Available for download: Tracks from the cover challenge

It's Christmas time. I'm going to go hand out some presents in a sec, but before that, I thought I'd put the covers from the last few days in one easy-to-access spot. Thank you to all those who commented or shared the tracks as they went up. It really felt nice to have such positive feedback.

Please feel free to download the tracks if you liked any of them.

Cover Challenge by ErrantKnave

EDIT: I thought changing the track names on Soundcloud would change the file extensions, but apparently they're still all titled under the original working file names. My bad.

I had fun playing these tunes. I know I said I was going to do twelve of them, and I'm not happy that I only got through half of them. I want to revisit the other six someday. Maybe someday soon.

Links to the previous posts, detailing each song:
The White Stripes - Fell in Love With A Girl
Britney Spears - Baby One More Time
Hanson - Change in My Life
Bruno Mars - Marry You
Frank Sinatra - Fly Me to the Moon
The Beatles - For No One

Thanks for the support, everyone. Happy holidays!

Part 6 - 12 Covers of Xmas: For No One (The Beatles)

Yeah, 12 songs is a no go. We'll have to settle for a half dozen. Since this will likely be my last post before Christmas, I hope you enjoy it.

Part 5 - 12 Covers of Xmas: Fly Me to the Moon (Frank Sinatra)

I got an email last night that made me laugh. All it said was, "We need to talk about your drum pattern selections." That's it. The email was from the drummer of my former band. When I record these songs, I usually just choose a beat and loop it through the entire tune. I have no doubt that my friend could come up with more varied and interesting beats. However, I'm not a drummer, so you'll have to suffer through plain old loops.

Moving on... this latest is one of my Top 5 Sinatra tunes.

Part 4 - 12 Covers of Xmas: Marry You (Bruno Mars)

Yes, yes, I've fallen behind. A lot. A couple of the songs just didn't work, and I haven't really been home either. But there's a new song for today, and I'm pretty happy with it.

Part 3 - 12 Covers of Xmas: Change In My Life (Hanson)

Yippie kay yay! It's another cover!

As you might have seen yesterday with Britney Spears and the day before with the White Stripes.

Part 2 - 12 Covers of Xmas: Baby One More Time (Britney Spears)

So, continuing with the plan I mentioned in yesterday's post, here is another cover. For my first attempt, I went with the White Stripes, with a song that jolted me from the moment I first heard it. Today's song... is a completely different matter.

Part 1 - 12 Covers of Xmas: Fell In Love With A Girl (The White Stripes)

Friends and readers, with twelve days to go until Christmas, I'm challenging myself to record twelve covers in that time and post one a day.

Some things to know before listening:
1) There is nothing Christmas-y about most of the songs. It's just a convenient title and time of year.
2) These are low-fi recordings; just me, a guitar, and a computer. I'm keeping it simple, only adding drum beats to fill out the songs.
3) I don't really want to do straight-up covers, so if you're in the mood for fidelity to the original, it won't always be there. That said, I think every song that I'll attempt is good in its own way, and I'm proud to play them. I'm not trying to send up the original artists.

The Top 5 Things I Learned From Ryan Gosling

Hey girl, I know this blog post is a day late, but... I promise to make it up to you. Hopefully today.

Right. I think the title explains the first half of this post pretty well, so why go throgh an extensive preamble?

From "F*** Yeah! Ryan Gosling" to "Feminist Ryan Gosling" to "Librarian Ryan Gosling", this dude really gets around. this is some of the information I've gleaned through his ubiquity.

Anatomy of a cover: Red Power, a graphic novel

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I spent a couple of months this year working on the first graphic novel that Fifth House Publishers would produce. (Fifth House is one of the companies I work for.) As such, there was a bit of a learning curve, especially when laying out the interiors, but I can easily say this was one of the most rewarding experiences I’ve had. So I thought I’d write a little bit about how I came up with the cover design.

This is something a little different that I felt like sharing. Continue reading, or skip to the bottom for the Song of the Week.