Music Success in Nine Weeks – Week 2

After setting our goals in week 1; in week 2 we were encouraged to set our perfect pitch.

At first glance the exercises in this chapter appeared as both an exercise in creative freestyle as well as a challenge in defining ones personal sound.

The end of the week saw me immersed in deep personal reflection and a little frustration (as I will attempt to explain) despite gaining a grand appreciation that it is likely for every serious musician to consider all aspects of their business, pitches included, given that the more successful musicians of today are the ones who ‘own it all’.

So what is a perfect pitch?

A perfect pitch is a essentially a snapshot piece of information to help others understand whether what you have to offer is for their ears and consumption.

Following Ariel’s guide, I broke in to a train of thought:

• What do I do?
• What do I specialise in?
• What makes me unique?
• What do I sound like?
• What’s my call to action?

Generes I play:

• Punk Rock
• Rock
• Heavy Rock
• Industrial
• Classic Rock
• Metal

Influences

I first considered artists I may sound like using both my own opinion and the feedback of others over the years: Reef, The Black Crowes, Green Day, Alice in Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, Rage Against The Machine, Soundgarden, Ozzy/Sabbath/Iommi, Kyuss, Fu Manchu to name but a few.

Then I began to dig much deeper. As a guitarist and writer I felt compelled to consider who I am more directly influenced by and why.

I went in to some great detail in my journals as to what aspects of each of these players I have adopted over the years I was fascinated to learn that it was Zakk Wylde’s unique vibrato, Billy Duffy’s whole note bends and song construction, Malcolm Young’s open and wholesome rhythms and the tight, intense jaggedness of the playing of James Hetfield that inspired me along with more unusual blends including the rhythmical style of Faith No More’s Jim Martin.

Then, having referred objectively to feedback from TAXI critiques as well as reviews of bands I’ve played in over the years, not excluding footage, I treated myself as a composer guitarist I had only just discovered and was in the process of trying to place:

I could hear a heavy influence of an early Josh Homme and Tony Iommi in the de-tuned open-string seventies-esque fuzz with a strong hint of traditional minor pentatonic rock blues filtering up through the playing of many years of classic rock guitarists such as Joe Perry, Slash, Richie Sambora and Def Leppard’s Steve Clarke and Phil Collen. There were also obscure sonic influences such as Nick McCabe from The (early) Verve, Adam and the Ants Marco Pironni, and interestingly, Reef’s Kenwyn House.

I realise we are all of our influences and each one of us impossible to place completely.

Emotions

Digging this deep, I contemplated the emotions generated and influenced by such music and, perhaps, why I was attracted to different sounds over different decades and how those sounds affected me in the context of life experiences. The logic behind this subjective part of the process was to find words that reflected both the moods and emotions, which resonate with me when writing or playing, to aid the development of a concise pitch.

I was drawn back to significant life experiences: Overlooking Death Valley from Dante’s peak at 5 a.m. with two best buddies on a Californian road-trip, baking in the white hot beaches of sun-scorched Australia, a blistering bright sunrise over Uluru and more deeply losing my grand-parents and gaining two beautiful nephews, giving up everything in Australia to try and ‘make it’ with a band in Berlin and more energetically driving race cars at 180mph and feeling the rush of air sky-diving over a bright-blue Nevada desert. I now understand why I prefer to write music as words often don’t come close enough for me for the awe that life has to offer.

Jennifer, from the mastermind forum, suggested a thesaurus.

Atmospheric, sublime, universal, global, depth, space, connection and power (beyond our control i.e. love, acts of god, universal forces.)

Excitement, energy, front-foot assertiveness, high-octane, empowering, encouraging, adventurous.

With Agent, Red we went through a similar process when constructing our biography so I reflected upon the relevance of what was written back then in the context of how I sound now. With minor modification and following Ariel’s test for authenticity, as recommended in her book, I got as far as…

Sound

With rhythms pounding like a universal heartbeat and riffs wide enough to bridge galaxies, Rob’s sound is a fresh combination of hardcore punk assertiveness with a heavy dose of rock sludge.

Having putting it out there and gained further feedback from the mastermind forum we messed around with a number of entertaining examples in a brainstorming forum that included:

• Volcanic face-melting Rhandy Rhodes rock with a heavy dose of hot Soundgarden sludge
• Triple XXX tearing up a mountain of fire to Soundgarden and Stone Temple Pilots
  
• An airdog tearing up an epic mountain 180 SoundGarden 360 Stone Temple Pilots…
  
• Assertive hardcore rock with a heavy dose of rock sludge. Riffs that will gleefully deafen your boss
  
• AudioSlave and Black Sabbath collide in a Mosh Pit of Guitar Shredding, Head Pounding Classic Metal Fusion
  
• Face melting guitar riffs to rock the world of Zakk Wylde and Randy Rhoads aficionados
  

This was a lot of fun and, evidently, there is a lot of further work to do. Now I realise why successful Musician’s hire publicists and marketeers.

Perfect Pitch

This week has created a fantastic avalanche of insight and, to an extent, emotion.

Creating a perfect pitch is a little like trying to catch a water snake and juggling labels endlessly to create a tight fit often feels impossible. Collaboration and brainstorming with others eases the burden and amplifies the output, I have found.

My key lesson, this week, is that a perfect pitch has to be compelling: It’s both critically (and only) an invite to the party. It must get to the heart; to the point.

Unless you are unsually gifted, this may be a task where it is vital to get a little help from your friends.

Have you got a Perfect Pitch? What are your influences? Leave a comment below.

Further reading:

• My Goals
  
• Music Success in Nine Weeks
• Ariel’s book “Music Success in Nine Weeks”
• Week 1, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 6, Week 7
• How to make sure your bands elevator pitch sticks

Photo Credit: © Sandra Farrow