about
Heard this story about beatbox house on NPR in March, and they gave a brief tutorial to the interview host of how to make each sound for each drum.
www.wbur.org/hereandnow/2023/03/08/beatbox-house-state-department
Always felt in my head that I could beatbox, but never tried to track it, and after working on this song, it was probably hubris. Listening to this NPR piece it sounded like there was more to it. I was particularly interested in how one of the members could handle a polyphonic melody between a buzzy bass note and a higher note. I don't know how to do that, so I looked up some videos here:
lmgtfy.app?q=how+to+beatbox+two+notes+at+once
on beatboxing multiple tones:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx4GeJI-ZlQ
www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbLB65abriM
Also these on overtone singing:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=UHTF1-IhuC0
www.youtube.com/watch?v=w42DQoZ-z_c
I ended up not being able to do most of these fancy techniques reliably or at all, but I was able to approximate the simple humming with mouth drums which you hear in the intro, as well as a synth-like sound from a different video that I watched. I relied on these two for my learning:
on humming while making drum sounds
www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbLB65abriM
beatbox synth tones
www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBA4tUuQXHY
I then tried to come up with a backdrop story for how and why a band would need to beatbox for a big show with some absurdist humor (my favorite kind, but doesn't land with everyone, but after last round I've already resigned myself to elimination). I really pushed myself on the strings and orchestra last round and taking away my guitars and bass, so I tried to continue that theme this round as well by taking away my instruments too.
lyrics
Ad libbed intro
Our instruments just became sentient and left; something about ChatGPT, and after all that inappropriate touching and plucking said something about the me too movement. They threatened to sue. The bass said something about the me too movement, we don't want to get sued. Did somebody say BASS BASS BASS BASS (Not now, DAN, this is serious!)
Hello Cleveland
(This is Jersey, you idiot!)
So what do we do now, they seem pretty pissed?
V1
Already lost,
Beaten down
too tired from dragging hollow smiles across town
Ruts I'd tilled,
This wasted way
Walls stretched too high to wave "good morning" to the day
I fell down
Ears filled with dirt
I waited to be swallowed by the calm and hungry earth
PCH
Then I heard it
My heart still beating
Forgetting's just a sin
'til we remember
how to hear again
CH
Take the music from my heart
I give the music from my mind
Have the music from my body
I'll give you all that I can find
When there's no sound inside me
I'll pound and stomp the ground
And even when I'm lost, it's always found
There's music all around
V2 Rap Verse
By the time I grew up I was falling apart
You can't bank the good when you save in a broke heart
Grab the choke start it up again and again,
Got this rad melody buzzing now with my friends
Now I'm looking sharp, see, and I won't be flat,
no F's spared for doubts under a panicking hat
Gee, minor changes have a major impact, adding up when they stack, and it's a knowable fact
That every symphony started from a single note of hope someone wrote,
I'm here to pay it forward so you don't have to pay it back
PCH
Then I heard it
My heart still beating
Forgetting's just a sin
'til we remember
how to hear again
CH
Take the music from my heart
I give the music from my mind
Have the music from my body
I'll give you all that I can find
[[We did it guys! I'm turning into a guitar!]]
When there's no sound inside me
I'll pound and stomp the ground
And even when I'm lost, it's always found
There's music all around
[[Rising Guitar Scale? Bridge?]]
CH
Take the music from my heart
I give the music from my mind
Have the music from my body
I'll give you all that I can find
When there's no sound inside me
I'll pound and stomp the ground
And even when I'm lost, it's always found
There's music all around
Outro
Ad libbed outro
Yeah! Woo, we did it....uh...hey, do any of you guys know how to change back...?
credits
license
