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Let's make a song
Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Just replace each software instrument with a real one.

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Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Tobias Dammers
Member #2,604
August 2002
avatar

Quote:

We need Tobias and his awesome trombone, too.

Sigged.

Quote:

Trombones are cool. Do we have any trumpets? Violins?

Trombone: yes. Trumpet: yes. Violin: no, but I could arrange someone for say 100 € per track. :-*
The rhythm section needs some serious brushing up (and better samples, especially the various percussion things). The ride cymbal is the last thing I'd worry about. I'd use a different kind of groove in the verse, more r&b, less disco. Some of the fills sound like a ten-year-old who has just found the drum bank on his new casio (remember Ross on 'Friends' with his keyboard? bit like that). freesounds.org has a few useable free drum kits; the 'tic tac shutup' one isn't half bad, though very heavy on the ambience (which makes it useless for dry mixes, but it's probably OK for something like this). The electric piano deserves better: Logic's built-in EVP88 and Steinberg Hypersonic both have very nice patches for this; otherwise, might want to use a (real) guitar instead, and maybe add some hammond.
About the lead vocals: I like the mood (nice trashy nerd thing going on there), though the lack of singing skills maybe shows just a bit too much. Throw in some more lyrics, and you're good.

Quote:

I'm not even sure which is the trombone and trumpet, considering most of the instruments sound like a five year old's imitation of a fart.

Using MIDI to imitate brass instruments deserves to be legally banned.

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Me make music: Triofobie
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"We need Tobias and his awesome trombone, too." - Johan Halmén

Mark Oates
Member #1,146
March 2001
avatar

Quote:

Trombone: yes. Trumpet: yes.

Sweet, Tobias would be better for this kind of thing, could you record those parts? I have more of that wanky classical sound. :-/

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jhuuskon
Member #302
April 2000
avatar

Quote:

Using MIDI to imitate brass instruments deserves to be legally banned.

Don't blame the control protocol, blame the synthesizer, which I'm guessing is that horrible Microsoft/Roland GM/GS synth bundled with XP. It wouldn't produce any better results even if it was controlled via OSC...

You don't deserve my sig.

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Trombias said:

The rhythm section needs some serious brushing up (and better samples, especially the various percussion things). The ride cymbal is the last thing I'd worry about. I'd use a different kind of groove in the verse, more r&b, less disco. Some of the fills sound like a ten-year-old who has just found the drum bank on his new casio (remember Ross on 'Friends' with his keyboard? bit like that).

If we just would get anyone to record the drum track with real drums or at least with an electronic drumset to midi, I guess said drummer would find a better rhythm pattern/style.

Quote:

Using MIDI to imitate brass instruments deserves to be legally banned.

Well, they were there to mark the vocal things in the chorus. They were replaced by the vocals in the last mp3. Well, not the toy trumpet thing before 2nd verse.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Tobias Dammers
Member #2,604
August 2002
avatar

Just recorded some horn junk (2 trumpets, 2 trombones). Uploading right now (over 13 MB of zipped .wav, so I can't attach it directly).

I've mixed the 4 horns into one stereo track, panned from extreme left to extreme right (with the outer parts around the center and the middle parts at the extreme ends); also added a low cut filter to get rid of rumble, and compression, but no reverb. Whoever does the mixing will hopefully have an easy job with this one. In case someone needs the completely dry tracks, one by one, I might send them, but that will be about 26 MB zipped.

OK, here is the file. I removed the first twenty or so measures of silence, the file starts exactly one bar before the first chorus.

Quote:

Don't blame the control protocol, blame the synthesizer, which I'm guessing is that horrible Microsoft/Roland GM/GS synth bundled with XP. It wouldn't produce any better results even if it was controlled via OSC...

Yes. Even high quality samples, recorded by the world's finest players, and carefully put together in a sampler instrument, can only do so much. The thing is that there are so many different playing styles (all sorts of variations in tone, attack, vibrato - the trombone offers 3 different techniques, valve and lip trills, valved vs. lipped vs. tongued legato, shakes, falls, slurs and whatnot) that it is virtually impossible to emulate them all in a midi-controllable way. (Or if it were, then using those controllers would probably require an equal amount of practice). Another issue is the enormous dynamic range.
There are some fine samples for very specialistic applications: e.g. orchestral trumpet, but using them for anything else just produces crap.

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Me make music: Triofobie
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"We need Tobias and his awesome trombone, too." - Johan Halmén

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Great! I haven't listened to it yet, I'm downloading it right now. So far we have no one for sure who will do all mixing, neither a decision on what is going to be mic recorded and by whom and what will be some midi/software instruments and whose.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Matthew Leverton
Supreme Loser
January 1999
avatar

Those are all your decisions, Producer Johan!

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Ok, Matthew, you do at least the singing of verse 1 and 2. And the chorus solo voice. If you're not happy with my lyrics, you're free to create your own and even change the melody, if it only fits the harmony and background vocals. Get some lyrics for verse 2, too. Don't mind what Tobias said about your singing talent, he's just jealous.

I must listen through Tobias' wavs before I know what to do with the rest. I guess Paul's got to record a guitar solo or two. After that we see how much we try to replace the backgrounds with real instruments. At least the rhythm guitar.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Mark Oates
Member #1,146
March 2001
avatar

Hell yea Tobias that sounds fantastic!! :D

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Matthew Leverton
Supreme Loser
January 1999
avatar

Okay, Johan. the latest MP3 makes sense to me with the times and the chorus vocals in there. Thanks.

Quote:

I like the mood (nice trashy nerd thing going on there), though the lack of singing skills maybe shows just a bit too much. Throw in some more lyrics, and you're good.

You're exactly right on the mood... that's what I want it to sound like. After all, the song mocks the Monday style of management via a song produced in exactly the same way! It's only fitting that it comes across as completely amateurish.

And I make no apologies about my voice! If I were a good singer, I wouldn't be a programmer. ;) I'll try to at least make it not unbearably bad. I cannot hear tunes in my head, so trying to lead without a proper melody is extremely difficult for me. But I can, of course, tell which parts really suck (comparatively) when I play it back and listen to it.

As more instruments are added, it should get (very slightly) better.

jhuuskon
Member #302
April 2000
avatar

Quote:

Yes. Even high quality samples, recorded by the world's finest players, and carefully put together in a sampler instrument, can only do so much.

Of course. They're samples. Not all synthesizers use them, you know...

I haven't tried any but heard some surprisingly convincing results come out of a physical modelling synthesizer. I bet combining one of those with a wind controller would produce not necessary realistic results but results convincing enough for the layman to be fooled.

You don't deserve my sig.

Matthew Leverton
Supreme Loser
January 1999
avatar

Here's Johan's latest MP3 with the horns added on top (monday-song-with-horns.mp3) for listening pleasure.

Quote:

After that we see how much we try to replace the backgrounds with real instruments. At least the rhythm guitar.

I'm all for using real instruments if we have somebody to play them!

Indeterminatus
Member #737
November 2000
avatar

Tobias Dammers said:

Trombone: yes. Trumpet: yes. Violin: no, but I could arrange someone for say 100 € per track.

Well, I could give the violin bit a try, but I lack the proper recording equipment, so it might actually sound worse than a synthesizer :P.
What notes, what speed, and what frequency do you use for an A? (440 Hz?)

_______________________________
Indeterminatus. [Atomic Butcher]
si tacuisses, philosophus mansisses

Pedro Avelar Gontijo
Member #5,372
January 2005
avatar

I'll try to record the violin part tomorrow morning. But then, I recommend whoever other violinists (Indeterminatus) are to try it as well, because not only I have never tested the recording equipment I have here but also from all violinists that we could get here, I'm probably the worst.

Are you sure you don't want some Chinese violin sweetness in it? ;)

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兩隻老虎,兩隻老虎,跑得快!

Tobias Dammers
Member #2,604
August 2002
avatar

Quote:

What notes, what speed, and what frequency do you use for an A? (440 Hz?)

The tempo is M.M. = 120, and the tuning should be 440 (the default for pretty much all recording equipment). You'll need to come up with the notes by yourself I guess, but the chord progression is this (1 chord per bar):

 E / / /  B / / /  C#m/ / /  A / / / 
 A / / /  E / / /  A  / / /  B / / /

Quote:

I must listen through Tobias' wavs before I know what to do with the rest. I guess Paul's got to record a guitar solo or two. After that we see how much we try to replace the backgrounds with real instruments. At least the rhythm guitar.

First trumpet does not play anything in the solo backgrounds, the idea was that one might have a trumpet solo. The one I recorded was utter crap though (me not being an actual trumpet player and all). I'd say anyone is welcome to post a solo, guitar, violin, harp, bagpipes, whatever.

Quote:

it might actually sound worse than a synthesizer

Los Van Van, one of the most famous Cuban bands ever, recorded their ground-breaking albums with which they defined the songo genre using microphones from old telephones. They have a frequency response of something 200 to 8000 Hz, and introduce all sorts of nonlinear distortion, but that's one of the reasons why they sounded so unique and fresh (back in the 70's, that is).
A synthesizer doesn't sound bad, it only does when it tries to emulate acoustic instruments, something at which most synthesizers suck big time.

---
Me make music: Triofobie
---
"We need Tobias and his awesome trombone, too." - Johan Halmén

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

In Matthew's latest mp3 the horns are an 8th note too early, I think. They kind of fit in, but not very good in the chorus. Oops, sorry, Tobias, if I'm wrong.

I don't know how much you hear of the lyrics in the chorus. At least in Matthew's latest mp3 the sound is really messed up, so here we go:
Allegro cee cee... It's totally lame! Allegro cee cee... You sure won't get no fame! Allegro cee cee... Ain't it just a shame that no one's got a real life!
I recorded each song part only once. And then I copied it to each chorus. But the last "no one's got a real life" should have a lazy ritardando (slow down). If no one wants to add something else to the end. I kind of like the ending as it is, the soloist's (Matthew's) single voice is the last thing one hears.

[edit]
:-[ Don't know what I sing there, but it should be "...ain't it just a shame...".

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Matthew Leverton
Supreme Loser
January 1999
avatar

Quote:

In Matthew's latest mp3 the horns are an 8th note too early, I think.

Probably. I used Audacity and guestimated a point. Was close enough for me, so I just saved and uploaded. ;)

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Quote:

I'd say anyone is welcome to post a solo, guitar, violin, harp, bagpipes, whatever.

Well, one guitar solo from Pedro and one trombone solo from Tobias would be enough. But any more solos could fit in. I'm talking about the solo part from 1:42 to 2:14. If needed, it could be extended. As I said, the very last chorus could also have some add on improvisation, to give the feeling of getting off the ground.

Tobias said:

The one I recorded was utter crap though

Don't be modest. No one else is.

Since this is obviously growing to something great, should we take care of some licensing? Like everyone who contributed with anything is free to make money with it.

[edit]
BTW, is this whole Monday thing only an a.cc inside thing? I don't visit other forums or coders' societies, so I wouldn't know. Tried to google a little, but didn't find anything.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Ron Novy
Member #6,982
March 2006
avatar

Cool. That sounds awesome but the backup vocals are a bit muddy to me and I think the trumpets/trombones could come up a bit... I'd like to get all the audio tracks when you're all finished. I have some mastering stuff here that I could try and use to make a semi-pro mixdown. The best I could do with midi right now is an old XG synth, but I could do a lot if I had actual audio tracks. I have a fast connection here and really not much else to do atm.

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Oh... Bieber! I thought everyone was chanting Beaver... Now it doesn't make any sense at all. :-/

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

Yes, I did some stupid and useless reverb and chorus testing on my vocal tracks and I just left it that way. Two or three mp3 encodings and it got really messy. I might do a re-recording of the background vocals, either I do them one octave lower or I sing them a fifth lower and do some magic with Logic Express to get them back to the key of E.

If you'll do the final mix and we have to depend on midi, it doesn't mean you have to have the synth. I could as well convert the midi tracks to audio. I have some good instruments, if I only find them among all Logic and Garage Band stuff.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.

Ron Novy
Member #6,982
March 2006
avatar

Cool... Erg. That damn explosion just rattles the room :o and needs a little equalization but I can't do that without destroying that part of the mix. But it can all be fixed... I like the reverb sound on the backup vocals it just needs the low end trimmed off a bit. Matthew's vocals have kind of a distorted sound with some bite between 1KHz and 4KHz which is ok, but it needs a little more low end. You probably won't be able to get that with a little computer mic though, but that could always be fixed later in the mix too...

Here... I did a quick remix of that one and it sounds ok I think... But I'm going for lunch now... Let me know what you think.

oh yeah... If anyone has trouble sending .wav or converting to quality mp3's for shipping tracks over the net you could always use wavpack (www.wavpack.com) to compress stuff first. Actually wavpack support would be a good add on for Allegro saying its a loss-less compression format ;)

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Oh... Bieber! I thought everyone was chanting Beaver... Now it doesn't make any sense at all. :-/

Paul whoknows
Member #5,081
September 2004
avatar

I attached a MP3 file with a guitar solo, rhythm guitars and a little 2-guitars arrangement. Let me know what you think.

Anyways, here is a ZIP file with each separated track in WAV file format:
http://rapidshare.com/files/146687267/Tracks.zip.html

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"The unlimited potential has been replaced by the concrete reality of what I programmed today." - Jordan Mechner.

Ron Novy
Member #6,982
March 2006
avatar

Paul, the other instruments cut out during the solo... I love the solo though... The rhythm guitar sounds a little out of tune though which might be the intonation on your guitar. Maybe me or someone else should do the rhythm guitar? I think I've got it down. I'd just have to record it...

BTW... What did you use to record that solo? That sound was pretty cool.:D

[edit] And now that I think about it, wavpack is slow when compressing/decompressing so no add-on...

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Oh... Bieber! I thought everyone was chanting Beaver... Now it doesn't make any sense at all. :-/

Johan Halmén
Member #1,550
September 2001

That solo is really beautiful, Paul! It fills the whole solo part. If there's going to be other solo instruments, too, I'll just extend the part. If Tobias plays a solo as long as this, I guess we place the trombone solo first and then the guitar, because of the brightness of the guitar sound.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Years of thorough research have revealed that the red "x" that closes a window, really isn't red, but white on red background.

Years of thorough research have revealed that what people find beautiful about the Mandelbrot set is not the set itself, but all the rest.



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