Podstream Holiday Special - December 8, 2022 (first draft) - December 24 (first version release)

Dark Side of the Tree: the 2022 Podstream Holiday Special

The backing track to this song was the first purchase I ever made of a karaoke track back on October 30, 2011. I was (at the time) going to be in-character for halloween as Will Ferrell's version of Robert Goulet so I started looking for that Christmas song he sings on the infamous Conan O'Brien appearance

15) Jigsaw Falling Into Place (orig. Radiohead, -1) recorded 2022-11-28

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=f620056259229dbffa3923cc2df5eb4a

testing... let's see how long this stays up!

10) Thank You (orig. Led Zeppelin) 2022-11-24 i.e. American Thanksgiving at The American

9) I Thank You (orig. ZZ Top) 2022-11-24, i.e. American Thanksgiving

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=4660bc22a34dca8dc65347f600612527

4) Crying (orig. Roy Orbison & kd lang) mix of first and second test takes, Dec 5, 2022

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=5f83ed4ab4976dde62398d540109d5bd

2) Dean's Vegas Melody (orig. Dean Martin, live at the Sands)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=17c3a34c53acac4bd970ce5f17db9c48

5) Human Touch (orig. Bruce Springsteen) lead guitar boosted, to be replaced

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=f9f0b1e0b21fba4afda36ea56db44fea

16) I Who Have Nothing (orig. Tom Jones)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=c21701691ee325a93770fc939b4531fc

8) You Make Loving Fun (orig. Fleetwood Mac, key of Tom Jones, for the late Christine McVie)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=be5a249aa4c97ac444ecdae4bb880ee2

22) Christmas Blues (orig. Dean Martin)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=2910ddc1d333e1314afd9a8064b6f5b5

14) Moonage Daydream (orig. David Bowie)

7) I've Got A Feeling (orig. The Beatles) recorded 2022-12-09

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=174062006fe861766122d28646d41d64

6) Don't Answer Me (orig. The Alan Parsons Project, key of The Boss)

17) Bridge Over Troubled Water (key of Elvis)

3) Blue Hotel (orig. Chris Isaak) recorded Dec 22 2022

Angel Eyes (in the style of Frank Sinatra)

Karaoke Version source files: https://www.karaoke-version.com/custombackingtrack/frank-sinatra/angel-eyes.html 

Soundtrap project link: https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=17bdac100ac0470223cbb1dbbf8d7d64

1) Angel Eyes (orig. Frank Sinatra) recorded December 24th, 2022

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=14bc922169f6ab2daab55fc4f9ad3748

20) Romeo And Juliet (orig. Dire Straits)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=8a453d67705221037f8cc4e4b206fc24

11) Mainstreet (orig. Bob Seger)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=e36abfe849229e82b2c7b4ebba908be1

18) About Today (orig. The National) + Lost Coastlines (orig. Okkervil River)

https://www.soundtrap.com/signup?ref=d9c6669b2ca83d12556417c21148ce14

13) Walking In My Shoes (orig. Depeche Mode)

So this is effectively the start and the end of this double album I'm just wrapping up. All that remains is a sweet sweet Eli Slamang guitar solo to replace the crappy guitar on the Bruce Springsteen karaoke track. Going to try to pull that off remotely using the Soundtrap app shown below in the cover image as proof-of-concept. 

My Sinatra vocals here were re-recorded a couple days ago because the first go I had at recording the song was on Christmas Eve after a few wobbly pops. I needed something in that moment, given my original intention of recording a Bublé-esque Christmas album at the start of December. But I only got Dino's "Christmas Blues" done and this other thing came out instead. Whaddya gonna do? It's art. It's a process you only have so much control over until it stops being art. Anyway, the newer version turned out well. 

But it wasn't the FIRST version of "Angel Eyes" I worked on. That happened in April in Las Vegas. Yep, always a plot twist! You can hear the original and read about it here:

https://soundcloud.com/podstream/angel-eyes-karafun-duet-w-frank-sinatra-and-ella-fitzgerald

That original version didn't have me singing on it. It used existing karaoke tracks to create a "duet" between someone at Karaoke Version doing a Sinatra voice and someone else doing Ella Fitzgerald (shifted up in key by three semitones to make it all work). I had this Karaoke Version version originally at the end of Disc 2, while my boozy Christmas Eve version opens the whole thing on Disc 1. 

It then occurred to me the other night – while NOT at Podstream, for a change – that I should really sub in for the Sinatra parts if I'm putting this song on the album. So that's what this is, and it makes sense that when I finally got around again to putting my vocals on an album, it would be done with karaoke tracks! Right?  

And, as a bonus, it ties together my first thesis on "remixes" and "mashups", because I'm basically remixing these songs with my voice included in order to create new versions... AND the two albums – and the unreleased tracks that didn't make the cut –were created in an online remote collaboration space that is effectively a "mashup" of two separate platforms, i.e. Soundtrap + Karaoke Version... 

So in the Stafford Beer concept of a Viable Systems Model, that's what this is: a viable and remotely accessible system for producing new derivative works out of instrumental karaoke backing tracks and their individual "stems". Welcome to Podstream! This is what we do here! GOULET!

But... BUT... how can this make money, you may ask? How do you get permission to use these songs in this way... or in other ways for that matter? It's simple, yet complex, like the agreements we don't read when clicking "Okay" to the Terms and Agreement popup on iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, or whatever. The licensing has to be part of the system for it to be viable... and that's the topic of a future dissertation.

21) Angel Eyes - KaraFun duet w/ Dr. Goulet and "Ella Fitzgerald +3"

OLD ADVENTURES IN LO-FI... 

Next to a small little cobblestone street on the edge of Vancouver's Gastown used to be a bunch of rehearsal spaces for local bands, with all the aesthetics, trappings, and varmints of a set from David Fincher's Fight Club. Matt Wilson, the ex-bassist from from late 90s Campbell River rock band halcyon days had a shared room here with his other band and in late 2008 suggested to former bandmates Joel Flynn (vocals, acoustic guitar) and Derek Lee (drums) to come on by and make use of the space. After the sudden passing of Flynn's father in December of that year, the ex-Riverite singer needed some music to work through the situation. He recruited two other ex-Riverites, his nephew Luke Schuss on guitar and Erin Lahay on piano/keyboards. 

To honour the infamous old singing fisherman - Flynn's father Doug, who had moved on to Fiddler's Green - the five-piece put together a bunch of mostly Irish-themed songs to play at a St. Patrick's Day memorial at the Media Club. The nameless group continued to get together and learn songs, some new originals and holdovers from the halcyon days era, but mostly just a bunch of cover songs that were fun to play. Borrowing Flynn's nom-de-plume of that he used for his digital media art experiments, the band played one other show at the Media Club in July of 2009, but never did anything else outside the walls and microphones of, ahem, "Cobblestone Road Studios". 

Of course, "studios" is saying a bit much, as it is basically a 15'x15' room with some randomly placed microphones. These consisted of either a Rode Podcaster or an iPod nano with a Belkin stereo mic attachment, which were later thrown together into multitrack Garageband projects. Yet this bare minimal approach did the lo-fi job and the Campbell River collective continued to play away in the space until it was closed down in early 2010. Some informal recording took place during this time, but was more note-taking and reference material for the band members than anything else. 

Later in the year, while backing up all these recordings to a new hard drive, Flynn ended up losing most of them when the brand new drive crashed within a  week (damn you LaCie!). File recovery software couldn't identify the Garageband files, and the old "throw the drive in the freezer" last resort couldn't get the drive spinning. The still nameless band never ended up finding another full rehearsal space, or play another show as a full band, while the lost Garageband recordings are still sitting unrecoverable on the busted LaCie (with the eye-catching design by Porsche). 

FAST FORWARD: While rummaging through discs, drives, and other piled up office stuff in early 2011, Flynn came across an old recovery disc from the busted LaCie drive. On it were some raw and rough mp3s taken during the group's rehearsals in 2009 that he gave a listen. With Erin now on a two-year 'round the world adventure, and the rest of the band still in limbo with other projects and a lack of a regular rehearsal space, Flynn decided to collect and coordinate some of these lo-fi recordings through a SoundCloud page, which has now been repurposed for Podstream Studio's uses.

Dark Side of the Tree: the 2022 Podstream Holiday Special

Podstream Studios