Madeleine McMillan

More EP Tracking Progress

2009-05-13T22:45:00.000-07:00

School is now officially over for the year! I managed to get a bit of tracking done before the year was done. Rob Hokamp layed down some awesome electric guitar parts for a few songs. And Ben, as always, did a fabulous job of engineering.

EP PREVIEW

2009-05-01T09:40:00.000-07:00

I have posted quite a few photos and tidbits about the recording of my new EP. I bet you're wondering what it sounds like! this is a very VERY rough mix, courtesy of the fabulous Ben Goldstein. Since it's in it's rough stages, all suggestions and comments are welcome.

My New Mini Music Video

2009-04-30T21:10:00.000-07:00

Thanks to my wonderful mother and her wonderful connections, I was fortunate enough to have this mini music video made for me. it's only 46 seconds long. The song is a demo from 3 years ago. BUT it's a cute little (slightly awkward perhaps?) representation of myself. ENJOY!

EP Tracking Progress

2009-04-14T23:13:00.000-07:00

Slowly but surely the EP is coming together. We worked on piano tracks, which I am very happy with. You can see Ben Goldstein setting up his various micing techniques above. Alex Frenkel was kind enough to stop by the session to play some acoustic guitar for me. He did a fabulous job. The beautiful Guild guitar was lent to us by Dave McNamara, so he deserves some credit too! We ended up working until 2 am. All in all, it was a great night. Thanks guys!

EP Tracking Progress

2009-04-10T07:40:00.000-07:00

On wednesday night we finished our bass tracks. All the studios on campus were booked, so we turned Ben Goldstein's practice room into an isolation booth. We also turned the 3rd floor hallway into our control room, thanks to Ben's portable recording gear and the couch from the green room. Not to worry, we returned the couch to it's rightful place before we left the music building. All in all, it was a fun and productive night.

My First YouTube Video

2009-04-01T20:57:00.001-07:00

I made my very first YouTube video. It's a 1:30 min commercial for myself featuring my two pugs, Winnie and Lilah. Hope you enjoy it! I know I enjoyed filming for it!

A Room With No Sun

2009-04-01T12:00:00.000-07:00

For a while my cute little usb powered external hard drive was MISSING! I found it today, and inside it were some hilarious pictures from my first session with Ben Goldstein. This is definitely not the most interesting picture of myself, however, I felt it was a perfect representation of how most musicians feel at the end of a long recording session in a soundproofed room with no windows; tired, confused, and... tired. You walk in while the sun is up... and wonder where it went when you leave.
Have you listened to my demo on my myspace recently?

Dear Madeleine, Where Have You Been!?!?!

2009-03-26T13:11:00.000-07:00

I spent the past week in Jamaica. This is a photo of the stop we made on the bus from the airport to our final destination. I did a bad job of taking other photos due to how much time I spent lying around doing NOTHING under an umbrella. My skin is too pale to even consider tanning. SPF 50 is where it's at. I'm not into skin cancer.

Tracking Progress for my New EP!

2009-03-26T12:53:00.000-07:00

As some of my readers may know, I am working on a new EP with the fabulous producer/engineer/drummer Ben Goldstein.
Things are going slow. We have encountered many obstacles. It is a learning process and we are definitely learning a LOT.
Here are some of the lessons we've learned so far:
1. Recording guitar tracks in the tunnels underneath the purchase mall is NOT wise. Just as we finished setting up a truck pulled around the corner and we had to pack up and get out of the way!
2. Recording guitar tracks in the stairwell in the back of the music building behind studio B sounds awesome. We encountered no problems. It was fabulous.
3. The cute little wooden lamp sitting unused in studio A is a perfect way to brighten up that very very dark stairwell.

A Songwriter's Confession

2009-03-11T19:20:00.000-07:00

I LOVE MAINSTREAM POP MUSIC.

My beloved friend and I have two tickets to see Britney Spears this saturday! I am so excited.
As a child of the 90's, I can't help but love Britney. I was at the peak of my "tween" girliness when she came out. Right after the Spice Girls!
Going to see Britney Spears is not about celebrity status or loving HER per se... it is about being in a huge crowded room with the music blasting so loud that NO ONE CAN HEAR ME SINGING ALONG. YES.

The Funniest Songwriting Collaboration Ever

2009-03-04T15:59:00.000-08:00

Last year, as a freshman, I took a class called 'Culture and Society in the West" with a Studio Composition Professor named Jim McElwaine. Jim turned "Culture and Society in the West" into a class that should have been called "My Favorite Cultures and Societies throughout History." He really likes China (and having traveled there this past summer I am quite a fan myself).
We learned many things in Jim's class. We discussed the Analects of Confucius and translated Chinese poetry from word for word english translations into idiomatic english. We discussed disco frequently. We learned all about how Jim is rumored to have written the theme songs to The Muppet Babies and Fraggle Rock. I suppose we learned a little bit about western culture too...
For our Final, Jim decided we should all do our own creative projects based on what we learned in class. So I got together with two of my classmates, Ben Goldstein, and, Will Sweeney-Samuelson to write a song. Ben and Will had previously been writing a song about their Wii system, and we decided to use the chord progression for our song. Because it had been a love song about a Wii, we decided to write a love song for Jim. How sweet. We used the chinese poem translations to get going on the lyrics... and then went on to make many references to Jim and his class lectures.
We spent about 3 hours writing the song over the course of 2 days and booked out 1 evening (a total of 6 hours) in the studio. After we were done laying down tracks, Ben stayed up until 6 am mixing the tracks so they would be done for class the next day.
My father often requests that I play this song during car rides. He laughs every time we get to the "I love you more than squirrel" line in the bridge. Enjoy!!!

Ben Goldstein: Drums, Engineering, Production
Will Sweeney-Samuelson: Vox, Guitar
Madeleine McMillan: Vox, Piano

p.s. have you been to my myspace?

A week in the life...

2009-02-24T19:47:00.001-08:00

This past week has been intense. I have been writing quite a bit! I am very close to finishing two different songs... starting to demo one tomorrow so maybe that will be available for blog listening soon!
I also officially started recording for my new EP. So far we only have drum tracks but I hope to be adding guitar and bass in the next week.
I'm also starting to think more in depth about production. This is a step I have often skipped on past recordings. I am realizing... production is HARD. Especially for my own music. Once I've played through my song enough times I completely lose perspective. I am thankful to have such a brilliant team of musicians working with me. They have been so helpful.
I am so excited to be working on a new recording! My last even semi-professional sounding recordings were made 3 years ago. I have come a long way since then. You can hear them here.

"Blue Eyes"

2009-02-17T20:53:00.000-08:00

In my first post I spoke a wee bit about the difference between personal writing and professional writing. My original song Blue Eyes fits into both categories, so I think it deserves it's own post.
Blue Eyes is one of the better songs I've written. It came from an unusual place in my head and went through quite a large transformation from start to finish.
I first got the idea for this song on vacation in Cape Cod during a dinner conversation with my parents. I have no recollection of what the conversation was actually about... but when my mother described [whatever it was] as brilliant blue, something clicked in my head. I started writing the lyrics immediately. I was hooked on the idea of brilliant blue [something]. Eventually I decided on eyes.
My boyfriend at the time happened to be staying with us. We were talking, him lying down, me sitting up and looking down at him. He didn't actually have blue eyes but that didn't stop me! He was looking up at me and something clicked again.
I managed to get "Your brilliant blue eyes looked up at me..." but had no idea what to write after that. I came back to the song months later thinking I could use my tiny little unused idea as a way to practice writing professionally instead of personally. I decided to turn it into a breakup song. The lyrics describe a snapshot of a couple looking at each other, the narrator knowing that the relationship is over, and the other character not wanting it to end.
The arrangement came together over a long period of time. At first I intended for the song to just be me and an acoustic guitar. I performed it that way several times and even made a (crappy) recording. After forming a band I changed my mind! With their help I was able to bring the song to life. The acoustic version really wasn't cutting it.
Here is the finished version of "Blue Eyes."

PUGS!!!!!

2009-02-17T18:53:00.000-08:00

My younger sister has been obsessed with pugs since she was 3 years old. When my parents finally gave in and let us a have a dog it HAD to be a pug. Eventually we ended up with two!!! I couldn't possibly love them more. Their names are Winnie (the fawn one) and Lilah (the black and white one). Winnie is 5 and Lilah is 3. Winnie is the "lapdog." She loves people. When guests come to the house she leaps into their laps. Whenever she goes to the neighborhood dog run she sits in the laps of strangers. Don't be fooled though! She is extremely lazy (all of her favorite activities involve little to no movement). Lilah is very different from Winnie. She is the baby of the family. While Winnie is placid, Lilah is startled easily and scared by many things. She has a funny habit of barking at the television only when someone pauses it. Lilah licks EVERYTHING! There are no exceptions. If it's close enough to her face she will lick it. Winnie and Lilah complement each other perfectly. They are the most loveable little alien-like animals in the world. Luckily Purchase College is very close to my house in New York City, so I get to see them often.

The Transition from Personal to Professional

2009-02-09T14:05:00.000-08:00

Being a Studio Composition Major at Purchase College is harder than I anticipated. As an adolescent I always wrote songs because I needed to. Someone would piss me off or hurt my feelings and I would go home and write a song about the experience. Things have changed a lot since then. Now that I am studying songwriting as a real profession my approach to writing has totally changed. I am not as prolific as I once was because I am thinking too hard!

I always used to say that I wanted to transition from being an emotional songwriter to a writer that could write about ANYTHING. I am transitioning, but very very slowly.