Making new music, and finding time to blog about it.

If you’ve followed my YouTube Channel long enough, you can start to trace trends where I have a lot of activity followed by a dormant period.  I wish I could fix that but the truth is I don’t do this full time and there are things I need to handle outside of music.  Fortunately I finished up some sports leagues and my weeknight schedule has a little more free time to focus on music.  Adding a few live shows has forced me to learn some new songs and I’d like to use YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter as a sounding board for feedback from fans.  The first cover you will see below is a song called Try by the amazingly talented Ernie Halter.  I heard this song years ago from a video Ernie posted with Josh Hoge and was fortunate to see him play it live while I lived in Chicago.  It sticks out to me as a deep song about longing for the one you love and feeling willing to give everything you have to keep the relationship alive.

The second video is a relatively new John Mayer song that popped up in my feed on YouTube.  It’s called Hotel Bathroom Song but will most likely be re-branded as Everything You’ll Ever Be on his new CD (if it ever comes out).  I enjoy the lyrics quite a bit.  And the soft guitar riff with the tiny step down in between the major notes is a nice touch.  It’s a very classic Mayer acoustic song.  It fit well with my vocal range so I gave it a shot last night with just the condenser mic and this is what I came up with.  Hope you enjoy it.

As always, thanks for listening.  Follow me on Twitter and Like me on Facebook.

Um….I had a show. And I didn’t blog about out. My bad.

Here’s a quick vid from a fan last night at the show at The Grape Room in Manayunk Philadelphia, PA.  I had an absolute blast playing the set and the crowd was into it.  I can’t thank the guys at Grape Room enough for setting it up.  Mackenzie played a great set with some beautiful originals and Winchester Treaty brought the night home with a great rendition of ‘”Shake It Up.”  Thanks again to all those that came out and supported me and the other performers.  I’d love the chance to get up there again.

 

I’ll blog better in the future, for those that read the blog.  Don’t forget to follow me on twitter @ryanburnsmusic.

I Need a Doctor – Eminem and Dr. Dre Cover w/ Tutorial

I wanted to get this one up weeks ago when I first heard it but I wasn’t sure if it was a leak of a single or a b-side that would never be released.  Anyway, the song is on the charts and is currently climbing and climbing as you’d expect from another collab between Em’ and ‘Dre.  It took me about 3-4 times to record through the rap section before I felt comfortable enough to post it.  I realize it’s not perfect, but I want you to get a raw track from me rather than some doctored (pun intended) up studio version like you get from Tyler Ward or others.  Tyler is a gifted musician in his own right, but don’t kid yourself if you think he is singing into that mic and recording the video all at once.  He spends hours recording his tracks and then creating video after the fact in sync with his studio recording.  That’s neither here nor there, back to the song.

I ran my guitar straight into the mixer along with the new condenser mic and mixed it all in garage band like normal.  I’m happy with the end result and I am happy to provide a tutorial to everyone for this as well.  I realize it’s been far too long since I did a “real” tutorial for the songs I play.  But I am hoping that my fans are evolving enough in their playing that they are able to follow along with my down strokes since i generally show the guitar in the frame.

Enjoy the song, the original is great.  The cover needs life support…

Kings of Leon – Pyro

This needed to be done.

New Microphone = New Video. Mumford & Sons – Blank White Page

I finally ordered the new microphone I have been eyeing for what seems like years.  And I couldn’t be more happy with the sound quality.  As soon as I opened the package, I started setting up this recording.  I love the music that Mumford & Sons have been making and I’ve been meaning to make a cover from some time.  The new microphone and the new camera make these videos a snap nowadays.  I can knock these out in one take where it used to several due to sound quality.  Anyway, enough talk.  Enjoy the video and leave some comments.  You can also hit me up on Twitter- @ryanburnsmusic.

Another Stripped Cover, John Mayer’s “Half Of My Heart”

Greetings fans and blog readers.  I had several requests for this song over the past few months and I wanted to record a version for everyone.  I had some time last night to lay this down after what seemed like 50 takes.  I added a little bit of my own flare to the intro and a few vocal runs but didn’t want to mess with the integrity of the song because I love it so much.  While I am able to relate to many of John Mayer songs and reminisce about different points in my life, “Half of My Heart” connects with me on a different level.  Certain lyrics in the song personify exact what I’ve been trying to create in a song myself for so long.  Anyway, enough about my connection with the song.  It’s apparent I need to buy a pre-amp for recording because the single mic makes the vocals come out a little flat.  It sounds much different in the headphones.

Please leave comments and let me know what you think either here on WordPress or on the YouTube video itself.  Thanks again for listening!

Bruno Mars is getting his right now. Here’s my version of Grenade

Here is Bruno Mars’ new chart climber Grenade.  I chose to take it a different direction than the original and I really enjoyed the outcome.  I am playing directly into my friend Brad’s dual mic set with an excellent preamp.  I think the quality shows in the recording more than any other recording I’ve made.  What I most enjoy is that the entire video was taken in one take and what you see is what you get.  There are no additional sounds added or any additional mixing.  Thanks for listening and let’s try to make this level of quality in recording the standard moving forward.  Also, if you are looking for a mp3 version of this song or any other of my YouTube songs, please follow the Link.

Cee Lo Green Cover

 

This is an acoustic cover of Cee Lo Green’s Fuck You Forget You.  I really enjoyed listening to this one on the radio and decided to do my own rendition.  This was all filmed and recorded in one take and it’s a quick one in my bedroom to start the day.  Please leave comments and feedback.  I hope you all enjoy it.

-Ryan

I’m On Fire

This one is more of a cover of a cover.  The original song is written and recorded by Bruce Springsteen.  Then recently on John Mayer’s new album, he covered it brilliantly and added it as an exclusive download to anyone who purchased the album on iTunes.  I chose to cover John’s version because it really captures me when I hear it.  Here is my version.  I recorded it prior to making the video and the video is more of a tutorial for my fans who wish to learn it.

 

Competition Time: Help Me Out With “Likes” and Comments

I saw a post by Tyler Ward last week promoting his new singing competition with the first place price being a trip to Denver to record in his Live Lounge studio and record and release two songs to iTunes with Tyler.  I respect Tyler’s videos a lot.  In fact, there might not be anyone better on YouTube right now.  I decided to do Mike’s Posner’s “Cooler Than Me” for the competition, mainly because I wanted to see how it would turn out on acoustic, and because the song was been stuck in my head for weeks.  Please take a few minutes to check out the video, and follow this Link to comment and “Like” the video on Tyler’s wall.