DJ Vespers Interviews Veela - Part 2

DJ Vespers interviews 17 year old electronic music producer Veela.
Apologies for the sound scratching! (cleans up at the 1:35 mark.)
See Part 1 here.

Death Cab For Cutie-Transatlanticism- Kill Paris Remix Video

All Clips from the Film "The Science of Sleep"
Download the track @ http://soundcloud.com/killparis/death...
myspace.com/killparispaige
soundcloud.com/killparis

bitley™ Reason Hints 1 - the ReDrum

A little Reason school here - guidelines for CV / Gate programming with the ReDrum in Propellerhead Reason.
bitleymusic.blogspot.com

52 Reason / Record Tips #11- Convert Reason song to Record

In this week's episode I show how to take a song that was previously saved in Reason, load it into Record, and use the individual Mix channels in Record to mix it down.
James Bernard - Propellerheads Product Specialist
Buy James' music on his page at lulu.com

14:13 - Eyebrowz Live

14:13 - Eyebrowz Live by Danni

An experiment in live loop recording and playing live parts.
this is a one take live session using reason/record running an 8bar loop...
bass guitar played live thru boss me20b.
guitar uses r/r fx.
silver box 303 in r/r rack triggered by boss fs-6 dual pedals.

all mix and fx parameters controlled by bcf2000 and arturia a.f.e.
m-audio used for pad combinator.

No edits...No overdubs...Nothing was added that wasn't there when it was recorded. 100% Reason / Record by Propellerhead Software.

Thanks to the Reason / Record community for all their inspirational music.

... and thank you for taking the time to check my music.

Regards
Eyebrowz

audio version @ : eyebrowz.bandcamp.com/

Never Work With Dinosaurs - the making of 14:13

This is a walkthrough of the different channels that were used on Records SSL mixer in the live performance of 1413 - Eyebrowz Live.

Using 100% Record and Reason by Propellerhead Software.

...blooper reel at the end btw :D

eyebrowz.bandcamp.com
soundcloud.com/i-eye-eye-browz/tracks
musicnuevo.com

DJ Vespers Interviews Veela - Part 1

Below is the first part to an interview DJ Vespers did with 17 year old pop producer Veela. It's really cool to see a young girl produce and play her own tracks in this male dominated field. Talented and cute as a button... check it:


www.myspace.com/veelabeats
www.youtube.com/user/veelabeats
www.facebook.com/pages/VEELA

Reason Wizardry 10 - April Edition

The April edition of Reason Wizardry is out today! This month's tutorials are on wavesequencing synthesis, made popular by the Korg Wavestation synthesizer back in 1990. According to VintageSynth.com, wave sequencing "was a break-through form of synthesis, by which short segments of sampled audio waveforms could be played one after the other and cross-faded into each other for some complex and unusual tones, pads, textures and rhythms." Should be another informative tutorial! By the way, if you "befriend" Nucleus SoundLab on Facebook you become eligible for a free trial month of Reason Wizardry! Just check out the Fan Area.

Urban Process

Urban Process is a project that explores the compositional aesthetics of sounds from the urban space. Using field recordings of urban environments, and drawing ideas from Musique Concrete, as well as using contemporary approaches to sound design and music production, such as generative music, granular synthesis and microsound, we have compiled a collection of tracks that explore urban noise in a musical context. Often the pedestrian, commuter, or urban flaneur will choose to block out the sounds of their surrounding environment via solipsistic headphone listening. We believe that all sounds have the capacity to be heard and invite you to not only download the tracks for your own listening, but also to offer your own content to the project, either via downloading the sounds we used for your own composition, or downloading loops we have made, or contributing sounds from your own city for others to use, via the DropBox on this page. Thanks for listening and taking part.

0003 9-Audio by Urban_Process

Stepmosh by Urban_Process

Glitched drum

here's a glitched drum track setting that I have been working on today.

The Orb - Ok,its the orb on Kompakt is one part where I got the idea from. I want to thank Rob from Reason101.net for giving the mention on this CD.

Even while the 'drum' is not the same, yet it opens up a lot of different options to play with. Have fun!
hydlide.nl

Creating Mixer Channels In Reason / Record

Taking beats that have been made completely in Reason, then importing into Record...You need To create Mixer channels and run the outputs 1 by 1! This video will cover it for you
www.idubl.com

Art Pepper: Live in Stuttgart - May 25, 1981

WIDOW'S TASTE RECORDS IS DELIGHTED TO ANNOUNCE...
...the latest in the collectors' series of Unreleased Art Pepper recordings.
Volume V, Stuttgart (1981) with Milcho Leviev, Bob Magnusson, and Carl Burnett (a 2 disc set), will be released on May 18th.

These performances have not been heard, except by those who were at the concert and those people who've been trading sub-rosa recordings over the years. (They're the people we have to thank for THIS material!) And even for those mad collectors, the exceptional remastering by Wayne Peet may make this feel new to them, too.
As usual, Art Pepper put his whole heart and soul and all his art into this concert, and it's hot, cool, swinging, soulful, rough, funky, and just ridiculously beautiful. This band had been on the road together for more than two years. Their communication with each other within the evolution of this music was magical and always surprising.
artpepper.net
www.cdbaby.com/Artist/ArtPepper

Propellerhead Record + Reason: How to Make Talk Box and Auto-Wah Effects

Line 6's Propellerhead Product Specialist Matt Piper demonstrates how to simulate a Talk Box effect for guitar using the formant filter in Reason's Thor synthesizer, and also creates a classic auto-wah effect for guitar using Reason's Envelope Controlled Filter.
Line 6 Blog

4ms ABG and the Ekdahl Moisturizer

Here we have the 4ms Autonomous Bassline Generator running through the Ekdahl Moisturizer. The ABG is a kit that can be easily built and is a whole lot of fun. It can continually produce varying melodies seemingly by magic!

The Moisturizer is a super-cool spring reverb unit with an analog multimode filter and LFO for modulation. One of the best things about the Moisturizer is that there are controls for wet/dry amounts for both the filter and reverb sections. The built in LFO can modulate the filter cutoff frequency and the filter mode which can yield some great results. There's also a host of jacks on the back of the Moisturizer, giving voltage control over filter cutoff, filter mode, wet/dry amounts for reverb and filter as well as LFO speed and an LFO output. Gated, filtered, modulated, funkdafied spring reverb! The Moisturizer sounds great on guitar too and anything else you can think of;)
Big City Music

52 Reason / Record Tips - Week 10: Advanced Drum Replacement

In a follow-up to week 8's tip on "Simple Drum Replacement," James shows us a way to do more advanced drum replacement that allows for velocity and timbre changes in drum sounds. The result is a very realistic drum track containing many of the subtle variants that give live drums their sound.
James Bernard - Propellerheads Product Specialist

You can pick up James Bernard's music on his lulu store page.

Torley - The problem with electronic music is that it's too human.

GET MY MUSIC @ http://torley.com

12-way filter Combinator (with Shaper) for Reason & Record

This video shows you how to utilize the 12-way filter Combinator from my reason101 site. You can download the file there. It's dot net btw... So anyhow, this allows you to switch between th ECF-42, Malstrom A/B, and Thor filters, and navigate through the various filter modes on all those devices. You can also utilize the envelope of the ECF, and the shaper in both the Thor and Malstrom.

-008' Clap Machine

Received an e-mail this afternoon from -008' about his latest free refill Clap Machine:

Today is kind of a holiday,
so Happy 4-20, smoker's christmas...,puff puff passover
-008' Clap Machine is a FREE Reason ReFill, made especially for big layered/stacked claps.
It is a combinator patch (NN-XT also) made from 20 custom -008' claps.
Ranges key C1 to G2 you can play chords or random groups of notes and really get huge claps in no time.
Open the combi and tweak the EQ or add patch to the RV-7000 etc..
Rotary 1 = Wider - simple delay stereo effect.
Rotary 2 = Tube Damage (Button 2 = Tube Off/On)
Rotary 3 = Thunk Filter knob is just a filter for the Thor percussion noise, that I made to supplement the claps....or not (Button 3 = Mute Thunk) This uses ch.3 in the combi's mixer.Adjust level there.
Rotary 4 = Reverb Send Simple Aux, load or make your reverbs in the RV-7000! (Button 4 Reverb Off/On)
Get at me if you need any further assistance!
Ok, go light up a new beat and roll some claps into it for me ;)

Pick up your own copy of Clap Machine at www.008refills.com

Legalize It!

Peff - CycleOn Real-Time Control with iPad

A demo of using the CycleOn combinator in real time with a custom TouchOSC iPad controller:

CycleOn Real-Time by peff

Resonant Filter checks out bitBumper Deluxe V2!

As promised a week or so back... Resonant Filter's first video! This is a review/run thru of some of the great patches available in the bitBumper Deluxe V2 ReFill for Propellerheads Reason:



bitBumper Deluxe V2 is available @ Soundcells.de

Stay tuned for some more RF videos! We'll be checking out PZP's new ROAR Order ReFill, as well as Biolabs Alchemy Labs soundbank in the coming weeks...

Producer Pack Demo - thelooploft.com

A look inside The Producer Pack from http://www.thelooploft.com

Selectable Thor Filter Combinator with Envelope (Part 2)

This is part 2 in my series about how to create a selectable Thor filter. In this video, I'm going to show you how to adjust the envelope gating, as well as how to apply the envelope to the Resonance or the Chorus Modulation Amount. Furthermore, you can switch to have the envelope applied to the Resonance, Chorus Mod Amount, Frequency, or all three. Fun stuff!
Reason 101

Click here for part 1

Xerrox Monophaser 2 - Alva Noto

'Xerrox vol. 2 undertakes an intense journey and affords the luxury to take its time. while Xerrox vol. 1 (r-n 78) referred to the old world with its tradition deeply rooted in classical music, Xerrox Vol. 2 tries to access a new world. it works with samples that have been gathered and developed in the usa the so-called new world where the album also has almost completely been recorded.
The dramatic and dynamic approach of Xerrox Vol. 1 on Vol. 2 has been replaced by a structural density. Instead of working with individual musical entities the new album rather develops an overall, linear aesthetic that refers to musical strategies of film music. Hence there are no implicitly singular pieces, but open musical structures a journey without a predetermined target.
The first four tracks of Xerrox vol. 2 actually condense to one track, using samples of michael nyman and stephen omalley. They kind of combine to a soundtrack as for a movie before fading away in a swell of reverb feedback. Xerrox Sora is a rudiment from the collaboration with Ryuichi sakamoto, which originates from and has been performed as encore during the 2004 Insen tour. Continuing from Xerrox Monophaser 2, the album creates a dense and interweaved complexity, which only gradually unfolds its depth. while Xerrox Teion dissolves in the process of copying into another sample rate (xerrowed), Xerrox Teion Acat again tends to re-condense its quality.
Xerrox vol. 2 seems to be more playful than vol. 1; following the approach of a live set it is not so much obligated to a theoretical concept. therefore it intends to break a static framework before it gets too restricted. The eleven tracks of Xerrox Vol. 2 serve as documents of an immediately experienced time or as attempts to unfold in an endless space. In this sense Xerrox Vol. 2 comes close to the idea of the Aleph-1 project that tried to disappear rather than occupy an endless space. In the end one might ask where the journey will go. Will the next albums in the series Xerrox Vol. 3-5 again commit to the idea of atomisation of sound or condense in monolithic structures? This only time can tell.'

All samples xerroxed by Carsten Nicolai, recorded in Otranto / Aca Florida, New Smyrna Beach / Berlin 2008, mixed in Berlin Lager Studio, thanks to my brother Olaf

Thanks for the samples:
Stephen O'Malley, Michael Nyman, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Continental Airline malfunctioning inflight program, metaphysical function 1 and 2

http://www.alvanoto.com/
https://shop.raster-noton.net/

Strange but true - Orange OPC

The revolutionary OPC Computer Amplifier Speaker is 100% designed and built in the UK. It is a fully integrated computer with internal speaker which delivers playing, recording, editing and computing capabilities to musicians and music aficionados. This is the first computer of its kind that you can connect yourself and your music to the digital world simply by plugging in your instrument.

The OPC will be leading the way with a number of ‘Firsts’:

- The first computer of its kind to have a built-in high powered speaker which delivers superb full range hi-fi quality sounds as well as vintage guitar sounds.

- The first computer to have a universal input jack enabling users to plug in a multitude of musical instruments (guitar, keyboard etc ) and peripherals such as the iPod, MP3 players, microphones.

- A unique cooling system to ensure air goes in and exits only after cooling the internal computer

PZP Roar Order

Point Zero Productions has just released Roar Order for Reason/Record. This ReFill uses Thor's step sequencer to great effect creating patterns, melodies, beats and bass lines. Here's the info from PZP:

The idea behind this refill was to create a solid library of sequenced patches for a variety of genres, which are not just very playable, but can quickly inspire new tunes, allow for very live tweaking and to use as building blocks for all types of rhythmic based music. It contains a wide sound palette including sounds for minimal, techno, progressive, breaks, trance, ambient, psy, house, electro, downbeat and many other styles.

Contents include:

Over 350 fully mapped Combinator Sequencer patches.
Over 250 Thor Sequencer patches.
Over 200 Bonus Thor Patches.

For more information go to pointzeroproductions.net.
And stay tuned for a full review on Resonant Filter!

Reason Patch a Day Challenge

I finally finished my piece for the Reason Patch a Day Challenge. The point of which was to finish a track in Reason (or at least begin one) in a week. Mine was a week late, but those of you that know me, know that's how I run. There's been some great entries, I dug Jeremy's "2048", Chris Stallone's "Sunshine", V2057's Tarnac 9 (Rough), and Robb PAD's "Breaching The Heliopause". Really everyone's was pretty cool. Definitely worth checking out!

Selectable Thor Filter Combinator in Propellerhead Record

This tutorial shows you how to create a selectable Thor Filter in a combinator in Propellerhead Record. The rotaries allow you to change the filter type, frequency, resonance, and envelope amount. Youll also learn how to create a button to turn the envelope on and off, and how to apply the Filter Drive parameter to the mod wheel. Lastly, youll use Thors step sequencer to trigger the envelope controlling the Frequency of the Filter. I may put together a part 2 if people find this useful.
Reason 101

Ned Rush = Welcome To Europe (Squarepusher Cover)

a faithful cover of a piece of pure exuberance. i struggled with getting a lead synth sound that was close to the original, but everything else is pretty spot on, and its only a bit of fun anyway. enjoy!
Mr Ned Rush

52 Reason / Record Tips - Week 9: Vocal Remover

As the name suggests, vocal removing is about taking vocals out of a stereo recording. Perhaps to add your own sweet voice instead? This week, James Bernard shows how to do this in Reason and in Record.
James Bernard - Propellerheads Product Specialist

Reason 4 Tutorial The Formant Distorted Wobbler

Here's a nice addition to the dubstep series in reason 4. This is kind of like a lead that you could use in DubStep. In this case I am going for the combination of using a Formant Filter - Warp - foldback distortion. Use 2 LFO's to shape the formant filter.
hydlide.nl

Torley on Wave Alchemy Blog

Everyone's favorite fuchsia obsessed vlogger, Torley, has his debut editorial up on the new Wave Alchemy blog. Entitled Genre Boundaries - What's in a name? the blog discusses the idiosyncrasies of music classification and the benefits of stretching boundaries. Like everything Torley does, it is worth checking out. Speaking of Wave Alchemy, here's a review from last year of the Wave Alchemy SFX Collection Vol. 1 done by none other than Torley:


Genre Boundaries - What's in a name?
Torley.com
Fuchsia

Reason 4 tutorial - Dubstep and the Screaming Lead

Here's a nice addition to the dubstep series. This is kind of like a lead that you could use in DubStep. I have a couple of ideas laying around on the floor, so I am going to chew on these.
hydlide.nl

Boost 309 updated to version 2!

I received an e-mail this morning from Harald, the man behind Soundcells about an update to Boost 309 a Reason ReFill based on Quasimidi's RaveOlution 309 beatbox:

Boost 309 Version 2!

"Boost 309 V2" is based on the complete sample set of the vintage, lo-fi but charmingly sounding machine Rave-o-lution 309 by a company named Quasimidi. Soundcells have created 90 brand new combinator drum machines for you with these samples. It all ranges from the old original 309 thing to amazing and unique patches that could have never been created within the 309 itself. Besides cool beats and complex, crazy rhythms Boost 309 will offer you even more!
While closing version 2 of this ReFill we found ourselves putting 200 combinators into this product. Version 2 is a huge update which adds 20 new combinator patches, 40 rex loops making use of our "Boost 309" drum machines and the original (!) Rave-o-lution groovebox, as well as completely redesigned and great looking backdrops...

Boost 309 V2 Contents:

• 110 combinator patches containing deep basses, great playable keys, surprising leads and awesome pads.

• 101 NNXT patches, 22 redrum kits and over 300 samples.

• Of course the original 309 samples and waveforms.

• The 90 combinator drum machines we have talked about above are in fact 45 basic setups with their 45 shuffled counter parts
(10 new machines since V2).

• 40 rex loops making use of the "Boost 309" drum machines as also the original machine.

www.soundcells.de

Offering price is 19,- EUR until the end of April (normally 29,- EUR).



For those of you not familiar with the fantastic Quasimidi RaveOlution 309 that Boost 309 culls samples from, here's some information from Vintagesynth.com:

The RaveOLution is a stand alone groove box that has taken the techno world by storm. Very popular among DJ's for live performance and interaction with the audience! It features a very advanced sequencer and a host of excellent analog and electronic drum and bass synth sounds. The 309 is very intuitive and easy to get started using. Play with the patterns or make your own. All real-time tweaks can be recorded into your sequence for later playback!

The 5 part multitimbral feature is the secret to this units power for live and interactive performances. The 5 separate parts are Kick, Snares, Hi-Hats, percussion and bass synth. During your performance you can mute any of these parts to drop the beat or isolate the kick, thus building or lowering the groove and your audiences energy! A plethora of knobs offer quick and easy access to filter and envelope modulation for shaping and morphing the music. The 309 is also well suited for studio work with complete MIDI implementation that includes all real-time controls and knobs.

The 309 is truly an instant dance machine! It sounds great for analog emulation synthesis! It looks pretty cool and comes from a company that knows all about Trance and Techno music. The RaveOLution 309 is an obvious choice for anybody seriously looking to get into dance music with an affordable all-in-one box that will grow and remain useful in your studio and music for as long as techno is still around! It is used by Apollo 440 and KMFDM.

Est. Value: $700 - $900


And finally in Soundcells news on Resonant Filter, I figured out how to record both my computer audio and an external mic into my new screen capturing software this past weekend, so expect a video review of Soundcells Bitbumper Deluxe V2 and day now ;-).

Drum replacement using Reason 4

Here's a more 'tricky' tutorial. A time consuming method to make drum replacement with Reason 4. This technique works with NN-XT loops, NN19 samples and Dr Rex loops. Its always easier to use note lanes from Dr Rex on this matter. But then again, I want to be special ;)

What we'll be doing is convert the audio to a cv signal again, and route that inside a Redrum. The tricky part comes from isolating the drums.
hydlide.nl

eXode - Call of Gaea on iTunes!

One of my favorite sound designers, eXode, now has his debut album Call of Gaea, available on iTunes! As some of you may remember, Resonant Filter interviewed eXode, aka Daniel Olsson, back in November of last year. I referred to "Call of Gaea" as my favorite work of his available on virb, particularly the song "Transcending the Old World" which I described as starting "off with what sounds like children playing only to give way to a synthesizer line that would make Harold Faltermeyer (composer of "Axel F theme") jealous.." Another question from the interview concerning "Call of Gaea" was:

- Your songs make great use of the spatial field, are you mastering your songs yourself and is this done is Reason, Record, or another software?

Everything was done in Reason, I have however started to move these songs over to Record because I prefer the mixing abilities provided. No other software (or hardware) is involved in the mixing/mastering. I must mention that I haven't really done any real mastering on my tracks. I think that a key thing with music is that you should try and find sounds that fit the bill right away instead of having instruments that struggle in the same spectrum. You can also play around with EQ and Pan to carve out the right places for your instruments, I've found that I do this increasingly often and I guess this is why my productions get better too. In the end I trust me ears!

Pick up eXode's Call of Gaea now on iTunes! You can preview this and other great work from Daniel at his page on virb.com.

Reason 4 and Dynamic Compression

A technique which i sometimes used is something called "dynamic compression". It just comes down to add an additional listener to the compressor while it changes the dynamics according to the audio signal that parses through.

kind of like an advanced threshold ;)
hydlide.nl

10 Questions with New Atlantis Audio!

I've been wanting to interview New Atlantis Audio ever since picking up their Polar Elements ReFill the week it came out. This company seemed to come from nowhere with stellar sound design work and incredible graphics... and their website didn't answer very many of those questions. No background, no base city, just quality sounds for a good price. So needless to say I was psyched when Theodore Jordan of N.A.A. agreed to my interview, here it is:

- Who's behind New Atlantis Audio and where are you based?

I'm Theodore Jordan and I'm the main person behind NAA. I'm currently living in New York City. I collaborate with a handful of people scattered around the US, mostly in Boston. My buddy Francis up there was helping out a lot in the beginning but he's a real-life scientist with a proper job now so it's pretty much just me at this point as far as sound design goes. Thanks for having me!

- How did you get started in sound design and why did you choose the Reason platform for your patches?

This is a fun first question because my foray into this whole sound design/computer/Reason mess is one big intertwined ball of snot. I'll try to make it as concise as possible...

I started playing music really young, maybe at 4 or 5 years old. But instead of becoming a budding prodigy, I tolerated lessons and sheet music and spent most of my free time plugging effects pedals into karaoke machines and just making a whole lot of noise. By the mid/late 90's I'm playing bass in some indie rock bands, playing some jazz and get into synths and samplers. It was really foreign territory to me. Nobody I knew was into this stuff so it was a really personal thing for me. I didn't listen to electronic music at all. It was pretty pure exploration. I could make music by myself for the first time and I really loved that. Over the next few years I amassed a bunch of gear and got heavily into sampling. 

Music was still very much a hobby for me at this point, I was an outdoors guy and was studying to become an arborist. My love of the outdoors took me across the country to Seattle. I had a neighbor there who was into MIDI and synths too, he was also into computers. I literally didn't even own a computer at this point and would check my email over dial-up from my Sega Dreamcast. That was my "computer". One day he shows me this crazy new program with rackmount synths, samplers, drum machines… and you could plug them all into each other! It was Reason version 1 and it just come out. I was blown away. Reason 1.0 was literally the first real piece of computer software I ever used, music or otherwise. This kickstarts me on computers and I max out a credit card to buy a Mac and Reason. Haha, and shortly after start selling off my hardware to pay for it. Next thing I know I'm way into audio software, but also getting into graphics and teaching myself to code for the web. I wind up coming back to New York and enrolling in art school.

I take a random unpaid internship for a few credits doing web design work. Just so happens that the company was a music production house and had one of the first big online sample libraries. One day after about 4 months of working for free the boss asks me to call around to find a replacement for the main sound designer/composer dude. He stormed out and quit and left a bunch of half-finished projects behind. Expecting to be laughed out of the room I mention that I've been into the music thing for a long time and maybe I could finish up his work until they found a replacement. Really, I was half-kidding but we end up having a 5 second conversation that went something like this:

"Oh yeah? Well if you can finish all the bullshit he left behind then you can have his job."

When are they due by?

"Last week."

So I skipped school and worked completely through the night. I finished up at about noon the following day and the job was mine. In one night I went from unpaid art student to full-time sound designer. I stayed there for another year or so before they switched gears and sold the company. I made tons and tons (and tons) of loops that they sold online. We put out a handful of sample CDs and we even had a rebranded version of Acid with my sounds all over it. I got to work on all sorts of stuff; some tv music, some little video games. It was a total dream job for a young kid and I learned a whole lot about everything from sound design to the web to running a business. Very, very lucky to have had that opportunity.

In a nutshell, that's how I got started in sound design. 

In the decade since I've worked for some sound companies, done some neat freelance work and gotten very much into field recording. Over the years a lot of gear and software have come into and out of my life but the single thing I've used and stuck with all this time is Reason. When I decided to get back into making soundware I knew I wanted to do some stuff for Reason. The Combinator is obviously huge from an instrument creation standpoint. And the ReFill format is about as clean as it gets for distribution. It's a great community to be a part of as well. The best ReFills are coming out of the small indie shops right now. A great thing about Reason is that people from every conceivable musical corner are using it. I think there is a nice little spot for my work in there somewhere. My sounds definitely won't appeal to every Reason user, but the people who like them seem to really love them. 




- Your refill B.E.A.S.T. features samples from some of the greatest hardware synthesizers ever made, including the Arp 2600, minimoog, Prophet V, MS-20, TB-303...  when creating a refill like this how do you get all the synthesizer sounds together?  Rent, borrow, beg, steal?

Ha, almost all of the above! Those recordings came from a project I was hired to work on up in Boston a few years ago. I was working for a studio and this group of doctorate students came by looking to rent some equipment. They were developing some new software sampler thing that could do some radical time stretching and granular synthesis stuff. In hindsight, similar to Alchemy from Camel Audio. So anyway, they wound up hiring me to record some source material for it.  Luckily New England is really like ground zero for old synths. That's kind of where it all started 30 years ago so there's just so much crazy gear still floating around up there. I just started reaching out to people. I was looking on craigslist and ebay for synths being sold within driving distance and sending them an email like "Hey, I don't want to buy it but I'll give you some cash if you let me come sample it for a little while!"  I wound up meeting a ton of cool people.  The MS-20 was on an active Naval base.  That guy had a bunch of great synths! I nicknamed him "Captain Cutoff".  I was driving around New England and meeting all these people. It was a blast. Anyway, they never got that sampler to market so last year I made a deal with them and got the rights to all of my sounds back. There's loads of unused material in there that I'll probably use for other things. The sources for Polar Elements were in there as well. 


- Both your Physical Therapy and Polar Elements ReFills feature field recordings prominently, what gear do you use to capture your field recordings?

I have a modest little field recording rig.  For a handheld all-rounder I blew my holiday bonus on a Sony PCM-D1 a few years back but not long after I tried a PCM-D50 and honestly felt like it was just as good for what I was doing so I "downgraded" and have been very happy with it. I actually like it much better. I also have a more traditional single point stereo setup, a matched pair of condensers, a shotgun and a very nicely modified Tascam HD that I got on a trade. I want to start capturing in surround now so I may trade up to an 8 track Fostex machine. It's so bulky though. I have this pair of tiny condensers that are meant to be worn on your body. I am experimenting with mounting them on my head for pseudo binaural stereo. I use a little Sonic Studios battery pack. I honestly don't usually recommend field recording gear because there are so many factors to consider. I think comfort is too often overlooked. You're carrying this stuff around, holding it for hours, sometimes you're wearing it. You may need to use it in the rain or in the dark. Once you hit a certain price point the differences in quality shrink and then it becomes more about usability. Get very comfortable headphones! That's my only gear recommendation. =)


- Speaking of field recordings on the Propellerhead's Forum you recently posted about your use of an old upright bass recorded outside in the cold winter for the Polar Elements ReFill, where do you come up with the ideas for your field recordings?

I'm one of those people that believe you can borrow a special moment in sound and enjoy it again later just like a photograph. Polar Elements was originally just going to be part of a fairly straightforward field recording series for picture. I came across one of those big images that are made up of a ton of smaller images, not sure what they're called, a photomosaic I think? Anyway, I thought well what if I can take these small moments in sound and combine them into some larger whole in the same way? That's kind of where the Polar Elements sounds came from. 

So to use that upright bass as an example; We sat outside bowing this poor frozen bass in the snow. Then I stretched a tiny chunk of it a mile long, mashed it with more tiny chunks - maybe the sound of wind or ice cracking - figured out how to loop it and turned it all back into some new instrument that still has those moments buried inside it. In fact, I think the resulting patches portray those moments better than the original source material in a lot of cases. We spent one afternoon inside a cave in New Hampshire banging on giant wind chimes, all to use one tenth of a second of the audio.

Physical Therapy comes from a whole different direction. I had a bunch of footage from Puerto Rico just collecting dust. I was sort of struggling on the percussion sounds I was making so I just threw on some of those nature sounds in the background just to listen to something else and relax. Suddenly I'm designing percussion sounds just to go along with the field recordings and loving the results. I couldn't bare to not include them in the ReFill after that so I worked out a way to make them part of it and it just evolved organically into this strange tropical thing.

There is two-way inspiration happening all over the place with those but sometimes I just want to sleep at night too. I used to go outside and record the ocean for an hour or so at night and loop it on the stereo while I slept. Then I'd wake up in the morning, delete it and do it all over again the next night. We lived right on the water and one night on my way out my wife was like "why don't you just sleep with the window opened?" Haha, she probably has a point there. I guess for me field recordings have always offered a bit of escapism, like a way to revisit places or travel without going anywhere.




- A portion of the proceeds from your Reason ReFills goes to charity, different charities for every ReFill.  You've donated to the Shriner's Hospital for Children, World Wildlife Fund, and Camp Sunshine - I think this is a great idea and I'd imagine it helps you sell more refills, I know I've bought everyone one of your refills because even when I'm low on money I can justify that some of the money is going to charity.  How has the reception been to this and how do you pick the charities?

Well big thanks for being supportive of it, but it actually seems to have no effect on sales at all. Only a small fraction of my customers even notice it, and an even smaller fraction have bothered to register or take part. I actually get a little worried about it sending mixed messages sometimes, like are people trying to figure out if we are sound designers or fund raisers? I don't know. It's still definitely something I will always continue to do, but I'm starting to see potential negatives to publicizing it. Doing charity work is great, but doing it in silence can be even better. The last thing I want is people getting the impression that it's there to boost sales, because it's not the case and it definitely isn't the result. I liked the idea of people helping me to find new organizations to give to but there's just not much feedback in that area at all. I might rethink the whole thing soon. Thanks again though for being behind it, definitely means a lot to me.




- I absolutely love your logo!  It has a iconoclastic look to it, reminiscent of monetary design and  ancient Greek motifs.  Who does your graphic design work and did they also design your website?

Thanks! I do all the graphic design and the website. I've always been a typography and design geek but I can't take much credit for the logo itself as it's just a hybrid of stock vector art mostly. I still do some freelance design work so it's always a struggle to not constantly redesign the website. I stripped it down to almost nothing and try to just leave it alone.


- New Atlantis also does for-hire sound design work.  Is it difficult to find the clients for this type of work and how would you compare it to designing ReFills and can you give us an example of some of the for-hire jobs you've done?

Well it's definitely not the kind of thing you'll see an ad for in the paper. I have a small group of people I've known for a while who throw me little bits of work for specific types of things. Some neat work in audiobooks and art installations. I used to do more "normal" work, sounds for television mostly, but lately it's been oddball stuff.

With client work your goals are clearly defined. The processes in between are basically the same, you're using the same tools. There's just rules in place. I've never sat down and said "I am going to make a Reason ReFill that has x number of patches, sounds like y and will go on sale on date z." I just let it evolve naturally and sometimes a cohesive collection is born. I don't really make much music for public consumption anymore so these ReFills are sort of my albums and the patches are my songs. Corny, but kinda true. All of my ReFills are very thematic/conceptual or whatever you'd call it. When doing those, it's my concept. With client work, it's their concept. That's the major difference I guess.

I'm working on one project up in MA that is a pretty regular exhibit of modern art pieces; sculptures, paintings etc, but they are having me hide microphones inside the pieces and throughout the space. The idea is to take in people's commentary on the art, do all sorts of weird stuff with the audio on the fly and then spit it back out into the room through the sound system, along with my own ambient soundscapes, maybe some beats. And that becomes sort of an exhibit unto itself. A realtime soundtrack I guess. The trick is timing, and having enough of a delay so there isn't feedback, but getting sounds back into the room soon enough so that people can hear their own voices before they leave an area. Ha, I'm hiding up in the rafters basically missing the whole show, should be fun.




- Your Physical Therapy ReFill has some absolutely fantastic mallet patches, which I was actually looking for at the time it came out.  What was your process for recording the different samples used in the refill and what different instruments did you use?

Thanks! That's great to hear because all of the instrument sounds in there were actually created with synths. The only "real" sounds are the nature sounds.  I love tuned percussion and I hadn't had the chance to mess with acoustic modeling in a long time so it was a lot of fun to make. A lot of people seem to think the mallet sounds are real sampled marimbas and stuff so I guess it came out good. 

I used Sculpture, Reaktor, a Yamaha VL-7 and the Applied Acoustics thing. I borrowed a VSynth too but didn't use it much. Most of the sounds are combinations of tones from those sources. I'm pretty happy with the way it turned out, especially considering each instrument contains only a single sample. 

Might be worth mentioning that that all of the instruments in all of my ReFills contain only a single waveform each. That was a goal of mine from the beginning, partly because I absolutely hate multisampling. I just get so bored with it. I also love the old school days of sampling and working with hard limitations. It was definitely a challenge at times. For mallet and bass it's not too bad, but Polar Elements was a lot of work. Some of the sounds in there are pretty complex and huge sounding and people are usually shocked to find out it's coming from a one second blip of noise.


- Speaking of samples, what software do you use to trim your audio down?

Well for years I was a diehard Soundtrack Pro fan. But sometime (in v2 it seems) this really dangerous bug came about in it and unfortunately I've had to stop using it. When working with mono files you can randomly get blasted with an outrageously loud white noise spike in the right channel. The meters read at over 600db! Ha, I don't know if that's even physically possible but it's definitely LOUD. I've gotten hit with it a few times and have had to stop working for days or even weeks at a time to rest my ear. It's really serious and if you're wearing headphones (which I do often), could easily cause permanent damage. May already have for all I know. Scary stuff. I'm trying WaveEditor from Audiofile Engineering these days. I'm still getting used to it and I miss a lot of STP's features. I really miss the effects. Anyway, WaveEditor it is, for the time being.


- What advice would you give to someone that wants to get into Sound Design and is there anything you wish someone had clued you in on when you began that you had to learn "the hard way"?

Well there are certainly some markets for sound designers that can provide a fairly normal and stable career, the video game industry is probably a good example. There is always work in sound for picture. It's tough to break in on the large scale, everyone I know who have "Hollywood" type sound jobs did the traditional thing of working for free making coffee and running wire for years and gradually worked up through the ranks. All these industries use a set of very specialized tools too, in addition to the standard musician's software, so do your homework and learn the voodoo. I can definitely vouch for the benefits of the good old fashioned internship.

I guess my only real advice might be to try to only do work that you love, try hard to stay happy. That sounds cliche but there's nothing worse than trying to force yourself to be creative for something you aren't into. I worked at a jingle house once making awful music for awful television commercials and it sucked the life out of me. I couldn't enjoy making music on my own after a solid work week of that and I was pretty miserable. Don't get me wrong, I can think of a million worse jobs than writing music for tv commercials so it's not a lack of appreciation. I've been very lucky. Just feel good about what you're creating is all.

Oh, and fuck gear. Seriously. It's meaningless. All of it. Pretend it doesn't exist. Worry only about your ears and your ideas. You will actually be needing those.
 

- What is New Atlantis Audio working on currently and can we expect a new Reason ReFill coming out from you guys in the near future?

There's 3 or 4 ReFills in progress that I'd love to get wrapped up as soon as possible. Not sure when exactly though, just "soon"? =) 

Still focusing on sample-based stuff, that's just my thing. I'm buying some land up in the woods in the middle of nowhere and building a house on it with my wife and our friends so probably expect a lot of field recordings in future releases.  Really looking forward to moving out of the city.


Thanks for the great interview Theodore! I can't wait to find out what New Atlantis Audio releases next. And as a gift to Resonant Filter readers for the month of April if you use the code "RESFILT" at check out you'll receive a 25% discount on their ReFills. How cool is that!

-008' DirtySouth Deconstructions

New refill from -008', the company that brought you Drumutations, Crates, Hitman Drums and Urban Tech! Here's the info:

This aint yo granny's construction kit! This is Dirty South Deconstructions!
Your average construction kit has 10 kits for thirty bucks
Here you get 12 kits (inc.demo refill) for only $20!
DRUMS-There are 12 x 6 808 Rex Drum Loop sets, and 12 Redrum 808 kits.
That's 72 one-shots or loops of 808 Kicks,Snares,Claps,Percs,Hats and Crashes
INSTRUMENTS-The 60 bonus Combinator Instruments include Bass,Synth,Pads,Leads and FX
they're made to customize and tweak (way farther than a synth loop)
and two people might get totally different sounds out of the same patch.
For extra fun, I threw in the "huh wha ohhh" vocal chants from a football team I recorded!

Go to www.008refills.com to buy and/or download the demo.

Propellerhead Record + iPad

Mixing a drum session in Propellerhead Record using the iPad as a control surface. Custom Mixer template with TouchOSC via OSCulator.
Peff.com

Daydream

A simple tune on the Rhodes piano, with Drums from MC909 for accompaniment.
corporozzidentity

Trifonic: Graintable Synthesis with Malstrom

Reason's Malstrom synth combines granular synthesis and wavetable synthesis to allow for all kinds of modulation awesomeness. In this video, Brian Trifon of Trifonic demonstrates how to use Malstrom to create rich bass and other synth sounds.

nextstepaudio.com
www.trifonic.com

BassMaker Reason 4 Refill Demo

Demo of Bassmaker, a synth-bass Refill for Propellerhead Reason 4.0 (or higher). The Refill features 139 synth bass patches and 464MB of sampled synth waveforms. You can purchase it from www.vst-patches.com

Propellerhead Record + Reason: Mixer Tips & Tricks #2: Pattern Tremolo (LFO to CV Level In)

Line 6's Propellerhead Product Specialist Matt Piper demonstrates how to use the LFO control voltage (CV) output from a Subtractor Analog Synthesizer to control the volume level on a channel of Record's mixer to produce a tremolo effect. Automation is used to apply different time division values to the LFO rate, producing a Pattern Tremolo effect.
http://line6.com/blog

52 Reason / Record Tips - week 8: Simple drum replacement

"Bro... that snare drum track we recorded last night sounds weak.. I wish we could replace it with this fat snare sample"...
In this weeks episode I show how to achieve drum replacement using the cv out of audio drum tracks to trigger sampled drum parts.
James Bernard- Propellerheads Product Specialist

Evolve Mutations

These videos demonstrate the powerful and dramatic content of Evolve Mutations 1 & 2. See how Heavyocity and Native Instruments take sound design for the modern composer into new realms.
Native Instruments

How you can tell I know a song is done...

Music is "We Died Together" by Torley. Yes, it'll inevitably be released. GET MY MUSIC @ http://torley.com

What if you can't transform creative ideas into reality?

Trilobite asks:

"I have a question and/or idea for a video:
Lot's of times you are talking about how to play stuff, create stuff, how to approach things and so on, which is great (and really helpful!), but I came up with another and probably bigger problem - what if one can't transform what's in their head (or heart?) into reality (music, of course ;) because they lack the ability to play the instrument very well (or at all), that they live with some kind of pressure of ideas they want to release, but lack the knowledge how to transform them.
I'm not sure you understand me, but I hope you do."

Well, what makes you think you can't? :) I go into some possibilities.

Torley

Gate Sidechaining - Ableton Live Tutorial - The DSP Project

This is a really quick easy way to get nice rhythmic cuts based on the other elements in your track. Ableton Live tutorial using the standard gate plugin.
This is a really quick easy way to get nice rhythmic cuts based on the other elements in your track. Ableton Live tutorial using the standard gate plugin.

Comment, subscribe:
thedspproject.com/

Luftrum 2 - 69 Ambient Patches for Reason

Luftrum 2. Ambient ReFill with 69 ambient patches for Thor Synthesizer, Propellerhead Reason 4.

With an exclusive selection of ambient pads, sleeping drones and textured soundscapes Luftrum 2 is taking Thor to a level yet unheard. Judge for yourself and listen to the audio demo. Whether you produce deep cryo-sleeping ambient, experimental IDM or beatless space drone music, this ReFill is guaranteed to inspire your sound. Luftrum 2 sounds like: Harold Budd, Tangerine Dream, Brian Eno, early Aphex Twin, Global Communication, FSoL, Moby and Biosphere.

Luftrum 2 contains 69 ambient patches for Thor:

38 Ambient Pads
16 Textured Soundscapes
8 Minimalistic Lead Synths
7 Sleeping Drones

www.luftrum.com

Kikbak Online

Kikbak, the man behind the Raw MPC @ 4+dBv series has a new website (www.kikbakonline.com) featuring videos, his music, and of course a store. Check out Cancel That Bitch under beats, a smoking track for sure, for sure!

Biscuiting w/ a pinky drum synth (by Franck Smith)

Biscuiting w/ a pinky drum synth (by Franck Smith) © 2010 — Biscuit by Oto Machines is a 8-bit effects/processor allowing precise Lo-Fi treatments and rate frequency downgrading. Used here with drum synth mixing adapted turntable drumming and scratching technics w/ video-game esthetic and real-time electronic beat-making (No loops and no sequencer used here).

Material in this video:
- Handsonic HPD-15 (by Roland)
- Biscuit (by Oto Machines) *FX section not used here

http://twitter.com/franck_smith
http://francksmith.blogspot.com
http://www.youtube.com/odiolorgnette

N.B. Some of the routines obtained here were partly inspired -- in their content and esthetic -- by turntablists Qbert and D-styles . Although nothing can rival real vinyl manipulation by experts, a personal adaptation of these techniques on Handsonic makes imagine new ways in real time electronics.

IF POSSIBLE USE HEADPHONES WHEN VIEWING VIDEO MATERIAL OR CONNECT YOUR COMPUTER TO A QUITE DECENT SOUND SYSTEM.

"Franck Smith" Handsonic turntable adapted techniques Roland HPD-15 drums electronics percussion Biscuit Oto Machines scratching Lo-Fi 8-bit processing Odiolorgnette

Reason 4 tutorial - introduction to dubstep parts 6 & 7

Lets talk more basslines here. The most annoying thing with basslines and dubstep is, its all about tweaking, and changing settings to find the right spots. In this setup, I am going for a bassline that is more present. Using 2 subtractors in a combi.

Additional I am adding a malstrom and go heavy on the combing on that one, and the sweeping bass line.


this session was a bit improvised while I go along.



a little bit of a build up for a sequence.
hydlide.nl

Ambient Space I ReFill free from Nucleus SoundLab

Ambient Space I now 100% Free Download

As a thank all of you for your feedback and support these last 4 years, we've released Ambient Space I for completely free download! This product previously sold for $25. To find out more about what the package includes, click the link above.

The free release includes all available formats - Reason Refill, Wusikstation/Viral Outbreak, Soundfont and SFZ!

www.nucleus-soundlab.com

First / Last / Next

The finale from "Bjorn Arntsen Goes Surround," exploring electronic and acoustic drum & bass. This video features, the late, Glenn Gould, talking about being recorded.


Track 4 from the album "Bjorn Goes Surround."This track explores the doppler effect used in a musical setting. In the 5.1 surround sound version, the backwards Rhodes chords move from the Left and Right speakers to the Left and Right Surround speakers - creating constant movement. Craig Bradfield features on Bassoon, Brendon Putt on trumpet and Strachan Johnston on Double Bass. I play the rest.
www.bjornarntsen.com

The Books - Group Autogenics

The Books, Live @ The Luminary Arts Center

Creating an Auto Panner with Thor in Propellerhead Record

Learn how to create an auto-panner in Propellerhead Record software. This produces an automatic panning for any audio channel using an LFO waveform. All aspects of the waveform can be controlled by the Combinator Patch: Rate, Delay, Waveform, Tempo and Key Sync. You'll also learn how to trigger the Panning (ie: turning it on and off) by programming this functionality into the Combinator's Modulation Matrix. Oodles and oodles of fun. For more, visit Reason 101.

Reason 4 tutorial - introduction to dubstep part 5

Lets talk more basslines here. The most annoying thing with basslines and dubstep is, its all about tweaking, and changing settings to find the right spots. In this setup, I am going for a bassline that is more present. Using 2 subtractors in a combi.

this session was a bit improvised while I go along.
hydlide.nl

Reason - Introduction to dubstep 3 & 4

Here's the kick off for making dubstep inside propellerhead Reason 4. Lets talk basslines. In the next 2 parts I'll be layering in one subbass and one pair of wobbles
hydlide.nl

Reason 4 tutorial - introduction to dubstep part 2

Here's the kick off for making dubstep inside propellerhead Reason 4. Initially I'll start about the drumtrack, since this part is gonna be an important factor.

After this I'll expand the series with a couple of ideas you might need for making bass lines since the drum track and bass lines are the heart of dubstep.
www.hydlide.nl

Click Here for Part 1.

SB-01

SB-01

SB-01 rounds up all the free SampleBasement ReFill's released in 2009. A lot of new material has been added as well. The patchcount goes thru the roof! A total of 1196 patches for the various Reason instruments can be found in this ReFill.

All the multi-samples have been created using the DSI Mopho. A small but very powerful real analog synth. The multi-samples bring you a selection of my favourite Mopho sounds. You can use them to create your own layered Mopho sounds in the NN-XT and/or Combinator.

Have Fun!!

All samples in 24 Bit / 44.1 KHz.

Content

- 10 Multi-samples containing 18 sampled notes each
(1 multi-sample containing 4 velocity layers with 18 sampled notes each.

- 28 Drum Samples.

- 330 Combinator Patches

- 92 Malstrom Patches

- 13 NN-19 Basic Patches

- 36 NN-XT Patches

- 107 Subtractor Patches

- 611 Thor Patches

- 7 Thor Tool Patches

Go to SampleBasement.com to download.

Want to know more about Dave909 and SampleBasement? Check out RF's interview with Dave909 from September of last year.