The Shamblemaths CD showed up in January. I’m looking forward to spinning this one.

I’m always nervous about listening to new music because I have this horrible feeling I’ll hear something I really like and then be creatively stuck in the sense of “writing music in the style of..” if I’m lucky, and “totally ripping off…” if I’m not.

But usually, the opposite happens. Feed your head with lots of different new stuff, and this can free up your creative juices and break through writer’s block.

I had a good moment in the car the other day, after listening to some Marillion. The iPhone’s handy Voice Recorder app is invaluable for capturing these inspiration moments… hopefully the final result won’t be “rip off”. By the time I actually record it, it will sound different anyway. It always does.

It looks like a whole lot of nothing has been going on here recently, and that is largely true. However, I have been writing a lengthy piece of music in my head which I’m thinking is going to fill out album #2, if I ever get around to, you know, actually recording it. At least it isn’t writer’s block keeping me from the studio. It’s partly work (the day job); and partly waiting for some bits of equipment to arrive (I’m looking at you, VaxMidi).

In other news, as an exercise, I remastered the tracks on the GTR album from 1986 this evening, to boost the bass and cut down on the shrill hi-frequencies.

And, ooh, a revamped Piano-Roll View in the latest SONAR update. Timely.

http://www.cakewalk.com/Support/Knowledge-Base/2016000060

In August I gave in and pre-ordered the Behringer Deepmind 12. I’m really feeling the need for a knobby analog poly again (I still miss the Jupiter-6).

Also, someone ordered our CD. Thanks, whoever you were.

Strymon are really rocking it in the effect pedal department. If I had infinite money… as it is, I’ll have to have a disclaimer to the effect of “no Strymon pedals were used in the making of this album. Unfortunately.”

Here’s an article about mastering audio from September that makes a ton of sense:

Editors Note, August 2020: Alas, the web page is no longer available. I have found an archived copy on the Internet Way-Back Machine:

https://web.archive.org/web/20161225072614/http://jonvilleproduction.com/2016/09/08/actual-mastering/

I’ve saved this in PDF format, just in case.

Things to do when recovering from food poisoning #1: fine tune a Moog Taurus patch on the Mopho SE and re-record that bass track.

I’ll probably use it once, but at $13 it is a no-brainer. Klevgränd produktion PADS VST. If I can just free up some time this weekend, I’ll give it a spin.

https://klevgrand.se/products/pads/

Looks like the DeepMind 12 is shipping to some lucky early adopters. I have one on pre-order but I’m not expecting it to arrive until early next year.

Here I was, getting all inspired n’ stuff, and Radiohead goes and releases another four minute slab of genius. Well done, boys.

SONAR 2016.05 is out, and has a new user interface theme which is pretty nice.

While waiting for the VaxMIDI to show up, I’ve been playing around with FingerFiddle:

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/fingerfiddle/id1057024351

It is pretty damn’ impressive. In fact, I replaced the sampled cello track on “Painting Abstracts” from our first album, to see how it worked.

It shows up at around 2’30” in the remixed version, released digitally as part of Fruit of the Steel Tree 2.0, available on BandCamp:

I will totally be making room for this in future projects. Recommended. Actually, no, I’d rather keep it as a secret weapon.

In other news, at the last meeting of Analog Anonymous, no-one was paying any attention to the speaker… we were all watching this on our phones, over and over:

Bass traps decorated and installed (folded mover blankets).

I brought the Korg M1 out of retirement today. I’ve been looking at an older project, with an eye to remixing it for a commercial marketing video, and I realized that I just had one stereo track called “M1 Mix”. The dark side of the M1 Combi mode… Anyway, the M1 fired up without problems and I quickly created 5 separate tracks for each of the parts. Remixing can now proceed!

April 30
Where did the morning go? All I did was put some new strings on the Telecaster. Now it’s lunchtime.

Interesting fact: The Telecaster is different from other electric guitars because, unlike others, the bridge pickup is “rhythm” and the neck pickup is “lead”.

When the 8-octave version of this arrives in the studio at the end of the month, I’ll have something more to say about it.

The meantime, the Fantom goes into storage… its place on the stand is now occupied by the VK8. An attempt to goose the muse.

I’m guessing the VaxMidi isn’t going to show up this month. Which is O.K. by me because I’m busy… but the studio is all ready for it.