Introducing The SingStar Dev Team (Look! We’re Not Boring!)

Hello! I hope you’ve had a great holiday season so far and not yet exploded from all the chocolate and gorgeous festive food you’ve been consuming!

Tonight is the biggest party night of the year and, as we’re sort of taking over the blog a little bit, we thought it would be a really great idea to get some of the team to introduce themselves to you and show you just what a talented, creative and fun bunch we (some of us) actually are.

So, without further ado let me introduce to you some of the SingStar HQ Dev Team members I work with every day here at the SCE London Studio. Boys and girls, over to you (and thanks for sending and writing lots of things in a very short amount of time without too much moaning).

Nina x

PS: Don’t be afraid to check out any of the links below. You may just discover something you really, really like!

Jon Spanyol – Senior Music Transcriber

Music has always been my passion, so when I’m not working for SCEE, I like to keep as busy as possible writing songs and playing gigs. I love all different genres of music, but generally focus on Jazz and Pop, performing in many different venues around London and occasionally, further afield.

For me, music is all about creativity, and Jazz Piano gives me the opportunity to express myself through improvisation, which I find immensely satisfying. I play in a variety of different ensembles with singers and instrumentalists, predominantly gigging for functions and doing occasional bits of session work on Piano and Trombone.

I also write, record and perform my own Pop songs, which is another great way of being musically creative. I’ve played several gigs in London, both acoustically and with full band, including headling Twestival (a charity Twitter festival), which was great exposure for my music. However, the musical highlight of this year for me was recording and releasing my debut EP ‘Good Things’, which on its release in March, received positive reviews and BBC Radio airplay. I’m currently working on a full length album, due for release in Summer 2011.

You can download my EP from Bandcamp, iTunes and all other major music download sites.

Ben Whyntie – Senior Music Transcriber

Hiya, so…

I’m Ben and I work for SingStar. Yay! I’m a Senior Transcriber and my job is to create the pitch bars and lyrics that you see on-screen when you play the game. There are many reasons why I enjoy my job and like working for SingStar, the main one being the free Diet Coke. If I did have a complaint, it would be that the fridge is too far away from my desk.

To do my job, you have to be quite good at music. I’ve been playing music since I was a kid and, after gaining my music degree from the Royal College of Music, I was wrenched out of the classical music world and thrust into the gaming world. Quite a scene change! But the great thing about working here is that everyone enjoys music, whatever the genre.

2010 has been a good year for the team and a good one personally. I oversaw the notation of SingStar Guitar and went to Spain to give a presentation at GameLab 2010 on our new releases.

Outside of work, I still pursue many musical adventures. I’m currently playing trombone in the band Gypsy Hill. We’re a mix of gypsy, balkan, electro, dub, and phat beats. It’s weighty! We’re in the midst of recording our debut album and currently playing shows and festivals around the UK and Europe. It’s quite a hoot! You can find links at the bottom of this spiel.

Also, I currently have a little home recording studio and write and record my own solo stuff. I love rock and metal and earlier in the year I completed my debut album under the name ‘History in the Making‘. That album was released on 13 December 2010 and is available on iTunes and to listen to on Spotify. I’m deep in the midst of writing the follow up album. Exciting! I’m also the producer for a new band down in Portsmouth.

Enjoy your New Year’s Eve celebrations and have a good 2011!

Gillian Wood – Music Transcriber

I’ve been working/singing/dancing (delete as appropriate) on SingStar for two and a half years now. My background isn’t gaming but music…. I studied cello and classical music at the University of Glasgow and then came to London a few (several!) years ago to do my MA in Audio Production. I ended up freelancing as a cellist and teaching and lecturing at the University of Westminster and a couple of other colleges in London.

I came to SingStar as a temporary Music Transcriber one summer back in 2008; I meant to leave but somehow didn’t! I now work as a Producer on the SingStore. I still play a lot of cello (sometimes too much!) with various bands and artists. Lately I’ve been playing with the lovely Beatie Wolfe, Carey Willets from Athlete, the amazing and brilliant Kidkanevil (working with him on his next album as well), the equally brilliant Stateless (their album is due out on Ninja Tunes in the new year with strings by me!) and I’m hoping that, if I have the time, I’ll get round to completing my own album…

What did I do this year? Uhm…Dance? Dance? Oh yeah, dance, dancers, green screens, the wonderful world of Camberwell, learnt how to make lunch for 8 people, dance, dance, green screens, transportation of a large orange crate to and from the studio, dance, dance, dancers, choreographers, wigs, big wigs, little wigs, long wigs, short wigs, more dancers, change of scene, Islington, no more lunch making, new green screen, more dancers, more songs, more dancing, new wigs, more clothes, dance, dance, dance, dance, last shoot end of November, a little wine, a lot of wine, some tequila, 2010 end!

Liam Shalloo – Art and Video Production Assistant

BAMF! POW! SNIKT! Roll Out!

Wow peeps! What a wacky, wonderful, west-side, wintery time. 2010, a year filled with a few lows (boooo) and many highs (yay!). For me, one of the coolest events of the year combined both my life here at Sony and my ‘other’ life as a Billionaire Playboy flying around in a shiny metal suit… oh wait, that was a dream? Shame.

Basically, outside my life at Sony I’ve managed to have some success within the comic book industry, working on properties such as Transformers, Spider-Man, Dr Who and GI-Joe. And while I ain’t gonna’ lie by saying that working on stuff I used to read as a kid isn’t cool (it soooo is), the absolutely coolest thing about all of it is: Conventions!

At these shows I can meet hundreds, sometimes thousands of people over the course of a weekend and you know, one of the things I’ve ended up noticing is that a lot of fans (and a few creators) bloody love SingStar!

At one of these conventions I was busy signing a few comics and Spidey DVDs when a very familiar shaped box was waved in front of me. I look up and, low and behold, saw that someone had not only brought a copy of the latest SingStar game but also their console for me to sign!

After a few jokes and a nice long chat (apparently they had heard a podcast interview in which I had mentioned my involvement with SingStar) I signed both console and game and they went of on their merry way with a unique bit of memorabilia.

For more info and samples of my work visit http://limabean01.deviantart.com/.

Jim Fowler – Music Content Manager

It’s been a busy year for new content on SingStar – as well as the usual disc and store songs there have been 128 new guitar enabled tracks and 122 with dance. The Content Team has grown (a bit) to cope with all this additional content and there are now 14 of us transcribing, editing audio and making videos.

As always, it’s been (mostly) fun and I got to help out on some other games too – check out this trailer which I wrote the music for.

Outside of Sony, my kids’ theatre show ‘The Mole Who Knew It Was None Of His Business’ (“Perfectly pitched” (The Guardian) : )) was back on tour, entertaining audiences with catchy songs about toilet habits of animals.

But enough of that! It’s list and summary time of year, right? So here’s a run down of stuff I have (and haven’t) enjoyed in the world of SingStar and games this year.

Bands That I Wouldn’t Have Heard if it Wasn’t for SingStar
Revolverheld and The BossHoss – both their tracks on German SingStar Guitar are worth checking out.

Obsession of the Year
OCD enabler Minecraft. Where did my lunch hours go?

Song That I Have Been Unaccountably Unable to Get Out of My Head No Matter How Hard I Try
Fruta Preferida from Spain’s SingStar Patito Feo disc.

Hidden Talent of the Year
The senior coder whose uncanny Tina Turner impression was broken out every time we tested ‘Steamy Windows’ for SingStar Dance. Bandy legs a-go-go.

Most Fun Times
Recording the SingStar Guitar Menu Music at Air-Edel with various Music and Art Team members (see pics below).

Eamon Murtagh – Designer SingStar/SingStar Home

My favourite album of 2010 is a perfect marriage of analogue electronics and a real live band.

LCD Soundsystem’s ‘This is Happening’ is a confident statement from an artist the peak of his powers. Earlier this year James Murphy (the driving force behind not only LCD Soundsystem but the entire DFA Records Empire) intimated that ‘This is Happening’ may be the last hurrah from his LCD Soundsystem project.

After three albums, perhaps he felt the prophetic lyrics to his breakthrough track ‘I’m Losing my Edge’ were about to come to fruition. The song is a touching confessional from an artist feeling his age. He can feel the presence of other younger contemporaries “with better ideas… and more talent” coming up on his shoulders and it is evidently freaking him out.

Ironically, it was this track that opened the door to the greatest success story of his long and varied career. Now, after years of knowing exactly where he will be a year in advance (thanks to the constant touring and PR demands of the LCD behemoth), he has decided it is time to stop. If this is to be the last hurrah of LCD Soundsystem then it is clear that the ‘edge’ he was losing all those years ago is still razor sharp.

It’s one of my pet hates when artists resort to writing songs around their experiences as a recording star, rather than their experiences of ‘real life’, but the intimate style and epitaph framing of the ‘last’ LCD album manages to charm its way into your affections. You can hear how weary he is; it’s that sort of honesty that allows you to stick with tracks like ‘You Wanted a Hit’ which berates the music industry execs who make the decisions but don’t make the art.

The album opens in conversational mode; gentle drum machine percussion acting as background noise for Murphy’s dialogue. You instinctively want to turn the volume up to hear what this guy is saying – it’s reminiscent of Lou Reed; very New York (and like New York you don’t need to turn the volume up because something is going to break the silence soon enough).

The New York sirens come suddenly in real life and ALWAYS make you jump, so when the album’s opener ‘Dance yourself clean’ eventually rumbles into life, it is both joyous and surprising (especially in a live setting). Murphy has a deep understanding of both dance and rock music after his early days as a drummer in punk bands and later work as a club DJ. He uses the classic *LOUD* quiet *LOUD* mantra that has served the likes of The Pixies just as well as it has served the likes of The Prodigy. All the way through ‘This is Happening’ the listener is picked up and put down again by not only the dynamics of the music but by instinctively putting themselves in the mind of Murphy and his rollercoaster of emotions.

It’s evident that this is the work of someone who loves not only music but people; ‘I Can Change’ is the most heartfelt plea I’ve heard in a mainstream song in years – I can imagine myself as a love-torn kid singing along, as clearly as I can feel my adult self unearthing the same raw emotions which are usually buried deep under the layers of adult life. It’s a neat trick.

The album has a little bit of everything from the disco a go-go of ‘Pow Pow’ to the schlock rock of ‘Drunk Girls’ (which bears a remarkable similarity to ‘White Light White Heat’ by The Velvet Underground). There is an underlying energy to it all that comes from one man’s vision being seen through from start to finish without interference – perhaps for the last time.

So I ask you to dance to it, sing along with it, identify with and extrapolate from it – ‘This is Happening’ has room for all. If it is going to be his last hurrah then we might as well soak it up – like the ageing Gil Scott-Heron we won’t see the likes of LCD Soundsystem again – they will be forever remembered in my mind as the band who finally welded dance to rock.

This is happening – you can’t avoid it.

My LPs of the year – The Full Top Ten