Arcana

I really enjoyed Episode #33. Best show from pixietricks and the Wingless yet. I like pixietricks' use of the background music in the shows. Often I find myself tuning in on the background music in the show in addition to the voices in the foreground.

What do you mean by flexible? Like rearranging package deals? At Novamusik, they are offering free headphones with their Alesis Micron, so I was considering buying mine from there. I've mentioned it to Sweetwater but they didn't promise me anything to compete with that. I didn't bring it up recently but I might do so again when I consider buying the Micron in the future.

At some point in my life, I was thinking of buying an Alesis Micron, so I called Sweetwater to get an idea of what their shipping rates and total cost of the system was. Eventually, after looking at my finances very carefully, I decided that I really, really didn't have the money to justify the purchase and then decided not to buy anything. Well, a few days ago, a representative E-mailed me back, asking if I was still interested in the Micron, and that they'd be willing to discuss it if I was. I thought that was rather nice of them to have kept me in their database under "potential customer". Now that I have a little more money (they underpaid me a couple of months ago), I might have to consider this again. Maybe after my trips in the summer. It's nice to have good customer service representatives. By the way, for those of you who are wondering, if you ship from the US to Canada using FedEx Express, you don't have to pay brokerage fees; they're included.

Can you post a screenshot? (I don't know why I'm asking. I'm not an FL user.)

Man, I haven't tried making a song since August... and then I decided that it was no good and eventually withdrew from the Tales project. It's not really a slump, though... I just haven't had the heart to try lately.

I'm curious to know what you write down on your pen and paper. I've never been good at writing notes on a staff, since my ear sucks (it took me 6 months of ear training for me to recognize a Major 6th from a Minor 6th). I'm wondering if you just use a staff, or if there's some other way you do things.

Hmm, main thing with the show is all of the talking while doing the Remix review. It's nice to hear banter, but when you say "Remix Review", then I hope that I can hear the Remix after a brief 2 minute review. Keep the talking before or after the remix. Focus, focus! I think I preferred the "summary of news" before the Remix reviews, myself.

A truck that transports panzers, of course. It's just like saying, "Look, there goes the furniture truck" or "Watch out for that ice-cream truck!". But... if there's a panzer truck, I guess that means the vehicle that brings cars into a new car lot is a "car truck"...

Biggest. Mistake. Ever. Heeeeeeeeey, what's that supposed to mean?

I rofl'd. And pixietricks looooves me. She proved it by putting my clip in the show even though I called WHILE SHE WAS EDITING. Oh pixietricks how sweet thou art.

Darangen creates a rock remix here with some great instrumentation and some good vocals. Many people have criticized the vocals, but I think they're on par with what you hear from an indie rock group. The chorus is not mixed as strongly as I would have liked - there is a slight delay in the voices, which muffles up the words a bit, and makes them sound as if the vocalist not annunciating words. However, the rest of the vocals are not as bad as most of the listeners would let on. The vocals definitely don't ruin the song; I just think everyone's been spoiled by some other vocal mixes posted on the site, which have been absolutely stellar. Some of you need to read the other reviews before posting. Darangen said that he was taking voice lessons back on page 1. I look forward to seeing him improve. For an early vocal attempt, at the time, getting on OCR is a strong achievement. Good work from Darangen here, and I will be looking for the next vocal mix he sings for.

My main complaint is that the volume's not very normalized. You'd listen to a voice that was nice and normal, and then a sample would blast your ears off. The mixing is a little bit off, as well (some of the vocal clips are cut off a bit by sound effects). I'm sure those technical aspects are easy to fix. Go Cyan Ide - good consistent work from that guy every week! I'm sure that there's a bit of transition going on still. The introduction before the ReMix reviews felt long, but that's really a transition thing, and not anything specific to what The Wingless and pixietricks are doing. I don't think I'm able to resist The Wingless's manly charm. It's good to hear the show again. I usually use it as a spotlight for the latest mixes on OCR; also, I like the RRR; I like hearing the hosts' opinions on the songs that are read out, in the form of "Which song do you want rolled?". And this is such a strange request... but I think pixietricks should swear less on air. :P She's taking after Rayza, now!

Too bad Dell makes crap.

If you flip the rack, you should be able to put a cable from the MOD OUTPUT CV of the Malstrom (Mod A, for example) to the Master Volume of the NN-XT (for example). The knob next to the Master Volume adjusts how much amplitude the volume gets based on the CV-input. If you flip the rack back around, you can select a MOD A waveform that matches what you want to control the volume with.

This was actually somewhat expected; there were concerns that VGDJ wouldn't be able to last past the fall term when school started again. It managed to get as late as November and December, though, even on their schedules. I like Aurora and Rayza too, CompyFox, so you're not alone in that respect, but it's so much better to have the legacy continue than it is to have NO show. Rayza and Aurora will come back to it if they have time to and can pick it up, or whatever. If we start a trend of the creators being comfortable passing on the buck, we can easily get a VGDJ legacy going on, here. VGDJ can (and should) run across a few generations of OCR.

Well, I'm thinking more of what notes you would actually put in a strum. I know almost nothing about guitar, which is why I'm curious. Let's say I have a piano roll, then, and I'm trying to sequence some chord that the player is strumming. As far as I know, the natural tuning is something like EADGBE? If I want to strum that chord (I don't even know what it is), would I use only those notes in my sequencer? Let's say that I want to do a C chord instead. You have to put your fingers on some fret, and that mutates the sound of a string and makes it higher or something. I'd have to know each of the notes that the individual string plays, and then put them together in a time sequence that simulates a down-stroke? For example, on the piano, I can play a C chord with a C, E, G. Would I simply put the C, E, G on the sequencer with a guitar soundfont, line the notes up, and then call it a strum? As I said, I don't play guitar, so I really don't know what I'm talking about (perhaps I should learn?) and would appreciate it if someone with some patience can fill me in on some of the technical details, or perhaps point me to a good resource that I can read from.

Do you guys actually map out the notes of the strings, as if you had plucked them, and then put them in a strum-like pattern? I don't know what notes each individual string makes, so even though I'd be able to look up a C chord, I wouldn't know how the C chord fingering mutates the rest of the strings. Or is it really more simple than that?

Sampling, though, is illegal... whereas covering is less illegal. http://www.ocremix.org/remix/OCR00079/ ^ Being locked down? Aw, I like that mix. It's kind of cute.

This is hot. The track starts off with some nice heavy goodness and then evolves dramatically as it moves along---what really made me sit up and take notice was the creative interpretation with the gated synth at around 2:36, which eerily sounds as if it's an actual whistle, but yet, not. The dynamics in this mix rock the house. It's crystal clear, it's full of awesome sounds, and makes you move. There's no way you can ignore this song. bLiNd sets an example for us all and brings great honour not only to OCRemix and the VG music remixing community, but the genre that this song represents.

Where would I start to do this kind of "investigation"?

For those of you who are Logic Pro users, the Logic Pro 7.2 Universal binary upgrade has been released. http://www.apple.com/logicpro/ http://www.macrumors.com/pages/2006/02/20060203070358.shtml Besides Universal binary support, there are a few new features in it, but I can't find them at the moment. The upgrade for existing users is $49. Since I'm a student, I should be able to get the upgrade for a bit cheaper, but I think I'm going to wait until my MacBook Pro arrives, and I browse the feature list, before getting an upgrade. I haven't been making music lately, so spending money on software isn't very productive. If anyone witnesses the new feature list, let me know. I'm at work right now so I can't afford to search to find it. EDIT: here. http://www.apple.com/logicpro/crossgrade.html From the look of it, other than potential Universal Binary support, there aren't that many compelling features or bug fixes. Looks like it's mostly better support for external software and hardware.

Shopping in Canada for synths is retarded. All of the prices are set from when the dollar was really, really low compared to the US dollar, so if you go to a store, they charge $625 Canadian for the Micron. If you buy one online for $399 US, then it comes out to $465... but once you do, you end up having to pay $60US for shipping. I don't understand why the Canadian market for gear is so pathetic.

The Ion has many more knobs and a bigger screen, and is also much larger. I haven't played around with an Ion much, since I wasn't planning to buy it, but it should be easier to coax some good sounds out of it compared to the single multi-function button on the Micron. The Ion is definitely more powerful than the Micron and relies a little more on traditional synthesis techniques, but the Micron has a few more features (pattern sequencer and an arpeggiator) and is much smaller (awesome for gigging and live use).

Post your files. Sorry, I don't have space anymore, since I've moved.

Whaddya know. I'm seriously considering buying an Alesis Micron, myself. I went to the store and played with one for who knows how long. I just kind of sat there and banged away at the keys and turned the knobs until the salesperson came back to check on me. I have no idea how much time I spent there. Unfortunately, the price in the store is more expensive than the price I can get by ordering online from the US and having it shipped to me (I live in Canada and am considering ordering from Novamusik, which I hear hasn't screwed people living in Canada based on reports from my friends). In total, it'll cost me about $600 CAD (taxes & shipping in). The only reason I'm hedging on it is because I'm really not sure if I can afford to be spending $600 on *anything* that has no immediate utilitarian use at the moment. There was a Novation K-Station in Ottawa (used) for sale that I wish I had looked at before flying out west. It was selling for $525 + tax.