I have a couple of articles published in the January 2008 issue of Electronic Musician Magazine. One article discusses some of the important keyboard commands that make using the new sequencer more efficient. Some important notes about effectively using the ReGroove Mixer, and some cool RPG-8 tricks. The other article is a sound design tutorial that shows some off the features of Combinator 2 and using Thor as a filter device. I’m not sure if these will be available online, but I’ll certainly post a link up if they are made available digitally.
Over the weekend I switched hats to indulge in some serious vintage analog style recording at the Hangar Studios in Sacramento. I’ve been to this facility many times, but this was the first time I’ve had the pleasure of working in the space.
For over a year now, I’ve been helping my friend, Goh Nakamura try to find a recording style that suited his music. Obviously with a strong Beatles influence, the Revolution REDD and RS have been instrumental in achieving the tone Goh wanted for his next album, and after months of experimenting we were ready to finally get this project recorded (to pro tools - but we seriously contemplated the use of tape!)
After months of writing and home recording the base tracks of his new material, Goh and I planned to get his tracks recorded. Goh’s first album Daylight Savings is basically a home recording session of voice and acoustic guitar. The arrangements are very well done, and the unpolished feel adds to the charm of the album. This new project is much different as Goh has been working with other musicians including drummer, Tim Bulkley, Bassist Justin Miller, and pianist Adam Shulman.
Bryce Gonzales engineered our session using a variety mics including some great RCA and Coles ribbon mics. On vocals we used the Wunder Audio CM-7, a U-47 clone, running through the REDD.47 into a RS-124 into a UA 2192 converter. This was the magic signal path! Tim Bulkley had a procured a vintage 1950s Gretch kit with a killer tone, and with the acoustics of the Hanger space, we nailed a great drum sound using a vintage AKG D12 (into a V72) and an AKG D19 running through another Revolution REDD.47 mic pre. We even had to apply some tea towels to balance the levels.
Bryce set up Justin with an old Ampeg flip-top, and employed a prototype of his custom guitar head for Goh’s electric guitar parts. Adam was set up with several keyboards including a Rhodes Eighty-Eight, an old Wurlitzer, and even an Arp Odyssey. The Odyssey was a bit worn down and had some broken sliders (like most arps) but i managed to program a few cool patches on it. I also used some moogerfoogers on the electric pianos which were fed into a fender twin. Adam even worked in a pump organ part on one of the tracks.
On the second day of recording, some of Goh and Tim’s bandmates, Sadie and Han from The Invisible Cities, dropped in an added backing vocals to the tracks. Again we used that CM7 and had Goh and Sadie position themselves at different distances to balance the levels while we tracked them on the same microphone. On a different song we set up a little chorus of five on the mic.
The Hangar is simply a great sounding room, and with the great mics at our disposal we were able to get a sound worthy of the musicial skill of the guys performing. In two days we recorded 9 tracks; however one track was just an impromptu jam session - i punched record while the guys were fooling around and it sounded great. Bryce did a great job with the tracking. We may have spent a little too much time getting mic placements, but mixing this album is going to be easy because of our initial efforts.
Coincidentally, this session happened just as Goh’s Video for “Embarcadero Blues” was featured on YouTube. In a matter of days, his music has been heard by hundreds of thousands of people, and so this new album seems to be coming at a most opportune time. Goh’s PR man, Gary Chou, was busy taking photos and video of the session, and I taped a bit of the behind the scenes action and posted it up:
Dan Engelbrecht and Peter Sjöllen were in California last week for some programming workshops on the apple campus. I managed to catch up with them a couple of evenings to hang out and enjoy some nice dinners. The three of us went out to one of my local favorites, Gochi in Cupertino where I had them sample the Kim Chee Pizza. Peter even attempted to eat it with Chopsticks!
Later on in the week, I organized a big group function with some fellow Reason 4.0 sound designers and beta testers at Amber India - one of the better Indian restaurants in the area. Dan and Peter finally had the opportunity to attach faces and personalities to the names from the Propellerhead user forum. Hopefully they weren’t too annoyed by the constant questions about Reason 4.0 and that pesky broken Leopard library that disables Recycle 2.1.
Afterwards we went to catch up with Rick Silvestri who had a show at a pub in Cupertino. Rick plays bass with the Ry Kihn Band and tried to get the group to learn his new “I AM THOR” song. I’m guessing these serious rockers weren’t into it, so Rick stepped up to the mic in the middle of the set and started doing his best impression of the Reason 4.0 patch.
Last weekend, my dear friend Marie and her fiance, Gordon, finally tied the knot. It turned out to be an amazing weekend in Carmel. The weather was beautiful and warm. Gordon’s family came in from Scotland, and Marie’s friends and family travelled from Japan, the northeast, and the midwest.
The wedding ceremony was an eclectic blend of traditions. Marie made a stunning bride and wore a red Japanese silk robe over a traditional dress while Gordon and his groomsmen were in kilts. It was like scene from Highlander 3! I’m kidding… sorta… There were bagpipe players, Marie’s mother sang a traditional Japanese piece, and their friend, (Rev) Kurt Elling, presented a touching service. There was no shortage of wonderful music this day. At the reception, Gordon and Kurt had a little impromptu session.
Already? Really? Yep, there are a slew of Producers Conferences slated for the coming weeks. I wont be heading to Europe, but go see James do his thing in Oslo and Gothenburg. I’ll be in Hollywood a week from Saturday and in New York in November. The US tour is going to be pretty cool with some indepth looks into the new sequencer, and ReGroove, and of course, THOR!
Reason Users who attended the Producers Conferences in the UK, DK or LA this year, probably saw my demo of building a granular type of effect in Reason 3.0 using the NN-19 as the primary sound generator. (NY people saw the beat repeater combi : ) Thanks to some new features in Reason 4.0, this patch has taken shape into a completely new device with some very useful features.
I’ve got a little youtube clip online that demonstrates using a snare drum sample in the patch to create some crazy elastic zipping sounds. The combinator is being triggered from a sequencer track, and the patch actually tracks the pitch from the MIDI notes. With the right sample content, the grains respond to a chromatic scale, and you will hear the snare at different pitches.
It’s not exactly granular synthesis, but the results are pretty close.
Well, up until this week, i’ve been busy working on a new project. It’s been about 5 or 6 years since I last created a Reason Tutorial video, so it’s about time that i got a new one out of the can thanks mostly to my friend Josh Mobley.
Up until a month ago, i was focused on working on a new version of Power Tools for Reason, but an opportunity came up with Groovebox Music to develop and produce a tutorial video. After a brief phone conversation with Josh, I had a spark of inspiration - basically we would take his Reason 4.0 demo track, Narrow Escape, and reconstruct it to show people how to make the most of the new sequencer, the new ReGroove Mixer, and a bit of Thor programming.
12 Hours after our conversation, I had drafted the script. A few days later, I was on a plane to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to work with Josh at his place where we spent 5 days cranking out several hours of screen capture animations as well as some video, and voice overdubs. Yes the picture is Josh’s Reason Tattoo. Click on that picture to see Josh’s livingroom/studio with the total minimal rig we used to develop the video.
This video is the cousin of my old Producing Music with Reason CD-Rom, but it’s much more relaxed and casual as you will see in the demos. Amazingly, here we are 4 weeks after the idea was sparked, and the videos are starting to come online at the link below:
Yep, Reason 4.0 is finally slated for release tomorrow, Wednesday the 26th of September.
I’ll be in San Francisco at Robotspeak tomorrow night at 7pm for a little Reason 4.0 release party/clinic. Yes, they will be open late on Wednesday, so come by and pick up your upgrade, and GW Childs and I will be around to show off some of the new features.
Robotspeak
598 1/2 Haight Street. San Francisco, CA
Yesterday, I attended an event to support Senator Barack Obama as the democratic candidate in the 2008 presidential campaign. Yeah, normally i tend to avoid politics, but this seemed like a special opportunity to hear what the Senator had to say. I was quite impressed with Obama’s presence. He is quite charismatic and yet has a down to earth quality. His presentation lacked details about policies or goals, but he was indeed inspirational and knew how to work the audience. Senator Obama is a natural front man, and I think he would be an impressive president. I do have some doubts about the Senator’s electability, but he definitely embodies an idea that I would like to see succeed.
I’m getting ready for another trip to the Producers Conference in New York, scheduled for the day after tomorrow, July 28th at 1:00pm. It’s been a long time since I’ve been back in NY so this will be a nice return to visit my old home and see how my old home and old friends have changed over the past decade.
The Line6 Crew and some of the Propellerheads crew will be attending, and we’re hoping for a turnout of about 150. Anyways, this is going to be a very cool event for several reasons, and I’m looking forward to meeting the NY Reason Users.
I think there are a few seats left open, so if you haven’t registered, you can find more information at the link below: theproducersconference.com
Ed Bauman and I took a road trip on Tuesday to join up with a small group of Reason Users in Los Angeles for the first official meeting of the LARUG. Ed had a pretty long drive down to my place, and then he endured the second 5 hour drive from San Juan to LA. All things considered, we made pretty good time for the 300 mile trip.
Kenny M. organized the meeting at the PF Changs Restaurant in the Beverly Center. Since Ed and I were cutting it close, we drove straight to the restaurant and were the first to arrive. When we checked in with the hosts, they asked us to explain about the “Reason User Group”. I guess to civilians, it sounds somewhat like a MENSA meeting.
It was an interesting group of users who ranged from people learning to use Reason, to people who work for different companies in the music industry. We sat for hours just talking about music and software and eventually the laptops came out and we played around with different combi patches. Ed demonstrated a few of his ReCover tunes and I showed my Beat Repeater Combi (which will be public knowledge next week).
This was a great meeting and I’m looking forward to future LA events. Next time we will try to get more guys from the SF group to head down and maybe have a mini-jam.
Pictured: Peff, EditEd4TV, Andrew, Seth, Don, Kenny, & Joy. Boris had to leave early and missed this group shot.
I guess it’s semi-official. Reason Users in Los Angeles are planning a get together next Tuesday evening, and Ed Bauman (EditEd4TV) and I will be driving down to join in on this initial meeting.
Anyone interested in joining in should contact Kenny who runs the myspace Reason User page:
