Dacoitage

Meaning robbery by gang or by mob. Though, it appears that the elderly dislike this and are willing to fight them off with their handbags.

Now, I'm going to attempt to make up for the shocking lack of posts this week. Firstly, I do profusely apologise for not posting, but once again it has been a horrific week. Truly horrible. One that I hope to never relive, but know that this coming week will be yet worse. Still, to find the positives from this, it will be better after this week is over, and things are bearable at this particular moment in time.

In a bid to take my mind off of the absolute chaos of my week, I put down my electric guitar, and picked up my Dad's bass guitar (pun unintended (for those who don't know, picking is a method of playing a bass guitar (and any guitar for that matter (I think this may be the largest number of nested parentheses I've done in a blog this far (maybe))))). However, all tangents and whatnot aside, I am leading somewhere with this story. I picked up my Dad's bass and began playing. It's around the same average difficulty as playing a guitar, but some things are easier and some are trickier. For example, a bass guitar has only four strings, but is longer than a normal guitar to account for the higher weight (thickness) of the strings. Also, some basslines require a consistent, fast rhythm, often in 16th-notes, meaning that when finger-picking (it's exactly what it says on the can, picking with your fingers), my fingers get tired very quickly and I begin to lose time. Nonetheless, I managed to get going fairly quickly, especially seeing as it's strung right-handed, as are most guitars by default. I am a rarity, one-of-a-kind, unique, if you will. I am a left-handed guitarist.

Which means that instead of fingering with my left hand and strumming / picking with my right, I do the opposite. I finger with my right and play with my left. But since I'm holding the guitar in the opposite direction, the strings are reversed, so to get the right order, I often have to buy new strings, restring the guitar and trim the strings to fit. It's no trouble, but bass strings are more expensive than normal guitar strings. Still, this is only backstory to my actual article (which, funnily, might actually be shorter than the backstory).

Since I can play a guitar, bass, synthesiser and sing to a fairly decent standard, I have decided to cover a song that is a particular favourite of mine. Map Of The Problematique, by Muse. A song that references a book called Limits To Growth, which outlines a "global problematique" - a set of likely challenges that the world might face in the near future. It is also a musically unusual song since, while it revolves around a consistent four-chord structure, not once does it ever use the dominant chord in the riff.

This song utilises a pumping bassline, accented by a very pounding drum-beat, and quite spidery riffs on an electric guitar. And then come the eerily haunting wails of "Fear, and panic in the air . . .", referencing the two moons of Mars (Phobos and Deimos, the Greek Gods of Fear and Panic, respectively). To cover this song, I do not intend on playing all instruments simultaneously (I'm good, but I'm just not that good, I'm afraid), but I will be utilising a method called layering and sequencing. I will be recording individual instruments and effects individually (the layering part) and then splicing, pasting and metaphorically gluing all of the pieces together so that they work together and are in time with each other (the sequencing part).

To begin with, I will be starting with the primary electric guitar that plays throughout. It is an electronic fuzz that pumps throughout. I need a piece of software called Guitar Rig to pull this effect off though, because the effect requires the use of several pitch shifters, an overdriver, and a Fuzz Factory footswitch. It is cheaper and easier to perform these effects through a computer, and you get more control over the effect. Secondly, I will be recording the guitar on which a little twiddly bits are performed. This just requires individual effects to be switched on and off at different parts throughout the song (Guitar Rig can also be used to automate this). Thirdly, I will be recording the synth parts that accent all of the other instruments, before recording the trickiest layer of the song.

I'm not a drummer. The most I can extend to is the irritating drumming on the desk with pens. I know the theory behind playing drums and I have rhythm, but I can't multitask playing the kick drum with one foot, the hi-hats with another, and then using my arms and hands (with drumsticks, of course) to play the remaining drums laid out before me. But I will be giving it my best shot. I can only try and persevere, and hope that it sounds ok in the end. If all else fails, I can always record each drum individually (note to self: find more microphones to record the drums) and splice them together.

At this point, I will be left with a fully-fledged, beautiful (hopefully) instrumental of a beautiful song. And then comes the fun part (not that the rest won't have been fun). I get to add vocals. I do love to sing and it's not even a secret. It's a fantastic stress-relief and I thoroughly enjoy singing. I don't even need to add any effects, so I can just plug the microphone in and sing till my heart's content. Or until the song is finished.

I still need to get the software (note that I'm not actually saying that I'm going to buy the software) and I need to find a boom mic for the kick drum and several others for different drums to get the best quality, but I am seriously set on this idea. Anyway, that's one of the many (well, two) posts that I've missed this week covered. I leave you with the reason that Matthew Bellamy gave for trying Magic Mushrooms:

" . . . to experience something that's not always on offer. I'm not afraid of seeing something horrible. It's a way of connecting with yourself in a way that you can't normally do."