Tag: music

New songs by Colours Run

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Música2 Comments

If you want to know about my story with Tim Cameron and his band Colours Run, check out my previous post about it. In summary: back when I was a teen, until I was eighteen or so, I used to frequent some comedy forums named PWOT, where an English fellow by the name of Tim Cameron, and nickname of Camerhil, posted his songs. I found him brilliant. You had the sense that this guy opened his heart up to you. It’s like he felt he had little time to do that in this world, so he was in a hurry to make it somewhere with his music. In 2007 or so, along with his bandmates, he published an album, and then he disappeared to the US and was never heard from again. I never heard from him again, at least. As far as I can tell, you can’t even buy his works these days.

I used to treasure his songs, but I had lost most of them along the way. It was almost a miracle that I came across a twenty-year-old CD with about eleven songs of his, and that was all I had left. Last night, though, a kind soul gave me an early Christmas present; turns out that there are other former PWOT members out there who loved Tim’s music.

Without further ado, here are the missing Colours Run songs (apart from a few ones that are, let’s say, only for former PWOT members).

From the album Cynical Wonderful:

“On My Side”

“Pilot Light 30-04-07”

“Beautiful Waste of Time”

“Scars”

“The Traveller”

“Perpetual Motion”

“Apathy Ever After”

“Pilot Light”

“Marketplace Crisis”

“Good Night”

“Tethers”

“Song for the Doctor”

From the E.P. The Sticks:

“Old”

“The Sticks”

“Curiosity”

Doghouse Demo:

“Before the War (demo)”

“Chaos Song (demo)”

“Tethers (demo)”

Unknown:

“Pilot Light 1st Master”

“On My Side”

“Fireflies”

“The Snowline”

“Beautiful Waste of Time (demo)”

“Beautiful Waste of Time radio”

“Before the War radio”

2007 demos:

“Birnam”

“Gossamer acoustic”

“Gossamer with vocals”

“Gossamer”

“Methods of Escape (no drums)”

“Methods of Escape”

“Pilot Light 07-02-12”

“Pilot Light 30-04-07”

“Prelude in C”

“The Snowline 16-03-07”

“The Snowline”

“Wichita Lineman”

Now I have more songs by Colours Run and Tim Cameron than I ever did.

Song “Schizosaurus Rex” (Paisley Underground version) from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 4

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, this year I’ve been exploiting the amazing AI service Udio to produce songs. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

So yeah, a fresh new song directly to your ears, this one in the style of the relatively obscure Paisley Underground movement, which is a sort of garage psychedelic rock with a Californian vibe. I’m very fond of how this tune turned out.

Lyrics below:

A beast from the deep,
The monster under your bed.
Eyes red like the setting sun,
Claws the size and weight
Of a heavy human soul.
It can’t die; it only transforms.
It can’t be stopped,
Unless it decides to stop.

I have a portal to hell inside my throat.
It hurts, but I’m getting used to the pain.
Still, I don’t know whom I hate more:
The world, or myself.

This isn’t the story of how I died.
This is the story of how I met a girl,
We fell in love, and she betrayed me.
She didn’t do it on purpose;
She was just a dumb kid.
Besides, the darkness drove her crazy,
Almost as crazy as me.

I ain’t a poet, couldn’t hope to be,
But I’m the only person left:
A castaway in a plastic kayak,
Drifting down the River Styx
Past skeletons clinging to rocks,
Reaching out for a bite to eat.

You and I, love, we shared our lives,
We did the best we could,
But the best we could
Was a steaming pile of dogshit.

Someday I’ll make it to that faraway shore
Where eagles soar on golden wings.
There, I’ll sit and rest in my blue suit.
I’ll watch as time goes by,
Not aging a day, not losing a thing.
The memories will blur and fade
Until all I have left is me.

EDIT: I fed this post to the Google AI thing that generates podcasts out of your material. Yes, I’m writing the lyrics, you guys (who are by the way unaware of the fact that they’re AIs themselves). Check it out.

AI podcast about Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

This weird thing that Google has released automatically creates short podcasts based on any source of information you give it. I suppose it’s quite useful for serious purposes, but I’ve fed it all my posts about the AI-generated songs I made for the third volume of Odes to My Triceratops. Listening to these almost perfect AI voices talking realistically about my stuff is really eerie. They made a couple of mistakes assigning lyrics to their proper songs, though.

Anyway, I thought this was cool.

All the songs I have of Colours Run

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Música2 Comments

Back in my late teens I frequented the Pointless Waste of Time forums, a comedy site belonging to Jason Pargin, later writer of the John Dies at the End series. The little I remember of my teenage years was beyond miserable, but I looked forward to a few things; one of them was the songs that a member of that forum posted regularly. His name was Tim Cameron, an intelligent, funny and honest British fellow who made music that I still vibe with. He later formed a band that he called Colours Run. They seemed to be on the path to grandeur (appeared on live shows and such), only for Tim to suddenly call quits on the whole thing, move to the US, and never be heard from again. That happened about twenty years ago.

His songs disappeared from the internet. As much as I would have loved over the years to listen to them again, they were gone. A few years ago, though, I came across an ancient CD in which I had burned some, unfortunately not all, of his songs I had downloaded.

I want others to know of this creative dude and his talents, which used to brighten my horrid days, so I plan to post on here all twelve recordings I have left of his. Tim, if you happened to google your old band out of nostalgia and came across this site, I’ll take them down if you want. And thank you for your songs.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted the first song of theirs I intended to post. Back then, I wanted to focus on a single song per post, but I’ve been busy with other stuff lately, so I ended up not posting any more. To my surprise, someone who also likes Colours Run found my post and urged me to share the rest of their songs, particularly “Tethers” and “Apathy Ever After.” I suspect I have never listened to those songs. Looking back, right at the end I stopped visiting the forums for personal reasons, and that’s when Colours Run released their “real” album, that is now unavailable for whatever reason. All the songs I have of theirs precede that album.

Without further ado (and no lyrics this time):

“Before the War”

“Before the War” (live)

“You-Centric Song”

“Alphabet Soup”

“Sand”

“Plastic Cups”

“Winter’s Day”

“Chaos Song”

“Curiosity”

“Paper Cord”

“Paper Cord” (live)

“Colours Run”

Listening back to these songs, it’s a disgrace that Tim and his boys didn’t make it. They were the real deal. Even decades from now, if I live that long, I’ll still love his stuff.

If you reading this are a fan who has stumbled upon this blast from the past, if you happen to have other songs of theirs that have otherwise been lost to time, by all means tell me where the hell I can find them.

EDIT: I found “Tethers” on YouTube:

This one’s “Beautiful Waste of Time”, from the YouTube channel posted in the comments:

Song: Before the War, by Colours Run

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Música2 Comments

Back in my late teens I frequented the Pointless Waste of Time forums, a comedy site belonging to Jason Pargin, later writer of the John Dies at the End series. The little I remember of my teenage years was beyond miserable, but I looked forward to a few things; one of them was the songs that a member of that forum posted regularly. His name was Tim Cameron, an intelligent, funny and honest British fellow who made music that I still vibe with. He later formed a band that he called Colours Run. They seemed to be on the path to grandeur (appeared on live shows and such), only for Tim to suddenly call quits on the whole thing, move to the US, and never be heard from again. That happened about twenty years ago.

His songs disappeared from the internet. As much as I would have loved over the years to listen to them again, they were gone. A few years ago, though, I came across an ancient CD in which I had burned some, unfortunately not all, of his songs I had downloaded.

I want others to know of this creative dude and his talents, which used to brighten my horrid days, so I plan to post on here all twelve recordings I have left of his. Tim, if you happened to google your old band out of nostalgia and came across this site, I’ll take them down if you want. And thank you for your songs.

Without further ado, here’s the original version of “Before the War.”

Here’s a recording of “Before the War” from a live event they did:

Lyrics below:

When we lost the human race
All our brains got replaced,
And all these robots never laugh
At my jokes.

So take me back before the war.
Take these things, they’re all yours.
There’s nothing, nothing worth
Fighting for.

You stole my drugs, crashed my car,
But you left no lasting scars.
Retribution slipped so soft,
Like a blade.

We blew it up, knocked it down.
Never tried giving ground, and now
There’s nothing left of love
But what I saved.

I get tired winning games
When the pieces never change,
And all the clever moves you make
Seem so tame.

You can sulk if you want.
Don’t you wonder what’s the point
When there’s nothing left of love
Worth sulking for?

Did you cry when you left me?

Another year older,
The world on my shoulders,
And I’m still no closer
To finding a girl
Who won’t bore me to tears.
Not here.

There’s nothing worth fighting for.
Don’t remember what I did before the war.

Remastered “Behind the Door” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

Udio released the ability to download your produced songs in parts (bass, drums, other instruments, and vocals), so naturally I’m remastering all songs I thought done. And I wanted to tackle as soon as possible my favorite of all I’ve produced: a strange piece that somehow feels like it encapsulates most of my life in eight minutes and thirteen seconds of pitch-perfect emotion.

Udio uses AI to divide each song into stems, and it had trouble with this one: the wavering instruments and vocals turned up in different stems, only to return to the original. I haven’t seen it do this with any other song remotely to this extent, which adds to the strangeness of the for me timeless song. Too bad I came up with this one before Udio improved its audio quality.

Song “Knife-Beard Dreams (psychedelia version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 4

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Escritura, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

Here’s the second version of “Knife-Beard Dreams,” this time a mix of psychedelia and indie folk. I’m very impressed with how this one turned out. While the other three songs I’ve produced for the fourth album are unnerving to some extent (which sometimes the subject matter and/or vibe require), this one is so pleasant-sounding and groovy that I see myself listening to it over and over. Add to it Udio’s improved sound quality and my growing mastering skills, and even the MP3 version of this song sounds fantastic.

Lyrics below, same as the other version:

The words on the page,
They’re too plain.
I can’t read.
I have no clue what anything means.

The man in the heavens had a plan
To prove I’m insane.
He sent the sky crashing down,
And it crushed me into dust.

Deep down, the darkness whispers;
It calls and calls, and I must heed.
I can’t take my life,
But I can’t live the one I have.

Why the hell am I singing?
Nobody’s around to listen.
I should just shut up
And go back to sleep.

Maybe I’ll dream about a giant worm
With a beard made of knives.
Maybe I’ll dream of homicide,
And wake up with a big smile.

Remastered “St-a-b Ya-self” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

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Ever since Udio released the ability to download the songs in parts (drums, bass, other instruments, and voice), I knew I would end up remastering every single song I believed done before. And I’m glad I’m doing it, because this awesome psychobilly song “St-a-b Ya-self” sounds fucking amazing now: growling bass, crystal-clear voice, crunchy distorted guitars and drums.

What happened to psychobilly, anyway? There should be far more of it out there.

Why not, here’s a psychobilly song by an actual band made of humans:

Song “Knife-Beard Dreams (progressive metal version)” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 4

On By Jon UreñaIn Arte, Inteligencia artificial, MúsicaLeave a comment

In case you don’t know, I’ve been obsessed with producing songs lately by exploiting the amazing AI service Udio. I’ve already made and released two full albums based on a strange story I wrote back in 2021, named Odes to My Triceratops. It follows the adventures and misadventures of a trio of friends who live in a town lost in the map. The main dude is a songwriter named William Griffin, who’s passionate and sensitive, if a bit unhinged. Another character is William’s next-door neighbor Claire Javernick, a blind redhead. Then we have Lorenzo, who’s a sentient triceratops for no justifiable reason. You can download the first two albums of this story through this link.

I’ve made this weird little song about having to keep living when you don’t know how. Part progressive metal, part motown soul. It exploits Udio’s improved audio quality, that joint with the ability to download the song in stems, has resulted in my highest quality song yet.

The singer’s voice right at the end sounds almost exactly like Tim Cameron, leader of late 1999’s, early 2000’s amateur British band Colours Run. That’s one hell of an obscure reference, particularly because the guy disappeared about seventeen to twenty years ago, and I haven’t come across anything new of his since. Hey Tim, I’m a middle-aged dude now, but I still remember how eagerly I clicked on the songs you posted on that forum ages ago. Your music was among my favorites.

Anyway, lyrics below:

The words on the page,
They’re too plain.
I can’t read.
I have no clue what anything means.

The man in the heavens had a plan
To prove I’m insane.
He sent the sky crashing down,
And it crushed me into dust.

Deep down, the darkness whispers;
It calls and calls, and I must heed.
I can’t take my life,
But I can’t live the one I have.

Why the hell am I singing?
Nobody’s around to listen.
I should just shut up
And go back to sleep.

Maybe I’ll dream about a giant worm
With a beard made of knives.
Maybe I’ll dream of homicide,
And wake up with a big smile.

Remastered “Burying the Beast” from Odes to My Triceratops, Vol. 3

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Hey, remember the garage-rock song “Burying the Beast,” that I’ve remastered like five fucking times already? Well, now that Udio lets you download the drums, bass, other instruments, and voice of any song separately, I had to try and master the best possible version of this song. I really, really hope it has been the last time. This song has a high amount of distinct parts for its length.

In any case, the end result is far, far punchier and clearer than all my earlier attempts. If you liked this song already, I suppose you’ll really like this version. If not, well, suck it.