The Future of My Music

I've made some interesting rediscoveries recently.  While doing a spot of tidying around my home (it happens, don't laugh), I found one of my old briefcases that contained some paperwork from projects I have been involved with in the past, including the likes of Kingrow and Ducksel Comedy.  Some of these findings aren't on the official websites yet, so I'll take this brief moment to announce that you will most definitely be seeing some of these released in due time.  It'll still be a while as I have a lot to type into the computer (you know, digital preservation and all that jazz).  However, that's not what I'm focusing on in this blog entry...

Among my findings earlier was a bundle of old documents and paper scraps held together by paperclips, all with various writings to do with music ideas I've had since (brace yourselves) the first few years I started writing!  If you know my music history well, those first few years were when I was involved in a little project with Forbes called Swede.  These works, however, are not a part of the infamous "lyric book" we put together, but are other ideas from around that time that were written or printed on dot matrix printer paper, of all things (remember those noisy machines?).  At some point in the near future, I will be going through what I've already typed into the computer to see what paperwork needs to be digitized or destroyed (a lot of these papers aren't in the best condition, but you can still read what's written on them).  Once that's out of the way, I will see what I need to do with them (and have less clutter around the place as an added bonus).  I would be lying if I said there wasn't anything of worth from back then that I could use in future projects.  As amateur as some of the songs were in my early days, some were/are actually pretty good.  Most, if not all, would need a major update to be more suitable to what I would write now, so there is that.

But wait, there's more.

It wasn't just lyric and title ideas that I found among these papers.  I found a lot of them had ideas for music chords/notes and sequences.  Ideas for possible riffs, etc, because the guitar was my first love when it comes to playing an instrument.  I wasn't always a digital musician.  n-Somnia is actually the 5th major music project I've been involved with (Swede was 1st, Supertrip 2nd, Driftwood 3rd and Kerfü was 4th).  As I was sifting through the pile of riff ideas, it dawned on me that I "probably" have enough ideas on paper to have written a huge chunk of any future release I put out.

I can't remember how much I've said online about it, but after I have celebrated n-Somnia's 20th anniversary in a few months, I plan on making the follow-up releases stand out more than what I've put out before.  n-Somnia beyond 2022 will be a very different project indeed.  I've got at least 3 or 4 different style projects in mind, and by that I mean genre changes.  Sure, there will still be a digital element in all of them, but each one will be unique by comparison to everything n-Somnia has released over the last 2 decades.  Tidying my home and finding these writings, I think, has heavily contributed towards this.  The ideas for my future releases were already there, but the rediscovery had made it very clear that this is the direction I'll be heading with the next phase.  The first few years of the third decade will be very interesting!

Before anyone asks - regarding the guitar being my first instrumental love interest - I will say that there is always room for comebacks, and the signs are there.  As someone from my church said years ago, "God allows U-turns."  So yes, I am working on going back to my roots.  n-Somnia will soon be heard in a way the project hasn't been heard before.  I have flirted with guitar samples in a few digital tracks from time to time (e.g. n-Somnia's "Surfing Down the Drain" and Kingrow's "Jam"), but I think it's about time the riffs were my own.

Excited?  You should be. 😉

In closing, in case you were wondering about the 20th anniversary release, "Eliminator" is still being released (along side of an updated version of my 2011 release, "The Early Years") on June 1st.  Also, an important detail, the remix collaboration I announced almost a year ago has been extended to May.  The reason being the fact that there haven't been many applicants at this time.  That doesn't mean there aren't any though, so you will definitely be hearing a remix or 2 of the song by someone other than me!  If you wish to join those who are already taking part, get in quick because 2 months can actually go pretty fast.

To get involved in remixing "Eliminator", download the compressed WinRAR file here and have a play around with the audio samples.  You can send your finished work to me at this e-mail address by April 30th! 😁

I Claim This Territory...

I don't think I'll ever understand what goes on in the mind of a cat or dog when it comes to marking their territory through the use of urine.  It makes no sense to me as to why you would want to pee on something to make it yours.  I find the very thought of it rather off-putting, which is kind of the opposite of what they're trying to achieve.  Think about it.  If I were to pee on something, I'm more likely to want nothing to do with it.

So yeah...

Girl, You Know it's True

 We all should know the story by now.  The late 80's/early 90's pop duo, Milli Vanilli, getting caught out in mid-concert as people discovered, to their surprise, that they lip synced their own songs, only to later reveal that the voices on their albums were completely different singers altogether.  It was groundbreaking news at the time, and sadly, they lost the trust of the fans and the music industry during the backlash.  They even tried to redeem themselves by recording an album with their actual voices, and while it wasn't too bad, the damage had already been done and it was basically over already.

 In a post-MV world, Fabrice "Fab" Morvan would actually pursue a real singing career, and do a pretty good job of it (but nothing big enough to put him back in the global arena), but sadly for his former partner-in-crime, Robert "Rob" Pilatus didn't have a very pleasant life following the backlash, involving substance abuse, crime, and eventually an accidental overdose that led to his death in 1998, which was (as far as I know) a result of the guilt he felt about what happened with Milli Vanilli.

So, why am I bringing this up?  We all know this.  There's got to be a point...

I bring it up because I feel there's a lot of hypocrisy in the music industry, especially today.  The incident in 1989 that led to Milli Vanilli's decline was indeed a shock, but ever since then I have noticed that in 2022, there have been a lot of similar practices that are still happening, and yet nobody is speaking up against it.  Why?  Because it seems to be the way things are these days.

Music TV shows - Think "Top of the Pops" or musical guest appearances on talk shows.  In some cases, the instruments may be live, but the vocals...  There's a backing track involved (most of the time).  We've seen videos on YouTube about music fails on live TV.  For example: Ashlee Simpson on the set of "Saturday Night Live" (look it up).  Honestly, you could pick almost any pop singer from the past 20 years and they're probably guilty of faking it while they make it (another good example is Britney Spears, but I won't go there).

So, what's my point?  The point is that Milli Vanilli were mocked and treated, sort of, like a scapegoat to the point of near-crucifixion, destroying their career in the process...and yet, everyone else that does the same thing (on stage) is still around?  Where is the justice in that?  From my perspective, it looks like this...  "Milli Vanilli didn't sing!?  How DARE they!?  BURN THEM!!!" ...  Almost a decade later, Rob passes away.  Some time after that... "You know what?  It's not a bad idea, this lip sync thing.  Let's keep it going".

Do you think it's fair on Milli Vanilli that they got the treatment they received when these other "artists" are basically doing the same thing and getting away with it?  Shame on them.  One of the MV members died because of all of this, for goodness sake.  Show some respect, man.

So, how do we resolve this issue?  Simple.  Play your own instruments and use your own voice without relying on pre-recorded backing tracks when you're on stage.  If you can't hold a note while performing in front of people, then what are you doing there?  I would never mime or lip sync on stage, unless it was an actual lip sync competition.  You've proven you can play the song in-studio, now take your skills to the next level.  You won't increase them without the experience.

I haven't played music on stage since I was with Supertrip.  My last gig was in December 1998, and I miss doing that sort of thing.  The reason I've never had a gig as n-Somnia is because it's not music I've made, necessarily.  It's a combination of loops and samples I've found here and there that I've mixed together to create something new, and from time to time, I might include something that I have personally made from scratch.  If I were to go on stage with n-Somnia's music today, it would mainly be me up there with a set of speakers and an iPod, sitting on a chair with sunglasses on.  Not much of a show when you think of it this way.  That's why, when I do make my eventual return to the performance stage, it will be in a live band with real instruments, and the vocalist's microphone will actually be switched on.  Because THAT is how it's done, ladies and gentlemen.

It's like being a chef.  You don't fake it until you bake it.  Food for thought.

Another Milestone Approaches

In the coming months, it will have been 20 years since I officially launched my solo music project, n-Somnia.  The year was 2002.  I had already put my foot in the door of digital music composition 3 years prior with a song called "Red Alert", which was made with the help of my friend, Darren Roverts.  Since then, I had started creating loops and samples that I planned on using for future tracks to follow.  Unfortunately, and kind of embarrassingly, very few of those loops/samples have been used towards full length tracks and most are still waiting their turn more than 2 decades later.  But at least they're there, I suppose.

Along comes March 2002 and I am heading off to start a new music course that was run by my hold high school, Linwood College (formerly Linwood High).  I'd already studied audio engineering for 6 months back in 1999 (close to half a year before "Red Alert" was finished), so I went in with a bit of knowledge already.  It probably made up for the fact that I started a month later than everyone else (I discovered the course's existence after it had started, I think - very thankful they still let me join).

During this time, I had some pretty bad habits caused by activities in my personal life.  Some of which I will probably cover in another blog.  In this case, I developed an out-of-sync body clock due to chatting to an online friend from the UK overnight (during the day for them), so by the time I had to go to course, I was already awake.  So, I found myself going there for half days sometimes because I was so tired by lunchtime, I'd end up going home to bed.  It wasn't always a good thing for my course work, as you'd imagine, but on a few occasions I surprised myself.  One of which led to the creation of a song that would launch a new project.

So, the deal was I had an assignment that required me using audio software called ACID Pro 3.0 to create 2 songs.  Could be using samples and loops, maybe recording your own song with instruments, whatever you liked.  All you needed was to do it using this computer program.  Seems simple enough.  I opted for the loops & samples route, of course.  Now, I had put off getting the assignment done straight away, and my sleeping habits partially contributed towards the delay.  That is until one day I decided to have a go at one of the 2 songs, despite the fact I was feeling quite drowsy at this point.  After so many minutes of playing around with some loops, putting them together, etc, I found that I was starting to create something that sounded pretty good.  Eventually, I finished what would become the first version of a song called "Eliminator".  It was quite inspiring to have created this song while in my sleep-deprived state.  Which is why within days/weeks of this event, when I discovered some fliers in the classroom about dealing with insomnia, I was drawn towards the word in a different way.  At home, I had (or still have) a CD-ROM full of installation files for various audio software that I was taught to use on my first audio engineering course.  Among these is a program called n-Track Studio.  I remembered this when I looked at the word "insomnia" and thought it would look good if I spelled it like the audio software.  So, from that moment on, the project now known as n-Somnia had a name.

To cap it off with the assignment, I still had a second track to finish.  Not surprisingly, I didn't start it until the day it was due to be handed in.  So, the second song (called "Electronica") was actually a bit of a rush job.  In the end, it still sounded good, so I was happy.  My tutor seemed to like what he heard, based on the marks I got for the assignment a few days later.

So, that is how my solo project was launched.  Since then, I took my digital music compositions home with me (including a huge catalog of loops and samples from the course's computer network - cheeky me).  From there, I continued to do what I did at course and it led to something bigger than expected.  In fact, later that year in November, I created a song called "Robot Lover From Mars", which would (in December) reach the #1 slot on one of the charts on one of the music websites I joined earlier in the year.  Not a bad start.  The rest of the story, however, is one for another day.

To conclude this blog entry, I wanted to put out a reminder to those who are already aware.  For quite some time now, I've been reaching out to the public about taking part in remixing my song, "Eliminator".  Initially, I set the deadline date for the beginning of March 2022 - less than 2 weeks from now.  However, to my knowledge, only one person is actually taking time to put something together for me (thanks, Tim!).  With that in mind, I'm contemplating whether I should extend the deadline for the public or leave it as is (let me know in the comments).  This remix collaboration will lead to a release I've scheduled for June, so if I extend it, it might be up until May.  We'll see.  As for the release itself, it will contain every version of "Eliminator" available to me at the time, from the first version to all remixes (my own included).  It will be a great way to celebrate 20 years since it was first made.

If you're interested in taking part in the remix collaboration, you can download the files here (needs WinRAR or similar to open the compressed file).  Also, let me know you're doing this so I don't release it without your contribution!

In addition to the "Eliminator" release, I will be re-releasing a compilation I put out in 2011 called "The Early Years".  Originally, it was more like an EP and contained no remixes at all.  This time, it will feature every track I created between 1999 and 2004, including the ones I moved over to my other project, Kingrow (that's another story for later).  This compilation will be available at the same time as "Eliminator".

Exciting!

Commercial Breakdown

Over the past decade or so, I've been involved in a bit of a nostalgia movement on YouTube.  Unfortunately, I wasn't the one who started it all, but I feel that I've been doing a service for my fellow peers and their own by providing material for the cause.

For me personally, it began with simply looking through my collection of VHS tapes.  Not only for the main subject written on the sticky label of the cassette, but also for any evidence of old TV commercials that may have been preserved on these tapes for as long as they have been.  Of course, going back to when these videos were initially recorded from the TV, there were times where we deliberately didn't want the commercial breaks so we could have uninterrupted movies or TV shows (besides, it allowed you to fit more at the end of each one until the tape ran out of space).  But it was always a treat when a commercial break was left in.  Either it was a mistake or it was a recording that was made while you went away to do something else, whether it was recorded manually or preset (some old VCR's had the ability to set a timer for when you wanted something recorded, which wasn't always 100% accurate - if a TV show came on early or later than scheduled, it might screw up your recording plans).  As you would find these breaks that were left in, you would be taken back to that particular time when the video was recorded.  Didn't matter if the movie or series you were taping was released earlier or at the same time as the recording.  Each of these commercials represented the time it was recorded (unless the sponsor in question reused one of their timeless ads from way back).

Since YouTube was pretty much reaching its peak somewhere around the time I started getting involved with the nostalgia movement (at least in the video department), I saw it as an opportunity to try and make digital copies of these TV commercials and upload them as soon as possible (VHS tapes only last so long before they're too corrupt for anyone's use).  It started off slow for me.  My first video capture device was the EasyCap.  A USB device with RCA plugs attached that would connect your VCR to the computer and record what was on it via the use of the provided recording software.  It wasn't the best choice of device, I admit now, but it got my foot in the door at least.  I have since graduated to much better methods of VHS preservation.  In this case, I currently use a DVR.  The way I do it can be quite lengthy at times, so I often need to reserve several hours when I do my search for classic commercials.  It starts with having my VCR linked to the DVR.  From there, I record what's on the tape to the machine itself.  After which, I burn the content onto a DVD-RW disc, then I take it to my computer to copy it onto the hard drive.  Then comes the process of using my video editing software to trim the video where necessary to create a collection of video clips ranging from about 15 seconds to a minute, depending on the ad.  Sometimes I might find some music, an entire episode of a series or something else that's longer than a minute that I may consider for my YouTube channel, but the main focus is on the ads.  Once these steps are done, I then go through the uploading phase...and then it's done.  I then sit and wait to see what the viewer response will be.  How many views?  Are there any likes?  How about the comments section?  It can be quite fun (unless some spam bot or some idiot comes along, of course - they're no fun at all).

My second YouTube channel - Nostalgia Duck (my first channel is for Stuffed Duck Productions) - has been uploading such content for about 10 years now (that's what my oldest upload tells me).  To this day, I've been quite busy preparing more videos to put online for the sake of giving people positive flashbacks.  Not much different to the purpose of my old radio show on Plains FM.  To give you an idea of what I've got in store as I type this blog, I currently have about 21 files that are unedited and adding up to about 19.5 GB of drive space - and that's just the videos I've already made digital.  As for the remaining VHS tapes, I've got an entire shelf to go through yet!  So, I won't be retiring this project anytime soon.

On that note, I must get back to doing what I need to do.  My lack of blogging for the past few days shows that I've been quite busy lately.  But that won't become a habit.  In the meantime, feel free to go to my Nostalgia Duck channel on YouTube to view what I've added to the archive so far.  Enjoy!