Song: The Balad of Bruce

Greg Whitehead - The Ballad Of Bruce by GWGumby

Gather 'round and listen to the tale of Bruce "Ash" Campbell and his battle against the Army of Darkness. Bruce has to struggle against his complicated problems when all he wants is just to take some time off to enjoy the simpler things in life.

This synthpop song was inspired by the events of "The Army of Darkness" coupled with the musical stylings of some of my favorite late 80s synth-based bands such as Underworld (mk 1), Stan Ridgeway, and even a little Martini Ranch. It also includes the debut of my first acoustic instrument, the jaw-harp.

The song started out as a synth improv a couple months ago, just some playing around to see if anything could emerge. Initially it was just bass and rhythm. I had a melody more or less in mind, but needed to find some lyrical inspiration. I'm not sure what made me decide to couple the music with "Army of Darkness," but right when the first line came to mind, "Crash land on a real long day," the idea of Ash literally falling from the sky and crashing onto the ground coupled itself to the music and that's when I knew I had a story to work with.

So next I recorded some initial vocals and a few synth bits. My initial idea was to do something akin to one of my all-time favorite bands, Underworld. Or, more specifically, Underworld Mk 1--the late 80's version of the techno band when they were more Alternative Synthpop closer to INXS. The chorus and overall rhythm is definitely a cross between two of my favorite songs of theirs, "Underneath the Radar" and "Stand Up." Also, the deeper vocals and a bit of the vocoder harmony hearkens back to them as well.

From this point I fumbled around trying to figure out where to go next. Playing around with different sounds, eventually I found that the more plunky, banjo-like sounds really worked with the music. I hadn't intended to go with the country jamboree-style feeling initially, but the idea amused me. It reminded me a bit of some other synth-pop-country crossovers like "Reach" from Martini Ranch and a lot of Stan Ridgeway's stuff such as "Camouflage" and "Goin' Southbound." So I pushed the song in that direction, adding the banjo, jaw harp, and some extra ambient noises to make it feel like it was being sung/performed around a campfire.

All the synth sounds came from the Korg M3, Roland JV-1080, and Roland FP-9 digital piano.

I now have enough music to put together an album. This will be the final song to flesh out a full release. Unless I get some golden inspiration in the next few weeks that forces itself onto the album. I'm not sure how I'm going to publish/release it. I'm still researching that part.

The video is basically a slideshow of screencaps from Army of Darkness that more or less match the lyrics of the song, especially the verse portions.

Song: Turn Your Back On The World

Greg Whitehead - Turn Your Back On The World by GWGumby
"Turn Your Back On The World" is an instrumental piece that I started writing on the piano over 15 years ago. I wrote it intending it to eventually turn into a full song, but never having the capability to do so (until recently), it eventually evolved into a solo piano piece. Now I've finally taken that piano piece and added synthesizer, drums, and other various noises to make it into something a bit bigger and more exciting.

This piece is inspired by instrumental 70s rock songs by artists such as Genesis, Elton John, ELO, ELP, and Yes mixed with more modern artists such as Air, Roger Joseph Manning Jr., and Chateau Marmont.

The sounds on this song come from my digital piano, the Korg R3, and the Roland JV-1080 plus a nice acoustic-sounding drum plug-in.

Once again, here's a static YouTube video alternative.

Song: Today's The Day

Greg Whitehead - Today's The Day by GWGumby
Here's my most recent track for the new year of 2011. It's a little happy spacey synthpop song called "Today's The Day." There's no real story or background behind the song, it's just some ideas and musical phrases that organically emerged while playing around on my musical equipment that sort of capture the hopeful feeling of entering a new year with a sci-fi slant.

I tend to struggle with lyrics maybe coming up with one or two ideas quickly and then struggling to stretch it out to a full song. This song, though, seemed simple enough that I felt like the few ideas that came first were enough to sustain the rest of the song. I wanted the journey to be through the music and harmonies rather than the lyrics, hence the repetition or the lyrics.

While I was making this song, I was thinking it would be a song my wife would really like: a little softer, a little dreamier, and full of arpeggios (she likes those!) She did like it. She says when she hears the line "And when you see us flying overhead" that she pictures people with their arms outstretched flying through the air. So that inspired some of the image for the YouTube video below.

As always, the song was written and performed by me using my standard equipment. All synth sounds in this one come from the Korg R3. The rest from my piano and from plug-ins to my recording software.

Song: My Dreams

Greg Whitehead - My Dreams by GWGumby
Here's one of the things I did over my Christmas vacation. I've got a few more songs in the queue and I'm hoping sometime this year to collect them together and turn them all into an album.

Anyway, this song is called "My Dreams." Once again written, recorded, and sung by me (Greg). The inspiration and idea behind this song came from watching shows like "American Idol" where the people there are so convinced that their dreams of fame and fortune are the most important thing in the world and they'll do anything to make them come true. From that point of view, this song sort of emerged gradually throughout the year in my head and until I finally recorded it last week.

All synth sounds come from the Korg R3. Piano came from my digital piano, and drums from a software plug-in.

Here's the static YouTube video of the same song.

Song: Saturday Night

Greg Whitehead - Saturday Night by GWGumby

Sometimes when I write a song, I get a musical idea and then try to marry it to a lyrical idea. Sometimes it's the other way around. Then sometimes they come at the same time, as with this song. The main line "Don't Go To Bed on a Saturday Night" along with the melody came at once. Then it sat and percolated in my brain for a long time. I liked the line, I liked the melody, but I had no idea why someone wouldn't go to bed on a Saturday night and why I should be telling them not to. So I tried to find other lyrics, but by then the line was so embedded with the melody, I couldn't make anything else work. So I went with it, and here's the result. Basically, it's a song about going out to have fun once in a while. Not very deep, but there you go.

As usual, "Saturday Night" was written, performed, sung and recorded by me.  This one is a bit less synthy than most of my other songs. I used my Roland digital piano for the main piano accompaniment and the electric bass sound as well. The organ sound was from a patch on my classic keyboard expansion card in the JV-1080. The slightly natural sounding drum was from a virtual plug-in instrument on my recording software. That just leaves a few flourishes and synth solo from the Korg R3. I added a bunch of post-effects to the solo which makes it nearly sound like a guitar, but it's all synth.

Here's a YouTube Video with the typical static image:

Song: Video Life

Greg Whitehead - Video Life by GWGumby
Yeah, I know. It's been a while. I haven't given up, I've just had other things to focus on this past year. I took a break after the last song I finished and then found myself hyper-concentrating on a quest to get myself into shape. I've lost 50 pounds so far this year, which has forced me to put some other hobbies on the back burner for a little bit. I just recently re-set up all my equipment in another room and finally sat down to try working on some ideas and somehow this song erupted out in less than 4 days. My hope is to finish a few more before the end of the year with the various holiday breaks coming up.

"Video Life" was sparked by my browsing through the back log of Netflix's "Watch Instantly" section. Once you get past the first few pages of semi-recognizable movies, you eventually start finding some really weird stuff. One title that stood out to me was a horror movie called "The Video Dead."  My mind kind of started riffing on the idea of video coming to life like what's being presented here or in the movie "The Ring."  However, not wanting to dwell on the horror aspect, I switched "Dead" to its natural opposite "Life."  Somehow "Video Life" had a great ring to it.  It brought me back to the 80s with the start of MTV and video shows like "Friday Night Video," and songs like "Video Killed the Radio Star" and "Living On Video."  So now with bands like The Buggles and Devo in mind (with their similar in rhythm song "It's a Beautiful World") I started sketching out the loose concept of someone from the 80s who has made a video that's going to premiere on a show called "Video Life," and how the whole world is now moving to video.  There's also some shades of today's world with reality TV and YouTube and how easy it is to capture and share your life through video.

Like the rest of my songs, "Video Life" was written, performed, sung, and recorded all by me using my usual equipment, the Korg R3 and Roland JV-1080.  (As much as I talked up the iPhone in my last post 11 months ago, it was not used on this particular track.)

The YouTube video is just a still photo. I am fully aware of the irony of writing a song all about video and then posting a static image with it instead. I hope you can all forgive me.

My new instrument: The iPhone

Last November I got an early Christmas present, my new iPhone.

When the iPhone first came out, I wasn't entirely impressed. Sure you could call people and check your e-mail. But it wasn't until they started pushing the "apps" that I started to take an interest. Suddenly the iPhone's functionality was nearly limitless. And then I started to hear about people making music on their iPhone.

One of the earliest, and most amazing things I saw that finally made me want an iPhone was this:

This video showed someone using the iPhone as a breath-controller to play music. At 8:30 he plays an amazing concerto with three other versions of himself.

I realized that the iPhone's microphone, touch, and accelerometer inputs could all be added together to create brand new ways to create music. I now have a whole collection of music apps. From synthesizers and instruments, to drum machines and other percussion, to multi-track recorders, to general purpose music utilities.

The first app I purchased upon getting my iPhone was the Ocarina app for my son.


The next purchase was another app that made me yearn for an iPhone when I first saw it. "Ellatron" is a Mellotron emulator for the iPhone. Mellotrons were used by a lot of prog bands in the 60s-70s like Genesis, Yes, and Moody Blues.


As a keyboard player, I have tried several times, but have never been able to figure out how to play a guitar. So my next purchase was an app called "iShred" which is a pretty amazing electric guitar emulator with the ability to strum the strings via the touch screen. This has way more functionality than I know what to do with, but I've already started recording "guitar parts" on some of my own songs using this app and it sounds pretty good.


Here are just a few of the other apps I've purchased or downloaded:

• megaSynth: an fairly deep analog synthesizer
• GigDaddy: a multi-track recorder
• I Am T-Pain: an app that autotunes your voice
• Metronome: yes, a metronome
• Wickifon: an synth with a very unique style button input
• Magic Stave: an app that tells you what note you are singing or playing

I have a bunch of others that I've collected and still figuring out if I will ever have a practical use for them, and there are others I want to purchase when the time is right. All-in-all, I think the iPhone is really going to make for a great addition to my other instruments, both real and virtual.

My next few songs will probably end up featuring the iPhone in some form or other.

Song: Don't Want A Love Song

Greg Whitehead - Don't Want A Love Song by GWGumby

"Don't Want A Love Song" is my eighth song I recorded in 2009. I originally wrote this song in 1993 while in college. At that time I created a complete backing track for the song, but never had the ability to record the vocals. I used to perform this song acoustically in the mid-90's while I was in the band Piper Down. It was just me and my piano usually about mid-way through our set while the rest of the band took a break. I recorded a semi-live piano/vocal version of the song two years ago at the same time I recorded a bunch of other piano songs, but I've always yearned to go back and do it the way I originally imagined the song back in '93 with the full backing accompaniment plus harmonies.

The story behind this song is simple. I am not a big fan of sappy love songs. So I wrote a sappy love song called "Don't Want A Love Song." See, it's a sappy love song while simultaneously being about someone who doesn't want a love song. Confusing? Maybe. I thought it was clever.

The piano and harpsichord sounds from this song are recorded on my Roland digital piano. Most all other noises, except for maybe the bass and percussion, are done on my Korg R3.

I made my first animated video to go along with the music. Well, okay, it's four frames of animation repeated until the end, but that's all the amount of effort I want to go through for just a background delivery method for the song. I posted this on YouTube last week, and somehow it has been viewed more than any other video of mine already. Somehow the "Love Song" in the title has brought people to it.

Song: Ordinary Day

Greg Whitehead - Ordinary Day by GWGumby

I've finally finished my next song, "Ordinary Day" which is probably my least synth-y song I've done yet. This song is also unique in that it features guitar for the first time played by my brother, Jeffrey.

I actually wrote and started recording this song before my last two that I've published. I believe I started working on it in August. The melody came into my head in church, of all places. (Though I have often found creative inspiration whilst sitting on a pew.) Unfortunately I couldn't do anything about it other than repeat it in my head until I could get home and start playing it on the piano.

I have two initial tests/trials that a new song must pass before I start working on it seriously. The first is that it needs to be memorable. If a song idea comes to me and then I can't recall it later, it probably wasn't good enough to keep. Second, the melody/idea has to hold up to some type of basic instrument accompaniment. I've had plenty of song ideas that seem great in my head, but then when I work out the chords and basic structure on the piano it ends up much less interesting. I have several songs that exist in my head that I have yet to find an interesting accompaniment for, so they stop there.

Needless to say, this one passed both initial trials. I was able to remember the melody well enough to recall it to mind after church and the next day as well. Then playing it on the piano made it even more interesting. The next step was writing some lyrics.

I hate writing lyrics. I'm much more interested in the music--in melody and harmony and taking all these sounds and putting them together like a jigsaw puzzle until a nice picture emerges. Great instrumentals exist, but a song is much more memorable if it is sung.

The opening line came to me first "On an ordinary day..." but then what? I played with a few things until this idea came to mind of a guy who decides to stay home and watch life happen on his HDTV since it's just as good if not better than real life. I was inspired by artists such as Ben Folds, Blur, and ELO all of which often wrote song-stories about quirky people (see "Zak and Sara", "Country House", or "Horace Wimp").

Now I had some words and a melody. Time to start working out the arrangement. The song is a very power pop-style piece, inspired by some of my favorite bands like Jellyfish and Queen. I also had wanted to do something some day with my brother who is an amazingly talented guitarist. So I worked out some piano, drums, and vocals and then I emailed everything to him and asked if he would add some nice Brian May harmony guitars to it.

Jeffrey took it and then disappeared. He sent me one rough draft in September that sounded great. Then a final version in December. In the meantime I wrote four more songs (published two, recording two more at the moment).

After getting the guitar parts, I added them into the mix, added a bassline and a couple extra musical bits, mixed it all up and then poured out what you hear now.

I used my Roland digital piano for the piano parts. The Roland JV-1080 was used for the bass part. The Korg R3 was used for vocoder and minor string/synth flourishes. A VST was used for the drums. Any other non-vocal noise comes from my brother's guitar of which I have no information about to provide here.

Here's another static-image YouTube video with the song:


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Song: Run For Your Life

I just finished my sixth song at the end of October, "Run For Your Life" -- an ode to a failed supervillain.
Greg Whitehead - Run For Your Life by GWGumby

I worked on this song over much of October. The opening melody with harmonies came into my head one night and kept me from sleeping the rest of the night for fear of losing it. Meanwhile, I kept expanding the melody in my mind until I more or less had a song. I just had to write lyrics for it.

Originally, my mind was using the words "Reach for the sky"--which is what I sing right at the first. Eventually as I began playing with different words, "Reach for the sky" became "Run for your life." I imagined someone who had it good early on, but then failed, and that morphed into an idea of a very successful supervillain with intentions of world domination, who nearly succeeds, but then fails and has the entire world after him. So now with what little he has left, he has to leave and start his life over again on a cool space lair or moon base or something.

Once again, everything here was done by me. The bass and synth noises are all performed on the Korg R3. The piano was from my Roland FP-9 digital piano, with added post-effects to make it sound slightly more like a honkey-tonk or chorus hall style. The percussion is all through VST plug-ins in Cakewalk Sonar. I think it all works pretty well together. I'm particularly proud of the piano solo 2/3rds of the way into the song. I'm not always that great of a player, but I can always go back and fix things by hand; however other than some post-quantization (rhythm fixing), I did the entire solo in a single take.

I delayed posting this a few days until I could make an accompanying YouTube video. I was recently looking at viewing statistics, and even though the videos are usually an afterthought, more people view the video than listen to the widget from SoundCloud. So I figured I'd better keep making them. Once again, I just found a bunch of random images from the web to throw together that basically fit the song.