Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by uncbilly » Fri May 09, 2014 9:34 am

THis post was very interesting to me because I really wanted to understand why my opinion differed from the Reviewer's.
But i think I've figured it out. Unfortunately it'll be a long-winded explanation. I apologize I advance for the wall of text.

So...
I disagreed with the Reviewer's assertion that My Miami wasn't montage-worthy.
Here's how I saw it:
My main references for "Miami shows" are Burn Notice and CSI Miami. I've watched a lot of both. As the listing talks about the dark side of the city, crime, gangs, drugs, etc. I can reasonably assume that CSI and BURN Notice would at the very least, be consistent with the listing's show. CSI and BN both have Miami montages in many episodes. Wait, no, in EVERY episode. Several montages actually.

But there's two distinct kinds of "montages" in these shows;

Montage type 1 - has a "vocal song" that is played to provide emotional impact to what the characters are going through, which is more of the Bob Seeger, U2 thing. The vocal is forefront. (The Bruckheimer approach). These montages rely on the "popness" of the piece to provide the emotional context either with new twist by juxtaposing an old known hit, or add some hipness by having a new "undiscovered" gem of a tune. (Think 'All around us are familiar faces, worn-out places, worn out face-e-e-es....) Once again, vocal songs. And usually at the end of the show, while the video dissolves and pans to all the characters, some crying, some sitting contemplatively with their kids, one might be a junkie shooting up, a baby being born, etc... These montages generally run the full length of the song.

Montage type 2 - The other type of montage is focused only on providing an atmosphere of "bustling Miami" with shots of boardwalks, beaches. bikinis, oiled musclemen, cars cruising the strip, etc. These montages usually happen at the beginnings (credits) of shows to set up the vibe and between scenes as the characters travel from one destination to the other to investigate a crime or when transitioning between tow sub-plots. These montages very often use music that does not have the vocal up front. These pieces, in my experience, tend to be groove-oriented and maybe have a chant-vocal or rap kinda thing going. (some can be instrumental) These montages basically remind the viewer that they're watching a sexy show about a sexy town. And they very often sound like some kind of cool Latin rap/hip-hop song that's local to the region. You know, "legit." But I also hear alot of clearly "guy in his studio playing a groove and sending it through TAXI." This kind of piece is far enough from the "legit" pieces that it doesn't sound fakey and stupid to folks from Miami, but cool enough so that Miamians might spin it.

So, within the above context, I perceived "My Miami" as fitting squarely into the Type 2 category. Seemed pretty simple.


Then, it occurred to me that the problem might be a fundamental misunderstanding of the word "Montage":


The word "Montage", to the Reviewer, may mean ONLY Type 1 montages.
The Reviewer ( and sup) may consider Type 2 Montages as "cut scene music" or "transition" music, and within the workflow of the client, Type 2 stuff may all be done in-house, in which case they're only looking to TAXI to provide Type 1 music.

If the above is true, then I would side with the reviewer. I probably wouldn't forward "My Miami" for a type 1 Montage because as sexy as the song is, the vocal/story isn't foreground enough for type 1.

But the reviewer would have no idea that the Artist doesn't make this delineation.
And the Artist may have no idea that there's a even a delineation there to begin with.
So the Artist walks away frustrated because they benevolently came up with something that pretty much "nailed it" (at least to a forward-able degree)...
While the Reviewer walks away satisfied because they successfully completed the review and, within their own understood context, provide articulate feedback.
Meanwhile, some of us on this post are confused. In the absence of clarity, we're coming up with all kinds of reasons why/ why not it wasn't forwarded. And as we read and absorb each others conjecture, we become the Human Centipede of our own BS, essentially. :shock: (which I hope I'm not doing right now be typing this :D )

So is anyone to blame for this unfortunate circumstance?

-Well, as Artists on TAXI, if we intend to work in TV/Film, it's our responsibility to learn the standardized terminology for the industry. If "montage" within the industry ONLY refers to what I called Type 1 within the industry, it's ultimately our job to know that. We have to accept that and learn the industry-standard terminology we you intend to work in the industry.

-Can I blame the Reviewer for not schooling the Artist on the difference between Type 1 and Type 2?
Nope. The Reviewer has no idea of what each artist's context is. And it is wholly unreasonable to expect a Reviewer to know what each and every TAXI Artist does and doesn't know. Especially within the context of a submission, so, no.
Now, if the reviewer's delineation between Montage and cut scene ISN"T based on industry-standard terminology, then they DO bear the burden of resonsibility because, JUST LIKE THE ARTISTS, the reviewers are responsible for using industry-standard terminology. So IF the reviewer doesn't understand this industry term, and "Montage", in fact CAN mean both types listed above, then the reviewer has done a disservice to both the client and the Artist because Reviewer caused a missed opportunity for both parties, as well as for TAXI. But I'm not saying that this is the case, as I suspect that the Reviewer IS using standard terminology in some form.

-Is there something wrong with the submission process itself? Is there some kind of failsafe for this? I don't think so. Currently, the process is simple.
Right now it's "here's my song, let me know." It's gotta be that straight up.
I can't be "Here's my song, and here's why I think it is on target so if I've missed the point, write me a detailed description (a la this post, haha) of what I don't know." Ugh, nobody would ever get forwarded because the TAXI staff hands would fall off.

So is there a solution?
Yep. A glossary of terms that is based on Industry-standard terminology that we ALL adhere to consistently and is readily available on the website.
Is there one? If not, I volunteer to drive it.

In closing, I'd just like to say that it looks like the Artist and Reviewer in this situation both did exactly the right thing, given their contexts. I commend them both for taking care of bidness. If my assertions are correct, the process worked. But like they used to say in the 70's "Hey, misunderstanding happens." (or something like that :D ). It's frustrating, but I don't think the frustration could have been averted. Nobody knows what they don't know. Ultimately, the real frustration that we all bear in this situation is lost opportunity.
Think about it, Op's got serious GAME. If OP had put his efforts into the right target I have no doubt that he could have knock it out of the park.
As it is,he wrote a great piece of music that may end up in a TV show yet. I know I wouldn't mind having "My Miami" in my back pocket for future use.
Well done.

Bill
Last edited by uncbilly on Fri May 09, 2014 12:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by realdoyle » Fri May 09, 2014 9:53 am

uncbilly - I have to say I was DEFINITELY imagining your Type 2 scenario when writing/recording this. Sexy shots of sexy city, not a "story" montage with characters. This is a direct quote from original listing: "Your Songs will be used in montage scenes with dramatic, sweeping views of Miami’s skyline and beaches to establish the location. The energy and vibe of your Song can be upbeat, fun, and infectious, with references to sun drenched beaches, bikinis, suntan oil, beach volleyball, rollerblading, drinking, partying, nightclubs, dancing, etc." To me that sounds like a Type 2 montage. Regardless, the screeners disagreed that my song would work.

HectorRContreras - I mixed the vocals back a bit just in case there was dialogue and they wanted to "duck" the music for that bit. I could have provided them whatever mix levels they wanted. For this submission I decided to give them lower vocals instead of radio/pop vocal levels. Mix levels were not mentioned in the critiques so I don't think that was a big issue. Thanks for the feedback though. And I don't know why "Paris" is listed in the tags. That soundcloud account is not mine, it's the guy with whom I co-wrote the song.

Russell Landwehr - Thanks for the kind word, Russell.

And thanks to everyone else for giving their feedback. It was a tough one. I usually don't mind when I get Returns but sometimes there are listings that i really think I've nailed (even after sleeping on it for a few weeks and coming back, like I have now). So those Returns are a bit harder to swallow. A bit more difficult to "submit and forget."

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by HectorRContreras » Fri May 09, 2014 2:22 pm

Brilliant ! Well said, dear UncBilly ! :) ;)

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by uncbilly » Sat May 10, 2014 12:47 am

Thanks, Hector! But...

I'm going to title this post "I am the human centipede of my own BS" yep, I'm a one-man human centipede. (I work alone) :D
All that stuff I said in the last post was purely conjecture because I didn't understand the writer's context.
But I've figured out. And why this listing is so confusing.
To be sure, ambiguous and misleading language is the problem. But it's not the ambiguity of the word "Montage" that's the issue.

Reald, I read your last post and totally agreed with you that the quoted line wreaks of Type2.
I also observed that all the song examples were Type1, while all the descriptions were Type2. Hmmmmm?

So I figured i'd read each sentence very slowly and look for clues. At the end of the second sentence, I got it. Duh. I just didn't have the context because I didn't know the title of the show. As I read it, I googled "Magic City", because it seemed weird that the city's nickname was in the listing. Honestly, I thought the writer was hinting a lyrical suggestion of sorts, as the listing specifically wants the tune to have "Miami" as the lyric.
Armed with this new info (the show's title) I reread and found the one KEY WORD that galvanized my (our) misimpression - rollerblades. You see the show takes place in 1959.

So, here are the observable (not speculative this time) problems with this listing:
-As the "Magic City" is a common nickname for Miami, if you don't know the name of the show, you don't get the "hint" and thus, don't get the context. So it's both ambiguous and presumptuous. The writer presumes that I know the name of the show.
-Rollerblades didn't exist in 1959. Nobody above the age of 12 even rollerskated on outdoors in 1959. So if I don't know the name of the show from the "hint", I'm automatically locked into 1981 or later upon reading "rollerblades". And since the first line is "A-list supervisor on hit TV show" I'm thinking CSI or maybe Burn Notice.

But this show's montages aren't quite the same as CSI/BN. The vid is shot differently, not as much close-from-a-distance movement stuff. More classic panorama stuff. So they actually lean toward Type1 music for their Type2 montages.

Personally, i'd describe the show as a "highly stylized drama centered around organized crime syndicates in Miami in 1959. The show is edgy and uses music from all periods. Think of the movie "Casino" but with Miami gangsters in '59, before rollerblades were invented."

Bill

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by Len911 » Sat May 10, 2014 2:02 am

Bill, if you're thinking that the name of the show is titled "Magic City", I googled that also, and discovered that there had been a show with that title on the Starz network, it was cancelled Aug. 2013.

If anything, the word montage in the listing should have little effect on how one submits for this listing, other than maybe edit points or something that would make it easier to edit into a montage, that I know virtually nothing about,lol! At least nothing to do with the content.

It would be a formidable task to guess the minds of the writers, directors and producers of the show. The listings aren't about finding a composer or another Kander and Ebb for collaboration. It's about finding songs that the listing party will assemble into a montage. I think the only thing you can really do in this case is to take the listing at face value and not overthink it. I think the listings in general are given the most info and hints that are possible in this type of format.

But it's fun sometimes to speculate! ;)
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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by uncbilly » Sat May 10, 2014 11:26 am

Len911 - Didn't see that it had been cancelled. Thanks for righting me on that. it was late when I noticed "Magic City". :oops:
In the absence of knowledge, one is left with conjecture and speculation. To be honest, I wouldn't exactly call it fun. :? (but i hope it was at least funny) :D
Len911 wrote:If anything, the word montage in the listing should have little effect on how one submits for this listing
While my gut disagreed initially, this ultimately lead to the "aha" moment I was looking or. And I'm going to take it one step further. Given realdoyle's context (which I shared 100%, ie type2), he may have been more successful by completely ignoring everything in the listing except the essential info, which apparently was:

1. We want a song with the word "miami" as the prominent hook.
2. Here are some examples.

Realdoyle may have written a whole different song if he didn't have the idea of CSI / BN Type2 montages in mind. I know I would have.

Then as I thought about it, I realized that about 95% of the time, I read listings and say "oh, I have something that would fit this perfectly." But when I listen to the examples, they're way different than what i got from the description and my piece clearly misses the target.

So, given my experience, and Len's response, I think I get it now. Aside from adhering to the boundaries (no profanity, no brands names, etc), responding to listings seems to be essentially a 2-step process:

1, Listen to the examples
2, Send something that sounds like the examples

Thanks Len911,
Bill

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by Baldwinphilly » Wed May 21, 2014 2:37 pm

Hello, I hope you take this as constructive criticism.

I believe the instrumental and lyrics are outstanding. The part that I personally don't like is the vocal performance. Theres just something about the vocal that doesn't match the song, and I would have hired a demo singer.

I'm sure many will disagree but I believe this is the reason you were not forwarded.

Good luck!
-Drew

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by realdoyle » Wed May 21, 2014 2:59 pm

Hey Drew,

Thanks for the feedback. I don't take offense at all and I see your point. This was a song written and recorded on a short deadline for this listing. I think if we had more time, finding the right vocalist would have definitely been a high priority.

Thanks!

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by crazyhooks » Sat May 24, 2014 3:54 pm

Real Doyle ,
Your track was Contemporary Retro fresh , your mix was tight, its a great new wave dance track ,and it did fit the montage of all it was asking for , and your lyric included enough Miami references.
In my opinion it shoud have been forwarded , supervisor probably focusing on modern Pitbull , even though there's a disco reference with Will Smith .
In my experience for this genre most library's focus to the first 10 secs of the vibe , not the lyric before they want it.
Really great work.

J.

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Re: Miami - Returned and I STRONGLY DISAGREE (U140205MI)

Post by admin » Fri Jul 04, 2014 10:23 am

Hi Josh,

It's extremely rare that I visit this part of the forum... actually, I'm not sure I ever have! That said, posting here and hoping that I'd drop in and reverse the screener's call is a low probability bet. ;) You can always write to headscreeer(at)taxi(dot)com. We like to make sure the screeners are doing their jobs well, and we look into this kind of stuff every day.

I hate to even give a personal opinion here because it's hard for readers to hear the inflection and tone in my voice when typing. Just know that I've listened twice (top to bottom), and this PERSONAL opinion comes from the heart. It's also the 4th of July, I'm at home (avoiding BBQ set up) and I'm not looking at our database to see the screener's comments on the critique, so it's impossible to know what was in his or her head when they heard it.

There were several things I liked about your song! But there was something about it that also made me want to hit the stop button. In the end, it was a visceral thing that I think was based on the Miami theme being so repetitive. I think it was too much of a good thing. There were several ideas and parts that were cool (loved the guitar hook!), but some would have been more cool if used more judiciously.

The robotic basso "Mi-am-i"vocal part in the verse didn't do a lot to make it cool. Maybe TOO 80s? Probably too frequent. And the Latin section might have been better left out, although I understood why you put it in there. Again, I hope this sounds constructive and not harsh. Were there some useable parts of the song? Absolutely! But it might be best compared to the Bee Gees song, Night Fever in that you love it (at least I do), but at some point (about 2/3 of the way through the song) you get fatigued by hearing "Night Fever, Night Fev-er" over and over and over!

I think your song would really benefit if there was a more stripped down approach in the intro. Instead of introducing us to the full compliment of instruments used in the chorus so early, try dialing the arrangement back. The clavinet part felt like too much too soon that early in the song. Tasty hints of it might have been a better approach at that point, and would have given the guitar part the spotlight it deserved. Was that guitar hook in the intro? If not, it might be cool to try it there.

Although uses for songs about cities are more rare than universal lyric themes, the basics of your song are strong enough that if you gave it more sectional contrast, and it didn't push the city's name so hard, not only do I think it would find a home in a library, I think it could get used in a film some day. Happy Independence Day!

I hope this helps,
Michael

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