what is going on in your musical life

new stuff for Bandcamp Friday. It's 18 minutes of distorted drums, thick dubstep bass and crunchy guitars, but with pan pipes and string samples - not quite "power ambient" but almost there.

link?

I've embedded it in the first sentence of the post, sorry!

Oh lol, couldn't see it on my dim phone screen. Will check it out!

I had two releases coincide this week, one on my label (I just did the remix at the end) and a single on a different label:

https://impossiblecityrecords.bandcamp.com/track/waterfall-in-reverse

https://limitedresourceslabel.bandcamp.com/album/hmurd-lrl004

In the week I’ve had my bass I have been focusing on hitting the notes smoothly and without any fret buzz. need to build up strength in my left hand fingers

https://i.imgur.com/bdPdoH0.jpg

It me

Available for practices and gigs that are in the middle of a river

Available for practices and gigs that are in the middle of a river

I'm taking a break from building DJ sets so that I can focus on getting some new original music completed. I went through long list of half-finished jams I had in Ableton to sort out what could actually be turned into something real. Here's the first new one of the year, a dark melodic techno track that brings those late night rave vibes. I'm quite happy with how this came out!

https://soundcloud.com/moodlesmix/haptic-drift

something that's really nice is going back to listen to music you made long enough ago that you feel separate from it and can't remember the details or struggles of the creative process anymore and you can just appreciate it as music and it still sounds good to you

This is true, although it can be frustrating to be faced with the inability to remember how I made something when I'd very much like to do it again. It sometimes feels like I'm starting from scratch each time I try to record something new, and arriving at the point where I know how to shape something into a finished piece seems to happen through arbitrary magic or luck rather than a repeatable process.

just mastered the cassini record (band me and global t. are in) and it looks like it's going to be released on vinyl, which is a lifelong dream of mine to have a full length i played on

Awesome, congrats!

Nice!

I'm getting more comfortable throwing away demos that stall out or don't have an obvious path to becoming a finished thing. You can always come back later to scavenge them for parts.

congrats ums and global t

It sometimes feels like I'm starting from scratch each time I try to record something new, and arriving at the point where I know how to shape something into a finished piece seems to happen through arbitrary magic or luck rather than a repeatable process.
moodles you have to write it down

i have been struggling with this for an upcoming performance and have had to devise a notation method that i can understand so i am able to recreate things i made. it's going...ok

lol

congrats on the mastering & release -- true dream indeed

Was drunk last night & listening to pretty much everything I’ve ever released under different project names & I think the best of me would make one really very good album.

thanks all! it's pretty cool and very unexpected.

i have been struggling with this for an upcoming performance and have had to devise a notation method that i can understand so i am able to recreate things i made. it's going...ok

lol

― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Tuesday, April 18, 2023 6:26 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

this is a total struggle, my "solution" is having a million and one 15 second phone recordings called shit "led zep thing" or "bouncy riff" haha

I’m much more methodical about it! I have to be — I’d never be able to understand my notation/plan otherwise. I’ve got a solo performance coming up Sunday and I’m on the “rehearse set every day at least once” stage of prep. If it’s just me up there, I have to do whatever I can to not let myself down. There’s room for improvisation but I need practice and a plan to feel confidently prepared. I’m less obsessive about rehearsal for teaching but just as obsessed with planning.

One time I was playing a couple shows with a band I rehearsed with like 3x and I not only had detailed notes and hours of practice but I laminated my notes just in case. I wasn’t about to lose my plan bc someone (me) might spill a beer. That’s dedication amirite???

Any NY ilxors down to play?

I'm starting to feel like I'm leveling up with recording on my current setup and getting closer to that ever elusive workflow. I'm more comfortable in Ableton and have a pretty good idea of go-to effects to use to shape particular sounds, and I'm figuring out ways to get usable sounds out of the Roland TR-8S drum machine. With the synth and modular gear, I've learned to let things roll and play without constantly tweaking so that I can take my jams and shape them into parts of actual tracks.

I spent a bunch of time on this noisy techno track over the weekend, especially with getting drum tracks that worked with the chunks of modular jams that I had recorded previously. Pretty pleased with how it turned out, especially with how the kicks and low end work together and sound plenty thick.

https://soundcloud.com/moodlesmix/quad-funk

Sounds trippy, Moodles. Rock on.

thanks! trippy is indeed my goal.

I’m much more methodical about it! I have to be — I’d never be able to understand my notation/plan otherwise. I’ve got a solo performance coming up Sunday and I’m on the “rehearse set every day at least once” stage of prep. If it’s just me up there, I have to do whatever I can to not let myself down. There’s room for improvisation but I need practice and a plan to feel confidently prepared. I’m less obsessive about rehearsal for teaching but just as obsessed with planning.

― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Wednesday, April 19, 2023 10:53 AM (five days ago) bookmarkflaglink

One time I was playing a couple shows with a band I rehearsed with like 3x and I not only had detailed notes and hours of practice but I laminated my notes just in case. I wasn’t about to lose my plan bc someone (me) might spill a beer. That’s dedication amirite???

― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera), Wednesday, April 19, 2023 10:55 AM (five days ago) bookmarkflaglink

this is awesome and i wish i weren't so lazy

I applaud your dedication, LL. For unfamiliar styles (prog, jazz, rockabilly) I do try to be organized, but those gigs are the exception. Most of what I do is normal folk/classic rock/country stuff, so I can usually go in with no plan and no rehearsals whatsoever and it almost always works out fine. I don't need much in the way of guidance for "Hotel California" or "Under the Bridge" or "What's Up" or - GAH - "Wagon Wheel."

Recently, two local acts have asked me to record them, and I am getting reasonably proficient. One is an acoustic singer-songwriter type, the other is a punky emo band. For the former, we record a couple tracks at a time in my basement - he does guitar and vocals and I add drums, bass, and mandolin. For the latter I just bring a mobile rig to their rehearsal space and try to capture a decent room sound plus some overdubs.

I am not ever going to characterize myself as a producer or even an engineer (just a home recordist), but so far it's been fun.

Oh I’d be ok playing covers without laminated notes but this situation i described above was original music with pretty strict arrangements. There was not a lot of room for winging it.

Now that I’m done w my gong performance thing I’m looking to June when I will be recording in an actual studio. It’s my gift to myself for my tenth birthday as drummer.

Ooh cool!

Conga-rats to you LL and best of luck in your endeavors.

we played two shows in one week and both of them were our best shows ever. new material went over really well. my playing's not as fast or as nuanced/musical as i want it to be but at this point i think i'm... a passable drummer? at least according to my standards

does anybody know of a good recording studio/producer combo for a punk band in nyc? we've had to abandon our previous producer bc he's been going on cop-defending rants on facebook since june 2020 lol

I discovered the glories of open E tuning last night and am now working on learning “The Headmaster Ritual”

https://i.imgur.com/MpxCjGx.jpg

I know there have been a number of pre-covers albums semi-recently but has there been an ilx covers comp since the beatles one? or has there ever been a various artists ilx covers record?

so...kind of unexpected, but I post random covers/singing to FB all of the time, and the leader of the local instrumental metal band Kaupe here, who I'm friends with, saw it, didn't know I sang, and wants to collaborate.

I thought it was just drunken talk but he came back w/ a track today that he wants me to work on. to come up with melody/patterns for screams/etc.

never done this before. any tips from anybody who has been on this side of the fence before?

Nope but sounds exciting and cool - good luck

I got recruited to play drums with some local parents in a sort of concept cover band that's doing 90s trip hop and chillout stuff like Portishead, Morcheeba, Zero 7, etc. with a few other mellow/moody things thrown in. Not 100% up my alley but I'm really enjoying it because they're good musicians and good people. That's kind of all I want from a band these days, people who are musically well attuned, nice to be around, and care about presenting something at least decent to the audience.

Also they don't play painfully loud which I love - reduced volume practices where I mostly use bundle sticks and brushes.

that sounds fun, after watching a bunch of Men I Trust concert videos, I'd really love to be in a band that plays music that is both super chill but tight and groovy

Man, try the Rute 505s. Subtler than rods but stiffer than wire brushes, and you can retract/extend them to get the right level of response.

I also like the Vater Whip and Meinl nylon offerings. Generally, for me, in acoustic settings, nylon has proven better than wooden rods (e.g. the ProMark Lightning/Cool lines).

I am the quietest drummer in my area, and I am extremely protective of that niche. I want to use real drums (as opposed to cajon or electronic kits), so stick choice and dynamics are key.

After nothing for a couple years due to covid we played a show back in february but nothing since then, until now when we've got two shows in one week.

The first one is at the dive bar place we've played a couple of times and I'm not to stressed about, but we're playing at a local farmer's market next Saturday (which feels very on brand for a group made up of middle aged university faculty) and I'm really nervous about that one because there will be a lot of people there and I will probably actually know some of them compared to the 10pm Thursday slot at the shitty club.

Also bandleader has slowly but insidiously injected enough of his jam-band-ness into us that we will be playing the trifecta - one song each by phish, the dead, and the allman brothers

Ugh
Which songs

Waste, Jack Straw, and Melissa respectively. I honestly don't mind but it's funny to me how they just kind of crept into our repertoire

I am attempting to share some demos with a record label, but I'm not sure what's the best way. I'm nervous about just handing over audio files and would prefer that they just preview the tracks with no downloads. I tried sharing private links from soundcloud, but that seems to confuse people.

Is this a reasonable concern or should I not worry about it? Is there another way to share a link to a stream without making the track publicly available?

I've always done private soundcloud, but I believe you can disable dls for a Dropbox link. There must be a way for Google drive too?

Bandcamp not an option?

I did a show yesterday where I sang “Master of the House” from Les Miserables, “I Like Myself” from It’s Always Fair Weather, and “Lucky To Be Me” from On The Town. I’m doing it again tomorrow afternoon.

I don’t feel like there’s a lot of risk in giving out audio files. What’s your concern, that they’re going to pirate them or something? If you share as mid-quality MP3s or something you should be safe from most eventualities.