Gunfail.....Failed.

Ok, not really!! Haha. I just decided to change things up a bit, but maybe I should just try and explain how Vortex Afternoon and all it's inhabitants (me, myself, and I) co-exist in this slightly schizoid ecosystem of musical identities.

So, first there was Danie Nel. He was fresh from playing in a band with mates, and did his first gigs in 2000 as a solo act. This band was called "Even" and had a couple of incarnations, with me moving from lead guitar to bass to guitar and vocals and principle songwriter. Herewith a line-up list from a show we still played in '99.

Josh Sithole even played that evening... May he rest in peace.

From 2000 I played the same venue a couple of times as a guitar and vocals solo act. This then became my "project" which has been running for 17 years now. The idea is and never was to be performing publicly, but merely to be a guy writing music, and to release it in some way or the other.

I recorded an EP in 2004 which was then absorbed into my debut album "Painting with Light" which I released in 2006. Recording time was bartered for a photoshoot with Street Level Music, home of such notable acts as "The Usual", "Tait" and "Hey Mister".

I printed about 50 CD's which in time all sold. To me, that's a gold record! But more than that, I then decided to make all my music available for free.... at least this album, with only commercial rights held. I used JAMENDO to release this album onto the world, in 2009. This was the best decision I have made in terms of distribution, so far.

Here is the kicker: I have made more money this way out of music, than I ever have trying to "sell" music. It is free for personal use, but for background music and licensing, Jamendo charges a subscription and you get paid per use.

Here is some stats on this album to date on this platform:

Listens (Streams):

1 435 596 .... yes, almost 1.5 million people have heard this album through this portal alone.

My total catalogue of music has reached 1 957 326 listens on this platform to date. It is mainly made up of singles and 2 EP's. As one of the EP's is Afrikaans worship music, it is understandable it won't draw as many listens.

73251 Downloads... quite a bit more than the 50 CD's I sold.

I also submitted the tracks from this album to radio stations, online stations etc. To date, here are some highlights:

"Harde Hout" reaches no.17 on the SAMP3.com charts.

"Mercury River" reaches no.11 on the SAMP3.com charts.

"Morning" is selected as acoustic track of the day out of 10 000 entrants on Garageband.com

"Harde Hout" reaches nr.2 on CoastalRadioSA.com's Afrikaans Top 20 charts.

"My plek" breaks into the CoastalRadioSA.com Top 20 Afrikaans tracks.

The Album gets playlisted on NamaquaFM terrestial radio.

"Kinders vang die son" gets playlisted on Jakaranda FM.

But, ANYWAYS, I the album is still doing very well, and I'm immensely proud of it. Subsequently I brought out an EP called "Een" which was Afrikaans Worship songs, an live in studio acoustic album, recorded warts and all, called "Live to a mic" and subsequently a couple of singles.

I play Cape Town Church of Christ 's worship band, and that also is another outlet and style of music that I play. It also feeds my need to play infront of people, and is hugely uplifting to know that we serve to help people worship God.

But I digress greatly. The point is, that my tastes are eclectic, and I'm a huge metal fan, and I've started writing in that direction in the last couple of years. I write Afrikaans, folksy stuff, pop rock, ballady stuff, have a thing for punk.... and you can see how this can get confusing. If you're Devon Townsend, Neil Young or someone like that, you can probably weave all those personas into one and it's great.

I feel kind like I struggle to go from the extremely soft and folksy pop of "Morning" to "Hammerfall"'s industrial metal raucus as the same "band". I like the idea of personas. Also, if I tell someone to go and listen to Danie Nel, but they like metal, and they happen to listen to a folksy number, they'll assume that I am a folk musician and not be bothered to explore more. So the personas also help to get people into the style of my music they prefer quicker.

Thus I created "Crashtackle", my metal band. Or really more like a heavy - anything weird goes - progressive type idea with a focus on heaviness.

As such I then had 2 personas to administer, and I felt I needed a consolidated home (ironic) for both. I thus created Vortex Afternoon, which is the "record label" of I, myself and me. Hahaha. This way I keep my personas together, but also seperate.

However, lately I started feeling that a lot of the stuff I write for Danie Nel is actually hard rock, and punk. I came up with the idea for a punk outfit too, called "Gunfail". However, I realised that I am getting way too complicated now, and I'm ending up having to occupy 10 personas for every musical style I like. I'm no Phil Anselmo, so I  consolidated somwhat.

Anyways, that's a very long way of getting to the point. Gunfail is no more, but might become an album name. 

Deezer

I have  totally become a fan of Deezer. Much like Spotify, only Spotify is not available in my corner of the globe. So, I've also since then noticed how many people actually use Deezer. So, without any further ado, here are my playlists from Deezer for your enjoyment!

Please consider adding one of my songs into your playlists, it really does help to get the word out, and earn a cent or 2 along the way. Literally.

Something new is coming...

A new project I am launching.... think punk.... think fun.... think guitars.... think major chords....

My music is available on most streaming sites. Also Deezer, which is available in South Africa, where Spotify still isn't.

Herewith links to the 2 playlists:

Crashtackle

Danie Nel

Danie Nel Music - The Gathering (Official Lyric Video)

This tune was written shortly before the turn of the millenium. It's just about making peace with your past, dealing with your old self and finding the reason for why things happened and closing those chapters.



This song was release in an acoustic live version on the  "Live to a mic" project in 2009 and is still available on Jamendo for free streaming and download here:



https://www.jamendo.com/artist/356082/danie-nel



It is an odd-ish kind of song, in that I can't place the style, or anything enough to classify it. I guess it is rock with tango and space rock undertones!!



As usual, I played all the instruments, did the recording and did all the vocals. I really enjoyed playing the solos on this. Again. It has a bit of a gypsy, tango, weird feel, but it just came naturally once I layed them down. Also the instrumentation features my father's 50 year old Hohner Melodica. I love that thing.



Buy the track  here: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/danienel5



or at any of your favourite online retailers, or streaming services:



iTunes:

https://itunes.apple.com/za/artist/danie-nel/id298708556

Google Play:

https://play.google.com/store/music/album?id=Bm3ol3askyn762cxixlkn3nwoau&tid=song-Tr666kqgzaahk4jgiab7ritygdy



....Spotify, Deezer etc etc.



I also have some tracks available on Jamendo for free download and streaming:



https://www.jamendo.com/artist/356082/danie-nel



or pay-what-you-want or free at:



http://danienel.bandcamp.com



All instruments: Danie Nel

Music and lyrics: Danie Nel

(C) Daniël J. Nel/Vortex Afternoon Music



PS - PLEASE SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE NEW MUSIC

Bandcamp for Crashtackle

All my releases are now available at Bandcamp with a an instrumental version for each! Jeremiah's complaint is still available absolutely free.

A sale at Bandcamp gives me more than double wat iTunes gives me, and 500x more than a Spotify stream. Literally. Having said that, as long as people are enjoying it, I don't mind how they do it. So go ahead, add me to your Spotify, Google Music or Apple Mussic playlist. Even your Youtube playlists.

The more people listen to the music or watch the videos, the better.

Latest from my studio... Aerials (System of a Down Cover) and some thoughts on COVER MUSIC.

I'm not great at doing cover versions of songs. For many years, I actually did not learn any new covers. As a guitar player I obviously cut my teeth on learning cover songs, and I will not deny that this is vital for learning an instrument. I quickly got tired of it though, and chose just to try and write my own material. 

I listen to a huge amount of music, and I'm always learning by listening, but as for simply learning to sing and play songs by other bands, in the past I just couldn't be bothered. And maybe I was a bit insecure and afraid of criticism too. And maybe not that good at learning songs properly. Or executing it. (This is a hugely cathartic blog post!) There is also the way people judge how good of a musician you are based on how well you can copy someone else's song, that frustrates me. If that was true, we would probably never have listened to Bob Dylan. 

I have had a bit of an issue with playing covers "exactly so". Carbon copying the original artists, if you may. Steve Hofmeyer, a South African artist, did a cover album of Neil Diamond songs and sold mountains of these things. He certainly has the voice for the material, but the fact that the songs were sung and produced exactly like the originals begs the quesion: why not just buy the original? Nobody sounds more like Neil Diamond than Neil Diamond, surely. I can't argue with CD sales, so obviously there is a need for this type of cover, but I've always looked for artists who interpret songs in new ways.

Take Metallica for example: they pay homage to bands that influenced them by playing at least one cover version per live set, and having brought out an EP and a double album of cover versions, along with tribute projects to Ronnie James Dio, Black Sabbath, Lou Reed (not Lulu, but live versions of "My Sweet Jane") and some more that I can't recall right now. What they do is interpret the  songwriter and original artist's vision and effort with their own set of skills and styles.

They even tackled some more commercial pop and rock songs in this medley performed at a MTV-event. There are many other examples, such as their rendition of "Turn the page" by Bob Seger, or "Whiskey in the Jar" by Thin Lizzy, which in turn is actually a cover of an old Irish folk song. In turn, Metallica's catalogue has been covered many times, by so many different people, and often these versions can bring new appreciation for the song. Just listen to anything by Apocalyptica, or Pat Boone 's version of "Enter Sandman" to appreciate how far you can go with covering a metal song.

Nirvana loved the odd cover as the MTV unplugged album shows us. "The man who sold the world" became my favourite song on the album, originally written and performed by David Bowie. And I don't even much care for Bowie's music. So the new "packaging" actually helped me appreciate Bowie more to some degree. 

 I saw Saron Gas (now known as Seether) cover "How You Remind Me" live, when it was okay for metalheads to like Nickelback. I stage dove on it. I headbanged to it. Don't tell anyone now.

I especially appreciate it if artists can reinterpret songs into completely new genres, or parts of the song, a lick or hook, and almost rewrite the song around that. A client of mine, Loki Rothman, has become an internet hit with his "one man band" covers of well know songs. The fact that he is a prodigy on guitar and does things to strings that should be considered unlawful is part of the draw of this type of cover. And to see him do this live, is quite something. Without creating an alienated version of the song, he re-purposes it, in a matter of speaking. From jazz to pop he puts his own touch on any song. See what I mean below:

  

Ok, I can probably do a thousand page blog post on songs that different bands covered in their own inimitable way. And that is beautiful, and a huge compliment to the songwriter, me thinks. But, I have to make mention of one last artist, that has become an internet phenomenon: Leo from Frog Leap Studios. 

A metal musician, re-purposing pop and more mainstream songs into metal madness has introduced a huge amount of people to heavy music, that normally wouldn't have listened to it. He plays all the instruments bar the odd collaboration with other musicians. Seeing his version of Adele's "Hello" blew my mind wide open. And then Pete Cottrell ripping the hardest solo over the breakdown I have seen in years... I saw the light properly: doing covers can be mad cool. 

So I  really like the song "Aerials" by System of a Down. I would sing it at top volume in my car on many an occasion. All their quirkiness, creativity and commentary is just perfectly distilled in this tune.  I would often wish I could write a song like it. And I still do.

Well, I tried, and I couldn't. I wrote my own songs, and that is great. Inspiration is needed now and again, but I couldn't write my own "Aerials". So, I started jamming it along with them. And I thought, hmmm, some fingerpicking could work...., but I don't do covers...yet. Then I Youtube'd some covers of "Aerials" and the one below showed me that maybe I could bring my own acoustic feel to it. Not like the girl obviously, but do it in line with my own skill-set.

So, I decided to go all in. With my own set of skills. My voice, my playing, my own solo written for the song, and my weird instruments. Below is a pic of some of the things  I used.

I really really enjoyed reproducing the song with my own vibes, and here is my effort. Let me know what you think. I'm busy thinking about some more songs that I can cover. Not necessarily in this exact style, but in my own way. Whatever that might be.