The Final Mix!

OK!!!

Added today, April 1st: THE FINAL MIX!!!!

Yay! Now it's all jazzed up, sparkling and shiny:

"Rumor has it" by Betti Gefecht (Final Mix!)

One posting below, there's still the rough recording as it was

before Freimann, the sound whiz had polished it up.

What a difference...

Random. Betti. Music. History.

Sorting old photographs is a funny thing.

Well, it was for me when I did... I wasn't really aware of 

how many bad hair days one can have in a single 

lifetime - it's fascinating. 

Anyway - I don't want to bother you with my past private 

disasters. But I felt like sharing some of my public ones.

I actually had my first appearance on a public stage 

at the age of nine. Honestly, no school production or else: 

Me. Guitar. Club. Concert. 

Unfortunately undocumented... so this starts age 16.

 

The real fun though is to say: "Look, no hands!"

I play several instruments - guitar, piano, drums, flutes - but 

do I like it? Nah... can I please have a band? 

And a stage big enough to perform my ass off... running, 

jumping, dancing? Thanks! 

The pics below are all "nowadays"...

NM Trailer III (NO SPOILERS)

"New Moon" Movie Trailer III, at minute 1:08

Hello, Monsieur Desplat...

... and hello, goose bumps!

Did anyone notice? 

The trailer starts with the familiar score of Carter Burwell. 

Which is good because it makes us feel at home. 

But then, when Bella - oops! No spoilers!! 

Ok, I try again: 

But then, at 1:08 the vibe and feel changes... 

smoothly... but you feel it.

First the strings, so sad, so touching - I knew immediately: here comes the frenchman!

And then through the next scenes, the orchestra joines in - strong, dramatical, heartbeat accelerating.

And at last the sacral choirs on top of it - breathtaking! 

And all the way, the theme stays the same... it is just building. 

And building. 

Even this short excerpt of what is to come breathes the depth of a long cultural/musical history of Europe, which hits a nerve within me instantly.

I know right now I will buy the score for sure. 

Thanks, Alexandre Desplat, for not disappointing me!

Related posts: 

Interlude: New Moon Original Score

Just for the record: I DID like Carter Burwell's score, 

including his idea of Bella's Lullaby.

In a comment to the above blogpost about Alexandre Desplat, I wrote:

To answer your question, I suppose you mean 

whether Bella's Lullaby matches the description given in the book?

I honestly think, it doesn't.
While the melody quite has that little edgy course one could expect, 

it is lacking the complexitiy of different woven layers and conflicting themes 

as described by Stephenie Meyer.
Burwell kept it very simple, or at least Paul Murtha, the arranger did. 

It's a beautiful, uncommon and haunting melody, nontheless. 

And I think Carter Burwell did an excellent job with the Twilight score overall .

His music was definitely an upgrade to the movie.

'New Moon' soundtrack hopeless

PREFACE

I was thinking about the Twilight Examiner article 'New Moon' Soundtrack Hopefuls. It's not the first time that I was mentioned in connection with that term. So - just because I wrote a twi-spired song - am I a 'New Moon' soundtrack hopeful? Straight answer: No. I'm not. I can't be - for several reasons. I'll give you three. But before I do so... 

•••

JUST FOR THE RECORD 

Getting "One Wolf" on the soundtrack was neither my intention nor my motivation for writing and recording it. It was a thought I admittedly had allowed myself to think some time later though, in pleasant moments of daydreaming ;-)

"But you've uploaded it and promoted it on the internet", you might say. Yes, I did. Sure! I'm an artist/performer, and like any other of that species, I long to be heard. With artists, this is very common (you can google it... LOL). So I made my work public. But unlike certain other well known young singer/songwriter ladies, I didn't campaign.

I don't want to dish these surely talented fellow artists, but lately... 

•••

SOME REALLY OVEREGGED THE PUDDING 

During the last couple of days alone, there've been daily mailings from one of these 'New Moon' soundtrack hopefuls on myspace and elsewhere, asking its multiple recipients to write to certain media and persons in charge and say: "Hey, I just found this artist and her song must be on the soundtrack!" There are petitions and circular letters they demand to be signed. 

Besides the fact, that such behaviour has to be treated simply as spam (which maddens me), it's also quite ridiculous. What do they think? Like this is the way to gain a director's or music supervisor's artistic respect? It's like these crazy fangirls throwing themselves on Robert Pattinson, as if that would be the way to make him fall in love with them... a wee bit embarrassing, huh? Even worse, some of their songs are really good - but this begging kinda depreciates them. Just my two cents though. But ok -  these girls are young. And here we are:

•••

THE FIRST REASON

I'm NOT young. Which plainly is one of the main causes why I'm not a 'New Moon' soundtrack hopeful. Just in case you haven't noticed yet: I'm even too old to play Bella's mom in the movie, ok? And even if I had recorded the musical masterpiece of the century, there'd be no way it would be considered for a movie with a target audience like 'New Moon'. Briefly: If you can't put me on MTV, you can't put me on the soundtrack. In case you're a Twilight Mom, about to shout "Objection!" right now - face it: in financial terms you are merely part of a minority, providing a welcome extra income to those whose job it is to bloody sell as much cd copies as possible.

(Just to save what is possible of my self esteem, I'd like to point out that at least I still look younger than Madonna - before breakfast, that is. Ok? Good.)

•••

THE SECOND REASON

I'm German. And I'm in Germany. Big obstacle! 

It is almost impossible to bring yourself to the attention of the people in charge over such a distance. Even if I lived next door, I'd still have to hang on the phone and keep on knocking all the right doors literally day and night. (Did you know that this was exactly what Paramore, respectively their management did to get the deal? Or were you deluded into the romantic idea that they were accidently brought to light by some talent scout? That's not the way such things happen.) 

So, with no badass agent spending his nights sleeping on the music supervisor's threshold, your demo cd is most likely to rot in some abandoned paperbox, among thousands of others, unnoticed.

Actually, I do have an agency agreement with a Hollywood-based film music library where my music (including "One Wolf") can be cleared and licensed. But that doesn't help to prevent my songs from the rotting process mentioned above. And last but not least:

•••

THE THIRD REASON

I'm indie. No fame here, at least no international fame. And with respect to the success of the first movie, they'd rather go big time now. Even if this might be a misjudgement on my behalf and Alexandra Patsavas will be going to fight for her beloved indie musicians with claws and teeth - in what parallel universe would I be possibly one of them?

•••

RESUME

All this (plus several other points) considered, I really never was a 'New Moon' soundtrack hopeful. I just wrote that song, because I was moved and drawn into that romantic overkill by the books of Stephenie Meyer, and creating music was my way to deal with it. It still is. Creating my animated little vids is my way to deal with it. Writing this blog is my way to deal with it. And guess what? It works. I am having a lot of fun. Especially with my fellow twi-bloggers.

So f*ck the soundtrack, I'll keep going. Take or leave it. Love or hate me. I am a 'New Moon' soundtrack hopeless" and I'm having a ball!

•••

---  Drop me a line. Comments are my fuel  ---

playing Jeff Buckley: another competitor?

This young man is Peter Pawan, 

London-based actor and musician. 

His name was mentioned by someone 

in a comment to the ongoing 

"Who should play Jeff Buckley"-discussion... 

so I did some research.

Well.....

If you haven't yet read my post "Rob Pattinson= Jeff Buckley? A singer's POV" and listened to the soundclips of Pattinson's and Buckley's singing there, I'd recommend to do this first. So you'd be prepared to make a better comparison.

 

I'v never heard of Peter Pawan before which isn't surprising. Seems he had no significant career so far, apart from a short feature called "Sunshine" and voicing over a few commercials.

Nevertheless he seems to somehow apply to play Jeff Buckley because 

• a) he very much tries (and admittedly succeeds) to resemble him in his photoshoots and 
  
• b) he obviously thinks(!) he can sing like Buckley 
  

...ouhkaayy.... *cough cough*

So since I'm trying to remain fair, again you can judge for yourself. Please listen to the soundclips of Rob and Jeff and then check the video of Peter by clicking the image below. In the second half of that video he is performing live two songs of Jeff Buckley.

I think he's trying hard but his performance does nothing to me. I was like "oh please, stop that whining!" He might have some talent, perhaps if he'd stopped trying to be Jeff Buckley. But this is kinda pathethic. Uhm... I correct: He's got no singing talent at all IMHO. Sorry.

Anyway... see for yourself.

Unfortunately, I still didn't manage to find any examples of James Franco singing. Even at the most devoted Franco-fansites there wasn't anybody who had a clue. Seems he never sang at all, at least not in public or in any of his films.

I would love to add a soundfile of Franco though, for the sake of completeness.

Ideas anyone?

One last note: I read that Jeff Buckleys mother allegedly insists on having Jeff's original soundfiles used in the movie. I hate to admit but: if it just is about lipsyncing, it would definitely be James Franco. *sniff*

Rob Pattinson= Jeff Buckley? A singer's POV

Rumour has it... 

...that Robert Pattinson would apply for the leading role in a Jeff Buckley biopic. Yesterday I stumbled over a discussion about whether Pattinson could or could not pull it off. 

As a long time admirer of the Buckleys (Jeff's father Tim was a incredibly gorgeous singer too - just in case you're too young to remember...), plus being a singer myself, I got some thoughts about it to share... from a singer's point of view.

- The singing, yes or no?

When I heard Pattinson singing for the first time (actually not knowing who it was) he immediately reminded me of Buckley. I am not easily impressed with vocals  and it is a rare thing for me to get goose bumps while listening to a song. I wanted to know who the hell did that trick after... yes: years! When I found out, my first thought was: "No way! That... KID?!?" (a clear déjà vu of my first Buckley encounter btw)

Well, I guess I made my point clear about my opinion towards his singing skills.

I'm not quite sure though whether Pattinson could manage the angelic high notes Buckley was famous for, but I would LOVE to hear him try... (it's learnable - subject to a given potential. I know what I'm talking about!) I believe he would throw in everything he's got. And he's got a lot! 

So: Yes.

Jeff Buckley singing


Robert Pattinson singing

...and some more Robert Pattinson singing


Jeff Buckley (the tricky part!!!)

- The physics, yes or no?

Most people who think Pattinson is a no-go for that part were referring to his look. They'd rather have James Franco because he looks so much like Buckley. There's obviously a strong resemblance, so what? We're not talking about a photo shoot here. It's all about acting!

You can rely upon Pattinson's ability as an actor here, he's got the depth. Some people thought he isn't a good actor and said, they hated him in "Twilight". Oh pleeaaase... no matter how much I loved "Twilight" for the romantic things it did to me - my analytical mind still insists on telling me it wasn't a very sophisticated movie. The part of Edward wasn't very demanding at all, and Pattinson made more of it than possibly could be expected. He WILL look like Buckley. 

Definitely: Yes!

A little manip for the doubtful. Left: Buckley, right: Pattinson

   

Hey, just got a wonderful idea: why not have Franco play Tim Buckley in that pic? Maybe that part goes without singing... uhm, not very likely. But he could lipsync, and I'd recommend my adorable hubby Freimann for the vocals. Want a taste?

Freimann singing

Music snippets taken from

1: Jeff Buckley / song: "Lover you should come over" / album: "Grace"

2+3: Robert Pattinson / song "Let me sign" / album: "Twilight Soundtrack"

4: Freimann / song: "Sailing" / album: "Hopeless Pokus III"

See also: Playing Jeff Buckley: Another competitor