#poly me

For the purpose of this performance, Dan and I have created a session in the Ableton allowing us to control as many parts of the song as possible. The idea behind it was to play then loop particular regions of the song leaving us free to manipulate delays and reverbs, sing and trigger samples. Genere Dan and I aimed for were a 90′s rap with music references coming from MF Doom.

The song which we have performed had a simple structure intro then the verse followed by the break and a second verse and the outro. To control futures of the Ableton, we have decided to use my trusty Akai APC 40 with the footswitch, midi keyboard and the Makey Makey. Our goal was to make the performance enjoyable for the listener, to achieve this we have implemented the Makey Makey connected to the Curley parsley. Triggering samples with a use of the Makey Makey was great fun. The only problem we have had while using this setup was that I had to be electrically grounded all the time. I had overcome this by grounding the bass guitar bridge so when I was holding the guitar I was able to interact with the Makey Makey. Many parts of our performance were affected by the effects, to make an effect manipulation easy we had decided to utilise the effect racks with the macro controls function, this allowed us to have access to the most Fx parameters when the channel was chosen. I think most problematic part of our performance was recording the bass guitar loop. I have assigned the foot switch to start and select the looper device making it available to preview on my computer screen. It was a wrong decision causing Dan to interfere with looper functions while he was applying delay on to his vocally, making impossible to record a good bass loop.

Poly Me semester 2 Task 1

For this task, I have composed short disco track using the Ableton. Music composition incorporates the Midi Rack consisting of the Massive instrument with the primary functions mapped to macro controls; a group of three tracks containing hi-hats and percussion instruments; the Drum Rack; recorded bass guitar; samples and the Vocals. When recording this task, I have utilised session view to create three scenes intro, verse and the break then I have used Akai APC 40 to launch clips and scenes as well as real-time effect manipulation while recording to the arrangement view. For the purpose of making this song, I have utilised the effect racks; two return tracks; the resonators to add harmonies to the percussion; clips loop and follow action function; automation of the effects in the arrangement view. Screenshots bellow represents the arrangement view and session view.

Video bellow shows how we have improvised little music piece with a use of the Ableton and a looper.

Dan Orme and I have chosen to perform together. Our performance will utilise the Ableton Live as a performance tool. 

Performance will be based on the looper, launching audio clips, drum racks, bass guitar and processed vocals. Our idea for an upcoming assessment is to loop the sample phrases, and bass guitar what will allow us to perform the other parts of the music act. We are planning on using plants as triggers for samples, this will be possible to achieve thanks to the utilisation of the Makey Makey. For the purpose of this performance, we will be using the Akai APC 40 with my DIY foot switch, bass guitar, MIDI keyboard and Makey Makey.

Links bellow show similar performances.

The name of the track i created for my final piece is called “Mario Kart Drill 69 Grind Edition” and it is just over 3 minutes and 30 seconds. 

The style of the track is a dark and quite serious song, leaning towards being more of an instrumental with the accompliment of nintendo’s one and only “Mario”. The genre falls within the category of UK drill with a hint of grime, however i purposely tried to avoid using anything that could lead it into being american trap. The 7 tracks i used as references were all influenced within this track, following the standard procedure of 140 BPM, the church bells and also the edited crash symbol too.   What i was trying to achieve was exactly what i think i’ve created, a blend of traditional UK drill with a slight comical twist being the Mario samples. 

One key production technique i used was the use of automation and panning. This was used a high amount within the creation of this track, monitoring the the levels with a mix of panning far left and right for certain sounds; for example the mario noises at the start of the track. 

4. Robbery https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqWkzjrLJ0w&list=PLFX8FbxKFbbfQeoGHPN3m5fzMqUSYDG6X&index=2

The track i have chosen to analyse is “Robbery” created by Yamaica productions.  The form of the song starts with an introduction, moving onto the chorus, lead by a verse, which goes into another chorus, and this is repeated once more until the final chorus; which is doubled at the end.  The melody to the song is one of the reasons why it is so catchy, as its mixed with pianos and synthesisers playing around the panned audio field, with a major harmony. The initial sounds are double notes mixed in with some sort of arpeggiator.  The rhythm is quite up beat, holding a strong fast tempo of 140 BPM, quick and swift high hats which are accompanied by an electronic snare drum which are used frequently around the song.  The production of the song was flawless, there are so many techniques and skills used around this song; for example the hit machine and bass drum in such perfect timing and velocity with each other. Not only that but the overall equalization for the song too, the high frequencies from the high hat and piano blend very nicely with the low end bass drum and french horn.