Smashing Mashup

Hello loyal listeners. This is another one pulled from the archives, dusted off, re-jigged and polished for your listening pleasure: Without You (Eminem vs. Yes). But, there is a small tale behind this one.. so humor me a moment. Sherman, set the wayback machine for 2004...

It was around this time that I became aware of the Mashup scene. Party Ben was in full swing on Live 105 in San Francisco and was churning out some great Mashups (if you don't already know Party Ben, go look him up). Having listened to a few tracks, and spent way too many hours making music with Sonic Foundry's Acid (they owned it before Sony bought them up), I thought I would try my hand at a Mashup.

I got a hold of the acapella to Eminem's "Without Me" and just started to goof around with it. As a joke, I looped a section of the 'pella with a section of "Owner of a Lonely Heart" by Yes, thinking that the two songs were so far a part, how silly it would be to join them.

Well... it worked. It worked really well! In fact, the more of the tracks I laid on top of each other, the more they clicked – they had same basic verse-chorus structure underneath. So after a few hours (or was it days) of work, some sample hunting and splicing, I had a really great Mashup.

Back to 2010.

I keep coming back to this mix and cleaning and polishing it every few years. For the 2010 mix, I've re-sliced some of the guitar loops, added some ADT to the lead vocals, adjusted a few levels and toned down the final master compressor.

To this day, this is still one of my favorite tracks I've done to date.

Enjoy!



Techie Stuff – for those that care.

The drum break and "orchestra hit" that Trevor Horn used on the original Yes track is from the song "Kool is Back" by Funk, Inc. I found a copy of the song and spliced those elements back in to the track along side the originals, but without the odd filtering that Horn did.

Trevor Horn was at one time or another a member of The Buggles, The Art of Noise and Yes. He also has produced just about all of Seal's albums.

Run the Blade

Another one pulled from the archives...

Who doesn't love Blade Runner? If you don't... I don't wanna meet ya! ;)

So here is my meager tribute (aka blatant copy) to the music Vangelis wrote for Blade Runner. This one features a very HUGE string pad - provided by Aurturia's CS80v VST - as well as a analog harmonica-sound that I think Vangelis would have even used - again, courtesy of the CS80v.

So snuggle up to your favorite Replicant, pour a glass of wine and enjoy.

Ch-Check It Out

Well. It seems that almost 3 months has gone by and nothing new posted. Life for me has been a bit "chaotic" to say the least. I won't bore you with the details, so on to the music, yes?

This is one from the archives. Some time ago, The Beastie Boys decided to upload many of the a cappella versions of their songs to their website - http://www.beastieboys.com/remixer/ - so I took a spin at remixing "Ch-Check It Out" in an somewhat old school style.

So lace up your Adidas and pull out that track suit. Here comes the BASS! Enjoy.

Old is the "new" New

Well... it's been some time since I posted anything new, life is keeping me very busy these days. Anyway, here is a little something I whipped out this evening. It's very 70s sounding - complete with Univibe and Leslie goodness. Please excuse the drums, I'm not the best "keyboard" drummer out there.

All the guitars (including the bass) were tracked with my Line 6 Vetta II amp, straight into Cubase via S/PDIF on the Presonus FP10.

Enjoy.

New strings brings out the Muse

It's amazing what a new set of strings will do for your muse!

I'm not that big of an acoustic guitar player, but a new set of strings seems to have made the difference. This is a simple little track I improvised in open G recorded with two Shure SM58s and a direct feed from my Simon & Patrick CW6.

Retro-tech

I was playing some old Cubase tracks that I fiddled about with when I was working for Keyfax New Media and found this little ditty:



It's got this sort of retro sound - courtesy of the Arturia CS80v, Arp2600 and a few other virtual synths - but it also has a electro feel. Fun stuff either way.

Heat and serve!

Mmmm...Organ-y

There are times when you want to rock out. And then, there are times when you want to to play cheesy organ music. This time, the Organ won.



For those that care about this sort of thing, here are the free VSTs I used to make this charming little ditty:

Instruments
VH-2 Organ - http://www.iliadisorgan.com/
Rhythmus (Analog Drum Machine Sim) - http://elektrostudio.ovh.org/

FX
Ambience (Reverb) - http://magnus.smartelectronix.com/
Classic Series Comp/Lim - http://www.kjaerhusaudio.com/

Enjoy!

C2