About: A New Era (Up to Date) *DRAFT

JuelTones: A New Era, started production on September 26th, 2023; just after the start of school. My idea behind this album was to create songs based upon people in my life, either by their personalities, favorite songs, or other aspects of the persons life. Let's get started!

The inspiration begun while I was in a residential treatment facility (R.T.C.) where my only form of entertainment was a golf No.2 pencil, and an 80 page wide ruled journal. My personal thought process started on making an album about the pain I experienced over the past few months of my life, however I realized how depressing that was. I then misconstrued this negativity into something positive, and learned to use my depression as motivation for something more! As the days built up, more and more ideas were being spat out onto that journal, in the idea that one day I'd be able to materialize these words into reality.

Soon, I realized I wanted much more than to just create an album, but to make some real profit off of my musical abilities I'd gained over the years. About halfway through my stay, I started constructing a small business under the name "Juels Stoney, (or JuelStoney.)" Many days were spent making skeletons of what my website could potentially look like, what products/services I could sell, and how I'd advertise my brand. I drew ridiculous amounts of rough drafts for a potential logo. Of course, the word "Stoney" is a very controversial name, so I used an idea my mom threw at me: JuelTones, and cut and pasted all of my previous ideas, just with a new name!

←Here's an example of a few rough drafts of the logo

When school began, I began the first construction to A New Era, which was finance. I needed a few materials before I could start, so I thought: "What would people possibly want to pay me for?" My first thought was making songs for people (which is how the inspiration of A New Era started,) and then I remembered how I'd gotten into music in the first place: a family friend, whom of which gave me 4 drum lessons. "That's PERFECT!" I thought, and made an advertisement within 5 hours of that idea sparking.

←Here's the Advertisement

I recorded, edited, and then posted this ad to my neighborhood Facebook page, and overnight I'd gained three people interested! After this, I made the money in no time at all, and got myself better equipment than I was expecting. All that I got are included as follows: Universal Audio Volt 276 Compressor Audio Interface; x2 Shure SM-57 Dynamic Instrument Microphones; and a midi cable.
Once I had the equipment, I then began on my first song for the album;

Alli's Song. I had met my friend Alli in the same R.T.C., and she's one of the most relatable, interesting, friendly, kind, energetic, and sweet people I know. This song I wanted to make as personal to her as possible, and already was brainstorming with the chill and euphoric vibe in mind. When I asked what her top 3 songs were, here was her response.
1. Paper Planes; By: M.I.A.
2. Substance; By: 03 Greedo
3. Avalon; By: $uicideboy$
With those in mind, I L O V E D the percussion from Substance, and wanted to recreate that sound with acoustic instruments. I got together the drums I had, tuned them to the weirdest tunings I've ever heard, and hit record. In total, I had 3 drum tracks; one with the bass drum, and floor tom (which sounded like a low congo.) Two with bongos. And lastly, three with hi-hat on my right ear, and triangle on my left. The shaker sound is midi, since I didn't have a shaker. The snapping sound is also midi. I then used my keyboard for some ambient chords, added an extremely simple piano riff that plays whole notes, and added some midi on top of the driving bass drum. The total time of production from start to finish was 35 days. (September 7th - October 12th.)
The next song I made was:

Olivia's Song. I'd known my friend Olivia for over 3 years back then, meeting her on SnapChat quick-add during lockdown. She's always been extremely bright, and has an optimistic insight, even when things are dark, she always can see the light. She's experienced hospitalizations as well, which I can relate to heavily. As well, she plays the clarinet. This song portrays the personality of Olivia very well from my personal perspective. The big band sound, the upbeat tempo, the dramatic changes, the large bass, and the light bassoon riff incorporated to represent her experience in band.
Starting the production off, I began with the various drum parts. I mic-ed the drums in a unique way, I'd not tried before. It has a very isolating sound to just the hi-hat, snare drum, and kick, allowing me to add countless other layers of drums on top later in the song. The second drum part was just an ambient ride cymbal sound, meant to keep the song driving. It was very repetitive, actually repeating throughout even the dramatic switch of the song. I then added a rhythmic tom part, best described vocally as: (Bim-bem-bum...bumbum.) For my musicians:
(1+2+3+4+1+2+3+4+.) After the jazzy drums, I incorporated the bass. For My bass, I wanted to be very reserved, but loud & bouncy. This was a frustrating sound to find, taking countless takes to get the right feel that I wanted. When I finally got it, I just used it for the whole jazz section because, in my opinion, it was really fitting. Then, I added some piano. The piano wasn’t as difficult, because it was all in the B scale (I believe, don’t quote me on that I forgot.) I played the piano part in halftime, only taking about 10 attempts total before I was happy with it. Last but not least, my brain was screaming at me to add just one more thing to the sound; a brass/horn part! So, I took a brass sample from ableton, made it into a midi keyboard, and then placed a whole bunch of blocks. Once this was complete, I produced the motherload out of the midi sound, to make it sound and feel as much like a real brass instrument as possible. And BOOM! We go right into the mozambique rhythm of percussion.
I wanted to capture Olivia’s dramatic personality by portraying it into this dramatic switch of sound! The entire percussion section is 7 tracks total; 2 midi, and the rest live sound!. The triangle, and the clave were the only two I made midi, the rest were heavily modified tom sounds, and borrowed percussion equipment. When the end of the build up happens, that high drum sound on a baby drum-kit tom I tuned up as much as possible, in an attempt to emulate the sound of a timbale. Then, we go into a super popular latin rhythm, used by many artists nowadays, but also bled into the world of hip-hop. (Ex. Doja Cat’s more recent songs, Santana.) Next is the real difficulty. In this scarcity of wind instruments, I had to get extremely creative with my synth. The only instrument I could get my hands on was a bassoon, and only for 1 day. I composed the bassoon part, studied it, and then took ungodly amounts of takes, to give me as much room to work/improve as possible. After, I added an ambient synth chord that changes 3 times, and repeats. On top of this, 2 bars in I incorporated a low piano part, with an arpeggio to get the “drive going” on the song; make it more uplifting. Well! That was it. The production went way more in depth than I can put on paper; taking me a total of 56 days (Oct. 1st-Nov. 25th.)
Then, there was:

Camila's Song. I met Camila just 2 months before the creation of her song; both me and her were in School Of Rock's: Latin Rock performance band together. Oh man is she a strong, independent, sweet, hilarious, and amazing character. She’s an extremely talented singer, and it fits her playful and outgoing personality nicely. When making this song, it was supposed to be an apology for her. (To be honest, I don’t remember what the conflict was about.) With this song being an apology, I wanted to make it as short and sweet as possible, while also portraying her as a person. So, I used midi throughout the entire song.
I started by copying the triangle and clave from Olivia’s song, and then added some midi drums made from live drum sounds I’d recorded. Then, of course, you’ve gotta have that 808 Kick Drum, (well, bass.) So, right after the swooping riser, I added a massive and heavy hitting bassline, which carried the whole song. After the rhythm section was complete, I incorporated some low octave recorder sounds as my bass flute. This became my harmony, to the sliding synth that comes in after two bars. Once I’d gotten a good recorder sample, I placed a bunch of lower midi notes, and it turned out to be an insanely cool vibe to the song. Now, I needed that melody, which I did with a Garage Band piano, since I don’t have the slide effect on my keyboard. Lastly, There needs to be a good ending. So I re-miced my drums, and did a little solo at the end, before the loud crash of the final chord. This song was very simple to make, however the production value took me a second. It took me 8 days to make: (Oct. 18th-26th.) I honestly loveeeee this song with all my heart, for the simplicity, and the impactful and joyous sound.
However, this next song will blow your mind:

Felicity’s Song.
My friend Felicity, was a girl I’d met around the same time I met Camila, (because she was in the same band as me.) Me and her got to know each other, mainly because of how much we had in common. We had a love for music, a love for carts, a love for the arts, and had a few similar favorite songs. Her personality as an artist is all over the place, however, in her music, she loves a driving bassline, a whole lotta piano, and for it to be uplifting, rather than depressing. I believe I portrayed this very well with Felicity’s Song.
I started off with the piano part, (I made it in Garage Band,) in which it repeats basically the entirety of the song. With this part wrote, I had gained a whole new perspective on what this song could be, and so I played it into Ableton and got started on the rest. The next pieces of the song I pieced together was the “Marching” sounding drum part. Starting off with just the snare, I played a simple, yet awkward groove to make it unique from other marching drum parts you’d hear. After that, it was the bass, which was also very conservative. I played that part with a marimba mallet, and a mic still inside of the mic hole on the other side of the bass drum. I added some midi, some synth, and started to listen to the song hundreds of times over. I then came up with the “story-teller structure” to the song. (Not having a chorus, a verse, instead having a beginning, middle, climax, and resolution.) When doing this, I added in some tambourine, and driving cymbal sounds that play in both ears. I also played some bassoon for the climactic riff, and added more midi brass sounds. The post-climax piece was constructed completely of midi, other than the drums. Basically this song was much more about the sound, than how many real instruments I’d use. This song is by far the one I’m most proud of on the album, for a lot of reasons, the main one being I’d never gotten this kind of sound before. It really sounds like a lot of pop songs nowadays to me. This song took me 45 days to make: (Oct. 25th - Dec. 9th.) Altogether one of the most prideful songs I have.
My next song takes a more simplistic turn:

Billy Joe Craft. This song is all for my grandpa, and his continuous longing for me to make a blue-grass song. Since he moved closer to me and my family, I’ve been enabled to build a much better relationship with my grandpa and grandma. Because of this, I’ve endured a LOTTTT of blue-grass, country, folk, and more within that genre of simplistic drums, and a driving guitar line. Most, if not all songs within this genre focus completely on blues. 12 bar blues is a cool piece of musical theory I’d learned in jazz band 2 years before the creation of Billy Joe Craft.
I used my basic knowledge of the blues, and applied that into my first time recording guitar. The start to this song was me playing in 3/4 to a metronome on drums. Then, I took about 10 takes of D.I. bass guitar, and effected the two to sound much more vintage. I added a rhythmic guitar on top in a total of 2 takes. I tried making a soloist guitar, but after 150 takes, I gave up pretty quick. So, instead of guitar, I wanted a bassoon to solo, however couldn't get my hands on one in time before christmas, so this was the final product! In total, this song only took me 2 days to make (Dec. 17th-18th.) I love this song, but also hate it for how simple it is, and how easy it was to just make a song like this. I realized making music doesn’t have to be as complicated as I always made it. However, I also now understood that making it complicated made it sound good, and made it sound like me, rather than every other song out there.
This led up to me fiending for some midi, which I scratched that itch in my next song: