Raindances friend's blog entries from MI7

New Single "You Do it Right" Released via Airplay Direct from niteshift

niteshift — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 06:39:45 GMT

Hey All,

Well, after some time in the musical wilderness, I finally got back into it, and have a new commercial single coming out Monday December 1st. At this rate, the album should be finished by 2118. Ah well, can't win em all. Press release is as follows.....

NEW SINGLE BY LETHA ALLEN DUE FOR RELEASE VIA AIRPLAY DIRECT DECEMBER 1ST

Equinox Entertainment and Letha Allen Music in association with The Graveyard of Songs announce that "You Do it Right" , the new single by Letha Allen, will be released to radio nationwide and internationally the week of Dec 1st, 2008.

Written by singer/songwriter Letha Allen (ASCAP), composer/guitarist Mark Kaufman (BMI), and composer/producer Geoff Wood (ASCAP), over the month of October 2008, and recorded in studios in Michigan, Minneapolis and Sydney, "You Do it Right" is the unique culmination of a global collaboration of artists. Produced by Equinox Entertainment in Australia and Denmark, and released to over 940 stations globally, "You Do it Right" is truly an international record.

With soulful vocals delivered over a solid acoustic rock groove, "You Do it Right" is a number that stands out beyond the usual suspects of everyday musical fare.

Broadcast quality downloads as well as streaming plays are available to commercial broadcasters, exclusively and immediately from Airplay Direct.( http://www.airplaydirect.com/music/LethaAllen ) Internet downloads of "You Do it Right" are available to the public exclusively from Independent Artists Company beginning December 1st, 2008. ( http://www.iacmusic.com/songs.aspx?SongID=69909&ArtistID=70202 ) Interested parties are invited to contact Equinox Entertainment for broadcast quality preview, commercial review and available interview dates. ASCAP Title code 551130195.

# # #

Contact ; Geoff Wood
Email ; audiofile@optusnet.com.au

Please take a listen, leave a comment, or just drop by and say gidday. It's been a long time between drinks.....

cheers, niteshift

Unplug the Plugins ! from niteshift

niteshift — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 11:52:13 GMT

Well, what a harrowing week it's been. Having the time to sit down and actually get it all togther and create something has got to be a gift at the best of times. A month just to write, a collection of internet collaboraters to help speed the process along, and long days dfirting off into the creative ether. Nothing could be better right ?

Now, nothing at all is suppossed to go to plan, and with no agenda, the pressure should be off, to just go with the flow and let the mind have a mental splurge. That is, until internet collaborater No1 comes up with some lyrics, a great tune, and a great voice to sing the tune, to a musical piece first visited a couple of months previous.

So, it's into the dark recesses of the computer, to pull up the track, and see how it sounds with a new melody line. Sounds great, and everything is flowing along well. So, it's a quick mixdown, and onto the internet for peer review.

First comment : "There is something very wrong sonically like the music is playing from a separate source than the vocals. I have never heard you have this sound before, is something off on the set up?

Second comment : " ...but the vox sound like they are recorded in a room quite different than where the music is taking place "

Third comment : ".....had the same sense of something off, so I'll look forward to the next one? "

And so they went on . OK, check and recheck, and yep, there is a phasing issue, and yep, those vocals are sounding really different to the backing track, so what's the problem ? The problem was, that the backing tracks were recorded months ago, built up one by one, with various effects being added to the tracks. Sometimes 2 or 3 units per track, as it was a bit thin at the time and needed some "oomph" After adding a total of thirty five tracks, each with it's own clutter of little gizmos to make it sound "better" the whole thing ends up a sonic cosmic slop, spinning around in the phones like a demented cat in a clothes drier.

Only solution. Back to basics. Back to square one. Back to kindy school and back to the simplicity of the sandpit. Like a child scribbling with crayons, the plugins are unceremoniously detatched and thrown out the virtual window hopefully to be shattered on the ground into a million little bits never to return. Replaced with just an EQ, a bit of reverb, a smidgeon of compression, and a big dash of ears, all is well in sonic land.

We live, we learn, and try to remember that "better" does not always mean "burden me down with gadgets" So the next time you consider brewing up a batch of sonic soup, just remember....... unplug the plugins.

cheers, niteshift

I've added 4 new (old) songs! from Richard Thomas

Richard Thomas — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 09:00:24 GMT

Hi friends, I've recently added four new songs to my page, relatively old for me but new for this site: Two more or less spontaneous instrumental improvisations (category: humor) and two songs, 'Bushmensong' and 'Mystery to Me'. The latter being based on an improvisation of words, guitar and Groove Agent. The lyrics seemed meaningless at first but in retrospect they reveal some meaning, at least to me. I hope you like them.

Interview with Lo Kivikas! from Lo Kivikas

Lo Kivikas — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 21:11:21 GMT

SR International Radio will broadcast an exclusive interview with Lo Kivikas on Saturday, 25 of October, 22.00. You can find the station at 89.6 on the FM dial.

New song added: Theme for An Imaginary Mindmovie from Mindmovie

Mindmovie — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 21:36:03 GMT

This will be the opening title of my upcoming first solo album. If you find some time please take a listen and if you want to feel free to leave me a comment. Audio quality is below my normal standard as the song is 8 minutes long I had to go down with the bitrate to 160kb. Anyway I hope you may enjoy.

New Song added - Moonmaiden from Mindmovie

Mindmovie — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 21:43:23 GMT

A rough mix of one of the songs which will be on Mindmovie's first solo record - your feedback is most welcome

new music from pietgeluk

pietgeluk — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 20:57:59 GMT

5 new pieces , either brand new (fraxinus) or from the dusty shelf (in the mist ---). hope you like it.

New Song added - House Of Love from Mindmovie

Mindmovie — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 23:17:03 GMT

Although This side is now soooo painfully slow that it is no longer a real funny thing to upload something - here is a new song. Welcome to any visitor who wants to leave a comment about the music. This title features Sara England on vocals - she as well as myself have discovered what it means when you a re trying to build a "house of love" with the wrong person. That's what this song is about.

Planet Passion IV from Mindmovie

Mindmovie — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:54:30 GMT

A collaboration with Andres Rexach a guitar magician from Spain. Check his profile on myspace this man is a guitar and sitar monster.

Benjamin from Tom Pedroli

Tom Pedroli — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 20:23:07 GMT

Today at 12.00 hrs my (our) son was born. We named him Benjamin. The Clair the Lune remix was specially written for this child (as a modern lullaby).
All is well and we are all very happy.

"Spirit Warriors" from Lo Kivikas

Lo Kivikas — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 20:47:03 GMT

New song uploaded! Have a listen to the collaboration of our common work. Three people living and working in three countries in different musical stuff...Thanks for your ears!

A nice mention on the cyberwaves from Mera

Mera — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 02:16:38 GMT

A long-time friend of Mercurine has given us a nice mention in his interview with LSPC Reviews! Andy N. of Setting Sun talks about his work as well as artists he has interviewed and worked with:

computing humor from rodney

rodney — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:10:46 GMT

Quotes of the day:

Someone decided to trash the one part of Windows that was usable? The file system is no longer usable. The registry is not usable. This program listing was one sane place but now it is all crapped up. ...The lack of attention to usability represented by these experiences blows my mind. I thought we had reached a low with Windows Network places or the messages I get when I try to use 802.11. (don't you just love that root certificate message?)

Now you're thinking "oh God, another Linux zealot going off about Windows"... until you see who wrote it: Bill Gates. Full story at Gizmodo Note: this is actually an old story about Windows XP. Vista, as we all know by now, is even worse.

Symbian is Free Software from rodney

rodney — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 12:07:47 GMT

News just in is that Nokia have bought up Symbian, and intend to release it as Free Software (under the Eclipse Public License) as of today. As far as I'm aware Symbian is currently the most widely used Operating System in the world - there were 100 million phones running Symbian in 2006 - so this means that as of this moment Free Software is now more widely used than proprietary software. That's a pretty significant shift in the way of things, especially considering Symbian own 67% of the smartphone market, with Windows Mobile holding only 13%...

Real World stuff from rodney

rodney — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 09:42:03 GMT

Oh, forgot to mention in the last post: I've been spending some time recently talking with The Cedars, winners of the MI7 Real World contest. Looks like the plan is for me to produce the session at Real World Studios sometime next month, if all goes well. I'm very much looking forward to it, they are a great band, and I think we could create some damn fine tracks there. Let's see...