yeah. i'm not going to hear anything back from that psychiatrist. i've been working on a mix that has taken longer than i expected; when it's done, i'm going to have to make some calls.
i may have to fast forward my reaction a little, depending on what i hear when i call to ask for an extension.
i've been sort of contemplating just giving up and getting a job. see, the problem is that my perspective on labour is going to be very disappointing to people. it may be suggested that it's defeatist, but anybody reacting that way is missing the point. see, as i'd be working because i'm forced to, my desire would be to minimize the amount of effort i have to put into it, rather than maximize what i can get out of it. i already know that i can't get anything at all out of it - or at least nothing that i want. i can't make enough money fast enough to retire in a reasonable time frame, so what's the point? that's not a defeatist perspective, it's simply the reality of it. it doesn't really matter what the nature of the job is or how big the pay check is, it's all the same waste of time to me.
this isn't something new. i figured this out around 2006-2008ish. i had a few jobs over the period that required a larger amount of responsibility, which meant i had to spend more time on them. that meant i had less time to do the things i was actually interested in, which meant i was very unhappy. i ended up quitting these jobs to take lower paying jobs that were closer to where i lived. it might seem strange to quit a full time job at microsoft to take a survey job at half the pay, but it meant i had twice the time. i was much happier with less responsibility, and the lower pay check didn't affect me.
the crux is that you can't just put pressure on an anarchist to act like a capitalist and expect it to happen. this is actually a key point worked into the system. they call it "incentives", but.....they're not universal in their effectiveness, at least. i'm simply not driven by profit motives. i'm not interested in climbing a hierarchy. helping people doesn't excite me. when i say that i think labour in this society is a waste of time, i'm not just saying that. i really believe that, and my actions are going to reflect it.
so, i'd rather work a job with the lowest amount of responsibilities possible. i'm not going to apply for the kinds of jobs that my education prepared me for because i don't want the responsibilities attached to them; if i'm going to be forced to work, my preference would be to work part time in the service industry. i can pay my bills with about 20 hours a week at minimum wage, and i consequently wouldn't want to work more than that. of course, if i can work at a higher wage rate, it means i'd have to work less...
what that means is i'm taking hours away from somebody that has a family to feed or wants to build a resume to get somewhere. it's certainly not beneficial to me. it's not really beneficial to society, either.
my worker keeps telling me that she doesn't understand why i don't want to live up to my potential. but, i *do* want to live up to my potential. i just don't see any goals that i can accomplish in the workforce. and i work very hard on what i do.
the reality is that i haven't had a job since 2008. it's going to be a culture shock if it comes down to it, and i'm going to have to be very careful that i don't take a job with too much structure - because i won't last. if i don't quit, i'll get fired. because i don't want to be there.
as mentioned, i may have to fast forward the reaction. i'm going to do everything humanly possible to stay on odsp. it may get messy. i'll keep this space updated.
when i compare a job at statscan v. a job at mcdonalds, i don't look at the pay rate, i look at the responsibility level required.
if i'm working at mcdonalds, i can just go home at the end of the day and not worry about it - meaning what i've lost is the amount of time working, and that only.
but, working at statscan means i have assignments i need to take home, staff parties and all kinds of other things - meaning i'm going to lose far more time working there.
i'd consequently rather work at mcdonalds. and, there's plenty of logic in the decision. it just puts value on minimizing time lost working, rather than maximizing time converted into money.
again, the most rational thing to do is just to let me off the hook on this. we have a surplus of labour. and i'm producing a product with real value, even if the market isn't reacting to it. if it requires three or four suicide attempts, so be it.
i think i've mentioned this before...
i was hoping to see a psychiatrist over december, and either have the forms filled out by the person or take the information to have them filled out by camh at the beginning of january. i was going to determine if i needed an extension or not over the course of december.
but, the psychiatrist is not calling back.
so, i now need to call and ask for an extension. when i'm done this mix and can shower and stuff...
one of two things will happen.
1) if i get the extension, i will wait until january before i react.
2) if i do not get the extension, i will need to have the forms filled out before january and will have to take extraordinary steps to have that happen. my plan is to go immediately to camh and demand to see a doctor. i will give them one hour to accommodate this. should they choose to not allow me to see a doctor, i will start popping aspirin in the foyer. i will make the condition known. hopefully, that will be enough to get the diagnosis. if it is not, i will repeat the same thing over and over again (go to camh, give them an hour, start popping aspirin) until i am able to get the forms filled out.
this is a recurrence problem, in terms of diagnosis, and i'm aware of it. i just need to be careful that i don't give them an excuse to put me in jail rather than fill out the forms.
it's not a question of if i belong on odsp. i do. anybody that knows me knows this. it's a question of demonstrating the fact.
the first time, they're probably going to tell me that i'm trying to get a reaction and am behaving rationally, and i'm going to agree with them - and suggest it's pathological behaviour. if they agree, that's the end of it. if they don't, then repeated occurrences have no end point but eventual diagnosis with some sort of personality disorder.
after the third or fourth time, they're going to have no option. i have no intention of hiding the fact that i'm being aggressive about this; to the contrary, i think it's the key point in the diagnosis.
could anybody do this? in theory, sure. but i think you'd by definition need to be crazy in order to actually go through with it.
in the end, this can be done the easy way or the hard way. and i have every intention of making the hard way very, very, very hard for camh....
in the end, i may end up in jail. on purpose. my concept of freedom aligns fairly well with free meals and infinite library access; certainly, it's closer to my idea of freedom than being forced to find a job. but, i'm not done my discography yet...
my plan after i finish my unfinished works is to lose myself in the books. and, when it comes down to it, jail might be the preferable option to do that.
i don't want to hurt anybody though. i'll have to study the legal code. i might pretend to rob a bank or something...
yeah, i'd want to be separated from the general population, i think. but the general condition doesn't really frighten me. if i decide to go to jail, i'll do the research in figuring out how to get to the condition i want to be in. that's not going to be for a few years.....
Thursday, December 4, 2014
an open letter to the fucker at the mixing desk...
listen. people have been mixing things differently for different equipment for years. there's a substantial amount of 70s aor that's mixed for fm radio, and sometimes even specifically for cars. what that means is that if you're listening to your favourite zeppelin disk on a turntable then you're doing it wrong - pop it in your car, and you'll hear the drums and bass come out better through your trunk, if you still have that kind of system in your car (and you probably don't). in the late 70s, people started mixing things for clubs, and it's still something that defines essentially all dance music. when mtv hit, people started producing different video mixes for tv. you'll notice that if you track down old videos on youtube they're often mixed differently than the versions on the records, to compensate for crappy tv speakers. there was an industry built around "digital remasters", which was a reaction to the jump to compact discs. a lot of early idm is mixed specifically for headphones, and doesn't sound nearly as good when played through a set of actual speakers. more recently, some producers have started mixing tracks specifically for mp3, which means laying off the compression at the mastering stage because it's understood that the source is going to be compressed. i stumbled upon this myself in the late 90s, when i started realizing some of my songs sounded better through mp3. i didn't understand the role of compression in mastering at the time, and was essentially stumbling upon a crude form of mastering.
my music is eclectic, but it's broadly in a progressive rock tradition. what that means is that i'm mixing for reproduction. but i'm specifically mixing for reproduction over headphones. i make this very, very clear in my repeated requests for people to listen over headphones. but, you also need to be listening to it from a decent source - a stereo system, preferably.
it's not a question of one approach being better than another, it's just a question of how the music is meant to be listened to.
so, yes, i'm going to mix the bass in ways that may cause somebody's phone to explode. when i listen to my stuff on my laptop speakers, i often can't even hear the bottom end at all. but i don't fucking care about people that want to listen to music through shitty equipment. sorry.
i know that a lot of people want to be pragmatic about this, but i don't. it's going to be a function of any music that uses the spectrum in a complicated way - it's going to sound bad on cheap equipment. that's why it's cheap equipment...
as stupid as this is, you gotta understand it sounds better out of a car with a subwoofer in the trunk. it's easy to understand when you hear it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC-T0rC6m7I
and if you're trying to listen to this without phones, you're missing half the mix.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRUREWB_sJw
listen. people have been mixing things differently for different equipment for years. there's a substantial amount of 70s aor that's mixed for fm radio, and sometimes even specifically for cars. what that means is that if you're listening to your favourite zeppelin disk on a turntable then you're doing it wrong - pop it in your car, and you'll hear the drums and bass come out better through your trunk, if you still have that kind of system in your car (and you probably don't). in the late 70s, people started mixing things for clubs, and it's still something that defines essentially all dance music. when mtv hit, people started producing different video mixes for tv. you'll notice that if you track down old videos on youtube they're often mixed differently than the versions on the records, to compensate for crappy tv speakers. there was an industry built around "digital remasters", which was a reaction to the jump to compact discs. a lot of early idm is mixed specifically for headphones, and doesn't sound nearly as good when played through a set of actual speakers. more recently, some producers have started mixing tracks specifically for mp3, which means laying off the compression at the mastering stage because it's understood that the source is going to be compressed. i stumbled upon this myself in the late 90s, when i started realizing some of my songs sounded better through mp3. i didn't understand the role of compression in mastering at the time, and was essentially stumbling upon a crude form of mastering.
my music is eclectic, but it's broadly in a progressive rock tradition. what that means is that i'm mixing for reproduction. but i'm specifically mixing for reproduction over headphones. i make this very, very clear in my repeated requests for people to listen over headphones. but, you also need to be listening to it from a decent source - a stereo system, preferably.
it's not a question of one approach being better than another, it's just a question of how the music is meant to be listened to.
so, yes, i'm going to mix the bass in ways that may cause somebody's phone to explode. when i listen to my stuff on my laptop speakers, i often can't even hear the bottom end at all. but i don't fucking care about people that want to listen to music through shitty equipment. sorry.
i know that a lot of people want to be pragmatic about this, but i don't. it's going to be a function of any music that uses the spectrum in a complicated way - it's going to sound bad on cheap equipment. that's why it's cheap equipment...
as stupid as this is, you gotta understand it sounds better out of a car with a subwoofer in the trunk. it's easy to understand when you hear it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hC-T0rC6m7I
and if you're trying to listen to this without phones, you're missing half the mix.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eRUREWB_sJw
actually,
i think i'm safe. i just checked the modified dates on the project
files, and it indicated they hadn't been modified, so the information
had to still be there. so i reinstalled the plugin and the information
seems to have reappeared...
thankfully.
yeah. i think it's ok. it looks ok. i may have fucked the bass part up myself in reaction, but i wasn't done mixing it yet, anyways. but now i'm paranoid about it. the key thing was those nasty guitars and they seem to be back to what they should be. a little extra quality control in a final run through isn't a really bad thing.
i just wish i knew what caused it. it wasn't that the settings were changed or anything, it was that the plugin on the track was just gone. deleted. caput.
just a reminder to save your settings. i did have them archived, but i wasn't sure they were updated....
it's izotope, fwiw. and it's not the first time it's gone wacky, but it is the first time this has happened. i guess i at least know now...
anyways, back to work. i plan to be done this today.
thankfully.
yeah. i think it's ok. it looks ok. i may have fucked the bass part up myself in reaction, but i wasn't done mixing it yet, anyways. but now i'm paranoid about it. the key thing was those nasty guitars and they seem to be back to what they should be. a little extra quality control in a final run through isn't a really bad thing.
i just wish i knew what caused it. it wasn't that the settings were changed or anything, it was that the plugin on the track was just gone. deleted. caput.
just a reminder to save your settings. i did have them archived, but i wasn't sure they were updated....
it's izotope, fwiw. and it's not the first time it's gone wacky, but it is the first time this has happened. i guess i at least know now...
anyways, back to work. i plan to be done this today.
omg....ALL the mastering settings are destroyed....i think i'm going to cry....
i don't understand how this could happen. it was fine last night when i went to sleep. now, i wake up and it's all ruined? wtf is going on?
i'm going to need a few minutes to order myself. but there's not anything else to do but sit down and recreate it the best i can.
i don't understand how this could happen. it was fine last night when i went to sleep. now, i wake up and it's all ruined? wtf is going on?
i'm going to need a few minutes to order myself. but there's not anything else to do but sit down and recreate it the best i can.
wow.
my plugins magically changed. i don't understand how this is possible, but it could set me back a few days. i spent a lot of time getting the guitars to have that raunchy, boris-style sound and they seem to have defaulted to some bullshit corporate 80s rock garbage. ugh...
i may have them saved in an old file. otherwise, i have to redo what i spent the last week doing. and i'm not happy about it.
my plugins magically changed. i don't understand how this is possible, but it could set me back a few days. i spent a lot of time getting the guitars to have that raunchy, boris-style sound and they seem to have defaulted to some bullshit corporate 80s rock garbage. ugh...
i may have them saved in an old file. otherwise, i have to redo what i spent the last week doing. and i'm not happy about it.
Wednesday, December 3, 2014
i realize my discography has become difficult to navigate through, so i've labelled the releases as lps, eps, singles, etc.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/
yeah. i got this out. the three important things to get out were the two
classicals and the acoustic, because the excitation on the high end of
the guitars is just super tinny - it's the primary reason i'm doing this
in the first place. when i did a similar transform a few years ago, i
just wasn't paying attention and it fucked up the song. i was able to
cleanly remove all three. they're completely inaudible in the output.
i wanted to get the bass out to compress it separately, and i was able to at least floor it. i'll have to play with this. i had multiple paste overs in the track, which has left it as a ghost; i'm doubling it in the remix, as well. i suspect this may actually work out ok. but i may have to squeeze it out using a multiband compressor. that's not something i want to do though, we'll see how it sounds...
there was a really raunchy guitar part that i didn't think i'd be able to get out well, but managed to. i'm surprised by this as i thought i had overlayed it, but i guess i didn't. that will let me put it through a separate amp sim and really raunch the fuck out of it. it's already completely decimated, though, so i'm not sure how much more catastrophic i can get it.
there were three synth parts on top of that. i was unable to line up two of them, but i got about half of one out. i could have probably got it completely out, but i decided not to because i want to double it through the reverb anyways and it's at about the right volume. that's why i'm not concerning myself with those two synth parts, either.
that's what was in the file to disassemble. disassembly complete. now, to reassemble it...
i wanted to get the bass out to compress it separately, and i was able to at least floor it. i'll have to play with this. i had multiple paste overs in the track, which has left it as a ghost; i'm doubling it in the remix, as well. i suspect this may actually work out ok. but i may have to squeeze it out using a multiband compressor. that's not something i want to do though, we'll see how it sounds...
there was a really raunchy guitar part that i didn't think i'd be able to get out well, but managed to. i'm surprised by this as i thought i had overlayed it, but i guess i didn't. that will let me put it through a separate amp sim and really raunch the fuck out of it. it's already completely decimated, though, so i'm not sure how much more catastrophic i can get it.
there were three synth parts on top of that. i was unable to line up two of them, but i got about half of one out. i could have probably got it completely out, but i decided not to because i want to double it through the reverb anyways and it's at about the right volume. that's why i'm not concerning myself with those two synth parts, either.
that's what was in the file to disassemble. disassembly complete. now, to reassemble it...
i've been far more successful in getting the tracks separated today. i got the first classical out clean, the bass to -15db and the distorted build down to static. what's left may even add a bit of definition to the mix if it's put through the reverb. the last thing i need to pull out for this approach to be feasible is the ending classical part, and even that is just a small section of it.
separating the tracks means i can reverberate them separately.
if i'm not able to get the last classical out, i think i've got it worked down to the point where i may be able to rebuild the time shift, and then reconstruct from there.
either way, i'm no longer stuck with this end part as one file. i *will* be able to mix it...
separating the tracks means i can reverberate them separately.
if i'm not able to get the last classical out, i think i've got it worked down to the point where i may be able to rebuild the time shift, and then reconstruct from there.
either way, i'm no longer stuck with this end part as one file. i *will* be able to mix it...
Tuesday, December 2, 2014
i've had to stop and start mixing all day to rest my ears. this is not something you want to listen to on repeat at high volumes unless you're using earplugs, but i want to make sure i'm not getting the sound of being dulled to the room reverb on the guitar amps. the effect is in the sudden onset, so listening to it over and over again as one normally would when mixing is simply the wrong approach - i'm going to get used to the roar as it cycles, and end up with the wrong output. so, i have to listen to it loud, stop, adjust, wait and repeat. it's just about there. i think the next run through could legitimately be the last one...
well, for the first 7 minutes, anyways. but that's the hard part. the last 18 minutes is going to be minor tweaks.
well, for the first 7 minutes, anyways. but that's the hard part. the last 18 minutes is going to be minor tweaks.
Monday, December 1, 2014
nah. i could only get the acoustic out clean. the other files had
components that weren't saved. like, the big buildup was pasted over top
of itself at least twice, but i only saved the final version, so i
can't possibly get it out. i can turn the bass down but i can't take it
out. the classical part seems to have been cut up, which is leaving ugly
relics. and neither synth part wants to come out at all...
i also tested it with the reverb i wanted to use and realized that the sound i wanted to reverberate was a mix of the effect pattern i'm trying to isolate and the bottom end of the acoustic guitar. i think i'm better off playing with the plugin...
takeaway: i'm not *actually* close to being done this, and it's almost the end of the day...
i need to go back to the start and do it slowly, one section at a time. at least i know now that i have a few options that i didn't think were available to me.
the key thing is that i need to mix it for high volumes. that's what's wrong; that's what needs to be focused on.
it's actually not in a bad state. tomorrow. maybe.
i also tested it with the reverb i wanted to use and realized that the sound i wanted to reverberate was a mix of the effect pattern i'm trying to isolate and the bottom end of the acoustic guitar. i think i'm better off playing with the plugin...
takeaway: i'm not *actually* close to being done this, and it's almost the end of the day...
i need to go back to the start and do it slowly, one section at a time. at least i know now that i have a few options that i didn't think were available to me.
the key thing is that i need to mix it for high volumes. that's what's wrong; that's what needs to be focused on.
it's actually not in a bad state. tomorrow. maybe.
i seem to have succeeded in cleverly removing the acoustic guitar part from the base file by using the technique of phase inversion. this adds a whole new level of complexity to the remix, but it also allows me to reverberate the electric guitar parts without making the acoustic part tinny.
if i can get the rest of the mix out, i'll be able to do this cleanly....
if i can get the rest of the mix out, i'll be able to do this cleanly....
i'm being schizophrenic. it seems to have to do with very subtle changes in the master volume level on the receiver out. but that's going to be true of anything - nothing sounds the same loud as it does quiet. i just need to dial into the sweet spot and not touch it until the master is done.
it also seems to have to do with the dulling effect of listening to something loud. i think that's the key thing i've confused myself with. when i was mixing the power chords, i was doing it at a high volume. then, i came back the next day and it didn't sound the same. sure - my ears weren't ringing anymore.
i find it sounds better if i sort of put my ears into a state of shock by blaring it for a few seconds, then turn it down a little. that's a realistic way to do it, too, because the end point of this is for it to be headphone music.
i tend to mix at high volumes, but mixed this at a lower volume because the input file was already floored. that is, i got the high volume effect without having to turn the volume up. now, it's doubling back on me.
what was freaking me out was not understanding *why* it was changing sounds so apparently randomly. i think i'm getting a handle on the factors. i may have to tweak a few things, but grasping the factors is the key part...
i think it'll be done today.
it also seems to have to do with the dulling effect of listening to something loud. i think that's the key thing i've confused myself with. when i was mixing the power chords, i was doing it at a high volume. then, i came back the next day and it didn't sound the same. sure - my ears weren't ringing anymore.
i find it sounds better if i sort of put my ears into a state of shock by blaring it for a few seconds, then turn it down a little. that's a realistic way to do it, too, because the end point of this is for it to be headphone music.
i tend to mix at high volumes, but mixed this at a lower volume because the input file was already floored. that is, i got the high volume effect without having to turn the volume up. now, it's doubling back on me.
what was freaking me out was not understanding *why* it was changing sounds so apparently randomly. i think i'm getting a handle on the factors. i may have to tweak a few things, but grasping the factors is the key part...
i think it'll be done today.
the fact is..
no matter how closely i study it,
no matter how i take it apart,
no matter how I break it down...
it remains consistent.
then why the fuck does it keep sounding differently? like, it's changing on a play-by-play basis, here. it's driving me berserk...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pr70ttkMoHE
no matter how closely i study it,
no matter how i take it apart,
no matter how I break it down...
it remains consistent.
then why the fuck does it keep sounding differently? like, it's changing on a play-by-play basis, here. it's driving me berserk...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pr70ttkMoHE
it still sounds wrong. i don't get it. but i need to rebuild it.
....no. wait. it makes more sense to deconstruct it. the only thing that makes any sense to me is that, as i've loaded more effects, i've increased the processor load and it's having an effect on the way the sound is going through the plugins. it might be the pre-amp i put on the bass. i can test this by taking the bass part out. if it turns out that this is the problem, i may have to mix it down and then add the bass parts in to a new mix.
i could also try and render some of the effects, but i've had mixed results with this in the past.
it's an older processor, now. i bought it in early '07. it was on it's way out even at the time. but what i wanted was the fastest single core i could get because i knew a lot of the software couldn't use multiple cores. so, i got a double running at 3.6 each, which was on sale because there were more efficient processors running at lower clock speeds. the version of cubase i'm using is from 2005. if you ask it to use a quadcore, it can't - it uses one of the four processors. but there are reasons why i prefer sx over newer versions of cubase. what i'm getting to is that i'm not going to accomplish anything getting a newer processor, even if i had the cash, because it's about as fast as a single core gets and none of the software i'm using can interpret multiple cores.
but it's certainly possible that some of the plugins might make compromises on the edge of the spectrum if the processor is being asked to compute too many things at once and this is why i'm getting a tinny sound. i can't prove this, but i can test it. i can't understand this, otherwise....
....no. wait. it makes more sense to deconstruct it. the only thing that makes any sense to me is that, as i've loaded more effects, i've increased the processor load and it's having an effect on the way the sound is going through the plugins. it might be the pre-amp i put on the bass. i can test this by taking the bass part out. if it turns out that this is the problem, i may have to mix it down and then add the bass parts in to a new mix.
i could also try and render some of the effects, but i've had mixed results with this in the past.
it's an older processor, now. i bought it in early '07. it was on it's way out even at the time. but what i wanted was the fastest single core i could get because i knew a lot of the software couldn't use multiple cores. so, i got a double running at 3.6 each, which was on sale because there were more efficient processors running at lower clock speeds. the version of cubase i'm using is from 2005. if you ask it to use a quadcore, it can't - it uses one of the four processors. but there are reasons why i prefer sx over newer versions of cubase. what i'm getting to is that i'm not going to accomplish anything getting a newer processor, even if i had the cash, because it's about as fast as a single core gets and none of the software i'm using can interpret multiple cores.
but it's certainly possible that some of the plugins might make compromises on the edge of the spectrum if the processor is being asked to compute too many things at once and this is why i'm getting a tinny sound. i can't prove this, but i can test it. i can't understand this, otherwise....
Sunday, November 30, 2014
i promised this would be done today, but the mix is sounding weird and i don't really know what to do about it. i'm considering starting from scratch, but really don't want to. i've just somehow lost a lot of bass and gained a lot of treble and don't understand what's causing it.
i've also developed a headache, probably from the stress of it not sounding correctly. so, i need to sleep it off.
this has happened before and it's sounded "right" when i woke up. hopefully, that happens this time, as well.
i've also developed a headache, probably from the stress of it not sounding correctly. so, i need to sleep it off.
this has happened before and it's sounded "right" when i woke up. hopefully, that happens this time, as well.
you know, sometimes i'm legitimately convinced that there's somebody else at the mixing console - that the computer is being controlled remotely, and there's some dipshit with a bag of doritos on his lap staring at a mixing board muttering to himself "no, no, no. this is all wrong. she wants to do it like this...", who then proceeds to fuck up everything i'm doing for the purposes of conforming to some stale concept of what is deemed to sound "correct".
i'm convinced of this because the mix tends to randomly change. and, so i curse at the ceiling and plead that this intervention ends, to various points of success. it's almost like they're on shift work, and my problem is with the overnight guy, because it seems to generally ease once the sun comes up.
i repeat the same things over and over again: you have no prerogative to fuck with my mix, no right to invade in my space. so, kindly fuck off.
but, for whatever reason it seems to be a temporary reprieve. whatever or whomever is in charge continually decides that i really don't know what i'm doing, that they're really helping...
not helping. not possible to help. only possible to interfere.
the more reasonable explanation is that i need to reboot the board from time to time.
but the perception is hard to shake....
and if i ever find the bastard, i may very well bash his head in with a shovel - if i can find a shovel in the moment, which is not likely to happen.
i'm convinced of this because the mix tends to randomly change. and, so i curse at the ceiling and plead that this intervention ends, to various points of success. it's almost like they're on shift work, and my problem is with the overnight guy, because it seems to generally ease once the sun comes up.
i repeat the same things over and over again: you have no prerogative to fuck with my mix, no right to invade in my space. so, kindly fuck off.
but, for whatever reason it seems to be a temporary reprieve. whatever or whomever is in charge continually decides that i really don't know what i'm doing, that they're really helping...
not helping. not possible to help. only possible to interfere.
the more reasonable explanation is that i need to reboot the board from time to time.
but the perception is hard to shake....
and if i ever find the bastard, i may very well bash his head in with a shovel - if i can find a shovel in the moment, which is not likely to happen.
Saturday, November 29, 2014
schrodinger's swan
this seems like the best thing on youtube to crosslink this to...
i put a five-year listening period on my serious reviews in order to ensure that the music can sink in and be put into context. sometimes, it's a matter of convention. with something like swans, it's really necessary to make sense of it. i've been a swans fan since the late 90s, and share a certain artistic approach with them, so i'm coming into this very, very familiar with what they are and what they're aiming for. i'm extremely critical but i need to point out that gira is one of a handful of living artists that i have legitimate respect for, as an artist. i'm not ready to write a full review yet, but i think i'm ready to provide a general impression.
oddly, not many people seem to be spilling much ink on the absence of jarboe. sure, it's not like there's any real chance that she's coming back to the band. but it's sort of remarkable how totally she's been written out of the band, as though she never existed in the first place. this strikes me as indicative of most reviewers coming to the band after their breakup period looking for a seminal doom act, and sort of skipping their psychedelic 90s phase. but, see, i think there's a dominant argument that what made swans' 90s work so remarkable was the interplay between gira's dour bluntness and jarboe's lighter, more airy presentation. you could think of it as tension and release. but it's just the juxtaposition of it...
gira's tried to compensate with the use of various female vocalists, but it's clear that it's on a guest vocalist level rather than a collaborative level, meaning it just doesn't capture the juxtaposition on as organic of a level.
in a sense, maybe it's unfair to draw the comparison. everybody knows jarboe isn't in the band any more. but, if you have an understanding of what swans is, the more recent material just seems like it's missing an important ingredient.
putting that aside, one needs to review a record for what it is.
the core of this disc is as strong as anything else swans has put out, but i get the impression gira is being driven a little too strongly by expectations. i'm all for long records, but a long record is something that needs to develop out of an overriding concept or simply a lot of material. neither of these things seem to apply to this. it seems like this record is long simply for the sake of being long, and is loaded with tons of filler to get to the point of being long. i don't think we really needed nearly as much aimless jamming (and a lot of it is aimless jamming) or damo suzuki impersonations.
i'm not walking away from it with the sense of it being the kind of masterpiece that gira has previously been involved with creating. rather, i'm walking away from it thinking it's a little tedious and that large amounts of it are simply rather grating.
i don't think this record is going to hold up as well as his other major works. it might be partially as a result of trying to fit perceived expectations of an epic double record. but i think it might be a bit of pretension getting into his head.
this could have been a strong 9 if pared down a little. as it is, i have to give it a 6 or a 7.
i put a five-year listening period on my serious reviews in order to ensure that the music can sink in and be put into context. sometimes, it's a matter of convention. with something like swans, it's really necessary to make sense of it. i've been a swans fan since the late 90s, and share a certain artistic approach with them, so i'm coming into this very, very familiar with what they are and what they're aiming for. i'm extremely critical but i need to point out that gira is one of a handful of living artists that i have legitimate respect for, as an artist. i'm not ready to write a full review yet, but i think i'm ready to provide a general impression.
oddly, not many people seem to be spilling much ink on the absence of jarboe. sure, it's not like there's any real chance that she's coming back to the band. but it's sort of remarkable how totally she's been written out of the band, as though she never existed in the first place. this strikes me as indicative of most reviewers coming to the band after their breakup period looking for a seminal doom act, and sort of skipping their psychedelic 90s phase. but, see, i think there's a dominant argument that what made swans' 90s work so remarkable was the interplay between gira's dour bluntness and jarboe's lighter, more airy presentation. you could think of it as tension and release. but it's just the juxtaposition of it...
gira's tried to compensate with the use of various female vocalists, but it's clear that it's on a guest vocalist level rather than a collaborative level, meaning it just doesn't capture the juxtaposition on as organic of a level.
in a sense, maybe it's unfair to draw the comparison. everybody knows jarboe isn't in the band any more. but, if you have an understanding of what swans is, the more recent material just seems like it's missing an important ingredient.
putting that aside, one needs to review a record for what it is.
the core of this disc is as strong as anything else swans has put out, but i get the impression gira is being driven a little too strongly by expectations. i'm all for long records, but a long record is something that needs to develop out of an overriding concept or simply a lot of material. neither of these things seem to apply to this. it seems like this record is long simply for the sake of being long, and is loaded with tons of filler to get to the point of being long. i don't think we really needed nearly as much aimless jamming (and a lot of it is aimless jamming) or damo suzuki impersonations.
i'm not walking away from it with the sense of it being the kind of masterpiece that gira has previously been involved with creating. rather, i'm walking away from it thinking it's a little tedious and that large amounts of it are simply rather grating.
i don't think this record is going to hold up as well as his other major works. it might be partially as a result of trying to fit perceived expectations of an epic double record. but i think it might be a bit of pretension getting into his head.
this could have been a strong 9 if pared down a little. as it is, i have to give it a 6 or a 7.
Zack Fishley
I envy people who lived through Swans' original run and are able to see those albums as Gira's masterpieces. While I like them, I feel like albums like Soundtracks For the Blind lose focus quickly when they hit disc 2. Just not as memorable.
deathtokoalas
they're more abstract records; they explore a wider scope. memorable is a subjective thing. but, you can objectively state that they require a deeper attention span and greater focus on the actual music. i find his newest work has more aspects of his oldest work in that sense; they're great if you want to listen to one or two things for three hours. soundtracks is more variable, and so is more immersive. but, you have to be looking for that, otherwise you're going to trail off, like you said.
what i was trying to get across here is that it isn't that gira has lost a step. what's amazing is that he really hasn't. it's more that he's lost a layer of self-criticism.
i'm almost done remixing my fourth symphony, which is a long time
coming. i finished recording the parts in 2002 and have been messing
around with it every few years since 2006, but i could never get it
quite right because i didn't really have the right tools to do it. what i
needed to do was separate it into parts, but what i had was a wave file
that i pasted parts into rather than anything i could recreate in a
traditional multitracking environment. trying to figure out where each
of the parts began was very hard without being able to line the parts
up...
trepanation nation (raw guitar mix) (initial upload)
around the middle of 2007, i sat down and tried to just paste some guitars over top of a half done mix i had. in the process, i created a guitar collage that i found interesting in it's own right and put aside for possible release as a remix one day. this is an entirely new mix, but it's based on that idea.
the idea was created around july 30, 2007. final mix was rendered on november 29, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/09-trepanation-nation-raw-guitar-mix
the idea was created around july 30, 2007. final mix was rendered on november 29, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/09-trepanation-nation-raw-guitar-mix
i was hoping to catch animals as leaders last night, but i ended up passing out. i'm not sure how exciting a live show it would have been. great guitarist, but it's headphone music.
i've got a new map up that organized things a little differently. as you can see, this is just loaded with guitar overdubs, a lot of them doubled or quintupled through separate effects paths. it seems like i'm hurtling towards 70 tracks. three more things to do there, down at the bottom.
...although i'm starting to wonder about maybe doubling a few more parts later in the song. we'll see how this goes....
i've got a new map up that organized things a little differently. as you can see, this is just loaded with guitar overdubs, a lot of them doubled or quintupled through separate effects paths. it seems like i'm hurtling towards 70 tracks. three more things to do there, down at the bottom.
...although i'm starting to wonder about maybe doubling a few more parts later in the song. we'll see how this goes....
Friday, November 28, 2014
it's almost there, really. i've just had to restart a few times, mixing different aspects in in different orders. i eventually concluded that i had to take the bass right out to mix the rest of it, after a few tries of trying to build it on the bass. the bass is important in the track, so i wanted to get the sound in first so it wouldn't cut anything else out, but i was just flooring it repeatedly. i've got almost everything else in - i now just have to set the levels on some power chords, mix the synths in and play with the bass compression until it's at the right volume. it's hard to say if it'll be done by noon or not; if it is, it'll be done today. otherwise, i need to do some real life things this afternoon and it will have to wait until tomorrow for finalization.
Thursday, November 27, 2014
here's the final map (i think). considering this is a 25 minute track, 44 tracks is actually pretty minimal - even if the base and drum files are composed of several tracks. there's a lot of doubles, as a relic of the mixing process, so it probably balances out to around 45 as an accurate estimate. that said, i may actually end up paring it down as i mix it. but i'd need more than a 32-track board for this if i were doing it the old fashioned way...
i think this should be mixed by the time the sun comes up.
i think this should be mixed by the time the sun comes up.
Wednesday, November 26, 2014
rabbit is jaguar?
wish it was a wolf....
rabid is wolf.
rabit is wolf.
rabbit is wolf.
i like the monty python shot, but that would be much cooler if i could find it......
i'm not really skilled with photoshop like apps. i don't even have one installed. but i could surely figure that out.
maybe a back panel, if the disc sells any copies.
wish it was a wolf....
it was a pun.
rabid is wolf.
rabit is wolf.
rabbit is wolf.
i like the monty python shot, but that would be much cooler if i could find it......
i'm not really skilled with photoshop like apps. i don't even have one installed. but i could surely figure that out.
maybe a back panel, if the disc sells any copies.
alright, i've finally got this thing lined up into components, split into very close approximations of snapshots in april, may, june and july of 2002 - as well as snapshots in 2007 and 2009. what that means is i can build up each snapshot mix by successively activating each folder.
now, i just need to mix the parts.
but i seem to have not slept well last night, so it'll be when i wake up. i think i'm only a few hours away from getting this, though.
it's probably because i spent four hours walking through london, and four hours on the bus. long day yesterday....
now, i just need to mix the parts.
but i seem to have not slept well last night, so it'll be when i wake up. i think i'm only a few hours away from getting this, though.
it's probably because i spent four hours walking through london, and four hours on the bus. long day yesterday....
obligatory "influential on the song of the week" post...
this redefined epic for me. i kind of grew up with a certain strain of prog, so the pumpkins made a lot of sense to me at the age when i was starting to feel the power of punk rock. they kind of acted as a bridge between my childhood and adolescent years, in that sense. there's still not much quite like this out there and there may never be.
(relevant files: screwed up, idiotic, first movement, too cold, to spin inside dull aberrations, others; everything, in some sense)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzZh4fdaUpk
this redefined epic for me. i kind of grew up with a certain strain of prog, so the pumpkins made a lot of sense to me at the age when i was starting to feel the power of punk rock. they kind of acted as a bridge between my childhood and adolescent years, in that sense. there's still not much quite like this out there and there may never be.
(relevant files: screwed up, idiotic, first movement, too cold, to spin inside dull aberrations, others; everything, in some sense)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzZh4fdaUpk
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
uploading screwed up to youtube
the track switches tonight. this track will be up for four weeks, and i expect to be through a whole lot by that point.
hits were down tremendously over the period unintelligible was up, to the point that i'm barely on track for two thirds of my last month's total. will they go up now that i've mentioned it, as happened previously? i honestly can't pretend i care anymore.
we'll see in a few days, but the curve seems irreversibly broken at this point.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSK3q-R9Y6s&list=PL3JSjmqp0cbsN9vZEYmFDghfz0V6hWbLI
hits were down tremendously over the period unintelligible was up, to the point that i'm barely on track for two thirds of my last month's total. will they go up now that i've mentioned it, as happened previously? i honestly can't pretend i care anymore.
we'll see in a few days, but the curve seems irreversibly broken at this point.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSK3q-R9Y6s&list=PL3JSjmqp0cbsN9vZEYmFDghfz0V6hWbLI
that was a very long day, which required upwards of five hours of walking through some pretty nasty windchills and ran about 36 hours...
...but i got my prescription, in the end.
that's one of two medical issues i needed dealt with. now, i need to figure out how to get the odsp renewed for at least another year.
...but i got my prescription, in the end.
that's one of two medical issues i needed dealt with. now, i need to figure out how to get the odsp renewed for at least another year.
i have my doctor's appointment in london in a few hours and i'm incredibly nervous about it. the first time, i figured it was just a formality. this time, i'm really apprehensive...
of course, i've been thinking about it a lot. at the end of the day, regardless of the outcome, the decision i made is not reversible. denying me hormones isn't going to coerce me to change my name back. it's not going to make me more interested in living a male gender role. it's not going to change how i present myself, how i dress, how i identify or how i behave. it's just going to put me in the awkward position of needing to explain that the health system is denying me treatment when i show up to a job interview in a skirt.
so, i'm hoping it turns out well. but i've kind of put it aside. it's not the chemicals that define who i am, and not taking the chemicals isn't going to change who i am, either.
i do hope i can at least convince him to keep me on the androgen blockers. i hate masturbating, and i'm very happy that i haven't had to in well over a year. i don't want to go back to having to deal with that, it's such a waste of fucking time...
what i really aim for, i think, is total sexlessness. just the abolition of sexuality. i like the fact that the feminizing hormones make me a little prettier when i want to be, but it's really the testosterone blockers that are giving me what i really want.
i spent 25 some odd years realizing i'm not very good at being a dude, and don't have any interest in being one, either. that's not just going to change overnight…
and the reality is that i will eventually get access to hormones, even if it takes a few weeks to figure out how.
of course, i've been thinking about it a lot. at the end of the day, regardless of the outcome, the decision i made is not reversible. denying me hormones isn't going to coerce me to change my name back. it's not going to make me more interested in living a male gender role. it's not going to change how i present myself, how i dress, how i identify or how i behave. it's just going to put me in the awkward position of needing to explain that the health system is denying me treatment when i show up to a job interview in a skirt.
so, i'm hoping it turns out well. but i've kind of put it aside. it's not the chemicals that define who i am, and not taking the chemicals isn't going to change who i am, either.
i do hope i can at least convince him to keep me on the androgen blockers. i hate masturbating, and i'm very happy that i haven't had to in well over a year. i don't want to go back to having to deal with that, it's such a waste of fucking time...
what i really aim for, i think, is total sexlessness. just the abolition of sexuality. i like the fact that the feminizing hormones make me a little prettier when i want to be, but it's really the testosterone blockers that are giving me what i really want.
i spent 25 some odd years realizing i'm not very good at being a dude, and don't have any interest in being one, either. that's not just going to change overnight…
and the reality is that i will eventually get access to hormones, even if it takes a few weeks to figure out how.
Monday, November 24, 2014
ok.
i've got the thing set up to remix it - i can do this. i may have to
split the drums up, but it's otherwise pretty clean. you can barely tell
on an a/b, and i'm going to be putting it through a mastering
transform, anyway, so it just has to be close. bonus: i can resync that
classical guitar part.
that's it for the night, and probably until wednesday afternoon....
it's almost a total reconstruction, afterall.
the parts i can't recreate are the drum soundscape (it's the reverb) and the time modded guitar effect that defines the second half of the track. i mean, i can do it in theory. and i may end up trying. but trying to get the exact point where i split it and the exact length i stretched it to is a fool's errand. if i feel forced to do that, i'm going to get a different shape in the second half of the song. i can say i've decided that the production is more important, but i want it to be a last resort.
i should be able to just cut the track at about the six minute point.
it's a slow fade in at that point. so it's easy to splice. i can then master that section a little differently.
so, it's coming together. again: i'm not doing this a fifth time, so i'm not fucking around with it this time.
that's it for the night, and probably until wednesday afternoon....
it's almost a total reconstruction, afterall.
the parts i can't recreate are the drum soundscape (it's the reverb) and the time modded guitar effect that defines the second half of the track. i mean, i can do it in theory. and i may end up trying. but trying to get the exact point where i split it and the exact length i stretched it to is a fool's errand. if i feel forced to do that, i'm going to get a different shape in the second half of the song. i can say i've decided that the production is more important, but i want it to be a last resort.
i should be able to just cut the track at about the six minute point.
it's a slow fade in at that point. so it's easy to splice. i can then master that section a little differently.
so, it's coming together. again: i'm not doing this a fifth time, so i'm not fucking around with it this time.
ok, it's the first few minutes that are pissing me off.
and i can probably reconstruct the first few minutes. it just means cross fading the end.
which is easy to do anyways.
i need to go to london (ontario) tomorrow, so i won't be working on this much longer tonight. but i think i've got a successful tactic, here.
and i can probably reconstruct the first few minutes. it just means cross fading the end.
which is easy to do anyways.
i need to go to london (ontario) tomorrow, so i won't be working on this much longer tonight. but i think i've got a successful tactic, here.
realistic assessment: i think i can make it better. i have to resign
myself to the reality that i can't make it perfect. i guess every
serious composer has a piece that somehow got away from them. maybe this
is it for me.
one thing i want to try is to run the drums and bass separately through a mastering shape, then kill the high end, then mix it with the same file that's had the low end cut (and just has the cymbals and snare reverbs on the top). that could conceivably separate the tracks. but i sort of already know that it's going to sound messy. have to try it though...
these are the kinds of hacks that i'm stuck with, though.
one thing i'll state clearly: in the end it'll be close to what i want, and i'll fuck with it until it is.
one thing i want to try is to run the drums and bass separately through a mastering shape, then kill the high end, then mix it with the same file that's had the low end cut (and just has the cymbals and snare reverbs on the top). that could conceivably separate the tracks. but i sort of already know that it's going to sound messy. have to try it though...
these are the kinds of hacks that i'm stuck with, though.
one thing i'll state clearly: in the end it'll be close to what i want, and i'll fuck with it until it is.
ugh.
running this through mastering software really pulls the parts of the mix out that i want pulled out, which are mostly on the bottom end, but it also introduces a large amount of noise into the track. the noise is at the same frequency level as the cymbals, and is the result of not cleaning the parts up well before i mixed them together in the wave editor (a lot of it is tape hiss). trying to mix the bottom over the track is just making it muddy - what i want is a clean signal on the bottom mastered separately from the top. the only way i could get around the problem is to rebuild the track from scratch - which is essentially impossible. there's all kinds of reverb settings and time manipulations that i could approximate but could never recreate. rebuilding the track is necessarily going to create a new song, which i don't want to do - i already did that a few months ago.
everything i'm doing right now is final. i don't want to come back at this in another five years and decide it still doesn't sound the way i want it to.
so, i'm going to have to do many, many experiments. and this is likely consequently going to take a lot longer than i planned it to take...
i've already learned the lessons and applied them, but i'm still stuck with the consequences.
there's really nothing else like this (excluding the earliest demos, which i can write off as early demos). it's not just the last time i'm mixing this track, it's also the last time i'm going to be dealing with this problem.
running this through mastering software really pulls the parts of the mix out that i want pulled out, which are mostly on the bottom end, but it also introduces a large amount of noise into the track. the noise is at the same frequency level as the cymbals, and is the result of not cleaning the parts up well before i mixed them together in the wave editor (a lot of it is tape hiss). trying to mix the bottom over the track is just making it muddy - what i want is a clean signal on the bottom mastered separately from the top. the only way i could get around the problem is to rebuild the track from scratch - which is essentially impossible. there's all kinds of reverb settings and time manipulations that i could approximate but could never recreate. rebuilding the track is necessarily going to create a new song, which i don't want to do - i already did that a few months ago.
everything i'm doing right now is final. i don't want to come back at this in another five years and decide it still doesn't sound the way i want it to.
so, i'm going to have to do many, many experiments. and this is likely consequently going to take a lot longer than i planned it to take...
i've already learned the lessons and applied them, but i'm still stuck with the consequences.
there's really nothing else like this (excluding the earliest demos, which i can write off as early demos). it's not just the last time i'm mixing this track, it's also the last time i'm going to be dealing with this problem.
the day i saw you cry (instrumental version)
ok, here it is one more time.
i'm confident this is really done this time. i think i should have the mix up to date to july, 2002 before the sun comes up, but i'm not uploading that version. the final production decisions may take a little longer. but i'm still convinced that this gets done by the end of the day.
--
the recording of this track over the spring of 2002 seems to have occurred in spurts, likely based around gaps in my school schedule. the drums in the first part of the track were sculpted together on the night/morning of march 7/8, which would have been a little after the track took it's initial folk punk form and centred on it existing in that way. the drums were sculpted from a mix of the initial drum machine part, real time ry30 square pushing, washes of digital noise and short, sculpted samples of greg playing in real time. the track seems to have been shaped into what it is during the week of april 15-22, a little after it was expanded by playing it as a classical piece, with the addition of multiple guitar and synth overdubs and all kinds of digital wave shaping through notch filters and time manipulation. i must have had that week off for exam related purposes; i probably had late exams that year. incomplete versions of the track exist that seem to have been burned around april 25, which are what the live version with sean would have been based upon.
the next spurt in recording was to add bass parts over the weekend of may 17-19. further drum and guitar parts were also added at this time.
i was experimenting with sequencing a rabit is wolf demo throughout may and ended up with two cd-r snapshots of the track at this point. these are the only instrumental versions from the period. unfortunately, the more complete version cannot be ripped from the cd properly - it was burned in three sections and normalized, which created volume gaps. it also has roughly 0.050 second null spots at the beginning and end of the three tracks, making it impossible to paste together properly. so, i've reconstructed a very close approximation of a late may mix out of a good sounding april mix. i've then used that mix to reconstruct a final instrumental version.
i was growing very insular during the period this was recorded, which was partially out of a decision to force myself to go straight edge in preparation for transgendered hormone therapy, which i was set to begin at the start of may. the bulk of the track was recorded before i went on hormone therapy. it may in some way reflect a sense of resigned preparation for a difficult process. but, it really comes more out of the isolation i had forced upon myself.
my parents were coming out of a difficult financial situation due partly to their own mismanagement and partly to my father coming out of a period of unemployment. he was completing a course in management over the period, which put me in the weird position of having to do his statistics homework for him. i was a second year honours math student at the time, so his basic stats assignments were not very challenging for me; conversely, he wasn't interested in the topic. i should probably have a diploma in business stats from the university of manitoba along with my math degree from carleton. but, who's counting, really? my math degree never got me anywhere in life (i haven't aspired to use it for anything....), but his management course opened up doors for him that have aided me. so, it worked out....
what this meant was that i found myself living in a split duplex around the beginning of 2002. for many years previously, i had lived in various basements and more or less had those basements to myself, merely having to tolerate the odd laundry run. the split duplex put me in the rather normal situation of having a bedroom upstairs, the privilege of having a studio downstairs and the inconvenience of having to follow scheduling rules. as i'd been so used to having total freedom in my scheduling for so long, i was unable to adjust to this.
if i were to come up and down the stairs in the middle of the night, i would wake my labrador retrievers up (who just wanted to come say hi) and that would wake up my parents. this was consequently forbidden. to get around this, i started sleeping in the afternoon, so i could go downstairs in the evening and not come back up until the morning. this left me without human contact for days or even weeks at a time. on long days, i would sleep on the carpeted floor of the studio. some days, i simply wouldn't sleep at all.
what you're hearing here is in many ways the culmination of this lack of human contact, complete abstinence from drugs and sleep deprivation - all in the context of the stress from simultaneously completing two university programs and preparing for a dramatic life shift. while the music was recorded in spurts, those spurts were emotional stress outlets. while parts of this may sound like my sanity was fragile while it was being created, the process of recording them is probably the only thing that allowed me to maintain it.
the final mix for this track was completed on nov 24, 2014, to mimic the version that existed immediately before vocals were added.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/05-the-day-i-saw-you-cry-instrumental-version
i'm confident this is really done this time. i think i should have the mix up to date to july, 2002 before the sun comes up, but i'm not uploading that version. the final production decisions may take a little longer. but i'm still convinced that this gets done by the end of the day.
--
the recording of this track over the spring of 2002 seems to have occurred in spurts, likely based around gaps in my school schedule. the drums in the first part of the track were sculpted together on the night/morning of march 7/8, which would have been a little after the track took it's initial folk punk form and centred on it existing in that way. the drums were sculpted from a mix of the initial drum machine part, real time ry30 square pushing, washes of digital noise and short, sculpted samples of greg playing in real time. the track seems to have been shaped into what it is during the week of april 15-22, a little after it was expanded by playing it as a classical piece, with the addition of multiple guitar and synth overdubs and all kinds of digital wave shaping through notch filters and time manipulation. i must have had that week off for exam related purposes; i probably had late exams that year. incomplete versions of the track exist that seem to have been burned around april 25, which are what the live version with sean would have been based upon.
the next spurt in recording was to add bass parts over the weekend of may 17-19. further drum and guitar parts were also added at this time.
i was experimenting with sequencing a rabit is wolf demo throughout may and ended up with two cd-r snapshots of the track at this point. these are the only instrumental versions from the period. unfortunately, the more complete version cannot be ripped from the cd properly - it was burned in three sections and normalized, which created volume gaps. it also has roughly 0.050 second null spots at the beginning and end of the three tracks, making it impossible to paste together properly. so, i've reconstructed a very close approximation of a late may mix out of a good sounding april mix. i've then used that mix to reconstruct a final instrumental version.
i was growing very insular during the period this was recorded, which was partially out of a decision to force myself to go straight edge in preparation for transgendered hormone therapy, which i was set to begin at the start of may. the bulk of the track was recorded before i went on hormone therapy. it may in some way reflect a sense of resigned preparation for a difficult process. but, it really comes more out of the isolation i had forced upon myself.
my parents were coming out of a difficult financial situation due partly to their own mismanagement and partly to my father coming out of a period of unemployment. he was completing a course in management over the period, which put me in the weird position of having to do his statistics homework for him. i was a second year honours math student at the time, so his basic stats assignments were not very challenging for me; conversely, he wasn't interested in the topic. i should probably have a diploma in business stats from the university of manitoba along with my math degree from carleton. but, who's counting, really? my math degree never got me anywhere in life (i haven't aspired to use it for anything....), but his management course opened up doors for him that have aided me. so, it worked out....
what this meant was that i found myself living in a split duplex around the beginning of 2002. for many years previously, i had lived in various basements and more or less had those basements to myself, merely having to tolerate the odd laundry run. the split duplex put me in the rather normal situation of having a bedroom upstairs, the privilege of having a studio downstairs and the inconvenience of having to follow scheduling rules. as i'd been so used to having total freedom in my scheduling for so long, i was unable to adjust to this.
if i were to come up and down the stairs in the middle of the night, i would wake my labrador retrievers up (who just wanted to come say hi) and that would wake up my parents. this was consequently forbidden. to get around this, i started sleeping in the afternoon, so i could go downstairs in the evening and not come back up until the morning. this left me without human contact for days or even weeks at a time. on long days, i would sleep on the carpeted floor of the studio. some days, i simply wouldn't sleep at all.
what you're hearing here is in many ways the culmination of this lack of human contact, complete abstinence from drugs and sleep deprivation - all in the context of the stress from simultaneously completing two university programs and preparing for a dramatic life shift. while the music was recorded in spurts, those spurts were emotional stress outlets. while parts of this may sound like my sanity was fragile while it was being created, the process of recording them is probably the only thing that allowed me to maintain it.
the final mix for this track was completed on nov 24, 2014, to mimic the version that existed immediately before vocals were added.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/05-the-day-i-saw-you-cry-instrumental-version
i missed a classical guitar part last night. i was wondering about it when i was mixing it, because the file was dated to after the cutoff but seemed to already exist in the mix. i'm sort of remembering that what i did was cut the file up to create a manual delay effect. so, i need to do get that back in there and upload the initial instrumental a third time.
it's a subtle effect, and you'd probably miss it if you weren't listening for it.
i missed it myself...
it's a subtle effect, and you'd probably miss it if you weren't listening for it.
i missed it myself...
Sunday, November 23, 2014
strangely, it turns out i had this all wrong. the version i rebuilt the track on in 07/09 was actually the same file i'm using now, minus a sort of swoosh at the beginning. i thought i had time shifted the file, but was wrong...
...and it was just out of sync because i couldn't find the right place to paste to.
what that means is that i've determined the source of the file. it was from a now lost early 3-track rabit cd-r, dated to between april 22 and may 5, 2002.
what it also means is that i should be able to use it to replace the corrupted early version. so, i need to take a mildly different mixing strategy.
i was hoping this would be done in a few hours, but it's the last time i'm doing it so i'm making sure i do it right.
i simply can't use the mix i built in 2009. i ran through izotope or something and whatever sounded good then doesn't sound "right" now. so, i'm rebooting to the beginning one last time.
it means, in the end, i should get three mixes out of this file and use two of them.
...and it was just out of sync because i couldn't find the right place to paste to.
what that means is that i've determined the source of the file. it was from a now lost early 3-track rabit cd-r, dated to between april 22 and may 5, 2002.
what it also means is that i should be able to use it to replace the corrupted early version. so, i need to take a mildly different mixing strategy.
i was hoping this would be done in a few hours, but it's the last time i'm doing it so i'm making sure i do it right.
i simply can't use the mix i built in 2009. i ran through izotope or something and whatever sounded good then doesn't sound "right" now. so, i'm rebooting to the beginning one last time.
it means, in the end, i should get three mixes out of this file and use two of them.
Saturday, November 22, 2014
there's the monster right there.
that massive file at the bottom is what i've been looking for and what has been confusing me whenever i've tried to do this for years. it's synced perfectly with the rabit version, indicating that it's a clean early mix. the volume captures the shape of the track. i didn't think i could get this perfect, but this is actually, in fact, perfect. hurrah for that...
the big file contains a drum soundscape (i've got roughly 30 components of this - live drums, programmed drums, live drum machine square pushing and digital generated/shaped noises), a bass part, seven guitar parts and two synth parts. so, i could actually conceivably squeeze this onto a 32 track board.
that's synced. i'll mix it in the morning, then it's done.
that file is dated to 2006. i don't remember where it came from; i may have ripped it from a since lost cd-r. i don't know why i didn't rebuild it from this in the first place. it's a long time coming, but it's finally what i wanted it to be....
that massive file at the bottom is what i've been looking for and what has been confusing me whenever i've tried to do this for years. it's synced perfectly with the rabit version, indicating that it's a clean early mix. the volume captures the shape of the track. i didn't think i could get this perfect, but this is actually, in fact, perfect. hurrah for that...
the big file contains a drum soundscape (i've got roughly 30 components of this - live drums, programmed drums, live drum machine square pushing and digital generated/shaped noises), a bass part, seven guitar parts and two synth parts. so, i could actually conceivably squeeze this onto a 32 track board.
that's synced. i'll mix it in the morning, then it's done.
that file is dated to 2006. i don't remember where it came from; i may have ripped it from a since lost cd-r. i don't know why i didn't rebuild it from this in the first place. it's a long time coming, but it's finally what i wanted it to be....
"i believe that people that are going to commit crimes shouldn't have guns" - george w. bush
this is a quote that was widely thrown around in the mid 00s as supposed evidence of mr. bush's lack of intelligence. i've never really seen the supposed stupidity in the statement. nobody doubts the truth of the statement. it may be a little obvious, but we're talking about an office that declares truths to be self-evident.
i've used it twice - in the unfinished curious george suite, and again in the sample version of the fourth symphony, because i wasn't planning on releasing the curious george suite (and now have). both of these uses preceded it's wide adoption by satirists.
i was taking a different perspective, though. it's one i've never seen anybody else use. i was actually focusing on the irony in the statement.
in fact, mr. bush was somebody that was clearly going to commit crimes. war crimes, as it turns out. therefore, by his own logic, he shouldn't have had guns.
of course, he did. which indirectly circles back around to it's more common satirical usage.
i still find the irony in it staggering. as an american, mr. bush probably didn't pick up on that...
"i believe that wars should not happen unless they are congressionally approved."
it seems like a rather different statement.
but it actually follows logically as a corollary.
that constitution down there is a bit wonky, though.
for all the talk of congressional approval, the reality is that the american form of government is designed to be a military dictatorship. i think that a large amount of the problems down there could be solved by merely grasping this simple point - the president is not meant to be in charge of civilian matters, but the commander in chief. that is, a military leader. and, while congress can act as a check on his power, he's constitutionally not far from being an elected military dictator.
the president can introduce legislation if he wants. and he can veto shit under limited circumstances. but it's not the primary function of the office. civilian things are actually supposed to be dealt with through congress. yet, millions of americans expect the president to set the domestic agenda. then, they get confused when it doesn't happen.
getting people to understand that the president is meant to be somebody that has guns and that they're supposed to deal with things like health care and decriminalization through various representative bodies would shift the focus back to where it needs to be to get things done.
the next step, then, ought to be to take away the president's guns.
but one thing at a time...
this is a quote that was widely thrown around in the mid 00s as supposed evidence of mr. bush's lack of intelligence. i've never really seen the supposed stupidity in the statement. nobody doubts the truth of the statement. it may be a little obvious, but we're talking about an office that declares truths to be self-evident.
i've used it twice - in the unfinished curious george suite, and again in the sample version of the fourth symphony, because i wasn't planning on releasing the curious george suite (and now have). both of these uses preceded it's wide adoption by satirists.
i was taking a different perspective, though. it's one i've never seen anybody else use. i was actually focusing on the irony in the statement.
in fact, mr. bush was somebody that was clearly going to commit crimes. war crimes, as it turns out. therefore, by his own logic, he shouldn't have had guns.
of course, he did. which indirectly circles back around to it's more common satirical usage.
i still find the irony in it staggering. as an american, mr. bush probably didn't pick up on that...
"i believe that wars should not happen unless they are congressionally approved."
it seems like a rather different statement.
but it actually follows logically as a corollary.
that constitution down there is a bit wonky, though.
for all the talk of congressional approval, the reality is that the american form of government is designed to be a military dictatorship. i think that a large amount of the problems down there could be solved by merely grasping this simple point - the president is not meant to be in charge of civilian matters, but the commander in chief. that is, a military leader. and, while congress can act as a check on his power, he's constitutionally not far from being an elected military dictator.
the president can introduce legislation if he wants. and he can veto shit under limited circumstances. but it's not the primary function of the office. civilian things are actually supposed to be dealt with through congress. yet, millions of americans expect the president to set the domestic agenda. then, they get confused when it doesn't happen.
getting people to understand that the president is meant to be somebody that has guns and that they're supposed to deal with things like health care and decriminalization through various representative bodies would shift the focus back to where it needs to be to get things done.
the next step, then, ought to be to take away the president's guns.
but one thing at a time...
replacing symphony 7 on youtube
this is now a discarded mix. there's a lot more information on the single page.
the track was written multiple ways in 2002, but i seem to have avoided saving a completed instrumental version. i've tried to rebuild this instrumental version several times since 2006 and have never got a good result. a large part of the reason for this stems from the mixing strategy i was using at the time i wrote and recorded it, which was to record each part in separately, process it in a wave editor and then literally paste it all together in an editing process. this mixing process is actually responsible for a lot of the blurry mixes i've been able to create over the years (i haven't abandoned it entirely; i go back to it for experimental and ambient pieces), but it doesn't allow for remixing or reconstructing tracks. once i past a part into the file, it cannot be removed or altered without starting all over again.
it's consequently necessary to save mixes at strategic points if you're going to be mixing in this way, and i failed to do that for this track when i added political samples to it in 2002. i've been trying to get the samples out since 2006. this 2009 version was the best thing i could create at the time, without abandoning the mixing strategy. it was built on an early 2002 mix; i ended up pushing the overdubs out of sync, and ruining it with a bad master. i initially didn't think i would be able to resolve this because i couldn't figure out how to get the overdubs back in sync.
however, i've spent the second half of 2014 completing my discography (i lost several months at the beginning of the year due to a bad bios flash. get a bus pirate. they're life savers.) and in the process i've found a proper 2002 mix that is in sync with the final mixes, which has allowed me to reconstruct the file properly in cubase. this best-i-can-do compromise mix is now obsolete.
the new video is available at this link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azl0LKVr6EU
this is the old video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=658axrUn-7w
the track was written multiple ways in 2002, but i seem to have avoided saving a completed instrumental version. i've tried to rebuild this instrumental version several times since 2006 and have never got a good result. a large part of the reason for this stems from the mixing strategy i was using at the time i wrote and recorded it, which was to record each part in separately, process it in a wave editor and then literally paste it all together in an editing process. this mixing process is actually responsible for a lot of the blurry mixes i've been able to create over the years (i haven't abandoned it entirely; i go back to it for experimental and ambient pieces), but it doesn't allow for remixing or reconstructing tracks. once i past a part into the file, it cannot be removed or altered without starting all over again.
it's consequently necessary to save mixes at strategic points if you're going to be mixing in this way, and i failed to do that for this track when i added political samples to it in 2002. i've been trying to get the samples out since 2006. this 2009 version was the best thing i could create at the time, without abandoning the mixing strategy. it was built on an early 2002 mix; i ended up pushing the overdubs out of sync, and ruining it with a bad master. i initially didn't think i would be able to resolve this because i couldn't figure out how to get the overdubs back in sync.
however, i've spent the second half of 2014 completing my discography (i lost several months at the beginning of the year due to a bad bios flash. get a bus pirate. they're life savers.) and in the process i've found a proper 2002 mix that is in sync with the final mixes, which has allowed me to reconstruct the file properly in cubase. this best-i-can-do compromise mix is now obsolete.
the new video is available at this link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Azl0LKVr6EU
this is the old video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=658axrUn-7w
Friday, November 21, 2014
ugh. this is my fault, i should have paid closer attention.
i'm trying to rebuild the mix on a may, 2002 version, which i had reconstructed from pasting together a cd-rip split into three copies. now, i noticed a little gap but i just deleted it...
the gap is a breakdown in information. bad burn, i guess. the first gap is inaudible, but the second isn't. so, i can't build it on that...
luckily, i have a version from april, 2002. which means i need to reconstruct more of the file in the mix, but it's a positive trade-off.
i seem to have built the 2009 on a different april mix that is time shifted strangely. what i'm about to do is the better option.
so, today was a wash. but hopefully i can still get the bulk of it done by the end of the night.
i'm trying to rebuild the mix on a may, 2002 version, which i had reconstructed from pasting together a cd-rip split into three copies. now, i noticed a little gap but i just deleted it...
the gap is a breakdown in information. bad burn, i guess. the first gap is inaudible, but the second isn't. so, i can't build it on that...
luckily, i have a version from april, 2002. which means i need to reconstruct more of the file in the mix, but it's a positive trade-off.
i seem to have built the 2009 on a different april mix that is time shifted strangely. what i'm about to do is the better option.
so, today was a wash. but hopefully i can still get the bulk of it done by the end of the night.
so, it seems like at some point i time shifted the track to 25:00, then i recorded extra overdubs after i time shifted. that explains why it's just a little bit out of sync. but because there were gaps in the rip it's not as simple as just shifting it back.
i'm going to do this the other way around: i'm going to time shift the overdubs back to the original length, then time shift it back to 25:00. it's not going to be identical to the two final 2002 mixes - it can't be.
the only other answer is to rebuild it, but i've tried doing this repeatedly and the blunt truth is that i can't. i can rebuild the first section, but the wave editing in the second half of the track isn't reproducible.
it's not going to be inaudible - you're going to hear a slight delay if you play the three tracks simultaneously. but who's going to do that? and it's the best i can do with it....
i'm going to do this the other way around: i'm going to time shift the overdubs back to the original length, then time shift it back to 25:00. it's not going to be identical to the two final 2002 mixes - it can't be.
the only other answer is to rebuild it, but i've tried doing this repeatedly and the blunt truth is that i can't. i can rebuild the first section, but the wave editing in the second half of the track isn't reproducible.
it's not going to be inaudible - you're going to hear a slight delay if you play the three tracks simultaneously. but who's going to do that? and it's the best i can do with it....
i've decided the existing mixes of this aren't sufficient. i built the thing back up a few times from '07-09 because i couldn't find the source, and it's just out of sync in a few places. when i didn't have the original timing, it didn't matter. i just had to guess. it does now...
so, there's a handful of tracks to re-add, and a number of modified tracks from '07 and '08 that i had put aside to mix in as well.
as the issues are sync related, the 07 and 09 mixes are likely to be simply deleted from the discography altogether. the 09 mix is on youtube, and i'll probably leave it that way. i'll have a good listen when i get it mixed down.
so, there's a handful of tracks to re-add, and a number of modified tracks from '07 and '08 that i had put aside to mix in as well.
as the issues are sync related, the 07 and 09 mixes are likely to be simply deleted from the discography altogether. the 09 mix is on youtube, and i'll probably leave it that way. i'll have a good listen when i get it mixed down.
Thursday, November 20, 2014
it's done
basically.
so, to recap.
- one cynicide disc. inri029. i'm splitting profits with jon on this.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/to-spin-inside-dull-aberrations
- seven rabit discs. inri030. inri034-inri038. inri040. i'm splitting these with you 50/50.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/me-myself-and-the-time-i-thought-this-was-a-good-idea
2) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-wave
3) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/clarity
4) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/9-46-outside-the-magenta-box
5) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/time
6) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/rabit-is-wolf
7) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-imaginary-tour-demo-ep
- a comprehensive fourth symphony overview. inri039. this is two discs, and you're on one, so you get 25% of this.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/trepanation-nation
- penny shoeman was actually written as a techno tune first, and the rabit demo second. i'll probably put the demo on the single when it's done, but as a bonus track. it's otherwise on the tour ep.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/untitled
- my sixth record (60% done) contains several instrumental rabit reconstructions.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2
that's it. all the material with you on it is up. here's the youtube playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3JSjmqp0cbvt_-_Lt2CqTm_MuaOwNrgw
and i'll contact you if or when a check is ready.
(pause)
sorry, here's the free download link.
(deleted)
numbers, again, are: 29,30,34-42. 39 will be up tonight or tomorrow.
41,42 within a week.
j
so, to recap.
- one cynicide disc. inri029. i'm splitting profits with jon on this.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/to-spin-inside-dull-aberrations
- seven rabit discs. inri030. inri034-inri038. inri040. i'm splitting these with you 50/50.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/me-myself-and-the-time-i-thought-this-was-a-good-idea
2) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-wave
3) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/clarity
4) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/9-46-outside-the-magenta-box
5) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/time
6) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/rabit-is-wolf
7) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-imaginary-tour-demo-ep
- a comprehensive fourth symphony overview. inri039. this is two discs, and you're on one, so you get 25% of this.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/trepanation-nation
- penny shoeman was actually written as a techno tune first, and the rabit demo second. i'll probably put the demo on the single when it's done, but as a bonus track. it's otherwise on the tour ep.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/untitled
- my sixth record (60% done) contains several instrumental rabit reconstructions.
1) https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/jjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjjj-2
that's it. all the material with you on it is up. here's the youtube playlist:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL3JSjmqp0cbvt_-_Lt2CqTm_MuaOwNrgw
and i'll contact you if or when a check is ready.
(pause)
sorry, here's the free download link.
(deleted)
numbers, again, are: 29,30,34-42. 39 will be up tonight or tomorrow.
41,42 within a week.
j
when
i figure this out, i'm going to want to finish building a guitar mix
that i started in 2007. this may end up with new sound. then it's done
and i can move to the techno track, which is also going to primarily be a
remix. there's going to be a few unreleased tracks attached to that.
the last song to complete for this period is this thing i called
ostrich, which was a first draft of sarah's 2002 xmas present. i ended
up discarding it in favour of flying. there's going to be some new sound
for this, but not much. the ep of material for the first half of 2003
is already finalized, so that will be a quick up. i'm going to have to
reinterpret some stuff from mid 03, but it likely won't require new
sound. in fact, i'm not looking at new sound after ostrich until
probably early 2005. i always wanted to release symphonies 5&6 as
the first part of a double, and no doubt will, but they'll probably also
be available separately as record #8. so, i could very well be to
xenophanes and symphony 7 by christmas. my period with sarah saw a
dramatic decrease in output, but at least i mostly finished what i did.
it's after sarah that things get scattered again. oddly. i think maybe i
ended up with less time, but more of a need for an outlet and
consequently more focus.
i literally have five reconstructions of this song that all seek to be the same thing.
there's a 2002 mix that i'm upping as is.
but i think i couldn't find that mix in 2007 and rebuilt from scratch. i have a bunch of modded source files from that point. i was trying to compile a list of symphonies at the time. i actually have two mixes from 2007 that seem to be almost the same (there's a louder guitar at one point). then, there's files modded in 2008, which i suspect were used in what seems like a remaster from 2009.
but i now have my 2002 version back again, and i'm thinking it would be best to just added the few extra tracks that were missing to it.
so, i've got a lot of just listening to do after supper. i'm not planning on recording any new material for this, but i want one definitive final instrumental version... to come up both for this and the ftaa upload....
i'm not rebuilding it from scratch. it's going to be based on one of the three near-complete mixes that are there.
this is why i moved to cubase...
there's a 2002 mix that i'm upping as is.
but i think i couldn't find that mix in 2007 and rebuilt from scratch. i have a bunch of modded source files from that point. i was trying to compile a list of symphonies at the time. i actually have two mixes from 2007 that seem to be almost the same (there's a louder guitar at one point). then, there's files modded in 2008, which i suspect were used in what seems like a remaster from 2009.
but i now have my 2002 version back again, and i'm thinking it would be best to just added the few extra tracks that were missing to it.
so, i've got a lot of just listening to do after supper. i'm not planning on recording any new material for this, but i want one definitive final instrumental version... to come up both for this and the ftaa upload....
i'm not rebuilding it from scratch. it's going to be based on one of the three near-complete mixes that are there.
this is why i moved to cubase...
uploading completed mixes to inri058
trepanation nation disc 1...
1) this is the first version of the track, which was written as an arena rock anthem in the summer of 2001 for use in a gestating rock band project that never happened.
i rerecorded the track to capture it in it's initial state on aug 3, 2014. track dated to aug 15, 2001.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/untitled-original-mix
2) the successor project to the aborted rock project was rabit is wolf, which consisted of myself and the singer from that project. while it was initially constructed around a shared interest in post-punk, the project took a sharp turn towards folk in the first half of 2002. the track was consequently converted from an arena rock punk/industrial anthem into a folk punk tune. this is the initial folk punk incarnation, as recorded in february of 2002. dated to feb 19, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-demo
3) i first started to record this track in earnest in march of 2002 by reconstructing the drums to utilize a mixture of machines and live loops. in the process, i began to experiment with the structuring of the track. the track may have been initially written on a classical in the first place (i don't remember); it certainly integrates the perspective of the classical guitar, and for good reason - i was playing a lot of classical guitar music over the course of 2001. so, it transferred to a finger picking style very intuitively. the final versions all have multiple classical guitar overdubs.
it was on the classical guitar that the track was expanded into the scale it came to exist in. this is an early performance on classical guitar, dated to april 7, 2002.
the knocking in the background of the track is literally background noise of my father hammering something outside my room. it became the inspiration for the ring modulator adlib in the final versions of the track (i gave sean a mic, plugged it into a ring mod and told him to bash on it while twiddling the knobs).
this version is very rough and is only available for download on bandcamp due to space requirements on the physical media.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/untitled-classical-guitar-mix
4) by the beginning of may, the track had taken on a defined shape. at the same time, sean and i were discussing ways to present rabit is wolf to the public and had decided on a two-person guitar/voice duo. the track consequently needed to be reworked for live presentation, which is what this is.
i constructed the mix in november, 2014 out of a guitar part dated to may 5, 2002 and vocals dated to june 7, 2002. i'm dating this to may 5, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-live-version
5) the recording of this track over the spring of 2002 seems to have occurred in spurts, likely based around gaps in my school schedule. the drums in the first part of the track were sculpted together on the night/morning of march 7/8, which would have been a little after the track took it's initial folk punk form and centred on it existing in that way. the drums were sculpted from a mix of the initial drum machine part, real time ry30 square pushing, washes of digital noise and short, sculpted samples of greg playing in real time. the track seems to have been shaped into what it is during the week of april 15-22, a little after it was expanded by playing it as a classical piece, with the addition of multiple guitar and synth overdubs and all kinds of digital wave shaping through notch filters and time manipulation. i must have had that week off for exam related purposes; i probably had late exams that year. incomplete versions of the track exist that seem to have been burned around april 25, which are what the live version with sean would have been based upon.
the next spurt in recording was to add bass parts over the weekend of may 17-19. further drum and guitar parts were also added at this time.
i was growing very insular during the period this was recorded, which was partially out of a decision to force myself to go straight edge in preparation for transgendered hormone therapy, which i was set to begin at the start of may. the bulk of the track was recorded before i went on hormone therapy. it may in some way reflect a sense of resigned preparation for a difficult process. but, it really comes more out of the isolation i had forced upon myself.
my parents were coming out of a difficult financial situation due partly to their own mismanagement and partly to my father coming out of a period of unemployment. he was completing a course in management over the period, which put me in the weird position of having to do his statistics homework for him. i was a second year honours math student at the time, so his basic stats assignments were not very challenging for me; conversely, he wasn't interested in the topic. i should probably have a diploma in business stats from the university of manitoba along with my math degree from carleton. but, who's counting, really? my math degree never got me anywhere in life (i haven't aspired to use it for anything....), but his management course opened up doors for him that have aided me. so, it worked out....
what this meant was that i found myself living in a split duplex around the beginning of 2002. for many years previously, i had lived in various basements and more or less had those basements to myself, merely having to tolerate the odd laundry run. the split duplex put me in the rather normal situation of having a bedroom upstairs, the privilege of having a studio downstairs and the inconvenience of having to follow scheduling rules. as i'd been so used to having total freedom in my scheduling for so long, i was unable to adjust to this.
if i were to come up and down the stairs in the middle of the night, i would wake my labrador retrievers up (who just wanted to come say hi) and that would wake up my parents. this was consequently forbidden. to get around this, i started sleeping in the afternoon, so i could go downstairs in the evening and not come back up until the morning. this left me without human contact for days or even weeks at a time. on long days, i would sleep on the carpeted floor of the studio. some days, i simply wouldn't sleep at all.
what you're hearing here is in many ways the culmination of this lack of human contact, complete abstinence from drugs and sleep deprivation - all in the context of the stress from simultaneously completing two university programs and preparing for a dramatic life shift. while the music was recorded in spurts, those spurts were emotional stress outlets. while parts of this may sound like my sanity was fragile while it was being created, the process of recording them is probably the only thing that allowed me to maintain it.
this version is dated to may 22, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-instrumental-version
6) sean's vocals were added at the beginning of june. i had to add some extra synth parts, as well, to fix some of the harmonization. i've successfully glossed over the problems, but this is the one recording where sean legitimately couldn't find notes that fit. it's hard to blame him, as the music is rather complex from a harmonic standpoint and there isn't an existing melody written out for him to follow. he didn't have the training required to interpret this. the vocal manipulations i used in the track caused some conflict, but the reality is that the vocal melody he had extrapolated out of the guitars for use in the acoustic version was simply not transferable to this mix and the mods were necessary to compensate. placing his naked vocals into the track would have created large amounts of dissonance where no dissonance was desired. when the track opens up a bit, there's more space, and the vocals are left unaltered.
looking back, i suppose i could have explained that to him and asked for a rewrite rather than just taking it into my own hands and slathering on the effects, but i was very keen on both maintaining his autonomy as a vocalist and maintaining my autonomy as a producer/composer. on top of that, i simply liked the end result. i suppose that, had i not been able to manipulate the vocals into what i wanted, i would have had to ask for a rewrite....
for the ring mod part, i wanted to emulate the knocking sound that existed atmospherically in the classical version. so, i gave sean a mic plugged into a ring modulator, locked him in the room and told him to smash it against the ground and play with the knobs for a while. i've kept this part in further instrumental versions.
that said, sean largely rejected the track in it's psychedelic form, so this is the last rabit is wolf version.
this is dated to june 15, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-3
trepanation nation disc 2...
7) once it had become clear that sean had rejected the track, i wasn't entirely sure what to do with it. i had some material i had put aside for a noise project (subsequently compiled as inri032: jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/give-em-hell-harry-strung-out ) that was meant to merge noise & politics, and i was maybe eager to get back to this idea of music as a political art form.
while there were not lyrics attached to the initial cynicide project, i did already have the idea of a conceptual piece connecting the existing condition of north american society to the idea of trepanning, or self-lobotomizing to get the precise point across. we were in the immediate wake of the 9/11 attacks (which seemed staged even at the point) and the political reaction to them. i felt the need to say something about this, but i didn't want to be too direct or judgmental about it so i compiled a list of samples that presented what i felt reflected the general condition of the world we were living in. the references are broad and vast; there's not really a succinct way to over-simplify it.
the overall context is the view that we were living through the end of the civil rights period. it could be argued that the focus on civil rights accidentally erupted as a reaction to world war two propaganda, hit a high point in the 1960s and began to irreversibly erode at the beginning of the 1980s. in this narrative, the collapse of the twin towers was the final death blow to something the elite never wanted in the first place and was happy to sweep into the trash heap of history.
but, i'm specifically focusing on how this is self-inflicted by our collective desire to be stupid - to drill these holes in our skulls, as though there's some kind of enlightenment in abolishing our ability to understand the world around us, and focus instead on our own short term gains. in that sense, it's an attack on the neo-liberal model and how it encourages us to destroy ourselves.
the spoken word section in the middle was a poem i created out of those word magnets you see on fridges. i was working as an overnight security guard at the time (summer of 2001) and just not sleeping at all. as i was doing my rounds, i stopped and made the poem. i got fired from that job for yelling at a coke machine...
i've considered doing a sample-by-sample breakdown of this but have decided it's neurotic. however, if you want to write an essay, and i like it, i'll link to it.
dated to july 4, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/trepanation-nation-sample-mix
8) in late 2013, i decided to complete unfinished tracks in a chronological ordering and it led me to the decision to complete the track in the form it was initially written in. completed on sept 24, 2014; dated to sept 16, 2001.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/10-to-spin-inside-dull-aberrations
1) this is the first version of the track, which was written as an arena rock anthem in the summer of 2001 for use in a gestating rock band project that never happened.
i rerecorded the track to capture it in it's initial state on aug 3, 2014. track dated to aug 15, 2001.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/untitled-original-mix
2) the successor project to the aborted rock project was rabit is wolf, which consisted of myself and the singer from that project. while it was initially constructed around a shared interest in post-punk, the project took a sharp turn towards folk in the first half of 2002. the track was consequently converted from an arena rock punk/industrial anthem into a folk punk tune. this is the initial folk punk incarnation, as recorded in february of 2002. dated to feb 19, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-demo
3) i first started to record this track in earnest in march of 2002 by reconstructing the drums to utilize a mixture of machines and live loops. in the process, i began to experiment with the structuring of the track. the track may have been initially written on a classical in the first place (i don't remember); it certainly integrates the perspective of the classical guitar, and for good reason - i was playing a lot of classical guitar music over the course of 2001. so, it transferred to a finger picking style very intuitively. the final versions all have multiple classical guitar overdubs.
it was on the classical guitar that the track was expanded into the scale it came to exist in. this is an early performance on classical guitar, dated to april 7, 2002.
the knocking in the background of the track is literally background noise of my father hammering something outside my room. it became the inspiration for the ring modulator adlib in the final versions of the track (i gave sean a mic, plugged it into a ring mod and told him to bash on it while twiddling the knobs).
this version is very rough and is only available for download on bandcamp due to space requirements on the physical media.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/untitled-classical-guitar-mix
4) by the beginning of may, the track had taken on a defined shape. at the same time, sean and i were discussing ways to present rabit is wolf to the public and had decided on a two-person guitar/voice duo. the track consequently needed to be reworked for live presentation, which is what this is.
i constructed the mix in november, 2014 out of a guitar part dated to may 5, 2002 and vocals dated to june 7, 2002. i'm dating this to may 5, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-live-version
5) the recording of this track over the spring of 2002 seems to have occurred in spurts, likely based around gaps in my school schedule. the drums in the first part of the track were sculpted together on the night/morning of march 7/8, which would have been a little after the track took it's initial folk punk form and centred on it existing in that way. the drums were sculpted from a mix of the initial drum machine part, real time ry30 square pushing, washes of digital noise and short, sculpted samples of greg playing in real time. the track seems to have been shaped into what it is during the week of april 15-22, a little after it was expanded by playing it as a classical piece, with the addition of multiple guitar and synth overdubs and all kinds of digital wave shaping through notch filters and time manipulation. i must have had that week off for exam related purposes; i probably had late exams that year. incomplete versions of the track exist that seem to have been burned around april 25, which are what the live version with sean would have been based upon.
the next spurt in recording was to add bass parts over the weekend of may 17-19. further drum and guitar parts were also added at this time.
i was growing very insular during the period this was recorded, which was partially out of a decision to force myself to go straight edge in preparation for transgendered hormone therapy, which i was set to begin at the start of may. the bulk of the track was recorded before i went on hormone therapy. it may in some way reflect a sense of resigned preparation for a difficult process. but, it really comes more out of the isolation i had forced upon myself.
my parents were coming out of a difficult financial situation due partly to their own mismanagement and partly to my father coming out of a period of unemployment. he was completing a course in management over the period, which put me in the weird position of having to do his statistics homework for him. i was a second year honours math student at the time, so his basic stats assignments were not very challenging for me; conversely, he wasn't interested in the topic. i should probably have a diploma in business stats from the university of manitoba along with my math degree from carleton. but, who's counting, really? my math degree never got me anywhere in life (i haven't aspired to use it for anything....), but his management course opened up doors for him that have aided me. so, it worked out....
what this meant was that i found myself living in a split duplex around the beginning of 2002. for many years previously, i had lived in various basements and more or less had those basements to myself, merely having to tolerate the odd laundry run. the split duplex put me in the rather normal situation of having a bedroom upstairs, the privilege of having a studio downstairs and the inconvenience of having to follow scheduling rules. as i'd been so used to having total freedom in my scheduling for so long, i was unable to adjust to this.
if i were to come up and down the stairs in the middle of the night, i would wake my labrador retrievers up (who just wanted to come say hi) and that would wake up my parents. this was consequently forbidden. to get around this, i started sleeping in the afternoon, so i could go downstairs in the evening and not come back up until the morning. this left me without human contact for days or even weeks at a time. on long days, i would sleep on the carpeted floor of the studio. some days, i simply wouldn't sleep at all.
what you're hearing here is in many ways the culmination of this lack of human contact, complete abstinence from drugs and sleep deprivation - all in the context of the stress from simultaneously completing two university programs and preparing for a dramatic life shift. while the music was recorded in spurts, those spurts were emotional stress outlets. while parts of this may sound like my sanity was fragile while it was being created, the process of recording them is probably the only thing that allowed me to maintain it.
this version is dated to may 22, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-instrumental-version
6) sean's vocals were added at the beginning of june. i had to add some extra synth parts, as well, to fix some of the harmonization. i've successfully glossed over the problems, but this is the one recording where sean legitimately couldn't find notes that fit. it's hard to blame him, as the music is rather complex from a harmonic standpoint and there isn't an existing melody written out for him to follow. he didn't have the training required to interpret this. the vocal manipulations i used in the track caused some conflict, but the reality is that the vocal melody he had extrapolated out of the guitars for use in the acoustic version was simply not transferable to this mix and the mods were necessary to compensate. placing his naked vocals into the track would have created large amounts of dissonance where no dissonance was desired. when the track opens up a bit, there's more space, and the vocals are left unaltered.
looking back, i suppose i could have explained that to him and asked for a rewrite rather than just taking it into my own hands and slathering on the effects, but i was very keen on both maintaining his autonomy as a vocalist and maintaining my autonomy as a producer/composer. on top of that, i simply liked the end result. i suppose that, had i not been able to manipulate the vocals into what i wanted, i would have had to ask for a rewrite....
for the ring mod part, i wanted to emulate the knocking sound that existed atmospherically in the classical version. so, i gave sean a mic plugged into a ring modulator, locked him in the room and told him to smash it against the ground and play with the knobs for a while. i've kept this part in further instrumental versions.
that said, sean largely rejected the track in it's psychedelic form, so this is the last rabit is wolf version.
this is dated to june 15, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-3
trepanation nation disc 2...
7) once it had become clear that sean had rejected the track, i wasn't entirely sure what to do with it. i had some material i had put aside for a noise project (subsequently compiled as inri032: jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/give-em-hell-harry-strung-out ) that was meant to merge noise & politics, and i was maybe eager to get back to this idea of music as a political art form.
while there were not lyrics attached to the initial cynicide project, i did already have the idea of a conceptual piece connecting the existing condition of north american society to the idea of trepanning, or self-lobotomizing to get the precise point across. we were in the immediate wake of the 9/11 attacks (which seemed staged even at the point) and the political reaction to them. i felt the need to say something about this, but i didn't want to be too direct or judgmental about it so i compiled a list of samples that presented what i felt reflected the general condition of the world we were living in. the references are broad and vast; there's not really a succinct way to over-simplify it.
the overall context is the view that we were living through the end of the civil rights period. it could be argued that the focus on civil rights accidentally erupted as a reaction to world war two propaganda, hit a high point in the 1960s and began to irreversibly erode at the beginning of the 1980s. in this narrative, the collapse of the twin towers was the final death blow to something the elite never wanted in the first place and was happy to sweep into the trash heap of history.
but, i'm specifically focusing on how this is self-inflicted by our collective desire to be stupid - to drill these holes in our skulls, as though there's some kind of enlightenment in abolishing our ability to understand the world around us, and focus instead on our own short term gains. in that sense, it's an attack on the neo-liberal model and how it encourages us to destroy ourselves.
the spoken word section in the middle was a poem i created out of those word magnets you see on fridges. i was working as an overnight security guard at the time (summer of 2001) and just not sleeping at all. as i was doing my rounds, i stopped and made the poem. i got fired from that job for yelling at a coke machine...
i've considered doing a sample-by-sample breakdown of this but have decided it's neurotic. however, if you want to write an essay, and i like it, i'll link to it.
dated to july 4, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/trepanation-nation-sample-mix
8) in late 2013, i decided to complete unfinished tracks in a chronological ordering and it led me to the decision to complete the track in the form it was initially written in. completed on sept 24, 2014; dated to sept 16, 2001.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/10-to-spin-inside-dull-aberrations
Wednesday, November 19, 2014
publishing the imaginary tour demo ep (inri059)
ok, that finishes inri040, which i'm releasing as a download-only release.
these mixes are a little messy at points, but it's marketed as a demo, so i'm ok with that.
--
something like this would have been the demo brought along on an acoustic tour that never happened. tracks 1-4 would have represented a live set over the summer of 2002, while tracks five and six are otherwise stranded acoustic demos. the style could be broadly categorized as folk punk, but it also leans heavily towards the emo of the period.
written and recorded in late 2001 and the first half of 2002. mildly remixed in november, 2014 to make the tracks more presentable; nothing substantial was altered, and no new sound was recorded. final mixes were on november 19, 2014. as always, please use headphones.
credits
j - acoustic guitar, voice (3)
sean - vocals, lyrics
released august 1, 2002
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-imaginary-tour-ep
1) this is the original demo, that the main track was built over. it is completely unaltered from the 2002 file. feb 5, 2002.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/9-16-outside-the-magenta-box
2) this is a new mix of the original guitar and vocal parts. written and recorded in march, 2002. mix done on nov 19, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/psi-4
3) when the idea of performing as an acoustic duo was decided upon, it became clear that much of the recorded material was unsuitable for this purpose. the original version of this track would have been painfully boring to watch as a duo, with the music consisting of nothing more than a basic bass line. so, i rewrote the song for acoustic presentation. this is a (rough) live demo that i made for sean. no recording with sean was created.
it's a tricky guitar part, and trickier to do while singing (which wouldn't have been necessary in a live setting).
obviously, a live version would have included sean singing his vocals rather than me reciting them. it would have also included dual harmonies at the end.
some minor editing of this may 5, 2002 mix was done on nov 19. 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/me-myself-and-the-time-i-thought-this-was-a-good-idea-2
4) this is actually a transitional version of the song, halfway between the initial folk version (jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-first-demo ) and the rabit is wolf version (jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry). the guitar part was recorded live in may, 2002 for the purposes of it being the performance version of the track, and just as a way to show it to sean over icq (or was it msn?). i've reconstructed the vocals from recordings of the studio version, which is in itself a substantial reworking because those vocals were heavily manipulated.
i had no option but to time shift some of the tracks as some of this recording is in a different tempo, but these are otherwise naked vocals and this is otherwise what i would have wanted a live performance of the track to sound like, as the ending point of any live set.
this mix was done on nov 19, 2014, out of parts recorded in may and june of 2002, and is dated to june 10, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-2
5) this was a live demo (with sean on the left channel and myself on the right) that i think was probably recorded in july. i've mixed the channels down, but not altered it, otherwise. mixed on nov 19, 2014. dated to july 14, 2002.
this was a song that had a split personality from the beginning; it was being converted into a techno song for my own uses at the same time that it was being written with sean, and to be honest i had far more invested into the techno side of it. i did play it for sean, but he wasn't interested. no final mix was recorded with sean. i think this version is best left as it is.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/penny-shoeman
6) this was a live demo (with sean on the left channel and myself on the right) that i think was probably recorded in july. this was never finished as a rabit tune, and i never expanded it into one of my own tunes. i think it's better left as it is. this acoustic ep is actually a good home for it, as it was intended that way.
the little bit of production i did was in mixing the channels. the intent was just to mix the two sources together, but i felt that the mixdown took something away from sean's vocals that they previously had when they were separated in the mix - this is hard to articulate, it's just something about the empty space. so, that's the idea going on there.
i constructed this final mix (date: nov 19, 2014) out of two mixes - one that continued the stereo rotation for the whole track, and the initial channel-separated one. it's dated to july 28, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/jumped-up-and-down
note that this is also the last rabit is wolf release.
i'm going to put a box set up, but it's difficult to place the boundaries on it so i'm not sure yet. the rule will probably be "include's seans vocals". which will make the box set eight or nine discs.
these mixes are a little messy at points, but it's marketed as a demo, so i'm ok with that.
--
something like this would have been the demo brought along on an acoustic tour that never happened. tracks 1-4 would have represented a live set over the summer of 2002, while tracks five and six are otherwise stranded acoustic demos. the style could be broadly categorized as folk punk, but it also leans heavily towards the emo of the period.
written and recorded in late 2001 and the first half of 2002. mildly remixed in november, 2014 to make the tracks more presentable; nothing substantial was altered, and no new sound was recorded. final mixes were on november 19, 2014. as always, please use headphones.
credits
j - acoustic guitar, voice (3)
sean - vocals, lyrics
released august 1, 2002
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/the-imaginary-tour-ep
1) this is the original demo, that the main track was built over. it is completely unaltered from the 2002 file. feb 5, 2002.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/9-16-outside-the-magenta-box
2) this is a new mix of the original guitar and vocal parts. written and recorded in march, 2002. mix done on nov 19, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/psi-4
3) when the idea of performing as an acoustic duo was decided upon, it became clear that much of the recorded material was unsuitable for this purpose. the original version of this track would have been painfully boring to watch as a duo, with the music consisting of nothing more than a basic bass line. so, i rewrote the song for acoustic presentation. this is a (rough) live demo that i made for sean. no recording with sean was created.
it's a tricky guitar part, and trickier to do while singing (which wouldn't have been necessary in a live setting).
obviously, a live version would have included sean singing his vocals rather than me reciting them. it would have also included dual harmonies at the end.
some minor editing of this may 5, 2002 mix was done on nov 19. 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/me-myself-and-the-time-i-thought-this-was-a-good-idea-2
4) this is actually a transitional version of the song, halfway between the initial folk version (jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-first-demo ) and the rabit is wolf version (jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry). the guitar part was recorded live in may, 2002 for the purposes of it being the performance version of the track, and just as a way to show it to sean over icq (or was it msn?). i've reconstructed the vocals from recordings of the studio version, which is in itself a substantial reworking because those vocals were heavily manipulated.
i had no option but to time shift some of the tracks as some of this recording is in a different tempo, but these are otherwise naked vocals and this is otherwise what i would have wanted a live performance of the track to sound like, as the ending point of any live set.
this mix was done on nov 19, 2014, out of parts recorded in may and june of 2002, and is dated to june 10, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/the-day-i-saw-you-cry-2
5) this was a live demo (with sean on the left channel and myself on the right) that i think was probably recorded in july. i've mixed the channels down, but not altered it, otherwise. mixed on nov 19, 2014. dated to july 14, 2002.
this was a song that had a split personality from the beginning; it was being converted into a techno song for my own uses at the same time that it was being written with sean, and to be honest i had far more invested into the techno side of it. i did play it for sean, but he wasn't interested. no final mix was recorded with sean. i think this version is best left as it is.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/penny-shoeman
6) this was a live demo (with sean on the left channel and myself on the right) that i think was probably recorded in july. this was never finished as a rabit tune, and i never expanded it into one of my own tunes. i think it's better left as it is. this acoustic ep is actually a good home for it, as it was intended that way.
the little bit of production i did was in mixing the channels. the intent was just to mix the two sources together, but i felt that the mixdown took something away from sean's vocals that they previously had when they were separated in the mix - this is hard to articulate, it's just something about the empty space. so, that's the idea going on there.
i constructed this final mix (date: nov 19, 2014) out of two mixes - one that continued the stereo rotation for the whole track, and the initial channel-separated one. it's dated to july 28, 2002.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/jumped-up-and-down
note that this is also the last rabit is wolf release.
i'm going to put a box set up, but it's difficult to place the boundaries on it so i'm not sure yet. the rule will probably be "include's seans vocals". which will make the box set eight or nine discs.
publishing time (inri056)
sound raider isn't behaving...i probably wouldn't have uploaded it anyways....
so, inri037 is now complete.
--
time & psi were partially a rejection of the folk idea in favour of glossy, somewhat experimental pop. i realized that it was reasonable to move in a more commercial direction, but folk wasn't something i understood well, so it was a weird direction for me to be moving in. experimental or psychedelic pop, on the other hand, was something i had a solid grasp on...
time had been initially recorded in the fall and was remixed in late february to integrate a drum part. no original files exist. psi was recorded quickly in early march.
the track, as it existed in rabit, was a conscious pop compromise. i had ideas that weren't explored to keep it poppy and that have been expanded upon in the remixes.
the time machine is added here as a bonus track. it's based on an earlier classical guitar composition that was always meant to be reinterpreted as an idm tune and finally was in early 2014. the thematic overlap makes it relevant, but there is otherwise no connection between the two songs.
i started working on what would become my fourth symphony very shortly after the material on this ep was completed, and it really represents the point where i lost interest in rabit as a concept, under pressure to continue moving in a direction i didn't have any interest in. there are folk and psych versions of the track; sean never caught on to the psych version, and i never had my heart in the folk version. there were final folk demos recorded as late as the fall, but the disconnect was not solvable. the vocal version of the fourth symphony is in some way a corollary of but is ultimately too separate from these files to include here. psi & time, together, consequently comprise what is the fourth and final ("psychedelic pop") phase of rabit.
written in late 2001 and early 2002 and recorded in early 2002 and late 2014. the final mix was finished on nov 18, 2014. as always, please use headphones.
credits:
j - electric & acoustic guitars, bass, synthesizers, digital effects & treatments, drum manipulations, programming, digital wave editing, loops, sound design, production, composition.
sean - vocals, lyrics (3,4)
greg - drum performance sample source (1-3)
the rendered electronic orchestra on track 5 includes acoustic bass, synth bass, electric bass, brass, orchestra hit, drum machine, electronic drum kit, nylon guitar, electric guitar, synthesizer effects, music box, piano, bells and mellotron.
released march 10, 2002
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/time
so, inri037 is now complete.
--
time & psi were partially a rejection of the folk idea in favour of glossy, somewhat experimental pop. i realized that it was reasonable to move in a more commercial direction, but folk wasn't something i understood well, so it was a weird direction for me to be moving in. experimental or psychedelic pop, on the other hand, was something i had a solid grasp on...
time had been initially recorded in the fall and was remixed in late february to integrate a drum part. no original files exist. psi was recorded quickly in early march.
the track, as it existed in rabit, was a conscious pop compromise. i had ideas that weren't explored to keep it poppy and that have been expanded upon in the remixes.
the time machine is added here as a bonus track. it's based on an earlier classical guitar composition that was always meant to be reinterpreted as an idm tune and finally was in early 2014. the thematic overlap makes it relevant, but there is otherwise no connection between the two songs.
i started working on what would become my fourth symphony very shortly after the material on this ep was completed, and it really represents the point where i lost interest in rabit as a concept, under pressure to continue moving in a direction i didn't have any interest in. there are folk and psych versions of the track; sean never caught on to the psych version, and i never had my heart in the folk version. there were final folk demos recorded as late as the fall, but the disconnect was not solvable. the vocal version of the fourth symphony is in some way a corollary of but is ultimately too separate from these files to include here. psi & time, together, consequently comprise what is the fourth and final ("psychedelic pop") phase of rabit.
written in late 2001 and early 2002 and recorded in early 2002 and late 2014. the final mix was finished on nov 18, 2014. as always, please use headphones.
credits:
j - electric & acoustic guitars, bass, synthesizers, digital effects & treatments, drum manipulations, programming, digital wave editing, loops, sound design, production, composition.
sean - vocals, lyrics (3,4)
greg - drum performance sample source (1-3)
the rendered electronic orchestra on track 5 includes acoustic bass, synth bass, electric bass, brass, orchestra hit, drum machine, electronic drum kit, nylon guitar, electric guitar, synthesizer effects, music box, piano, bells and mellotron.
released march 10, 2002
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/time
running out of time (final mixes)
1) the track, as it existed in rabit, was a conscious pop compromise. i had ideas that weren't explored to keep it poppy and that have been expanded upon in the remixes. written in late 2001 and 2002 and recorded in early 2002 and late 2014. the final mix was finished on nov 18, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/running-out-of-time
2) this mix is a combination of tracks from the original song played at various speeds, with large amounts of processing on the individual tracks. there's actually no synths in this track. track released nov 18, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-running-out-mix
3) a remixed instrumental version of the original track. released nov 18, 2014.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-unstuck-mix-2
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/running-out-of-time
2) this mix is a combination of tracks from the original song played at various speeds, with large amounts of processing on the individual tracks. there's actually no synths in this track. track released nov 18, 2014.
http://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-running-out-mix
3) a remixed instrumental version of the original track. released nov 18, 2014.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-unstuck-mix-2
i'm done reclaiming rabit stuff, now. the next few releases require some remixes but should be quick.
i don't know about this tour ep, i don't know if i have enough material. i'm not just going to release it for the sake of it. if i can get enough together, great. if not...
i ended up with a lot of unused edits for the first section of time, now called running out of time. i'm going to try a sound raider experiment with them to add to the ep. but they're not a part of the track. inri037 is otherwise done.
the rss will update. i need to eat....
i don't know about this tour ep, i don't know if i have enough material. i'm not just going to release it for the sake of it. if i can get enough together, great. if not...
i ended up with a lot of unused edits for the first section of time, now called running out of time. i'm going to try a sound raider experiment with them to add to the ep. but they're not a part of the track. inri037 is otherwise done.
the rss will update. i need to eat....
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
i feel that people are a little bit confused about this discussion of streaming media, and a lot of it has to do with not understanding the words that are being thrown around.
so, we live under the system we call capitalism. while there are many ways to categorize people in capitalism, the most widely adopted (and most successful, in terms of explanations) way to do this is to broadly split people into workers and capitalists. it's not a clean partition, and it's not exhaustive, but it's fine for the discussion.
simply stated, the workers in a capitalist system are the people that make the goods, whereas the capitalists are the people that own the systems of production and appropriate a profit from the worker's labour, while not producing anything themselves.
now, let us analyze a music distribution system, like spotify. clearly, the musicians are the workers in such a system. and, who are the capitalists? that would be the managers - spotify, google, apple....
and, we see the same thing in this system that we see in every other capitalist system - the capitalists make large profits by exploiting the labour of the workers, while the workers starve.
now, it's pretty blatantly obvious that capitalism is an exploitative system. so, one of the things that anti-capitalists (like socialists and anarchists) seek to do is to gain control of the means of production, so that they don't have to pay the capitalists. anti-capitalists would consequently seek to smash systems like spotify and replace them with artist-run spaces. that is, independent labels and independent artists. bandcamp is not exactly an artist run space, but it's far closer to a socialist model.
the confusion stems from this idea that any process of exchange is upholding capitalism, which is just a misunderstanding of capitalism. capitalism is not exchanging things. there are diverse types of market socialism. capitalism, specifically, is the appropriation of labour by a managerial class. and, the entrenchment of services that stream music for peanuts that are sent to a centralized corporate bureaucracy, while the workers get nothing at all, is one of the most blatantly capitalistic things we've seen happen in our lifetimes.
this confusion is upheld by social norms which seek to trivialize certain economic activities as outside the market. generally, it's "feminine things" that are trivialized in this way - child care, housework, social work and art, to name a few examples.
i hope i've clarified a few things.
so, we live under the system we call capitalism. while there are many ways to categorize people in capitalism, the most widely adopted (and most successful, in terms of explanations) way to do this is to broadly split people into workers and capitalists. it's not a clean partition, and it's not exhaustive, but it's fine for the discussion.
simply stated, the workers in a capitalist system are the people that make the goods, whereas the capitalists are the people that own the systems of production and appropriate a profit from the worker's labour, while not producing anything themselves.
now, let us analyze a music distribution system, like spotify. clearly, the musicians are the workers in such a system. and, who are the capitalists? that would be the managers - spotify, google, apple....
and, we see the same thing in this system that we see in every other capitalist system - the capitalists make large profits by exploiting the labour of the workers, while the workers starve.
now, it's pretty blatantly obvious that capitalism is an exploitative system. so, one of the things that anti-capitalists (like socialists and anarchists) seek to do is to gain control of the means of production, so that they don't have to pay the capitalists. anti-capitalists would consequently seek to smash systems like spotify and replace them with artist-run spaces. that is, independent labels and independent artists. bandcamp is not exactly an artist run space, but it's far closer to a socialist model.
the confusion stems from this idea that any process of exchange is upholding capitalism, which is just a misunderstanding of capitalism. capitalism is not exchanging things. there are diverse types of market socialism. capitalism, specifically, is the appropriation of labour by a managerial class. and, the entrenchment of services that stream music for peanuts that are sent to a centralized corporate bureaucracy, while the workers get nothing at all, is one of the most blatantly capitalistic things we've seen happen in our lifetimes.
this confusion is upheld by social norms which seek to trivialize certain economic activities as outside the market. generally, it's "feminine things" that are trivialized in this way - child care, housework, social work and art, to name a few examples.
i hope i've clarified a few things.
time (running out mix)
so, this is going to come in in three parts on the time single, which will be merged into one track on the record.
it's looking like it'll be around 20 minutes, which may be a mild problem when it comes to sequence the disc. but i can't worry about that right now. right now, i've got tons of space on the single...
the third part may end up not on the record. we'll see.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-unstuck-mix
this is the first section, which will open up into a remix of the song for the second section. the third section is an idea that will be chaotic, let's see what it sounds like....
written & recorded in late 2001 and early 2002 and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. the final mix was finished on nov 18, 2014.
it's looking like it'll be around 20 minutes, which may be a mild problem when it comes to sequence the disc. but i can't worry about that right now. right now, i've got tons of space on the single...
the third part may end up not on the record. we'll see.
https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/track/time-unstuck-mix
this is the first section, which will open up into a remix of the song for the second section. the third section is an idea that will be chaotic, let's see what it sounds like....
written & recorded in late 2001 and early 2002 and mixed in early 2002 and late 2014. the final mix was finished on nov 18, 2014.
Monday, November 17, 2014
well, i got my permanent record mailed to me, but it's not my permanent record. it's for somebody else with the same name born in july, 1981. i was born in january, 1981. so i need to figure out where my files are...
the one thing i did get back was standardized testing results from when i was in grade two. apparently, they identified me as being at a ninth grade level at that time. i passed a test to skip me past grade five, but the principal vetoed it because she thought i needed to stay the year for maturity reasons.
the truth is i was always almost a year older than everybody because i was born thirteen days past the cutoff. so, i was almost eight going into grade two. the skip probably would have helped more than hindered in terms of behavioural issues.
anyways, these were my grade two standardized test results. these are percentiles, not grades.
vocabulary - 99
reading - 95
language - 96
work-study - 99
mathematics - 93
total rank: 99th percentile (national)
i look back and don't wish i would have spent more time on school, i look back and wish i wouldn't have bothered at all. and, had i not been pressured into it, i probably wouldn't have.
i mean, i'd probably have more of this discography done at this point.
but i think i got to the right approach eventually.
speaking of which, i need to start the next remix....
the one thing i did get back was standardized testing results from when i was in grade two. apparently, they identified me as being at a ninth grade level at that time. i passed a test to skip me past grade five, but the principal vetoed it because she thought i needed to stay the year for maturity reasons.
the truth is i was always almost a year older than everybody because i was born thirteen days past the cutoff. so, i was almost eight going into grade two. the skip probably would have helped more than hindered in terms of behavioural issues.
anyways, these were my grade two standardized test results. these are percentiles, not grades.
vocabulary - 99
reading - 95
language - 96
work-study - 99
mathematics - 93
total rank: 99th percentile (national)
i look back and don't wish i would have spent more time on school, i look back and wish i wouldn't have bothered at all. and, had i not been pressured into it, i probably wouldn't have.
i mean, i'd probably have more of this discography done at this point.
but i think i got to the right approach eventually.
speaking of which, i need to start the next remix....
that reliable feeling of disappointment that one expects following a new smashing pumpkins release
all three of these tracks seem geared for radio play. it's not like the pumpkins weren't always a radio band, but...
i don't listen to the radio anymore and haven't in a really, really long time but i suspect that none of these songs are going to fit in well with anything remotely approaching an existing singles market. which gives them that left-field advantage. but that's low probability. hey, i hope it works out. but...
how many people are going to post the tired old "it's like everything else since insert event - it's ok, but it just doesn't grab me". well, they're right on some level but they're not able to articulate it.
the smashing pumpkins sound requires the integration of virtuoso guitar work.
that's the missing link, the je ne sais quoi, the intangible, the mystery ingredient...
sadly, it's probably the exact opposite thing that william (hey, he asked, have some respect) has heard from every label head, marketing expert, friend and pet over the last fifteen years.
this is alright. for a pop song. but it doesn't have that virtuosic angular energy.
which in the end just means i'm not in the intended audience. which is ok, too.
i don't listen to the radio anymore and haven't in a really, really long time but i suspect that none of these songs are going to fit in well with anything remotely approaching an existing singles market. which gives them that left-field advantage. but that's low probability. hey, i hope it works out. but...
how many people are going to post the tired old "it's like everything else since insert event - it's ok, but it just doesn't grab me". well, they're right on some level but they're not able to articulate it.
the smashing pumpkins sound requires the integration of virtuoso guitar work.
that's the missing link, the je ne sais quoi, the intangible, the mystery ingredient...
sadly, it's probably the exact opposite thing that william (hey, he asked, have some respect) has heard from every label head, marketing expert, friend and pet over the last fifteen years.
this is alright. for a pop song. but it doesn't have that virtuosic angular energy.
which in the end just means i'm not in the intended audience. which is ok, too.
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