Time is of the essence....

So, I’ve definitely had a little lay off since my last post. Life for me right now is crazy busy as I have a tonne of things going: sports leagues (bball and soccer), biking, music (trying to finish up tracks for an album), trying to get ready for a gig on July 4^th (I’d like to play live, but am not sure if I have the time to put it together), hanging out with my great wife, and taking care of the yard (cutting grass sucks!) along with keeping Samsquantch going. So between all this, I’m finding it real hard to get anything of value done – I seem to do a bit here and a bit there and it never really feels like I get anything done, so my frustration levels are rising a bit along with the heat here in South Western Ontario.

Remember I was talking about the dreaded loop monster a few posts back (not quite as bad as a Samsquantch, but bad never-the-less), I think I have been having more frequent run-ins with it over my last few sessions in the studio. Albeit, I did get the building blocks done for a track in about 2 hours a couple of weeks ago (the track is affectionately called “Stella” after my favourite type of beer!), but getting the track to a point where it is a track and not a bunch of loops is the tough part. So what do I do, instead of trying to focus and get the track to a point where is it almost complete, I start working on other tracks I have in the works - this doesn’t help my level of frustration, because, as I was telling you before, I feel like I get nothing done. It’s true, I may tweak some existing tracks to a point that I think they sound better, but getting anything of real value done seems like another life time right now (not a fun feeling when you are trying to accomplish a goal). Maybe I have a weird form of music A.D.D where I just can’t focus on one track for too long (no wonder I’ve loved DJ’ing for all these years, you bounce around tracks when playing like it’s nothing – maybe this has carried over to my production?!). To give you an idea of my level of frustration, I’ve been working on this track called “Music Talks To Me” for over 2 YEARS – yes, you read that right, 2 FRIGGIN YEARS. Granted, the overall sound of the track was muddy and needed some work (along with the sounds in the tracks and how they were used), but I mean come one, 2 years?! I’ve really only finished 1 track this year and have about 10-12 tracks in the working stages and about 4 done that I am somewhat happy with (although I’m finding I’m going back to these tracks to make more edits). I’ve been learning a lot about the art of mixing with respect to production, so I’ve been trying to apply what I’ve learned to my older tracks – and it has been helping, but I find myself being very critical of not only the overall sound of the track but the frequencies in which certain sounds sit (and how they play together) – almost to a point of obsession. This is the part of production that is not fun – and I think I need to get back to having fun and just going with my gut instead of constantly criticizing and rebuilding pieces of a track. Although when I think back to the various stages I have went through when learning how to produce, you notice lulls within the learning process where things level off for a while – this is usually followed by a period of inspiration and rapid growth where you can apply what you have learned along with your unique approach to get to a final destination. I’m hoping this stage is going to be following soon so I can follow up my goal of sending out an album to some record labels this year.

Phew. That feels better – LOL! As you can tell, I’m a bit frustrated at the moment and want to get a feeling of accomplishment soon so I can better manage everything that is going on in my life while moving forward with my goals. I told my wife over her 3 years of going back to school that hard work really does pay off (my wife was working full time and going to university full time for a degree) – her hard work paid off big time when she was one of only 75 people (out of 4000 applicants) who was accepted to a prestigious local teachers college!!! She just graduated last week on the Dean’s Honor role, so I’m super proud of her. Point being, sometimes you feel overwhelmed or like things are not going your way, but if you put in the work, you will eventually see the results. I’m using my wife as a motivator right now as it’s hard for me to see the light at the end of the tunnel, but seeing what she has done, and trying to follow my own advice, I should see something come of my countless hours spent in my basement dungeon trying to carve out my brand of music. For now, I have to get that loop monster off my back and get back to having fun in the studio. Wish me luck, and keep your browsers locked in as I’ll be posting some of my music with the next post (if you feel like commenting, PLEASE DO SO – I’m always looking for feedback whether positive or negative)!

Actually, why not post some links to some tracks now! I keep putting it off, but what the hell:

Breathe
Free Speech
Early Days
Exit Wisdom

You'll notice the variation in volume for some of the mixes. Like I was saying earlier, I'm trying to teach myself the art of mixing, and all of these with the exception of Free Speech were made before I had learned a few things (and it shows in the mixes if you ask me - still some work to do there in terms of levels, EQ'ing and compression - stuff I'll get into later). Free Speech is almost there as well, I think it just needs some more EQ'ing to bring make it "pop" if you will. Anyway, this gives you a little insight into the sound I'm going for (these are all aimed at dance floors - I have some down tempo stuff I'll post later, but that is OLD and still needs a lot of work). Wow, seems I'm perpetually working - I'll leave that for now cuz I need to get that monster off my back and start having fun with the music again. Once I have my own approach to mixing, things should start to churn out (at least I keep telling myself that).

Alright, now back to having fun and getting things done….. Steer clear of the dreaded loop monster…..

Cameras Ready, Prepare to Flash

This is just going to be a quick post on biking - just want to post some pics I took last Friday at the Grove. As the title hints at, all these were done with a remote flash. It's our new toy this year, Colin got it over Christmas and we've been trying to get the handle on how to use it properly. I think this is the best pics yet with the flash, although we did it a bit differently this time as instead of using a tripod to put the remote flash on, we had someone walk around with the flash - so it was real easy to direct the angle and direction without much hassle! Hope you enjoy....

See the forest gnome - LOL!

Hitting one of the many log rides

This is a pretty kool shot (that's our friend Dave hitting Low Road)

Colin heading up High Street!!

Hitting the roller (gives you a good idea of the size)...

Different angle - great lighting!

Injury update- Fergie is still down, I think he's cleared for light trail rides and that's about it, so he did get a chance to ride the new bike! Speaking of injuries, Colin used up one of his 9 lives the other day on a nasty crash at the Trussler jumps (he was lucky to walk away!) - this is a great reason why you wear full face shield helmets folks... Check out the video (yeah, we got it on video!!):

Colin walked away from this one pretty much unscathed, although he had to retire his helmet due to 2 cracks (better the helmet than his skull). If he wasn't wearing a full face shield, he most certainly would've lost some chick lits (erm, um, I mean teeth)!! That's it for this post....

Been a while...

Yes it has! I've had kind of a crazy week. 3 days, 6 flights with stops in Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Charlotte (twice) and Williamsburg for work. I was asked to write an article for a news paper on mountain biking (thanks Arthur!), which I managed to complete while laying over at one of the airports on my work trip (Arthur saw the blog and asked me to write about a trip up to Blue Mountain!). I ended up walking in my house at 5:30pm and walked out again at 5:45 to play in a soccer game (I had missed the first 3 games and couldn't miss this one) - ended up getting tackled fairly badly and get my knee and ankle twisted. On Saturday my wife Jaime and I headed to a house warming BBQ for Jaime's cousin Jen and her boyfriend Barry. I also managed to get in the studio a bit and take some pretty nice shots at the Grove! So, now I've finally managed to sit down and get to another post! As keeping with my alternating themes, we head back to the world of production.

I said I was going to get into how I produce. I'll touch a bit on that here. House and Techno are pretty much based around the 4/4 beat (4 beats per measure / 4 measures per bar). What that pretty much means is a kick drum on the 1 and 2 and 3 and 4 with the high hats falling in between (replace the ands with high hats!) and the clap falling on the 2 and 4. It's a very basic rhythm but one which makes you move (this is true universally) - I believe this is also what rock is based around. On a funny note, the church has rules about music, one of them being that certain rhythms were 'of the devil' and not to be used. Hence the old school saying that rock & roll was from the devil, because of the rhythm being used! Are we seeing the ultimate reason as to why our western world (and the greater world for that matter) is falling apart (insert heavy sarcasm here!). Just thought that was a funny little tidbit - no joke though, this pattern of music really does get you moving! Even hip hop and break beats have elements of this pattern, the only real difference being the placement of the kick drum (I really need to link to some examples - soon!). So the basic beat if you will is the palette for a lot of different types of music - if you start to listen you'll be able to hear the similarities pretty clearly. Pretty much all my production is based around this (well all of it actually). The trick is getting something that fits the template, has a nice groove (groove is pretty much the feel of the the combination of elements of a given track - including effects, shuffle, etc). Once you get a basic groove down, it's about (for me anyway) seeing what fits in the empty spaces and plays off the other parts of the track. So I try to place certain elements within certain areas of a track to give a particular feel - once you get this down it becomes your artistic style if you will. I've developed a certain approach to making my tracks that includes the effects I use, how I use them, sample manipulation (I like to resample material I have in a track - more on that in a bit), how I mix the song down, my arrangement style(s) and things of this nature. If you were to listen to my tracks I think you would be able to see that there are certain elements which are repeated in my tracks, but applied differently throughout the various tracks so as not to get boring (I'll post some links soon to my material). When it comes to resampling, I like to record various loops of material while working on a song and apply various effects and sample shaping techniques to twist the sampled material into something completely new - and then this gets added on top of what it was recorded on. I believe this is good because you are taking an existing piece of the song, so used correctly, it should fit in very nicely depending on how it is applied and where. I've found this to be a great technique as it allows for great creativity as well as giving you unexpected results which lead to other pathways for a song to take musically. Speaking of that, it's also one of the dangers - the dreaded loop monster!!! I thought I was the only person to experience this until I read a thread on it on the Ableton Live user forums. The dreaded loop monster refers to times where you end up sitting there tweaking 1 or 2 loops for hours, but never really get anything done at the end of the session (you end up listening to practically the same loop for long periods of time, sometimes with just minor tweaks). With so many pathways which open up when working with sample manipulation, it's also very easy to get off track and stay off for long periods of time - have to focus on the task at hand! Although that's also one of the fun aspects of working with Live, the fun you get as no 2 sessions will be the same (even with a little knowledge) - keeps new sounds floating through your speakers every time you sit down!

Ok, another quick post - hope this one was a little bit informative. Or at least give you a small insight as to how I approach making tracks (albeit a very brief version). I'll be getting into more production stuff soon, I want to get a record of the week section going where I will pull out my old records and give you a glimpse of some the old records I used to play (that will be coming very shortly). Looking forward to the next post with some more great pics from the Grove! Until then...