Billy Van - #AYearOfSongs

This year, multi-talented electronic producer Billy Van is embarking on an ambitious #AYearOfSongs journey to create 12 unique EPs with

By: Billy Van

 Sunglasses, my third collaborative EP of this #AYearOfSongs project, is all about energy and hooks. I wrote these four songs with Adam Christopher, a songwriter/vocalist. His post-hardcore electronic band, Brother’s Grimm, hired me to produce tracks for their debut EP, and after we finished that project, we decided to do an EP together and go a completely opposite direction.

 Adam’s voice has a really cool timbre to it, and brought me back to the punk/emo vibes of my middle school days. With references like Hot Chelle Rae, Secondhand Serenade, and Boys Like Girls, we decided to sculpt a more “modern” sound around that style of pop songwriting/vocals. One of our biggest inspirations for this project was actually old school Cash Cash (when they used to be a band!). Huge, hooky melodies were our top priority.

 We started each song with the choruses.  We’d vibe on chord progressions with gibberish melodies, then translate those melodies until words popped out. Once clear pictures of the hooks were in place, we built concepts and songs around them. Adam is a beast vocally, so we had lots of cool riffs and ranges to work with when making melodies.

 The EP takes on a few different shapes. From the opener, Cannonball, with its darker, more aggressive attitude, to the closer, Parade’s tongue in cheek “march” vibes, we spanned a wide variety of concepts that all revolve around the same idea.

 The overall concept of this EP is independence and confidence. One of the reasons I decided to do the #AYearOfSongs project is because I recently adopted the mindset of doing what you love no matter what. I am learning to be content being creative and making music that inspires me, even if it results in no fans or money. It is really easy to get fixated on analytics and I think that society really magnifies that problem. This applies to all aspects of life. For example, we are taught to find or be the model girlfriend/the rich boyfriend.

Click Clack Boom Remix Competition by Billy Van: Billy Van - Click Clack Boom (Julius CC Remix), Billy Van - Click Clack Boom (Adam Palinkas Remix)...

By: Billy Van

Flipswank, my second collaborative EP of this project, was a step in a new direction for Billy Van. J.T. Roach, this mega talented singer/songwriter came to Indiana for 5 days with no strings attached, and the music you hear is the result of our collaboration.

The groundwork for this project was laid quite a while back. J.T. and I have run in similar circles for a few years, both working with Quincy Kwalae and jamming with a lot of similar people. We had communicated a handful of times about each others’ various releases, and always supported one another. Each conversation concluded with a standard “We really need to work together at some point”.

J.T. is one of the few people I’ve had conversations like that with who actually followed through. In October of 2013, he called me and laid it all out. He wanted to drive down from Wisconsin and make some music. At this point, my idea for #AYearOfSongs didn’t quite exist, and I was really just in the mood to create something different, something fun. I agreed, the date was set, and we both began brainstorming ideas for what our collaboration would look like.

The first track we did together was Neon. J.T. had been writing acoustic/minimally produced songs for several years, and had this amazing bank of “sketches” to use for starting points. Before he arrived, he sent me this zip file of ideas and Neon jumped out at me instantly. The chiller verses, the openness of the hook, I couldn’t resist. I produced the songs up from scratch before he got here, and sent him a preview. My excitement fed his, and we knew magic was going to happen.

J.T. arrived and we spent five days doing absolutely nothing but creating this fun-loving danceable sound. Each track from the EP has a distinctly different flavor though. From the more aggressive “Click Clack Boom” to the ultra-groovy “Tearin’ It Up”, we had a blast exploring different tempos and feels. The project was elevated to a whole new level once we finished production and got into vocal recordings. J.T. and I both have a serious appreciation for harmonies, and spent a long time crafting the vocal sound that we recorded.