What a nice weekend. Really on a roll music wise. I am taking these songs slow, but really maximizing each part in each with the most groove!! For example, in one song, I added some filtered 808 hits, and got it right until it sounded on hit! Basic point, I am learning to take my time for the benefit of the groove! I added some basslines and recorded a couple more skeleton tracks. This James bond cut up themed album is taking awhile. But, it is also because I am sampling like a mad man. I notice the more time you put into pre production, the easier it is to sort a song out, quickly. I have learned a lot in the past couple months with regards to patience, attention to detail and how to work harder. God is really blessing me with lessons learned and wisdom gained. Also, am in the baby stages of working with an awesome vocailst. We have good chemistry and think we can write some great songs and maybe do some performing. Its an exciting project that is just starting up. The vocalist's name is Ariane, she has some vids up at www.youtube.com/yoitsariane
So, just motoring along. A song soon, and can't wait to start pumping out mayhem!
What I am sampling:
Henry Mancini- The Days of Wine and Roses- Some jazzy peices here, soft listening with mad groove. Highly recommend you give it a listen.
Henry Mancini- The Ultimate Mancini- Did you know he did the Pink Panther theme? Or a ton other popular movie, or show themes? Wow!
Thunderball- The Soundtrack- Awesome awesome awesome! Rent the movie, and hear the soundtrack with some rollerball action. lol!
22.7.08
Samplerism
I have been chopping and gathering sample age materials for a couple of months now heavy. Immersing myself in obscure, popular and traditional vinyl records. Not only am I getting awesome musical parts, but also good drum sounds, rhythms and grooves. In taking this different musical approach I have learned valuable things.
1. The music back in the ‘day’ was a lot simpler. The emphasis was on groove, melody. A story was being told, in rhythm and in lyrics.
2. In the simplicity is the true beautiful rhythm and groove. From the structure of the song, the simple melodies played. All in a fat sequence to be pleasing to the listener.
3. The lyrics weren’t about things of super negative connotation. True there were songs with a dark undertone, songs with sadness. But they were never usually about ‘killing’ someone, pimping a hoe or poaching a NARC.
I feel like I am in music school listening to these albums while sampling them. The likes of Sergio Mendez and Brazil 66’, Strauss, James Bond soundtracks, Liz Story, Liberace, Billie Holiday just to name a few. It is teaching me song structure, pleasing rhythmic nuances and to just have fun.
I am glad I am taking this approach to music. It has humbled me greatly in this aspect I’ll tell you about. I used to look down upon, frown upon artists who would heavily sample. Hip hop artists, electronica artists, those who did cover songs. I guess I frowned upon it because I didn’t understand it. I didn’t fully grasp the real art that it is. Listening to all of these records I realized one thing, plagiarism and cover songs, riff lifting and such was apparently heavy in the fifties/beyond just like it is today. Then diving deeper into musicology through vinyl, I come to realize that even classical artists from today’s generation and back in the day generation borrowed heavily from each other whether they knew it or not. So I beg a question. Is it ethical for me to be doing this? Does God approve? To be basing my beats and songs around lifted string riffs, lifted musical portions. Manipulating them into new arrangements with new twists. Is it? Why not, if done with a pure heart. If said samples are giving credit to the original artists. Maybe, if the song you have done is banging and the listener looks further into the song and sees where the sample came from, a thought might pop in their head to listen to the original rendition. Then the listener is now exposed to new forms of music, from possibly before their time, and they are enlightened to an age not much different than what we are in already. I may never know if God truly approves, but I know if my heart becomes cold with success, hard and deceitful. Then that is where a definite disapproval will ensue. Then another question appears. What is the difference between lifting a sample with a pure heart for artistry, and the multitude of cover bands doing their renditions? Is it the ‘clearance’ and ‘asking artist approval’ aspect? I think the clearance thing is a sticky situation. We all start on the bottom, unknown. When we as artists are ‘coming up’ we don’t have the luxury of having direct access to the original artists if alive. A good face to face conversation to iron out use of said lifted samples with the original artist is not plausible. Once again, I feel that if credit is given, and a good heart is present than if you have success you might talk to the artist at that time, which I think is when said conversation should happen.
I guess I bring all of this up after seeing and hearing for years the disapproval of samplers, samplists and cutters/choppers. I see the points brought against them as moot, and not truly valid. It is almost as if we all sit on high horses, overlooking the true artistry in this world we live in. While yes, there are those who would sample and deny, there is a multitude who do it for the love of sound.
1. The music back in the ‘day’ was a lot simpler. The emphasis was on groove, melody. A story was being told, in rhythm and in lyrics.
2. In the simplicity is the true beautiful rhythm and groove. From the structure of the song, the simple melodies played. All in a fat sequence to be pleasing to the listener.
3. The lyrics weren’t about things of super negative connotation. True there were songs with a dark undertone, songs with sadness. But they were never usually about ‘killing’ someone, pimping a hoe or poaching a NARC.
I feel like I am in music school listening to these albums while sampling them. The likes of Sergio Mendez and Brazil 66’, Strauss, James Bond soundtracks, Liz Story, Liberace, Billie Holiday just to name a few. It is teaching me song structure, pleasing rhythmic nuances and to just have fun.
I am glad I am taking this approach to music. It has humbled me greatly in this aspect I’ll tell you about. I used to look down upon, frown upon artists who would heavily sample. Hip hop artists, electronica artists, those who did cover songs. I guess I frowned upon it because I didn’t understand it. I didn’t fully grasp the real art that it is. Listening to all of these records I realized one thing, plagiarism and cover songs, riff lifting and such was apparently heavy in the fifties/beyond just like it is today. Then diving deeper into musicology through vinyl, I come to realize that even classical artists from today’s generation and back in the day generation borrowed heavily from each other whether they knew it or not. So I beg a question. Is it ethical for me to be doing this? Does God approve? To be basing my beats and songs around lifted string riffs, lifted musical portions. Manipulating them into new arrangements with new twists. Is it? Why not, if done with a pure heart. If said samples are giving credit to the original artists. Maybe, if the song you have done is banging and the listener looks further into the song and sees where the sample came from, a thought might pop in their head to listen to the original rendition. Then the listener is now exposed to new forms of music, from possibly before their time, and they are enlightened to an age not much different than what we are in already. I may never know if God truly approves, but I know if my heart becomes cold with success, hard and deceitful. Then that is where a definite disapproval will ensue. Then another question appears. What is the difference between lifting a sample with a pure heart for artistry, and the multitude of cover bands doing their renditions? Is it the ‘clearance’ and ‘asking artist approval’ aspect? I think the clearance thing is a sticky situation. We all start on the bottom, unknown. When we as artists are ‘coming up’ we don’t have the luxury of having direct access to the original artists if alive. A good face to face conversation to iron out use of said lifted samples with the original artist is not plausible. Once again, I feel that if credit is given, and a good heart is present than if you have success you might talk to the artist at that time, which I think is when said conversation should happen.
I guess I bring all of this up after seeing and hearing for years the disapproval of samplers, samplists and cutters/choppers. I see the points brought against them as moot, and not truly valid. It is almost as if we all sit on high horses, overlooking the true artistry in this world we live in. While yes, there are those who would sample and deny, there is a multitude who do it for the love of sound.
21.7.08
rest
Good weekend! Started out on Friday watching 'The Dark Knight'. What a good movie. It is 2 1/2 hours long, but worth every minute. The Joker was played exceptionally well. Christian Bale, as usual did a solid job playing a good batman. I enjoyed the movie very much, and thought it was actually worth ten bucks. Also, during the previews before the movie started, there was a preview for a movie called 'The Watchmen'. It looked very epic and really visually stunning! Who knows on that one.
Saturday was productive. I have just been lately continuing to sample, practice beats and songs. Spent the day doing that and going through my archives on dvd and cdr and taking elements from there to use for sampleage. It is fun going down memory lane. Taking the best from certain unfinished projects and breathing new life into them. The album is slowly getting done, but I think all the songs are banging.
Yesterday I helped my buddies/roommates get our place wired for internet. Did some cleaning, rearranging. I had to crawl under the house with spiders and an enclosed area. I am a wimp with that stuff, lolz. Overall a refreshing weekend.
Therapeutic blog out.
Saturday was productive. I have just been lately continuing to sample, practice beats and songs. Spent the day doing that and going through my archives on dvd and cdr and taking elements from there to use for sampleage. It is fun going down memory lane. Taking the best from certain unfinished projects and breathing new life into them. The album is slowly getting done, but I think all the songs are banging.
Yesterday I helped my buddies/roommates get our place wired for internet. Did some cleaning, rearranging. I had to crawl under the house with spiders and an enclosed area. I am a wimp with that stuff, lolz. Overall a refreshing weekend.
Therapeutic blog out.
16.7.08
सम चोप्पेद ब्रेअक्स इ उप्लोअदेद फॉर या!
So there is a drummer named KJ Sawka. I found out about him on youtube, randomly. He drums jungle/drum n bass. He is awesome!!! Here is his site: www.kjsawka.com/
And here is one of his videos:
So, on the FSOR forum one of the users named Lush Puppy got a bunch of audio from a lot of KJ Sawkas vids on the net, and compiled a 6 minute blob of a bunch of his breaks. Uploaded it, and I snagged it. Then I thought it would be sweet to cut up that blorb into sections that I could throw in my monome for food. So I ended up chopping the 6 minute blob into 58 sections. With each section beaing a loopable on its own beat. So these can be used for grabbing drum hits, chopping, mashing, whatever!
www.archive.org/details/KjSawkaBreaksChopped is where they are located. Have fun!
And here is one of his videos:
So, on the FSOR forum one of the users named Lush Puppy got a bunch of audio from a lot of KJ Sawkas vids on the net, and compiled a 6 minute blob of a bunch of his breaks. Uploaded it, and I snagged it. Then I thought it would be sweet to cut up that blorb into sections that I could throw in my monome for food. So I ended up chopping the 6 minute blob into 58 sections. With each section beaing a loopable on its own beat. So these can be used for grabbing drum hits, chopping, mashing, whatever!
www.archive.org/details/KjSawkaBreaksChopped is where they are located. Have fun!
15.7.08
The क्य्क्लोने ऑफ़ अ move
So a buddy of mine said "Hey, when you move, give yourself a couple weeks to get adjusted." I said to myself, "heck no, i am getting setup in the studio and start mashing away!!!" Well, it is a couple weeks later, and I am just getting adjusted. LOL! It's true. Live and learn.
Last night I started sampling again. I got some James Brown slammed on down. I sampled some Sade I found on vinyl. Then, an odd find at Rasputins. The best of Gozilla soundtracks. Its actually got some cool cops on it. I will have fun using some stuff from there!! Crazy where you can find good groove lines or string comps. Really fun to search and rip, then throw in the monome with a beat I made, and tear it up!
The drummers of their own timeline are easy to loop, it is the strings that smash it!
Last night I started sampling again. I got some James Brown slammed on down. I sampled some Sade I found on vinyl. Then, an odd find at Rasputins. The best of Gozilla soundtracks. Its actually got some cool cops on it. I will have fun using some stuff from there!! Crazy where you can find good groove lines or string comps. Really fun to search and rip, then throw in the monome with a beat I made, and tear it up!
The drummers of their own timeline are easy to loop, it is the strings that smash it!
7.7.08
Back to it!
Last night was the first 'time' in about three weeks that I finally sat in front of my equipment ready to get stuff done. Don't get me wrong, I have been fiddling here and there, but now I feel comfortable and focused and ready to go. Yesterday I installed my little ac unit in the studio. It is a temporary solution until cooler weather pops in. Then I will take it down, and have a window again :)! On to other exciting things. I started cutting up some James brown and some 'Liz Story'. Very nice stuff to use for canvas painting!! I also got done with taking pictures of start to finish of the studio and part of the move. So, i hope to do a little picture blog, should be fun to see. So, new music going to coming soon, just been in a whirlwind lately, but like always, getting through it...
One cool thing about cutting up vinyl is: If you record a whole track and then start chopping it up, if in your sections of your chop you can make it loop naturally, then it will be easier to layer in time with a beat you make your self. Very cool!
One cool thing about cutting up vinyl is: If you record a whole track and then start chopping it up, if in your sections of your chop you can make it loop naturally, then it will be easier to layer in time with a beat you make your self. Very cool!
1.7.08
ये, इ गोत सम बीट्स ROLLING
So, last night I finally got to play with some beats. Got my music making area about 70% complete! Been taking pictures of the progress, and it is coming along nicely! I am very proud so far. The set up is minimal and mainly for the things I use only, no unnecessary gear just sitting around taking up space. I figure anything I do not use, I will just store for a rainy day. I know I got a little too much gear, lol! Its all good, I am just looking to get things done now, not really concerning myself with utilizing all the gear just because I have it. Blah. Less is more, or so shall we see. Today I hope to finish up setting up and then its madman scientist cooped up getting albums done!!! I can't wait!
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