MORE INFOAll of the tracks from singer/songwriter Charles Allison's song-a-week project are available to stream at www.charlesallison.orgTHE ROGUES GALLERYCharles Allison collaborated with about 30 musicians, including:* Stephen Nichols, founder of the music/art collective The Good Players.* Butch Ross, dulcimer player and folk singer/songwriter.* Kyle Malone, producer/vocalist of the electro-pop/rock band The Hearts in Light.* Travis Knight, bassist with funk/soul band The Distribution.
Some people can't write their way out of a paper bag. Charles Allison wrote himself out of a rut.
Last September, the local singer/songwriter decided to break his habit of abandoning new material by committing to recording a new song every week for a year and posting his results online.
The latest release, "What is time?," is the 50th in the song-a-week series, which will end later this month. Allison, 36, said the effort of composing at such a breakneck pace for 11 months has taught him to write on a deadline and has opened up a new path for getting his music to fans.
"One of the things I was frustrated about with my music (before) was that, since I didn't know what I was doing with it, I got really precious about things," Allison said. "I'd get songs 90 percent done and then couldn't write the lyrics, so I'd move on.
"Part of what I wanted to do was break out of that cycle. I wanted a project where I knew I could create and release something in a totally new way."
Allison is the founder and front man of the local experimental rock band Land Camera. Thanks to a MakeWork grant he received from the non-profit CreateHere group last year, he was able to acquire the inventory of a commercial recording studio, fulfilling a long-standing dream by turning his home into the base for Spanner, a professional-grade studio that produces music for Web, film and TV.
As a result of Spanner and his music career, Allison is well connected in the local music scene. From the first release, "Life is falling back to being a baby," on Sept. 16, 2009, he said he knew the project was going to be highly collaborative.
That first song featured Bob Stagner, the percussionist in Land Camera, the members of which have contributed to about 15 of Allison's songs.
Some weeks, releases have featured as many as seven performers and only six were solo endeavors. In all, about 30 local musicians have had a hand in the project.
Considering most songs were finished in 8-10 hours, from shaking hands to uploading a finished product, Allison said it's a miracle he's only missed one weekly song deadline, and only then after his computer self-destructed last month.
"Dealing with that kind of stuff is the journey I'm on," he said. "It's going to happen, and I can't believe it didn't happen before now, actually.
"We were starting with no telling what was going to happen, and it all turned out pretty well. That's definitely been a confidence booster for me and good experience in terms of being a producer."
Bijan Dhanani, the guitarist with the local band Ramble Horse, collaborated with Allison on the song for week 38, "I'm waiting for your dissipating," which features Allison's plaintive, dreamy vocals drifting over Dhanani's funky accompaniment.
The finished product belies the 3-4 hours it took to write and record the song, Dhanani said.
"From a recording perspective, it was something that was completely new to me," he said. "It's very improvisational and on the fly, which made it something very special, I thought."
"It sounded like a legitimate recording. I was very happy with it."
With a studio full of high-grade equipment at his disposal, Allison said he has been able to keep production values consistently high, something he said sets A Song a Week apart from similar projects by other singer/songwriters.
"That was very important," he said. "I wanted to make sure people didn't think it was me writing an acoustic folk ditty every week. I wanted this to be as fully realized as it could be in that time frame."
From the onset of the project, Allison said he planned on releasing the music in some form when he finished. Since he's avoided self-editing his work, Allison is planning to release all 52 songs on two discs rather than select specific songs. The album should be out this fall.
From learning to love the banjo to acquiring a more-defined ear for recording nuances, Allison said he's grown tremendously as a musician and a producer throughout A Song a Week. Despite this, he said he's ready to leave some of the insanity behind.
"I'm ready to not rush," he said, laughing. "I'm ready to take my time and be deliberate, to work quickly, but not as quickly as I've had to."