Dark Rain
By GregVK on January 11, 2026 8:05 pm
This week's beat was an exercise in letting go of perfection.
As a freelance songwriter/producer, I'm used to mix templates and editing plugins/workflow, like Melodyne, Autotune, Vocalign, etc.
For a long time I've been hesitant to record any instruments raw into my M8. I felt like I'd first need to record into my DAW, edit and then sample into the M8.
Basically I just avoided the whole process, despite really wanting to add my vocals, and guitars to my M8 songs.
Stupid, I know... But anyway. Being a human is weird!
I was working on another song, but got stuck somewhere along the way. So on Wednesday I switched to this one. With even less time to make this song, I had to give up trying to make it "perfect".
I ended up doing a bunch of stuff I'd never do and still love the end result. For example:
-Letting lyrics just happen instead of outlining, multiple drafts and days of editing.
-Recording a vocal into my M8 in a single take (the chopped up vocal in the chorus).
-Recording the final acoustic and vocal section with my Shure SM7B and Rode Nt1, but with zero editing or eq in the DAW, just a little compression and a cassette emulator.
So I learned something from making this song.
Use whatever tools and skills you have on hand to make art. You don't need everything to follow your perfect workflow for maximum quality. And just going with what's in front of you, will often result in a far more "you" version of what you would have created.
Loving how weekly beats forces you to work with the time and resources you have, rather than waiting for the perfect conditions.
Lyrics:
Dark rain is coming down on me,
So hard that I can barely see.
And it might wash away the road.
Hope I remember my way home.
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