Way behind schedule..

With only one more rehearsal before the recording.. it seems that time gets faster as the date of the live draws near. However, the way things are going.. we won't make it (or maybe I'm too pessimistic about it.)

In any case, sick as I may (for those who don't know, i'm fever-stricken as of the moment and I spent most of my day sleeping..) we need to change the practice schedules.. Thus, I came up with this:

Jica Vocals Practice (with Master) :
Wed/Fri 4:00-5:00pm (or earlier depending on Physics 187 Dismissal) Blue Room

Carmen Guitar Lessons:
Sat 9:00-12:00nn
Carmen's Boarding House

Regular Rehearsals:
Sat 1:00-4:00pm
Auditions - Studio A

Sorry if I decided on this on my own but we need to focus on the vocals and rhythm guitar parts.. anyone interested in helping out or if there are any objections, inform me right away. I won't be in UP tomorrow. ~recup mode~

Thirty days make a month..

So I guess I found myself yet again posting in this blog site. Come to think of it, thirty days make a month--meaning it gets busier from here on. After all, we only have a month's left of practice left before the live.

As time passes, I become able to discern who among my bandmates are in love with what they're doing, and who among my bandmates need a little pushing.

To be more specific, everything seems to be going well in the bass and drums department. It seems Ed and Neil have taken the initiative to make their tracks better. In particular, I only gave Ed a score sheet and he comes back to tell me,

The guitarpro file sounds plain from measure 18 to 26.. We can make it sound better by removing this slap..

leaving me with a yeah, I guess you're right and poof! We now have a 100% accurate drums track! I can tell that Neil's been practicing real hard as well, judging from the way he plays the bass now as compared to how he used to play it. I've come to think that he really is getting serious about getting his own bass guitar.

Truth be told, NEWTONE's weakness is at the moment its vocals as well as both rhythm guitars. Jica needs to work on sustaining her notes and making sure they don't end up flat. I can't really blame Carmen--she's new to this so it might actually be tad too early for her to play those riffs. Mangs is in Recup mode so she can't practice.

In Master's case, the way he played wasn't bad but it wasn't that good either. How do I put it, let's just say there's still a lot of room for improvement. He only managed to rehearse with us once, so I bet his still has stuff full of surprises left in his pocket.

Contrary to my belief, I actually get better on my 16th notes riff by learning styles from other songs. Yup, my 16th notes got cleaner thanks to the weird rhythm in Cagayake Girls!'s Guitar 2, Eric Clapton's Bell Bottom Blues, Hit in the USA's lead track, and the intro riff for My Love is a Stapler.

Sig called us again to tell us that they're requesting for a copy of the recording for the song to be performed in the live. Proves once again that my intuition is correct since I've already anticipated it and it was part of my plan to record the song. I probably have my Art Studies I professor to thank for teaching me to do more than what is expected from me.

I was actually planning NOT TO ATTEND this weekend's practice ON PURPOSE to see how my bandmates would act on their own initiatives.. but I guess that just wouldn't work with just a month's worth of practice left. NEWTONE should prepare itself for a more frank, and probably mean Aru-sempai. After all, we need to play the song in such a way that the performance is worthy of a recording in two weeks time (i.e. more time for me and Master to arrange the tracks.)

P.S.
I'm actually planning to switch roles with Carmen in Tomorrow. I'll have her play the lead cause one, she still doesn't have the endurance to play the entire song. Two, she gets less riffs to play with the Lead. And three, I can be Jica's back-up vocals if I play rhythm.

No NEWTONE Vocals Practice or Guitar Lessons Tomorrow!!

Of course, if there will be one, I won't be the one facilitating it.

I've been thinking lately.. another reason why this thing is not working out right is because I'm trying too hard. I don't even know why I'm taking this seriously aside from the fact that I don't want to get embarrassed with the performance during the live. Since I try so hard, I push them too hard. And maybe that's why I get the impression that it's either they don't want to practice, or they are just forced to practice.
Maybe I'm just having my Azusa-chan moments but yeah, I'd rather be working on my thesis problem tomorrow. みな、ごめんなさい。

Today's Practice

Wow ang haba ng pinost ni Earl haha.

I was about to rant on the rehearsal studio din sayang naunahan niya ako hahaha. Dapat pala tinest talaga namin ni Carmen yung amps nila when we checked the place. Sayang naman yung malaking studio na yon, sabi ni Sison dun daw nagpapractice dati ang Radioactive Sago hehe.

Mangs couldn't come today... Pagaling ka Mangs!!!! *massive glompity glomp hug*

Uy ayan Earl, I posted, the blog's not pointless heehee. Wala pa lang kasi kami masyado masabi at mapost sa blog. Ang masasabi ko nga lang tungkol sa pagtugtog kanina, nakakatuwa dahil may piano na. Ang ganda pakinggan ng piano. At natuwa ako na nakapag-gitara ako hehehe. Ayun.

Waaa! How do you sing/play from the heart? Hehe gambatte!


jaa~ ^__^

あなたの心を再生!! T_T

I'm actually starting to think that it's pointless to have a NEWTONE blog--since there's only one member writing it namely me.

Today is probably one of the worst days in NEWTONE's history. First, there was no practice this morning (Jica - Vocals and Carmen - Guitar Lessons). Second, we spent the first 15-20 minutes of our time getting lost. Spent another 15-20 minutes just to get one of the guitar amps to work. Another 10 minutes for Carmen to get to the rehearsal studio, and after about two runs of Tomorrow and Innocent Starter we were asked to leave. Poof. So much for practice..

Truth be told, I did NOT like that rehearsal studio.

広い。たぶん。いいえ。広じゃない。

It might be a wide rectangular room but come on, the amps and drums were so clumped you can barely breathe in there. Their amps sucked, and we kept getting feedback from unknown sources. The guy in charge doesn't know how to troubleshoot. He even came to the conclusion that my guitar was dead despite the fact that the cables just sucked.What really got me pissed though is the argument I had with Carmen. She kept on insisting that her score for the chorus was wrong. I didn't find anything wrong with it. When I asked her for her reason, it was told in a way a physicist would answer and not an artist--I counted. Wait a minute, everyone in the group is a physicist. Maybe that's the reason why it just doesn't work right. A band is not looking for physicists, it's looking for artists and musicians. At the end of the day, the problem was her difficulty in shifting from one chord to another while keeping the rhythm.

Personally, I never doubted the GuitarPro File or any part of it to be wrong. I believe that I don't actually have the right to correct someone if I can't play or compose better than he/she can.

To everyone in NEWTONE.. please do not forget that Music is not a Science, in its own right. Your mind can only dictate how something is played, but it's your heart that makes the music. Skill can only tell you how many ways you can play something, but it is dedication and an artistic spirit that would determine whether the music you produce is pleasant to the ears.. or not. You DON'T COUNT! You SING and you PLAY YOUR HEART OUT!

I did not like the way we played innocent starter. I know we could perform better. They're telling me that it's only the first time we practiced together.. but that's not the point. People only practice together when they have already mastered their parts. Band rehearsal is all about adding the pieces together and making them fit, not working on each individual piece.

To summarize my rant, I just want everyone to think they are artists instead of scientists the moment you hold your instruments. I can tell that despite all this, we are getting better. But at this pace, we might not make it in time. We still have volume leveling and effects to take care of.Finally, I'll finish this post by pointing out everyone's weakness--the way I see it. We need to work on:
Jica - Vocals, Breathing Exercises and jogging to prevent your shortness of breath
Carmen - Rhythm Guitar, You should play the strings we need you to play. Techniques come afterwards but first we have to make sure your foundation is set. Stick to the basics!!
Master - Keyboard, Intro part (practice with no one singing at proper tempo) and use something equivalent to - Synth Pad (New Age)
Ed - Drums, Please refer to the GuitarPro file for the drumming pattern. We can modify it later if needed, but for innocent starter I want everyone to stick to the GuitarPro file first.
Neil - Bass, Work on the slides and 2nd chorus to bridge
Earl - Lead Guitar, I still have my 16th notes riff to work on. The problem I'm having with looking for everyone's mistake is that I miss the opportunity to work on mine. That's why I practice on my own. In just a few more plays, the iTunes play count for innocent starter would reach 300. xD

P.S.

Tomorrow was sweet. The Bass track (which is the main track) finally sounds like the real deal. Now I need to look for something Master and Carmen can do.

NEWTONEブラグへようこそ!! (=^o^=)

Ok, so I started making this blog out of whim. I just wanted everything that had to with NEWTONE archived.. for memories sake? maybe. After all, the members keep insisting that the band was formed not for the prize that awaits (which does not apply to me.. fufufu.) but for the experience.

As you can see, most of the blog posts are dated according to their exact chronology, i.e. posts were written to travel back in time; thus, some posts may be addded to the archive making it hard to follow which post comes first.

Oh well, blame it to bloggers and their ability to set posting dates. Will probably give Carmen, Jica and the others (yup, the others kasi more likely than not, si Jica lang at si Carmen yung magko-contribute ng posts dito..) the ability to co-author once I get to talk to them tomorrow. ^_^

btw, nana-sempai ga, kirei na!! (stole it from her blog site.. xD).

Kei and Brawny are now running on SLINKIES

So we finally had NEWTONE's electric guitars restringed. ^_^

I finished restringing my guitar last weekend and managed to get away with snapping off the B-string. Luckily, my parents were generous enough to buy me another set of Super Slinkies. And yeah, I realized that my tremolo bar needs a little cleaning. I used Super Slinkies because they were the thinnest ones around and they're good for single-notes, slides and bends.

Today, I finished restringing Carmen's guitar with Regular Slinkies while Jica and Mangs were practicing. I used Regular on Carmen's since the set is a lot more rich in terms of Tone as compared to the Super ones, which is perfect for rhythm guitar.

I think I'm getting a bit rusty when it comes to tuning strings manually. I think I'm already used to having a tuner around which is not good.. at all. I believe that all guitar players must be able to fine-tune their instruments without a tuner and instead having to use a trained ear.

Oh well, I'll probably have Power Slinkies on Neil's Bass (to get as much tone as possible), while Mangs' Acoustic strings is still a matter of debate.

Animelo Summer Live 2006 - innocent starter

Mizuki Nana performing innocent starter during the ANIMELO Summer Live 2006 concert.

NEWTONE

NEWTONE is band of physics majors who are fond of Japanese Animation and Japanese Culture. It is a fact to note that most of the members has not played or even touched their instruments until the group decided to join the contest. The name NEWTONE came to mind when Earl (Lead Guitar) was thinking of a name for a band which had something to do with Sir Isaac Newton, while flipping through the pages of Feb 09’s NEWTYPE magazine on the train ride to JICC to submit the form.

NEWTONE started with Carmen’s initiative to join Japan Embassy’s J-Pop/Anime Singing Contest after mistaking it for a video contest. Along with Jica, they started recruiting other Physics Majors who were fond of Japanese Animation. Earl joined the crew as their manager, but turned out to be the lead guitarist. At the same time, his close friends Neil and Ed joined to become the bassist and drummer (Jica’s instructor). Cindy was then poised to become the band’s vocalist but settled down to be the acoustic guitarist, and Carmen started to learn how to play rhythm guitar. Master came along to mix the tracks for the instruments but eventually decided to be the keyboardist for the live performance.