Interesting music bed. 

Who is the guy wearing the terrorist costume?

LOL - Mark, you are speaking the truth. She is now off of all (OK most) "treats" of that nature. Its Doggy Specific from now on. Last weekend scared me very badly and I need to take her welfare a bit more seriously, whether she likes or understands it or not. Now if only I was less of a push over.

Danny - Its my turn to say holy cow. I am sincerely gratified by your words. Somewhat stunned by them actually. I will admit you are a bit of an enigma to me. With no insult intended to any other here, you would seem to be a bit out of our league. But, the board is better off because of you; we have all learned from you. Thank you for listening, and thank you for making my day.
 
Scotty, I swear it took me five minutes to recover from laughing so hard at your statement. We tease him and call out "Mujahideen" as a battle cry. Poor guy. His name is Harman, and he is an orthodox Sikh. Our city has gone a bit overboard with the health rules and have made him cover up completely due to somebody complaining to the health dept that his beard was "unhealthy". The guy is probably the cleanest of us all. I think it is unnecessary humiliation. I defy anybody to prove that somebody with a (clean and groomed) beard has cause anybody on this planet to get sick. Ah well, what can you do? Can't fight city hall, as the old saying goes.

Danny - Its my turn to say holy cow. I am sincerely gratified by your words. Somewhat stunned by them actually. I will admit you are a bit of an enigma to me. With no insult intended to any other here, you would seem to be a bit out of our league. But, the board is better off because of you; we have all learned from you. Thank you for listening, and thank you for making my day.

 
Just tellin' it the way I hear it. :) This was a smooth, well balanced mix to my ears. Hmmm...I've been called a lot of things over the years, but "enigma" is a new one. LOL! Nah man, we're all in this world together....make the best of it as a team, ya know? I have the same issues everyone else has with mixing....thankfully, I can hear and fix issues a bit faster than some people...that's about it really. Thanks for that though....it's great to feel appreciated and I too have learned from everyone. You know how it goes with this field...you learn something new everyday. You're welcome...you're welcome and thank you for the kind words. :)
 
-Danny

Danny, somebody said on Philip's and your song that it was the best song they had heard on the board, ever. I wholeheartedly agree. I simply said yup because I was gobsmacked. That production and performance we not just beyond us, here, it is beyond a lot of so called professional mixes. I am the Wizard of Oz (all smoke and mirrors), you are the real deal. I wish there were some way to translate my first reaction to it to you. I literally started looking around my space, trying to solve the dissonance of hearing Philips song produced soooo friggen well (no insult meant to Philip). It made no sense for a moment until I just started to listen.

foxwolfen


Danny, somebody said on Philip's and your song that it was the best song they had heard on the board, ever. I wholeheartedly agree. I simply said yup because I was gobsmacked. That production and performance we not just beyond us, here, it is beyond a lot of so called professional mixes. I am the Wizard of Oz (all smoke and mirrors), you are the real deal. I wish there were some way to translate my first reaction to it to you. I literally started looking around my space, trying to solve the dissonance of hearing Philips song produced soooo friggen well (no insult meant to Philip). It made no sense for a moment until I just started to listen.

Man you're just too good to me! You're my new bestest friend....check is in the mail by the way! LOL! :) Well, that's an awesome compliment for sure and I thank you sincerely for that....but there have been some astonishing pieces of music posted up here with incredible production and performances, that's for sure.
 
Nah, you're more than smoke and mirrors brother. Don't be too hard on yourself. I've not heard a bad song in your roster and all your mixes are consistently good for the styles of music you work with. That's all you can really ask for unless you buy all the stuff the pro's use and those sick sampling libraries. One of the edges I *may* have over some people is I do this stuff 24/7 where lots of others are hobby guys or they have families and other priorities. They don't invest in gear that could take them to the next level either because it's too expensive or it's not that important to them. Both reasons are completely acceptable. Most are not runinng businesses either, so it's not needed.
 
If you or anyone else were in my shoes and had some of the gear I have while having the time to put into it, the game changes drastically, ya know? Trust me it would. I've been at this since I turned 14 and I'm 45 now. On my birthday when I was in 8th grade, my mom and dad bought me a Fostex 4-track cassette recorder. I've been at this ever since and well, it's taken me that long to get what I like to consider, at the least, decent, consistent results. Some guys are getting close to what I get and even better and have been at it a shorter amount of time and they are using limited gear. The other thing that makes me feel very lucky and blessed is thankfully, I play all the instruments I record so you get that human feel going on even if it's not completely perfect, ya know? It all adds to the quality of a piece in my opinion especially if you can lose the "sequenced" sound we all kinda get when we program things.
 
I play my drums either on a real kit or I use my V-Drums which right there...changes things up. Play a real bass, play the piano for real or whatever...spend a few bucks on the right samples or mic the stuff yourself, and everything changes. But not everyone has that kind of time, desire or patience. If they did, they'd all be blowing me into the dust. That stuff definitely can change the game for everyone. Then of course all the time I've invested into the whole recording thing helps a bit.
 
Some of it I went to classes for, but the majority was all trial and error while actually being in the field. It's kinda like being a passenger in a car going to a far away place. You don't pay as much attention to "how you get there" until you make the drive yourself as the driver, ya know? Same with this field. When you're in it, or doing something for a paycheck while doing it, you're sort of forced into delivering the goods but man do you learn from it! Better than any book or class would teach you, that's for sure. :) Anyway, yeah I know...I did it again..lol..thanks so much for the kind words and the chats, Shad. If Philip posting this song made me a few new friends like you, that's a good thing and I'm completely happy with that. :)
 
-Danny

 Thats right Shad Tim is my name. I have wished for years I would have chosen another screen name lol.....great job!

My turn.

All want to do is this 24/7 - work takes so much energy from me that most days I have nothing left when I get home. My short term goal now is it build up a portfolio of work: I also do graphic art, fine art, animation and literary writing. My hobby is philosophy and religion (not the worship but academic study of).

I am actually happy to be the Wizard of Oz. I see the Wiz as somebody who turned a disadvantage to an advantage, and in some ways that is me. I am dirt poor. I cannot afford equipment or software. I am using Sonar 6, Cubase 2, and my AVID is circa 2005. My camera is an 80 dollar disposable polaroid with no image stabalization, no zoom, and no manual adjustments for exposure or shutter. The vast majority of software I use is free/open source (like audacity, LADPSA, and VirtualDub).

I came to sonar and music composition late in the game. I was making videos, and had need of music, but licensing costs were prohibitive. I decided to see how hard it was to make my own. I bought a loop based music program for 60 bucks and started to fiddle with it. While it was fascinating and I enjoyed it (and discovered that loop editing is much the same as video editing), I felt like a fraud. To me it was cheating.

So I turned to my (now ex) wife and asked if I could spend some money. Fortunately she supported me, so I went out and bought a Korg keyboard/contoller and Sonar 6. Spent a week learning it, "composed" my very first song, recorded it and posted the results here... on the very same day I joined, in 2008. That song was "Dreaming of Flight".

I can honestly say I have never been rewarded by anything I created like I have been with music. The sheer joy (bliss actually) I experience when at the keys is impossible to describe. It feels mystical. Like it flows from something external to myself. It takes me to a different place, a place I hate returning from (I really do). I have often wondered if there is some sort of "bi-polar" attribute to it. It is a bizzare, manic, all encompassing "high".

But, I am limited. I cannot run the upgrade race. Because of that, my entire goal is to try to appear to be as well equipped as those with money spend. So instead of money, I spend a lot of time. Time learning how to accomplish my goals without the proper equipment, or manually doing the work that can be accomlished with automation and modern tools with one click. In some ways, I do things exactly like you would have with that old Fostex of yours.

Fortunately, I have so much experience with related tools and fields, that the learning curve with Sonar and music production was rather small. And, I will say again that coming into music production as an artist/audiphile is a good thing. It means I have a very well tuned ear (as I love sound, all sound).

But, you clearly demonstrate that to get to the next level, tools will be necessary. I cannot accomplish a mix like yours with what I have. But, tools are not all it takes. There are some (mostly in other forums) with dream suites and still they are not very good. You have shown a clear understanding and ability that makes the tools you have shine in a way few others can. If I can get close to what you can do, I could probably die a happy man (probably not as I am never really satisfied with anything I do, but I digress).

And I am not blowing smoke up your arse either Danny. There are a few people here that I admire, whom I use for inspiration. People who show sheer compitence in their work, people with amazing gifts of talent, creativity... people I chase. You are one of them. Simple recognition of ability.

What makes me your friend though is not your work. What makes me your friend is that you participate here in the song forum. I admire those who take the time to listen to the hard won efforts of the others here. I suppose you could describe it in one sense as: this is the "give" where the rest of the forum is the "take". It requires a bit of a commitment (more than any other area of the forum) on the part of the listener, and I do not take that lightly. IMO it is the folks that hang out here that are the best of us.

Cheers
Shad

Tim - Nothing wrong with the login name. Hardly any worse than foxwolfen (which sounds conflicted... is it a fox or is it a wolf? ). Thanks again.

I'm lovin the final version...
This is fine work, and you should be proud...
Well done Shad...
 

this is really cool, Shad.  nice work!