Neifion

Great points, Chris, and well said!

PM sent as well!

Also, we're gonna have a launch trailer up soon. Here's the first trailer:

Listen to the soundtrack: Game Available Now for PC on Steam Early Access! http://store.steampowered.com/app/262630 Tom vs. the Armies of Hell is an indie Action-Adventure game from Darkmire Entertainment. Set in a world somewhere between Office Space and Army of Darkness, you play Tom, a down-trodden software-engineer turned reluctant half-demon hero as he tries to survive the dangers of Hell.

I've had a chance to chat with Michael Barry, one of the five team members; he's a real cool, down-to-earth guy. Nice getting to see a bit of their synergy and process. In case you haven't seen the music video for The Curse of the Sad Mummy:

https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/aegis This is a theme for someone bred for brutal, mindless warfare but who ends up discovering and then fighting for his own passions and beliefs. Your thoughts are kindly and greatly appreciated!

The Friedlander has an ensemble mode which basically duplicates the solo instrument for 2-12 violins panned in a semi-circle, with options for adjusting offset and intonation for realism. It is not an actual recorded ensemble of players playing together. Also just a note, Embertone doesn't really do sales. They do offer a generous student discount if you are a student.

Surprised no one suggested the Journey soundtrack. Braid soundtrack: http://magnatune.com/artists/albums/braid-soundtrack?song=1 Also, Homeworld: Finally, I'm going to tip my own hat and suggest a few of my tracks! There are vocals in algoRhythm, but they are of the soothing and wordless nature. algoRhythm: https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/algorhythm Lingering Whisper: https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/lingering-whisper

https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/a-life-worth-living This is a piratey/adventure theme for a hardened man who starts out in a dark place, believing life is meaningless, but ends up finding action, romance, and a place to belong. Hence the turning point about 1/3 through the song. Your thoughts appreciated!

If that's the case, then try finding a MIDI file of a song and importing it into your DAW. Look at the notes, the chords, notice which instruments are given which voicings. Then delete the melody track and try making your own. Or erase the chord progression and try to make a slightly different one. Or experiment with changing up the rhythm of the track, fiddling with the percussion, etc. This is a great way to go "under the hood" and learn while also dipping your toes into rearrangement.

Mock up one of your favorite songs, note for note. Even if you can't read sheet music, do it by ear the best you can. Then go back and add your own flair. Good for learning and also expanding your creativity.

No problem!

Haha, yeah, it's definitely a "dark before light" mentality. Maybe for the next romance track commission I'll flip things around. Thanks for listening!

I think adding a touch more reverb to the strings throughout the track would do nicely. That might also help with blurring the legato and run transitions later on. I use Mural as well (love the tone of that library), perhaps adding a bit more of the Ambient mics there could do to blend things in further.

This is very nice! I love the writing and arrangement; it really accomplishes that warm, heartfelt feeling of a Studio Ghibli film. At 0:44, when the strings end their sustain abruptly, I think a touch more hall reverb would be nice to allow a bit of lingering. The legato transitions of your strings could also use some smoothing to make them sound more realistic, especially when they are exposed at 0:49-0:53. Lastly, I feel that the violins run at 1:32 could sound more convincing. If your strings library has mic positions, I might suggest emphasizing a bit more of the ambient mics. Combined with a slightly wetter reverb and maybe increasing the dynamic range to start at a softer pianissimo and go to full forte, this could blur the run and make it sound more convincing. As it is though, great start and looking forward to hearing more!

Nice! I feel that the chord progression you establish from 0:00-0:47 is a bit... standard? Used a lot? Dunno know the word, but you incorporate enough nice elements around it, making it more interesting. I really like when everything fades and the bass kicks in at 0:47. How did you get your bass to slide that like? Also, may I ask how/what you used for the ethereal vocal sound that appears at 0:48?

https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/the-roads-between-us I wanted to evoke a romance that has it's up and downs. Gray, rainy days as well as moments of warm sunshine. Your thoughts are appreciated!

A theme for a "face-changing" assassin, something akin to a mirage. Emotions bubbling beneath a stoic exterior. A sort of ambiguity between sounding dark and warm. And a bit of a gypsy/Spanish sound. Your thoughts appreciated! https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/the-man-and-the-mirage

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays! This is a short arrangement of some of my favorite classical Christmas songs. Pardon the roughness; I did it in one evening trying to get it done for family before Christmas Day (and failed by two hours, lol!) Hope you enjoy it, and have a safe Christmas! https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/christmas-in-the-arbor

https://soundcloud.com/kekopro/simple-beginnings I wanted to do a little something musical for my wife and my 6th anniversary, and I thought I'd share. Thank you for listening!

I like the bass at 0:37. I might give this a shot.

I can vouch for the UR22. Solid metal construction, very low latency, compact design. Part of the reason I got one too is because it's made by the same company that develops my DAW, Cubase, so the ASIO driver compatibility is optimal. Also, yes, most keyboards have a USB connection these days. However, having MIDI ports on the audio interface frees up a USB port on my system, and that was a definite plus for someone like me! My mics, my keyboard, my interface, all just take one USB spot.

Hey, I'm with you there completely. I don't think it's freaky or surprising, I do the same thing and I think many do as well. In fact, my post was pretty much exactly what I DON'T do, but maybe should now and then. I'm always like "naw, I'll just figure it out." And I do, and I like it. But maybe in my stubbornness to "write it my way and not the book's way", there could have been an option I didn't see and wouldn't have. So what I think they always say is true: knowing theory really only helps (that is, unless, you make music completely for academic proficiency. And I know there are people who do this; they don't care about how it actually sounds, just that it's theoretically perfect. That's not music to me. But back to the topic...) I have to be honest, part of the reason why I still haven't dug into theory at all is because of the stubbornness that I want it to be "all my music". It's exactly like when I play a video game. No hints! No cheats! And truth be told, I get pride from the fact that I crafted a song purely from feeling and intuition. And for many situations, this is ideal; getting that raw, instinctual, from-the-heart quality. But I'm recently (just now, in fact, lol) starting to realize that it's not someone else crafting the music for me. It's knowledge; tools that I'm gaining that I engage when I want and need to. Back to the swimming analogy, I never felt like I didn't earn a medal just because I had a coach. Sure, he helped, but I'm the one who hauled my ass across the pool. Besides, when you think about it, once the theory is out of the book and into your head, then it becomes your intuition.

I think of it like this. I was a competitive swimmer as well as a coach for many years. Did I have to know exactly what degree of angle to best slide my hand into the water for least resistance at the end of a recovery for a freestyle stroke? Of course not. My brain did it automatically by "feel" and muscle memory. However, as a coach, I did have to deconstruct a swimmer's technique and think about exactly what was going on (or more accurately, what was causing problems). I had to watch and see things like "okay, your body is riding too low in the water because you're not getting enough push when your hand is at this position", yada yada. In short, swimming was like walking, while teaching someone to swim was like having to think about "bend left knee to lift leg leg up, roll on ball of right foot, straighten left leg, catch fall with left leg..." Writing music, for me at least, is mostly like walking or swimming. I don't think about the technical stuff. It's all happening of course, in my mind, but it's intuitive. As you guys have been saying, it's "wordless". However, if I get stuck or something's not working, sometimes it's good to have the theory knowledge to see what alternatives are available to me or to quickly work it out instead of having to waste time "playing around" until it's fixed. That's just like with swimming. At the national level, you have to constantly tweak your stroke to squeeze every ounce of speed and efficiency that you can (not unlike tweaking a comp or mix). In that case, I would allow myself to get more technical, break my stroke apart, and think about what my body position is, where my hands are and what amount of thrust they're providing at certain points of my stroke, etc. So 95% of the time, I was in intuition-mode. But that 5% I spent with the technicalities was critical. So to wrap this up, this is pretty similar to Neblix's point in that you can get good at things just by doing it without the theory, but it usually takes longer and when problems or opportunities for a better sound do come by, you either might waste time trying to figure them out through intuition or miss the opportunity completely. I've barely touched the one music theory book I have on my shelf and I have an advanced counterpoint video course downloaded but unplayed. I know it would benefit me to spend time with either, but I always feel like my time is better spent actually writing music, especially with deadlines. Kind of ironic. I swear I'm going to force myself to balance the two!

New version up, same link as before; removed the solo violin counterline at 0:52 because it was distracting from the main melody and I also wanted the choir harmony to come through. Also smoothed some dynamics throughout. I would love to hear your thoughts!