Rabbit Dreams and Mountains (Snippet)

Pssst, here's what I'm working on at the moment:

Rabbit Dreams and Mountains

Moodswings

Remember I said in my last post I had 3-5 tracks in various stages?

Soooooo, for a while now I'm stuck on a certain track in the Thing-making-process... There's definitely a problem with it on one listen, but then on the other it sounds almost perfect.

Well, then it hit me: MOODS, BABY. IT'S A TRACK TO BE LISTENED IN THE RIGHT MOOD.

Today, I was listening to this track, gearing up to work on the echoes I had found so annoying previously. I was pretty much splayed out on the least ergonomic computer setting possible, my wrists aching slightly and my feet cold. I was also shoving copious amounts of untoasted bread and aloo methi into my mouth. I was so relaxed. Man, I could feel the relaxy-waves touching my feet as I stretched out more comfortably. Or it was just the draft of cold air from under the bedroom door. And I hit play. 

The track sounded (almost) perfect. A little tweaking here and there needed, but quite good. Even the echoes sounded just right, wedging themselves into my ears easily, spilling over each other. 

So I guess, the moral of this fable purpose of this blog post is: Don't talk to strangers. Especially those in not the right mood. 

The alignment will be justified!

Wasting, Working, Playing

Let me tell ya, it's so hard to found that instrument sound you are looking for. Knowing virtually nothing about the whole 'plugins' and complicated dials/buttons on them means I can't really do much tweaking. I mean, only now am I starting to learn what fancy words like "reverb" and "sustain" mean. I think. I couldn't explain to anyone what my understanding of them is. It also means, my sound-making process is full of frustration. I absolutely hate it when one tune I play sounds like exactly something I've done before. I guess this is normal, but I can't make my fingers play what I want them to play. And so instead of that beautiful sweeping violin/harp/anystringinstrument sound (is this correct????) I'm aiming for I get an irregular plink-plink arrangement and some noise pasted into the background. *cringe*

I'd love to know how other people started on music. Not people who've been playing instruments for years or are in a band, but losers like me who essentially know squat about playing instruments and reading music. I suppose the wisest thing would be to learn an instrument, but it is not an option at the moment. 

All my failures aside, here are a few quick updates:

- I got a new laptop, to be shared with my siblings.

- I'm playing a lot of Criminal Case on Facebook these days.

- I'm not really busy with my thesis at the moment, so worked on a track or two.

- I'm experimenting with new sounds and instruments... some erhu, some flute, some creepy choir stuff...

- I would say I have at least 3- 5 tracks stuck at various stages to be included in the album-project-thing.

- My headphones are not helping with the aforementioned task. I need new ones.

- I lied. I really should be writing my thesis.

- I hate putting off writing my thesis, but I've got no motivation to work on it.

And the most important part of all... I've got a title for this project, code-named The Thing. I came upon it months and months ago. Still wondering if it is too corny. I guess I'll see how the The Thing sounds like in the end before naming it.

And yeah, I'll probably post a review 'soon'. I'm very obsessed with the soundtrack of The Legend of Korra these days. I will review Pakistani music too probably, but I need time to recover my music collection. More than 10GB of assorted tracks, all selected and organized so carefully by yours truly, gone with the stolen laptop. Needless to say, it still hurts to think about it. Sounds stupid I guess, but it was the first time something so important to me got stolen. I'll try to keep the whining to a minimum.

On a brighter note, 2014 is close-ish! Too early to think of any resolutions. I know working on my thesis should be one of them though. Naaaaaaa, I'd prefer not to think about that at all.

Hope everyone has a swell week,

spirare.

 

Track Discussion: Dreaming

Well, this track is a more recent sort of thing. At first I intended to discuss tracks in order of their making, but I am a bit excited about this one, even though it was posted on soundcloud four months ago. 

I tend to name tracks as soon as I create the first layer of instrumentals. Being a beginner with limited knowledge (and with no desire to accumulate more, it seems unfortunately) I have a rather crude way of making music. Or at least that is how I feel, since I have no idea how other people do it. I don't play any instruments or own any kind of music equipment for now - unless cheap headphones count as such. So for this little gem, I used Majken's Chimera plug-in. Then this is how it all went: Load it on some vst plug-in host, baang on the (computer) keyboard. Sounds  good. Sounds dreamy, kinda like those foggy moments when you are hovering between sleep and wakefulness. Hey, let's call it "Dreaming"! This layer, will be the backbone of the whole track. And now it needs some strings. Mess around with those indecipherable dials. Fine-tune till it gets that gritty buttery cello sound. Bang bang baanng on the keyboard. Lay it thick beneath the dreamy sounds. Now for a sprinkling of tinkling sounds/ weird noises! And done dun dun. 

For this track "the process" went real smooth. It took all of 15 minutes to think up a rambling sort of melody and end up with a drastically different piece of music. I was really happy with the "strings" and how good they sounded. To me, at least. Yes, I do listen to my own music for pleasure. If it is something I want to hear again and again, then I post it on Soundcloud.

Like always I make a track first and then think of how it feels. This one, I imagined was something I'd like to listen to as I fall asleep. It's not meant to be warm or happy, just this gentle stream of bubbles that give off lost and wistful and nostalgic vibes, while at the same time slipping into a kind of unconsciousness. This track, as well as "Evening" are like two different shades of the same face. I plan to include them in the "album" - man does that word feel phony when I say it - next to each other. In my mind, "evening" will probably be followed by "dreaming". They are somehow linked to each other, two little yellow peas in a green pod. My favourite ones out of all the music I've ever made. 

Of halts and songs stuck in my head

Ya, ya novaya model...

I am somehow in love with this song by the now split-up Russian duo t.A.T.u. 

I felt this was an extremely important declaration to make. 

Now that I have put that aside, here's the problem: my lovely Jupiter, the Dell n4050 bestowed upon me by Shahbaz Sharif got stolen. The machine upon which all my music took form. The machine I probably might never see again. Ever.

*excuse me while I go shed a few tears*

However, since I was in the process of setting up a new operating system on it, all my music and software had been shifted to another computer. I am lucky that most of my data was backed up, but this is still a huge loss to me since all my work (music, college presentations, downloading torrents, etc) was done using Jupiter. It's definitely brought my glacial pace of putting together an album to a halt and left me kinda uninspired to do any more work. Until that laptop can be retrieved or I get a new one, my music making will move very very slowly. I've got a couple of half-baked tracks that I initially wanted to post on soundcloud, but they were...well, half-baked. A little more grime and polish is needed before they end up anywhere.

In the meantime, I have decided to listen to more Pakistani music and expand my horizons. Maybe even do a few reviews, if possible. And all those track discussions.... 
Well, stay tuned for more rambling from me.


(And if anyone finds a cherry red dell inspiron n4050 in Lahore -with Crunchbang installed on it - in the hands of someone you feel is not the original owner, I'd love to know.)

Plotting

These days I have a little idea that has been swimming around in my lazy little brain. I've been itching to go through the music-related trash in my HD and release an "album" of sorts.... That sounds like a challenge for me. :D
Let the work begin!!!

Track discussion 1: Under the Voices

I thought that, just for fun, I could take make a blog post each week about each track of mine and wax enthusiastic about how I made it, if something inspired it and how it was named.

(Truth be old, most tracks are named randomly.)

For today, it's Under the Voices - the first track that I made that seemed "ambient". To me at least.

I was a raw beginner at that point (now I'm just a beginner, I guess!), and I downloaded a bunch of software and cluelessly played with it. The ending was what bugged me the most. I wanted it to sound gritty and give a sort of ... 'foreshadowing' vibe. The end result sounds pretty simple, but I remember getting frustrated about everything not falling in place. It was more of an experiment than a real instrumental piece.

I would say that this track was most probably inspired by "All Is Full of Love" by Bjork - the Homogenic album version. More specifically, the instrumental beginning, and the scatterings of harp (played by Zeena Parkins).  

I guess Under the Voices is a pretty quiet and light track. It's still incomplete and needs a bit more work before it reaches its final state, but for the moment I've shunted it aside till I get more ideas.


Next week: Plain Winds!




 

Membranes

Yup, a short little somewhat creepy track. I have plans to smooth out its rough edges and extend it, but for now this is it!!

Membranes

 My favourite part of making this track was playing the virtual cello pizzicato notes and arranging them as a background to the harp-ish plucking melody. Experimenting is fun! :)

The Big Bang

Whenever I work on any project, it appears to me as if I have not actually plotted it out, begun at a beginning, but plunged straight into it and trudged along and suddenly found myself somewhere in the middle, unsure of what direction I was going towards, or whether even if I had one. 

But this time, even though I still don't know where I started from with these sounds/music I make, I have given this direction a name.

Spirare.

I have a pretty good feeling about it.