Good news everyone! Not only are you reading this is Professor Farnsworth's voice, but I've invented a device that plays the final cut of Soldarity! It's here. Mixing that down gave me serious trouble. Gosh.
Breakdown of what's left to do in these last Jesus Christ how are there suddenly only 7 days left.
Febalchin -I should get Zeph's recordings soon, when I do I'll finish the whole choon. Shouting Down -Not much really, I think just the mixdown. Tent City Inn Free Suit -I want to alter the drum pattern at the drop. -Mixing down Solidarity Huria -All of the programming. -Write the outro. -Mix down.
Haven't updated in a while because I've been only sort of working. Newest set of news:
The two spot is tentatively called Shouting Down, but I'm also thinking about calling it You Shall Listen. Gravemind sampling occurs. (In case you forgot, that's the big bastard flood from Halo 2. He says, among other things, "there is much talk, and I have listened through rock and metal and time. Now I shall talk, and you shall listen." The end bit works quite nicely for my revolution theme. If only Free Suit fit in.) It's mean and techy and hard and needs work on the transitions, and I made the preview (with too much sub again I think), but soundcloud is being a douchecartel and won't come up, so uploading didn't occur. Soon, tomorrow maybe.
The track order has changed because going straight from that into Tent City Inn would be jarring. I might even need to come up with a middle-ground tune at the last minute, but for now, here's the list, with (more for me than you guys) what I have left to do.
1. Febalchin Still waiting on Zephyr's end here, but that's fine, I have plenty else to do. Need to finish writing. Need to mix down. 2. Shouting Down/You Shall Listen Need to improve transitions, EQ, and mix down. 3. Free Suit Need to make less repetitive and mix down. 4. Tent City Inn Nothing! 5. Solidarity Need to finish writing (I'm close) and mix down. 6. Huria Need to finish writing, do all the programming, and (of course) mix down.
Mainly writing this one out of force of habit now. I've started my two-spot and it's gonna be sweet. Called Shouting Down, although that's only a working title and I'm probably gonna alter it slightly. Lots of FM synths in it. And so for it has no hihats and doesn't feel like it needs any (weird). If you want a preview of the melodies I'm dealing with you know where to go, but it's super early and some of the timing is even off.
I guess the main point of this was a complete track list ^_^
1. Febalchin - suspenseful 2. Shouting Down - brash 3. Tent City Inn - sort of restful while still building 4. Free Suit - Eerie, conflicting. 5. Solidarity - Powerful and slipping into something major. 6. Huria - Too damn happy.
You bet your sweet ass it is. The final name is Tent City Inn. That fits well into the overarching narrative my album kinda has, with the exception of Free Suit, which is just cool. It actually took me a shockingly small amount of time to mix this down, which makes me think something is wrong with it... Let me know what you guys think.
Yesterday I didn't do much because mah woman turned 21. Sue me.
Tracklist as it stands: 1. Febalchin (feat. TheZephyrSon) Not necessarily done writing it. Some good synth work has happened. 2. ? I'm looking for something both catchy and nasty here. Not sure what yet. May listen to some Heatbeat for inspiration. (Ideas: Vergatron||Hadoken (holy shit)||Neitherworld [Heatbeat Remix]) 3. Tent City Inn Now final. 4. Free Suit Needs mixing down and to be slightly less repetitive. Maybe more effect-type samples. 5. Solidarity I haven't returned to it since I posted the preview, so all the same issues remain. 6. Huria (formerly Febalchin) I'm defs happy with the happiness now. It fits with what I want it to be. Starts with a trance-speed break beat so I can mix in, then jumps into freeform, honestly almost borderline happy hard (spit). Almost done writing, no synthing yet. May sample one recently deposed President.
Today's work was limited to formerly Thundersleet. (Man should I come up with a title for it.) I've finished writing it, its structure is set, and the time has come to mix it down. I hate mixing down and don't want to spend all of the last two weeks doing so, so I went ahead and got a head start on the process with this one. It's coming along brilliantly and will be final sometime this weekend. Bank on it.
The rest of this day I didn't do a whole lot. Studying and hockey occurred. So it goes. Progress is progress.
Anyone who can tell me what this current mood means wins a prize. In your own words. If you Google like I did, it does not count.
It's a large undertaking to do an album in a month. But I'm a firm believer that if you do a little bit every day, it's very very doable. Even if you only spend a few minutes a day tweaking, you didn't do nothing that day.
Today I had every intention of doing nothing. Tuesday was being, well, a fukken Tuesday. But I said wellll, I'll just work on laying out Free Suit more for a few minutes. What resulted was I worked on the thing for a couple hours and have basically finished writing it. As always you can find a preview at my Souncloud here. (Obligatory Suba sub warning. The quick and dirty clipping prevention technique I use for previews might explode your speakers, so be careful with this. Start quiet and turn it up.) I really like this one. It's a new sort of tune for me. Techstep in the vein of Zero T. Right now it's a bit more repetitive than I'd like, but I'll deal with that soon.
I've got a hilarious snow day tomorrow, so productivity hopefully awaits. I might even get going on the mixdown for something, and I really need to return to formerly-thundersleet. I hate that I'm still stitting on Febalchin, you guys, the shit is ballin, but I'm not sure how to end it yet. Hang in there.
And if you're finding yourself struggling to keep working on your own project--Just put in a few minutes. Five minutes is more, and better, than zero.
A slow day in the writing center and I was able to write a shitload of what might turn into a closer, and might turn into nothing. It's rather happy and stuff. That's why I don't like it. There's a lot of coolness between melodies, but I just don't know if it will fit. I dunno. Also I've added on to Free Suit. I can now justify the name Free Suit beyond "oh I was having this random convo and needed to save the track." It's a certain sample from the original Men in Black. Will Smith had just put on his suit. Added a second sub to it too, shit's gonna be cash.
But then the Avs laid a turd in Jobing.com Arena and my woman didn't feel well and I have a test tomorrow. So not only do I not feel like producing or writing right now, I couldn't if I wanted to, since Salamanca Studios is currently a desk opposite the bed and she sleeping. I need to study anyway.
So, as the title implies, here's a summary of the week's progress in the form of a tracklist.
1. SteveHouse feat. TheZephyrSon - Febalchin: Next time I can get to Eddie (the desktop) I'll send what I have along, zeph. The .sib is written out and stuff, I just need to render what I have so far with and without the violin stand in instrument. Everything up to the breakdown is lain out. It's half mean and half dancy tech trance in triple. 2. ? 3. SteveHouse - ?: This was originally called Thundersleet. No progress has been made since the first preview went up. 4. SteveHouse - Free Suit: The preview I have up is no longer current, even in terms of the bassline. I've changed the delay time and added another. I'll try to get another preview of that up tomorrow evening. 5?. SteveHouse - Solidarity: Again, no progress since the preview went up, but I am getting some very positive feedback on it. thanks guys 6. Febalchlose - See above.
As my sig says, you can check my progress here. Figured I may as well make a set on Soundcloud while I was uploading there.
Keep on pushing, keep on writing, here's to a better tomorrow. I gotta study.
Was feeling pretty shitty so I didn't do a production blog yesterday. I made a lot of cool progress on Solidarity, and that was it.
Today, though. Hoo boy. The intro (henceforth Febalchin) is coming along very nicely. I added synths to the midi I have, including a filler for the future violin part (Zephyr if you're reading this, I'll have you that by Monday, plus how much improv I might need, it won't be much). Lovin it. Solidarity is coming along as well, even if it did turn into a type of song I really don't normally like at all. You can find a preview here. I've got some work to do, but it's basically lain out, so you can see where I'm going with it.
Future projects: -I'd like to do a bootleg of an anime OP. I was gonna do Lain, but there's too much drums for what I want to do. Then I was gonna do Bebop, but it's too awesome a bassline to remove or adulterate. Hoping for good suggestions there. -A jump-up tune or a techstep tune, depending on my mood when I go to lay down the beat. -I lack a closer. No clue yet. -All the mixing.
Today's progress shifted a bit. I intended to go for the warm techtrance, and instead I ended up elsewhere. It's trance, but it will end up slightly more goa-influenced but not enough to actually be goa. That's just the lead I'm running with and it's inspired heavily by Armin's killer line in Blue Fear. I've been listening to it all day so that happens. My bassline is ballin (also inspired by Blue Fear but less obviously so) and my atmosphere is this digital deserty sound, which goes with my original plan here.
So I said to myself, this is 4x4 with a straightforward hihat. It needs some accent percussion. Opened a synth and came up with a little pluck. Then I accidentally wrote a gorgeous breakdown with it. Please don't tell me I just wrote a pretty plucked breakdown line. That's as cookiecutter a trance idea as it gets! Ferry Corsten Why!?!?!? But the part I'm having to come to terms with is I like really, really like it. So, oh well, I'll be making it work I guess. Solidarity is gonna be a stormin track
Today I sat at my compy and I said to myself, I will get this shit mixed down. And so I started and have nearly finished mixing down a tune for the 3rd electronic album. Sounding pretty proper if I say so myself--which I did. But that's neither here nor there re: this challenge.
Later on I returned to Thundersleet. I'ma change the name of that but I still don't know what to, so for now think of it as Formerly Known as Thundersleet. I've finished the main body of it (unmixed) and uploaded a preview to my soundcloud. You can find it here. This isn't my normal style, as some of you may know, but I'm quite pleased with it.
Good day all around. On the menu for tomorrow, other than going back to uni (the Snowpocalypse has subsided enough), I plan to work more on writing the intro and maybe try to come up with a lick that is more my favorite style--tech trance with a warm, square lead. Here's a few examples.
Wezz Devall - This is Your Day (jump to 2:00 for the epic storming drop at 2.20 if you're the impatient type) Robbie Buri - Casino (it's been awhile so I can't remember which remix I prefer) Plus the energy of (insert any Vicky Devine choon--hell let's go with Starfire) and you get me ^_^ Tomorrow. Might go with some sort of Phrygian scale while I'm at it and call'er Solidarity. The Steve House Production Blag: Generating ideas while I ramble.
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