. founded march 12, 1995 _| : _____ t r a x w e e k l y # 92 ______________ |___| _ _______/ /\___________________________ / ____________/ /\__\ _ _______/____/_____________________________ / / _________ \/__/ ______\ \_____________________________ / / / `_ . .~ \____\/ _ __ ___ / / / _____ . _ \ __ ___ _/__/\ / / / / /\ _ The Music Scene Newsletter __ __\__\/ _/__/ / ____/ /__\_________________________________ _____ ___ _ / /\/ /___ __________ _ ______ _ ___ \/ /\ / / /____/ \ \ / /\ / __/\ / /\ \ \ / \ /____/ / / \ / \/ /_ \___/___/ \ \_/___/ / \_/ / / \ ___\ / /_/ /______/\/ \ /______/\/ \ /_____/ // \ \ / / / \ / / \ \ \ \_\ \ \ \_\ \ //____/\____\/ / / / / / \______\/ \______\/ \_____\/ \ \ \ \ / / / / \____\/\____\ / / / / _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ _____ / / / /__/ w /\___/ /\___/ e /\___/ /\__ / l /\___/ /\____/ / / __/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/____/________/ / __\ \____\ e \____\ \____\ k \ ___\ \____\ y \__________/ \____\/ \____\/ \____\/ \____\/ \____\/ \____\/WW ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- | TraxWeekly Issue #92 | Release date: 20 Mar 1997 | Subscribers: 932 | ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- /-[Introduction]------------------------------------------------------------ ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ Dear readers, Welcome to TraxWeekly #92. Over the last few weeks, I've been thinking really hard about whether or not I should continue running this newsletter. Thankfully, I have just finished another quarter and finals at university, and free time is around again. First off, I want to thank all twenty or so of you who volunteered to take this task off my hands. I really appreciate the fact that you would be willing to take on a job that pays nothing and can end up being a chore instead of a hobby. In any case, we have an excellent set of responses to Bibby's excellent "Thoughts on Tracked CD's and Cassettes" article from Issue #89. Also included this week is the ModSquad and their coverage on music theory, and a short piece on Sound Club, a music writing program I think some of you will be interested in. Please welcome the group Aim Higher back to the music scene! Wow, someone still remembers Epinicion...sniff...brings a tear to my eye. =) Have a great day, and enjoy the issue! Gene Wie (Psibelius) TraxWeekly Publishing gwie@csusm.edu /-[Contents]---------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ ________ _________________________________________________________________ / ____/_/ __/ \ __/ / _____/ \ __/ __/ ___/_ < \____\ \ \\ \ \\____ __/ __/_\ \ \\____ \_____ \__ \ \ \ \\ \ \ww\ \\ \\ \ \ \ \ \_ _\________\________\\___\____\ \_____\\_______\\___\____\ \_____\_______\ Letters and Feedback 1. Eric Bell 2. Anonymous 3. Doc 4. Lachlan Barclay General Articles 5. Music Theory: A Modern Approach....................The Modsquad 6. The Story of Sound Club............................Terminus Group Articles 7. AIM Higher 8. DiSC Closing Distribution Subscription/Contribution Information TraxWeekly Staff Sheet /-[Letters and Feedback]---------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ --[1. Letter from Eric Bell]------------------------------------------------ From howling.dog@sympatico.caFri Mar 14 22:29:04 1997 Date: Fri, 14 Mar 1997 10:06:17 From: Eric Bell To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu Subject: Tracked CDs / Todds Modds A couple notes from the MOD Philes: I really enjoyed Bibby's article on tracked music migrating into the netherworld of non-computer playback via CDs and cassettes. I'd like to cover this aspect of the scene in the MOD Philes in Music & Computers. Would anyone who has a CD or cassette drop me an email? Thanks! In case you missed them, here some of Todd Rundgren's fave trax: "This was culled from titles I left in my PlayerPro playlist. Also, you'll note that there's nothing with a title beyond 'H'- boy, it takes a long time to get through all those files! Also, I could find no info in some of my favorites- not even a title sometimes. Good luck TR Bangin' Cindy by: paal granum Banana Split Alternative Samba by: juha kujanpaa Boesendorfer Romeo Knight Ambient Break by: timm albers batacuda! by: dj blackbird Do Ya Trust Me? by: andrew barnabas Here's Johnny by: Doctor J" ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --[2. Letter from Anonymous]------------------------------------------------ From anonymous@anonymous.orgFri Mar 14 22:29:10 1997 Date: Fri, 14 Mar 1997 16:21:37 +0100 From: anonymous@anonymous.org Ode To ELWOOD You came and rocked the scene Like nothing we had ever seen Your music pure Uncatchable And bright Turns stones on fire Makes darkness go light But before we could ask, who ... what ... where ... You'd left like you were never there This, somehow I see Is sadly how it should be ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --[3. Letter from Doc]------------------------------------------------------ From adi_s@netvision.net.ilFri Mar 14 22:28:09 1997 Date: Thu, 13 Mar 1997 14:47:43 +0200 From: Doc To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu, bibby@juno.com Subject: Selling out Tracks - Comments. Hi. First of all, I'm DOC, i'm 22 and i've been tracking for about 5 years. I would like to say and bright some things about the article called "Some Words on Tracked CD's and Cassettes" which came with the 89th edition of Traxweek. I've been thinking too, how to sell my work to the public, ofcourse, i'm talking about the Non-Tracking people. The main idea is NOT to relate this music as "Came out from a PC", people who read this and doesn't know what its all about, Automatically think its an Electronic/VideoGames/Chip music, and as far as i can tell, that's a wrong impression. Take me for example, I create various music styles, Its not hard to tell that the higher percent of the tracking -music, is Techno/Rave/Dance, BUT, that's not what i do. One can create so many styles using trackers, I for example, make Classical/Jazz/ Alternative Rock/ and mixture of all styles. To another style i create, i call "SoundTrack" style. That's exactly the type of music you hear at the movies. So, another way to make money, it not just trying to sell your music to the public, but also selling your tracks as a TV-Series music for example. Anyway, to hear samples of my music, go to my site: http://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Heights/3693 Signed, Doc. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --[4. Letter from Lachlan Barclay]------------------------------------------ From s943011@mhs.schnet.edu.auSun Mar 16 17:49:39 1997 Date: Mon, 17 Mar 1997 10:53:03 +1000 From: lachlan To: gwie@mailhost1.csusm.edu Subject: Tracking Music, Traxweekly To Gene Wie and everyone at TraxWeekly, I have been an avid tracker over the past six years, and would like to contribute my thoughts to the scene. Most people don't know me [apart from a few selective people (Bibby, Red Haze, Jester)], so here's a bit of a clue in; I started tracking when I first went around to a friends and he had an Amiga. The music just blowed me away! I had a PC with the typical PC speaker sound, and going from that to a 4 track mod file on an excellent stereo was just mind-blowing. Anyway I laid my hands on a copy of ModEdit, found a few samples and chucked together a couple of songs. The first results were pretty terrible, but I bought myself a sound blaster and things were getting a bit better. Two years later, I met somebody at school who had a copy of Scream Tracker 3, and now I could use more than four channels, and better quality sound as well. I now bought myself a Pro Audio Spectum. Strange choice for tracking? It's basically the only sound card which has a Bass and Treble levels built in, and once I found Impulse tracker I was flying. However, recently I have been having a bit of a look at the very new music files coming out, I have found a lot of BIG .XM's. Using Fast Tracker I have found that a lot of these songs are just huge samples, with a couple of looped drum beats. I am really against these music files as you might as well chuck together a couple of wave files together. However, if you have sampled all the instruments (not samples) yourself, then I can't see why there is nothing wrong with that. The problem is here, who samples their own stuff? However, if you have used a tracker to play a lead sample, and used a filter on it (Roland TB-303 or a guitar multi-effects pedal) to sample back into your computer, then THAT would be a very good way of creating an original sample, from an unoriginal sample. And that is the method which I am using at the moment to create my own original sounds. Using these very technoish prodigy sounding samples, I have recorded some of my efforts onto tape and played them for a few friends. I've selected a wide audience, girls, guys, teenagers to parents, and most of them like my easily accessible dance stuff. Recently, a couple of my friends have asked for tapes of my music to have a listen to and play to their friends, and somebody has even offered to play my stuff over the radio. (If you live in Melbourne, Aust, listen to 89.9FM this Thursday morning (20/3/97). So I got thinking, why the hell not make a CD out of this? So I designed the CD cover using POV-Ray (a great Ray-tracer) and pieced together my best songs, and made up a few titles (Thanx Chuck Biscuits, Great title for a song). I'm getting the CD pressed in a few weeks, and now I'm trying to get a wider audience. The Question is: Can you make some decent money out of this??? Where would you start to make and distrubute a tracking CD? Have many people tried to make some money out of this? Bibby's article last week really got me thinking, look at Prodigy, yea Gods Purple Motion's heavy techno stuff is light years ahead of their music. Look at "Cool City" and the famous second reality music. That is just fantastic, really popular stuff. And as for Raves playing video's and stuff as everybody dances, imagine gawking at Second reality on a huge projector, it would be enough to send anybody into an epileptic fit! Well thanks a lot for listening to my gibber, please Reply and remember: Keep Tracking, Original and non-suppressed music rules! Lachlan Barclay P.S. My hard disk Crashed yesterday, so I pray to everyone, please back up your music. You don't know how much you need it until it's gone. Backup now! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- /-[General Articles]-------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ --[5. Music Theory: A Modern Approach]----------------------[The Modsquad]-- Music Theory: A Modern Approach To Perfecting An Old Art, and Learning How To Better Yourself, and What You Track. by Finrez, Radio Shock, Neon Hunter, and Bottlehead modsquad@juno.com This is a new introducer named Bottlehead. Thats me! I have to say that this series of articles is important, considering that Music Theory has been governed by really old people like Beethoven (wasn't he a dog?) whos like 250 years old. I mean, in dog years thats like 20, but look at us. Most of us are like thirteen or fourteen. Its nice to hear a fresh voice in theory isn't it? I mean, look how Elvis did. This is the fourth article in our second theory series. We don't know how long it will be, but with the delays in traxweekly, we've managed to write quite far ahead, so the articles will be a little bigger than they normally were. We expect to finish up around number 8. This one, we will cover Elvis' Tips, Experiences Building a Vocoder, Legends of the Firestarter, Elvis in his Youth, Lightsources, and The Stratocaster -----[ Elvis, He Knew How it wuz DUN ]------ooOOOoo- "Ah knew what ah was doin when ah was fifteen. You get a bass guitar, play it without an amp, and make a fool of yourself. Thats how stars are born, thats how I was made." - Elvis This is what I and you personally should go by. Whenever tracking, turn your speakers down real low, below audible ranges, and start tracking! This was how WAVE was born, this is how YOU could be made. .OooOo.----[ MY EXPEaRENCES BUILDING A VoCoDeR ]----oOo. "Maybe you were kidnapped, tied up, taken away, and held for ransom!" _HEARTBREAKER_HOTEL_ --Aphid Twix You could not believe the joy I experienced when I recieved my Vocoder kit in the mail. I had waited weeks for this package after making that special call to Paia, the magic Vocoder company that I had heard so much about. Now I had the legendary Paia vocoder in my hot little hands. Ignoring my mothers indignant questions about how "all you got for the $600 I spent are these little plastic parts?" I set about to build it. Assembly. For the most part it was easy. The manual was fairly well written, although some pages were out of order. More than once I did things like putting a bolt in place before realizing that a grounding strap had to be attached underneath it. The parts, well.. really only a few op-amps and a transistor was missing, but of the screws and bolts of the kit, there never seemed to be enough. It would be a good idea to keep a supply of nuts and bolts just to be sure. This was an 8 band vocoder. Basically this means that each of the inputs are split up into 8 bands, going from bass to treble. Like so: So this way the inputs are split ,--[8 ohm]---| |--, into 8 sine waves each. Then input 1 band 1 ---< >-- each band is multiplied together `--[1 ohm]--/\/\--' using transistors. Finally, the resulting 8 waves are mixed ,--[7 ohm]---| |--, together to form the vocoded input 1 band 2 ---< >-- sound. In general, the more `--[2 ohm]--/\/\/-' bands a Vocoder has, the better it sounds, but a fewer number /\/\/ = coil [x ohm] = resistor of bands produce a gritty sound | | = capacitor that some prefer over the smoother sound of an 8 band 'Coder, much like some people prefer the gritty sound of the distorted guitar over the smooth sound of the Hammond B3. After two weeks of soldering, I finally got up the courage to turn the damn thing on. Running a sound through it would seem a simple task, but I'll tell you: I couldn't find a microphone anywhere! I finally had to run down to Radio Shack and buy a cheap mic to use. Then I couldn't find my headphones! I found a tinny set to use just for a test, but they were broken. Finally I got my good pair and plugged them in. I plugged my Casio Tone Bank into it and punched up the organ patch. Plugged the mic in. I held a note and spoke into the mic: "Watson come here, I need you!" The sweet, sweet sound that flowed out of that mono jack was the most beautiful sound I have ever heard in my life. Knowing that I could put this rad sound into my tracks sent a chill through my spine. The Paia Vocoder: the best buy I have ever made. And my mother likes it too. ---------[ LEGENDS OF THE FIRESTARTER ]-------- "Hello?? Hello??" ---Inspekdah Deck I finally found out about all of this firestarter mumbojumbo... one day, i was walking down the street, when part of my upper-right arm caught on fire for no apparent reason.. luckily, no one was around to cause emberassment... becuase i tell you, if anyone saw ME combust, i would freak. but anyway, i had a coke can in my backpack and i opened it and put out the flames after having a few sips.. man.. theres no more hair THERE anymore.. after going to the doctor, and explaining what an in-convience this problem was, he told me what disease i had.. he said, "man, you've probably been infected with the streptocumbustious disease.." so now you know, about this quickly spready, near-deadly disease! it is highly contagious!! .. so becarefull... or you yourself, may become a "true firestarter"... -------o-----------[ ELViS iN HiS YuTH ]--------.~-.-~-------- "Heya girl, do that them thing with those there legs again" --Elvis in his Youth Contrary to popular belief, Elvis was not born with a silver foot in his mouth. In fact, he didn't even make it into the choral group cause he couldn't sing well enough. I told ya before, its all in his hips. His hips were a big secret for a while, he never showed them to anyone til he was famous. These are the most important things to remember about Elvis: 1. He was showt az da shee 2. He was killed by fan bladez 3. He is dead 4. So are the damn saints It could be that he was only short as the shit after death because of the fan blades but that is debatable cause he didn't die instantly so he was short as the shit before his death for a little while at least IMHO. -----[ STRATOCASTER ]--------- "Every day is like a dirty road!" --Sheryl Crow My uncle used to play the guitar in high school. He was pretty good at it, too, until he took his first whiff of crack, then his main thought in life was "Lookit the birdies, wee!" and then he would urinate on himself. He had some wonderful sayings when before he fell prey to the clutches of crack-cocaine. One of his (and my) favorites was: "Buy yourself one stompbox every payday." He made quite a collection for himself until he switched over to "Buy yourself 20 grams every payday, and food if theres money left over." You see, he had a job at a ball point pen manufacturing facility. He would insert the little nozzle of ink into the tube that the ink went into and remove it when it was finished. This took about five seconds, and after that he had about 25 seconds free (but he had to be careful, because that ink went everywhere and didn't come off if he missed). So these 25 seconds, he used to jot down little ditties that he would later play on his guitar, and imagine about what the new stompboxes would do for him. He got a new stompbox about every two weeks. It was sheer beauty to see him play, his fingers a blur on the strings, his solos, his feet switching effects left and right, getting just that right kind of distortion, and harmonizing with himself with a delay that was set to be two beats later than the original note. He could almost play in tune with a ring modulator, and his wah-wah effects came second to none. But no band ever offered him a position. They looked at him and listened to him play, and they said "Well he's good now, but what'll happen after he gets his first whiff of crack-cocaine and urinates on himself?" And dammit, they were right. I remember one of those bands, Toe Knee Times Three or a similar name, they were amazingly rude to him. They said "Man, you play good except you're probably gonna get hooked on crack-cocaine and piss all over yourself and die soon, so fuck you." I hear they went on to be very successful. Wouldn't you know it? One day he came home from work covered with ink, all depressed. His foreman had given him a little vial of stuff that looked like rock candy but wasn't. He looked at it and sighed, and stripped off all his clothes to wash off, then lit the stuff right in the vial, bare ass naked. He told me about it later. "I was just gonna take this toke see? And then I would see what all the hype was about? And that would be it, see? I would never do it again. But then I took the smoke into my lungs, held it there for thirty seconds, and let it out. It was the most amazing euphoria you can imagine, right?" He sat there for thirty minutes on his bare ink covered ass, immediately addicted to The Rock. It all went downhill from there. At first he only bought a stompbox every other payday, then he stopped buying them at all. And THEN, he started to sell them to buy his drug. First the phaser went. Then his ring modulator, then the reverb, the two delays, the chorus/flanger, the compressor, and finally his prized box, the distortion. He was fired soon afterwards. He was down to playing raw, but he really wasn't much of a player anymore. All he could get right was the simplest tunes. Finally he sold his amp and played with a pair of headphones. Then he sold his headphones and played with nothing. He wouldn't sell his Stratocaster though. I hear it would've netted him over $10,000, enough for a trip to the Betty Ford Clinic, but neither he nor I knew about this until it was far too late. He went wandering one night with it slung over his shoulder like a sack of beans, and he got mugged by some hopeful punk rockers who wanted to form a band. I hear they got a good start in a local club, Soul Kitchen, and went on to be pretty successful. I think their name was The Aquabats. Anyways, after that, uncle Eddie (that was his name) just lay there and cried. He broke into Soul Kitchen one night and saw his beloved Stratocaster onstage. He was so mad, he jumped right up there and ripped it away from the player. But he accidentally went too close to a stack, and the feedback made him deaf. To this day, he wanders the streets of Soho, in the rain, looking for Chinese resteraunts, mumbling about beef chow mein and urinating on himself repeatedly. ---------[ INSPIRATION OUTDOORS ]----------- "Sometimes, I really needed inspiration. My wife was very nice about this, and she came up with the perfect solution. She came up to me and rubbed up against me and said: 'No sex until you write a new song!' Then I would quickly get a new song done, believe you me!" --Stan Miller To get inspiration to write tunes, I often have to go outside. If you go outside you can see lots of cool stuff. For example, I once went outside and saw a squirrel. You know, those squirrels are pretty cute. I went inside and wrote a song about the squirrel I saw. One time I went outside and looked in someones window and watched Dr. Quinn Medecine Woman through the window until it ended. And then I went and tracked a song about Dr. Quinn Medecine Ball. Another time I went outside it was raining hailstones and I went inside and tracked a hardcore gabber tune. A different time, I went outside and saw a few kids playing street hockey and riding around on bikes. I watched as the younger generation acted out their future roles in society in amazement and wonder. Then I tracked a tune about how they would all grow up to be professional hockey players and wrestlers and doctors. One of them was a girl so it might even be a future Dr. Quinn Medecine Ball but I didn't ask her name, it might not have even been Quinn. One time I went outside and skateboarded around for a while until some guys drove by in a car and yelled at me "hay you punk" and then I went home and found them there in my driveway and they took my ram chips and I cried all night because I couldn't track. When I was going to get more ram chips some kids kicked me in the balls and stole all my money but I grabbed one of their guns and went and shot the clerk and stole a bunch of ram chips so I could track. It was the best song I ever tracked in my life. ------------[ LIGHT SOURCES ]--------------- "I was thinking about thise whole light source coding thing, and then I thought 'What would happen if we just had no light source at all, and we couldnt see shit!' Thats how our group won at Assumblo '96." --Crevice/Suture Crew I was thinking about that ancient Chinese art that was rearranging your house so it would help you in life. It was called Roomagami or something like that, I forget. Anyways, I was thinking about how it might apply to tracking because I was in a rut tracking wise at the time. After a bit of thinking, I decided that it would be best to rearrange my own home. I found that most of the rearranging was all in the lights and shadows! So if you move the light source in the room you can change your whole lifestyle! I found after trial and error that the further away your light source is, the better you track. I should have known; when the light goes on when you get it perfect, its dimmed by the light nearby and you keep trying and just feel like shit! But the problem was, with the light source so far away I couldn't track because I couldnt see the keyboard! I had to deal with this problem. After thinking a while, I decided to put a lampshade on the light, so I could see the keyboard and still see the light as it went on. After I found a shade and moved my light source back to where it was, and I tracked better than I ever had in my life! So theres the solution: put a lampshade on your light and just leave it where it is and your tracking will improve dramatically! ------------------------------------ That was the fourth installment of our second music theory series of articles. If you want to contact us, our email address is at the top and bottom of the file. Love, Finrez, Radio Shock, Neon Hunter, and Bottlehead modsquad@juno.com (c) 1997 FuNkY MoDSQuaD iNC ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --[6. The Story of Sound Club]----------------------------------[Terminus]-- This is the story of a music program most of you probably haven't heard of, but which has had a great influence on the people who use it. I started my way into computer music with Sound Club, and I still use it quite a lot, although I've shifted to FT2 for most part :). But let's not rush ahead. Things started in 1994 or something, when I was round at my friend's place and he had a cool 286 =). I had heard something about computer music and I used to listen to the mods on my 286 and pcspeaker with the old ModPlay which - yup - only played 4chnl mods :). There weren't too much others round, well, not round my place anyway. I was desperately looking for a program to write music with, I had found some kind of modedit but it didn't work and so I flushed it. I asked him to show me some kind of music program he had, and he showed me SC. It was an early pirated betaversion, it would only let you edit one pattern, and all the patterndata + samples + all other info had to fit into the conventional memory which was left over from the program - some 400k. But there were limitations and so the length of a pattern was something like 3 minutes for me (a 3-minute pattern??? wtf??? more on this below =). And I was like, no kidding, you can actually WRITE MUSIC on this thing.. and I started to write quite a lot. I have all my old pieces, and it is sometimes quite nice to listen to what I have written. I never EVER trash my own stuff, I have atleast 2 copies of everything backed onto my tape just in case :). Well, what's so special about SC anyway? The thing is that it takes a completely different approach to computer-based music, unlike anything I've seen - well, not really. SC looks pretty much like a MIDI sequencer, i.e. patterns run from LEFT to RIGHT, horizontally, not vertically as in most (all?) trackers. Note's pitch is represented by its relative height in the grid... ah, to make things more clear, let's take an example. Let's say you have something like this in a tracker: 00 | C-3 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | A-3 01 40 000 | 01 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 02 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 03 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 04 | C-3 01 40 000 | F-3 01 40 000 | A-3 01 40 000 | 05 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 06 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 07 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 08 | C-3 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | G-3 01 40 000 | 09 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 0A | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 0B | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 0C | B-2 01 40 000 | E-3 01 40 000 | G#3 01 40 000 | 0D | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 0E | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | 0F | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | ... .. .. 000 | (btw the progression is quite good... invented by a friend of mine :) (Well yeah... I never was an ASCII artist...) In SC, the whole thing looks somewhat different: c-1|| | | | || b- || | | | || a# || | | | || a- ||xxxx|xxxx| | || g# || | | |xxxx|| g- || | |xxxx| || f# || | | | || f- || |xxxx| | || e- ||xxxx| |xxxx|xxxx|| d# || | | | || d- || | | | || c# || | | | || c- ||xxxx|xxxx|xxxx| || B- || | | |xxxx|| Different picture - same music. If you look at it. Each 'x', each SC 'tick' corresponds to one row. This way you can actually SEE your music, to visualize it, as opposed to trackers, where you can see your progressions in time, but not in pitch - you can't tell from a pattern what key it is in without reading all the notes - but in SC, you can just see what notes aren't used and that's it :). Now, even if you can imagine this sort of thing, several questions come into your mind, probably, like... "Where the heck is the volume column?" Aha. Gotcha. SoundClub is heavily window-based. (OUCH! What the heck was that for? I didn't say _WINDOWS_-based! I said WINDOW based. Which, of course, is a different thing. ;-) So the one I drew before is called the notes window. This is where you actually enter the music. Another is called volume window. Guess what's there. Besides, there are tempo and balance windows. And then there's lyrics window. :-) All the windows are aligned in time, i.e. the 'marker' runs from left to right in all windows syncronously. You can't have, say, it positioned in one place in the notes window and in another in the volume window. So, to set the volume of an instrument, you would open the volume window, find the volume bar of that certain instrument and drag it up and down with your mouse until you find a certain position that suits you. Or you could do a slide or whatever. The same with balance. "Where, then, is the effect column, or 'window', or section?" This is actually one of the weak points of SC - it does not support many module effects. :-( It naturally supports things that deal with volume/balance, it also supports portas up to some extinct (to enter them, you would switch to special portamento mode in the notes window and connect the end of the previous note with the beginning of the next one). Of course, general commands like tempo and patternloops/jumps are supported. ...Anyway, let's move on. Now to the structural representation of a song in SC. In a tracker, you have rows, and you have patterns of rows which are mostly of fixed length (well, can be altered in some trackers, but generally it is still the 40h/80h rows that is used). In SC, it is different. The smallest unit in a song is a TICK, which is like a row in tracker, but vertically. So in the screenshot that I had before ;), a vertical row, for example, the first three 'x'es would be a tick. Ticks are organized into BEATS. A beat usually consists of 4 ticks. So the first 4 vertical 'x'es, the first 12, would be a beat. Beats are separated from each other by a thin line because it would be quite painful to your eyes to track individual ticks, which are just no more than a few pixels on a standard 640x480 VGA screen. Beats, again, are organized into MEASURES, which, again, usually consist of 4 beats. The whole 16 rows/ticks up there would be one measure, and measures are separated from each other by a thicker line - again, to improve visibility. A standard tracker pattern (64/40h rows) would then be 4 measures with 4 beats each of 4 ticks in SC. 4x4x4=64, as you may already have figured out. However, the great thing is that it is not carved in stone that all has to be this way. Wanna write a waltz type of thing? No problem, just change the number of ticks in a beat to 3 (or 6, if you need 2 ticks/rows for a note in actual musical representation). So now you have 4 beats in a measure, each consisting of 3 ticks, altogether 4x3=12 ticks (rows). And there is no difference whether your patterns consist of 1 tick or 8192 ticks, provided memory won't start limiting things. SC also has a different way of handling instruments. In trackers, it is no problem to set an instrument playing on all the channels simultaneously. In SC, there has to be only one sound of instrument playing at a certain moment - to enter triads, you would actually have 3 copies of the same instrument in the instrument list. They all aren't of course stored in memory, where there is still one copy, but in the list you would have three. You can tell one instrument from the others easily in the grid, even if there are 60 instruments in your song. This is based on the fact that there is only one instrument 'active' at a certain moment. The 'bars' of that instrument are black, whereas the bars of the other instruments are grey. You can enter the music in 3 ways: * simply by 'drawing' them in the grid with your mouse - that's what I do * use the standard tracker-like ZSXDCVGBHNJM, keyboard entering method, or * use your MIDI keyboard - for the more ambitious :). One thing which is unlike (unfortunately) any other trackers with Sclub is it's licensing/distribution policy. The shareware/demo versions somewhat work, but they won't let you save your music and the DOS version won't let you play back the whole song, but one pattern only :(. Luckily they realized that this was a mistake and in the new version things are fixed. So there are several versions of Sclub. Nowadays most popular is the semi-registered version, which works pretty much like the registered one, except that it won't let you export to any widely known formats :(, but will only save in .SN, it's only own format. Btw, the brief features of .SN: * pattern length is still somewhat limited ;-) - for 1-voice pattern, 16384 ticks; for 32-voice pattern, 666 ticks * maximum 32 voices (channels) * maximum 30 ticks per beat/beats per measure * max 200 patterns * max sequence length 200 * max 64 instruments * max 65501 bytes samplelength - 8bits only :( * runtime (de)compression, no need for archiving cuz .SN is compressed internally I have the registered version, which also exports to .MOD - 4- and 8-channel. It does not do so with too much accuracy, cuz .MOD does not have a separate volumecolumn, so many of simultaneous fx (for example, a change in both balance and volume) are lost... it can also export to .MID (general MIDI), which is nice for writing webpage music :) - but the registration costs 99 DEM :( - something like US$ 70, which, ofcourse is WAY too much for such a program unless you are totally obsessed about it (like me :).. us$20 like they take for FastTracker would sound like a deal more fair... Just a few weeks ago, a new version came out - for Windows 95. As I am the registered owner, I got the upgrade for free :). The most important changes are: * NO channels (# of voices) limit * unlimited polyphony, you can have 40 copies of the instrument playing or how much you want... * can export flawlessly to .S3M * 16bit samples, no sizelimit (memory limitations only, but under W95, you have virtual memory and what not...) * can directly import .WAVs/raw data for samples (old one could also import raw data) * can export songs directly to .WAV - great for making audio CDs * the new .SN2 format is not compressed and will, if everything goes OK, made public Even if you are not a great fan of Windows or window-based DOS programs, I advise you to check atleast the demos out to get an idea of what computer music might be like besides trackers... NO, I'm not the author and this is NOT an ad... :) Download the DOS version: http://www.dc.ee/Files/Music.Player/sclub_sw.zip or the win95 one: http://www.dc.ee/Files/Music.Player/scwdemo.zip You can see a screenshot from the DOS version on my webpage, http://www.teleport.ee/~terminus/eng/sound.htm And if you have any questions about Sclub, or would like to correspond about tracking, music or life in general, do not hesitate to mail me :-) Terminus / Theta terminus@teleport.ee ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- /-[Group Columns]----------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ --[7. Aim Higher]----------------------------------------------------------- ###### #### ######## ## ## #### ###### ## ## ###### ####### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ###### ## ## ## ## ###### ## ## ## ###### #### ####### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ##### ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ## ### ## ## #### ## ## ## ## ## #### ###### ## ## ###### ## ### P R O D U C T I O N S BACK IN THE FOLD... AIM Higher has recently risen from the dead, and this time hopes to be bigger and better than ever. AIM Higher was a highly successful (locally here in Toronto anyways) and highly motivating music group that was around from the Summer of '95 to early 1996. Due to many unfortunate factors, a decision was made to axe the group, with several group members going in their separate directions. However, Hypnotic Melody, Paganus and myself have decided it wouldn't be a bad idea at all to renew the spirit of AIM Higher in the hopes of helping some young musicians out there who are struggling or just anybody that wants to learn. THE PHILOSOPHY... AIM Higher is a Toronto-based PC music group much like the former US's group Epinicion, which anybody can join. The group is mostly modelled after the American group, yet with some differences. The organizers, a central group of around half a dozen trackers, saw a pc music scene that didn't welcome or aid new musicians as much as it should. Thus the group invites all people who aspire to be able to compose well, regardless of their ability when they join, or their style. Another function of Aim Higher is to be a label for "accomplished" trackers to throw a tune into every-now-and-then. The group feels this is important as it is a chance for skilled trackers to show their devotion to the pc music scene. By releasing their songs alongside the tracks of new composers, we are hoping to provide these new composers with something to strive for. By helping us out, the vets show that they are willing to donate their time and talent to broadening the scene, instead of merely competing with newbies on occasion. JOINING... Probably the easiest thing to do is join AIM Higher. Just write me Master Of Darkness an email and let me know where you are and what you'd like to do. Even if you are just curious about music and don't necessarily wish to join, by all means email me. Anybody can join, and (taking a bit out of the old Epinicion .nfo file :) ) it doesn't really matter if you have any other affils at all. This group is for composing, learning and just plain old having fun. Because that's what it's all about, right? So email me.. CLOSING... In closing, I'd like to apologize for the somewhat sloppy information that I've written, I'm not good at this type of thing, but wanted to let you the public know what is going on. Our comeback should be exclamated with a musicdisk. Currently the release date is unknown but if you wish to supply us with a guest tune, simply email me at the below address and either send the song (file attach) or wait for me to reply.. Thanks for reading.. Master of Darkness (tandlar@jupiter.scs.ryerson.ca) Aka Todd Andlar "I'm not only the president, I'm also a client!" ######### ### ########### ######### ### ########### # # ### ### ### ### ### ### # # # # ### ### ### ### ### ### # ### # ## # ### ######### ### ### ### ### ### ## # #### ### ## ###### ##### ######### ### ### ### ### # # # ## ## # # ###### # ### ### ### ### ### ### # # # ## # # # ##### # #### # P R O D U C T # I O N S ------------------------------------- #### ---------------------- (c) AIM Higher 1997 -- | Fidonet : Todd Andlar 1:2424/1004 | Internet: Todd.Andlar@dark.tor250.org ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- --[8. DiSC]----------------------------------------------------------------- "You wanna go Pro?" by Tol / DiSC disc@audiophile.com ------------------------- .oOo. .o. .oo. .oo. : ┤; :┤ ;┤ ; : x : : ¿¿; ===┤ : .; :¿¿ ;. ; `¿¿¿┤ `¿┤ `¿¿¿¿ `¿¿¿ ------------------------- www.techno.org/disc ------------------------- ...intro... While I'm having an hour or so left, I'll take this opportunity to write down some words about a project called DiSC, or the DigitalScorceryClub. This may seem like just another shameless plug for just another PC music group, and that's exactly what it is. At least for a start. _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ...let's start with the plug... DiSC IS a PC music group concentrating it's production on Techno music in all various forms. The group is currently consists of MING and Teapot (musicians, founders and maintainers), InhOUsEd, PopFaktor, DJKike, Balistic, Red-I, Euphy Scott and Noxy (musicians) and finally me, Tol (tiny imp who runs mailing lists, post to Usenet and write silly little articles like this one). ...just a bunch of newbie lamerzzz... Anyway, the music-group part of DiSC isn't much more than that, just a common tag to put on the tunes, and a bunch of distribution channels. I guess you could call us newbies, since none of the founders, and most of the composers haven't been in this "Scene"-thing for much more than a year. But they (not me, I don't track a byte) instead have different musical background than most of the sceneheads. MING partially makes a living as a classical and musical composer, and Teapot were the songwriter of a medium hyped synthpopband in the early 90:s, an era he isn't very proud of nowadays. And here I put his shameful past up on display for approx. 950 readers, *Bwahahah*. And I can say, without being too boastful, that there occationally comes out some really great tunes from'em. So, if you're terribly interrested in us and our music, please pay a visit at the DiSC WWW: http://www.techno.org/disc/ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ ...wasn't there something else he wanted to say?... But, (and that's the main reason I write this) there are plans. (yipes!) There are plans to make DiSC to something more than a group. MING and I are currently investigating the technical qualities and possibilities of the module format, to see how and where to introduce PCs (or Macs, Amigas, whatevers) and trackers as a professional tool for composing music. Not to commersialise the scene, but to open the eyes on certain pepole for the capacity of the tools themselves. ...and boy were they impressed... Where MING lives - Stockholm, Sweden - there are companies and schools organising various courses. One course that is popular is called "Computers and Music", where you learn this one thing. MIDI. But after have made some audio CDs with high-q tracked music (with the composers permission of course :) and donated to the various teachers, they immediatley came rushing, and wanted to know more. How to make those songs, where to obtain the programs, and some even asked where to buy the equipment! You should had seen their faces when MING told them that they probably had all the equipment he'd used right in their office. Except a CD-ROM writer perhaps. Anyway, what DiSC in the future will provide, if enough interrest is shown, is a website where actual job opportunitys for trax-composers will be announced. Thre are already some interrested potentional customers here in the roaster, and maybe even a few more, multimedia looking for music and personally designed players - both free and implemented, even small TV and teatre productions wants that and courseleaders looking for educational material. ...HEEEELLLP!... But, we need your help on this. First of all, we need to know if there are anyone interrested in doing those jobs, someone who doesn't carry secret dreams of a future as a famous rock'n'roll star, but think he's pretty good at what he's doing, and simply wants to earn some extra cash. Second, we need assignments. Most of those would probably crop up locally (local TV stations, scenes, small companies, maybe even as muzak at local shops). For this we need pepole all over the world, locating those assignments. If we get those things, we┤ll have a thing going here. Of course, DiSC, which is a totally non-commersial organisation, itself will not make any profit on this (except that the members may do jobs too of course :), and any job is a buissness between the fellow doing it and the one with the payroll. All we'll do is provide a website. If all this actually is a realistic idea, that is. :) And if not, DiSC will continue as just another tracker music group. Nothing wrong with that either... Please mail all feedback and replys to me at: disc@audiophile.com And, while you're at it, have a nice day. /Tol the DiSCophile. (c) - DiSC 1997 - SOSU 1997 - Tol 1997 - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- /-[Closing]----------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------/ TraxWeekly is available via FTP from: ftp.cdrom.com /demos/incoming/info (new issues) ftp.cdrom.com /demos/info/traxweek/1995/ (back issues) /demos/info/traxweek/1996/ (back issues) /demos/info/traxweek/1997/ (back issues) TraxWeekly W3 is under construction indefinitely. To subscribe, send mail to: listserver@unseen.aztec.co.za and put in the message body: subscribe trax-weekly [name] (NOT address) To unsubscribe, mail same and: unsubscribe trax-weekly (in message body) Contributions for TraxWeekly must be formatted for *76* columns, must have a space preceding each line, and have some measure of journalistic value. Please try to avoid the use of high ascii characters, profanity, and above all: use your common sense. 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