Has anyone brought up the point yet that...

[Reyngel]

...releasing songs this way prohibits him from going back and making valuable tweaks and changes later in the album-making process? Tweaks that he will learn along the way while recording Teargarden?


According to Bill himself, being able to go back and make changes after going through the journey of recording an album and learning things along the way has always been absolutely imperative for him as an artist.


I remember him talking about how the song that took the most time to record on Adore was actually Crestfallen, simply because he was never completely happy with the vocals and type of synths used at first during the beginning of the 6-month period of recording. So he went back at the end of the Adore sessions, after everything was finished, and obsessively worked on the vocals until they were perfect. And they are. Maybe some of the smoothest Billy vocals of any song, ever. And the synth choice that he ended up discovering after working on soundscapes for the rest of the album totally fits.



If he had given himself one month to get that song done, simply because he told the public he's releasing a song each month, Crestfallen would have sounded God-awful... unfinsihed, B-side-esque.


...and that's what's happening to Teargarden. Each song is sounding forced, contrived, and with little room for growth or evolution. It's to the point where the 44th song will probably sound pretty good, simply because he's had 43 other songs to dick around with and try things in terms of recording. But all we'll be left with is a 44-song album with the first dozen or so songs shitty, simply because they were all warming him up for the later ones.


And THIS is why the full-album process is still superior to this one-song-at-a-time shit. While he's 100% dedicated to each song in the moment, over the course of recording Teargarden his "100%" will actually become a much more evolved and greater 100%. The only songs that will benefit from this phenomenon are the ones at the end.

[Kahlo]

Did he say that he had all 44 songs in demo/rough version at this stage?

If that is the case then I would have to agree with you.

[Reyngel]

Originally Posted by Kahlo

Did he say that he had all 44 songs in demo/rough version at this stage?

If that is the case then I would have to agree with you.

Well you know, the thing about that is, let's say he has 30, 35 songs or so in demo version at least. He seems to always have these ideas written down, recorded on his tape player, his phone, whatever. When he finishes doing song 35, what if he just doesn't have anything else he feels is good? Does that mean he just has to force-write another dozen or so so that he meets the number he told us?


The whole-album-process is superior because it allows the artist to have the entire album-creating time to decide how many, which ones, and how they're recorded, which translates to a better product.


Odds are, he'll learn something awesome along the way while recording song 38 or something, and think to himself, "Fuck, I wish I had thought of that before I released Widow Wake My Mind... oh well, too late. I already released it." And that's stupid.

[Reyngel]

Or remember that story he told about the ending of Thru the Eyes of Ruby? He said that originally, it didn't end with the fadeout to the MCIS reprise, but he came back months later decided "it just fit."


It's revelations like that that he'll never be able to capitalize on with this type of song-releasing process.

[Caine Walker]

but he loooooves widow make my mind.

new approach, new sets of challenges, new mentality. i'm not saying it's a good thing, but sometimes changing your process is good for creation.

doesn't seem to be the case here so far, but, uh.... fuck it, nevermind.

[Pop Tart]

But even the crappiest piece of crap on any of the early demos is still better than anything from Teargarden that I've heard. For the past ten years, all we've heard is Billy's experimentations, and him exploring his own "genius". The bands that have survived the long haul - whether you like them or not, bands like The Cure, Pearl Jam and U2 - have changed with the times without changing the essence of their music....Billy's just aimless now. He doesn't know what the fuck he's doing.

[slunken]

Originally Posted by Reyngel

being able to go back and make changes after going through the journey

You do realize that TGBK is supposed to be how you can't do this in real life?

[Springbridge]

Originally Posted by Reyngel

...releasing songs this way prohibits him from going back and making valuable tweaks and changes later in the album-making process? Tweaks that he will learn along the way while recording Teargarden?


According to Bill himself, being able to go back and make changes after going through the journey of recording an album and learning things along the way has always been absolutely imperative for him as an artist.


I remember him talking about how the song that took the most time to record on Adore was actually Crestfallen, simply because he was never completely happy with the vocals and type of synths used at first during the beginning of the 6-month period of recording. So he went back at the end of the Adore sessions, after everything was finished, and obsessively worked on the vocals until they were perfect. And they are. Maybe some of the smoothest Billy vocals of any song, ever. And the synth choice that he ended up discovering after working on soundscapes for the rest of the album totally fits.



If he had given himself one month to get that song done, simply because he told the public he's releasing a song each month, Crestfallen would have sounded God-awful... unfinsihed, B-side-esque.


...and that's what's happening to Teargarden. Each song is sounding forced, contrived, and with little room for growth or evolution. It's to the point where the 44th song will probably sound pretty good, simply because he's had 43 other songs to dick around with and try things in terms of recording. But all we'll be left with is a 44-song album with the first dozen or so songs shitty, simply because they were all warming him up for the later ones.


And THIS is why the full-album process is still superior to this one-song-at-a-time shit. While he's 100% dedicated to each song in the moment, over the course of recording Teargarden his "100%" will actually become a much more evolved and greater 100%. The only songs that will benefit from this phenomenon are the ones at the end.

An interesting perspective...but since he is releasing the songs one by one and putting all focusing power in one song at a time the plan is that there shouldn't be any real need to go back and improve a song since there is so much time to make the current song being worked on more or less complete.

[Esty]

I honestly never thought releasing a "concept album" four songs at a time would work unless he was fully done. Still, It's bill fucking corgan and the guy lost his fucking marbles years ago.

[dudehitscar]

yes. The Full-Album process sure helped Zietgeist!


oh wait...

[Reyngel]

Originally Posted by flspnut

I believe your first point in your essay is completely mute and wrong. From my understanding the final product will not be the same as the 11 sets of 4 EP's So if that is the case, doesn't he have the ability to go back and tweak songs? I believe he HAS to do that to make the songs a bit different. Isn't that what he kinda has planned all along? So after reading your first paragraph....I didn't even need to read more.

From my understanding, he's not going to touch the songs later. He's just simply going to package them in a new all-in-one boxset. He's not going back to tweak, re-record, or anything like that. So I don't know what you're talking about.

[Reyngel]

Originally Posted by dudehitscar

yes. The Full-Album process sure helped Zietgeist!


oh wait...

No you're right... that's a very valid point.


However I'd add that so far, I like almost everyone of the songs on Zeitgeist much more than the 3 songs we have for Teargarden. And I don't even like Zeitgeist much, if at all.



The fact is, at the end of this Teargarden process, we'll be left with 44 individual one-song albums, rather than anything cohesive, simply because he's not recording it as an album. Which is why I can't understand how he's claiming it's going to be a concept album, as though he's already finished the entire album in his head already, and he's just going through the to-do list step by step.


I know he's been known to often write things in his head, and that he often creates 80% of an album song in about 20 minutes(or so he says). But his history shows that he needs, thrives and depends on the freedom to go back and make changes that he realized needed to be made later down the line. Every album he's made so far has been that way.


...or it will be rushed and contrived and sound shallow. Which it does so far.