Something very short, not finished. Didn't spend a lot of time composing this week.

A live jam for a synth meetup this evening. I also recorded a stream of this on Twitch where I was setting it up and practicing performing it.

Gear: TR-8s, Analog 4, Deluge, Linnstrument

My hard drive is almost full, so under the circumstances I needed to finish something older instead of creating yet another unfinished project.

Lossless here: https://soundcloud.com/trent-hawkins/20210121-pt2-feat-tubular-corporation

As I sort out some issues with my electric guitar setup here's a nice improvised track on the acoustic guitar, using a looper and Eventide Blackhole. There's a clear post-rock vibe and a tense ending.

All the sound design and sequencing of synth on this week's track are made on Elektron Digitone. The drum beat was done with Wavparty Mutated Drums samples. I only added reverb and delay sends (+ vocals) in Ableton, where the arranging, mixing and mastering was done.

Lossless on Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/user-493253580/a-new-era

This track is still at the stage of "storyboard". I think the ideas are not bad for the composition but the execution is still very very raw. The concept was slowly walking into a dense jungle, both physical and metaphorical and ending up either at a cave or at a cenote where the trance takes place.

I like some elements of this track - happy to have found this Tuvan (Tibetan throat singing) sample on Splice, the flute is a cool sample too. The trance is a good idea in itself but kinda clumsily executed. It also misses an apex. The mix is raw. A track is a track is a track is a track.

I'd probably come back later to this track to scavenge it or build upon this flow and try to make something more interesting. Of course this is an obvious lie, I never go back to past tracks. :)

Still working on VCVRack bits elsewhere, so for a break here's a more traditional production. Mastering, as ever, leaves a lot to be desired, bit too much high end that needs taming, but generally I like the grittiness and fullness of this. Proud of the beat too, all individual samples, no breaks.

I ended up working on two tracks this week, and was trying to decide which one to use; then I remembered one of the advantages to this site during alternate years is multiple attachments!

(this really helped me during 2019, because like music, I may not be very good at graphic art but I enjoy it)

The first one is another throwaway industrial joint, but I started getting story vibes while I was trying to mix it into being listenable. I had a vague but coherent character development and plot integration for my weird space opera project (conceived on weeklybeats in 2018 and given life here during 2019, thank you @onezero!)

The second I had named as a jab at myself because I had started out trying to make something starkly different from my usual (threw a random scale at myself among other things) and then it turned out to be one of my most "repeating myself" tracks in a while. My bag of tricks is limited, I get it- but damn you universe/ego/whatever!

The upside is, the story vibe picked up with both of them and I realized the characters and scenario didn't work as well on the moon as they did on earth, so this week marks the official beginning of my third and final album in the Red Rising project. I have decided to embrace the fact that I am the kind of person to start the sequels before I finish the beginning so.. woot!

Also, I have never been able to tell if this site notifies you on comment replies and because I've regretted not commenting / replying more;

@Kedbreak136 thank you! the drums are EZDrummer. It's awesome. Pricey (by far the spendiest thing in my "rack" but it has some of the deepest and most convincing samples I've every heard, and in multiple flavors (I think I was using "tape filter"). On top was a little CamelCrusher for distortion and compression. Before I picked that up, I was using a free plugin was really damn close to that good (especially for the price), MT Powerdrummer which I highly recommend.

@Arcana Dude. Thank you. Your feedback in the past has been pretty influential for me and this time you hit me with the double whammy of; Critical ear but also positive feedback specifically on areas I was trying to improve.

Running a little late (for me) on this one, for...reasons. I wrote the drum patterns late Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, had some piano lines I threw out, and put down bass (Epiphone P-J, EQ-8 rolloff, room-sized convolution reverb send) and pedal steel (Balls Effects KWB, Moyo Volume, Ableton Auto-Filter, Glue Compressor, Utility, Auto-Pan). I ultimately replaced the piano with Ableton's Operator (Bells & Thin Pad preset). Then...although I'd tracked more pedal steel, I just put in some reversed accents from the first channel into another.

Sends: room-sized convolution reverb, Echo, and Valhalla Supermassive. Full-Chain multi-band compression on the stereo mix, and finally some inline Max Humanizer on the drums.

Title from 64 being the sixth power of 2.