Meteo Xavier

I should have clarified that I was talking more about music intended for serious release than actually just practicing and creating music tracks in general. Very much echoing everyone else that practice construction is a huge EXP builder, but for a lot of those tracks, you'll want to use them to get feedback on and see where your strengths and weaknesses are - and then archive it to use later. From there, you'll be able to get what you need to zero in on what you should do for a quality album. A lot of my serious output today is STILL just remaking my old stuff from when I was practicing - too much good, solid potential to toss out. Oh and this doesn't have anything to do with resolutions I guess.

I don't have anything particular to add, just know if OCR had a "Like" button similar to Facebook, I would've clicked it. Edit: Oh wait, I do have something to add - has a name been picked out for her yet?

I recommend amending your resolutions to focus on quality of music as opposed to quantity. Making music is not like playing tennis, and doing 3-4 albums in a 12 month period just to do it won't really serve a constructive purpose. Being OCD about it is also less helpful than you'd think as well. Instead, focus those 12 months on one quality album. Don't be OCD about it, be dedicated to it - there is a difference and it affects habits and performance.

Flexstyle was a good obvious choice, but I really like that Kristina was a surprise choice. Two new worthy judges with an excellently balanced dynamic - I love that.

"Manning Up To Reality" is my theme for 2014. 1. Create a list of resolutions that aren't just subtle ways for me to brag about accomplishments I've already had. 2. Make peace with the fact that I'm a difficult person with an unattractive personality and fix what can be fixed, reconcile with the rest, and direct them to where they really need to go, instead of the places that got me in trouble this year. 3. Spend less time debating Generation Y (and X) with their complete unwillingness to be humble or open-minded, and instead just annoy them with logic as it is less time-consuming and more satisfying on my end (within the realm of reason). 4. Man up and cope with the insanity of being young and alive in this time and place instead of expecting yet again my peers will grow up. 5. Hopefully remove these wisdom teeth this year. 6. Strengthen the body as it will do no good to face these people and challenges without energy and reflexes. 7. Reconcile that all progress comes with inproportionate sacrifice and man up to soak it in already. Still being burned from past stresses only blockades possibilities in the future. Yeah, my resolution list this year isn't too positive, but come January, they need to be priority items all the same.

It will actually be less love, more labour in practice though.

This place has a shit-ton of MASSIVE packs and other soundsets for $5 currently. http://adsrsounds.com

iLoks aren't as bad as some people make them out to be, but that's for a different discussion that already happened on this forum.

It's actually not Archangel holding that track anymore. Daniel Lippert (Usa, one of the original project directors) is going to be doing it when he gets some time in and I trust very much he'll get it in soon. Also, Rozovian's should be about finished as well as long as he took my suggestions. >

It might just be best parred down to "You either have it, or you don't."

I was never able to get over my performance anxiety. It's the very reason I never went into professional acting or playing the keys for anyone. It was particularly strange because acting, at that point, was one of the few things I really felt like I had. I have no idea why it would've made me anxious. Then I found my autism at age... 22 I think, and by then it was pretty pointless anyway. My ability to train properly was always going to be a Sisyphus battle as my muscles cannot learn quickly or efficiently, and I was never going to get the gigs I really wanted. Confidence is the key to any performance, and nothing blows it away like auditioning for something everyone in the room had more experience, talent, and biological capability to handle the gig than you did. At the same time, only ONE person from my old drama days is in anything even remotely professional entertainment - so perhaps I dodged a bullet there. I did get some voice acting gigs over the last year and I would like to pursue that as a side thing just so I could justify that part of my life. I have very few things I would call skills, so I hate having them wasted, but even as I practice it today, that anxiety to perform like a performer should very much hampers the performance.

I admire this mentality in all honesty.

My hope is this new Rebecca Black song will not be an invitation for the entire internet to jerk off their egos bullying a teenage girl whose only crime was a lack of talent and justify any plans to save the Earth by human nuclear extermination like "Friday" was. Then again, I know better...

I'm STILL tempted to get Evolve on sale, and it is a mighty temptation, but all practicality in the world says I don't need it. Isn't there a VST Addicts Anonymous somewhere yet?

I did not do well to put new projects aside to rebuild and restructure what I already have, but I'm definitely doing much better than I did this time last year. I never did get around to reading my orchestral and EDM textbooks, but I do have better opportunities right now than I've ever had, and I need to chase those first. Happy to also say the incredulously long wait for Seiken Densetsu 3 project to be done is nearing its end for realz. It was also worth the wait, as if we had released it before now, we would have missed out on some GREAT tracks and an interview with Hiroki Kikuta himself. Just need a couple more finished tracks in and BOOM, evaluation time. Still not 100% finished, but those of you who are impatient will have nothing to be impatient about (totally not looking at you, Brandon ).

I LOVE tribal rhythms and hand-percussion grooves, and I love just as much to put them into tracks I'm working on. I have a potential, higher profile gig than I'm used to having coming up that will be using a lot of ethnic and cinematic percussion, but I'm finding it difficult to change up rhythms once I have a starting place. I'm therefore under the impression I need to learn how that stuff works for real. Do any of you know any worthwhile tutorials online that teach the mechanics of how tribal rhythms work in composition and the mechanics of changing them up? Also, any recommended tutorials specifically for Stormdrum 2 would be excellent as well. For reference, I'm looking into a lot of the old Turok N64 game soundtrack (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjSt1GpdGSM&list=PLbYy8mitnHrMTymS7x_T4erQJWnkmHQqZ) although I'm not going quite that hardcore, and the DKC series. Thank you!

I don't know how to do it myself, but there most certainly is a way. That's why if you go to www.vgmusic.com, there is so much more music for the older systems than the new ones. Lot of lazy MIDI coders out there.

Mine is mostly going out in general, not so much an expo or anything of that sort. I go to a game store wearing one and I'm sure to get a conversation started.

It just seems like a Seinfeld style social faux pas to me. It doesn't feel like a casual exchange of information, it feels like an attempt to win some business (which is why they're called business cards in the first place). At the same time, I realize (now) my sensitivity to that kind of thing is pretty skewed. It's the same reason I don't go to music stores with keyboards anymore - half the time I go there, I meet some keyboard guy customer, we get to chatting, but his conversation goes off from casual to bragging about who he plays with and what he's scored, he gives me his business card where I can buy his music and it's like, ok, I'm not a person anymore, I'm a dollar sign... I swore I'd never do business even remotely close to that way. I suppose my narrow-mindedness is mistaking that for this here.

Hmm. You're right, I forgot it's also a good way to just have a written URL down. Not sure what was influencing me to be narrow-minded there.

That's pretty much exactly how SNES stuff was sampled, although Chrono Trigger used some Korg M1 stuff, or just Korg in general IIRC.

I prefer just using the T-shirt. Not only do people lose business cards just as easily as they forget what it was you were trying to introduce to them, but it's mid-level common sense that anytime someone gives you a business card, it means they're trying to sell you something, and the only time you would get a business card is to get their business, meaning you're also trying to get money from them. If not, than it also kinda comes off like you're bragging about it and trying to get an ego high from an impressed stranger. The T-shirt, on the other hand, is definitely a conversation starter. I've had no less than 10 people ask me what ocremix was, and more than a few people point at me in pleasant connection to what they were seeing. From there is an easier and more humble approach to introducing yourself as a remixer and musician. The trick is gently letting the stranger build his or her own interest in Ocremix while talking, and not in yourself. If they really want to check Ocremix out, they'll pay attention and find it on their own. If you were my Grandma Ellis, you would have a third hand to which you could put on that business cards would still be useful to put up on local bulletin boards and stock at local game stores, gas stations, etc. So I'm up for OCR business cards, I just don't want to be that guy that hands it out as cheap personal advertising anytime the subject comes up.

Well, it gets worse with the actor who played Luigi in SMB3 and W. He had to do time in an institution of some kind as he contracted a rare paranoid psychosis where he genuinely believed his wife and family were imposters and I believe he attacked someone over it as well. Suffice to say, the history of Luigi gets a lot of shit for laughs, but a lot of it really isn't that funny either.

Hmm... good question. There are better answers than the one I'm about to give you, but in my experience, I've signed contracts ranging from simple, written down agreement terms to something far more complex and legal-looking. I think maybe you might need a notary public?