Samsquanch

Good Tutorials & New LP Sequencer

2010-01-06T14:22:00.004-05:00

Came across these over on the Ableton forum and though I would share. Good tutorial on splitting up a drum break to make something new. Nothing new to me, but it's always good to get a refresher on techniques. Take a look if interested, definitely a good watch:

Part 1

Part 2

The Blog.

Also came across another post from a very smart dude who goes by Lo-Fi Massahkah. I know him from a previous patch he made for the Lemur and Ableton Live which was just amazing, so I was very interested to see what he came up with next. Definitely not disappointed, it's a nice synth sequencer for the Launch Pad. Check out the video, very kool stuff indeed....

Inflection - Launch Pad Sequencer [video]

DyNAmic Sequencer for the Lemur and Live [video]

Rediscovering the Old

2010-01-06T13:51:00.004-05:00

HAPPY NEW YEAR Everyone!! Hope 2010 is the best yet.

So I went on a track spending spree over xmas, mainly older Detroit stuff that I never thought would make it to mp3. The classic No Ufo's and Time, Space Transmat from Model 500 from *1985*!!! Then there's the classic Big Fun (the Magic Juan remix) which is another timeless classic for me. Classic, timeless techno from the fore-fathers! And I haven't mentioned some of the earlier Cybotron stuff or the Transmat stuff. I'll be looking for these next!!

Then there was some Rob Hood stuff. A lot of people really look to Rob Hood as the first guy in Detroit to can the minimal sound and his Minimal Nation Album defines that sound to a tee.... Minimal, driving, hypnotic and above all Detroit!! For some reason these tracks just hit the all the right strings for me, and I did hear a lot of these tracks when going to parties in Detroit in the mid-90's. I also picked up some F.U.S.E. tracks - I can clearly remember picking up Dimension Intrusion in the early 90's. That was probably one of the CD's that really got me into techno. And the tracks still sound fresh today!!

Someone I particularly is a DJ by the name of Twonz - a DJ from Detroit who championed the Detroit sound - he was known as the techno terrorist before it was socially unacceptable to use the word terrorist. His mix tape, Don't F*ck With Detroit was playing on my stereo pretty much constantly for 2 years. An awesome mix that really highlights what Detroit means to me.

Very happy to reacquaint myself with music that started it all for me. This also has me rediscovering my vinyl collection, which has some gems that I had totally forgotten about. Makes me want to play records out again!

Gear List

2009-12-14T14:05:00.003-05:00

In the interest of keeping the blog going, I'm going just post my gear list real quick:

Intel Dual Core PC @ 2Ghz, 2G RAM (need to update this)
Dual flat screen monitors (I find this essential)
Live 8 Suite Edition w/Max for Live
KRK Rokit-8 Speakers (may potentially add my 10", 500W sub to mix)
Roland RBUS VM3100 Pro Mixer
M-Audio RBUS Soundcard
M-Audio Oxygen 8
M-Audio Keystation 88
AKAI APC40
Native Instruments MASCHINE
NI's Komplete 5
NI's Kore2 + controller
Jazzmutant Lemur
Novation Remote Zero SL
Novation Launchpad
Behringer BCF2000/BCR2000
GURU
Camel Audio's Alchemy
D16's Silverline Collection & Classic Boxes Collection
PSP Nitro
IKMultmedia T-Racks Suite

Damn, writing the list down it looks pretty impressive! I've been building/collecting stuff for 10yrs, so not a bad collection at all. Anyways, I'll probably talk about some of the controllers in other posts as that stuff really interests me (although I have a lot to learn here with respect to customization).

That's it for now, I'll leave you with a new track I finished on the weekend that was inspired by a trip to see Jason Hodges play some proper underground house. Hope you enjoy it (and see if you can place the sample - hint, the track title gives it away!):

Doggy Style by Ypsi Kid

The Build pt. 3

2009-12-01T12:45:00.002-05:00

So I'm going to try and wrap this up as I think I've been a bit long winded and I also want to move onto some other exciting things to talk about.

I've got my drums, bass and synth line going, I need to orgainze everything for the different parts of the track, sequence the parts out and then do some mixing to get even better levels (this is where concentrating on levels from the beginning comes in very handy - safes you a LOT of time and effort trying to get things right at the end). I have no real formula yet for my tracks, I try and keep things locked onto the 4/8/16/32 bar change ups (either for sections or breaks of the track). I didn't have a lot of different parts for this track so I knew it was going to be a bit tracky (nothing wrong with that if done correctly). Needless to say, I put the sequence together pretty quick and was somewhat happy with it.

After walking away and coming back to the mix, I really did not like how the bass was sounding or sitting in the mix - so I decided to change the sound that I was using for the bass. This can be a problem that I've heard affectionately reffered to as "the dreaded loop monster". This phenomenon happens when you are working on looped based music and start to listen to the same loop(s) for an extended period of time. You tend to convince yourself that it sounds good, only to find out after a break that the loop I've been working on/listening to sucks. So this is always on the back of my mind when making tracks and I'm sure to always come back after a few hours of rest to ensure my material isn't crap!

I was glad to take a break and find that the bass was not what I was looking for. Turned out the patch I picked the second time for the bass fit really nicely into the mix. That pretty much concludes this build post. I'm going to do another one, except a little more more "real time" and less wordy. I'll stick to the juicey facts and make sure to post examples.

That's it for this build, if you've made it through all these build posts, I commend you as they are fairly long and kind of scattered!

Thanks for reading, until next time check out some of my new track on soundcloud.

MAX for LIVE Released!!!

2009-11-25T10:40:00.003-05:00

Just had to quickly post about the release of Max for Live. Something that I think will change the face of music production and bring it into the 21st century. Its like being able to pop the hood of a car and customize and tweak to your liking - except you can now do this with instruments, effects and midi effects... while the Ableton is running... WOW.

Thanks to my lovely wife for snagging this for me for my B-Day. I'll be deep in the programming game for a while but hopefully this will enable me to customize my APC40 to my liking. But of course, I will be making some tracks over this time as well (Also picked up Camel Audio's Alchemy, an awesome, powerful and easy to use synth).

I'll be finishing up the build post today as well, need to finish that up as I have tons more I want to post on! I also need to post about my new gear! I should have some time over the next couple of days, so expect lots of new posts over the next few days.

Peace.

Check this out!

2009-11-14T17:11:00.008-05:00

Just wanted to point out a really nicely produced track by someone who frequents the Ableton Message Board - Jeskola01, also known as Breakitdown on Soundcloud. Low Winter Sun - This track is a great piece of work in the DEEP techno realm. Put on those waders, cuz its going deep...

Low Winter Sun by breakitdown

Enjoy, and support him if you like the track, I did.

The Build pt. 2

2009-11-10T14:35:00.004-05:00

So I have my light foundation with the drums, just a shell that I can build over top of - again nothing special, but gives the track its first identity and usually is a good indicator of what type of track it will be. I originally started this track with the idea of a dubstep tune in my head (idea being that I wanted to make a dubstep track, not conscious yet of the elements).

With the bass line, I'm using Native Instruments MASSIVE which is a nice flexible synth and one that is easy to use to get a nice big sound (and I believe it is a well used weapon in dubstep). This is a new synth to me, but one I like because, as I said, it's pretty intuitive to use which is a big bonus. So I set out to make my own patch, something I've been working on lately instead of using presets. The process involves using Oscillators to create waveforms, and then use filters and efx to shape the waveforms into something you would use. I was able to get a decent sound pretty quick and used the LFO (low frequency Oscillator) to make the bass wobble by assigning it to the filter cutoff of the onboard efx (what this does is make the filter cutoff, the frequency which is allowed through the filter, to move in either a synched or non-synched way, giving you a decent 'wobble' effect on the bass). Had this in place and used a simple 2 note bass line with some wobble applied.

Now I have my drums and bass, I usually look to add the synth/keys here or I focus on adding rhytmic elements to the drums to add some depth and movement. On this track, I decided to go with the synth/keys first and use a new Virtual Synth I picked up for a steal (regular $150, got it for $15!!) which is Applied Accoustics Ultra Analog VA-1. Another easy to use synth that resembles the 'analog' world. For those of you who don't know, there is the eternal debate of digital vs analog. Some people think digital sounds like crap and analog is warm and fuller sounding - and you get those who say you can't tell the different. I really don't care as long as it sounds good in the context of my tracks... and digital is cheaper and more accessible. Anyways, a great synth that I wanted to start incorporating into my work flow and what better chance to use it than here!

I found a nice pad like sound and, keeping things in key, sequenced out a simple 2 note synth line. Nothing special cuz my music theory sucks, so I have to keep things simple - hwoever, to me, the simple stuff usually sounds the best (or maybe I'm just biased!!). The riff was sitting ok in the mix, but was hitting the same time as a kick and the bass, so things were a bit clogged in this space. To make things breathe a bit better, I eq'd all these elements to carve out some space and give the sounds room to breathe - this worked pretty good, but had to do something else to bring the kick out.

This brings out another tool from the toolbox which is very handy if used correctly (although this is probably over done in todays dance music). Side Chain Compression. Quick overview - compression is simply the idea that you set a threshold in db, and set a ration (ex. 1:2). What this means is that everytime the signal is below the threshold, it is brought up 1db. If the signal goes over the threshold, the signal is reduced by 2 db - so you can manage the levels or db of your tracks better with Compression. Side Chain compression takes that idea and instead of setting a threshold manually, you use a secondary signal in order to set the threshold. So, in my case, I use Side Chain compression on the bass line track, and set the input (threshold) to the kick drum - this means that everytime the kick drum hits, the bass line track will be turned down based on my setting. As you can tell, this is a good technique for giving tracks room to breath, so here, this gives my kick drum space/room to breath over top of the bass line. You can use this technique in extreme ways to get a 'pumping' effect - something very prevalent in French House (ex. Daft Punk).

I think that's good for today, so in the mean time let me post the finished product of this process. I'll talk about the other aspects of the production in the next couple of posts.

Slow & Steady by Ypsi Kid

Back to Basics

2009-11-06T10:26:00.003-05:00

So as you know, I've been hobbled for the last 2 months. While this has been a weird time for me as I've never been this inactive for this long, I'm trying to keep a positive spin on things and focus on what makes me happy... Music. I've finished a few songs in the last couple of months (or somewhat finished, good enough for me) and have been trying to keep the momentum going. I'm currently finishing off a downtempo piece whose bass has been shaped by my fascination with dubstep. I'm going to walk everyone through my process for building this track.

First off, I'm really trying to focus on my mixing skills and getting everything its own place in the mix in terms of frequency range. You see, if you have different sounds that occupy the same frequency space, you begin to get muddiness where those frequencies cross (nice technical term for all you readers - HA!). Until you start to mix tracks or you are an audiophile you probably wouldn't be able to notice the muddiness too much unless you A/B'd it with something that was done correctly. So, that is a point of emphasis now when I sit down to make tracks, especially with the dubstep bass because you not only need the very low frequecies to stand out over top of the kick, but you have mid and hi frequencies that can help to define the sound as well, so getting your EQ'ing and compression right is key. Just a quick point here for non-producers, when I talk about EQ'ing, what that means is either increasing or decreasing the volume (or dB) within a certain range of the frequency band (ex, I want to ensure the kick drum and bass line don't interfere, so I would lower the volume of the Kick drums frequency on the bass line track or vice versa - for an example of muddiness, check out my track called I Will Go (to the bass) - you can see that when the bass comes in, it kind of drowns out the kick drum - not a good job on my part of getting the elements to sit right in the mix). So anyway, that's a big emphasis when I sit down to make a track and something I've kept in mind for Slow & Steady.

Whenever I sit down to write a track, I usually always start with the drums. Why do I do this, probably because I'm pretty good with rhythm and not so good with melody - do my rhythms usually drive the track as opposed to melody. I find that by doing things this way, melody usually falls in line with the groove of the track. Kind of an ass-backwards way of doing things as I know most people start with a melody and derive the key and then go from there. My lack of understanding the melodic elements is probably the sole driver for my approach. No formal music theory, so I try and and go with rhythm and use my ears as to what sounds good to me - I find this usually works out well for me.

For this track I decided to use Ableton's native drum rack and used one of the CR-78 kits. This kit has some nice percussion and a nice kick that I though I could work with. I'm bad in that fact that I start out with a 1 bar loop and because of this my stuff (or at least the drums) tend to be a bit tracky - my formative years in Detroit has made a mark on me in this respect! - so I do some other things to get movement and add interest whic I'll get to later. The obvious I start with is the kick, snare and highhat. True 4 to the floor style which usually hits nicely and gives a lot of options in terms of rhythmic structure for other percussive elements. For this piece I movement the 4th kick to change the rhytm a bit and added a rim shot in the space that was not occupied by either the kick, snare or HH (this is another approach I use, I like to have things sit in their own physical space within the track, especially with drums).

Now I have the drums, I usually go after the bass next since I like the bass to be one of my main elements and also because a bassline does not need to be very dynamic in terms of melody. Great basslines are usually pretty simple and interact with the rest of the track in a unique way (at least in my opinion). I'm going to stop here for now and will continue with the rest of my track buidling process with the next post. I'll also put the track up so people can take a listen.

So, until next time. Turn up the bass and do a 2 step.

Bromont Pics

2009-11-03T16:00:00.004-05:00

I thought I would throw up a couple of quick pics from the biking trip in August:

That's me hitting the Road Gap with Fergie lining up the table

That's Colin hitting the 50 footer (I broke my foot on the jump to the immediate right)

You can see the teaser video footage in the link I have in the last post (nice work Colin!). I'll post a couple more pics some time over the next month, but this give a quick glimpse as to what we were up to. Fun stuff.

Snap Foot

2009-11-02T17:08:00.005-05:00

So, I was saying I got injured. Here's a shot of my foot when I was waiting to see a doctor in an Emergency room on Bromont, Quebec. Check this out:

As you can see, my ankle and foot looked f*&@#d to put it mildly. Your probably asking, 'what the hell happened?' right?! Well, me and the boys were on a biking trip up in Bromont, Quebec, which has some awesome trails, not to mention an insane bike park. We had planned for 3.5 days and had just about gotten through the last day when we were ripping down a trail and decided to hit the bike park in the rain (more like light mist). I was hitting everything nice and decided to hit the road gap, hit it with good speed and landed it big. But I was going pretty fast and had a zesty moment trying to hit the bridge for the next section... hit the bridge and was carrying my speed nicely and decided I was going to hit this 20/25ft table. Hit the table and both my feet slip off my pedals - I managed to get my right foot back on, but ended up landing and my left foot slammed into the ground and twisted inward. I stayed on the bike but knew something wasn't right so I stopped before the next jump and got out of the way. When I tried to put my foot down, I dropped in pain and new I had at least broken something. Managed to make my way down the hill on one pedal and then pretty much collapsed in the medical center, the pain was getting to me and I knew something was messed up pretty bad (as you can see from the pic above). I ended up in the below after 2 shots of morphine and the doctor saying I just broke a bone in my foot (although my foot did hurt near as bad as my ankle - more on that later). This is after the nurse said to me "we may have to rebreak the foot/ankle, it doesn't look good). All things considered, I'm glad that did not need to be done.

No crutches, so the boys had to carry me!

Anyways, long story short, the doctors didn't pay attention to my ankle (despite my attempts at asking them about it), and started physio 1.5 months later to find out I had 2 tendons detach from the bone. That would explain why I still can't walk right. So no physical activity for me, it will be a long road to recovery - I'm hoping sooner rather than later.

In the mean time, I've tried focusing on music more - I've been liking dubstep stuff lately (which is a mix of jungle and techno/breaks really). Mostly been loving the deep twisted bass coming from the genre. Trying to emulate that in the studio has been a lot of fun and resulted in some interesting productions (M-Step'n, Broken LFO, I Will Go (to the bass), Game Changer). Also picked up some new gear which I'll talk about in some future posts. So, as you can see, I'll be focusing primarily on the music side of things with the odd biking pic and video thrown on to let you see what the guys have been up to.

They're baaaccckkkk....

2009-10-22T21:55:00.002-04:00

Samsquanch's have been spotted once again. Look for me to make a return to this very spot.

Long story short, I've been injured pretty badly and now have lots of time in the studio. So updates on some biking stuff from this summer, but more importantly, a return to all things production.

In the mean time, check out what I've been up to:

My Soundcloud Account

Over a Month?!

2008-08-24T11:36:00.003-04:00

Wow, I know I'm pretty lazy at times, but it's been over a month since my last post and a ton has happened during that time - from a 2 week trip out west to BC, to a few requests for some DJ gigs, to getting some good work done in the studio - it's been a busy month!

The first thing to note was the riding out in Whistler, BC. I have to admit I was pretty nervous about hitting up the trails at Whistler. When I first arrived, you have a huge, towering mountain shadowing over you, and the chair lifts go out of sight... with bikes! Now I've ridden a mountain - Mount Bromont - but this looked like another level all together! I was also really excited, because if you are a mountain biker, Whistler is like a mecca - everyone wants to ride there at least once in their life time. So with a mix of nerves and extreme excitement I hit the trails on Sunday July 27th.... in the rain no less! So up Colin and I went, and we were literally going into the clouds (and rain!). Arriving at the top, we were a little wet to say the least, we decided to hit a Blue Trail - Crank It Up - to get us warmed up and a chance for me to feel out the rental bike. To my surprise, despite the rain and crappy weather, the trails were fairly dry and grippy - and for a Blue trail, it was really fun! After the warm up run, we decided to hit a very famous and well know trail - A-Line - because we were pretty confident that we could hit it after a solid warm up run (although to be honest, I was still pretty in awe of the place!). Another wet ride up the chair lift and we hit the entrance to A-Line... The beginning was fairly tame with some small table top jumps and berms - I was beginning to relax a bit. Then we started hitting the bigger tables - they were pretty big, and if you carried your speed, you would literally be flying. A-Line is a flow track which basically means it is meant for speed, and to hit all the jumps on the trail with speed and 'flow' your way through. Now, I hadn't really hit anything like this in the past, although similar type stuff, not really as big or as long. Granted, being my first time down, I was on the breaks pretty good and was catching a bit of air, but not able to clear a lot of the jumps (I needed man up and not hit the breaks!). So first run down A-Line was fun, but there was a lot more potential in that trail and we skipped the A-Line rock drop (look big, and it was wet), and we also skipped the 'GLC Drop' which was practically down by the chair lift and, if there was one drop I was going to hit, it was the GLC Drop. On our way back up, Colin suggested we take the Garbonzo chair after we hit mid-station (Garbonzo brings you to pretty much the top of the mountain, as high as you can go with your bikes). I said yes, but it took some coaxing - you had no idea where it went because you were in the clouds and the chair just disappeared, it looked pretty scary. On the Garbonzo lift we went, and we happened to be sitting beside an older guy (probably about 55/60). This guy started talking to us about the trails, and suggested that "if you want the best 45 minutes of riding that you will ever experience", to follow him - he made sure that we were comfortable on jumps. So, after about 15mins on a chair lift (that's right, I was getting pretty damn scared at this point), we get off and can see the glacier. Time to follow this crazy old bastard and see where he takes us. From the first turn, we were hitting huge jumps, smooth bermed corners, all while clipping along at a good pace. Then came the first step up. I'm riding a little behind this crazy old guy and Colin, and as I come over this shale rock face, I see them at the far end of, for lack of a better term, a valley, I can hear them yelling me to go as fast as I can. I didn't see it at first, but after mocking down a rock face, and coming up the other side of the valley, I see the jump (a step up is a jump which throws you up, so you are 'stepping up' when you hit the jump). Holy crap the thing is big. I pin it as fast as I can toward the jump and hit it full tilt - I get kicked up pretty high and just manage to make the step, my heart almost jumping out of my chest!! The first section of Freight Train complete. We ride down a shale road for a bit, and it comes up along this huge cliff - I'm thinking about tomorrow when it's supposed to be clear and you can see over this cliff. Then down another shale road and hit a step down, then I hear shouting in front of me again to go as fast as I can - yip, another step up - this one is even bigger than the last. This time I really get kicked in the air (I'd say close to 15 feet), my feet slip off the pedals, but I manage to land on my seat and ride away - any landing you can walk away from is a good landing right - LOL! The next section was pretty much all fire road, so it was quick with a bit of sketchiness with the loose shale and rock. Now the old guy is smiling, saying the next section is where all the fun stuff starts - I was just thinking of survival at this point.... The old wise man was right, the fun really did start here - from nice fast sections to tables to drops and berms - this was turning out to be the ride of my life, everything I would want on a trail and we're not even half way down yet! I can pretty much tell you that I was yelling and screaming the rest of the way down - fun, fast, airtime and built just right. The stuff just kept coming and the smile kept getting bigger (and the yelling louder). Next we linked into Dirt Merchant which probably was my favorite trail - big drops to river gaps (jumping over a river) to step downs and step ups - this had it all and then some. I was going bigger than I ever had before and everything just felt smooth as butter! We linked into the second half of A-Line after Dirt Merchant finishes up. At this point we had lost our guide and my heart was pounding and my knuckles where white. We finished up A-Line in style, getting lots of air and going pretty good - then we hit the GLC Drop, easy and one goal down.... what was I going to try next. After saying that, I also hit a nice big drop on Dirt Merchant which is probably the biggest drop I've ever done (bigger than GLC even!). I was stoked - we had just ridden what we felt was our dream trail, we decided we would probably pretty much only ride this from here on in, it was just that fun.

I'm going to stop there as my hands are sore from typing, and would you believe it, we got NO PICS when we were there (riding pics anyway). So I'll come back soon and finish up the riding stories, although we pretty much did only ride Freight Train to Dirt Merchant to A-Line all week! I also have some helmet cam footage from the trail runs that I will post when I get it up on youtube. So till next time, keep it real!!

Music & Math

2008-07-17T22:01:00.003-04:00

Just a quick post this time around about a pretty crazy article on music & math. How some math guys are trying to plot out the relationship between melody & harmony and how they combine to make music. So it pretty much boils down to the shape of music. Kind of geeky, but I thought I'd share the article anyway because I enjoyed it!

http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2008/07/the_shape_of_music.php?page=1

Back 2 Basics

2008-07-07T15:45:00.000-04:00

Seems I’m on a staggered schedule here in terms of the blog – apologies as I know everyone has been waiting on edge for my next post – ha! Well, I have a gig this Saturday and wanted to play live, but it’s looking more and more like will not happen and I’ll have to fall back on my tried and true DJ’ing abilities (although it’s been a while since I played out at a club) – looking forward to it though! But I’m going to focus back on biking for this post as I’ve had a great couple of days on the ol’trusty steed!

I started our (somewhat) long weekend by taking my wife up to Niagra Falls to an amazing hotel overlooking the falls. We’ve had a spat of bad news and I figured it would be good to get away and clear our heads – so it was a great start to the weekend for sure as Jaime and I had an unbelievable time over the weekend (we seem to be able to have a great time no matter where we go!). When we got home, Jaime went to go check the mail and came running back in – my article had been published in the Georgian Bay times (based on my 3^rd post on the blog about the trip up to Blue Mountain). So needless to say I was pretty excited ;) Funny thing was, Colin had contacted me and asked if I wanted to hit Blue on Canada Day. Since I had nothing on my plate (although I probably should’ve been working on my live set), and the weatherman saying it was going to be sunny and around 25 degree’s, I said let’s do it! Actually, before I get into our trip back up to Blue, I have to talk about something crazy I saw at the Chicopee Bike Park on the Friday. Colin, Fergie and I were sessioning the jumps at Chicopee when 2 kids show up who we have never seen. They start hitting the big line nice and smooth, and the one kid starts doing 360’s off the various jumps on the big line – this in itself it pretty sick as it’s not everyday you see someone make a 360 look easy and smooth. Then came the best riding I think I have ever seen. They were trying to close down the park and it was myself and this kid at the top of the run in. Not being able to really do any tricks, I thought it prudent to go first and give the kid the last run for the simple fact he was just way better than me. What does the kid do on the first jump…. A friggin backflip!!! Now, you or not supposed to invert on any of the jumps at Chicopee for insurance reasons – the guy running the park at the time could do nothing but stare (I think his jaw hit the floor to be honest, as did everyone else’s)! So everyone was getting him stocked, hi-5’s, yelling and screaming. He goes back up for another run, and the Chicopee guy wanted to see it as well (we all did!). The kid comes down again, backflips the first jump, 360’s the second jump and then does a huge tuck no-hander (this is where the rider ‘tucks’ the handle bars on his knees and throws both his hands out to the side) – just a spectacle to behold, I was just blown away that someone could do those on the local jumps, just incredible. To make it even better, the kid was one of the most humble kids I’ve seen there and did not really make a big deal out of it – just made the feat that much better to be honest, no attitude at all – I love it!

Ok, another quick story before I get to Blue. The BBC. No, not the English channel with the great comedy (yeah, I grew up on BBC stuff and love it!), but the Backyard Booter Crew. This acronym was affectionately invented when our good buddy (and owner of Sattelyte Wakeskates – the BEST WakeSkate company in the world, IMHO) built a snowboard ‘booter’ (or jump) in his backyard. There were many a night where people would be over at Garry’s sessioning the booter. So, Colin has it in his mind that he is going to learn how to 360 on a bike, and seeing that kid on Friday lit a fire under his ass to get it done. Colin negotiated with his wife to let him build a small jump in the backyard so he could learn 360’s. While Jaime and I were enjoying an amazing view of the falls, Colin and Fergie had a dump truck full of dirt delivered to the house and were busy building the summer incarnation of the BBC. I get back from Niagra Falls to see a nice little booter built in Colin’s back yard – The BBC is back. Colin has attempted 2 360’s so far in his backyard playground, but as of yet, has been unsuccessful at landing a 3… He’ll get it though, he is one determined rider!

Ok, back to the trip to Blue this past Canada day. After arriving at Colins a bit late, we headed up to the only lift access downhill in Ontario (I think anyway!). We expected it to be a bit busy, but the thing I was looking forward to the most was hitting some trails which I have not ridden in about a year (they were closed the first few times we went). So we arrived, and after a short delay due to my shifting cable and derailleur being shot, we headed for the lift. There was a nice size crowd there, but you didn’t have to wait more than 5mins to get on the lift, so things were looking good already. Checking the trail maps, Autobahn and Shot Glass were open – 2 of our favourite trails (Autobahn because it is FAST as hell – aptly named! And Shot Glass cuz it’s nice and technical). We got off the lift and headed straight for Autobahn – nothing like mock speed for the first run of the day, and DAMN was it fast! We shredded that trail like nothing, and I was feeling good despite not having riden Down Hill for over a month, and the adrenaline was pumping nicely from all that speed!! We hit that a few times and then headed to Shot Glass which is full of fun little stunts all the way down mixed in with some nice technical sections (steep rooty/rocky sections that test your skill). Man was I happy to be back on the trails, it felt great! After shredding Shot Glass a few more times we decided to hit O-Chute which is a fun, fast, technical trail as well and connects with another trail (R-Shore) half way down. We hit the first section nicely, and were ripping the second section (I was actually pretty lucky not to dummy myself when I hit the second sections rock drop and almost went over the bars!), and halfway down the second section Colin gets a flat. Pretty crappy place to get a flat cuz it was step, and the terrain is not really meant to be walked down because it’s so steep!! Needless to say I kept ripping the rest of the trail and Colin had to maneuver down the hill with his ‘dirt bike without an engine’ of a bike!!!

After fixing his flat, we ripped Shot Glass and Autobahn a couple more times before calling it a day (was about 6:30 and we’d been riding for about 5 hours). My muscles were nice and sore from the day and I was ready to go home. The ride home was fun as the lactic acid was pooling in our legs – you could feel your legs getting stiffer by the minute!! Once we hit home, it was tough to just walk back to the car, a sign of a good day of riding!! What a weekend indeed, hoping to have another one like this before the summer is done, but Whistler is coming up in less than a month and I think Colin and I are going to try and hit Mt Bromont next weekend to get some training in for BC – LOL! Anyways, that’s it for me for now, stay tuned for an update as to how the gig went! Ride hard and enjoy life… until next time…

Time is of the essence....

2008-06-16T17:03:00.005-04:00

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

2008-06-05T14:43:00.015-04:00

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...

2008-06-01T18:16:00.008-04:00

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...

Broke Back - Injury Update

2008-05-25T18:22:00.011-04:00

With that last post, I didn't think I could leave everyone hanging with respect to my man Fergie. Fergie took a nasty bail at the Grove last Monday and is off his steed for a while. He was getting up onto the step-up bridge and when he got up on the platform, his chain skipped and left him with no speed for the step-down. Needless to say he was heading for a meeting with the landing, but he bailed out nicely BUT landed on the edge of a skid (his back took the brunt). He had to go to the hospital with swelling around his spine (Ferg, you need some armor man!!!), but nothing serious. So it was good to see our buddy not too badly hurt. Just to rub some salt into the wound, Fergie picked up his new bike this week as well, so he hasn't been able to ride it yet! He was looking pretty rough on Thursday, but as of Friday was moving a lot better - we're hoping to see him back on the new whip real soon....

Funny thing about this (not really that there is any humor in Fergies injury), but I broke my collar bone in 2 spots last year at the Trussler dirt jumps (yeah, the spot I mention in the below post -that was the last time I was out there!). Right before I broke my collar bone, I had booked a trip to Whistler (mountain bike mecca of the world) AND just ordered a new set of front forks for my new ride at the time. 2 days after I had broken my collar bone, my forks show up - sound familiar! So I had to wait to ride my new forks, and was never able to ride Whistler (can't wait for this years trip) - so therein lies the humor between the 2 incidents....

collar bone snapped in 2 spots, can you see - #@$%$#!

Mount Bromont is coming up soon, that'll make for a good story - LOL! All the best Ferg, we'll see you out again on the trails soon.... I didn't even get to this weeks Blue Mountain trip, I'll talk about that soon (was a FUN trip in terms of shredding some trails!!)...

a section of the new Canada Cup trail @ Mt. Bromont, QC

Back to the music...

2008-05-25T15:55:00.007-04:00

First off, apologies for the delay. Been a bit of a hectic week - Fergie gets injured on Monday at the Grove (lucky no Samsquanches were involved), I was stopped at the border on Tuesday when I was driving through for work, and we ended up hitting Trussler (a spot we haven't hit for almost a year)! So I'm glad to be back here posting again - I'll fill you in on the biking details in my next post, but I want to try and stick with going back and forth between music and mountain biking. This post I'm gonna talk about production - a bit general, but mostly focused on myself.

Music production in general has come a long way in last 10-20 years, especially in the area of home music production. Back in the day, in order to get into music production and recording it would take a small fortune due to the amount of hardware you had to buy in order to make this happen (mixing board, effects racks, amp racks, compressors, patch bays, etc). With the advent of computer software that could model physical hardware, it became possible to have a studio in a box if you will (all you needed for music production was contained on a computer). Now full on production houses didn't make the move to all digital studios as a) they probably already invested in outboard gear and b) analogue stuff typical just sounds better - so they went to a hybrid approach since the computer offered a streamline way of getting things accomplished. Needless to say, the amount of home producers sky rocketed with the introduction of software that worked on home computers (especially combined with the power of midi). We sit today with a huge selection of affordable gear aimed specifically at the home market - the selection of equipment within a certain area can sometimes be mind boggling with the amount of choices available. Some argue this trend, along with the ability to promote and sell via the web, has flooded the market with a lot of unspectacular material. Others would argue it's up the ante for producers, because in order to be noticed now, your stuff has to be really good. Personally, my views fall somewhere in between - but with the amount of work going on out there in home studios, I think it's great there's an outlet for a lot of that material (less control by big labels is always a good thing in my opinion). Now I'm hoping I can find the right outlet for my stuff - lol!

As you've probably already guessed, I have a computer based home studio. My setup is great, and has allowed me to learn a lot as well as make some pretty good tracks (if I don't say so myself - ha!). For the geeks out there my studio is running a Roland VM-3100PRO 20 channel mixer (8 in/8 out from the computer), M-Audio Delta RBUS, KRK Rokit 8's, M-Audio Oxygen 8 midi controller, Behringer BCF2000/BCR2000, Roland JX-3P/JX-8P Synths, Lexicon MPX100 Effects unit, and I have 2 turntables (2 Technics 1200's) with an old Numark scratch mixer! I have it tucked away nicely in my basement - great little studio that I tend to spend hours in!

On the production side of things, I use a program called Ableton Live (although I originally started producing with Cubase). I started using it back when it was version 3, and they are currently up to version 7 - they revolutionized how artists play electronic music live and also the approach to production with something called 'session view'. This essentially allowed to you 'jam' very easily with your material to get creative ideas for where you wanted to go. This coupled with it's simplicity quickly made it a force in the electronic music community (don't get me wrong though, outboard, analogue gear is still very prevalent in the community).

I'm going to leave it at that today - it's 21 degree's out, and my BBQ is calling my name! I'll talk more about my actual approach to production in another post - now you know what I use in terms of equipment and production, I'll get more into how I produce and why (not a formally trained musician at all!). Sorry this was kind of a boring post - starts with the potential of some good, interesting stuff and devolved into a pretty boring talk about production!! Time to throw on the pork tenderloin....

RIP-EN-ZIE

2008-05-17T15:21:00.021-04:00

Rip'a what? Yeah, I know. My friends and I tend to use heavy slang (we're still pretty much 16 at heart!), and the above pretty much means tearing up a trail - we actually say rip-en-zie deutch (the full slang version). Anyways, enough of a glimpse into our psyche, yesterday was opening day at the only lift access mountain bike 'hill' in Ontario - Blue Mountain. My friend Colin and I decided to get seasons passes this year since we are hooked on down hill and because Blue is pretty close to us - only about an hour and half drive, so for us there was no question. This is our 3rd season hitting the hill, so we knew the trails really well and could rip pretty much any trail they had on offer (mind you, I'm by no means really fast, but I am able to throw my bike around now pretty good!). So when opening day was coming up, we both decided to take a day off work and pick up our passes and ride till we could no more - wow did we pick a good day to ride....

After an early morning and some Tim Hortons, a hassle free drive on the back roads to Collingwood, Ontario - the home of Blue Mountain. As you can see here to the left, we are almost at the hill and the clouds are just about burnt away by the morning sun - at this point you start getting butterflies in your stomach... a mix of excitement and fear!!

The first thing we did when we arrived was head in and and grab our seasons passes. The little resort town at the bottom of the hill is very Whistler like, but WAY smaller. At this point it was pretty slow, but there was some activity as the place was getting ready for May 2-4 (Victory Day Holiday in Canada, faithfully referred to as May 2-4... no coincidence that there are 24 bottles of beer in a case.....). We hit the bike shop and it was pretty dead so things went fairly smoothly besides some initial bad service at the front desk. We finally had our passes, so we headed back to the van to get suited up for our first runs. Now for those if you not familiar with Down Hill mountain biking, you have to wear various body armor to project yourself from the nasty falls that can occur when hitting the trails (I have been referred to as 'Robocop' by some who have seen me in my armor). After getting suited up and making sure the bikes were good to go, we headed for the lift (those butterflies were now in full effect!) - to our disappointment, not all the trails were open, but that didn't deter us as there was still a tonne of fun to had (to be honest, we checked the bike conditions and trail report on my BlackBerry on our way up - haha!). On our way up we decided to hit one of my favorite trails - Big Sleaze - it was a bit of a pedal from the lift to the trail head, but I didn't mind at all considering the great view and amazing weather. We dropped in and everything was like I remembered, the adrenaline started to kick in right away as there is a nice step rock entrance, so after hitting that smoothly, I was ready to rock (no pun intended!).

You can see Colin just about to enter the little rock chute - we both hit this nice and smooth and continued down to the next section of the trail and I see Colin begin to open up a gap on me. I finally loose him, but heading around a corner I see him pulled to the side - he's saying something to me. As I get closer I realize he's saying 'Do you see it, do you see it', and then I see him point - through the tree's I saw pretty big deer staring right back us. Colin had seen the deer come through the bushes, cross the trail, head into some thicker bush were it stopped to turn and stare us down!! What a start to our ride - reminds you of the other reasons that down hill is so fun, the adrenaline is just a big bonus!! After getting back on the trail, and hitting all the sections we loved last year (nice step, rooty sections that really work your suspension - fun times). After hitting a long log skinny at the bottom section of the hill, we quickly came to notice that the bottom section had been changed. We weren't really too pleased with the changes at the bottom as it required quite a bit of pedaling up hill in order to get back to the gondola - previously you would hit the end of the hill and ride a road back to the gondola, but the road is about to be worked on so they diverted the bottom of the trails in this area. The pedaling was a little more than we had bargained for, but we didn't let that minimize the fun any! After heading up the lift again, we decided to hit another trail on the far section of the hill (these were pretty much the only ones open anyway). This time it was Waterfall (named because you can see parts of a waterfall on throughout the trail, and because of some nice steep sections). This was another fun trail which I rode pretty well on, but Colin again ripped it up - tearing the trail a new one! At this point it was about 1pm and we were getting pretty hungry. All the excitement and the physicality of the sport hit us early and we decided it was time to eat - we used to eat in the village, but you have to take out a small loan to enjoy yourself here (not unlike Whistler as well!!). We grabbed some pita's and headed to a local beach nearby so not to tick off the resort staff (and Colin was adamant that this would be the lunch spot for the year). After we arrived at the spot, I knew why Colin was saying this would be the lunch spot. The place was amazing - it was right on the shores of lake Huron in Georgian bay, what a back drop for lunch!

As you can, not a bad spot to sit down and eat lunch and enjoy a can of liquid courage aka beer. After refueling, we were ready to tackle the hill again until closing at 5. The first trail we wanted to hit was called Squeaker and had a pretty gnarly rock entrance to it with some step pitches. I remember skipping the entrance last year and just riding the rest of the trail as I was pretty intimidated by this section. This year we both rolled up to the entrance and went through it like we've hit it a 100 times - was a great feeling (anytime you hit something for the first time, or conquering it after either falling or skipping it is an unbelievable feeling).

So as you can see from these shots, the entrance was not joke:

That's me on the left and Colin on the right.

After hitting this section, it's open trail for a bit where you can pick up some nice speed before hitting some rooty steep sections which are a blast. Here's a couple of shots from one of the sections I just mentioned...

We hit Squeaker and Waterfall pretty much the whole afternoon. It wasn't till our last time up the hill that we brought along the camera - glad we did as we got some decent shots for the first out (plus, it's the FIRST day out!!).

So, after being up since 8, driving 1.5 hours, riding for 6 hours, and driving another 1.5 hours back that you'd be tired right - down but not out, we called Fergie and made plans to hot the Grove on our way back - needless to say we had another great session at the grove, I hit something I've never hit before there (low road to skinny out, pretty difficult line), and Colin redeemed himself after a nasty bail the night before after exiting high road. Unfortunately Fergie never hit the drop, but I think he's going to soo - we've been razzing him pretty good about it (all in good fun ofcourse), but we know he can do it!!! You all will be the first to know when Fergie gets his wings at the grove - lol!

Once again, Me on the left, Colin on the right.

Here's a couple of pics of Colin finishing off an amazing day of riding (I'm writing this today and am completely drained, never mind sore!!!).

Until next time folks...

Mus-I-C

2008-05-13T16:48:00.004-04:00

Finally getting around to another post – the weather has been decent here, so I’ve been out hitting our spot and riding the beginnings of a new bike park at the local skill hill (Chicopee). But, I’ll be leaving the biking world behind me with this post as I want to get into the world of music. Not sure where to start here, so maybe I’ll start with a bit of history of Techno (Detroit techno) and House and then get into an interesting theory concerning minimal techno (interesting to me at least!).

DETROIT TECHNO

Ok, so Detroit Techno or High-Tech Soul as it is sometimes referred to, started (you guessed it) in Detroit with a man by the name of Juan Atkins (aka Cybotron, Model 500, Infiniti). The first track that started the whole thing was “Clear”, a track recorded with Rick Davis under the Cybotron moniker – this has been widely recognized as the first foray into fusing the extra-terrestrial funk of Parliament Funkadelic with the futurist visions of Kraftwerk – so Detroit High-Tech Soul was born.

Detroit at one time was a booming mecca of the US based on the car industry, which thrived there until racial tension reached a head in 1943, and a racial riot broke out. This was due to racial inequality directed at the Black Community. After the riots, Detroit began a slow downward spiral in terms of prosperity and racial integration. The city has suffered through some tough times, but people are slowly changing things for the better. The people of Detroit are strong willed people, if anyone can effect change, it's the people!

Detroit always had a very rich history of musical talent, Motown is one powerful example of this. The arts, music in particuclar, became an outlet for many people during these tense and tough times. This helped to foster the forward thinking artists of yesterday and today as they used art as a means to escape the desolation which was happening around them. Enter Detroit Techno. I’ve heard Techno be referred to as an escape from hardships of Detroit, because when you listen to techno, it truly does take you to another place. Just take for instance the first track considered to be Detroit Techno – Clear – which was recorded by Cybotron, CBYOTRON!! For those of you not down with transformers, Cybotron is the home world of the transformers. Think about that for a second… cybotron, a high-tech world based on robots and electronics (Kraftwerk) – what a better way to take yourself away from an unhealthy environment while taking advantage of the merging world of technology and music?! So Detroit Techno was born. You can see a parallel to what I have talked about above when looking at “the first wave” (Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson, Derrick May) of Detroit Techno Artists – a tendency to make music with a jazzy sense but with a high tech soul - that took you somewhere/someplace else. Detroit also has its fair share of house music producers who could stand up to anyone (Moodyman being the first to come to mind). Now I have to mention that Juan Atkins wasn’t really the only pioneer in this area. While he was growing up, him and his friends used to listen to a radio show by The Electrifying Mojo, and this ended up being their outlet for their music. The Belleville Three – Juan Atkins, Kevin Saunderson & Derrick May found The Electrifying Mojo playing some of their tracks which they were making at the time. Derrick May started Transmat and Kevin Saunderson started KMS and Juan Atkins started Metroplex recordings (check out their discography for a what’s what of early techno). I could go on about the early days for a while, but I think this will do for now (I’ll talk about the history of parties or Raves – I really hate that word – later).

HOUSE

House music. The story of house changes slightly depending on who you talk to. The widely held notion that house was invented in Chicago is pretty well on point. Chicago had a club scene in the early 80’s – after the national attack on Disco, people who still wanted to get together and dance had to look hard for places in order to fulfill this need. There were a few pioneering promoters who started nights at various locations throughout Chicago and one very important club in NY. There were a few staple DJ’s who controlled those events (Larry Levan, Frankie Knuckles, Ron Hardy, Farley Jack Master Funk come to mind). Also to note here though is the Paradise Garage in NY which was another seminal establishment notorious for breaking down the barriers of race and sexuality, abandoning the segregation policies that were the norm for clubs at that time (Mr Larry Levan was the man behind the Paradise Garage). SO here you see the early beginnings of the scene and what it was originally about – getting people together from all backgrounds to listen and dance to this new type of music. Now the name. Big in this scene was a club called The Warehouse, this is where most of the events were held and is widely recognized as THE club in Chicago for this new sound. So, with this new explosion of music and events, DJ’s started to go to record stores to seek out certain types of records which they felt could be used effectively - so people came into record stores asking for tracks that were played at one of the warehouse parties or for stuff they though could be played at warehouse parties. Since most of the activity was at the club called The Warehouse, eventually they shortened Warehouse to just house, so DJ’s came in looking for House records. House was born. This was when Jack came out to play. Jack was basically a type of dance that was on display at these events and was eventually one of the things that house became known for… more on Jack later.

I’m sure I have missed parts of the history of both genre’s, so if you are looking for more info beginnings of techno click here . If you are looking for more info on the early days of house, click here. There is still a tonne to talk about concerning the history, but this give you a little taste of where the music I love comes from and how it evolved. I haven't even begun to talk about the TB-303 or the 909!! I’ll get into other aspects of the music and scene at a later date, but I think this is a good start.

TONE SHIFTING

So, last but not least I want to talk about that theory I mentioned wayyy back when! Tone Shifting. Now, I don’t think this is an accepted scientific theory as of yet, I actually read this on the 313techno mailing list several years ago, and it really struck home with me, so I figured I’d share! Silence plays as big a role if not bigger in terms of how you hear what is being played (I’m specifically talking about minimal dance music in clubs). By this I mean your brain interprets the silence between sounds in a unique way in that it bridges the heard sounds over the silence (pretty much your brain fills in the blanks). You may be thinking, “what the hell is he talking about, go smoke another one”, but if you think about it, it makes sense. Your brain is used to processing sounds at all times, this is instinctual – so your brain is used to hearing sounds throughout music. When the brain finds “space” between sounds it wants to fill the gap – this results in every listener having a unique experience. Now when I say unique experience, I don’t mean the song being played is being heard completely differently than the next person, the heard elements are the same for everyone. What is great here is your interacting with the music in a very unique way, experiencing it slightly different than the next person – makes the whole experience very personal. Now, for those of you that have not been to a club/party where minimal was on the menu, you may think I’m crazy (well that’s debatable!), but I have experienced this myself, so that’s why this rings true with me. I’ve consciously (as well as unconsciously) found myself either filling in gaps with words or other sounds – and makes for a very unique experience. There were times where I could hear lines from other songs or sounds that weren’t there which gave the song a different meaning or feel than when I would listen at home or in a different context. Anyways, without sounding like a complete nut, I thought I would throw that out there for you to digest. Maybe next time you’re in a club or situation where minimal is being played, take a quick second to try and “listen” to the silence, I think you’ll be surprised at what you hear!

Until next time….

Where to start?

2008-05-10T21:18:00.023-04:00

So many things to talk about, where to start?! Since the title of the blog is a little obscure to say the least, I think it's best to start with something associated with a 'Samsquanch'!

As you may have already discovered, a 'Samsquanch' is a creature that is something like a Sasquatch, except it targets back woods bike trails (particularly Shore trails built of wood) and is a little more friendly from what I've been told . My friends and I have been building our own trail in a sneaky spot just outside of town. Coincidentally, we have built a shore trail, which we have dubbed 'The Grove'. We're lucky we haven't run into one at our spot.... yet....

That's me on the left (and above left), and Fergie up above (and above left). Colin is by far the best rider of our group, and we have some killer shots of him which I'll share later.

That gives you a good taste of what we have built already. Not bad considering 3 guys pretty much built the whole thing! The shot on the left was taken last year after we had just finished the section you see in the picture, along with a drop and a natural log ride. It's kind of a funny story how we started the spot - Colin scoped the spot (great find!), and he told me about it. We decided the first thing we had to build was a drop, so we went ahead and built a 6-8 foot drop between a couple of trees (picture later). After building the drop we didn't really go back to that spot until we took a new friend to see it (he was from England and we both had an interest in mountain biking, specifically Shore).

I should stop right there and explain what Shore is for those of you who don't know what I'm talking about. Shore is short for 'North Shore', which refers to the North Shore of Vancouver, where people built wooden 'bridges' and 'skinnies' in order to create a trail through the forests of the North Shore (to avoid natural obstacles). This soon progressed to where people where building wooden stunts through the downhill trails where everything was in the context of being in the flow of the trail. British Columbia, and the North Shore in particular is widely recognized as being the mountain bike mecca of the world (specifically Whistler). So the world started to recognize the skill and thrill of building and riding these trails, and the sport has been growing ever since!

So, back to the story! Danny was over from England and we went on a couple of rides with him at the local ski hill (which is decent), and we started talking about shore. Colin mentioned that we started building our own trail, so we took Danny out to the spot to show him. At this point we started talking about all the various lines that were possible on our little claimed spot of land! And we finally started building again - and then we brought in out other friend, Fergie, to help out. We ended up working for about 2 months straight to partially finish it and make it ridable - and we had to endure some crazy attacks from mozzies (mosquitoes). They were bad out there as it was pretty much swamp land, but we started to pack it down pretty good with all the work we were doing. We also had some help from another friend named Dave, he pretty much single handedly finished the landing to our drop - props for the hard work Dave!!

The first thing we had to do, of course, was the drop. It was scary enough, not too big, but standing on the wooden platform and looking at the landing was pretty scary - mostly all mental, but it was a sniper landing and run out (to make it that much more scary!). I was just coming back from breaking my right collar bone (more on that later maybe), so we affectionately named the drop 'Collar Bone' after my injury - and naturally I wanted to hit it first! So, I went first. I have been biking for almost 3 years now, and must say that I have taken my fair share of licks in order to learn the sport (maybe some stories on that another day!). So you guessed it, I bailed - I landed the drop fine, but got sketchy on the landing and had a hard time hitting the wooden run out. Luckily for me, I was decked out in some robocop like armor which helped keep me in one piece. I tried 2 more times and failed - bruised but not broken we walked away to try it again another day. In comes the helmet cam! We like to take as much footage as possible of ourselves riding (photo's along with film), so we decided it was a good idea to add a helmet cam to the arsenal - sounds like a good idea right?! Well we had our first session with the helmet cam out at the grove (which you can see parts of here, along with other various biking vids from our group), and on the last run that I was wearing the helmet cam, I followed Colin off the drop and, yip you guessed it, bailed again. Colin was nice enough to leave that footage out of the clip I mentioned earlier, but I ended up with a nice cut on my chin. Now the drop was in my head, and I didn't want anything to do with it. After this bail, we collectively decided to change the drop slightly - it was angled up a bit much and would kick your back tire, so we made it more of a down slope. The whole summer I pretty much avoided it (I learned how to hit a step up/step down which I now think is more difficult), but ended up giving it a go after many attempts to talk me into it! I ended up hitting it no problem this time (a summer of riding downhill did a number for my confidence and riding skills), and continue to hit it no problem - definitely the funnest thing at 'The Grove'.

That's me on the left hitting the drop, and Fergie on the right getting stoked!

So, if it wasn't for a chance meeting with a guy from England, through work (a friend at work connected us because he knew we were both into mountain biking), the chances of us doing what we did, I believe, were small. We probably would've had some stuff out there, but not to the extent of what we have now. Some people have referred to it as Ewok Village, but we just call it our personal play ground!

That's probably way too much for right now, but I'll be back again. Next time I'll probably talk about my other passion, music, electronic music in particular. The Symbolic Studios side of the equation.....