crossing the finishing line

It's done. The album is ready. My label is starting the promotion and hopefully in September it will be realesed. This is the final and definitive tracklist:

1 – Sinner (prod. Freshbeat)

2 – Soulfood (prod. Hiko)

3 – Mary has (prod. Hiko)

4 - Your touch (prod. Freshbeat)

5 – I can teach you feat. Martina May (prod. Hiko)

6 – So high (prod. Freshbeat)

7 – Get me mad (prod. Hiko)

8 – What they want (prod. Freshbeat)

Bonus tracks:

9- Chillin feat. Brain (prod. Freshbeat) extracted from the Freshbeat "story-tellers" album

10 - Soli (prod. Shablo)

I feel so strange and impatient... relaxed and nervous at the same time!

I will soon update the myspace and as soon as the album will be out, I will publish the lyrics on this page.

Keep pushing it!

one love

The ultimate sinner (updates)

Hi Everybody! It hasn't been an easy time for me since the last post I've been publishing. I couldn't afford translating all the stuff I've been writing for the Italian version of this site/blog and In any case I find it useless.
I will therefore try to summarize the main updates of my work, so that whoever is interested in reading what's happening to me, can be satisfied and hopefully not bored.

First all of, I've found a new beatmaker. At the beginnining I was pretty convinced I would have used only one producer, but song after song, I realized the risk of a strong similarity between every track was too predictable.
This is why, after a casual listen to some instrumentals of this guy, I decided he was the man! He's called HIKO and you can listen to some of his stuff in here.

He is the producer of my following tracks:

"Mary has" (sin: ENVY)
"soulfood" (sin: GLUTTONY)
"you know how to get me mad" (sin: RAGE)
"I can teach you" (sin: PRIDE)

The rage track has been changed several times. I was not very convinced of the first draft with Fresh instrumental, the song was great but it had nothing to do with the general atmosphere of the album. This new version, is still the most "different" comparing to the other tracks, but I can hear it meets my taste more completely.


Another news is about the featurings of my album.

Two tracks will be featuring 2 artists:

"I can teach you" features Martina May which you can appreciate in all her charming and beautiful voice on her YOUTUBE channel.

"What they want " is the last track I've recorded and it is about GREED. This smooth and Erikah Badu-style of song will feature a great French singer called EDSON NESSEE and you can hear something about him here.

Talking about the actual situation, I can proudly say I AM DONE.

I have recorded all the tracks, and I am only waiting for Edson part for finishing my last song.

The Tracklist of my album will be the following:

1 - SEVEN prod. Fresh
2- SOULFOOD prod. Hiko
3- YOUR TOUCH prod. Fresh
4- I CAN TEACH YOU prod. Hiko feat. Martina May
5- SO HIGH prod. Fresh
6- (you Know) HOW TO GET ME MAD prod. Hiko
7- MARY HAS prod. Hiko
8 - WHAT THE WANT prod. Fresh feat. Edson Nessee

I will probably add one ghost track, just to avoid any person saying the album is too short. Of course it IS short, but I've concentrated on the quality, not on the quantity. And the price will fairly consider the numbers of tracks in it..

I will be mixing with my sound engeneer all the tracks during the next two weeks and hopefully the master will be ready for half May.

Next Sunday It's photo shooting time. And the PHOTOGRAPHER in charge is Malì Serena Aurora . A great artis, really. I just can't wait to be there!

Let's get in touch for the next updates. Once I'll have the master on my hand, hundreds of independent labels will receive it. All what will come afterwards, will be history.

(yeah, I like dreaming)....

The beatmaker

This work would not exist if I had not been given a "musical carpet" especially built for the undersigned.

Today it is difficult to find valid people that put their talent to your disposal.
Especially, with honest and genuine purposes.

And it's difficult to also find them because of the enormous quantity of beatmakers on our peninsula and often they are just not that much known.

Myspace seems to be invaded by djs and producers, 16 years-old, 20 years-old, 30 years-old, some are good, some are NOT.. They have different schools of thought and they use different techniques.

Personally I have always preferred the beatmaker sampling the sounds or the loops from old vinyls of soul, funk and rythm&blues.

It's only a matter of tastes of course, entirely disputable, but the world's beautiful because it is various.
It is also often thanks to this type of producers that I have succeeded in discovering back music artists of the sixties and seventies which have been unnoticed despite their talent and their divine jobs!These artists have contributed to my artistic growth and they have become integral part of my musical influences, for which I will spend a word in the next chapter.

Of course, I have never disdained the instrumentals created with the solo use of drum, bass, synth etc but the sampled sounds, even if few and hardly perceptible, have always transmitted me that necessary vibe for the creation of the atmosphere to which I would have given life with my voice.

This variety of techniques for the instrumental production makes if difficult to find that kind of beatmaker corresponding to your musical personality, and who can exactly understand what are the sonorities you are looking for..

And if you get to find these producers, they are usually very busy, and despite the artistic feeling, it is difficult to get along with them as the human side is concerned. And personnaly I take this side a fundamental one, since the long road that brings to the creation of a disk needs patience and continuoussupport, as well as a sincere and constructive exchange of opinions.

Fortunately, I haven't struggled too long before I could find the perfect producer for me.

To say the truth I don't even remember how I got to reach him. I have perhaps listened to one of his instrumentals in one of the CDs to which I have collaborated and when I have been told he was an Italian beatmaker, I started the merciless search!


Once I found him, I have not had any doubt anymore: him, Fresh, has been sent me as an angel to produce All of my tracks.

The feeling I had initially, has been consolidated when my eyes fell on its list of artistic influences:


HipHop Inspirations: dj premier & gangstarr-pete rock- rza & all the wu tang clan- mathematics-4th discipline 9th wonder- j dilla (R.I.P.!!) showbiz-dj jazzy jeff-dj red alert- dj babu-the beatmekerz-alchemist marley marl-diamon d-lord finesse biz markie-prince paul- dr.dre-the roots-bobbito- dj spinna-mr complex kev brown-oddisee-ill mind ayatollah-de la soul- a tribe called quest- dj hi-tek blackstar-mosdef-all the rawkus artists dj scratch-dj skizo-just blaze kanye west-rjd2- mobb deep- nas & all the queensbridge artists trackmasters-dj khalil-madlib oh no-mf doom...................... .....the HIP HOP CULTURE....... .....ONE LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FUNK, SOUL & JAZZ inspirations: george clinton & the parliament funkadelic-the delfonics-the O'jays- the dramatics-5th dimension earth wind & fire-don julian & the larks al green-marvin gaye-steve wonder dennis coffey-bobby caldwell- bobby womack-eddie floyd duke ellington-chuck mangione bernard pretty purdie-ann peebles ahmad jamal-edwin starr-curtis mayfield franco micalizzi-jhonny pate- gill scott heron-j.j.johnson-jerry butler lonnie liston smith-lyn collins-lou rawls main ingredient-bar-kays-isley brothers harold melvin & the blue notes-chi-lites maceo parker-fred wesley-pee wee ellis minnie ripperton-MOTOWN-marva whitney quincy jones-rick james-roberta flack- roy ayers-patrice rushen-t-connection smokey robinson-donny hathaway- undisputed truth-booker-t-herbie hancock donald byrd-groover washington the24 carat black-b.t.express-the meters the temptations-the wild magnolias willie hutch-love unlimited orchestra luther vandross-roger troutman.........


Irony of the fate, while I was about to contact him, he had already sent a zipped file to my husband (who is himself also preoaring his solo album) with some of his available instrumentals.

You can easily imagine the consequences: 7 of these instumentals were already MINE! lol


Our job is procceding quickly now. And this is only the beginning....

About the name of the tracks

As you may easily imagine from the title of the album, the "leitmotiv" of my work is the seven capital sins.
As a matter of fact, the EP will contain 7 tracks (+ 1 ghost-track which is absolutely essential! :D) and each of these trackes will deal with a capital sin.

The first issue I have to solve is the tracks titles:
I could simply use the original nouns of the sins, this is to say:

Pride,
Greed,
Envy,
Anger,
Lust,
Gluttony,
Sloth.

However, I am not fully convinced and satisfied about them, since the way I will deal with these topics will not be limited to a simple definition of the sin.

What I would like to do is to use the sins as a point of departure for building up a song which could be a story telling, a melodic voyage, or a confession...

This is why I still have to meditate upon the titles issue. Will I use the official terminology or will I find the way to give each title a specific meaning according to the song writing?

In the meantime, the album concept has been fixed and nobody can touch it! This post witnesses that, today, June 17th, 2009, this idea belongs to me and nobody can steal it! :D

Obviously, all kind of suggestion or idea you would like to share with me is welcome!

Preface

31 years-old. It's time for me to make my biggest dream come true. I want to leave my mark on this journey called "life".
I've always been in love with soul music. I write my music, I record it and together with my group (FNO), I have already released two albums which are some very "niche" products, but well apreciated from critics. I am definitely underground. Street. My soul has the taste of asphalt mixed up with the smell of flowers.
I am a simple woman, married, dealing with a boring-8 hours per day-job. But soon after I leave my employee life, I lock myself in my recording studio which once was a garage.

Before entering in what would have become our house, me and my husby already had in mind the same thought at the same time.
While the state agent was praising the size of the garage and the importance of having all that space left after the car was inside, me and my man were traveling with our imagination and were already building in our mind what would be really built one year afer: or own "baby" recording studio.
I still remember that december 31st of 2006, 11.30PM, when, both dirty with glue, we were placing the last noise reducing pannels on the walls. Once done, we toasted to the new year and to our common dream which came tue.
In that studio, we recorded the tracks of our second album and I, as a soulsinger, I had the chance to record more than 20 tracks for several collabos, mixtapes and compilations.

I write and record my songs in english because in my opinion this language suits better that music genre. But I have also created some italian stuff.

Most of the time, I have been satisfied with my works, with my prjects to be, with the "success" of my group (that I will introduce in a next chapter) and with the newest creation of my soul band "FunkAddiction", which members are talented musicians playing funky, blues, and soul.

Nevertheless, one particular event has fueled my dreams...

Few months ago I was reading a black music magazine when I opened an article of 4 pages dedicated to a young woman who has released her album. 4 pages but 2 were pictures of her half naked. I red her interview and checked her myspace to feed my curiosity and I discovered a banal voice, and no personality in her singing and in her tracks.
I downloaded her album and tried not to skip any track. My final judgement: 6.5/10.
At that stage I realised that it was not fair to blame her for having released a CD too soon, but I was the one to be blamed because I was wasting my time in too many fruitless projects giving me not much visibility.

That's when I asked myself: hey, whatthahellareyoudoin??

Thanks to this girl (who I still respect for having left her first mark on this life and who I am sure will improve with time and experience), I have found the necessary power for providing myself all the basic elements I needed for starting my preject. And in less than two weeks I have held in my hands all the instrumentals created for my album-to-be, froma very competent beatmaker.

I have drawn my action plan and for the first time in my life I have a precise idea of the paths I will have to follow.
Despite my disorganise character and my way of being a scatterbrain, I have a project in my hands and if this will be feed properly and in the established lead-time, it could represent a turning point in my life.

By turning point, I don't mean poping up in television programs from your brainstroming, nor making business and becoming a milionaire!
What I mean is having the possibility of getting myself into it, that much that it would allow my music and my personnality to touch you anyhow.
I wanna be known and recognised for who I am from the soul specialists and from the underground world. Where everythig is filled with respect and honour.

I have challenged myself: this work has to be finished within january 2010. Staightforward, with no loss of concentration and motivation.

Let's do it!