One of my all-time favorite songs. There are so many things I like about the original, from the quality of the vocals to the way the track builds, I don't think I could list them all.

I was really worried I wouldn't be able to pull off a decent cover. I spent hours and hours listening to the original over and over; at different volumes, with different speakers and headphones and all different kinds of filters; trying to hear every little detail so I could reproduce my own version of the track. In the end, I'm actually very happy with the instrumental I made. Believe it or not, it's almost entirely comprised of real instrument sounds (as opposed to synthesizers). With few exceptions, I was able to achieve the sounds I wanted by just applying filters to real instruments (tremolo strings with a low-pass filter sound very interesting). I wasn't confident I could muster a good match for the electric guitar parts, so I opted to use orchestral strings instead, which I think turned out well. All in all, with over 40 separate instrument tracks, I think this is my most complex work yet.

Oh, and none of that is even touching on the vocals. It probably goes without saying that my voice doesn't hold a candle to any of the performances from Marianas Trench, but I think I managed pretty well. Hope you enjoy it.

The Journey

Porcelain

The first real song I ever wrote. I came up with the idea one afternoon when I was home alone, watching a storm roll in from my back yard. I started writing the lyrics and before I knew it I was sitting at my dad's piano, singing to an empty house (a little wet from practicing in the rain).
The entire instrumental was created using virtual instruments and the vocals were the last piece to be added, as well as my first ever vocal recording. It still stands as what I consider to be one of my best original songs.

Homemade Harmonies

Here Comes The Rain

Marianas Trench is one of, if not my favorite band. Aside from having amazing vocal harmonies, they also commonly weave certain songs together, taking bits of one song to use in another. Since their songs obviously mix together so well, I decided to make a mashup of some of my favorite parts from their various tracks. This mashup includes parts from "No Place Like Home", "Porcelain", "End of an Era", "So Soon", "Ever After", "Dearly Departed" and "Cross My Heart".

Marianas Mashup

There's no way I could match his voice. But I can echo the words, sing along, and do my best.

Linkin Park is very close to the #1 spot on my list of favorite bands, I've been listening to them for longer than probably anyone else. This is my cover of their song "One More Light", a simple, beautiful, painfully accurate piece of music. I hope it would make Chester proud. People will be singing his words for many years to come.

One More Light

I have a thing for simple songs, especially when they're emotional; one of the handful of reasons I decided to make a cover of Mayday Parade's "Terrible Things". It's a good piece of music. I hope I've done it some justice.

Terrible Things

I got hooked on this song from the first time I heard it on TV. Rebecca Sugar is a great songwriter, and Olivia Olson has an amazing voice- it's just a really nice piece of music. I had a really good time making this, coming up with instrumentation and extra harmonies, but of course I kept the iconic baseline. I think it came out really well.

Everything Stays

I really like the lyrics and the message in this song, so I wanted to put my own voice to it. Also, I really wanted to add harmonies to the end.

Unpack Your Heart

There's no way I could match his voice. But I can echo the words, sing along, and do my best.

"What I've Done" is one of my favorite Linkin Park songs. It's the first song I ever performed to an audience, back when I was a kid. Whether I had understood the words or not, I understood how they felt.

For this song, I wanted to try and replicate as much of the original as closely as I could. I listened to the song over and over, studied guitar tablature, and went through about every drum sound I had. The one thing I just *had* to sample from the original, though, was the iconic repeating "clack" sound from when the drums first come in- which I'm pretty sure is the drummer hitting the stick against the drum frame. Everything else was recreated using my own instruments (real and virtual).

I did add a few of my own touches, though. Namely the strings, which I added throughout. I think they fit well, especially in absence of the original's disk scratches and guitar feedback whines.

I wont pretend it can stand up to the original, but I do hope it makes for a worthy tribute- one that would make Chester, and all his bandmates, proud.

What I've Done

I got the idea for this song after trying to explain myself to someone for the umpteenth time. It's about having a feeling that I can't figure out how to accurately put into words. So I put my feelings about that feeling into words instead.

I composed the music on my piano, and then added horns, strings, a marimba and some drums to fill it out.

You Might Never Know

I started writing this song on my porch, in the evening of one of the last days of winter. The words and the melody came first- the whole first verse at once. The guitar, the other instruments and the other lyrics came gradually over the following months. I finally finished the song almost two years after finishing my previous one. I think it might be the best I've made so far.

The style is sort of a mix between Passanger and Isakov. I wanted something simple, that I could sit down sing with just my guitar.

Evening

I love music and love creating music, so after learning to play the guitar, I taught myself how to write, compose, record, and produce so I could share my hard work with... well anyone who's interested :)

The Blue Dragon