouTube channel up and running soon. Tune in next week!
Week 9: Disco! In the Panic Room
Don't aim for flawless,
'Cause some of your best art is made with chalk on your sidewalk, it's
Gone when you wash it off, it's
Not made for fame or profits,
It's looking back and giving all you got to top it - Bug Hunter
The song “Disco! In the Panic Room” by Bug Hunter has some really fun lyrics, but this snippet resonated with me. Art oftentimes is created from an accident or playful musings. I remember during the first rehearsal I attended for this project, the band spontaneously decided to cover a new song, and it sounded amazing! They didn’t want to arrange or record this song, instead opting to just play around.
I went to a mini concert with a lineup of three bands consisting of college students. The headlining band had amazing crowd control, I’d say at the level of a band on tour. Through some digging on Instagram, they shared an interesting fact about their first original single. The singer of the band happened to think up a chorus while sitting at a bus stop. That chorus spurred the rest of the members to pitch in with lyrics and create a full fledged song.
Throughout that concert, the musicians were having fun. They mirrored the crowd’s energy, took song suggestions, and overall made it feel like a real concert. I particularly enjoyed how they involved the crowd in singing their original song. Usually, the audience screams the lyrics to a known song along with the band. However, the chorus of their song allowed the crowd to repeat a word back to them, which made the song interactive and wonderful to hear live.
While we don’t have any original songs out, some covers that we recorded have been mixed and mastered with cover art attached. I chatted with my advisor about plans for releasing the music and he gave me some tips. While most of the pre-release material regarded the money and copyright aspect, some important things were audience involvement and pacing.
If there was more time for this project, I would have gone through more items on his pre-release checklist. These would have involved changing the profile photo of my instagram account with every release and creating an email list of listeners. We agreed on creating a post for the new song (instead of a reel), which would play a short snip of it. The song’s release will be announced on a story and will direct followers to the YouTube channel.
Live performances are tougher than expected to schedule, because most busy streets have a sign up system. Another avenue, however, is radio. I contacted a radio station which has live music nights on air, and hopefully, one of my bands can perform there.
The headlining band of the “concert” I went to is called “Six of Spades”, and their original song is called “Take”. You all should take a listen!
Hopefully we will get music released next week! While it is AP week for all the High Schoolers participating, I’ll continue to contact artists, venues, and even a radio station to try to have my bands perform live. Stay tuned for more!
Week 10: Take!
Taking a drive through outer space,
Take me to some forgotten place,
Watching the memories of those days
Blow by - Six of Spades
Here is the first original song by the band Six of Spades, which I mentioned in my previous blog post. These lyrics struck a chord with me, ever since I realized that graduation is right around the corner. This project is also ending soon, but if clashing schedules permit, I hope to continue promoting my bands over summer.
Future plans
Recently, there have been a few complications with this project. These high schoolers are relatively busy with school, jobs, and AP exams. I don’t want to stress them out, and I let them do last minute cramming in peace.
Scheduling rehearsals is difficult because of school and these musicians’ workloads. When you add pollen allergies to the mix, it’s a perfect storm of no rehearsals. During the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, many popular bands couldn’t perform live or even meet to rehearse. Many started having virtual concerts from the safety of their own homes.
One such band was Metallica. They posted videos of their quarantine concerts on youtube, which gave me an idea. Apparently, each of the members would record their own part from home, and the videos would then be put together. I pitched this idea to one of my bands, and hopefully it will kick off. Once they agree on a song to cover, all they need to discuss is a key and tempo to play it in. Then the work is independent, and they can send in a video of their part, which can be combined with the others.
Additional Musings
I’ve developed a recent interest in true crime, and often read about previous cases. While reading up on the story of Japanese cannibal Issei Sagawa, I saw that he became famous and even had a song written about him. The song “Too Much Blood” by The Rolling Stones essentially detailed the story of the murder he committed, and his subsequent capture.
I dug deeper and found out that there is a quite large genre of music inspired by serial killers and murderers. The Rolling Stones have another song titled “Midnight Rambler” which was about Albert DeSalvo, aka the Boston Strangler. Popular rock bands such as The Smiths, Ghost, and Marylin Manson (whose name was coincidentally taken from serial killer Charles Manson) have songs depicting the stories of famous serial killers.
Even Måneskin has a song (albeit in Italian) titled “Mark Chapman”, which is about (you guessed it) Mark Chapman, the man who had an obsession with but later killed John Lennon of The Beatles. This song is one of my favorites, but I didn’t realize how common the idea was.
The idea of glorifying or romanticizing serial killers for media appeal has been prevalent for decades. While the songs about murder I previously mentioned are all under the Rock and Metal subgenres, these lyrics are common in Hip-Hop and Rap songs, too. Both overarching genres were popular in the 1970’s and 80’s, and both profited off of the serial killer, or general crime, craze.
I’ll put a disclaimer out here that romanticizing murder is wrong. However, I do love a good rock ballad, and these bands created music that entertained the masses.
Speaking of entertaining the masses, I’ll segway into promoting my youtube channel, which will become active very soon. Here is the link to the channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZRj3TFOuf66_1SoEVDuC4w
Check out some upcoming music next week!
Week 11: Applause
I live for the applause, applause, applause
I live for the applause-plause, live for the applause-plause, live for the-
Way that you cheer and scream for me
The applause, applause, applause - Lady Gaga
This week we posted three covers! My first band settled on a name: Sweatshop Six. So I am proud to announce that covers of Fly Me to the Moon, Cherry Wine, and Nothing have been posted to the I’m With The Band YouTube channel.
Views, likes, comments, and subscribers have been coming in, hence the song choice for this week: Applause by Lady Gaga. Experimenting with social media has been fun with this project, and YouTube was another avenue for me to explore.
Even though I can directly reach out to more people on Instagram, posting content on YouTube has been beneficial so far. The algorithm has pushed my content to strangers on both platforms, but I’ve noticed that people are more comfortable interacting on YouTube. All of the videos posted have comments from people I don’t know, which hasn’t happened on any of my Instagram content.
My Instagram page seems to have grown a voice of its own over the past couple weeks. I’ve moved into more audience motivated content, instead of providing strict weekly summaries. One series I started was posting clips of the “Best Parts” of songs. These can be cool introductions, fun riffs, unique vocals, and even instrumental portions. The response to the first video of this kind was great. I asked for song suggestions, and the people replied with some of their favorite songs. In the next video of this series, I tried to incorporate as many suggestions as I could, while still including the song for the weekly blogs. That video has the most comments, mostly of people getting excited that their favorite songs were featured.
Gaining popularity was a large part of this project, but appealing to the masses on social media is difficult. My main goal for this week was convincing people to attend the live concert (!) that I have organized for Senior Project Presentation Day. The main audience is BISV students who wouldn’t have originally come to watch the presentations. Sweatshop Six will be playing during the breaks, which will hopefully usher people to watch presentations in the meantime. I worked with the band to finalize their setlist (six songs total, grouped into two sets of three) and worked on promotion by designing a poster.
The poster is now out around the school, so go check it out! Publicity is such an important and often overlooked part of putting out music. I spent last weekend in NYC, and artists busking on the street had mastered the art of gaining the public’s attention. I spotted two artists on the street who employed different strategies. One rapper had a sign set up with QR codes to his Instagram and Spotify accounts, and called those out during his performance. The other artist, who was playing the bass, decided to dance along with his playing, and people on the street danced along with him! Both strategies were used to catch attention, and I hope this poster achieves the same effect.
Next week is the last week of the project and we’re going out with a bang (read: live performance)! I hope to see you all there!
Week 12: Thank You For The Music
So I say thank you for the music, the songs I'm singing
Thanks for all the joy they're bringing
Who can live without it? I ask in all honesty
What would life be?
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music, for giving it to me - ABBA
Well, this is it. Not really, but I’ll elaborate on this later.
First of all, a quick weekly recap. So much progress happened this week, whether due to a deadline or schedules finally aligning, I don’t know. I wanted a couple members of my Basis band to perform live at a coffee shop in downtown San Jose that hosts live music. Nirvana Soul has open mic nights every Friday, and since I was out in New York last Friday, May 17th was our only chance.
Gauri was the only one available to perform live at Nirvana Soul, so I decided to accompany her on guitar. We worked out a set list of songs she suggested, which were easy enough for me to pick up on guitar. Our three chosen songs were Best Part by Daniel Caesar ft. H.E.R., Let The Light In by Lana Del Ray, and Linger by The Cranberries. We were only allowed to perform two songs, so we played through the first two. Hopefully, we’ll go back to another open mic night to finish up our set.
Listening to everyone else at the open mic night was amazing, as it exposed me to San Jose’s music scene. It is definitely thriving, as the performance included rappers, a saxophone player, guitarists, pop music and even comedy singers. I know of loads more live music venues around the city and hope to visit them in due time.
My personal addition to the live music scene
On Saturday, May 18th, Senior Project presentation day, I got my first band to perform live. With some coordination with the school, the band (who finally settled on the name Sweatshop Six) set up their instruments in the theater, and were ready with a set list.
The performance went amazing, and they really got to experiment with the songs they played. The set list included Fly Me to the Moon, Isn’t She Lovely, Always, Best Part, Cherry Wine, Nothing, and This Love. Additionally, I sat in while they were rehearsing for their second set, and I’m still in awe of their musical process. The band is so “in sync”, for lack of better words. Their practice is efficient, but they still have time (and the talent) to mess around and try playing new songs.
The videos are being posted to YouTube: www.youtube.com/@im_with_the_band_sj
So definitely go check those out.
I wanted to give some final thank you’s to all of the people who helped me immensely with this project.
First, all of my musicians. Thank you so much for putting up with me and taking time out of your busy schedules to coordinate.
I owe a large thank you to my faculty advisor Mr. Brady, without whom the idea of this project wouldn’t have left the ground. My original plan was to lock myself in my room for three months and bash out a senior project, but this idea forced me to go out and talk to people, which I am now so grateful for.
I’d also like to thank my out of school advisor, Phil Johnson. He gave me so much advice that spanned loads of topics about the music industry. From warnings about working with musicians and suggestions of live venues to advice about my Instagram account and a full checklist of pre-release to-do’s, his help really pushed the project along.
And last but definitely not least, I want to thank Mr. Perez for so kindly letting us use his recording studio. He and a friend at the studio did all of the mixing and mastering of the three songs. They additionally helped the band feel at ease throughout the recording process, which they truly appreciated.
Now, going back to the beginning of this post, allow me to elaborate. While this project is over, there are some things I want to continue. Sweatshop Six has some more songs they want to get recorded so I’ll end up coordinating another date for the studio. I probably won’t keep the Instagram account as active, but stay tuned for new music over the summer!
Until then, in the words of ABBA: thank you for the music, for giving it to me!