Before discovering the PC a few years back i was into music in different ways. I played the drums in some trashbands, even in a pretty good gospelband for a while, and had a Yamaha keyboard with a Roland TR 929 drumcomputer.
Since i don't read notes and having no special musical skills other then drumming, i was limited in getting the best out of the Yamaha, but compensated this by programming interesting beats on the Roland.
First i did a lot of coversongs, but i had the need for originality and started making my own compositions with fine drumloops and lousy keyboardplay. My friends had to listen to endless repeated melodylines which where even to boring to play along with, although at that time i was very proud of it. As time goes by you'll try to improve, and so my compositions were getting a little more complicated. An average keyboard-player would still laugh about my lack of skills, but hey. I'm not a keyboardplayer to begin with, i started drumming on it.
On the PC i started with Ejay and Magix software, which was basically a matter of some sample-editing (cut and paste), and even that didn't satisfy me. With Absynth i finally combined 'real' playing with editing. I used my own samples but still needed something else. Vocals.
I'm not much of a singer myself. Even when in church i'll use the technique of playbacking. Yes, i go to church once in a while with my wife Sonja and son Michael Brandon, howdy & Hallelujah.
If you don't use your own vocals you have to get it somewhere else and since Sonja was available but not willing i used Ejay & Magix voice-samples or looked on the Internet.
Then i thought about using speech in my songs. GW Bush was an obvious victim, because first of all people recognise his voice and it's actual. But i also got frustrated about his political choices and so i used him a lot for parody.
If you're trying to make a fool of somebody it would be nice if he could say things he's not actually saying. That was a difficult task, because for the track BUSH CONFESSES he needed to say the word ASSHOLE.
Since he's probably using this word a lot in his office at the White House but not in public i had to rely on my cut and paste-technique to let him say this.
The soundeditor Goldwave is perfect for this job. For example. If GWB said somewhere AS, as in AS YOU ALL KNOW i used the letter A, looked for an apropiate S-sound like in the word FORCE and used his HOLE when he told Saddam was found in it.
Later i made a list of all the things he said, so i could quickly find what i was looking for. The song BUSH COMES CLEAN is a good example. First i wrote the speech, and then i looked for the words, and in cases where i couldn't find those, used the words or letters that was useful for editing, so he could still talk the way i wanted.
Off course the smoothness of the speech is gone, because you'll have to get it from different recordings, but the fun is still there.
One of the more important things about the voice editing was where to put it in the music. To me this was crucial, because when i listened to some other Bush parodys, i noticed that
1. mostly the music was just a necessary companion on the background, didn't had much impact, and 2. the (mostly) manipulated speeches looked totally random placed. This was something i wanted to do much better; give the music a lot more credit and make the speeches sound more rhythmical within the song.
Now i did about 20 Bush-parodies and had more than enough of the man to be honest. But when time and opportunity comes,maybe i'll try some more.
The song NINE ELEVEN was done out of compassion with the 9-11 victims. I first thought it wouldn't be appropriate to use Bush's voice, but then, since he was the big guy at that time, i tried to avoid any sarcasm in the song,letting him sound sincere (which is pretty hard if you're GW Bush!).
BUSH GOES ARABIC is a track where i used the REVERSE-technique a lot. With comedy you have to be careful not to overdo something that is potentially funny, or rely too much on just the technique itself. There still has to be something funny left when the technique is imaginably gone.
What i've learned most of songreviews is that something that is fun for one fine guy could be bull (or even offensive) for people without taste. Gnigni...
Keep in mind that i only try to do what i, myself, think is good or funny and i respect everybody's view within reasonable limits. Some reviewers (MAKE SOME REAL MUSIC ASSHOLE!!!)are way off and some (GREAT MUSIC!!!) are good and objective. LOL
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