Sunday 6 March 2011

ALMODOVAR

IT'S DONE! All 6 tracks (with an additional instrumental) are finished and recorded.
At 6 pm all tracks will be loaded onto

www.myspace.com/rachelintheattic

Dont forget to scroll down the music player to hear all the music

It's been an intense week. I'm pleased with the finished tracks. There's no way of attaining anything close to perfection when writing and recording 6 songs in 6 days - so i have had to let go of them imperfect.
I really hope you enjoy all of them, and i thank you for the support and encouragement throughout this entire process.

my one sadness will be that many of you will hear the music through a computers speakers - if you can, listen through headphones or make a cd and crank it up loudly and listen with your eyes shut.

Much love to you all -
I'm off for a nap with the Skrap

Rachel - who loves Almodovar

24 comments:

  1. Thank you so much for letting us take part in your project, Rachel! Very glad that I have a pair of good headphones - eyes closed and with complete concentration is the only way to listen!

    Now to wait for 6 pm...

    xo

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  2. Thank you - it has been a pleasure to revisit these movies and to see you are well equipped to create in your country home.

    Now if I can just figure out the new My Space. I have totally lost track of my account there may have to start over.

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  3. So heavenly, like being gently directed and guided through someone else's haunted dreamscape. Just beautiful. Thank you for taking us along on the journey to creating Almodovar. It's been fascinating to see your creative process unfold and watch the pieces come together.

    Now promise that you won't go and disappear into the ethers, will you?

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  4. Thank you for introducing me to the films of Pedro Almodovar in such a unique and creative way. The music is heavenly. Enjoy your well deserved rest. Hope you keep in touch with us.

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  5. Oh, sounds lovely even on my mac speakers at least to me. I really like While you Sleep (because I am listening to it). A challenge to listen to streetcar because I know the actual play so very well. sorry!

    get some kip and thanky

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  6. Listening now.. .(it must be 6 pm somewhere already)...

    :)

    Thanks for the music, Raz :) It sounds great on my 5x speakers. (only 3 of which work at the moment)

    I would have to say While You Sleep remains my fav too. It's a lullaby of sorts, and I love the ND-ishness of it. Yet it's as original an RF a composition as ever.

    GOR-gee-us!!

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  7. But Ghosts Don't Cry is a very, very, very close second. (In fact - this is the song that gets stuck in my head)

    Love 'em!

    Well done, great week!

    (p.s. my post confirmation word is, get this: "wooting")

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  9. You sneaked them in early!

    Again, the songs make me think the ability you have of making music that is perfect. I know it's probably not perfect in musical terms but it FEELS perfect and right. Quoting again shamelessly, with alterations: "... where every note is at home, taking its place to support the others... the complete consort dancing together". I'm not hyperventilating about some magical, superhuman ability. I know a part of it is the musical training. But then again, any amount of training wouldn't make a musically talentless person a great songwriter.

    Just some impressions now:

    Almodovar: The guitar. Ah, the guitar!

    While You Sleep: I love the dreaming waltz, with the cello. Then the joy of seeing her dance by his window. The heartbreaking but incredibly beautiful lines "If you won't wake, I will escape and join you in a perfect place."

    Streetcar Named Desire: The gently rocking rhythm/backing, still think it's like the steady, slow journey in a streetcar, the clang of the wheels. It's perfect. The piano at 1:20 - gloriously beautiful!

    Ghosts Don't Cry: The repeating sequence of
    four, single piano chords is perfect. At 1:55 there are
    just a few - I think four? - piano notes that struck
    my ears as exquisite. The guitar around 2:15.

    Tie Me Up, Tie Me Down: For some reason the
    music made me think of old French films. Not quite sure
    why because I have no clear recollection of the music
    of those. A detail I love: the high piano notes at the
    start (0:12). Another: the flowing, almost exuberant
    piano at 1:20. This song has incredible, subtle changes
    of tone throughout.

    Thank you so much!! xo

    One humble request: if it's a simple job of copying and pasting, could you consider posting the lyrics
    somewhere? My English is excellent but with music I
    often find it's difficult to get the complete image of
    the words without reading them first.

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  10. Hey Rachel congratulations on a roaring success with Almodovar project. If people didn't already know how prolific you were, they do now. I had a chance to listen to the 6 cuts a couple of times and your arranging skills are in the forefront this time around. Brilliant work! Get some well deserved rest!

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  11. Rachel, thank you for sharing this project. It has been a delightful week! With all the media sites blitz, I hope now others will know of your brilliance, as we already do.

    I am going to listen through my computer right now, but will create a CD and listen to it proper.
    What a treat these songs are for the ears, the music, the accompaniment, the lyrics, your voice(and I haven't listened through a CD yet!)

    Muchas Gracias
    Enjoy some rest.

    xox

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  12. Je viens de faire l'écoute. Elles sont toutes belles et brillantes! Félicitations pour la réussite du projet. Il a été amusant de vous voir dans votre élément nouveau!

    Beaucoup d'amour,
    xo Molly

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  13. Hm, am I missing something tho? The songs don't seem dloadable from myspace so there's no way to make a CD.

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  14. What a wonderful week it has been watching your project come alive. What brilliant songs. Beautiful each one of them. I can now sit back and enjoy the full songs. Great work Rachel. I will share these songs with my friends. Now sit back and relax you deserve it. Thank you Rachel for your gift to us of these lovely songs. :) Now I will go back to listening.....

    Kitty,

    xxoo

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  15. Blasting away on a nice Bose setup Rach, very very lovely indeed. You should be proud of yourself.

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  16. I'm old fashioned. I'm still waiting for a Kew CD (with booklet,lyrics and pics) as well as one I can hold in my hand for Almodovar...

    :D

    I'd happily pay full price, whatever it costs. :)

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  17. perfecto chica, honestly. thank you.

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  18. BTW, I've decided A streetcar named desire is my favourite out of the bunch.

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  19. It's evening here, what a way to end this day. listening to all your music.
    Your project here.
    Reflecting on the week.
    I knew of "Volver" when it first came out, but now I am aware of all of Almodovar's work, through your beautiful work.
    What an amazing, creative idea, and fete.
    I look forward to more of those 'closing interview' snippets.

    'nite.

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  20. I have Netflix – and why not for $7 a month, so I searched for “Volver” and there it was.

    Began watching it – correction – reading it as fast as I could while grabbing a glimpse of Penelope whenever I could, and I watched the death scene and the food scene and then hit pause. Went to IMDB and read the plot for “All About My Mother” and watched the trailer. The trailer reminded me of Wild at Heart, and Wild at Heart always reminds me of Willem Dafoe aka Bobby Peru, and Bobby’s crazy sense of humour.

    I wasn’t crazy about David Lynch’s Wild at Heart. I think the best thing about it was this: I didn’t have to read it. I could relax and just go with the flow. But I think both of David’s movies, “Wild at Heart” and “Lost Highway,” were aimed at a European audience. In North America people would just be kind of shaking their heads sideways! People at the Drive-In Theatres would be honking their horns and flashing their headlights and so on. I think David Lynch pretty much blew his wad with Blue Velvet, and he had nowhere to go, so he went European.

    The way I see it, David probably thought to himself, “from what I’ve seen coming out of Europe, I figure the Europeans can sit through pretty much anything.” So he made Lost Highway.

    I think it’s time for you to let your hair down, now that you’ve let it grow long. You cut it way too short a while ago, for expedience sake I suppose. No fussing in the morning. But there is a price to pay for that! Don’t ever do that again! You remember what Delilah did to Sampson don’t you? Remember when she deliberately sapped all of his strength and drained him. Well don’t ever think that she wouldn’t do the same to you, because she would. Good old Sampson. He wasn’t the brightest Jew in the Bible, and it cost him severely.

    WHOA!! – I’m still on “pause!” I better shut Netfix down for now. I’ll get back to “Volver” in the morning.

    And I’m going to get my 30 year old AKG K240 Studio headphones out, and plug them in and listen to your songs. I’ve got a cheap (less than $100) set of Sony headphones that I use daily, and they’re good enough for everything that is less than MP3 quality. If I want to listen to music, I get the AKG’s out. That way, if the musician drops a pin in the studio, I will hear the clang!

    I feel like writing for you Rachel, because you intrigue me. So that’s probably what I’ll do for a while, here or there or anywhere I write, I’ll keep you in mind. I find that to be much easier than writing for a crowd. I keeps me focused and I gotta watch my P’s and Q’s. If I found myself writing for a crowd, I don’t know if I would say fuck, or motherfucker, or shit bird, if the occasion arose! Whereas with you, I know you’re okay with that.

    I’ll let you know what I think of your musical interpretation of “Volver” after I watch the rest of the movie. I expect the notes that you wrote will be in perfect order, I don’t expect to find any ‘clinkers’ in there. In order to write the music that you write, you have to have SIX Things. Good eye (that’s one) good hand (that’s two) good ear (that’s three) and brain (both lobes) coordination. Oh, and a wealth of knowledge most certainly! That’s what you need. So congratulations Rachel, from the academic side. Now I want to hear the artistic interpretation of “Volver,” and that’s what I’ll hear tomorrow, if everything goes according to Hoyle.

    Would anyone say that Neil Young’s interpretation of “Dead Man” is right on? A perfect interpretation? Or would anyone say that he missed the mark somehow? Or that he was way out in left field, or other things of that nature? Of course they would. It’s all in eyes of the beholder, and Neil only has two eyes.

    So far with “Volver,” I’ve learned that it takes quite a while to move a dead body a short distance. It’s dead weight, and the dead guy looked to be about 180 pounds. And I learned that it can be quite the chore to cook for thirty people....

    I’ll finish the movie tomorrow.

    Tommy DisCool

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  21. Always listen to anything important through headphones. LOVE the *imperfect* work. It all sounds *perfect* to me.

    xoxoxoxox
    ~Lace~

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  22. ...Been here in the ether,lovely work Rachel!

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  23. Hey Rachel, when I first heard your Almodovar Love project, the first thing that came to mind was that you should send him a copy of your project. Best case scenario would be to have him ask you to write a song for his next movie. Worst case, he loved your music. I hope he at least responds back to you.

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