To hear about the main process of the songwriting, recording and production, head over to this page to listen to a short podcast about the process of creating each song on the EP.
Songwriting
I wanted each song to be about a different environmental issue, such as deforestation or sea level rise. I made mind maps of each aspect and then could add ideas to them as they came up, which is how I began exploring lyrical and textural ideas. From there I began creating instrumental lines or writing lyrics.
Here are some of the pieces of paper showing my workings on lyrics and chords. The recording and production process took place alongside the songwriting process, with the studio process being a key element of my song writing. Often I would record some tracks and then take them home and manipulate them electronically to create the texture I wanted.
Recording
For instance, here, I sung a part (video on left), but then I cut it up in Cubase (below) to make a more broken and disjointed texture, in order to reflect the deforestation themes of the song.
Due to the third Covid-19 lockdown, the nature of the songwriting and recording process changed around January. Rather than writing all the songs and then taking them to the studio to record with other people, my recording sessions were cancelled and I continued working on the project at home with my own minimal recording equipment. Sometimes I would take this equipment to the university studios where I could record without annoying my housemates with the noise. However, this dramatically changed the process of songwriting and production to a more combined approach where I worked on them both at the same time. It became quite a varied process - I didn't finish writing all the songs, and then take them to the studio to record and then mix them after. As all these processes took place alongside each other, they informed each other. I think this created a really unique style of music that I wouldn't have otherwise created. This made the process more difficult, I think, but I really enjoyed it as a new way of working.
Due to the recording process happening during the Covid-19 lockdown, there were a few times face masks came in handy during recording! Here, as covers on drumsticks to make soft beaters (left), as as a clip to hold a microphone to a stand (right).
Here's a clip of me playing marimba for Treesong, recording with an SM57 (the only microphone available to me for the entire project).
Mixing and Mastering
Due to the nature of the songwriting process, the mixing took place alongside the songwriting and recording process. For me, mixing is quite an intuitive part of the production and songwriting process. For instance, I might be mixing a song and then think 'I should add some more backing vocals in here', and then just do it straight away where I'm sat. That was one of the main benefits of a 'bedroom pop' style project, where due to the nature of lockdown, all of my work had to be done alone, most often from my room or with my own limited equipment in the university studios.
I decided to master the songs myself, as another new skill to learn. I used a range of reference tracks to compare the levels of my songs to professionally mastered songs, and listened on multiple different speakers and headphones to get the best sense of what songs sounded like on a range of speakers. I taught myself about LUFS, compression and automation in the mastering process.
The order, progression and concept of the EP
I have always loved albums that flow really well as a piece and fit seamlessly together. It's a production technique that draws me in and I always get excited about. As my EP is based around one concept with many different elements, I wanted to draw it all together to flow well as one piece.
I sometimes had my best ideas walking to and from the studio, and that was how I often came up with new ideas for my EP. It was on a walk where I realised the way I wanted each song of the EP to fit together and flow into one another. As soon as I got home I scribbled down this flow:
I then used this as a base to structure the flow of my EP.
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