The hihats have been taken out, and I’ve sorted out a few niggles here and there (mainly with EQing). I originally held back on mastering this until the Studer A80 was fixed (ended up being a massive job as the power board was fudged, so had Clive Kavan give it a proper service).

Really gone to town on this one – after mixdown the chain was as follows:

1. Avalon 747, with TSP on… works well on here as it smooths out the highs.
2. Studer A80, 15ips, RMGi 900 tape… few niggles with this as the tape was already starting to shed (1 year old), but it was the only thing to hand, and I managed to find a clean run. Quantegy where art thou?!
3. Waves X-Noise… see above.
4. UAD Manley EQ… nice stuff, tested the demo for this, and its pretty cool for sorting a few problem areas. Tailed off some high freq’s, and reduced high-mids slightly.
5. UAD Fatso Senior… just used the transformer preset to beef things up, although I set the saturation much lower, as it was messing with the bass.
6. UAD Multiband… not much to do on this one, but compressed a few bands, and expanded the lower/kick for more punch.
7. UAD Maximizer… final chain, again just in demo mode, but I love it so far. L2 seemed flatter when I tried it.

Well thats it! As usual, I would appreciate any feedback (profesisonal or otherwise) on this. To my ears it seems okay, although as a song its pretty busy. This is going to be used for a Kickstarter project we’re going to set up, as Milly (singer) and I are looking to sort out an album, but really need funding to do it seriously.

Infernal Machine by Obscuresounds

Mike’s mix on the original track for the SOS article has been invaluable both in terms of opening my own eyes and showing what can creatively be done with the right tools. Its amazing what can be learnt with a bit of encouragement.

Please note the following things:

1. hissing – yup, aware of it, I’ll gate the instrument track thats causing this and re-upload at some point.

2. levels – I’ve held back on limiting too much in the master chain, but I don’t think it detracts from the feel.

3. energy – controversial, but I ended up changing the drums entierly, and bloomed one of the guitars (actually a SQ Pro-1 through an amp) to create a softer sound. Dynamics should still be there. I’ll explain more on this below.

4. kick/bass levels – think the kick might be too loud or EQ’ed a bit too extremely, although I need to listen with subs to check this.

So whats changed?

This version is based on multitracks that Mike sent me after the article, so I created a few additions and changed a few elements.

Drums:
Drum wise, I opted for a more jazz/soft rock style kit mainly to get a snappier sound, which I think may cause some contention depending on whether you like/dislike heavier stuff, but I don’t think it detracts from the song itself. Using Mike’s input I ended up placing the overheads through a UAD LA2A to give a wide open effect… works really nicely on the ride and crash cymbals.

Bass:
In the original the bass was based on an Commodore Amiga PCM which I then resequenced in Ableton Live, but it ended up causing too much digital rubish to seep through, so I decided to use the SQ Pro-1 with LFO controlled pulse-width modulation – its something you don’t really hear much today, but it sound nice to my ears.

More Bass:
At the very end you might notice a 1/8 bass hit… this is a Clavinet D6 going through a Marshal Bass amp. Just wanted things to bounce along more.

Vocal:
Obviously this is the most controversial element. The original track was praised for having a characterful style with my voice processed to sound like a fake female singer. I thought about this for a long time, but the sad truth is that I’m not a good singer (hence disguising my voice), so ultimately from a performance level I would prefer to team with other people if it means making something I feel to be a better sound. The new vocal is going through some pretty hefty equipment – Neumann M149 and x2 U87 (for grabbing room footprint) which then heads in to a UAD 1176. Also did a separate send which goes in to an EMT 250 with an LA2A on a slow attack/release which makes it sit nicely (learnt this by listening to a Radiohead track which used a similar effect).

Guitar:
The original has more energy, but because of the new vocal take, and drum change I felt that this needed to change as well. Before it was a sequence from the Pro-1, however I’ve opted to do it on a guitar and the bloomed it to give a nice wash.

Vocoder:
Roland SVC-350… yummy!

Enjoy! Loved all of the feedback from creating this track. Next step, this is hopefully going off to get mastered as I don’t trust my studio for that side of things. Want this on radio if its good enough so will probably pigeon hole it.

Infernal Machine by Obscuresounds

Its funny how much music can get you going. I started this project with one notion in my mind – that I wanted to sing/write about people living in the city. On top of this, I wanted to convey the notion of deep seated human insecurity, and how we shy away from it. I mean put it this way, we’re all here in a materialistic world where its ‘cool’ to own the latest gadgets as that makes us feel happy, but ultimately its something that will be cast away in an empty cupboard years later. In essence its like poor mans gold – the idea that owning a large quantity of chains, bracelets, medallions and other gold paraphernalia in the style of Mr T will somehow make you feel rich and important. But it doesn’t. You are only you, and its your mind that really matters.

So this track is essentially about living in the city, and all of the insecurities behind it where people constantly dream of a happier life, but never quite reach it. Instead we’re hiding behind fake smiles and saying its all okay, generally following the crowd like ‘sheep to the slaughter’. Deep, probably a case of drinking to much whiskey. The general influence of this track is as follows: Air, Massive Attack, Ladyhawke, Bat For Lashes, Beck, Radiohead.

This track uses a bit of everything from pianos to vibraphones, and typical band instruments, all played by me. Synthesizer wise I’m pretty happy with how this has turned out – I think its reached the happy medium of an 80′s sound, but with contemporary ideas.

At the very beginning I have a Sequential Circuits Prophet-5 playing away (going through a guitar amp to cut through the mix), this is followed up by piano and bass.

The vocal is actually my own voice pitched up to sound ‘female’. The idea being that at some point I’ll be able to find a professional female singer who will want to replace it – I’m not a singer, and I don’t want to try, but this method at least gives me a way of conveying what’s in my imagination.

The fun bit starts at 1:01 where I have a Korg MS-20 blasting away with filter overdrive, alongside the Octave CAT that takes over the bass to do a funkier bass-line with glide. At 1:24 the music goes slightly up tempo and this is where I use the Ensoniq ESQ-1 doing the upward 1/8 (or 1/4) ARP and choir sound at the ‘ghostly apparition’ – I also overlaid the ARP sound with (believe it or not), a Clavinet D6 which smoothed it out with some slight detuning and timing changes.

Some of you might be interested to know that I recently acquired a Publison DHM 89 B2, a rare digital delay that’s great for quirky stuff, and I use it on both the vocals and some of the instruments to give a dirtier sound. During the middle of the track (1:49) I then have the vibraphone and Octave CAT working away alongside my own voice humming for that haunted feel. The filters on the Octave CAT open up as the beat kicks in.

The final chorus (2:48) then utilises a dirty bass patch on the ESQ-1 with a combination of square and detuned saw waveforms to give a steel-drum effect which works really well.

Hope you all enjoy it, and welcome any feedback good or bad.

On Phoenix

So here’s my own take on Phoenix’s 1901. I wanted to see if it was possible to create something a bit more bouncy mixing 60′s drums, with 70′s funk, 80′s synth, and 90′s guitar. My general influences are drawn from Beck, Feist, Ladyhawke, Chemical Brothers, Portishead, Passion Pit, and Air.

So there’s pianos, glocks, drums, and an 8-bit funk guitar. Building up to the chorus section with the ARP 2600 blipping away, and some retro computer sounds. I added on their Yamaha CS-80 (siren) sound with the Octave CAT… which has a similar edginess to it that adds a little extra sparkle (modulating the pulse-width and mixing in the waveforms manually).

The voice is a big chunk of the track… but one thing I wanted to do was add in a Queen effect where the vocals go through a Roland vocoder with slight distortion to harmonise the main vocal track. This only happens briefly twice, but really makes a difference. The process isn’t pretty – I have Thomas’s voice converted to midi which controls an ESQ-1, which is then fed in to the vocoder, and the results are sent back in to the computer. I also wanted to add a bit of Dimension-D chorus on the whole vocal track, but never got around to it.

If I had time I would have made a few more changes. Enjoy and feel free to share this around… I’ve sent this off to Phoenix’s label so hopefully something will come of it (permission more than anything), but there are so many remixes out there that I’m releasing this to try and reach out to a larger audience and showcase my own production skills, which considering I’m a one-man show in a self-built studio I reckon is a good thing! You’ll be hearing more from me in the near future.

Enjoy!

Download the Track

Lovers Hangover (Featuring Diana Ross, Breakbot, Data)

Breakbot… you’ve gotta love his style. The sound brings me right back to the trackers days on the Amiga machines. The way you could cut up sounds in such a rigid fashion really gave a certain sound that was pretty cool. Now with modern sequencer technology its far easier to get filthy with samples.

I heard Breakbots remix of a Data track, and thought it would be cool to mix in a Diana Ross track to it – Love Hangover had a great piano sample at the beginning which has been used loads of times by other artists, including an old favourite of mine Pepe Deluxe with their track Beat Experience. That track got me started on this.

If I have time I might be able to take this back in to the studio and process the vocals a bit… as they’re pretty dry at the moment. Maybe placing them through some tape echo.

Download the Track

At Night (featuring Lily Allen, Lady Gaga, Justin Timberlake, Dizzee Rascal, Black Eyed Peas, Kid Cudi, Daft Punk, Rihanna)

This is an experiment I’ve long wanted to put together… I love the idea of having at least 10 famous bands or pop stars working together. This wouldnt really be possible in real life, but sampling does give us the closest way of seeing how different styles work together.

For this track, I basically took each UK/US pop hit from the charts over late 2008/2009 and merged some other sounds I had at hand… I think it sounds okay, although I may need to do some re-levelling of the vocals. The instrumental is from Lily Allen’s “The Fear”.

Apologies for the average quality video. Unfortunately I have not had the time to source the original HD clips and as such I have stuck with pre-streamed material.

This track was created to pay homage to the 60′s band Tomorrow. Weirdly the band never made much commercial success, but they were critically acclaimed within the scene. These guys were recording at exactly the same time when The Beatles were recording in Abbey Road Studios.

The original track (Ten Thousand Words in a Cardboard Box) was released under both Aquarian Age & Tomorrow, but band member Twink went on to adapt his own version in 1970. It seems appropriate to mix them all together and do my own personal take on it. This is more of an engineering test than anything else, with a mixture of obscure samples, and additional production from the studio. Totally re-layered the drums, tambs etc. added some more organs. I also recorded some improvised MS-20 sounds with the white noise and lfo towards the end. As usual, loads of other sampled sounds in there which all add to the picture.

Drumming was a bit of a hassle, as I had two low quality drum mixes to sync… that’s why I had to add my own layer to blend it all together. Still some hi hat issues though, but the ‘vibe’ is there.

I properly mastered this through the Avalon mastering EQ & compressor. – still some timing issues I’ve gotta correct, but I’m happy with the levels and how it all sits.

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Official album track number 4 has been complete, and I’ve decided to change direction a little – up to this point my material has been focusing on fairly upbeat styles that would quite happily cater for indie bars. Whilst this may be fine for that particular market, from an albums perspective you would want to change the tempo slightly to relax the listener at various points (much like how an artist in a concert would follow a fast-paced song with a relaxing one). I’ve always enjoyed the idea of writing an album as though it was an unfolding story, where each song is part of a collective that makes up a whole feature.

Lady Love is a mash-up based on a song by Richard Swift (Lady Luck), a track I originally heard whilst browsing through various Blogs. His style is the old-school sound of soul, which from a production level is great. My take on the track was to mix sweet with sour – so whilst the lyrics are what you would expect, I wanted to interject a sense of joy in to the track… however during the mid-section and final chorus you will find that sour starts to creep in, so by the end the song fades out under the distorted echoes of tape… as though the tape has ran out, and all is too late. The Solina String Ensemble (retro organ), and Ensoniq ESQ1 (80’s digital synth) play a part in the production, alongside lots of outboard gear.

Challenges faced in this release will be clearing and setting up royalties with the respective parties – The song also contains 8 other samples from various bands, including Radiohead’s song Videotape. Clearing 1 sample may just work, but clearing up to 9 bands ranging from 1966 to 2008 is a logistical nightmare. So for now this is a production release. As with all of my tracks, if there are any disputes with associated publishing companies, then please contact Obscuresounds and I will take this track off immediately. Until that time though, enjoy!