Setting up for the weekend.

Writing and Marketing with Spotify

Music is an important part of HG World.  Careful listeners will hear references to songs in the dialogue, the characters and even settings throughout the show.  Because I can't afford the songs I hear in my head that I think would be perfect for the soundtrack, I try to put some reference to that song in the show in the hope that it creates an earworm or that the listener picks up on the cue and imposes that song in their imagination as they listen.  I don't know if that works or even makes sense, but I've been trying to figure out a way to add new music to the show and share that experience with listeners.

One thing I may try for Season Two is a "song swap" track for each episode.  One scene, for example, would ROCK if it had "Welcome to the Jungle" playing underneath it. Because I can't pay $25,000 for legal rights, I might just produce a version without it, but with instructions for people who own the music (and have a music editor) to superimpose the cut they own at the timecode I'd specify.  Not sure about the legality of it, but it's for private use and I think it would sound awesome.  On the other hand, I see some logistical problems with that.  Stay tuned.

I used to be a casual Pandora listener and kept it in the background while I wrote or revised my scripts.  Pandora is pretty much Internet radio with a clever algorithm to help identify songs with similar musical elements to keep your interest.  If you search for Warren Zevon or, say, "Werewolves of London" Pandora may not pull out the specific request, but may offer you something similar.  I never really understood that because if I ask to hear "Excitable Boy", I don't want to hear Jackson Browne play "Lawyers in Love".  On the other hand, when I pick Metallica, I can be assured of hours of screaming vocals and power chords.  It's a bit of a trade-off because you have no control over the queue and can only skip over so many songs before being locked into their rotation.  Of course, you have more options if you choose to subscribe to the paid service.

I tried Spotify a few months ago because it allowed me to find and queue specific songs and artists. While it misses a lot of my favorite artists (or offers covers and karaoke versions of them) it has a tremendous amount of obscure material ranging from blues and jazz to techno and whatever modem carrier signal music kids today love.   Like Pandora, you can pay to remove the advertisements and a larger song library. But I'm cheap.   Spotify lets me select the songs I want, skip, rewind, replay, save my playlists and share them with people.  It's pretty cool.

At Farpoint, a listener asked my how I titled the episodes of HG World because they read like song titles.  He couldn't find some of them.   I mentioned that the titles to the main series episodes are, in fact, lyrics.  I couldn't remember all of them off the top of my head, so I went back through and searched for them on Spotify.

I was surprised how many of them were online.  While Spotify doesn't have a lot of Pink Floyd, it does have Roger Waters' albums, so I was able to cheat a little by subbing in decent cover versions or remakes.  Musically, it doesn't always flow well ("Welcome to the Jungle" into "Thriller" doesn't quite work, but it's in episode order), but I was able to create a list of all the title songs in order and then added future episode titles and songs either referenced in the show or that WOULD appear if I had the budget to license them for the podcast.  Check out the list here (and please subscribe!)

HG World: The Music

The cool thing is that your iTunes subscriptions are searchable within your Spotify environment.  Because I have HG World on iTunes, I can add them to the playlist and introduce each episode by it's "title song".  It requires some manual set up, but you can do it, too if you have iTunes and Spotify on the same workstation. That assumes you subscribe to HG World through iTunes, of course.

WRAG Radio: Top Tracks with Todd Rage 

The Spotify playlist for Todd Rage's AM station is 11 hours of hits from the fifties to the "end of real music" in the 70s" (plus a few exceptions before and after that period) that I think of when writing the character of Todd Rage.  I imagine these songs crackling out of an AM radio in the night - songs of hope and loneliness, loss and an enduring American spirit.  It's got everything from Billie Holiday to The Animals. Sam Cooke, Van Morrison, the Eagles, Elvis, Waylon Jennings, Rod Stewart... touchstones from a long life listening to music.  I think it's an excellent mix to play while cleaning out the garage, painting the living room, driving across eater-infested territory late at night or just hiding out and scraping beans from the last can in your pack.

I toyed with feeding Keith "Todd Rage" DeCandido with some script bumpers to thread into the WRAG-AM playlist and may still do this. It would be neat to be able to plug random reports, PSAs, commercials and even AD links into the playlist.

Dogberry's Playlist

Dogberry, as played by Lee Sands, is one of my favorite characters.  He's weird, chaotic and sometimes dangerous.  His tastes are scattered, so his music reflects that same weird, sometimes troubles, borderline creepy yet loveable vibe.  So of course I had to add some Thunderclap Newman, Jonathan Coulton, David Bowie, They Might Be Giants, even a little Buckner & Garcia.

McInnes' In-Flight Recorder

Group Captain McInnes is one of the most popular characters and a JOY to write.  Part Chief Engineer Montgomery Scott, part James Bond, with a dash of wandering Time Lord, McInnes is an RAF pilot living in a world without wings.  Ayoub Khote plays the role in HG World, Googies and now his own short series "A Simple Prop" making him the only character (even counting Todd Rage) to show up in all HG World related properties.  Starting with "Scotland the Brave" (because I had to) and Queen's "One Vision" I tried to select the kind of hard-driving, British-slanted rock you'd expect to hear in the middle of a dogfight or a fight through a herd of a thousand zombies.  It tries to mix a complex tapestry of violent disregard of authority with archer fingers raised with an undertone of honor and duty.  McInnes is about adventure and action, so you'll find a mix of Sex Pistols and The Clash, Elvis Costello and Black Sabbath with some McInnisian transitions courtresy of Mojo Nixon, Strawberry Switchblade and The Specials.   This was tough to populate at first, but now there is over 3 hours of music to smash things by.

Constable Jeb's Head Voices

Jeb is another character I love to write.  He's a brute.  He might seem stupid, but as Jill Woodbine said of him, he's like an oncoming storm; when he's there you just have to ride him out and cope.  Voiced by DT Kelly, I could write the line "I like kittens" and Jeb would make it sound like he likes them grilled and covered in wing sauce.   Fitting to his character, this playlist is an hour of batshit angry rock and metal.   I pulled songs listed as the favorites of combat soldiers in Iraq along with some of the songs I used to play (that contributed to my tinnitus) in college.  Korn, Limp Bizkit, Eminem, Dope, RATM, AC/DC...that's the theme.

Jill Woodbine's iPhone

The Diary of Jill Woodbine is a story about HG World from the perspective of an inquisitive young woman who doesn't believe everything the managers tell her.   Diary is designed to be a noir detective story with a Gothic horror feel and supernatural undertones.  As one wonderful listener wrote me, "If Buffy were a lesbian and fought zombies instead of vampires, it would be The Diary of Jill Woodbine". I'd like to believe that's true.  Her iPhone has an hour of eclectic songs that I think Jill would listen to while writing her own stories, composed and performed mainly by regional artists I've met or heard on the convention circuit including SJ Tucker, Jonah Knight and Voltaire along with some songs I think she might have pulled from her mom and dad's collection.

So check out these playlists and, if you dig them, please subscribe so I know there are people enjoying them as much as I am while writing the shows.

The writer's mood

Some days, the writer/director can feel this way:

Or see himself as:

But much of the time you feel like...

...and sometimes you feel like you're sucking down peppermint schnapps and calling Morocco at two in the morning...

So the gamut for writers is anywhere between Orson Welles and Mark Borchardt.
But this is how you gotta look at it, kittens...  

Checking In

As I wait for the evening's sleep aid to kick in (I have a long day tomorrow and my body isn't ready to sleep for another 5 hours) I thought I'd post and comment on some of the reviews HG World has been getting over on iTunes.  I am glad to see reviews and comments there because the universe is silent elsewhere on the subject.  The comments from our old feed on Pod-O-Matic are lost to the ages, but they ran about the same as the ones below...

(Note: It's not my plan to defend against bad reviews or snark my way to asshole creator status.  People who take the time to review the show are important to me.  They could be watching YouTube, jerking off to Smurg porn, or listening to someone else's show.  As it is, I appreciate objective feedback.)

So off we go!

Bullock Zombie Lover:  Thank you.  1) We'll take all the praise we get. 2) The hard work is paid by praise.  And beer donations.  And saying "hey" to Mike at conventions so he knows his hard work is appreciated.  I mean, we tell him, but the dude needs to hear it from the peoples.  3) I have to work out how to put a DONATE button back on the site, but yeah...thanks.  It costs about $20 a month to host the show.  I can't put a value on what Mike and Bryan do for production and there's a whole lot of time and energy coming from a lot of unpaid actors.  I would love to be able to buy shirts at some point.  We are still here, still working.  And as I always say, I'll take the comparisons to "We're Alive".  I think we're a different show in a lot of ways, but they're a benchmark for zombie awesome in audio drama, so...yeah, cool!

Yimlengyang: Thank you, brotha...or sistah.  Rock on.

Villain2814: Yeahhhh.... a gentle nudge.  I know our schedule is not the most consistent.  But I hope you're enjoying Jill Woodbine (and the amazing +Veronica Giguere) and "A Simple Prop" starring +Ayoub Khote as Neil McInnes.  Googies will be back, soon.  And the final season will follow.  I promise.  But I can't afford to hire Mike from his day job. :)

COsurvivor:  Whah?  Our web site is down??? (checks) Whew.  No.  www.goodmorningsurvivors.com is still there.  We shifted hosts, but we have a streamlined "wix" site with lots of links and groovy stuff.  And we're not gone.  Promise.  

HVM rfo: "HVM"?  Happy Valley Militia?  Is that like Browncoats?  Or Trekkie?  Because I'd like to think it is.  I doubt it is, but a writer can have his little arrogant mental masturbatory aspirations, right?  Thanks. There's lots of crazy coming.

Part2:

Andre Noble: I know you're over on our Facebook page, so many you can help me with some of this there (or here, whatev.) What about the audio quality?  I'm sure Mike's ears are burning on that.  Dialogue?  Sound Bed design?   As for "few relatable characters"... you make a fair point.  I hope at least Dogberry competes for time in your memory with McInnes.  But I appreciate your feedback and your willingness to stay with us.  

Litmaster 14: See?  This dude likes the Dogberry!  Looks like I accidentally truncated his post but the point of it is that we have a lot going on and a Narrator might be really helpful.  Point taken.  I made a choice early on to try and drive this by characters without going all expository.  I might consider a narrator (Todd Rage or Ken, maybe) in the remasters.  We're trying to help with our "previously on..." bits at the top, but perhaps those might work better as narration).  Hmm... will think on this.

DaisyMaeGogo:  Thank you and we certainly will!

LolaBittles:  I love that we were somebody's Howard Stern summer replacement.  We try to push the actors to give us their best work and, for the most part, I'm pretty happy.  A lot of it is the isolation of acting.  Remote Productions remove some of the chemistry that's necessary to really SELL a part and sometimes, Skype rehearsals just aren't possible (at least they weren't early on).  Thanks for listening.

And finally...

DIABLOU: Glad we're "the best" but no...we're not over.  Ken Peters will drive the Popcorn Express right into Season 2.  

Superbuggem: If not for the five stars, I might assume you thought we Grrrrated on your nerves.  

SoozieMac:  I'm sensing a theme here.  NO, we're Not Yet Dead.  Ken Peters (+Jim Patton) and Mark (+Bryan Lincoln) and Jo (+Gwendolyn Jensen-Woodard) are walking meat bags of awesome sauce telling a tangential but essential part of the HGW story!  McInnes is back!  The rest of the UNNDD is back in Googies soon.  Promise.

GMRC Rower Tweak:  Sweet.  And once again, invoke the name of the Wayland show we love so well.  

Thanks everyone.  Keep the comments coming.  Please add your voice to the conversation if any of these comments (or mine) have struck a nerve.  In the coming weeks, I'll try to make sense of the plot lines for everyone so...well maybe I can understand them, too! 

Essay - Variation in English for Voice Acting

The topic Variation in English includes a discussion of dialects which is of significant interest to me as a writer and especially because I write audio plays.  This week’s discussion mentioned the American Midwestern dialect as the one most commonly found in broadcast news because it is an easily understandable, accessible and clear dialect.  As a result many voice actors and communications students affect this speech rather than cultivate any range for regional dialects. 

A challenge for me as a writer and director is to inject a sense of realism to the story that has a very specific location and make sure the actors understand where their characters are in the story and how they should sound.  Because you cannot see these characters it is even more important to dress them in the right dialect while providing lines that reflect their patterns of speech.  Adding to this challenge is the fact that my performers live in several different cities (with their own informal dialects) and a few of the characters are not American.  This is a fun challenge.

For American and Canadian actors, “broadcast English” is too formal.  I receive auditions from broadcasters that are too clean and articulate to be convincingly informal.  Actors provide better material, but they often don’t understand the Northwestern Pennsylvania mix of  Scots-Irish and Polish for natives of the region.  Fortunately, there are enough transplant (Really “refugee”) characters to make Philadelphia, Chicago and most southern voices applicable to rural Pennsylvania.   The fact that the story is about refugees makes it a little easier to cast talented people who may not necessarily get the local accent.  But I try to work harder with the actor performing “native” characters to make sure they sound roughly the same.   I start by referring actors to http://www.pittsburghese.com and this video.  The point is to overemphasize the differences in how locals speak versus where the actor is from.  Rural communities identify themselves by their common voice.  You find this in many “fish out of water” films where the main character speaks a more generic American dialect and the locals have a borderline comedic accent to demonstrate to audiences that they are somehow alien or detached from the world as the audience understands it. 

Elements of the Pittsburgh/Northwest PA accent are only as different as other accents from generic American, which means there are fun turns of phrase and inflections to use. “Guys! Go ahead and get some beer from the cooler and come watch the game” becomes “Y’unz guyz go ‘head’n grabba coupl’a burrs from that dere cool’r and cumun ova’ t’watch the game’n at.” 

The writing never tries to translate to the dialect.  The direction attempts to bridge some basic word choices in the script to some inflection that results in the line as read above.  In the script, I would write “Y’unz guys go ahead’n grab a couple’a beers from dat dere cooler and come on over t’watch the game’n that.”  The middle ground is intended to inspire the performer to reach for a specific accent. The goal isn’t to create the extreme example of speech, but to keep the actor mindful of the basic elements of that accent so that they are consistent with the other actors and convey their background in the story.

One of my favorite characters is named Group Captain Neil McInnes.  I am not Scottish, nor do I have an insight into the Scottish Standard English dialect beyond episodes of “Star Trek” and Monty Python sketches.  Using the basic premise from the Northwestern PA accent, I decided to go to an extreme in the hope of finding a more mindful and experienced actor to pull the lines together in a realistic way.  The actor I chose was a Londoner by the name of Ayoub Khote.  Given the prevalence of Anglo-Indians in Britain, this was not a surprise, but Ayoub brought a love of the Scottish voice to the part that may not have been a perfect imitation, but embodied the spirit of the dialect with a natural flare for the burrs and “whoops” of Scottish English that made it effective for a largely American audience. 

I drew on Canadian actor James Doohan’s popular style for “Star Trek” for my writing but asked that the Ayoub listen to more contemporary Americanized voices as displayed here on “The Late Late Show with Colin Ferguson”    Here, Scottish host Ferguson talks with Scottish actor James McAvoy and the natural conversation reveals how actors may remain subconsciously mindful of their American audience.  The music of the Scottish dialect is apparent here, which is something I wanted to capture for the performance. 

Two of the characters I wrote are of Indian descent, which could have been a generic caricature of the dialect, but each character needed to be distinct.  One character needed to be seen as a refugee and the other needed to be seen as an authority.  The difference between the two was conveyed by the latter’s closer resemblance to British-American English and the former’s heavier, more traditional dialect.

The character of Shiva Vesta was designed as a 20-something medical doctor, a medic who had to provide lengthy technical exposition.  Using an American actress to affect a more traditional Anglo-Indian dialect, I covered up any imperfections by suggesting the character had spent time in America pursuing her post-graduate degree.   This seemed to work fine as the British-English was the dominant dialect used in the show. Indian inflections were added whenever the character grew excited or upset, but there is never a regional identifier in her language.

The other character, Balamani, was played by actress Reena Sharma, who is also a psychologist living in Mumbai.  Reena provided an education in the vast variety of languages and dialects in India.  We discussed the character’s background as an engineering student recently employed in the United States from a college in south-central India.  Reena pointed out that most Indians know English and Hindi as their “official” languages.  Hindi can present in any number of accents depending on the origin of the speaker. British-English is taught as a common link between Indian cultures and the outside world.  In addition to Hindi and English, most Indians have a regional and familial language.  I modeled the character’s voice on a consultant I had been working with at the time who spoke Hindi and Telugu, a regional language from south-central India.  I chose Telugu for its distinct, pleasing musical quality that shines when the speaker is excited.  This worked perfectly for the character’s introduction:

FEET TRIP AND BODY FALL, CLOSE ON MIC.

BARBARA    (SHARP CRY OF PAIN. EFFORT TO GET UP.)

ZOMBIES APPROACH ON MIC.

BARBARA                  Monsters…(in Tulugu) Ńeh-nǔ dee-ńi ē-ĺah an-'thüm 'kah-niv-'va-nu[1] [I will not allow it to end this way.]

REVOLVER CLICKS ON EMPTY CHAMBERS.

BARBARA                    (in Tulugu) 'In-kah Ńeh-nǔ 'āy-mē 'chay-ya-'le-nǔ[2] [There is nothing more I can do for you.] (Throwing grunt)

I enjoy working with language as a way of creating characters.  Voice helps define a character, especially in audio drama, which makes this unit particularly important to me.

---

[1] Nenu deenni ilaa antam kaanivvanu

[2] Inka nenu emee cheyyalenu. (there is nothing more I can do for you)

Where things are tonight.

I just uploaded a rough preview of the new Neil McInnes short novel, "A Simple Prop".  This intends to be an action/adventure story set prior the rise of the undead, back when McInnes was a Flight Lieutenant on the business end of an RAF officer's shit-stick.  +Ayoub Khote reads the novel and, just as with "The Diary of Jill Woodbine" there are music cues by +Kevin MacLeod and expert engineering by Michael L Stokes.  If you're subscribed the HGW on iTunes, you'll automatically receive new episodes.   It's nice to hear Ayoub back as McInnes.  I know a lot of listeners will agree with me. 

If you had to pause at the whole "prior to the rise of the undead" you probably listen to HG World as a zombie horror show and are, therefore, concerned this one might not be for you.  True, this is not a zombie tale.  It's more of a James Bond/Dirk Gently sort of adventure.  That's not to say there won't be weirdness and there will be plenty of smartarses, sardonic dialogue, gunplay, sex, drinking, brawling and pop culture references that make McInnes fun to listen to.  While Major Grant is still in the future, McInnes has his own cast of characters to play with this time around.  

As you might have noticed at the end of the most recent Jill Woodbine Chapter (11b) I outed my first major character.  There are others in the story, but it hasn't been important to call attention to that aspect of their character.  With Jill, it seemed important to make a personal connection with someone.  Red Molly is definitely a femme fatale character and this story is intended to be a turn on the noir detective dramas.  It was nice to hear a favorable comparison between Jill and Buffy Summers.  I hope I'm representing the character's sexuality fairly.  Jill hasn't really explored that aspect of herself, so I hope this journey is as interesting to you as it was for me to research and write.  Jill is a fun character to write.  I'm looking at two friends of mine who are about that age to draw from in terms of how they speak and act.  Of course, +Veronica Giguere gives her this whole extra life that makes her fun to listen to in the mix. 

As I wrote earlier, I had a chance to listen to Googies #5.  In it, +Jim Patton reads this monologue (I'm big on those, aren't I?) about his childhood in the city and witnessing a tragedy that says with him even through the end of the world.  Like Veronica, Jim has this preternatural way of not only reading my words, but reading the beats, the cadence of the character's delivery and delivers something amazing.  I'm looking forward to hearing the final mix in the next few weeks.

So while we won't have an episode this month, I hope the glut of Jill Woodbine and McInnes goodness is sufficient to hold you over.  I've hear the rough cut of JW Chapter 12 and if you're a good lot, Jill might have it ready for you all in a week or two.   

Show Update from Jay Smith

A final revision on the HG World timeline is complete with most of the show's history and its three written seasons and the Jill Woodbine story.  I needed to write it all out because, I've lost track of a few details in the three years of production.  (Fun Fact: To be legible, the timeline would have to be printed at 18" x 135") I listened to most of the episodes again, reviewed the scripts and took some notes for Season 2.  I wish I could show it to you, but there are a lot of spoilers from un-produced episodes and notes about Season 2.

I also received the first chapter of +Ayoub Khote's McInnes audio story which sounded excellent.  There's a file glitch he's correcting, but I'm loving it all so far.  I'm very pleased with the latest Jill Woodbine chapter where +Veronica Giguere actually beats the living shit out of one of the longest sentences I've ever written.  As the kids say, Like A Boss.  In reviewing Googies Chapter 5, I cannot stress enough how well +Jim Patton and +Bryan Lincoln  sell this story.  Jim's performance as Ken (old and young) has been nothing short of psychic.  In listening, you can tell not only how the show has improved with the addition of talented engineers, but how those talented engineers have improved over the episodes.  When HG World ends, you AD peoples should get ready to fight for this talent.  I've been incredibly lucky.

As far as the PARSECs go this year, we've decided not to submit a reel for consideration this year.  We think our material is good, but after reviewing the rules we think we have a strong case to revisit in 2013 when Woodbine, McInnes, and Googies are complete.  In 2014, we'll see how the final season of HGW resonates with judges.  Thanks to everyone who nominated us for believing in the show and supporting us.  We'll plan to hit DragonCon 2013 to buy whoever beats us a round of drinks.

I hope that you enjoy listening to to this show.  It may not be the greatest story ever written, but I believe it's a good show with memorable characters, mystery and horror in an action-driven theme.  Yeah, there are zombies in it, too.  I promise all these threads will make more sense in the end than "Lost". And Season 2 will begin and end with explosive action.  Everything will come together in the last season and you'll hear from Ken Peters, Jill Woodbine and some other lost voices.  I am saddened that I'll be culling the herd in this season as well.  I promise my actors good deaths...wait.  CHARACTERS. I promise their characters good deaths.

With Holden Smith working on the wiki to update the summaries and information there, I think listeners will find an easier time navigating the story.  If the show needs anything right now, it's someone to help with the social media and networking.  But you'd have to be a real fan to want to do that.   Know anyone?

+Michael Stokes  and Bryan are working hard on Googies Part 5 which will reunite listeners with some old United Nations friends and then the blood will start flowing dark and deep.  I hope you enjoy and thank you for sticking with us.

Part 2: Welcome to the Blog

I'm told we need to communicate more.  Facebook is an okay place to post, but I thought this might be a little more comfortable and roomy for us to have a conversation.  You may want to subscribe so that my irregular updates show up and I'd appreciate a little interaction.  We spend a lot of time putting together a free show for your consumption.  It would be a truckload of awesome to hear from you, your thoughts on the show and characters, where you listen and how...it helps us improve.  If you're not keen on some parts (or all of it) you're welcome to the booth, too.  It's just nice to hear more than the chime of "like" on Facebook and the occasional attaboy!

The Googies are here!

http://thirtyfifteennorth.podbean.com/2012/01/21/the-googies-chapter-1/

Ken Peters never had a successful, comfortable or happy life, but it was a life that he made.  He didn't have much, but he didn't want much, either.  He lived modestly, earned an honest living and kept out of trouble.  In the terrible days before the outbreak causes a total collapse of modern civilization, Ken didn't lose as much as most others. In fact, he was more prepared for the eater uprisings than most.  He was used to fighting for what he earned, for work, for pay, for a safe place to sleep.  If he wasn't always a "good" man, he was loyal and would be ruthless in the pursuit of his objectives.  

This is the story of how Ken Peters united Group Captain McInnes with General Ying's camp, uncovered the plot of the mysterious Googies and set the stage for the a battle that would determine the fate of military relocation center #2210, otherwise known as "HG World"

Oops.

We accidentally reissued the original preview of "Googies Part 1" to the podbean feed.  Mike is still upgrading and fixing the episode to be consistent with subsequent episodes, so we pulled it down again.  Sorry for the confusion.