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This is the next chapter in "Extreme Gravity", and it is focused on Phrog the Munificent . . . :)

THOUGHTS

Phrog the Munificent is a curious entity, who in Cartesian space is the size of a gumdrop or jelly bean but has the unique ability to perceive time threads in the higher dimensions of spacetime, which include the Calabi-Yau manifold dimensions . . .

In Cartesian space, Phrog travels in vehicles provided by the Shadows, who as a group enjoy distilling petroleum and having wild parties when operating their Cartesian space vehicles, called "Shadow Wheels" (a.k.a., "Poly-Rollies") . . .

Phrog has a new set of novices whom he intends to train to be Time Thread Pilots, a process that requires a Deep Room, which by design and construction makes it possible to isolate the lower resonances of individual time threads . . .

One of Phrog's Deep Rooms is located on Another World in the Abandoned City of the planet that Bokra and Suzanne discovered after shining a LASER pen on a Ghost Rock (a.k.a., "Drost") and traveling through the portal it created . . .

Chapter 8 introduces the Arugulans, Melvin Piffle [not his real name] the Director of the Pretend FBI, and Bucky the Little Mutant Raccoon . . .

[NOTE: These chapters from the first two volumes of "Extreme Gravity" provide background and context and are best enjoyed when listening with headphones. Chapter 5 was recorded with a Fender American Deluxe Stratocaster, Fender American Vintage '62 Jazz Bass, Alesis ION Analog Modeling Synthesizer, and KORG Triton Music Workstation (88-weighted piano-style keys). The later chapters were recorded with these instruments plus a drumkit . . . ]

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Among other things, Chapter 11 features Professor Alphonse Twittle of the Department of Absurd Physics of the Institute for Advanced Physics and Modern Dance, who gives a lecture on "The Absolute Fundamental Units (AFU) of the Universe", something I wrote over 40 years ago after becoming annoyed by experimental physicists discovering a new quark every few weeks or months . . .

On one side of the coin, discovering more quarks certainly was amazing; but the other side of the coin is that sooner or later connecting a few dots tends strongly to suggest there is a lot more stuff; hence connect more dots and realize there is a smallest entity and unit, which I think provides the hithertofore elusive explanation for gravity . . .

Lots of FUN! :)
Last edited by Surf.Whammy on Fri Jul 08, 2022 7:57 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Fri Jul 08, 2022 7:18 am
I'm starting work on "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (Part Two)" . . . :)

THOUGHTS

Other than some final producing and mastering, I am happy with "Chapter 10: Darla's Sexy Dance"; so I am working on "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (Part Two)" . . .

For this chapter, I am using Addictive Drums 2 (XLN Audio) rather than MODO DRUM (IK Multimedia), although I plan to continue using the Timpani from SampleTank 4 (IK Multimedia), which is part of the Orchestral Percussion Collection, as heard in "Industrial Surf ~ v5" . . .

The specific timpani has deep bass tone and good sustain, which is enhanced by the T-RackS 5 (IK Multimedia) "EQP-1A" Vacuum-Tube Equalizer with a modified "FATT-1A" preset . . .

[NOTE: This is mixed for headphone listening . . . ]
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I have completed the basic rhythm section for the Intro and Outro; so now I am focusing on the Instrumental Surf themed first section that follows the Intro, where Phrog and his novices are traveling in a Shadow spaceship, during which the Shadows are having one of their typical petroleum-distilling parties . . .

The Shadows are obsessed with discovering and cataloging every possible petroleum distillate, which is a rather pointless project they started thousands of years ago, apparently for no easily discernible reason . . .

These petroleum-distilling parties inevitably result in several explosions inside the Shadow spaceship, which (a) do not disturb Phrog's novices due to their being inside protective cyberpods, and (b) do not bother Phrog, who simply jumps temporarily into a higher dimension . . .

However, Phrog's bongo drums are not so fortunate, although Phrog usually keeps his bongo drums in a protective case . . .

The problem occurs when the Shadows start playing Instrumental Surf music of 1960s Earth, which inevitably causes Phrog to start playing his bongo drums . . .

As the saturation of petroleum distillates increases in the Shadow spaceship, it just requires a single spark, and that's the end of Phrog's bongo drums . . .

In an effort to protect his bongo drums, Phrog tries to anticipate the inevitable adverse event, but as with everything which is inevitable, it's inevitable . . .

The middle section of this chapter switches to Professor Alphonse Twittle of the Department of Absurd Physics of the Institute for Advanced Physics and Modern Dance who embarks on a treatise and overview of the "Theory of the Absolute Fundamental Units (AFU) of the Universe", which is delivered in an Indian accent with corresponding Indian music in the background . . .

In a nutshell, the basis of the theory is two-fold: (a) Isaac Newton created calculus to trick mathematically-challenged physicists and (b) Isaac Newton did this to avoid revealing the facts that (b.1) there is plenty of stuff between the purported infinitesimally-small "slices" and (b.2) there are ultimately small particles that allow no further subdivisions, real or virtual . . .

Additionally, the theory makes it clear (a) that gravity is a metaphysical force and (b) that there are no gravitons or related "gravity particles" . . .

"At this point (actually at all points), there are only two types of AFU(s): (1) an AFU with positive character (the butterscotch AFU), and (2) an AFU with negative character (the peppermint AFU) -- (see Figure 11.1). There are three fundamental types of blocks (see Figure 11.2): (1) positive (composed of one unit of existence and two, positive units of character), (2) neutral (composed of one unit of existence, one positive unit of character, and one negative unit of character), and (3) negative (composed of one unit of existence and two, negative units of character). If you are observant, then you must be wondering what happened to the extra units of existence that were not used in the construction of these blocks—since, something must have happened to them, because existence can be neither added nor subtracted)."

"The only event in which character can produce existence occurs when there is no existence in the pool. Then, and only then, can the combined consciousness of all character produce existence (a process which continues until existence, itself, resumes the burden of consciousness and then whatever happens in the universe, once again, is no longer subject to the whims and fancies of butterscotch, peppermint, and pistachio but, instead, is being sensibly governed by the Neapolitan flavors [chocolate, strawberry, and vanilla]). For these purposes, it should be noted that both the existence pool and the character pool are in dimension-one (or, if you prefer, Nowhere)."

(Professor Alphonse Twittle, Department of Absurd Physics of the Institute for Advanced Physics and Modern Dance)

[NOTE: For reference, this theory was finalized on October 12, 1979 and was published and made available in the Library of Congress in the mid-1990s. Among other things, it predicted the fact that nothing new beyond the Higgs Boson has been--nor will be--discovered at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) since July 4, 2012. It also explains the reason Supersymmetry (SUSY) and its variations are garbage . . . :ugeek: ]

On a curiously-related and serendipitous occurrence, UVI just released "Dual Delay X", which is an amazing and versitile delay, echo, and reverberation unit . . .

Dual Delay X (UVI)

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Dual Delay X ~ UVI

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Lots of FUN! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Fri Jul 08, 2022 3:21 pm
I ordered "Dual Delay X" (UVI) and used it on one of the rhythm guitars .. . . :)

THOUGHTS

Another change is that I used one stereo track of Hammond B-3X (IK Multimedia) instead of the Wurlitzer Electric Piano that was used in the Intro for "Chapter 10: Darla's Sexy Dance" . . .

After doing some experiments with guitar presets for "Dual Delay X", I discovered that the "Mind Slap" factory preset works nicely to emulate one of the ways John Lennon (Beatles) strummed rhythm patterns . . .

The factory preset had the Delay set to 125 milliseconds, but I changed it to 105 milliseconds . . . :ugeek:

If you watch and listen to the way Lennon strums the chords on "Can't Buy Me Love" (Beatles), then the way "Dual Delay X" enhances the right-panned rhythm guitar in the Intro for "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (Part Two)" makes a bit of sense . . .

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In the YouTube video for the "Dual Delay X" example (see below), the Intro is played three times--one time with nothing isolated; a second time with the rhythm guitars isolated in various combinations; and a third time with nothing isolated . .. .

It's subtle but effective . . .

105 milliseconds is just over one-tenth of a second--not a long time . . .

It's relatively easy to do the Lennon-stye strumming with a real guitar; but doing it with music notation and a VSTi virtual guitar is not so easy--mostly because the strumming is too fast to do virtually . . .

[NOTE: As with everything I post, this is mixed for headphone listening, which is particularly important since the "Surf Mind Slap" is subtle, especially if you do not study delay, echoes, and reverberation. There is no voice-over, but there is a PinPoint yellow-circle "mouse pointer" to provide some visual cues . . . ]

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On a related note, folks who study songs from the 1960s will recognize that the Intro starts with the rhythm guitar chords for "Walk Don't Run" (Ventures:) and then switches to the rhythm guitar chords for "I Want To Hold Your Hand" (Beatles)--stylized, of course . . . :reading:

When using VSTi virtual instruments and music notation, there are limits to how rapidly notes can be played . . .

At some point, rapidly-sequenced virtual notes tend to sound more like a comb-filtered music machine . . .

Based on perhaps 15 minutes of experimenting with the factory presets for "Dual Delay X" reveals it is a very useful effects plug-in . . .

There are other ways to add 105 milliseconds of slapback delay; but "Dual Delay X" has additional functions and textures that make it different and quite excellent for subtle effects like this one; so I am very happy with it, even though I have no idea what most of it does, at least so far . . .

Having two rhythm guitars (one panned far-left and one panned far-right) and using "Dual Delay X" with the custom-modded "Mind Slap" factory preset does a bit of humanizing in a subtle way; and I call it the "Surf Mind Slap" . . .

Lots of FUN! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Mon Jul 11, 2022 11:58 am
I composed and recorded the prototype basic rhythm section for the Intro, Outro, and 1st Section of "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (Part Two))" . . . :)

THOUGHTS

I already had the Intro and Outro, so the next step was to compose the basic rhythm section for the 1st Section which begins the story with Phrog the Munificient and his novices traveling to the Deep Room in a Shadow spaceship . . .

As is often the case, the Shadows are having a petroleum distilling "party" and are playing Instrumental Surf music from 1960s Earth, which soon motivates Phrog to grab his bongo drums and to start bongoing . . .

It's a basic 1960's theme, and it will be more Instrumental Surf themed once I add some Surf guitars and outer space synthesizers (Clavioline and so forth) . . . .

[NOTE: This is mixed specifically for headphone listening . . . ]

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Its a bit reminiscent of "Green Onions" (Booker T. & the M.G.'s), but the YouTube coprright checking algorithm says "I'm good, no problems" . . . :+1

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I have "musical memory", which is the music variation of eidetic memory; and after hearing and studying music for seven or so decades, it maps to a festival of musical colors and textures that I use to "paint" songs . . .

In this instance, I added a Hammond B-3X organ (IK Multimedia) to the Intro and Outro and then added an Electric Piano (EW Composer Cloud X), which led directly to the basic rhythm section for the 1st Section . . .

I plan to add an Instrumental Surf lead guitar like the one in "Flying Saucers", which has a stylized "James Bond Theme" (Monty Norman) electric guitar sound and texture . . .

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[NOTE: The Intro begins with a Clavioline . . . ]

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One of the vastly useful features of Studio One Professional is the ability to import Instrument Tracks from other Studio One Professional "song" files--something I discovered a few months ago . . .

Instead of needing to start from scratch, you import an Instrument Track you already fine-tuned, and there you are . . .

The Instrument Track is imported along with its Inserts (effects plug-ins) and settings . . .

Whether it will be Instrumental Surf is another matter, but it will be similar conceptually . . .

Lots of FUN! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Tue Jul 12, 2022 8:30 am
I created and added some "crowd" and "explosion" sounds for the Shadows . . . :)

THOUGHTS

UVI has an extensive set of background and foley sounds; so I used them to create background sounds for the Shadows when they are having a petroleum distilling "party" and occasionally cause explosions which Phrog the Munificent tries to avoid, since it tends to destroy his bongo drums . . .

[NOTE: Extreme FX 1 and Extreme FX 2 (UVI) are included in MachFive 3 (MOTU), and it runs in the UVI Workstation. I think it qualifies for Extreme FX 1.5, but that's a guess. Regardless, I have Extreme FX 1.5, and it's properly licensed . . . :reading: ]

Extreme FX 1.5 (UVI)

The Shadows exist in a different dimension of spacetime, hence are not disturbed by the occasional explosions, as is their spaceship, which is designed to be "explosion proof"; and Phrog just jumps to a different dimension . . .

However, Phrog's bongo drums are not so fortunate unless Phrog moves them out of the way . . .

The Shadows provide multidimensional transportation services; and perhaps to avoid becoming totally bored during long flights, they pursue their passion, which is to discover every possible petroleum distillate, an activity they started thousands of years ago when the Standard Galactic Week had eight days, something which greatly annoys the Grand Eye of Toll-Eh who at one time was Canadian but now more than anything is happy only when things are evenly divisible by three, which is explained in "Chapter 12: The Slammers Attack Ranivir", along with the Giant Ball of String, Bowling, and Mind Control, where it should be noted that a perfect score in Bowling is "300" and is evenly divisible by three . . .

[NOTE. This is mixed specifically for headphone listening . . . ]

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Lots of FUN! :)

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The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Wed Jul 13, 2022 7:09 am
I did the voice-over for the Intro and 1st Section of "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (Part Two)" . . . :)

THOUGHTS

The music is the basic rhythm section, and I am using part of the music as a melodic metronome . . .

[UPDATE: I remixed this . . . ]

[NOTE: This is mixed for headphone listening . . . ]

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Lots of FUN! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Sat Jul 23, 2022 9:15 am
I completed the first fulll version of "Chapter 11: Phrog's Deep Room (*Part Two)" . . . :)

THOUGHTS

This the longest chapter, so far; and it runs for 37 minutes, which makes it approximately twice as long as "Chapter 10: Darla's Sexy Dance" . . .

It's the first full version, and I am going to add a few more instruments and foley sounds . . .

I made some changes to the recording strategy based on the fact that there is a practical limit to the number of Instrument Tracks in a Studio One Professional ".song" . . .

Previously, the strategy was focused on working with 20 Instrument Tracks at a time; but after discovering how easy it is to import Instrument Tracks from other ".song" files, this time I added an Instrument Track "temporarily"; used it for a new instrument or foley sound; archived the version as a variation; and then saved it again as the master . . .

Done this way, the master ".song" with its 20 primary Instrument Tracks is the foundation and has overall focus . . .

A key part of this strategy is to record the music or sound generated by the "temporary" or "roving" Instrument Track to what over time becomes a set of corresponding Audio Tracks . . .

Then I have the Audio Tracks but do. not have the additional overhead of the temporary or roving Instrument Tracks . . .

In this version, it's the way the whooshes, sirens, bongos, background atmospheres, and various alien and Shadow sounds are done . . .

This saved perhaps a week or two of recording time, and Studio One Professional makes is super easy to do . . . :+1

[NOTE: It might be nice to be able to do the continuous voice-overs perfectly for 30 minutes, but I generally can read my writing with no mistakes for a few minutes at a time. When I make a mistake, I keep recording and read it again. Later, after it's recorded, I edit the audio clips, which is easy to do in Studio One Professional. I work on one voice and scene at a time, so it's more like 5 to 10 minute voice-over sessions, which for me is a nice way to do it . . . ]

The longest part of Chapter 11 is the presentation by Prof. Alphonse Twittle of the Department of Absurd Physics of the Institute for Physics and Modern Dance on the Theory of the Absolute Fundamental Units of the Universe; and I created a new vocal character for Prof. Twittle, which is based on my Hindu character, the "Mad Scientist" from the "Fast Show", one of the performers on Britain's Got Talent, and a few Dalek moments . . .

[NOTE: I created the Theory of the Absolute Fundamental Units (AFU)) of the Universe in 1979 and first published it in the 1990s, where it is available in the Library of Congress; and while it is presented as a grand bit of silliness, it explains why the Large Hadron Collider is not going to find SUSY, Split-SUSY, or any other variation os Supersymmetry (SUSY). It also explains why particle physicists are not going to find gravitons and a lot of other stuff. In other words, (a) the current concepts in modern particle physics are total garbage and (b) no progress will be made until this is realized and understood. This also makes it clear that while formally-trained particle physicists essentially wasted nearly half a century devising garbage hypotheses, I used the time to focus on computer science, software engineering, music, writing science fiction, and not wasting time . . . :ugeek: ]

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[NOTE: This is mixed for headphone listening, since there are stereo motion and panning effects . . . ]

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Now that I am starting to do foley (a.k.a., "sound stage") work, the new strategy makes this easier; and perhaps I will be able to do a new chapter each week like it was done in the 1940s . . .

Lots of FUN! :)

P. S. For reference, it took about 12 years to learn enough about VSTi virtual instruments, music notation, and Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) applications--specifically Studio One Professional and NOTION for the music notation--to do this . . .

It's done in a sound isolation studio the size of a small, walk-in closet with the aforementioned software, an Apple 27" iMac (2013), a real electric guitar and effects pedal board, and a B.L.U.E. "Snowball" USB microphone, which is fabulous . . .

Fabulous! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!
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by Surf.Whammy on Thu Aug 11, 2022 9:38 am
I added more foley sounds and enhanced the electric bass during Prof. Alphonse Twittle's treatise on the Absolute Fundamental Units (AFU) of the Universe, which included enhancing the lead guitar phrases . . . :)

THOUGHTS

It's coming along nicely, and I might do more instrumentation . . .

[NOTE: This is mixed specifically for headphone listening, and there is a lot of motion and other stereo effects, but it's "stereo" in the sense of being a headphone mix--independent left-channel and right channel. I have not done a loudspeaker mix yet, but I might do this later . . . ]

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Lots of FUN! :)

P. S. "Ogly-Nogly" is an acronym for "Only God loves you-No other god loves you", and "Ylgon-Ylgo" is the reverse, hence the battle of Good vs. Evil . . .

From this, you should be able to connect the dots and understand who the "Cobbler" is, which is fabulous . . .

Fabulous! :)

Surf.Whammy's YouTube Channel

The Surf Whammys

Sinkhorn's Dilemma: Every paradox has at least one non-trivial solution!

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