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Saturday, August 31, 2013

Heyku 12


heyku 12
I was at work having a good night, sitting in the breakroom and it was me and another co-worker in there. Also got the chance to leave early cause of the Labor Day Holiday. A very good night.

Heyku 10

heyku 10
Well for anyone that has the app, or even used it before knows what I'm about to say then. When writing this Heyku, I was using the writer helper and the first thing that I was asked was "What do you smell?" Lol and of course I didn't smell anything. So that's exactly what I had put. And it was 11:42 pm that night, and was ready to put  some work in musically.

Heyku 9


heyku 9
This is my motivational, inspirational, and determined heyku yet. I was motivated to be at my best this day.

Heyku 8




heyku 8 This is a post that I did while I was at work, and the what was going on was me and my co-workers had to take our forklifts. And put a trailer load of ice cream away that had just came in for the night. And this was not the only truck, but it enough to me in the freezer for over 10 hours that night. BRRR. Lol  

Heyku 7

Heyku 6

heyku 6
At this time I was waiting for my parents to bring my up from Maryland, so I can my day with her before she had to go back for school.

Start at the foundation

Take a minute to determine what the foundation is of the thing you would like to do. Once you feel confident about the foundation, ask yourself what elements can be built up around it.

This idea is a great one that I like because. You can't really start anything unless you have a foundation, a core of what you want. Gotta have something to build on. So later you can look back and see where you achieved, and what you have done wrong. So at least you know where you stand, and even expand if and when you can.

Work In The Dark

Creativity flows when you're focused on creating and not evaluating. Try working in the dark to avoid over-thinking about what it is your creating. Evaluate only after you're done.

Ok I kinda understand what this means but not exactly. My opinion on this is that you should work In a not so well lighted area. And the thing is that you can kinda see what you doing but yet not really, like you're half awake and half sleep. And then if you are working in the dark and are half awake & half asleep you should look at this either when you're more awake, or whenever you have more time. At least at that time you can make more sense of what you were thinking at the time being. Give it a try to see what you come up with.

Do something daring

As Mark Twain said: "Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. Sail away from the safe harbor. Explore. Dream. Discover."

Simply this means take yourself out of your comfort zone, like for instance when I started writing, and mixing my own music. Even before that I was taking music lessons in Piano, Keyboards,Guitar, and Bass Guitar. All at the same time and the question that I kept asking myself was always: "Am I as good as anyone else?" So what I had done, while I was living in Maryland. Was that I had challenged myself, by going and taking summer music classes and one of the best music schools in Maryland, and in the United States. Which was Peabody Institute of John Hopkins University. And you know what I had found that I was pretty talented myself. I had started taking classes for beginners, and wanted to see if I could fair pretty good against their beginners. And what I had found out was that most of the students were either below my knowledge or at the same spot as myself. Which actually made me feel pretty good about myself. And so from that point on in the field of playing musical instruments that I had talent. So after a while of taking musical lessons, I wanted to do more like play in a band. But my mother had talked me out of doing that for that I was getting too old for it. So I had quiet doing that, but then I was working at a warehouse like 5 years later from the time that I had went to Peabody Institute. I wanted to get back in the music field again, so after speaking to a fellow co-worker for a few months at work. I had gotten the idea of writing, and mixing my own music. So what I had done I done some research online and figured out how to accomplish. So I downloaded my first DAW (Digital Audio workstation) which actually happen to be Magix music maker. And from there thats when I had started making, and mixing my own music. So for anyone that is interested in the song that I had created it is called:
MAKIN THE CONNECTION
And here is the direct link to where you can find the song and other music in my portfolio:
Dj Duece Music Portfolio
So after this song was writing and everything thing I had put it up on the internet. And from that point on it was a hit to me and my friends and family they loved it. So after making a few more songs the challenged at this point was to play it for members of any A & R Group or management in the music industry. And was once I got the feedback and realized that they liked it too, then I knew from there that everything was good in my mind and I was siked to going in this field. And have been doing ever since. And from now on all I've been trying to do is to get better.

Tips On Finding Inspiration and Jolting Creativity! (PrimeLoops.com)

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Tips On Finding Inspiration and Jolting Creativity!
Published: 08-14-2013

Although this blog frequently touches on the technical aspects of music production, that’s not the whole story. And while a quality mixdown can help you polish up a new tune, there’s still no substitute for good old fashioned musical inspiration. But what happens when you get stuck for ideas? How do you jump-start your track back into action? Well, here are a few tips that can help you get things moving when it’s all ground to a halt…

Relocation, Relocation
Most of these tips are psychological in nature. But that’s OK, because creating music and art is a psychological process anyway. There’s no formula, and all it needs is one good idea. So if you’re stuck, you need to change your way of thinking for a bit. One handy method is to try working in a new place. Take your laptop round to a friend’s house or studio for an afternoon, and use their setup if possible. Maybe get them involved in the tune, too. The change in equipment will force you to work a different way – different speakers, using a different keyboard or synth, different room acoustics. Even simple things like the posters on the wall and an unfamiliar view out of the window will help you get your brain out of the rut you’ve found yourself in.
Take A Bounce Of Your Master Output
This is not something you can do if you’re still stuck at the ‘blank screen’ stage of course. But if you’ve got a few ideas sketched out that you’re struggling to take further, a handy trick is to bounce down whatever you’ve got. Hash them out into a rough structure, render a WAV file, and load up a new project. Drop your single audio file into it, and now start jamming over the top. It’s often best to do this in audio, too – hit the pads on your MPC, mash out some keyboard lines, record yourself hitting pots and pans with a microphone. The fact that you can’t go and edit your audio file or arrangement means you’ve got no option but to just crack on with it and write some music. One of the biggest time-sucks in production is semi-productive tinkering; tweaking a snare drum feels like useful work when you’ve got no better ideas. This way, you can’t do that – just keep going until you’ve got (say) six to ten audio channels of ideas. Then drag them back into your original arrangement and start laying them out. Some of them will be completely useless, some of them might only be good for the occasional FX or fill. But there will usually be one idea in there that takes the track in a new direction and helps you get going again!

The Sample ‘Bait & Switch’
Sampling a huge chunk of someone else’s tune in your work is bad. Don’t do it, unless you like courtrooms. But for simple inspiration purposes? It’s always worth a go. Take a sample of a track you really like and start building around it; copy parts of it, work with it, borrow some ideas from it. Then remove it from your arrangement, and you’ll be left with the ‘shadow’ of the sample – you’ve harmonised it and funked it up with some drums, and all you need to do is fill in a couple of the gaps. It won’t make a whole tune, but it’s a great way of getting started, especially for novice producers!
Use Samples From A Different Genre
This is cheeky one, but if you want inspiration and originality to boot, then look to other genres for help. For a start, you should be listening to different genres than the one you want to be writing in anyway – this will always help for sources of good ideas. But try rocking a couple of different sample packs too – because they can be twisted in all sorts of ways and bring plenty of new ideas. For instance, drum and bass percussion tends to have lots of shuffle and drive to it. But if you pitch it down a whole load? Well, then it starts to lose some of that well-engineered sheen, becomes lo-fi and gritty, and it’s perfect for use in deep house and Detroit Techno. Similarly, if you’re writing DnB, minimal house and techno loops are perfect for pitching up to make neuro-funk style percussion. Or dancehall basses and drum loops mesh brilliantly with the new ‘halfstep’ sound that you hear on labels like Exit. The more unlikely the combination sounds, the more you should try it!
As we mentioned earlier, there’s a large dose of psychology involved – if you’re stuck, you kind of need to trick your brain into thinking creatively again. A break sometimes helps, but remember the old phrase; “inspiration needs to find you working”! So try some of these tricks, keep working hard, and good things will come to you in the end….

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Disconnect each step

Look at each stage of what you need to do, even the smallest of actions. What would happen if each of those things were a separate event, unrelated to the project or problem you're working on?

Breakdown the problem and see how you can individually make the problem easier to accomplish. I have a perfect example, at my current 9 to 5 job, I have to pick customer orders, and put them on pallets. So what I do is I look at my pick list and realize what is the biggest amount that I have to pick in my pick list, and then I skip through the order and pick up the biggest amount first. And then build my pallet off from the biggest amount down to the lowest amount. I had notice that I build a nicer, and more stabled pallet, and get through the pick order a lot easier on my end.

Sketch

Use your artistic abilities, or lack thereof, to sketch something on a sheet of paper. It doesn't matter what you sketch, drawing can make you simply feel creative, and also helps you physically see ideas.

Ok if you don't have any artistic skills in drawing, you can at least draw a diagram of what course of action you would like to have, or do to perform, or even to achieve your goal. Meaning that you can still sketch out what you are thinking.

Dance

Wiggle your arms, do the twist, or simply jump up and down. Get your body moving by dancing however you can. A 2005 study showed that dancing effects creativity greatly, so that's something.

I have an idea for someone to do. Listen to one of your favorite songs or albums whatever it may be, and imagine that you are acting act whatever is in your mind, or whatever had just happened to you recently and get all of your energy out. And maybe by the end of all this your going tired, or better play a video game( if that is your thing or not) again get your aggression out. So after all this your creative ideas will or should be flowing non-stop. Just some ideas of getting your creativity flowing.

Saturday, August 24, 2013

Write about being stuck

Write about what you think is keeping you from getting in the flow and what it feels like. Writing down your reasons for being out of the flow is an easy way to find potential ways to get in it.

Basically, write it out everything that is keeping you from moving from point A to point B in your project. And maybe while your writing it out the solution may come to after all that so give it try to see what happens.

Deep House Production Tips Part 1 – Deep House Tutorials (loopmaster)

Deep House Production Tips Part 1 – Deep House Tutorials
Deep House Production Tips Part 1

Hey Deep House fans, here’s part one of a two part series for Deep House production tips to get your juices flowing in the studio. While this article is primarily focused on Deep House, you can of course apply many of these tips to any genre.

1. Deep into the vibe of House!
A lot of Deep House’s vibe comes from its rhythm. While the drum patterns don’t generally deviate much from the 4/4 template, leaving them straight makes them sound too robotic. To give them a more human feel – à la Chris Brann’s Ananda Project – you can apply 16th-note swing quantisation or some more sophisticated groove quantisation if your sequencer supports it.
Analysing live drum breaks will give you a more human feel than straight quantisation, though you’ll probably find that keeping the kicks dead on the beat works best.

2. While programming riffs and chord progressions with a mouse is convenient if you can’t play the keyboard – and handy for tricky stuff, of course – you should at least give the old-fashioned live approach a try.
Mistakes can always be corrected later using your sequencer’s MIDI editor, and you might be surprised at how much better your sequences sound when you’ve played rather than programmed them. Plenty of top producers swear by the ‘human touch’ to inject a bit of life and soul into their tracks.

3. A very commonly used sound in Deep House music is the electric piano.
While it’s possible to spend hundreds of pounds on a commercial electric piano emulation, there are some superb free plug-ins out there that are more than capable of doing the job.
**Lacking some effects? You’ll find an ever-growing selection of quality free plugins here

4. If you want to create an authentic electric piano sound, it’s crucial that you use the right effects.
An Auto-Filter effect in particular can be used to add movement and feeling to an electric piano sound. Add an autofilter and turn the LFO Rate up to around 1.5Hz. Then add delay and reverb plug-ins in that order. Play with the wet/dry level of the reverb to make everything sound more intimate.

5. If your chords don’t have enough body, you can make them bigger by doubling them with another instrument.
Even if the part you double it with is extremely quiet (you don’t want it to overpower the original chords), it can still add character and definition. Also use augmented chords like 7ths and 13ths instead of just basic triads to get that classic Deep House feel.

6.When using doubled parts in this manner, you can use the stereo space to create different feels.
Try doubling the electric piano with something else, using a stereo imaging plugin to increase the stereo spread of the electric piano and to “mono-fy” the other patch. This will keep the electric piano vibes rolling around the stereo field while retaining a lot of definition in the centre of the mix.

7. You will probably want a wide and full feel in your Deep  House track so make use of the full stereo field.
A stereo imaging plug-in can make this a lot easier. Try turning the width value up  for an extra wide stereo image that’ll give your tracks a widescreen feel. Be careful of overuse though, stereo imaging plugins can sound great but they’ll also result in some bad mono compatibility and phasing issues if you overkill it.

8. Don’t forget the Mono!
Another way to create a wide sounding track may sound wrong but it’s to make some elements of your track Mono. This creates contrast and enhances the perceived width of your other elements.  If you are using as stereo enhancer turn the width down to 0%. This will ‘mono-fy’ the signal and enable you to place it precisely in the stereo panorama using your sequencer’s pan control. This can be useful when you want to accurately position percussion sounds in the stereo mix.

9.Effects are generally used quite sparsely in Deep House, so those that you do use need to be up to scratch or they’ll stick out like sore thumbs.
Unlike some genres, Deep House uses a relatively small amount of effects and instead relies on the interplay of  key elements to create a vibe. Reverbs, then delays are the most commonly used effects.

10. Stay out of the mud!
If you’re using reverb or delay send effects on sounds that have a large amount of low end you can end up with a muddy mix. You can curtail the amount of bass output from the send effect by adding a high-pass filter at any point of the effect chain.

11. Don’t go dead-centre
When you’re using a lot of percussion sounds, you can find more space to squeeze sounds into the mix by panning their stereo positions – if you pan all your drum sounds dead centre they can become one indistinguishable mass.

Ask why not?

Ask yourself why you aren't doing something. How is what you aren't doing affecting the project or task you're working on?

This creative ask you a question, which ask you why not? Meaning, why not do this?, Why not do that? It's just asking why can't you do anything in regards to your project, or problem that you are currently working on.

Heyku post 5

20130823-055811.jpg

This is a relaxing post before I went work. That's all.

Heyku post 4

20130823-055725.jpg
This night I can't remember what the date was but in the first line" football game." I was watching a preseason football game( I don't remember who was playing), but that was what I was watching at the time. Second line: "2:30 a.m. working on music" this was the time when I was most likely copyrighting music at that time. The third line "trying to be creative best" I was trying to be creative at my best at the time.
 

Heyku Post 3


20130823-055655.jpg
This Heyku is related to a car accident that I was in about 2 weeks ago from the date of this blog post. So with that in mind, In line one "Didn't have lunch yet" I had just gotten up me and my girlfriend and we just got dressed. The second line:  "Take the car to the shop" went to the my insurance companies claim adjusters office so they could look at the damage of the car. The third line: And wanted to see how much everything was going to cost for the repairs.

Heyku post 2


20130823-055458.jpg
In line number one: "Listening to my music" at this time I was preparing to make, or to improve on beats, or music that I had composed before. So what I was doing was actually getting ready to copyright the music, and artwork that I had done in the past. Second line: "Hot, Steamy" it was hot outside that night when I wrote this. The third line: Preparing for possibly making new beats which didn't happen that night, but was still feeling accomplished cause I had copyrighted everything that I wanted to that night, and then because of the time, I only published one of the songs that I copyrighted that night.

Heyku Post 1




20130823-055240.jpgThis is a new piece that I want to start called Heyku Posts. Well this is from a new app that I have found through in iTunes app store and it is called heyku where you go onto the site and you can freely write your own heyku of you own, or the app can guide you through it. And when you're done with it. In the above picture is what you will come up with. So I would like to start sharing them here on my wordpress blog site. So please leave comments and let me know what you think. Also, I will also shed some light on what all these heykus mean while I was writing them. In the first line "No one will listen to me." I was feeling like I could saying to anyone and I will still get the same result which was nothing at all.
In the second line, I felt like I wasn't doing nothing at all. Even I was in my own world at the time. In the third and final line, I was working on coyrighting my music on the internet, and also publishing my music as well. So even though I wasn't doing anything, I was accomplishing everything in my music.
Add caption

Gather Items

Take a few minutes to gather physical objects, then experiment with ideas involving each item. What if you combined items? What if you took a piece from one item and added it to another item?

I think what anyone should with this idea is to gather any, or everything that proteins to the subject matter of what you're working on. And then mess around with the items and see whatever you can come up with. And see how that works, anything is possible combinations, single ideas, anything that your imagination can come up with try it out.

The Tools of Music Fan Engagement [Part 4]: Twitter Basics

The Tools of Music Fan Engagement [Part 4]: Twitter Basics
So far Bandzoogle's “The Tools of Music Fan Engagement” series has covered blogging, email newsletters, and Facebook. The next tool we’re going to cover is Twitter. Twitter is a social media platform that can no longer be ignored by emerging artists. Twitter’s active user base has grown 714 percent from July 2009 to January 2013, and now has over 500 million members. So chances are, your fans and potential fans are using Twitter, and it’s a great platform to engage with them for several reasons.
Why Twitter is Great for Fan Engagement
The common misconception about Twitter from non-users is that all people do is post about what they’re eating. Yes, there is some of that, but Twitter is an incredible tool to connect with your fans when used properly.
At 140 characters per tweet, Twitter is the king of short form communication, so you can quickly interact with your fans. Short updates, quick thank yous, a retweet, or even favoriting a tweet can make a fan’s day. And like Facebook, it’s a great way to show that you’re active and retain fan attention, which is essential for musicians today.
Setting Up Your Twitter Profile: 5 Essential Steps
1. Select a Consistent Username
Your Twitter username should be consistent with your other online profiles like your Facebook page, YouTube channel, etc. If your Facebook page is Facebook.com/Bandname, then your Twitter handle should be @bandname. Individual band members can also have personal Twitter profiles, but there should be a dedicated Twitter account for your band/project. For solo artists, one account is really all you need.
2. Upload a Profile Image (No eggs!)
The default profile image when you create a Twitter account is the infamous egg. People generally don’t follow accounts with the egg as the profile image. You likely won’t be taken seriously, or people will think your account is spam. So upload your own profile image immediately before starting to use Twitter.
You can also upload a header image and background image to your profile. Here’s a great cheat sheet with all the info you need about image sizes: Twitter Cheat Sheet
3. Add Your Bio
Twitter gives you 160 characters for your profile’s “bio”. It might not seem like a lot of space, but you can make someone curious about your music and give them a real sense of your personality within those 160 characters. Take advantage of it, because leaving it blank could cause someone to simply move on to another profile.
4. Include Link to Your Website
Twitter allows you to enter a website that will appear under your bio. Many artists link to other social profiles like their Facebook page. There is only one link you should have, which is a link to your own website. Send people to your website where you can entice them into signing-up to your mailing list, where they can read your blog, watch your videos, and shop at your online store. Give yourself the traffic and potential upside, not another social media site.
5. Include Location
Twitter gives you a field to include your location. Use it. Fans often want to know where a band is from. Not only that, if another band/artist stumbles on your profile, it’s a great way to network with artists in your area.
Basics of Using Twitter
Twitter and Facebook are very different tools, and therefore, you should not connect your Facebook and Twitter profiles. Twitter allows up to 140 characters per tweet, which includes @usernames, so it should be used for shorter, more frequent updates. If you flood your Facebook page with your Twitter updates, you risk alienating your fans on Facebook.
How often should you tweet? Whereas on Facebook you can get away with 1 update per day or every couple of days, tweeting several times per day is not only ok, it’s almost expected. Some artists tweet 6-10 times throughout the day, others only once or twice. Just be sure to spread your tweets out and mix it up between personal and promotional tweets.
The Language of Twitter
Twitter also has its own language and etiquette. Here are some actions you’ll be taking on Twitter that are important to understand:
Reply: If you hit “Reply”, you’ll be responding directly to someone on Twitter. The tweet will start with their Twitter username, and only people who follow both you and that other person will be able to see that tweet in their stream. Use this to answer fan questions, say thanks, or respond to people you follow to start a conversation.
Mention: If you want to mention another Twitter user and have everyone who follows you see it, you just have to make sure that your tweet doesn’t start with their Twitter handle. So you could simply add a “.” before their handle, or add their handle somewhere later in the tweet. You can use this to promote your show at a certain venue, publicly thank someone, or give someone credit.
Retweet (RT): To “Retweet” someone is similar to forwarding an email, you’re sharing their tweet with your followers. You can simply hit Retweet so that the person’s tweet appears exactly as it was to your followers. On the mobile Twitter app, they give you the option to “Quote Tweet”, which puts the original tweet in quotations and you can add your own comment after. On other Twitter applications like Tweetdeck, Hootsuite and Echofon, you can Retweet (RT) and add your own comment before the original tweet.
Simple Retweet:
Retweet (RT) with Comment:
You can use retweets to share compliments about your music, retweet info about upcoming gigs, or just to share content you find interesting.
#Hashtags: A hashtag is the pound # sign followed by a word or group of words. The hashtag is automatically hyperlinked and creates a new stream if you click on it, which will include all tweets that have used that same hashtag. It’s a great way to be found on Twitter, start conversations, and join in other conversations with users who you don’t follow or don’t follow you.
Hashtags are commonly used by music conferences and festivals, where they create an “official” hashtag so that people tweeting about the event can see a stream of everyone’s tweets. So if you’re performing at a festival or conference, you can promote your show using the official hashtag and everyone following that stream will see the tweet and potentially retweet it, helping to spread the word.
Artists can also use hashtags to create a grouped conversation of their own, run contests, create surveys, and even use it during live shows to take requests or answer questions from the audience. Another use for hashtags would be to tweet info about an upcoming show and create a hashtag for your genre of music and the city name you’ll be playing in.
Favorite: You can click to “Favorite” a tweet, which in some applications is done by clicking a star. This has become similar to the “Like” button on Facebook. This can be a great way to quickly acknowledge a fan who compliments you on Twitter, or to end an interaction. It shows the person you’ve read their tweet and are appreciative of their comments.
Search: Using the search function in Twitter can be a powerful tool for musicians to help find new fans and promote shows. For example, if you’re going to be touring in a new city, you can search Twitter for your genre of music and the city name, and you’ll see users who tweet about your style of music. You can also search for bands that sound similar to yours, find fans in a certain city that are tweeting about those bands, and then strike up a conversation with them.
But when doing this, tread carefully, as it can be very easy to come across as spammy. Take the time necessary to develop a relationship with people on Twitter. If you think a user is in your target market for your music, follow that person, respond to their tweets, talk about music in general, and then mention your show at some point further down the road.
Use Twitter to Drive Fans to Your Website
As was the case with Facebook, Twitter is a very powerful tool that can be used to drive traffic back to your website. That way you can find out more about your fans through detailed analytics, get them signed up to your mailing list, and hopefully shopping in your online store.
Here are just some of the ways to drive people to your website from Twitter:
Website link in bio: As mentioned earlier in this post, make sure to include a link to your website in the Bio section of your Twitter profile.
Blog posts: When you have a new blog post, post a direct link and invite your followers to read the post.
Music: When you have a new song, upload it to your website and then post a link to your music page and invite fans to check it out.
Video: When you have a new video, instead of simply posting the link from Youtube, embed the video on your Videos page and tweet a link to the page.
Photos: If you have some great photos from your last show, upload them to your website and provide a link to the gallery for your Twitter followers.
Merch: If you have some new merchandise, talk about it in a tweet and post a link to your online store.
Twitter (like Facebook) is a Conversation Tool
The most important thing to remember when using Twitter is that it’s a tool for conversation. If you only promote yourself, don’t respond to questions and comments, or rarely tweet, chances are, you won’t gain a following of engaged fans.
In keeping with the 3 Pillars of Fan Engagement, Tweets should be in your own voice as much as possible (authentic), you should tweet on a consistent basis, and to really see results, you’ll have to sustain it over the long term.

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Group & Evaluate


In just 5 minutes, write down as many words you can that come to mind related to your project or task. Then group the words together by common attributes. Then evaluate what the items in each group have in common.
This is an interesting creative idea that this is. Cause I had just found an app in the iTunes app store. Where you do just the very thing that is mentioned here in this post. Once you see everything on paper or on a computer then you can process everything a little more better once you see it. So all I have to say about it is taken of advantage of all the ideas that you have gathered for yourself and see what you will come up with. Once its on paper and you get the chance to put everything in its proper place.

Sleep on it


Let your brain take a break from working for the day and get some sleep. Sleep works as a creative motivator because it is one of the easiest ways to break thinking patterns and refresh creative thinking.
Sleep is a great relaxation tool, it recharges your mental, and heathy batteries. So by the time that you get up again you'll be ready to tackle on whatever is facing for the moment. Hopefully, you can also come up with a possible solution to solve your problem, or your dilemma at the time.