Yves Villeneuve
"the chorus man" album
The simple poetic rock sounds of this artist are fluently and fluidly expressed in his debut album, which had been in the works since Jan 2008. His first album effort is based in a dark mood with poems positively inspiring any intellect. As the songwriter, vocalist, guitarist and bassist he is looking toward improving his craft with each new album. Situated in Canada, the artist is decidedly in the music industry to make records of lasting affect and effect on his attentive and loyal audience.
This musically inclined artist grew up with parents who provided everything for their children in a modest home in Capreol, a small town just north of Sudbury, Ontario prior to the amalgamation of surrounding municipalities to this city. He is the oldest of 4 siblings.
He began passionately playing the guitar at the age of 13 but stopped completely at age 18.
Following a 22-year hiatus and writing a series of love poems plus another on a different subject since the summer of 2007, he decided in November 2007 to rekindle his love affair with playing the guitar because he now craved to write songs to express himself to those who would take the time to listen and enjoy his message and songwriting passion.
On December 25th, 2007 after politely asking for some financial help in the form of Christmas presents, he was gifted his chosen Kramer electric guitar and strap plus a sizeable library of useful music related books from his parents.
Fortunately, the tendonitis he developed in his left thumb prior to Christmas Day trying to ready himself for receiving his guitar finally healed at the end of January 2008. Still, during December and January he was working on the lyrics and melody for his first song.
He felt a sense of accomplishment and pride when during the first full two weeks of February he had written his first 4 songs and by February 29th had written another 8 to complete his debut Rock album "the chorus man" in a swift series of demo recordings.
Following writing his first 4 songs, he made arrangements with a local studio to record his album within 4 days in July 2008, heavily relying on a trusted gut instinct, his overall faith and insight along with some simple planning he would finish writing the album by the very end of February 2008. The producer provided programming and editing of the drum tracks to enhance the rhythm section for each of the songs, which the grateful artist accepted.
The now totally pumped songwriter easily decided in February 2008, the 12 songs would appear on the album in the order they were written. The first track, originally expected to be a very short guitar solo, was later replaced by a spoken word piece to make 13 tracks total for the album.
After purchasing a Yamaha bass guitar and without vocal experience prior to December 2007, the second set of demos were recorded by June 8, 2008 with simple drum loops produced from his Digitech RP-350 guitar modeling processor. His Samson CO1U condenser microphone had been purchased in December 2007 and would connect to his computer via USB for the vocal demo recording.
In early June 2008, he publicly characterized his music on myspace.com as "the simple Poetic Rock sounds of Yves Villeneuve" expecting it to be his music career trademark.
To his dismay, he noticed in June he needed to practice his vocals 3 hours daily for at least 5 to 7 days since, while generally a very quiet person all his life, he rarely spoke throughout the day to naturally keep his vocal chords strong and stretched enough for singing.
"the chorus man" album was recorded, mixed and mastered between July 8 to 19th, 2008. Unfortunately, this was all the production time the new independent recording artist could afford at the time. He was still extremely happy with the quality of work John Hartman (icedrum.com) had produced in his Sudbury studio acting as producer, recording and mix engineer as well as providing programming and editing of the drum tracks. Vocals were mostly recorded in one take while vocal variations from verse to verse and chorus to chorus were mostly kept to give the sections some personal unpredictability.
The artist was also thankful for the mastering services of Paul Lipinski (visionsounds.com) and the cover artwork by Sue Sandlin (CommunityMusician.com) based on the artist's cover art concept.
As history would reveal, "the chorus man" album soon was completely uploaded at his official website on July 25 2008 for anyone willing to freely experience "the simple Poetic Rock sounds of Yves Villeneuve" ... at any high, medium and low volume levels.
2008 - THE CHORUS MAN
Beginning the tradition of limited recording/mixing/mastering time along with a deadline.
Released: August 4, 2008
Radio Single Releases: None
Yves Villeneuve: Music, Lyrics, Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Cover Art Concept
John Hartman: Producer, Mix Engineer, Recording Engineer, Drum Programming
Paul Lipinski: Mastering Engineer
Sue Sandlin: Cover Artwork
Icedrum Media Ltd – Sudbury, Ontario, CA: Recording and Mixing Studio
Vision Sound Inc – Orange Park, Florida, US: Mastering Studio
Track Listing:
01: The Inner Self - 0:37
02: See River Flow (North) - 5:21
03: He Is The Baddest Friend In Town - 5:01
04: Down On Two Knees - 4:31
05: Insane Rumors - 4:17
06: A Dream I Had Last Night - 4:13
07: The Chorus Man - 4:12
08: Slow Healers - 4:22
09: I'm Sleeping Single In Love - 4:58
10: Lone Wizard - 5:38
11: Soldiers Of Good - 4:32
12: Their End Will Come To Pass - 5:03
13: Will She Say Hello Again - 6:47
2009 - TENDER AND FIERCE IN YOUR WORLD
Continuing the tradition of limited recording/mixing/mastering time along with a deadline.
Released: October 13, 2009
Radio Single Releases: None
Yves Villeneuve: Music, Lyrics, Vocals, Guitar, Bass, Cover Art Concept
John Hartman: Producer, Mix Engineer, Recording Engineer, Drum Programming
Daryl Phenneger: Mastering Engineer
Sue Sandlin: Cover Artwork
Icedrum Media Ltd – Sudbury, Ontario, CA: Recording and Mixing Studio
Vision Sound Inc – Orange Park, Florida, US: Mastering Studio
Track Listing:
01: The Embodiment – 5;21
02: (Love Me) Tender And Fierce – 4:41
03: I Beg You Guardian Angel – 4:14
04: Children Of The Apes – 4:33
05: Little Trade Secret – 4:13
06: Democracy Evolution – 3:54
07: Your World – 6:18
08: Devil Hides A Grin – 4:52
09: When They All Cried – 5:01
10: Capture The Wolf – 5:30
11: Your Look Of A Double-Barrel – 5:16
12: I Whisper Your Name – 5:20