I've been busy making new tracks and working on building my SoundCloud fanbase when not directly involved in making music itself.
My last blog I talked about joining a record label called Sisyphean Records. Since then, I've decided to leave for a few reasons, but mainly because of the labels large size and also weak leadership from the top. I feel like I tried my best to salvage the situation and even offer donations to help out, but the attitude of the owner was very pessimistic and depressing; not the kind of of person I wanted in charge of my own success. With that aside, I still support them and have payed attention to their latest releases, but I no longer claim any affiliation with them. (Very eye opening experience and made me re-focus my goals into what I actually would want from a label and also whether one is necessary or not)
In other news, I've got into contact with a new small company from Georgia (The country, not state!) called Sound Siege Audio Mastering. https://soundsiege.wixsite.com/mastering
I sent in some of my tracks for free to get mastered, and I was happy with the results they gave, including two versions of each track to get a better comparison. When listening to music over and over again, you become very numb to certain sounds, and perceived volume as well as EQ work can be hard to distinguish properly when this happens. Although this was a free service, I gave them a pretty generous donation to reward their work. Communication has been great, and their work rate was very quick. Thanks Sound Siege!
Some new tracks since my last blog:
-Echoes:
https://soundcloud.com/th1rdeye/echoes
(inspired by a documentary on the history of Dub music, "Dub Echoes" by Bruno Natal) .. a must see for anyone who calls the mixing board home)
-Spice (Life On Arrakis):
https://soundcloud.com/th1rdeye/spice
(inspired by the Sci-Fi novel "Dune" by Frank Herbert .. always one of my favorites, as well as the PC games =))
-Origins:
https://soundcloud.com/th1rdeye/origins
**This track was the first one I made using a new synthesizer plugin called "Massive" by Native Instruments. 90% of this track was recorded by myself with synths, very light on samples besides the drums. I am excited to explore Massive further.
And finally, I purchased a Novation 25 Midi Controller keyboard today. I have been debating making hardware purchases since the beginning, but I finally feel that in combination with Massive, I'll be able to write interesting synth parts and work on adapting sounds to better encompass what I'm attempting to make.
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/keyboards-midi/novation-launchkey-25-midi-controller/j22035000000000?source=3TEM5KTBK
- Shout out to a couple of other fellow TL producers,
MMIC - https://soundcloud.com/MMIC
JieXian - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm1ox-gdTq9hjx2cF631xkw (JieShian Music)
iPlaY.NettleS - https://m.soundcloud.com/greenberg (Ruffneck)
synapse - https://soundcloud.com/synapsii (Synapsii)
Thanks for reading!