Making my EP

My EP consists of four original songs, three of which are new and I wrote this year. I have been working on my songwriting skills and style for about four years but have only in the last six months started to write originals that I was happy with.

Social media is a very effective and useful platform for a musician to use to grow their audience. I will be uploading my EP to my Soundcloud, linking it to my Instagram and Snapchat and uploading videos of me performing them to my YouTube channel.

My EP - https://soundcloud.com/emily-laura-snuggs/sets/ep-emily-snuggs

Planning my EP

I had eight original songs, some completed and some almost finished, that I had to decide between and choose which ones I should perfect and include in the EP. All of my original songs are not too upbeat, acoustic sounding and emotional songs but I wanted to choose the ones I thought suited my voice best, showcased my talent and showed my style as a musician best.

'Fix A Broken Heart' is the first original song I recorded. I was experimenting with my new equipment and my new MIDI cable as I'd never used one at home before so I used my keyboard instead of my piano. I recorded the song 'I Don't Know' on my piano and defiantly prefer the sound of the piano more, however because I filmed it as a video as well, I recorded the vocals at the same time as the piano which meant that I couldn't adjust the levels of the vocals as much without making the piano loud too. Next time I record piano I will experiment with adjusting the levels of the vocals before recording, or just record the piano and vocals separately. Recording the vocals separately to the keyboard in 'Fix A Broken Heart' meant that the vocals were stronger than if I were to have played and sang at the same time. Also, when I play the keyboard I can attach it to my Audio Box and have it come through a different channel to my vocals, and therefore can adjust the keyboard and vocal levels separately, something I can't do with just one microphone if I use the piano.

When I recorded 'Darling' and 'Naive', I played the guitar at the same time as singing, something I find easier than doing with the piano because of my guitar pick up which means, like the keyboard, I can put it through my Audio Box and have it come through a different channel to my vocals and then alter the levels afterwards.

I never do anything too fancy with the production of my originals or even the covers I record, as it's not my style to have elements such as programmed MIDI beats and backing tracks. I add some reverb so my recordings don't sound too raw but like to keep the acoustic sound to a lot of them as that's one of the elements that I think makes my music unique and my lyrics stand out more.

Production

I was thinking of using a photo of me performing, to show my passion for playing my own original music, as the cover for my EP but decided to go with a photo of a setup of my music equipment that I took during the recording one of my original songs 'I Don't Know', which is on the EP. I see a lot of modern album artwork that includes professional, done up photos of artists without any reference to their music in the photo which is good advertisement for the branding of a project such as writing an album but isn't as personal and doesn't give much of an indication to what kind of music is on the album.

An example of this is Ariana Grande's first album. This album doesn't have any reference to music apart from her as a vocalist on the cover. Like I mentioned this is good for people who are already interested in her music and the brand her and her management have created, but isn't very insightful as to what style her music is or what to expect apart from that it is most likely modern, but doesn't it appear very unique at first glance.

A cover I took inspiration from that does show a passion for music is Shawn Mendes' most recent album cover in which he is against a plain wall playing his electric guitar, an instrument he famously plays on stage. It's still got the creative references to the theme and brand of his album with the coloured font and wall, as green and blue is the colour theme for this album, but the focus is on him just playing a guitar, which makes his passion for music feel more real than someone who just has a head shot on an album without any reference to their music. The fact that he is on his own without any other noticeable items other than his guitar in the shot is a statement that this album started with just him and his guitar, as he writes all of his own songs. It feels more personal and makes it easier to understand his involvement when you can see it on the cover of an album. This is why I chose to use the photo of my recording setup, as it's a way to show the work that goes into the project of writing and recording an album.