The looper on the Yamaha Reface CS is a strange beast. I found myself amused by just cramming as many notes in it as I can, and just leaving the REC turned on so its recording anything I do with the keyboard while it’s looping. Although while it is looping, I’m doodling more with the sound itself and the effects.
This sounded better in my headphones than I thought. I just love sustain, delay, reverb,… anything with a tail. This is so fun!
NOTE:
Around just before 1 minute mark it gets crazy. It’s amazing how something cute and pretty can just fall apart on this thing. I think the ability to get full rich sound quickly on it, is the charm. Then, with one jiggle of a knob it screams like a demon and just crumbles. Go ahead, call it a toy. I don’t care. The track has a Fripp & Eno-Swastika Girls kind of vibe to it.
The “Yamaha CS 2 project Project” has interesting bits in it too, but I need to chop it down a bit. But this above? Only 5 minutes? Good enough!
Bob and I did a track with samples from Diamond & Silk. The reference source for this is a monologue they had about how “Socialist Cubans only get 5 eggs a month.”
This was too funny so we made a song.
Diamond & Silk
Bitchin Bob’s birthday gift was used for this. He got a groovy drum pad. It’s a Kat Percussion KTMP1 Electronic Drum and Percussion Pad Sound Module. We were breaking it in and came up with this track. The timing is off and its very sloppy but MAN did we have fun and laugh while making it.
Bob’s new drum pad thingy.
5 Mystic Eggs
Click the play thingy and give it a listen. The orchestra hit at the very beginning was left in intentionally. It was triggered by Bob on the drum pad.
It has been quite some time since I posted anything on the blog. I figured I should put something here since I pay for it and the numbers (what little I get) are dropping to nothing.
Today I thought I’d do some drone’y ambient’y thing with the Volca’s and this new Zoom MS-CDR-70 effects pedal. I have it connected to the output of the mini-mixer that holds the Volca Bass, Beats, and Keys. It has a lovely shimmer effect that I over used on this track.
This track was really slapped together (as most are) with little edits. Everything here is a hardware synth (no MIDI or Ableton was used).
Ingredients: Korg Volca Keys and Bass (through Zoom pedal) Korg Minilogue XD with tons of Riser reverb Korg MicroKorg with tons of delay from the Korg MiniKP (red box) Korg Kaossilator Pro with 2 drum patterns and a little solo lead synth noodling.
I recorded the thing at 60bpm but things are triggered haphazardly and initially when the drums kick in, its off beat. But if you listen and let the trance wash over you, it sort of catches up (hence the quicky song title).
It’s about 10 minutes long. Probably TOO LONG, but enjoy either way
I woke up around 7:30am and did this 5 minute bit. It’s a repetitive 2 chord loop with hand pressed automated sustain pedal (had to figure out how to do that). Soloed another reverby/delay’y piano on top for fun. Then figured, I would just solo some foggy pad in the background in hopes to keep it together or make it more interesting. Recorded it without a metronome/clock so not a finger snapper or dance hit. (You should know by now).
This is what ya get. A futile musical brain fart. Hope you find this amusing and it sustains you for 5 minutes or takes you out of where you were.
This was started with an Active Step Recording experiment on the Volca Keys for the arpeggio that runs throughout the bit. I kept dropping out and changing the keys subtly for the duration. Note: There is no beat or rhythm even though the whole thing was done at 100bpm.
After creating this, I found a “Filter Delay” effect that allowed changing the sound filter per left and right channel of speakers so this arpeggio doesn’t just have a variance on the keys being played but also the timbre of the sound per channel. Essentially its changing notes then it changes quality per Left/Right speaker channel independently. So, IT’S ALIIIVE!
I added some space delay piano, a little MicroKorg here and there, and I actually noodled around on the bass guitar a bit.
Good murder of a Sunday.
UPDATED (Thursday June 25, 2020): I learned how to re-pitch audio file SEGMENTS and fixed the sour notes on the bass solo at the end. I’m much happier with it now. I also did some volume changes on the bass solo. It starts at 1:45 if you are in a hurry to compare the two. Give it a listen if you want to challenge your ear a bit.
It’s all about the money, folks.CoronaVirus We Care Music
I was tired of seeing and hearing about all these huge corporations doing somber solo piano music commercials about how much they care about people “in these trying times”.
I thought I would take a whack at trying to make a coronavirus “we care” song of my own.
This is what I came up with. Feel free to think of some corporate bullshit to say on top of it. Try to get in the spirit of depriving your employees of income while you spend millions on trite music like this with somber stupid stock video footage to make people think you give a shit about their survival. This usually helps!
Say things in a low deep caring concerned corporate type voice-over like: “in these trying times” “when people must survive against an invisible enemy”
Feel free to leave your own stupid insensitive stock voice-over script in the comments. Maybe I can get Bitchin Bob to do a proper voice over.
Today I lowered the keyboard stand to match the height of the surrounding desks. This meant unhooking stuff and rehooking it which means ANOTHER TESTER TRACK TO MAKE SURE EVERYTHING RECORDED. (Which also means, it was a scratch track, so dont think for a minute this is supposed to sound “good” or be “official”).
The Lowering of the Table Tester File
And now I can SIT at the keyboard stand instead of STAND at it. Thank you quarantine.
Wow! So much time has passed since the 2015 release Hozpitality-To Go. There has been a lot of moving around and acquisition of new noise making devices and volunteering of new noise making people.
As you know, Hozpitality is a collective. Anyone who wants to make sound and record may do so. Since moving the “Hozpitality Home Studio” around a lot, more people have come on board. They will be listed in the Personnel List below.
Track List:
Beach Week (4:16) This was a drum pattern recorded by Bush, keys by CeMeGo, and vocals by Gloria Snatch (now known as Eriyyka BaDont). Please do not miss the Beach Week video (which is the first music video for a Hozpitality song). The lyrics/vocals for the song were created after watching Brett Kavanaugh hearings. He still likes beer. Yeah well so do we all, but we don’t get to be a life long supreme court justice (you dick).
D and C Drone for DC (5:43) This was extracted from a long jam session (May 2019) between Derek and CeMeGo. Derek plays bass. Not sure about the drums. Keys and noise by CeMeGo. Probably first recorded use of Korg Minilogue XD (closer to the end).
Don’t Know What To Say (3:45) Bitchin’ Bob souls up a hit. Drums and 2 chord melody by Bush. Extra keys and augmentation by CeMeGo. This is a touching song, about hats, impaired vision, and lots of grumbled Joe Cocker styled wailing.
Exceptional (5:33) A jam session created in April of 2017, chopped up, and repositioned by Bitchin’ Bob and CeMeGo. The Novation Launchpad was heavily abused for the drum pattern.
Epipen (2:33) A lounge statement calling out Big Pharma. The skyrocketing price of Epipens used to ward off an allergic reaction causes us to do a timely lounge piece. Gloria Snatch on vocals and Randy Glands on keys.
Guest Parking (with CHOB) (10:02) The voice sample is audio from an instructional video explaining how to park your car in a parking lot and remember where you parked (very ridiculous). There is also a dramatic reading of the guest parking rules for a certain overpriced apartment community in North Bethesda, MD.
The Tootsie Throwdown (4:34) Derek plays bass and croons about Tootsie (the cat). What else do we know? Right?
High Mystic Water Rhythms (5:27) This is not the first time CeMeGo has stolen drum sounds from the band Rush. This is a mash up of drum samples from Rush songs “High Water” and “Mystic Rhythms”. This was one of the first experiments with the Novation Launchpad.
Staying Up Late To Make Some Beats Tonight (But You’re Not Alone) (4:10) Instruments, vocoder, and junk by CeMeGo. Yet another stolen traffic report sample from WTOP radio.
Exceptional (Bangin Remix) (4:35) The heavy rocking mid section of the track Exceptional had us dancing around so hard, we had to jam on it. This is what happened.
Tools used: Ableton Live 9 Suite (too cheap to upgrade to 10!) A bunch of free .VST files from the Internet Adobe Audition (too useful unfortunately!) Fender Aerodyne Bass Korg Electribe Sampler 2 Korg Kaossilator Pro Korg Mini-KP (red box) Korg MicroKorg (lots of stuff and vocoder) Korg Minilogue XD (still new). Korg Volca(s) (Bass, Beats, and Keys) Novation Launchpad
