Tranzfuse » 12 Songs

Way Behind

tranzfuse — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 03:20:20 +0000

Well I’ve missed the last two ’12 Songs’ projects for September and October, but for good (enough) reason. I ended up buying and building a modular synth. More information to follow very soon, but hopefully musical results are not too far off either.

12 Songs in 2010: August Project

tranzfuse — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 03:25:49 +0000

Yeah yeah. Late late late. I know. Same story. I think I actually finished this in August, it just took me this long to get around to bouncing and exporting to MP3:

Take 1

August 2010 Project

Notes:

Sound quality is not too bad.
Song develops nicely, but arrangement still isn’t there quite yet.
Applied the Vintage Mastering 1 audio effect rack to Master track in Ableton. Made no adjustments to it.
Exported from Ableton with no normalization. Sample rate 44100, No Dither.
Opened exported Wav in Audacity. Applied normalization with -6DB DC Offset (still unclear about DC Offset) and then ran compression with default settings. Exported as MP3.

12 Songs in 2010: July Project

tranzfuse — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 03:55:08 +0000

Here is a rough draft of where the creative process has lead me this time around. It is not quite what I envision for a more fully realized take, but I found this sketch interesting enough. I borrowed some sample snippets from a lesser known song by a well known group from the 80s (and 90s). I am unsure if this qualifies it as an edit or song (or theft), although labelling it as such doesn’t matter too much right now anyway.

Take 1:

12 Songs in 2010: Edits as Opiates (Take 1)

Notes:

Mixing and “mastering” is still somewhat cryptic to me. I have A LOT to learn.
Still very tracky and loopy. I want my songs to develop more.
Arangement continues to be an interesting challenge. I have a sense of how I’d like things, but I am not quite able to produce the results that I hear in mind yet.
The tail was cut off, be sure to fix that up for Take 2.

12 Songs in 2010: June Project

tranzfuse — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 02:04:18 +0000

The month of June brought a new kind of song into my life. While I was involved in the creation process I can’t really take the credit…my wife did all the hard work. Meet Mila, our second daughter, she’s as lovely as sunshine.

Having a child is a wonderful gift, but it is no small task. Needless to say, my 12 songs project was temporarily interrupted, but I hope to get back on track for July.

Meet Mila Estrin Smith, born June 22, 2010 at 12:03AM

12 Songs in 2010: May Project

tranzfuse — Fri, 28 May 2010 02:17:57 +0000

Since the April project bled into late May I decided to create a version 2 of the April song. Since I was on the fence with the electro-ish ending of the April version I removed it from this one and extended the four x four kick. I added some beat repeat to the melodic bits and fuzzed up some of the other percussive elements for good measure.

Take 1:

2010 May Project (Take 1)

Notes:

Kept April project mastering rack on master channel
Applied Audacity’s default Normalize and Compressor effects to bounced wav, then exported from Audacity as MP3

Take 2:

2010 May Project (Take 2)

Notes:

Extended ending since it was being cut off a bit early in take 1

Take 3:

2010 May Project (Take 3)

Notes:

I reworked the beat repeat for the melodic bit

12 Songs in 2010: April Project

tranzfuse — Wed, 19 May 2010 03:49:20 +0000

Yes, I am late. It is a reccurring theme. But goals I have set, so goals I must try to meet. This one took a while to get to a point where I felt that I had a solid enough idea to warrant stopping jumping through every last possible preset and sound. This one I like well enough, but I find that it is maybe a touch boring, or needs more of a developing melody, vocals perhaps (vocoded of course), something. But for the sake of progress and moving on I decided to call it done, “mix” it a wee bit, bounce it, normalize, and see what happens.

Take 1:

April Showers

Notes:

Bounced/processed mp3 sounds considerably louder in iTunes this time around
On master track in Ableton I used: compressor with Opto-Tight setting, default Limiter, PSP Vintage Warmer plugin with Mastering First Aid setting
Added compressor with Gentle Squeeze setting on drum kick; added Dynamic Tube with Warm Tube setting on drum track
Applied light EQ to each individual track as I understand EQing should be used at this point
Rendered to disk from Ableton with Normalize set to off, exported as wav
Opened wav file in Audacity, ran Normalize with default settings; then exported as MP3
Highs are a bit high and have that near ear-piercing sizzling sound (not good in this case)
Overall I am happy with the considerable gain in loudness of the MP3, but it is almost too loud
I wonder if the electro bit at the end seems tacked on, or feels right; my decision I know, but I wonder
Ends pretty abruptly

Take 2:

April Showers, Take 2

Notes:

Removed the EQ from the open hihats, which improved the sizzling highs from take 1

12 Songs in 2010: February & March Project

tranzfuse — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 02:58:34 +0000

So I spent a good chunk of February fiddling with Reason as a slave within Ableton, which lead to countless hours of noodling and no real results. And then I spent the other chunk of February with Molar VST and the Monomulator patch that turns the APC40 into a monome-like device and had a lot of fun with that (although I have a lot to learn about interfacing with Molar VST).

My February experimentation did not lead to a complete song, but it did lead to an idea that was the birth of the March song project. So I’ll take that and keep on truckin. I’ll hopefully catch up down the road and sneak in an extra song at some point.

Take 1:

2010 March Project (Take1)

Notes:

Used Vintage Mastering 1 effect rack with default settings on Master track
Used basic EQ device on most individual tracks
Exported audio as wav file from Ableton and turned Normalize OFF, bit depth at 32, no dither
Normalized wav file in Audacity with default settings
Exported as MP3
Mixed entirely in headphones, probably a bad thing
Could probably ditch or modify the filter automation on maracas
Arrangement not too bad
Sounds a little too compressed or processed or something

Take 2:

2010 March Project (Take 2)

Notes:

Replaced Vintage Mastering 1 effect rack with Simple Mastering Chain rack, left with default settings except turned up the gain to 3.85dB
Removed the filter automation from the maracas track
Exported audio same as before
Did not normalize in Audacity, just exported as MP3
Sounds more natural, but much quieter than take 1 (when playing back in iTunes; it actually sounds better in browser)
I do seem to hear some glitchy artifacts sprinkled throughout (clipping?)

Take 3:

2010 March Project (Take 3)

Notes:

Returned to this song to try the final mix again after the April project (5/20/10)
Added the “_My Mastering Rack” rack to the Master track
Normalized, then Compressed the exported wav in Audacity; used default settings

12 Songs in 2010: January Project

tranzfuse — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 05:23:52 +0000

First actual full song I’ve ever completed. I don’t love it, but it’s not too bad. The real goal is to get over that hump of coming up with a half-baked idea and then abandoning it, which is what I did most of last year as I learned the ins and outs of Ableton.

Take 1: January (First Attempt)

Notes:

Used Analog Warmth rack on master track
Too much low end
Sounds way too muddy, basically unlistenable

Take 2: January (Second Attempt)

Notes:

Removed Analog Warmth rack
Sounds better, but still too bassy

Take 3: January (Third Attempt)

Notes:

Improved low end
Snares and hats too loud

Take 4: January (Fourth Attempt)

Notes:

Additional EQ on kick, bassline
Lowered volume on snares, hats
Added “mix gel” compression to master track
Sounds good, sparkly sound sounds a bit too processed

Takeaways:

Don’t love the bassline, doesn’t totally fit
Song is a bit boring, could’ve messed with velocity of snares to keep it interesting
Transitions are dull, if not totally absent
Effects applied on the master will impact the song when bounced in ways that may not be obvious at first
I have a lot to learn

12 Songs in 2010

tranzfuse — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 05:23:26 +0000

A goal I’ve set for myself for 2010 is to create a song per month, I’m already a bit behind, but I aim to catch up and get on with it. I decided to keep track of this project on my new and improved website/journal/blog. So here goes nothing…

Disclaimer: I have absolutely no formal training of any sort. I took a class at Dubspot a couple of years ago. I DJ’d for a good 10 years. I played trombone in grade 5. Aside from that I have no real understanding of music theory or composition aside from what I’ve read in a couple of books. All I really have is a desire to create music. I started focusing on music production instead of DJing about a year and a half ago. I had used Ableton to create some digital DJ mixes and it seemed like a natual transition to begin creating my own music…only problem is I had no real idea how to do that, so I am learning and trying to figure it out on my own for the mostpart.

Tools:

Ableton Live 8 on my Macbook Pro
Akai APC40
Akai LPK25
Akai LPD8
Korg nanokontrol (sometimes)
Presonus Firebox
Event TR6 Monitors
Sony MDR-7506 Headphones

Books:

Ableton Live 8 Power
Composition for the Computer Musician
Music Theory for the Computer Musician

Web Resources: