The music we make

There's already a thread for showing off our instruments, so why not one for the music we make with them too? This could be a nice place to get some constructive criticism of one's work, be it live/at home recordings, songs or covers. I bet there are many of us doing this. I'll go first!

This is a melodic and rocking tune by my one-man-band - with a new music video.


I recorded the drums at our rehearsal space using a single Zoom H2 recorder in front of the set (a cool piece of gear, btw). The guitars were recorded micing my 2x12 cab at home. Bass was simply plugged into the line-in of my soundcard and using Logic's bass amps. Mixing was done in Logic. HD600 was my monitoring hp for late night mixes. (I could tell more about the gear used, if there's interest...)

(There might just be a thread somewhere for this already, sorry for the unnecessary thread if so. I think this one applies to the mentioned "musical accomplishments".)

 

Here's a little batch of synthy tunes I turned out a few years back under my nom de clavier "Unity Gain Temple".
Done on the computer with a sprinkling of external hardware.

Unity Gain Temple Meets The Nog Goblin Inna Flotation Tank

 

Man, I enjoyed that THOROUGHLY! Great work....whisked away for a short while. I like the way you think...

 

Here is a recent recording I made. Have more coming along the way but thought would share one at a time. I also have the wav file in case anyone wants to add it to their collection. I'm the cellist.

 

Very, very cool playing @Cellist88 . Cello is pretty much my favorite classical instrument. And yeah, I bet it takes a bit more practice to get that kind of vibrato etc. compared to banging on an electric guitar The room is heard nicely here.

 

Thank you!

Second piece....Beethoven variations for cello.

 

Ok, here's one more. Maybe the one tune of mine I'm most satisfied with.

The song
I came up with the basic ideas on my guitar when I first dabbled in open-D tuning (DADF#AD). It allows some cool ways to add melodies and extra flair to basic riffs. While I usually "compose" my songs for two basic rhythm tracks (L & R) and a possible lead track, it's lots of fun to play the riffs and melody on one guitar... (This is the basic reason I admire Hendrix so much - using the thumb in standard tuning on the low string helps too!) Trying different tunings can really get one "out of the box" and force you to play differently. I recommend this to all guitarists!



Gear and recording
Just like the previous one, I played drums, guitars, bass, djembe and some keyboards on it. The drumset was recorded with three mics (overhead, kick and snare) to keep mixing simple. Guitars were recorded at home mostly using my Tokai Tele and Les Paul Studio through a Suhr Badger 18 amp & Orange PPC212 cabinet. Mixing / mastering was done in Logic 8. Btw, I like to use DT770 80ohm's for headphone monitoring during playback. They are easy to put on and isolate nicely.

The amp, cab & mic setup. The Sennheiser E906 mic goes into my Apogee Duet. The Rockerverb was used on lead guitars...


It's nice to see others chiming in with music as well, keep it up!

 

I guess since you're all here, why not collaborate on a song or two. I've done it in the past. Even come up with a band name (sbaf collaboration sounds too mainstream.)

 

Recorded this one take of Bach Cello suite #1 Prelude on my fretless bass for a school project. Made a few mistakes (bass is so much longer than cello) and at the end my amp cut out due to bad cable, and was recorded with my miniDSP Umik-1 because that was the only mic I had with a long enough cable to reach my amp, but alas, here it is:

 

Spwath we need it FASTER! LOL

Just dicking around at night today....guessing some notes for salut d'amor. Not really 100% correct but too lazy and don't care enough to print the notes. Enjoy

 

I'm mixing an album now that I recorded with my band in the fall. Pretty satisfied with this mix, but it is not yet mastered, comments welcome. (I'm on bass and backing vocals)
https://soundcloud.com/pingpongcomputer-1/new-york

 

Just finished another mix, I'll stop posting if it gets annoying, but I'd be happy to have mix comments from fellow audio interested peoples.
https://soundcloud.com/pingpongcomputer-1/lady-bird

 

My High School orchestra playing Intermezzo from Cavalira Rusticana
http://www.fairport.org/files/filesystem/Intermezzo from Cavalleria Rusticana.mp3
Right now we are playing Beethoven Symphony Nr 9. Concert in a few days. Will post that recording as well.

 

These are pretty old now, but here's a sample of a couple of the bands I was in while in the jazz program at UNT:

• The Jazz Repertory Ensemble playing Duke Ellington's Ko-Ko
• Latin Jazz Ensemble play Poncho Sanchez's Typhoon

The Repertory ensemble has a different focus each semester. The three semesters I was in that band, we did early swing in the first semester, then an entire semester of Stan Kenton, and the last was a full semester of Charles Mingus big band music. The latin jazz band was just starting when I got to school, but they've now put out 3 cds I think. This cut was from the first.

Anyway, I finally got my library copied off the backup I'd given to my dad, so I was going through some of this today and thought I'd share.

 

Thanks for sharing! It's cool to hear what people are doing in this thread. Here's a couple covers on the keyboard of songs I've always liked.

 

I'm teaching myself organ, playing for pleasure, not for audiences. So why post it here? Well, I do have a sadistic side.....

Here's me having some fun messing around with a Bach Toccata.

Edit: I think you will need to un-mute this clip to hear it.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=375095542921497

 

I recently wrote a jazz ballad tune. Might do an arrangement for the local stage band at some point in time.

You'll have to un-mute this one as well.

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=364888267275558

Edit: Couldn't embed it, so you'll need to follow the link to Facebook. Please let me know if it doesn't work.

Mods - Doesn't appear to be working, so I'll delete this post.

Further Edit - Oh. I can't delete anymore. Not to worry.

 

About a decade ago, I was heavily into Drum & Bass production. Had a couple releases with a mate.

https://soundcloud.com/whizz/sets/dnb-releases

Some were released on vinyl, other only digital/CD.

More recently been dabbling on and off with house/techno productions. Just for my own enjoyment. Don't mind the mix/mastering in these. I've been moving around a lot in recent years so never had a solid monitor speaker setup.

https://soundcloud.com/whizz/sets/mex

EDIT: instruments... all virtual the DnB stuff was done in Cubase SX at the time. I use Logic now.

 

@Zed Bopp @Garns @Cellist88 @spwath @bobboxbody @Daveheart @AdvanTech @TomHP

Way to go, all of you! Congratulations for moving beyond the consumption of music and onto creation and all aspects of the craft that this involves. I'd encourage all and sundry to post their efforts here, not for a post-mortem, but for mutual enjoyment and encouragement. We are all at different points along the road.

 

One of my friends convinced me to make a bandcamp page for some new-age/ambient music I've been making for relaxation.
https://juuts.bandcamp.com/