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Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 2:15 pm
by Rainmak3r
Hi all,

I've just posted a new piece on SoundCloud:

https://soundcloud.com/lminiero/intro

It's quite short (slightly less than a minute), as it's actually meant to be nothing more than an intro to the other track I've already published here (I've made the shortest playlist ever to group them!). It was already mostly complete for a while, actually, but since I've just started my holidays, I could only recently get back to it to fix a few things, like re-recording drums and guitars plus adjusting a few levels.

It's nothing fancy. The progression is a small set of arpeggios/chords I came up with some time ago, and that I like to repeat often when I sit down to play. In order to try and make it interesting, I used the incredibly cool "Angel's Chorus" effect in Rakarrack, and I recorded two separate tracks to give the illusion of it bouncing left and right in the speakers/headphones. The basic pad that comes in after a round is done with ZynAddSubFx, but unlike my first track, this time it's done in MIDI directly, with ZynAddSubFx used as a plugin in Ardour5: more precisely, I wrote the notes in Lilypond, exported to MIDI, and imported the MIDI in Ardour, to try and learn about the process. Finally, I wanted something that sounded "martial" towards the end, as a crescendo to the main track: the drums are done with DrumGizmo (someone recently pointed out I could use them in Ardour and drive them with Hydrogen, and it's been a revelation!), the bass is the same ugly trick I used for my other track (guitar with the Rakarrack "Bass" preset, I should really buy a real bass...), and guitars are two tracks (left and right) using the "Warrior" preset in Guitarix. I used my Ibanez Destroyer instead of a Fender HSS, this time, which probably gives them a bit more edge.

I'm not 100% satisfied of the result, especially for the crescendo martial part, but I wanted to share it anyway. Hope you'll enjoy it, and feedback welcome!

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 2:31 pm
by Basslint
I quite liked it! You can work those Rakarrack presets, for sure!

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 2:34 pm
by Rainmak3r
Basslint wrote:I quite liked it! You can work those Rakarrack presets, for sure!
I'm pretty sure they make up for 90%, and I for the rest! :lol:

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 2:47 pm
by Basslint
Rainmak3r wrote:
Basslint wrote:I quite liked it! You can work those Rakarrack presets, for sure!
I'm pretty sure they make up for 90%, and I for the rest! :lol:
No, trust me, I've been playing with them for years perhaps (it's my way to have fun when I plug the electric guitar like a joystick :lol:) and I never got anything as good out of them! Props :wink:

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 4:00 pm
by folderol
Works for me... actually as an intro for almost anything :lol:

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 4:13 pm
by ufug
This is good stuff. You can really feel the energy build. You are going to have to make a really good song to follow this intro!

Yes, you should absolutely find a bass ;)

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 4:39 pm
by Rainmak3r
folderol wrote:Works for me... actually as an intro for almost anything :lol:
I guess it could be seen as the most generic intro ever, yeah! :lol:

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Mon Aug 12, 2019 4:40 pm
by Rainmak3r
ufug wrote:This is good stuff. You can really feel the energy build. You are going to have to make a really good song to follow this intro!

Yes, you should absolutely find a bass ;)
Actually I wrote that song already :mrgreen:

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=20110

Whether it's good enough to follow the intro or not, I really don't know!

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Fri Aug 16, 2019 6:24 pm
by psyocean
Intriguing intro! It would be interesting to listen to the continuation of the album :)

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Tue Aug 20, 2019 7:26 pm
by milo
Basslint wrote:I quite liked it! You can work those Rakarrack presets, for sure!
I agree. That Angel's Chorus preset sounds awesome!

Re: Intro (to the album I'll never publish!)

Posted: Thu Aug 22, 2019 11:06 am
by Rainmak3r
milo wrote:
Basslint wrote:I quite liked it! You can work those Rakarrack presets, for sure!
I agree. That Angel's Chorus preset sounds awesome!
It really is, and I've found I particularly love the "cleaner" presets in Rakarrack, which is where I think it really excels. Apart from the "Succulent clean" I used in the other track, it has a few "Summer at the X" effects that are quite intriguing, and I'll definitely have to find a way to use "Heaven Garden" somewhere :mrgreen: