David’s Adventures Through the World of Music Creation and Sonic Exploration

Arturia has a nice offer this month (and last too, if I recall) which I wrote about here. But I’m skipping that one in favour of an Akai EWI 4000s. I need to get back to the roots and find new inspiration and I think that can come from another way of playing music.

I’m also waiting for the Spectrasonic Omnisphere which seems to be a killer. So that’s on my list instead of the Arturia stuff.

A lot going on at the moment, so I’ll try to recap some of it later this week. Stay tuned.

We’ve updated the Ypsilon 5 webpage with a flash based mp3 player featuring four tracks.

Tracklist:
1. Ground Zero
2. Titanium
3. Technetium
4. Beta Pictoris

The Ypsilon 5 logo (as well as the cover for the “Binary Sky” album) is done by Micael Forsberg over at Monowaste and the picture is shot by Estethia at Det Mystiska Hålet i Marken ‘08.

You can also find us on iLike and Facebook. I guess I have to take the horrifying step and create a page over at MySpace too?

Just got a quick note that Strangers in Wonderland will release the “Helios Radio Cut” on their album.

“[...] my personal favourite is David’s extended mix [David Lilja's Extended Helios Remix, ed remark]. It’s been spinning all day. Never thought it would be possible to get 8 minues out of C/G/Am/F (with a little variation) without been bored, but this one has got instinctive feel, warmth and a lot of air. And good variation.”

I can only lift my hat for a quote like that. Strangers, if you’re reading this. Thank you! I’m glad you enjoyed it.

Last time I got a remix released on an album was back in 2004. Halovox released the “Silent Whispers (Forever Mix)” on his self-titled album.

I’ve just finished two remixes for Strangers in Wonderland. I took on their track “Addicted”, which is a sweet song really. I tried to add some Pretorium flavour to it together with some pop influences.

Another remix, for a competition, is also bounced. It’s not my best and I’m actually quite sick and bored of the track after only 1½ hour or working with it. This is the first time I said “yes” to remix a track I didn’t like, and I will promise myself that I won’t do it again. Shit in, shit out, as they say…

I remember when it was 1997 (or was it 1998? I don’t really remember) and Steinberg introduced their new technology called Virtual Studio Technology, but today most commonly known as the abbreviation VST. Okay, it might have been earlier than 1997 too, but I do remember specifically when I tweaked Neon for the first time in 1997, or 1998. It was the beginning of something new. It didn’t sound that good compared to the hardware I had back in those days, but it was a new concept - that’s for sure.

Later came TC|Works Mercury-1 which (back in those days) sounded fabulous compared to what was out there. It could play four sounds simultaneously, if you had computer enough, and it reminded of a Roland SH-101 but, dare I say it, more powerful.

Back in those days you would load up a sound on your hardware synthesizer, record the MIDI to your host and then you change the MIDI track output to the soft-synth instead. Since it would use almost every cycle available in your massive Pentium 2 CPU running at 450 MHz you quickly bounced the track and used it as pure audio.

I must have missed the turn-around point when you started doing it backwards.

Today, you load up a sound in any VST instrument, use a MIDI keyboard to record the MIDI data on to a track and then… Then you start fiddling with your hardware synthesizers. You change the MIDI track output to your massive MIDI interface and dial up a great sound on the hardware unit connected to it via the data protocol from the 1970’s. Then, you record its audio onto a new track and mutes the MIDI.

I wonder what’s next.

Cubase is ready stretching some audio files for me since I’m cranking up a dull track from sleepy 128 bpm to more dance-y 139.