Friday 17 January 2014

3 goblins and a 2-headed Ogre

Christmas came and forced a break in the proceedings. I'm still waiting for a couple of location recordings from my good mate Andy before I can continue with the church stuff, so I have started working on Ketchup, track 2, which is all about gaming worlds. The first section has a name that I have wanted to use for a while, Booty Bay Blues, after Booty Bay which is a place in the game World of Warcraft. It's a goblin town, and appropriately will be a kind of skiffle/folk/blues. I say appropriately, because it seems to me that's what goblins might play, that or electro-pop. Or maybe metal.

Anyway, the tune is introduced by the players. I have invented three goblins and a 2-headed ogre. The leader of the outfit is Finklesnort and Tooheds is the drummer. Here is a cpy of my notes, and the script.

The cast:
Finklesnort (goblin)
Gruntbucket (goblin)
Weasel (goblin)
Tooheds (ogre)

F: Ok, tape's rolling, you ready guys?
all: grunts of agreement
F: My name's Finklesnort!
G: My name's Gruntbucket
W: My name's Weasel
T: And mine is the last voice you will ever hear
F: Aww tooheds knock it off.
(background from goblins)
T: Sorry. My name's Tooheds
F: and together we are...
All: Frankie goes to Stranglethorn
T: who's Frankie?
F: Sh. And this is... Booty bay blues. Too-heds?
T: Yeah?
F: hit it!
T: OK

Well this is of course reference to Frankie goes to Hollywood, and to a particular 12-inch mix of "2 Tribes" which includes the lines from teh band "My name's Pedz", "My Name's Mark", "My Name's Nash", "And Mine is the last voice that you will ever hear". But also to the classic X-factor-y introduction "My Name's Chris", "And My Name's John" ... "and together we are..." "Chris and John!"

Of course, there's only me to do the voices, so three different goblin voices and an ogre - no problem. Put a growl in the voice, use different pitches, shape the vocals with Avox Throat (which simulates modulation from different throat shapes), use a bit of pitch-shifting and some other grittying effects and it's fairly plausible that they sound almost like different people, possibly goblins. The Ogre was even easier, a pitch-shift down, a bit of stereo widening and deep talking to start off with, and a big dollop of reverb. I just love it.