As some of you know February is RPM Challenge and also FAWM. Do you take part in either or both of these ? I take part in RPM and that’s how I came to Alonetone. If you take part in either of these, what are your experiences good or bad ? Mostly I have had good vibes from RPM and really like all the different ideas that are shared. Any issues are mostly because I have a difficult time with technology. You experiences ?
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I’ve never seriously considered RPM myself because of work and what the recording process would involve for me. I love the RPM albums that members post here, though.
Interestingly, I’d never heard of FAWM and I’ve just been reading up about the two, and how RPM was originally an effort to get New Hampshire residents interested in FAWM, and… that it shifted the focus from songwriting (FAWM) to recording (RPM).
Now that is intriguing to me - I regard songwriting as an entirely different and separate process to recording. I always have done, and still do.
I could write 14 songs in a month… if I was going for it (I’ve been aware, ever since I was young, that if you force yourself to write a song a day you get a lot of “not too proud of that one” songs, but you also get more good songs a month than if you wait for inspiration).
I just couldn’t record more than 2 or 3! (Or not to a state that I’d be prepared to post on here - I tend to put “finished” things on here, I regard my alonetone stuff as my “published works” 
)
Ah… reading more on FAWM, if I made song demos, I’d need to be hosting mp3s elsewhere… like… here!
Definitely wouldn’t want song demos on my andyr account.
@sudara I wanna make an alonetone.com/andyrdemo account! 
EDIT: OK, signed up to FAWM 
Now, where did I put all those guitars I’ve bought!!
EDIT2: @sudara OK, don’t need another account now - I’ve made myself happy with posting demos on my main account.
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Yo! Having multiple “artists” on one email will require quite a bit of work, so it’s waiting behind a few other big features like rich text editing and comment replies.
In the meantime you can sign up for another account with another email address. If you have a gmail for example you can add a “+something” right before the @ sign and it’ll still go to your address. Like sudara+demos@alonetone.com will go to me…
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Cheers for that! I’ll check it out.
Meanwhile, I’ve decided I’ll put “song-writing demos” on my main account.
(And now I’ve discovered some folk preferring the “raw and personal” approach anyways… um… er… ok! 
)
Anyways, @acoustic57 many thanks for alerting me to FAWM 
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Hey andyr, glad to be of help. Have a blast and maybe at the end share a quick post and let us all know how it went for you. Cheers!
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Great question…This is my third year doing RPM (it brought me to alonetone last year…before that RPM had its own upload/music site). I really love the RPM and hearing the amazing talent and creativity out there - it really blows my mind. I think people may get turned off if they think RPM demands some fancy production…some people just post their iphone recordings and they sound great (and fun). I’ve been on a crazy song-writing challenge for the past two years (writing 100 songs per year) so RPM just fits right in. I’m hearing about FAWM and that also appeals to me (more writing and less production). Ultimately, I find having a structure that forces you to create very helpful (it also reduces the paralysis of perfectionism!). enjoy! Ps. I love listening to all the alonetone tunes…more fun than commercial radio!!
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This is my second year doing RPM, but I’ve never heard of FAWM! I looked into it, seems fun! But 14 songs? I can barely get down 5 for RPM haha! Anyway, I really enjoy RPM because it gives me a hard deadline and really pushes me but at the same time allows for flexibility with the goals and not requiring fancy production. I also found lots of great artists in my area from RPM. 
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I’m an RPM only guy. It’s the first one I heard of over a decade ago, and I’ve made such tight friends there that I don’t need to go elsewhere.
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Welcome aboard ( the forum )! Good luck with RPM 
@planetsapphire I’ve figured out, in the last week, doing FAWM, that actually I could have been doing RPM. For me, it wasn’t thinking that RPM demanded the production that put me off, it was me demanded the production for an “album”. When I read about FAWM, and discovered I didn’t even have to do demos - I was sold. A few hours later I talked myself into releasing demos if they were “ok”. And it all went from there
@staplegun Yeah, I was surprised. I’m a “man+guitar” sort of songwriter - I don’t really need recording software to write songs - so I knew it would be possible if I could get my act together and stay motivated. I also knew, from someone telling me it back in the 70s, that the idea of “write a song a day” really ups your game. But, I’d never tried it in all these years… I’ve been utterly AMAZED at what I’ve got in me. If you’d told me I’d only get to No 8, I’d have gone “not bad attempt”. But I’ve already done 8 and I started late! I’ve got 14 days to do 6 more. (Having said that, I’ve seen some folks on FAWM have ridiculous numbers of songs written! One guy had 70-odd a few days ago, I sampled 3, and they were all good… crumbs)
@keithlandryacoustic I never realised you were RPM only! When I joined alonetone, I’d never heard of RPM, and could never figure out your posting timing!!
Anyways, what this FAWM challenge has also done is open up the idea for me of being happy to post completed songs as acoustic demos instead of waiting until I’ve done a production.
I usually start a year with a list of 10-20 old songs I want to record… I start, I falter, I write a new one, get excited and record that instead, do an old one, start another, falter… go back to the sofa.
The moment this magical 14 for FAWM is done, that 10-20 list can get some attention as demos now, and that gets them off my chest while I can still sing them.
But! @planetsapphire I hear you on the “paralysis of perfection” … but I still LOVE perfection , it’s my hobby! Not sure I need 100 songs a year - wow!!! - but I do need to hollow out some time to do the productions too. My reasoning is if I can still manage 4-5 of those a year, then I’m not losing anything. (I also have VERY high hopes of speeding up that process too… watching/listening to yours and others makes me think there are possibilities
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So nice to meet an RPM vet. I’m loving RPM…heard about it from a friend I was in a cover-band project with (he did it for several years). Looking forward to hearing your stuff
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I’ve done both for years. This year I am just doing RPM but I am still writing new songs, and I am still going to end up with more than 14… so I guess I am still doing FAWM even though I haven’t been going to the site at all.
RPM turns February into a major event for me. I still write songs year round and I still come up with little recording projects for myself, but for some reason it all resonates more in February. I do miss the old website but I’m trying to get into the Discord (damn kids, get off my lawn!).
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I’ve been doing RPM Challenge since 2007. It’s good fun, and it’s really helped me with the composition, sound production, and project management process of creating music.
The project management element is very useful in my day job, where you may be tasked to do an absurd number of things in an unreasonable amount of time, and need to stick to a plan of attack.
The one downside of RPM Challenge is my video game console hates me during the month of February, since I’m too distracted by music making to use it. (The aliens and robots in the games enjoy the off month of me not firing laser beams at them.)
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FAWM for me as: @resonut123
This upcoming February will be year 11.
I did two 50-90’s with about 18 songs each but I successfully completed all FAWMs with 14 or more songs.
I like the FAWM community FAWMily.
They are very encouraging and it is a great songwriting challenge group.
I did RPM several years in a row, and it was one of the best things I ever did to improve my total musicianship. I highly recommend it for everyone.
I would encourage everyone to try it at least once. Learning how to finish things and move on, to adapt, and most importantly, get your gear stuff dialed in enough that it disappears and you focus on the creative part is essential.
I stopped doing RPM after 5-6 consecutive years because I realized I wanted to do stuff that required more than the sprinting, limited nature of RPM. But I am so glad I picked up those skills. Arguably those 5-6 months did more to advance my art than any 5-6 years I can think of.
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My 2nd year doing RPM …As well as the REM (record every month) sessions … really Enjoy the RPM and REM Program … just wish I knew about it earlier …I have heard and investigated FAWM not interested at the moment due to work and timing issues … Lots of Great People over at the RPM (Discord) … I like the Tutorials and other informative events they hold during the February event!
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I was lucky enough to be working in Portsmouth NH back In 2006. A regular named Dave came into the pizza shop, he worked across the street at the local paper called the wire. He asked if I was a musician, and like 80% of anyone working in a kitchen, I was. He told me about this new idea they had about getting the local music revitalized. They were going to call it RPM and was going to take place in February. He gave me a paper sheet to sign up on and I brought it over to the Wire the following day. I have been a part of RPM every year since.
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Cool to see all the responses And, one from an original RPM pioneer! Q: did you ever think this would grow like has ?