Trick_13

Synnack Remix released

2009-07-11T15:02:00Z

My completed remix of Synnack's "Rize (5mg)" (called "Rize (10mg)") is now out on his v.2.0.5 release, available through Force Of Nature. It is the bonus track on a digital-only re-release of v.2, or (the remix) is available as a (free) download if you're a registered supporter on the Synnack website.

trick_13 @ 2009-05-30T19:34:00

2009-05-30T23:33:37Z

I just bought myself a Novation Nocturn, and unlike my last Novation purchase, I was able to get it doing exactly what I want it to do within only a couple days.

This handle Little thing (it's about the size of a DVD case) can fit in my laptop bag and lets me do all the fancy knob turning things I normally do live, without having to require my own personal keyboards present to work right. Score.

trick_13 @ 2009-05-12T19:29:00

2009-05-12T23:27:26Z

I used to play WoW with one of these guys.

Blurp

2009-05-09T21:11:36Z

Every once in a while I find a track on iTunes where the sound quality is terrible. In today's case it is Combichrist remix of KMFDM - Bait & Switch. This is rather unfortunate because he took one of the weaker songs on the album and made it into something kickass. Not to mention both parties know how to mix a solid-sounding track, so I think it's more on iTunes' head. Sounds like they flattened it to mono.

Musician says Huh?

2009-04-29T22:37:27Z

This reminds me of a discussion znuh and I had at the Deadmau5 show.

RTFM

2009-04-19T20:43:30Z

Well, it only took me 6 Months or so, but I finally got my new keyboard set up to do the things I wanted it to.
This mostly helps with KTAGF stuff. Not sure yet how it can be used for GTD.

On top of that I've grabbed the latest versions of both Cubase (5) and Live (8), each with features that get me rather aroused.
Grabbed that floral soft-synth I mentioned some months ago (Synplant) and the packaged drum synth that P-O from Colony 5 was telling me about (uTonic) to boot.
Now I'm trying to decide if I want to round it out with the synth bundle NI offers for their Kore Player.

trick_13 @ 2009-04-17T22:37:00

2009-04-18T02:36:04Z

Sweet Jesus. I just wrote something unlike anything I've done before. Accidentally. While trying to write something else.
Sometimes staying in is way cool.

trick_13 @ 2009-03-21T19:05:00

2009-03-21T23:06:20Z

I was flitting around Last.fm on a whim and noticed that Ground To Dust is (understandably) one of my most listened to artists. But, I thought it would be fun to see who else might be listening in. And I found this review of the show back in January. This is I believe the first review I've ever read of something I've done.

"Wed 14 Jan – De/Vision, Seabound, Ground To Dust
Ground To Dust did an amazing job opening. I haven't heard of this band before but now I am really interested. Even better they are from the Boston area. The music was very fun to dance to.

I haven't heard much Seabound in the past but I was impressed with their live show. I may have to check out an album or two of theirs.

De/Vision was the reason I went to the show and they didn't disappoint. It is so fun to get good electronic music in Boston since we hardly ever see European bands over here. I don't remember the exact songs they played but it was a good mix of new and old.

Overall a good showing. I woke up the next day and my arms were sore from all the moving around I did the night before! :)"

trick_13 @ 2009-03-21T10:42:00

2009-03-21T14:49:00Z

I just woke up from this dream where I was doing a back-to-back A4A and GTD live show. A4A was first, and it was me on bass (forgot my pick) and Joel from Rooster Teeth/Red vs. Blue was on guitar [?]. But not only had I not built any of the A4A live tracks, but I had loaded up GTD - Broken. Somone hit play and the wrong song came on, so I was trying to figure out what to do. Leanne was there and recognized the song, so she tried to pick it up, perhaps thinking we'd been billed in the wrong order and that GTD would go first. And then we found that some guy had snuck on my computer and left me a bunch of angry messages.

Things to remember to avoid when I really do a show for A4A.

/shakes fist

2009-03-18T16:25:55Z

The blame rests squarely on dogslikeus for showing me this video:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=gISlB1IdUjI

If you're a gamer, it was supposedly during the end credits of Mass Effect, and that alone has won them lots of listeners.

And so now I've got the song stuck in my head and had to go buy it on iTunes.
The band, Faunts.....I'm not sure what to make of them yet.....

Reverse Remixing

2009-03-16T23:09:07Z

I'm having a fun little experiment with some tracks. In trying to write a Ground To Dust track, I started going in a direction that was very much not right. So that track is going to the 'remix', and now I get to try and reimagine it as an album cut. So far that mix is also not sounding like GTD, but also good.

trick_13 @ 2009-03-14T20:50:00

2009-03-15T00:51:56Z

I think I know what I want to spend my Refunds on:

Well, that and the Combichrist CD, the forthcoming VNV set, Cubase 5, KMFDM vs. Skold....

trick_13 @ 2009-03-04T19:17:00

2009-03-05T00:19:29Z

Josh and I are plotting.
I like it when we plot.
Especially when the plots involve the words "Fuck yeah".

Loss: Revisited

2009-03-01T00:50:24Z

Loss (Revisited).mp3

Intervewe

2009-02-26T04:23:15Z

INclination Magazine posted their Ground To Dust interview today:
www.myspace.com/inclinationmag
www.inclinationmag.com

Still: Revisited

2009-02-25T23:13:14Z

Still (Revisited).mp3

I've recently begun what should be an ongoing process of re-recording and re-mixing older tracks, primarily A4A.

My first foray into this task was something I wrote in the summer of '01. Those couple months were right after I got Reason (the software I've used for everything you might've heard up to this point), and I wrote something like 3 1/2 albums before going back to school. There's a fair amount of crap from that time, but a couple stood out, and 'Still' has always been one of my favorites.

Something I've been trying to do more with on this Mix is playing with the EQ on all the different tracks, trying to cut away all excess frequencies from the core elements of the sound. It's something one always does a little when mixing, but I've been hesitant to really push it in the past.

I tend to think of music as a collection of layers, and in the writing and design process, I put great care into each individual layer to make it interesting. The problem is that having Big and Intricate sounds can make it harder to squeeze them all in the small place that is your final mix.

Some will clash with others, some will cover others up, and sometimes they'll add up to the point where what was a nice little nuance is now accentuated to the point of being irritating.

The trick then is to cut away all the extra bits. Things that may sound great when played alone, but get lost in the full mix of the entire song and/or crowd the space.

I've always had trouble adopting this approach, at least beyond just some subtle touches. However, in listening to a lot of what bands are doing in some different scenes (primarily Electro-House), and some of what NIN has done the last year or two, I've been hearing a lot more recordings where an instrument is missing a lot of frequencies, and it works.

They're no longer individual layers, each meant to be perfect unto itself; they're now puzzle pieces that need to all fit together to create the whole.

'Still' originally had a very basic string section, and the sound of all the parts in it sort of blurred together to the point where it was just a wave of sound. In the new version I wanted to add a more defined string arrangement, with more melodic movement, more intricate harmonies, some better samples, etc. Musically I liked what I came up with, but the sound of it still was very muddy, and adding in the rest of the tracks made it all worse. The strings overpowered everything.

I took one of the string tracks, the original one from the song (slightly changed), and split it into 3 different tracks, each handling its own portion of the harmony. Low, High and Mid notes. I used the EQ to cut out the frequencies not used by those notes, or not important to the sound. Each track individually might sound funny, not all there or flat, but when put together, they help fill out the sound without stepping on each other's toes.

The Bass in the original track was one of the defining elements, so I didn't want to change it much, but at the same time it didn't function much in the way of actual Bass. So I added in an additional bass track. The new track is very low, with almost no upper frequencies. Not wanting them to conflict or mask each other, they each play at different times within the measure. Also, since Bass 1 didn't have much low frequency to begin with, I decided to cut out the little it did have, and keep the more important and destinctive mid and upper frequencies.

I replaced the drums with new samples, but ones that were pretty true to the original. The old 909 sound. I rolled off some of the highs from the kick drum and some of the lows and even mids from the snare. Again, each on its own might sound off, but played together and then thrown into the whole mix those 'empty spaces of sound' get lost to the ears, yet create a little more breathing room for all the rest.

Wow...

2009-02-19T00:36:58Z

'Once' is one of the best movies I've seen in a long long time.

Nerd Blossom

2009-02-13T20:43:25Z

Last night lulus_curse and I took a trip to Borders, where I was trying to pick a new Fantasy novel to read. It's been over a year since I last read a book. The problem was that the new works by my familiar authors supposedly sucked, and I couldn't remember who I should check out.

So I pulled a U-ie and picked up 'Dune'. I blame Dirge and znuh .

Then on my way to the checkout I submitted to their impulse by section and wound up with Episodes I - III of Star Wars on DVD (With Commentary, Deleted Scenes and hours and hours of exras!).

So now I get to decide if XMortis is worth it, or if I should stay home buy a weekend's worth of wine and just Nerd Out.

I'll be spending my weekend grinding the Valentine's Day achievements in WoW (on both primary characters).

W00T!

2009-02-03T23:47:18Z

So, we're totally on the latest DJ mix by END: The DJ!

March Of The Circuitheads
Club mix Recorded live

Intro
E.I.D.- END: the DJ (March of the Circuitheads)
Iambia- Renegade Cult Manifesto
C-Lekktor- We Are Already Death
Vicious Alliance- II Ice Age (2008 Version)
Psytechz- Distorted
FGFC820- The Heart of America
Wynardtage- Crash of a Star (Ginger Snap5 Ringtone Mix)
Worms of the Earth- The Whore
Ground to Dust- Desolate
Uberbyte- The Gift (Erektor Remix)
E.I.D.- Psychokiller
Stahlschlag- Lustseuche
Soman- Absolution
Souless Affection- Broken Dreams
Neurotoxxik- Psy Torture

Memories?

2009-02-03T00:17:02Z

Back somewhere around 12 years ago, I wrote my first collection of music. It was during (I think) my junior year of High School, and I had no idea what I was doing. I just thought that it was so cool to have computers make music.

On that first tape (lol!) were only two tracks that were even remotely good. One would go on to provide the foundation for Digging My Way Out. The other was the very first flowing mood piece that would come to make up a sizable portion of the A4A library.

For years I've been wanting to redo the track. I really like the chords. In my archives that I'm currently going through, I've found my collection of failed attempts. And one that actually kinda works. The problem is, I can't tell if this is my remix, or something dogslikeus did (it sounds kinda like his drum style). It would be just like him to be better at making my own music :-P

Mood v2

Mmmmm, Monday...

2009-02-02T20:57:25Z

I'm so ready to get my Club on...

trick_13 @ 2009-01-31T21:24:00

2009-02-01T02:44:43Z

I mentioned the other day that I'm feeling scattered. Part of that was a comment on my emotions, but part was a very accurate reference to a lot of the music pieces I've been piling up for years. Hundred of bits and pieces ranging from 5 seconds of a drum loop to a full track.
So I've been spending the better half of today going through and trying to get it all in once place, then clear out stuff I really don't need to hang on to.
My companions on this journey include: Faith No More, Kylie Minogue, Linkin Park, Toadies, others...

I'm finding a lot of old ideas here that I've had for.....up to 8 years now. Things I still feel I can one day do something with. Other times I stumble across something I totally forgot existed. A couple of these I don't remember at all.

The next step will be going through the pieces that fall flat overall but have a cool element, and try and extract that little bit to add to a library, so that I can throw out the track and then one day you the piece in something more worthwhile.

3-5-08
4-2
Amb 1
blagh 2
DH 1

W00t

2009-01-30T20:45:05Z

From the VNV Website:

"REMIX FOR COMBICHRIST : Ronan has just finished a remix of Combichrist's "All Pain is Gone". The Combi-lads plan to release the mix on vinyl and as a digital download, though those plans might change"

In addition to being excited, I'm also mildly amused. The first time I heard a clip from that track some months ago, I thought "Andy's venturing into some VNV territory here.". So I'm curious to see how/if Ronan says "No, here's how this is actually done..."

trick_13 @ 2009-01-28T15:39:00

2009-01-28T20:47:14Z

I'm feeling very scattered. I think I need to go through a mini-purge, try to streamline, organize, alleviate some of the clutter.

Last night Leanne and I didn't have much to actually work on, so I was showing her clips meant for the next album, and she was confused.
To paraphrase:
"I thought you wanted to be edgy and aggressive?"
*wince*

She was right. Most of the clips I've been tossing around totally don't fit into what I'm going for. I'll have to set many aside, for some other project or something, I don't know. The ones I hold on to I'm going to have to redirect. I don't know how to write the music I want to be writing (or any, for that matter), and my blind stumbling seems to be going further down the wrong path.

Which is part of why I rattled Josh/J2/OUAI's cage today. Time for new Div.2 maybe?

As much music as I have going on, I'm not very focused on it. Sometimes I feel like that's all that's missing, time and clarity to just sit down and tackle it with some idea of what I want and what I'm doing.

I never have that clarity.

trick_13 @ 2009-01-23T12:55:00

2009-01-23T17:57:55Z

I really like the new Combichrist track (single?) 'All Pain Is Gone'. I should buy this CD. Too bad I'm a cheap/lazy bastard. Frequent trips to a Myspace page are no way to listen to music.