IMPORTANT UPDATE: 2.0

"Themed Weeks"

Back before the beginning of this project I made a list of rules. Here they are:

• The 24 period per song can only be between 00:00 and 23:59.

• The piece of music can be any length (so jingles and short music motifs are OK, provided they are complete and not just "the beginnings of bigger songs")

• The music can be in any style / genre of music.

• Other people can collaborate on a piece, but it has to be completely original and not a reworking of previous song ideas / re-hashing of old riffs.

• No covers. No remixes.

From here.

However, I also decided that each new day had to be a completely new idea and song. I.e. There can be no preparing tomorrow's or next week's songs today. The process has to be spontaneous and about spare of the moment creativity. It has to be about working to a strict deadline and seeing what you can pull out of the bag.

There is one issue with this though: Back before this project started (and while it has been going on) I've been talking to people about the idea of having "themed weeks", where a week would be dedicated to writing songs in a specific style. I really love this idea, because it really opens up the potential for all sorts of craziness! Some themes I've thought of so far include:

• A week of noise pieces (electronics / broken machines etc)
• A week of a capella pieces (no rules on any style of music, just that they must ALL be made solely with voice)
• A week of METAL / FOLK / ROCK / JAZZ, (delete as necessary: i.e. genre themed weeks!)

More abstracted themes could include:

• Only use analogue gear (no laptop for a week, this would be really tough actually, but I do have an old cassette four track here)
• No drums
• Only drums / percussion
• Themes based on films / books / tv series / games
• Write based on a particular era of music (60s, 70s, 80s etc)
• A week of very quiet pieces
• A week of very loud pieces
• A week without any reverb or delay plugins ( I use them a lot!!)

Anyway, you probably get the idea. So I felt I should make people aware that this will happen soon: Occasional "Themed Weeks" for the SADFAY Project. I do apologise if, to some of you, it seems like I'm suddenly bending the rules or cheating, but I had discussed the idea of "Themed Weeks" long before January 2011. I think occasional Themed Weeks (and it's important to remember I would only do themes occasionally) would make for more interesting and enjoyable output and would involve more interesting creative experiences with collaborators.

I promise I will still stay true to not writing (or premeditating) anything for each song before each day, but obviously using Themed Weeks has implications for how original each day's new work is. That's the only thing I am a little concerned about: Themed Weeks slightly breach the rule about not premeditating any of the song before each new day. But this seems a petty thing to get in the way of what is essentially going to bring a lot more life to this project.

I believe it's still possible to write a completely original song every day, even if you already have some idea of a certain set of genres or rules you are going to work within. And I guess you'll just have to take my word for it that I'm not going to cheat or premeditate the songs that are part of these "Themed Weeks".

I'd very interested to hear any feedback on this from the followers of this project. If enough people say they don't like it, then I'll scrap the idea, but otherwise I think it's going to be a good way forward.

Cheers!