Sunday, September 23, 2007
My Burning Kiss part 2
I finally got a program that allowed me to record Flash audio, like that used at Jamstudio.com. The Freecorder toolbar. I used it to capture the audio of the song I wrote using the site's browser interface, so that I could record a vocal over it. Had to play with the settings a little as sometimes the audio would lower in pitch, or I just get static, a problem I had with a few other programs like Audacity.
Once done, I imported the wav file into Sonar and recorded a quickie vocal.
Here 'tis.
I'll put it on the shelf for now. Record it proper later.
Once done, I imported the wav file into Sonar and recorded a quickie vocal.
Here 'tis.
I'll put it on the shelf for now. Record it proper later.
Labels: My Burning Kiss, Sonar, web apps
Saturday, August 25, 2007
My Burning Kiss part 1
There are plenty of songs from the past couple of years waiting on the back burner to be completed. However, I realized I haven't written any new tunes this year. I just sorta finished Ménage à Trois with robots, so I figured on getting something new in between that whatever I'll spend the next month or two polishing up.
Always looking for new toys to play with, outta nowhere came ChordStudio.com, now known as JamStudio.com (both URLs work, currently).
A boon to songwriters, musicians, or those of us who pretend to be, this web interface allows you to not only arrange chord progression with a click o' the mouse, but also the musical arrangement as well. Nice sounding samples of drums, bass, guitars, pianos, etc.
Creating songs this way, offers one a way to think outside the instrument and maybe write songs that might not normally result from noodling on the guitar or keyboard. Of course, if you were really good, you'd think outside the box with or without your main instrument. I'm not, so here I am.
I threw some random chords together on the 3rd and 4th of this month, till I got a couple of sequences with melodic potential. Then I started to build on the first one, which I decided was a verse. A chorus and intro was eventually added and I started on lyrics, which I worked on little by little from the 11th to today.
There might be a wee bit of a WTF factor to them, which I'm not gonna get into, except to say there is some element of truth to the words and just leave it at that.
After nearly finishing the lyrics, I then constructed a bridge section, which will probably host a guitar solo or some kind of instrumental break. Too lazy to write more words.
The two big limits with JamStudio are the inability (so far) to record vocals (don't know if that can be done with something like this) and the inability to record your song to mp3 or other audio format. The latter would sorta take care of the former as one could then overly vocals over the mp3 in another program (not the optimal way to record a song, but fine for a demo). Otherwise the share song feature is almost redundant as you're just sharing a chord progression arranged into a verse-chorus sequence, and not really an actual song (words and music).
Otherwise, the website as it is will keep me somewhat honest as a musician, as I'm forced to actually play and record the music to complete a demo. Still, if I could do it all here, and then put it on the shelf til I was ready to record proper, that would be an extra two flavors of awesome.
My JamStudio song can be heard here (and then make your own) until I get around to recording it.
And the lyrics below (I don't think anybody's gonna be able to sing along, just yet)...
Burning Kiss (c) 2007 George-Williams Isaacs
The secret evil
beneath the surface-volitile
but all the while-I stay
politecuzIcouldneverhurtyouorburnyouyoumeanthewholeworldtomebutIstillwantto
because it feels so good
this is where I've stood-the line
between
two worlds
of pain and pleasure
I need you to release the pressure
There is no hate there is no anger
in my burning kiss
I lust to taste your fear
of my burning kiss
Submission
to the power
while my aura
overwhelms-I sense
thetensionincreasingthestrikesneverceasingeuphoriareachingnewheightsneverdreamedof
No safe words spoken yet
smell the latex and the sweat
Awake
the dragon
from hell up to heaven
all our sins are now forgiven
There is no hate there is no anger
in my burning kiss
I lust to taste your fear
of my burning kiss
Gonna crosspost this to Edshugeo The GodMoor
Thanks to Create Digital Music for highlighting this app.
Always looking for new toys to play with, outta nowhere came ChordStudio.com, now known as JamStudio.com (both URLs work, currently).
A boon to songwriters, musicians, or those of us who pretend to be, this web interface allows you to not only arrange chord progression with a click o' the mouse, but also the musical arrangement as well. Nice sounding samples of drums, bass, guitars, pianos, etc.
Creating songs this way, offers one a way to think outside the instrument and maybe write songs that might not normally result from noodling on the guitar or keyboard. Of course, if you were really good, you'd think outside the box with or without your main instrument. I'm not, so here I am.
I threw some random chords together on the 3rd and 4th of this month, till I got a couple of sequences with melodic potential. Then I started to build on the first one, which I decided was a verse. A chorus and intro was eventually added and I started on lyrics, which I worked on little by little from the 11th to today.
There might be a wee bit of a WTF factor to them, which I'm not gonna get into, except to say there is some element of truth to the words and just leave it at that.
After nearly finishing the lyrics, I then constructed a bridge section, which will probably host a guitar solo or some kind of instrumental break. Too lazy to write more words.
The two big limits with JamStudio are the inability (so far) to record vocals (don't know if that can be done with something like this) and the inability to record your song to mp3 or other audio format. The latter would sorta take care of the former as one could then overly vocals over the mp3 in another program (not the optimal way to record a song, but fine for a demo). Otherwise the share song feature is almost redundant as you're just sharing a chord progression arranged into a verse-chorus sequence, and not really an actual song (words and music).
Otherwise, the website as it is will keep me somewhat honest as a musician, as I'm forced to actually play and record the music to complete a demo. Still, if I could do it all here, and then put it on the shelf til I was ready to record proper, that would be an extra two flavors of awesome.
My JamStudio song can be heard here (and then make your own) until I get around to recording it.
And the lyrics below (I don't think anybody's gonna be able to sing along, just yet)...
Burning Kiss (c) 2007 George-Williams Isaacs
The secret evil
beneath the surface-volitile
but all the while-I stay
politecuzIcouldneverhurtyouorburnyouyoumeanthewholeworldtomebutIstillwantto
because it feels so good
this is where I've stood-the line
between
two worlds
of pain and pleasure
I need you to release the pressure
There is no hate there is no anger
in my burning kiss
I lust to taste your fear
of my burning kiss
Submission
to the power
while my aura
overwhelms-I sense
thetensionincreasingthestrikesneverceasingeuphoriareachingnewheightsneverdreamedof
No safe words spoken yet
smell the latex and the sweat
Awake
the dragon
from hell up to heaven
all our sins are now forgiven
There is no hate there is no anger
in my burning kiss
I lust to taste your fear
of my burning kiss
Gonna crosspost this to Edshugeo The GodMoor
Thanks to Create Digital Music for highlighting this app.
Labels: lyrics, My Burning Kiss, web apps
Friday, August 03, 2007
Ménage à trois with robots part 11
I am done with this one for now. I work on it on and off for the last coupl'a weeks without blogging about it, so I'll jot down what I remember...
Recorded more handclaps for a total of six. Bounced to stereo.
Was having trouble with x-runs, slowdowns, and crashes so I cleared out tracks I clearly wasn't using. That left me with seventeen tracks of recorded audio.
What really seemed to help, aside from some slight adjustments in JACK, was changing an audio option in Ardour. In options > audio file format > data, I changed from 32-bit floating point to 24-bit signed integer. I don't know what either of those are but that seemed to help a lot.
While I was having trouble, I played around with the latency settings a little. This while recording one of the hand claps. The slight delay helped fatten up the sound on one section, which gave me an idea. I was gonna copy those tracks and double them, synced at a slight delay. I decided I liked the claps the way they were and didn't bother.
Recorded some bass guitar to the later sections of the song. I don't think it's needed before then. Bass was plugged in directly into the Lexicon Lambda. I was using the Zoom 506 pedal, but the battery died on me, before I was ready to record.
I was thinking about some lead guitar, but I don't think it is needed either. Or maybe I'm just lazy.
Added some LADSPA FX. 1st applied them pre-fader, but after reading a little of the online manual, applied them post.
TAP equalizer on a guitar track that had too much hiss on it.
TAP Stereo echo and TAP reverberator on the handclaps track.
Frequency modulator on the bass guitar track, which punches it up a bit.
Setup a bus to route vocals to apply effects. right now only using TAP DeEssor.
I took the spoken chorus bit off the DeEssor bus cuz I didn't like the way it sounded there. Also normalized that track as the choruses for that track got louder and louder.
I'd experiment with more effects, but I seem to be pushing this computer to it's limits. I'm not sure that should be the case.
I'll revisit this tune when it's time to configure the next album, whenever and whatever that is.
In the meantime the song can currently (as of this writing) be found on MySpace (faded out at a tolerable 4 min, 15 sec) and here in it's full version.
Recorded more handclaps for a total of six. Bounced to stereo.
Was having trouble with x-runs, slowdowns, and crashes so I cleared out tracks I clearly wasn't using. That left me with seventeen tracks of recorded audio.
What really seemed to help, aside from some slight adjustments in JACK, was changing an audio option in Ardour. In options > audio file format > data, I changed from 32-bit floating point to 24-bit signed integer. I don't know what either of those are but that seemed to help a lot.
While I was having trouble, I played around with the latency settings a little. This while recording one of the hand claps. The slight delay helped fatten up the sound on one section, which gave me an idea. I was gonna copy those tracks and double them, synced at a slight delay. I decided I liked the claps the way they were and didn't bother.
Recorded some bass guitar to the later sections of the song. I don't think it's needed before then. Bass was plugged in directly into the Lexicon Lambda. I was using the Zoom 506 pedal, but the battery died on me, before I was ready to record.
I was thinking about some lead guitar, but I don't think it is needed either. Or maybe I'm just lazy.
Added some LADSPA FX. 1st applied them pre-fader, but after reading a little of the online manual, applied them post.
TAP equalizer on a guitar track that had too much hiss on it.
TAP Stereo echo and TAP reverberator on the handclaps track.
Frequency modulator on the bass guitar track, which punches it up a bit.
Setup a bus to route vocals to apply effects. right now only using TAP DeEssor.
I took the spoken chorus bit off the DeEssor bus cuz I didn't like the way it sounded there. Also normalized that track as the choruses for that track got louder and louder.
I'd experiment with more effects, but I seem to be pushing this computer to it's limits. I'm not sure that should be the case.
I'll revisit this tune when it's time to configure the next album, whenever and whatever that is.
In the meantime the song can currently (as of this writing) be found on MySpace (faded out at a tolerable 4 min, 15 sec) and here in it's full version.
Labels: Ardour, Linux, Ménage à trois with robots, plug-ins, Ubuntu
Monday, July 16, 2007
Ménage à trois with robots part 10
I'm hoping to conclude this one soon. It's been over two years since I've done anything significant with it. I'd exported the audio to be used in Sonar, but since figuring out how to make my USB audio interface work in Ubuntu Studio, I'm gonna finish this in Ardour. That's the plan, so far.
All I did this go round was to play around with fader levels and cut the not quite silent sections of the guitar and vocal tracks. I recorded a hand clap track during one of the last couple of sessions (but forgot to mention it). I plan on building on that, and then maybe adding some lead guitar.
The latest...
I'll be posting audio on Vox (hat tip to the Undercover Black Man) from now on as it's better than taking up space and bandwith here. Also, it's free.
All I did this go round was to play around with fader levels and cut the not quite silent sections of the guitar and vocal tracks. I recorded a hand clap track during one of the last couple of sessions (but forgot to mention it). I plan on building on that, and then maybe adding some lead guitar.
The latest...
I'll be posting audio on Vox (hat tip to the Undercover Black Man) from now on as it's better than taking up space and bandwith here. Also, it's free.
Labels: Ardour, Ménage à trois with robots, Ubuntu
Sunday, July 08, 2007
Lexicon Lambda USB On Ubuntu Studio
Works just fine if I plug it in after Ubuntu boots up. Also had to change a few settings in Jack Control to keep Ardour from shutting down on me.
I found out about the boot up issue reading the following (at the bottom of that page):
I haven't tried the solution, yet. I'm happy the USB interface works. For now, waiting til boot up to plug the thing in will do. Eventually I'll mess with the above gibberish.
I found out about the boot up issue reading the following (at the bottom of that page):
If you use a USB MIDI keyboard or a USB sound card as your secondary device, you may run into issues with it taking priority over your PCI device as your main sound card. This tends to happen if you leave it turned on and plugged in during boot. Here is the solution:
sudo su -c 'echo options snd-usb-audio index=-2 >> /etc/modprobe.d/alsa-base'I haven't tried the solution, yet. I'm happy the USB interface works. For now, waiting til boot up to plug the thing in will do. Eventually I'll mess with the above gibberish.
Labels: Linux, solutions?, Ubuntu
Friday, May 18, 2007
Ubuntu Studio! It's Here!!
I stopped checking for it a few days ago, but lo and behold; Ubuntu Studio has arrived. I haven't downloaded it yet, but I will soon. I need to save my data from my Agnula partition first.
Edit - figured I'd add the release notes...
Ubuntu Studio is a multimedia editing/creation flavour of Ubuntu. It's built for the GNU/Linux audio, video, and graphic enthusiast or professional.
The Ubuntu Studio team is proud to announce its first release: 7.04 for Intel i386-compatible processors. With this release, which you can download for DVD in little over 860 MiB, we offer a feature that is somewhat reminiscent of Ubuntu Server: on installation, you can choose between the Audio, Graphics or Video tasks; and choose also to install a number of plugins, which for this release is mainly aimed at audio production.
We have endeavoured to keep as many of our packages in the standard Ubuntu repositories as possible. Certain packages, such as wired and our art packages, are kept in an external repository and fully up to Ubuntu packaging standards. Be aware however, that this is only a temporary solution and we will be pushing all our packages into Ubuntu for the next release.
The Audio task also provides a different kernel to the Video and Graphics tasks, which has low latency to enable easy JACK work, and for Gutsy we will be providing a fully realtime enabled setup. We have built upon the usability and support of Ubuntu as a foundation, and are certain that this was a wise choice, for we have access to a wide range of packages in the repository, and a stable base system.
For the video task, we have chosen the GStreamer-based PiTiVi as our central NLE. PiTiVi is written in Ubuntu's favourite scripting language, Python, and the GStreamer back-end enables it to use all the GStreamer-compatible codecs that are installed, and thus taking advantage of Feisty's Easy Codec Installation. It also uses our favourite widget set, GTK+, and thus keeps with the theme and flow of the Ubuntu Studio desktop, and tries also to stay usable in any environment, in keeping with Ubuntu Studio's aim that media production should be simple and accessible.
We have also packaged Ardour 2, which will debut on our disc. Our theme is heavily based around the dark style of Ardour and many other audio applications, and we are trying to have a release that is as integrated as possible with all of our applications and tasks.
Finally, the Graphics task deserves some attention. We have included a very wide range of very high quality applications that are also very well known. What we have done is added to this selection (with Enblend, for example), and brought them all together into a coherent set. Some main packages to note are the GIMP, Inkscape, Blender, Hugin and Scribus, which are all provided with a default install of the Ubuntu Studio Graphics task.
As our wiki page at [WWW] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuStudio states: "Our aim is to make it more accessible for new users to get into the tools that GNU/Linux has to offer for multimedia creation/production. We also want to spotlight what's out there. Show users tools they might not have know existed." We have certainly fulfilled that aim with our first release with 7.04, and can only continue to improve.
Thanks to all who helped in Ubuntu Studios creation! Bring on the show!
Edit - figured I'd add the release notes...
Ubuntu Studio is a multimedia editing/creation flavour of Ubuntu. It's built for the GNU/Linux audio, video, and graphic enthusiast or professional.
The Ubuntu Studio team is proud to announce its first release: 7.04 for Intel i386-compatible processors. With this release, which you can download for DVD in little over 860 MiB, we offer a feature that is somewhat reminiscent of Ubuntu Server: on installation, you can choose between the Audio, Graphics or Video tasks; and choose also to install a number of plugins, which for this release is mainly aimed at audio production.
We have endeavoured to keep as many of our packages in the standard Ubuntu repositories as possible. Certain packages, such as wired and our art packages, are kept in an external repository and fully up to Ubuntu packaging standards. Be aware however, that this is only a temporary solution and we will be pushing all our packages into Ubuntu for the next release.
The Audio task also provides a different kernel to the Video and Graphics tasks, which has low latency to enable easy JACK work, and for Gutsy we will be providing a fully realtime enabled setup. We have built upon the usability and support of Ubuntu as a foundation, and are certain that this was a wise choice, for we have access to a wide range of packages in the repository, and a stable base system.
For the video task, we have chosen the GStreamer-based PiTiVi as our central NLE. PiTiVi is written in Ubuntu's favourite scripting language, Python, and the GStreamer back-end enables it to use all the GStreamer-compatible codecs that are installed, and thus taking advantage of Feisty's Easy Codec Installation. It also uses our favourite widget set, GTK+, and thus keeps with the theme and flow of the Ubuntu Studio desktop, and tries also to stay usable in any environment, in keeping with Ubuntu Studio's aim that media production should be simple and accessible.
We have also packaged Ardour 2, which will debut on our disc. Our theme is heavily based around the dark style of Ardour and many other audio applications, and we are trying to have a release that is as integrated as possible with all of our applications and tasks.
Finally, the Graphics task deserves some attention. We have included a very wide range of very high quality applications that are also very well known. What we have done is added to this selection (with Enblend, for example), and brought them all together into a coherent set. Some main packages to note are the GIMP, Inkscape, Blender, Hugin and Scribus, which are all provided with a default install of the Ubuntu Studio Graphics task.
As our wiki page at [WWW] https://wiki.ubuntu.com/UbuntuStudio states: "Our aim is to make it more accessible for new users to get into the tools that GNU/Linux has to offer for multimedia creation/production. We also want to spotlight what's out there. Show users tools they might not have know existed." We have certainly fulfilled that aim with our first release with 7.04, and can only continue to improve.
Thanks to all who helped in Ubuntu Studios creation! Bring on the show!
Labels: downloads, Linux, Ubuntu
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Above It All part 7 (The newest final version)
Given permission by this song's author to exploit it, commercially, I revisited Above It All and found some things I wasn't comfortable with. Most notably, my voice. So I decided to polish it up a bit, along with a bunch of other songs from the past couple of years or so, for a new album. If I was gonna charge money for it, I might as well make it sound as good as I'm able, right? The original mix will remain free, as well as the separate instrument tracks, should anyone else want to tackle this tune, either for covers, remixes, or whatever.
Those tracks, which are found on Archive.org, were the basis for the new mix, since I couldn't locate the disc I thought I burned (they may actually be on my hard drive, somewhere on the Agnula partition). I downloaded those and imported them into Sonar. I'd normally blog the same day I record or work on a song, but I hadn't felt like it over the last couple of weeks. I did take the following notes, though...
April 14th, 2007
Recorded new lead vocal. Didn't care for the old one. Recorded harmonized "oohs" for the
choruses. One set, then cut and pasted two more times.
April 17th 2007
Cakewalk FX Reverb into an effects send bus. For bass acoustic, 1 electric guitar track, and vocals. BlockFish Compressor and SpitFish de-essor onto new lead vocal track.
Eq'd a bass boost on the bass itself.
April 20th 2007
Spitfish on one of the background vocal tracks. Cakewalk FX Expander/Gate on lead vocal. Cut out silences on various tracks. Almost finished.
April 27th 2007
Lowered volume a little. Added Sonitus: FX Gate to a harmony track on the first chorus to
reduce some hiss. Did the same to the bass and acoustic guitars, but also used Sonitus FX:
Equalizer to remove hiss from the instrument sounds themselves.
Currently, this song can be purchased from the PsychoVoyager Music Store at the top of this page. It won't be submitted to any of the major music e-tailers until a full album is put together.
As of this writing, you can listen to the whole song on MySpace. It can also be streamed at the Podsafe Music Network. Due to it's being recorded at 48000kh or whatever it is, and a bug in Flash, the song plays slower than it should at Podsafe. I actually like how it sounds, so I'm not changing it yet. Plus I don't feel like re-encoding it. The Myspace and PsychoVoyager Store version play at the proper 80bpm.
Those tracks, which are found on Archive.org, were the basis for the new mix, since I couldn't locate the disc I thought I burned (they may actually be on my hard drive, somewhere on the Agnula partition). I downloaded those and imported them into Sonar. I'd normally blog the same day I record or work on a song, but I hadn't felt like it over the last couple of weeks. I did take the following notes, though...
April 14th, 2007
Recorded new lead vocal. Didn't care for the old one. Recorded harmonized "oohs" for the
choruses. One set, then cut and pasted two more times.
April 17th 2007
Cakewalk FX Reverb into an effects send bus. For bass acoustic, 1 electric guitar track, and vocals. BlockFish Compressor and SpitFish de-essor onto new lead vocal track.
Eq'd a bass boost on the bass itself.
April 20th 2007
Spitfish on one of the background vocal tracks. Cakewalk FX Expander/Gate on lead vocal. Cut out silences on various tracks. Almost finished.
April 27th 2007
Lowered volume a little. Added Sonitus: FX Gate to a harmony track on the first chorus to
reduce some hiss. Did the same to the bass and acoustic guitars, but also used Sonitus FX:
Equalizer to remove hiss from the instrument sounds themselves.
Currently, this song can be purchased from the PsychoVoyager Music Store at the top of this page. It won't be submitted to any of the major music e-tailers until a full album is put together.
As of this writing, you can listen to the whole song on MySpace. It can also be streamed at the Podsafe Music Network. Due to it's being recorded at 48000kh or whatever it is, and a bug in Flash, the song plays slower than it should at Podsafe. I actually like how it sounds, so I'm not changing it yet. Plus I don't feel like re-encoding it. The Myspace and PsychoVoyager Store version play at the proper 80bpm.
Labels: Above It All, buy my stuff, covers, Crystal Walters, downloads, effects, Sonar
