To Chill, or Not To Chill?

Hello, wonder babies!

A Burning Century rehearsals are an insane place. Loud, classically situated in a basement studio, and full of rock madness. I like it that way, it makes me feel authentic when we're sweating bullets and jerking around like we've all gotten rabies. Sexy rabies, that is.

Rabies make outs are hot.

The main thing I worry about is that we're blasting so hard and so heavy, you can't have a moment of chill contemplation in the middle of the show where you can stop dancing madly and start thinking about all kinds of things, including love and death and your sweet grandma... just don't think about them in that order, or you'll be severely depressed (and maybe a little grossed out?).

 Why, grandma, why ?!?

Anyways, at rehearsal yesterday, we had this moment where we weren't practicing written songs. We were just playing around with different sounds and generally having fun.

All of a sudden, there was this moment where the guitars were going and the drums were pounding, but it was rhythmic and chill. Everything I sang felt like Bjork had invaded my body and was coming out of my mouth.

"Bjork mouth" is a known disease in Iceland.  Look it up.

All in all, I figured out that quiet doesn't always mean introspective, and loud driving rhythms don't always mean the sound should be, well, a scream-fest.

To really understand what I'm talking about, you're just going to have to come to a live show. Bjork mouth, no charge :)

Written by Maggie Smith

Musical Talent Scale: An Idiot's Guide

written by Maggie Smith

TOFU POTATO CRUST PIZZA

Hello again, internet. Allow me to be the first to apologize for my absence from this blog for the past...however long it's been (I'm not used to doing it in the correct order). Alas, I am back! And come bearing tasty ideas.

During my leave, I spent some time expanding my culinary library and, one drunken night, stumbled upon a creation which I feel absolutely MUST be shared with the rest of cyberspace. I call it TOFU POTATO CRUST PIZZA and it's technically a total bastardization of the Italian masterpiece, but hell...so is Totino's, and no one has shut them down yet. Are you interested in trying your hand at this delicious mound of edibles? That's what I thought. Now, without further ado...

TOFU-TOPPED, POTATO-CRUST PIZZA

Ingredients for the sauce:

8 oz can tomato sauce

6 oz can tomato paste

6 tbsp fresh oregano

3 tbsp thyme

2 tbsp olive oil

½ tbsp garlic powder

½ large onion, diced and sautéed in butter

salt, pepper, and sugar to taste

For the sauce, you can either make your own or use your favorite (disgusting) pre-packaged and processed tomato-whatever-they-feel-like-putting-in-it. Just look at the ingredients on the label and make your decision from there. The assembly shouldn't be too much to decipher. In a medium saucepan, Heat the olive oil over medium heat and add the tomatoey things. Stir until well blended and homogeneous. Now add your onions INCLUDING THE BUTTER IN WHICH THEY WERE SAUTEED and the spices. Basically, simmer until it's nice and spreadably thick and not runny. Who wants a soggy potato crust, after all?

For the actual pizza:

3 large russet potatoes, peeled and thinly sliced (in half-circles)

1 package super-firm tofu, cubed

16 oz mozzarella cheese

8 oz parmesean cheese

½ cup Panko (Japanese breadcrumbs, but you can use regular ones)

garlic powder and salt to taste

You can prepare your tofu in whatever style you prefer, just keep in mind the context of the flavors. My favorite way is to deep-fry the cubes until they're almost crunchy and toss them in a combination of garlic powder and salt. But seriously, it's whatever you want. You don't even have to use tofu. You can put bacon on it for all I care.

Now, here's where it gets finnicky...

Spray down your pizza pan (yes, you need a pan) with your favorite non-stick spray or give it a light rub-down with about a tablespoon of olive oil. Arrange your potato slices in about 2-3 overlapping layers until they cover the bottom of the pan. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees farenheit and place those starchy morsels under heat for about 15-20 minutes preferably on the middle rack, but I'm not friends with your oven and I don't know its habits.

Take the makings of your potato crust out of the oven and admire the smell. DONT WORRY! The potatoes should not be fully cooked yet. Now, we're going to do something very cool. Without allowing your oven to cool down, turn the broil function on HIGH. While you're waiting for the top element to heat up, grab a handful of each kind of cheese and sprinkle them onto the top of the potatoes. Now, do the same with your breadcrumbs. Place this back in the oven (still on the middle rack- this time I mean it!) for about 3-4 minutes or until you see sufficient toasting/browning on top and remove the pizza. Turn your broiler off and put your oven back at 400.

Now we have a sick-nasty (in a good way) potato crust. It's time for the sauce, and you should know how to apply it. Not too thick, not too thin. Add the rest of your cheese and your prepared tofu. Put the whole mess back into the oven until you can see/smell crispily baked potatoey goodness. Give it a minute to cool and then chow down. If you don't like it, you need to diversify your palate.

DISCLAIMER: William Gaylord, A Burning Century, and their affiliates do not condone or encourage the use of cooking equipment and tools under the influence of alcohol and cannot and will not be held responsible for any mistakes, slip-ups, or acts of God that may happen to your stupid, drunken ass.

Contest Info

A Burning Century is hosting a day long, album pre-release event at Tellus: Northwest Georgia Science Museum next weekend and we want to share the day with four lucky fans. Winners will receive free admission to the museum and an advance copy of our debut album, Lucid Dreaming!


The album is synced to the international and critically acclaimed SpacePark360 Planetarium show. Tellus is debuting the show with A Burning Century's music on Saturday, June 4th! Experience theme park thrill rides scattered all across our solar system while listening to A Burning Century!


To be eligible to win all you have to do is "like" or comment on out Ticket Giveaway promo poster, posted on our Facebook page. If you "like" and comment you will be entered twice into the drawing for the museum passes. Your name will only be entered twice, so multiple comments will not be counted.


Come spend Saturday, June 4th with A Burning Century at Tellus: Northwest Georgia Science Museum!


Contest ends Tuesday, May 31st @ 11:59 p.m.


Winners will be announced Wednesday, June 1st!

Surprise! Girls Are Secretly Hideous.

Disaster can strike at any time. For instance, on a typical morning, I crawl out of bed like a swamp thing and and somehow blollop my way into the office. I usually look something like this:

Imagine looking out the window and seeing that right in front of you, breathing onto the glass. Yikes. It's really a miracle I haven't been staked by one of my co-workers and buried in an unholy grave in the parking lot. Somehow, though, I always manage to trudge to the bathroom and put on makeup. I'm still half asleep and the florescent lighting is unforgiving, but I feel better about myself and it's become an important ritual in my day. Without my makeup, I'm an ogre. With my makeup, I look like this:

I call it stoned & sunburned hooker chic. It’s sweeping the nation, s&s h at a store near you, and it’s way better than looking like a zombie. However, one morning, I forgot my makeup. Cue the horror music.

Yes. One morning I slithered into the office bathroom, and rummaged my purse for my makeup bag. Nothing. Panic set in. There was no way I was going an entire day without blush. Much like Quasimodo, I decided to make the bathroom stall my new home and haunt it for an eternity of ugliness.

However, as the minutes passed, I begin to feel the painful longings that other monsters (like Frankenstein) have felt, in the depths of their hideous loneliness. I longed for the companionship of my facebook, and the warmth of the hot coffee on my desk. I could stand it no longer. I must venture into the world, and try to fix my debased condition. Suddenly, I had a brilliant plan. There was another girl in the office, and SHE MIGHT HAVE BLUSH. I bagged my face and ran to her office.

And that's how I ended up with a permanent makeup stash in the office bathroom. The end.

Written by Maggie Smith

Pentatonics

Did you know that in every culture there is a variation of a five note scale called the pentatonic scale? This past week I have been thinking about this and how cool it is that even though there different styles of music across other cultures there is a thread that ties everything together and creates commonality. For the next few weeks, I thought I might attempt to discuss the differed tonalities and structure of music across the seven continents. Don't worry, it is not going to be intense. I will just be giving a nice broad overview of how music differs from place to place and culture to culture. To give us all a common starting point, I will talk about the basic tonal structure of music next post!

Tyler Cook

Get to know the people behind the music.

Peter Banning

The new ABC album had me doing a lot of searching throughout tracking and mixing. I studied up on known industry figures and came across other interesting characters in the process. These people aren't my heroes nor did they inspire me to make a great album, but it was enjoyable to study up on their own accomplishments and hear their stories. 

I'll share a few of my favorites...

1. Hans Zimmer - Composer: 

This guy is a monster composer. Credits include Blackhawk Down, The Dark Knight, the new Pirates of the Caribbean and my favorite, Inception.

Listen to "Time" from Inception at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srrAm9Eiqcw

I'd never worked on an album that was a score, but Zimmer's music provided insight into getting the job done right. 

2. Rick Rubin - Producer: 

He probably produced your favorite record. This Def-Jam Records co-founder uses simplicity in music, but does things to the max. It's rumored that he places vocalists in a Hyperbaric Oxygen Chamber if they aren't delivering during recording sessions. 

Learn more about Rick Rubin at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Rubin

3. John Feldmann - Producer/Engineer: 

If Rick Rubin didn't work on your favorite record, John Feldmann probably did. The first Feldmann album I bought was Story of the Year's, "Page Avenue". Even though it was released in 2003, it's still one of the best sounding records I can think of. Feldmann's drum sounds, although they are samples, are incredible. They are a testament to his mixing abilities.

Check out Feldmann's credits at: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Feldmann

Take the opportunity to learn about the people behind your favorite music. A lot more went into it than just a pretty face singing into a microphone. 

-Peter

Chase Recommends The Strokes new album, "Angles"

If you haven’t listened to the new Strokes album you’ve either been living under a rock or clearly don’t know what good music is supposed to sound like. Let me show you:

Pretty sweet video too. This song is so catchy I think I just caught a cold listening to it again. The bridge and prechorus are definitely my favorite part with the building of the harmonies and the lyrics that just hit home.

"Don't go that way. I'll wait for you.
I'm tired of all your friends, Knocking down your door.
Get up in the morning and give it your all.
So long, my friend and adversary."

Major props to Albert Hammonds Jr. for getting clean and helping make a phenomenal album in the process. Keep up the good work guys, looking forward to more great music from the Strokes.

On a side note, my favorite trio of white rappers are back. No I’m not talking about the Beastie Boys, whose new album launched this month, I’m talking about The Lonely Island. Andy Samberg and company have put together another slew of hilarious parody raps to be enjoyed by all. Here’s just a sample:

Check it.

Make Sweet Music Like Tyler with AudioTool

It is amazing how much we can do on the internet. I can watch a movie, read a book, read the news, and make music without ever having to shut my laptop or even move. Over the last few months I have really enjoyed getting some quick creativity out on this site: audiotool. I have literally spent hours trying out different sounds, beats, etc. Go give it a try and make some awesome music!

Let us know what you think.

http://burn-studios.audiotool.com/app/chrome

Cars are fun, but Top Gear makes them funny.

By Peter Banning:

I'm headed to Virginia this evening to play audio engineer for a Dodge Race Team documentary. Speaking of television and cars...

  

Top Gear is an incredible television show. Here's a clip I thought I'd share with those who haven't seen it. And please...don't ever say the American Top Gear, which airs on the History Channel, is good. It's terrible and always will be. 

I know you won't watch the entire video. This is the internet...people don't spend seven minutes looking at the same thing on the internet. 

For those who do make it, enjoy!

-Peter

3 Rules to Make Music That Sounds Like Unicorn Orgasms in Outer Space, and Could Possibly Save Your Life: A How To

Written By Maggie Smith.

I’m going to go ahead and let you know that my blog posts will not always be about music. A musician who constantly writes about music on a music blog is so boring that you will stop reading after the first couple of sentences, start hating music, eventually hate children who make music, and suddenly become a supervillain who terrorizes school orchestras while burning copies of “August Rush”.

So. To keep you from that horrible fate, I will just say that this post is a rare gem of musical knowledge! Also, it’s my first post, so if you personally know me, keep in mind that I will pop quiz you later when we’ve both been drinking and if you don’t pass with an A++, I’ll go all Tiger Mom on your ass and beat you with my purse. Just saying.

“Maggie,” you ask. “Get to the point. How do you write music that sounds like unicorn orgasms in outer space?”

As you are all aware, most of my music sounds like mythical creatures copulating in a vaccum, and as the resident expert in this area, I’m here to help. Here are my 3 handy rules to creating song perfection, songs so glorious that you weep with joy and stop doing drugs (if you do them) because now this music is all you need, thereby saving your life. Get out your clicky pen, your battered diary where you wrote all your previousy crappy music, and pay attention. Ehem:

1. Lyrics are for wussies. You should be writing epic Homeric poems, which just happen to slant rhyme the words “orange” and “porridge”.

Seriously, the best thing I ever do for myself when I first want to write a song, is to stop trying to write a song. Free-form poems are your bread and butter. You probably sat down to write because you felt  those pesky things called “emotions”, or you just heard Richard Harris’s song “MacArther Park” (seriously, one of the worst songs I’ve ever heard, the whole thing is about cake. The 60’s, man) and you’re convinced you can do better than that crap. Of course, if you’re slant rhyming “orange” and “porridge”, what the hell song are you even writing? You’re doomed.

2. Drunk people should be able to sing the melody you wrote, and they should want to.

This is a great test. Gather your friends and loved ones, and get them wasted. Proceed to sing the melodies you’ve been testing out in your bathroom. Ignore grandma making out with your best friend Bob. Do people sing along? If yes, you’ve got a keeper. You see, drunk people have absolutely no focus and direction, and getting them to do something in unison (other than form mobs) is incredibly difficult. Melodies are great when they are simple enough for the wasted, yet complex enough to rise above the din of drunken screaming.

3. “Hook” isn’t just a villain in Peter Pan. That’s a four letter word you should keep in your vocabulary.

Musicians hate the “h” word. It’s selling out, it’s cheesy, god forbid their artistic creations should have a structure that comes close to anything Lady Gaga ever made with her weird alien brain. But the fact is that the best, most timeless songs you’ve ever loved had incredible hooks. That’s why you love them. When I’m listening to Joni Mitchell’s “California” and her warbling voice starts up the scale on the word, go figure, “California”, I get this die-hard happy grin because it’s what I’ve been waiting for the whole song. That damn hook, it’s so good! Same goes for Spice Girl’s piano riff in “Wannabe”..... *cough cough* I mean, not Spice Girls, Indigo Girls..... you get my point.

Alright kids. That’s it. Go out and write songs with wild abandon, and I’ll see you at the bar. You did read this, right? What’s rule #2, HMMMM? slowly reaches for tiger mom purse...

Doctor Who?

Greetings, internets...

Today, I want to address the subject of Doctor Who. Many of you may have never heard of it, but it's a fantastic piece of British television programming. It's based around a character called the Doctor who is a being from an alien species known as the Timelords. And just what do you suppose a Timelord does? That's right, kids. Those clever bastards get to travel through time. Though, only the Doctor does that anymore because he killed everyone else from Gallifrey (the Timelord's planet), but that's best saved and explained at a later time, especially so considering the fact that Timelords regenerate their bodies a number of times (fourteen, i think, to be specific) and only really REALLY die after the last regenerated body "dies." As a result, there have been many incarnations of the Doctor, each with their own personalities, respectively. Thus, fans tend to have favorite versions of the Doctor, as each is played by a different actor (but you probably already knew that). This has given rise to the phrase "you never forget your first Doctor" and other such things.

At any rate, back to the less-detailed information...Naturally, any good time traveler needs a decent vessel, and that's why the Doctor has his TARDIS, fifth dimensional interior and all (that means it's bigger on the outside than it is on the inside). TARDIS is of course an acronym for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space. Don't worry that it doesn't make sense. It actually does and you just don't know how time works yet. The Doctor uses his wit, TARDIS, companions, and a nifty-as-all-hell screwdriver to save planet Earth on what is assumed to be a somewhat regular basis, though us regular humans never know anything about it...which is kind of the beauty of the whole thing.

Anyway, I say all this to tell you fine folks that this amazing television program is quite the intriguing piece of pop-culture and that you all should definitely jump on the band wagon (in addition to my band's band wagon...ha...) and grab yourselves some quality time-related entertainment/education. Any questions you have at this point can of course be answered by typing "Doctor Who" into your favorite search engine and clicking the resulting links. Now do as I say and watch this show.

Chow (Ciao),
Will

Interview With The Producer

     My name is Cameron Credelle, Manager for A Burning Century. Below is an email interview I had with the man who brought A Burning Century together.

     Will Wheeler produced A Burning Century's debut album, Lucid Dreaming. He is a television editor for "The Best & Worst of Tred Barta" on the Versus Network. Wheeler started his own music production company, Buck Walters Music Group, in December of 2009. The company specializes in songwriting, scoring and publishing.

Cam: Tell us about yourself and your music background.

Will: I started recording at age fourteen. I'd always record whatever band I was playing drums for at the time. Tracking all those bands was great because I was able to learn so much, even if we were pretty bad. 

I went off to study music business and audio engineering for two years at Belmont University in Nashville. The school was okay, but it wasn't for me. It's really tough to stick with music when Carrie Underwood's producer looks you in the eyes and says, "You're gonna work at Pizza Hut and do music at night for five years and then there's still only a small chance you'll become successful enough to do music full-time." I came across so many negative people up there. It was insane.

I learned a good bit in Nashville, but knew struggling to make a career in the music industry was not something I wanted to do. Music has always been fun for me and I felt the struggle would take away from everything I enjoyed about it.

I finished out my education at Georgia State University and picked up a degree in business. During my time at GSU, I got the opportunity to record some really talented artists, some of which are in ABC.

Cam: Tell us about the SpacePark360 project.

Will: This project was a monster under-taking, but only because we were committed to doing it right.

I was contacted by Tellus Northwest Georgia Science Museum in July of 2010 to do consulting on a planetarium show they had just purchased. Tellus was looking for new music to sync to the show. I was informed that the show was about "roller coasters in space." Having no experience in the planetarium world, my initial reaction was, "What are these guys talking about?" At our first meeting, I sat down in the Tellus planetarium and was immediately impressed with the visual.

There are nine rides, some roller coasters and some "pendulum style" rides. Each ride is located in a different location across our solar system, so there is educational value for those looking for it. Patrons of the show view the image on the planetarium dome as if they are seated on the actual rides. When you stare up at the screen you really do feel the motion.

The show is an out-of-the box concept for the planetarium world. It is based around allowing the viewer to have fun and it definitely accomplishes that. I'll admit that I was grinning like a little kid when I experienced the show's first ride, "Quicksilver".

Tellus gave me a shot at writing and syncing up one song to a ride before we moved the project forward.

I've done projects across the board as far as music genres go, but I knew this album had to be rock. It was a great opportunity to get loud and create a huge sound.

I contacted Maggie Smith to help get the job done. Maggie is an incredible talent. She’s a great singer, a great songwriter, a great pianist and a great painter. She's an "artist" to the full-extent of the word. We had worked together quite well in the past and I knew I could count on her to help secure the project.

We also pulled Will Gaylord on board. He's young, but his playing is fantastic. He and I had done multiple projects with one another.

Both Gaylord and I, along with Chase Dudley, had played some shows during the summer of 2010 with Maggie as the "Maggie Smith Band". The band had built up a small set list of original music. We chose to record one of the band's faster songs, "Watch Me Go", and try to sync it up with a SpacePark360 roller coaster.

Recording the song was easy. It was the syncing that was a nightmare. I spent days chopping and editing, trying to get the song to fit with the ride. The end result was a perfect fit, but I'll admit we got lucky. We took a song with an already set tempo and format, took it apart, and then rebuilt it to match the visual. It was a pain.

To make a long story short, Tellus loved it, we wrote and produced nine more songs (one ride has two songs) and here we are today with A Burning Century's debut album, "Lucid Dreaming". The whole process was ten months long, consisting of writing and recording on weekends and mixing on weeknights. There were many times we scrapped songs completely, then there were others that the songs just fell in to place (my favorite kind).

Chase Dudley came onboard to write with us and then Tyler Cook joined.  A few songs in, the band felt, "Hey, we have some really really good stuff. We would be idiots to sync it to a planetarium show and then leave it alone."

The "Maggie Smith Band" re-formed as "A Burning Century".

C: Tell us more about "the process".

W: My number one priority was to match the music to the visual. I wanted every single note to coincide with what was on the screen. Did we get everything to match? No. But we came very close. We were limited by our drive to create really good songs. It was a game of give and take. If the ride was going to be perfectly synced, the formatting of the music would lose a little and vice versa.

I think we created the perfect balance. It was surprising to see the timing of the rides coincide with general music structure.

The creation of every song/ride combo was gone about differently, but it always started with us watching the ride over and over again. We'd account for speed, motion and sometimes the color tones of the ride location were factored in.

If any band member had something they were working on, we'd preview it with the ride. However, a majority of the songs were written on the spot. In one instance, the drums were written and recorded before any of the other instruments or vocals had been written.

We would tweak things as we went. Once the chord structure and timing were correct, Maggie would go off with an mp3 file and work on the vocals. Initial recording sessions would leave behind the general core of the song, then I'd come in to produce and arrange.

Like I said, every song was different, but this was the general process.

I really feel like we nailed it. Our formula was exactly what the show needed. The music is current and matches the rides. Maggie's vocals have a universal vibe to them and those who don't enjoy rock can still appreciate what the music does for the show. We took risks, but we still managed to keep it sonically friendly for all ages that see SpacePark360.

C: What is your favorite song from the album?

W: “Summer Storm” is really well done and I love listening to it again and again, but the title track, “Lucid Dreaming”, is my favorite. That song was a blast to work on and it was a turning point for everybody involved with the project. During “Lucid Dreaming” tracking, everybody realized this was more than just a score and that we really were going to have a great album.

The song is so simple, but it's big and has complexities. The harmonies are tight and the openness of the verses makes the chorus even bigger. The message is great too.

C: When and where can we see the SpacePark360 show with ABC's music?

W: The show launches June 4th at Tellus Science Museum in Cartersville, Ga. The band will also be there to view their work in a planetarium for the first time. It's been a long process, so everyone is pretty excited to see and hear the finished product.

The show will continue to play daily at Tellus throughout the summer.

C: Anything else we should know about the SpacePark360 project?

W: The guys at Tellus were incredible clients. We really were given total creative freedom. Tellus took a big risk by going with us, but it has definitely paid off for both parties. How many other science museums have backed a rock album? There can't be many. It was great working them and I highly recommend everyone go visit their incredible facility.

Q: Thank you for your time!

For more information visit: facebook.com/aburningcentury

Contact Will Wheeler at: buckwaltersmusicgroup@gmail.com