my next big project is a concept album. i had the idea that each 'character' should probably have their own sonic palette, which would be effectively in conversation throughout the album. one such 'character' is... The Machine. and so this week i thought i would sketch out roughly the sorts of sounds i could imagine for it. this track will not wind up ON the album, but if i polished it up a little, these sorts of 'sketch' tracks might be a fun EP, i don't know.
like last week, i wound up just improvising all of the parts (sometimes on half speed... every note was played by hand rather than arpeggiated, i wanted total control!), then splicing together the decent bits into something more coherent. this worked out well for the machine because like a generative AI, it never does quite the same thing twice. i would probably consider a more focused composition process for the other 2 main characters.
i also added some old movie samples from various sample packs. given the genre i was working in, it just felt incomplete without them. rest in peace, the days of being able to just record your movie samples by hand from home and mostly get away with it. those sounded like fun times.
sadly i started super late (saturday!!) so had barely any time to spend on this. it's certainly not polished. i didn't have time to mix the drums except as a single drum bus (i need to make a project template that will split my battery channels for me. it's getting silly how many times i regret not doing that.). but this challenge is definitely helping me get faster. my first track took 8 hours for 2 minutes of music, vs this one taking 6 hours for 5 minutes.
I started this beat last week, but decided to let it cook another week, and am glad I gave myself more time with it. I was able to expand the melody a bit, and add some more depth to the drums. I'm really pleased with the result, and feel like I'm finding my groove with the OP-XY again, despite the bugs that have crept into the firmware.
Like last week, a slow three-guitar piece on PureSalem Mendiola. This guitar in particular invites barre chords, and I have a fondness for playing over a major/minor progression. Wistful, but finding some strength somewhere. This one came together quickly--rather more so than some recent weeks, so it's getting uploaded a bit earlier.
No inline effects, but the usual sonic profile: each channel is a different pickup combo. Each channel gets some send to a convolution reverb (theater sized), and the stereo mix gets some compression/eq.
The title comes from the river in Ireland, which at some points flows alongside the R586. Apparently its water is notably clean and clear.
I have been playing some Ghost of Tsushima lately and youtube took me then to some reviews of the new Assasins Creed game, which takes place in Japan. The prologue ends on a scene that is very reminiscent of Sergio Leone movies. As a group of grim samurai appear slowly from the mist, one is directly taken back to the intro of Frank and his gang in Once Upon a Time in the West. So I decided to do a Japanese inspired version of an Ennio Morricone track. After all, we are just closing the loop since a Fistful of Dollar is a remake of Yojimbo by Kurosawa.
I was happy with this track! It's the most time I have spent on a track in ages and I enjoyed the process. I need to go back in the habit to start a track earlier in the week than the weekend.
No tunes the last couple of weeks as I've been away learning Welsh.
Back to this, honestly got very bored of this quickly, didn't intend to finish it, was merely messing about with a 303 VST and went from there. Not the sort of music I want to be making right now.
