Archive for the ‘Freesound Project’ Category

One of the cool things about remixing (I know, again again again) is the ability to hook up, albeit virtually and perhaps without their knowledge, and lend your own spin to their work. So this week, some cool intersections.

First of all, on ccmixter, I found an mp3 from a Wired Magazine pack. Spoon has been with me lately, mainly due to my old friend, Robert Rising, giving me a random CD of awesome pop, the best of which was Cherry Bomb off of Gagagaga. This may be the best pop song I have ever heard in my life, and made me deliriously happy in the downtrodden, week-after-new-years that I had here in 2008. So I remixed their song, Revenge into a weirdo, ambient piece.

Secondly, I returned to my piano roots, sharing a duet with old dog, whose chops are definitely better than mine (his playing comes after the break, mine before).

Third, another strange coincidence with a Turkish musician of note, Murat Ses, an innovator of Turkish pop music, who like my Father before him, was/is revolutionary in changing Turkish music from oral folk tradition into something quite modern and new. He asked if I would relinquish a non-commercial creative commons license into a commercial one with attribution. I said yes (of course, effendim). The odd thing is, we had no idea who the other was, I had no idea of his legacy and he had no idea I was the daughter of another legacy. I am trying to remix his Anadolu Pop Theme, and it is KICKING MY ASS but I will finish.

I have sent some more loops off to ditto ditto, in France, who I hope to meet in person in March when I go there. So hopefully another collaboration will come of these loops.

Here is the music:

Breaking Apart, Sous Bois (featuring old dog, plagasul & dplante)

Revenge (Mix Cuit A Four) featuring viop & Spoon

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Rain Lament (Jaspertine Triste Mix)

If there was been one complaint about my music, across the boards, it had been about the drum choices. I happen to love a noisy, white wall cacaphony, but apparently it is not for everyone. I must now need to mention here, ditto ditto (aka Philippe) from just outside of Paris, with his fine ear and sensitivity for subtle sounds. We have been working globally together, on a few projects. The piece is called “Tell us your secret Kaer Trouz” you can listen by following this link , and if you want to download the acapella, you can by creating an account with CCmixter. I have been working hard to understand my new microphone, which like a new friend,must be worked out. Here is a screen shot of all the lines I must draw around my voice, in order to make it. The pink lines represent the manual drawing I did, which , on this particular piece, took 25 minutes. The black lines are my voice.

November sometimes hits me like a locomotive, I love autumn, the chilly hubris, damp smoke and fresh rot, the ways the trees look like stark brooms, jutting into the sky. I have been wanting for a while to do a piece without drums, and found some brilliant guitar samples from Jaspertine on CCmixter, as well as a realistically recorded thunderstorm from RHumphries, and another spare ambient industrial loop from dropthedyle, who may be my favorite Belgian scary noise maker of all time (if one were to have such a favorite).

Lastly, SAM is packing up a truck in Washington DC, and will be in Chicago on Sunday, and after a month of many email & file exchanges, plus a disturbing amount of IM exchanges, we will finally start our project, which I am over the moon about. Stay tuned….

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Yes, the old Shure SM 58, from 1992, died yesterday. RIP. I felt sad for a moment, but luckily, because it is a commodity, I was able to replace it with a better more reliable microphone. A Shure Beta 58 A.

Microphones are important for singers. I actually do not know much about them. I was talked into buying a FET microphone last year, a Groove Tube 55, which was a terrible mistake. I am not technically adept to know why this Fet microphone was so wrong for me, other than in the higher registers, this mic made my voice sound thin & weedy, and rank, and was not able to pick up lower registers, or nuances in vibrato. When Randy, our turtle, arranged her rocks in her tank- that you could hear perfectly!

This time, I made the skanky dude at the Music shop take all the mics out of the case so I could try them. I loved how this Shure sounded, organic, gooey and crisp, all at once!

I did a little remix/new composition today, featuring my new dulcet tones, culling a piano sample from Klaus Neumaier courtesy of ccmixter, and a crackly ambient loop from Drop The Dyle, courtesy of the freesound project.

Winter Comes

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