Nice writeup about “Masks” over at Animation World Magazine. Aparantly I ‘consulted with the Devil’ to come up with the score, which has been described as some “F*%ked up Shit”. Well, how nice. Actually I DO have a special offer over at the Instar store… both CDs for the low low price of YOUR IMMORTAL SOUL*! HA HA!!!! PATHETIC HUMAN!
>> Read Article
>> Hear the Soundtrack
* $15.93 also acceptable in lieu of soul.
devil image courtesy of this excellent PR blog
I hate drummers. Because they SUCK [about 95% of them]. From years of recording and playing in bands I
Inspired by the clean look of Jonathan Coulton’s music page (the song ‘re your brains‘ is fantastic, BTW), I revamped the Instar music site. More free songs, cool play buttons, lyrics, more.
Just back from New York, where I got to hear the draft story line of “Masks”, poke some holes in it, make some suggestions, and generally add about two months of work to the animating. More cinematic shots, Pat! More cinematic shots!
I think this is the best narrative Pat has done yet, and (along with the fairly insane-sounding score) should either get this film universally panned or loved. Bring the hate, film-snobs… we can take it.
Plus I got to play Galaga, ride the Acela, see the leaves, catch a vicious cold – all in all, a perfect New England trip. Go Sox!
Friday Night.
Your friend says “Hey (you), The XYZ Club has Reggae tonight – want to go?”
Ding! The poor reggae band just got demoted to being a “Genre Band”.
No one cares who the band is – as long as they are playing Reggae, everyone will have a good time. If the club substituted another Reggae band of equal skill at the last minute, nobody would mind – or even notice. That’s sad – but the Reggae band doesn’t care, they thought they had a good show. They rocked! They made money!
I’m not picking on Reggae here – any genre can overwhelm the act, but certain styles seem to crush the individuality of bands more than others. Top offenders are Ska, Swing, Blues, and Metal. How many freaking times have you seen a sharp suited bunch of guys hop up and stage and announce their quirky Swing-y name… “Hey, we’re the Poppin’ BeBob Elephant Daddys!” Dear PBED – I don’t care who you are – If your sound is a generic mush of your genre’s standard shtick, I WILL FORGET YOU THE SECOND I LEAVE THE ROOM. If you must be boring, please at least give out free drinks.
It’s the same problem cover bands have – by giving the audience what they want, you become a living jukebox (or in the case of genre bands, “vibe-box”) that delivers a predictable, expected, safe entertainment-pellet for the bar patrons to get sweaty to.
YOUR ONLY HOPE OF ESCAPE, FOOLISH “GENRE BANDS”:
- Write a songs good enough to crawl into the audience’s brain and go home with them.
- Change your boring-ass sound once in a while – switch up your sound during your set (go acoustic, then get loud, use weird effects, get rid of the bass player for a song, actually fire that guy permanently, he’s totally neurotic, whatever).
- Get naked, light something on fire…This is an emergency situation! Your audience has written you off! You must react!
Sadly, lots of Ska/Reggae/Blues/Funk/Whatever bands are out there right now, tonight, playing for comfortable little crowds of ‘fans’ (of the genre, not the band), firing up the good people with predictable moves and stale conventions.
They are musically dead. Unless you own the genre, the genre will own you. Now I’m going to go write a Reggae song. I LOVE Reggae!
[ Download Instar's "Secret Services" Album for free here ]
Pat Smith and I are collaborating on the new film “Masks“. I did audio for two of Pat’s previous films, ‘Drink‘ and ‘Delivery’. Not only is this the first score I’ve done for Pat for a movie that doesn’t start with the letter D, but we also completely inverted the usual director/score dynamic.
Pat asked me to come up with a few different audio ideas, then he picked one for me to develop further. Now he’s off animating to the music (poor bastard – do you have any idea how slow and tedious traditional hand-animation IS ?!? It’s horrible), and when he’s got some pencil-tests and imagery and storyline fleshed out, I’ll write more music and make edits. This is a very fun way for the audio person to work, compared to the usual “Dude! I love XYZ Band – write something that sounds just like them!”.
The score uses a lot of processed voice (basso profundo AND falsetto), random items lying around the studio, and heavily de-tuned guitars. I work mostly in Apple Logic.
Anyway, for the next few months I’ll just be surfing and drinking Caipirinhas while poor Pat toils in NYC, the days getting shorter and shorter, darker and darker… Stop by patsmith.com with your sympathy messages – and tell him to hurry up, I want to see how this crazy thing turns out.
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Visit the Instar website:
http://www.instarmusic.com
Free music downloads, photos, and video
About a year-ago I bought (on a whim) the Adrenalinn 2 guitar effect – it’s a remarkable little device that combines a simple drum machine with a guitar-amp modeler and a bunch of tempo-synced effects. So, instead of setting a delay to be 410 milliseconds long, you can set it to be a quarter-note long. And if you speed up or slow down the tempo of your drum beat, the delay automatically adjusts itself to fit. You can create amazing textures by processing the drum machine through the FX modules along with the guitar. Anyway, I loved this unit, and built it into my performance system. Turns out the unit is built by Rodger Linn – the inventor of the sampling drum machine back in the day. His LM-1 machine was used by everyone from Peter Gabriel to Prince.
I had a few technical questions, and on a whim called the company. Who did I get on the phone but the extremely helpful and friendly Roger Linn himself. Anyway, after a chat R invited me to help beta-test the then still in-development Adrenalinn 3. [ This is pretty much like a guitar player calling some company and getting Les Paul on the phone. ]
Over the next few months I experimented with the unit, hunted bugs, and even made a few feature requests which got incorporated into the final product. I’m pretty psyched to be able to take partial credit for the dedicated drum-distortion feature (thank you, thank you).
Anyway, my point is this: if you play any kind of electric instrument – guitar, bass, keys, YOU WOULD BE RETARDED TO NOT CHECK OUT THIS BOX. I’ve owned pretty much every rock gadget I can get my hands on, and this doodad is the most musical little rock contraption ever. One of these and an instrument and you can put on a very cool show.
[ Update: see the followup post after you read this ]
A good open mic is one of the most productive ways to play out. No booking agent hassles, no super-late nights – just get in, play a few songs, and get out. Awesome.
Plus, there’s a HUGE benefit to playing out a little all the time, rather than over-rehearsing for The Super Important Big Show (at which you’ll no doubt be stressed and freaked out by the new environment). It’s great to ‘fail often’ – find a new thing to improve every time you do that 2-4 song mini set. I know for a fact that my live performance (and my equipment) has improved massively from weekly testing. I’m lucky to have the excellent open mic @ Mongo’s available to me (thanks, Kurt & Brad) – find your own local open mic here.
There is, however, a downside. Open mics can also suck. Suck. SUCK…
Chief Open Mic Suckyness Enhancers:
But enough bitching. Open Mics are great. If you can find one with a cool vibe, with some original players, a supportive host… buy a few drinks and support the night. It’s special.
[ Update: see the followup post after you read this ]
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Visit the Instar website:
http://www.instarmusic.com
Free music downloads, photos, and video
