User:Janicewhaley/Janice Whaley

Janice Whaley is an American musician and vocalist, born in California, USA. She is most notably the voice of The Smiths Project, a layered-vocal tribute to The Smiths spanning January 1, 2010- December 31, 2010.

Early Life
Janice Whaley began repeating melodies by ear on the piano at age 3. She participated in music activities in school, such as marching band and jazz band, most notably filling in for guest Jazz singer Nancy Willson who was scheduled to perform with her school's jazz band. She sang jazz in Palm Springs, CA cafes after completing high school. She moved to San Francisco in 1995.

From the ages of 14 to 17 years old, Janice suffered from Polymyositis, a degenerative muscle disease, that robbed her of mobility until it went into remission at age 18. She credits polymiositis as a major force behind her creativity. Music and art were the main activities available in her weakened condition and they served as an emotional outlet during this time.

Music
Janice began recording music when she was 19 and is most often the only performer/instrumentalist on her music. In college at San Francisco State University, she became interested in Musique concrète tape editing techniques of early electronic music composers and began experimenting with these techniques within the new digital realm of ProTools software. Her first voice-only experimental piece was featured in the (now-defunked) SFSU online magazine in 1997. While in college, she recreated two pop songs in a layered vocal style, the first being I Will by Radiohead, followed by Why Don't You Find Out For Yourself by Morrissey.

Her approach to music continues to borrow from tape editing techniques in that she uses very few sound sources and then edits the source material heavily to create the instruments she desires. In the case of The Smiths Project, her only sound source on all 71 Smiths songs was voice. She sights the music of Morrissey and Johnny Marr as being a major influence on her life and music as she listened to The Smiths heavily during her illness with Polymyositis. Her more recent influences include Laurie Anderson, Meredith Monk, John Cage, John Zorn as well as the experimental aspects of rock/alternative music by such artists as Bjork, Mike Patton, and Radiohead.

The Smiths Project
In 2010, Janice began a year-long all-vocal project called www.thesmithsproject.com. She re-created covers of every original song by The Smiths by using only her voice for instrumentation including, guitars, strings, synths, percussion, as well as lead vocals. Each song was composed in layers, often reaching 30-50 layers of voice and took between 20-40 hours over several months to complete. She worked tirelessly on the project for the entire year, posting one or two songs per week to her blog, often dedicating the tracks to a particular friend of the project.

The Smiths Project was first publicized by American actor Thomas Lennon on Febuary 1st, 2010, who then drew attention to her project by tweeting about it to his Twitter followers. Radio DJ for Indie 103.1 and Sweet and Tender Hooligans front man, Jose Maldonado began playing her music and interviewing her regularly on his radio show Breakfast With The Smiths: The World of Morrissey shortly thereafter. In March, Simon Goddard devoted a blog article to her entitled, Janice Takes a Bow. From there, word spread throughout the world each week as more songs were posted.

Because of fan demand, Janice took on the task of creating a box set of the entire project in January 2011. She used the fundraising website Kickstarter to asked for a small amount that would allow her to make a 6-disk jewel case of the project but due to it's popularity, the kickstarter ended 530% funded at $18,700 that allowed her to create a deluxe box set with graphic designs by The Mystery Parade done in tribute to each of the Smiths original album designs and mastered by Ryan Coseboom. The box set and individual albums are available at http://janice.bandcamp.com. All royalties are paid to The Smiths.

Original Music
Patchwork Life, Janice's first album of original music is currently underway and set to be released in April 2012. On this album, she employs the same techniques of using her voice as her main sound source but also encorporates piano and drum machine, edited in a similar way to her vocals. From her kickstarter page:

"After doing 71 covers on The Smiths Project last year, I was ready to work on original music. These songs were created in a similar recording style to The Smiths Project,  with layers of vocals making up all instrumentation including drum beats, strings, synths, choirs, etc. but this time, with the addition of piano samples on a few songs and, in one case, a drum machine and bells. That's it.  These layered-vocal tracks take months to piece together and edit into arrangements.  I will be posting videos and snippets to let you see how the music is created. 

Patchwork Life's Album Title I called the album Patchwork Life because of the many distinct elements of my life that have come together to make up who I am- and make the music what it is. Growing up, I had a quilt on my bed that my grandmother made from my mother's old 70s clothes. Each square was so completely different, bold, and colorful. Nothing matched, yet the over all effect was cohesive and deeply personal. The quilt mirrors my musical attempt to honor the many aspects and extreme differences of my life- real vs.online, acoustic voice vs. digital editing, motherhood vs. music dreams, sleep vs. finishing an album... to take all these elements and use what ever is around me to create something new.  Artwork The artwork represents what I see when working on music every day: waveforms. Since my music is made up of acoustic voices stitched together digitally, I spoke each song title into ProTools, took snapshots of the waveforms and then embroidered them onto fabric using ProTools track colors as my palette The album art consists of an embroidered physical representation of my voice for each of the 11 song titles as well as the album title. I will be posting the corresponding art piece with each track as they are completed."  Patchwork Life's track listings (in no particular order): Sugar and Fire Ants Megalodon Built My World Haunt Me Buried Tunnel Vision It's Not You, It's Me According To A Liar The Unusuals Integratron Collapse and Dissolve

Collaborations
In November 2011, Janice collaborated with Tears For Fears co-founder Curt Smith to recreate the song Trees as the bonus track for the re-release of his Mayfield album. The song is all-vocal, with Janice creating the instrumentation and backing vocals and Curt Smith singing lead vocals.

In January 2012, Janice collaborated with USA Network star of Psych James Roday on a Tears For Fears song called Ideas As Opiates as a gift for Curt Smith's 50th birthday. The song's instrumentation is janice's voice, with Janice and James taking turns on main vocals.

Honorable Mentions
Janice Whaley was awarded SF Bay Guardian's SF Bay Guardian's Best of the Bay 2011 and SF Weekly's Best of San Francisco 2011 for The Smiths Project. She has been featured in Bust Magazine Issue 69, and numerous news and blog articles around the world, including the popular Guardian UK

“Janice Whaley put her  mind to making a 71-track a cappella tribute to The Smiths. After a year  of hard, inspired work she not only succeeded, she made a very   beautiful, admirable, no, ASTOUNDING a cappella album. Morrissey, et al,  you should be proud of her.”

- Tony Visconti - Legendary music producer to Morrissey, David Bowie, T.Rex, Kristeen Young  &quot;I've never known anyone  to approach a task with the clear-headed vision and unwavering   dedication that Janice has shown on The Smiths Project. Embarked on with  love and accomplished with style!&quot;

- Curt Smith - Co-Founder, Tears for Fears  “So to cover one Smiths  song, and do it well, is extreme effort enough. To cover every Smiths  song, within twelve months, ventures into the realm of epic heroism. The  Smiths Project - being 71 tracks recorded over 52 weeks in 2010 by   Janice Whaley - is testament to the fact that such a hero exists. Whaley's achievement is truly extraordinary, not merely because of the  added caveat of undertaking the entire task using only the sounds she   could produce with her voice (looped, layered and lacerated by   electronic wizardry), but because, taken as a whole, the finished piece   transcends its original objective.”

- Simon Goddard - Author of Mozipedia: The Encyclopedia of Morrissey and The Smiths  “She doesn't just sing  Morrissey's words in majestic songs like &quot;I Know It's Over&quot; and &quot;How   Soon Is Now&quot; but re-creates Johnny Marr's shimmering guitar effects, the   timeless bass and drums ... plus the overwhelming sense of optimism and  dread that consumes the music.”

- Aidin Vaziri, Chronicle Pop Music Critic - SF Gate

 “…she's a testament to just how charming, creative and arduous the modern tribute can be.”

- Stephen Kelly -  Guardian UK

  “The effect is positively Björk-like, recalling both the drama of Selmasongs and the experimental heft of Medúlla.”

- Chris Martins - LA Weekly

 “The gorgeous recordings, given a feminine touch and featuring more heavy breathing and  beat-boxing than has ever been associated with Morrissey and Marr.”

- Marc Hawthorne - SF Weekly  “The fun in hearing  Whaley’s inventive covers is the variety of different approaches she   takes in layering her wonderful voice, from making “Please, Please,   Please Let Me Get What I Want” sound even more detached and mournful…to her liberal use of vocal distortion on “What She Said,”… Or just take in   this almost angelic-sounding version of “Hand in Glove.””

- www.slicingupeyeballs.com  “As a lifelong smiths  fan, I'm blown away by Janice's versions, the arrangements, her voice... I hear the songs in a whole new way.”

- Thomas Lennon - Actor, comedian, writer, director and producer. Lt. Dangle on Reno 911!  “For me, The Smiths Project personifies why we all love music. Janice is the rare artist  that might not know how talented she is...well, the cat's out of the   bag. Congratulations and don't stop. Ever.”

- James Roday - USA Network's Psych star Shawn Spencer

 “Many congratulations to  you on your ambitious Smiths Project. It is the feat of a true apostle - once it's over you shall officially be anointed Saint Janice of  Smithdom.”

- Simon Goddard - Author of Mozipedia: The Encyclopedia of Morrissey and The Smiths