Day 1: Lovely

Hello, my friend and welcome to the 1st day of the Lovely Experience! :)

We're gonna kick things off with this first and title track:

"Lovely" is a particularly special song to me for a couple of different reasons:

I think it turned out fukin' awesome.
The part in the middle where I play the original sample (mostly) untouched is something I've always wanted to pull off.
I've always wanted to be able to legally release a song that uses legit samples.

I've actually been creating music that is super sample heavy for a while now, but I've never been able to officially release them.

This is because they are technically "bootlegs" since my use of the samples aren't "cleared".

Sampling bits and pieces of music that came before is one of the most amazing ways for any artist to create something fresh and exciting that may or may not sound anything like the original.

Unfortunately, there is a whole lot of legal BS to go through in order to be able to properly and officially release music that uses samples.

Although it does protect the original artist in someways, it can really hold back newer artists in other ways.

For Lovely, I was able to use a service called "TrackLib" that let me discover the sample in this tune and easily "licence" the sample so that I was able to properly release the song I made with it.

Speaking of the original sample, let's take a closer look at this bad boy, my friend. :)

About The Original Sample

The main sample in "Lovely" is a song called "Could It Be Love" by a band called "Phase 7".

The original song was released in 1980 and was recorded a studio in Honolulu called Broad Recording Studio.

It sounds a little something like this:

At first I was thinking I would call my version something similar to the original name of the song.

Unfortunately...

There is a rule when using "TrackLib" that you can't use the original song or artist name in your new song's name.

I ended up with "Lovely" since it does tie into the lyrics, pays homage to the original song without being too on the nose, and kind of fits in with my tendency to release songs with 1 word names haha.

What Influenced This Track

Earlier on I mentioned that I had always wanted to create a song where it has a part in the middle where the original sample plays (mostly) untouched.

I originally heard this idea in a song called "Touch My Mind" by Illyus & Barrientos.

They are a really cool group and I actually first discovered this song when I was first getting into electronic and house music.

It's definitely one of the first songs I heard that really helped me figure out what kind of house music that I lean towards.

Whenever anyone gets into electronic or house music, it can be overwhelming since there are so many different sub-genres and styles.

This is why those first few songs that you discover that help you figure out your place in the world of house music are so special.

So I'm really happy to be able to pay homage to this track and to share it with you today:

Another artist that I wanted to mention that heavily influenced "Lovely" is a fantastic artist called "Folamour".

They sample quite a bit of hidden gem older tracks from the 70s and 80s to create something more modern, fresh and exciting.

They make some incredible music so I'd be definitely recommend diving into their back catalog if you haven't already.

Here is one track in particular that I love and was an inspiration to me when creating Lovely:

A Lovely Live DJ Mix

To finish off today's experience, I wanted to share a live DJ mix that I made based off of the song Lovely.

I shared the audio for this mix publicly last week, but this is the only place that you can find the video for it on the whole wide web.

Also, its a Google Drive link since YouTube would massacre me if I put this up on their site:

WATCH THE MIX

I hope you enjoy the mix and I'll see you tomorrow, my friend! :)

- Matt