How can we expect anything but eruption
When we treat you this way?
How can we excuse your decimation
When our provocation is clear?
Indignation spawns indignation, just as much as
Violence breeds violence.
Farmers of doom, we reap what we sow.
Keepers of the loom, we undo all that is known.
The more we turn the screws
The more you ungracefully squirm
The more we grind you down
The more you set to burn
We created you by destroying you.
We lost you when we found you.
You’ve turned being broken
Into a state of functionalism
You’ve defined your constant loss
As the norm of our idealism.

Of all my older albums, 2 Smargaid Maerd remains as one I don’t feel disappointed about, and if I’m in a good enough mood I’m actually very proud of it! Now many years after the fact it is easy to look back at earlier work like this and frown upon certain technical shortcomings and artistic immaturity employed in the making of this music. In 2003, when most of this work was done, I only had very limited and lofi means of music production, and I was far from being in a stable emotional state to be producing pieces of high sophistication. Mind you, I’ll probably look back upon myself now in 10 years time and think the same thing, hence the problem of looking backwards. Nevertheless, these songs seem to strike an emotional chord with people, and with the limited audience it has reached it has spawned a life of its own beyond my own consideration. Well, despite the blemishes, I still love it – so I am keen to get it out there to a wider audience if possible. So if you’re in the mood for some highly individualistic composition; that is ‘pop’ yet ‘experimental’; lush but edgy; and highly emotional homebrew electronica – this album is for you.

Hence, here we are on Bandcamp! The original CD-quality FLAC files have been uploaded: so if you’re feeling so inclined to spend $10AUD, then a copy of the whole thing is yours. But that’s not all (as he puts on his Tim Shaw Voice), you get a re-organised PDF package of all the original artwork and lyrics; plus, there are three hidden bonus remix tracks as well! These are not available anywhere else. Because Bandcamp is so neat, all the files come in whatever format of your choice, all tagged and ready to go for your portable playing pleasure.

The three remix tracks are Absolutely Doomed, My Heart Only Beats For You, and There Are No Answers – Only Dub. They have been remixed and mastered only in the last few weeks. The originals were very lofi and harsh sounding, so it was a good opportunity to put my new skills and equipment to the test. I figured if I could make these old sonic disasters sound good, then I’m doing ok. They were upgraded to 96khz mixing, and in the final stages of the mastering were run through my new 12AU7 ECC82 Telefunken NOS ribbed plate tubes (read on in earlier posts about the technical details). There’s a lot of lofi-intensity still inside these mixes, but at the same time they should be smooth and sparkle with clarity. The remixes will give a new angle on the old songs, perhaps focusing their emotional impact. Beyond that, I’ll leave it to you to explore them.

Thank you so much for your support and interest.

The Paradox: Masterplan

Good luck with that, I hope it works. Like I mentioned earlier, the tool is very handy if you are trying to attempt an album project, especially if you feel lost in all the different stages. It’s a lot to organise. So I feel more confident about it all having it mapped out ahead of me. It is motivating too in that I look at it and think “oooh, all these cool songs to work on, which part do I feel like tackling today?” My categories are particular to my project, but if you use the sheet then you can use whatever is applicable to what you’re doing.

I’ve read of artists in recording studios approaching album projects in a similar way, but instead using a chalkboard or whiteboard. This is the same thing, but for the geeks

I am between contracts with the university and the gap of time is fairly large. It’s a long time to be idle and without income, so I’ve put most of my energy into formalising the operation of my own audio production business. I have given it a name! Please make welcome Stormformer Productions. Getting serious about things has caused me to learn a little bit about the Australian Tax system, how to keep basic records and how to better organise projects and communications with clients. Now it is a new financial year I have to collate all my records and find a decent small business accountant to help me get my tax in order. It has been slow going with all this because I’m not very good at thinking about finance or document administration. But I’m learning.

I’ve also made some investments into audio equipment to make sure I can do the required production work at a professional level. First off, I badly needed to get better converters, something better than cheap consumer grade soundcards. So, with Simon’s advice, I went for the most transparent option affordable to me: The Mytek Stereo96 ADC and DAC units. With some soundcards you can hear how the sound is bent and coloured as it goes in and out of the computer: but not with the Myteks. If they were mirrors reproducing an image, then they are crystal clean and undetectable. Because of this, I no longer hesitate to record something, or send audio in and out from the computer through outboard equipment. To connect the Myteks to the PC I have got a TC Konnekt 24D from Simon. This allows me to connect via TOSLINK optical, have extremely low jitter, and have bit-perfect routing within the system. Already I can use this set up to master with outboard gear going out and in at 44.1khz. However I have some projects at 96khz that will need to go down to 44.1khz – to do that I need a second soundcard with optical. So on order is a M-Audio Transit card which should allow me to do that dual function while retaining a bit-perfect transfer using the Myteks as the clock master. Pretty geeky stuff eh? Well, it’s important to get it right for paying clients. And the sound is just fantastic.

Simon has also been exploring the world of vacuum audio pre-amp valves or tubes, and has been encouraging me to do the same. Again on his recommendation, I bought the ART Pro VLA II tube compressor, for use both in mastering and channel based compression. The stock unit comes with some so-so tubes, but many people “re-tube” units like these to put in their favourite tubes. Now, tubes aren’t precisely linear in frequency response, but they have a very nice ‘colour’ to them that brings out desirable harmonics and tone. After a bit of research I decided that the best tubes that would suit my approach, tastes and needs, would be the 12AU7 ECC82 Telefunkens, with ribbed plates. They are regarded for having a very open and clear sound, with a tasteful amount of high end extension. Fortunately, there is ‘new old stock’ available: tubes made in the 50s, 60s and 70s that have never been used. I found a matched pair for sale and happily paid the rather large price tag on them. Once I had my compressor I opened it up and re-tubed the unit with the Telefunkens. You have to ‘play the tubes in’ for about 24 hours straight with general music. While I was doing that I was checking in and listening to the progress: it started off with an excellent open sound, but as they warmed up I could hear the brightness and dynamic qualities of the tubes coming to life! They just sound stunning, but linear enough to use in mastering. I’ve not got into the use of the compressor so much yet, still learning how to make it talk – but the time will come.

More photos on my Flickr page if you’re interested.

What I have been doing is some test mastering with material from Distaudio and Hunz. With a very lite DSP chain beforehand to to make things safe, I send the audio out to the compressor unit and play with the levels only. The tubes are like tape: different levels bring out different saturation colours. I just finely tweak it unit I hit the sweet spot and record the results. I still have the Tascam BR-20T reel to reel deck on hand for much the same sort of task. I recently re-calibrated the deck and have it sounding really nice and as linear as possible. But, tape sounds gooey and all over the the place compared to running through good tubes. Nevertheless, I have been using the deck to run out stems for saturation processing. Some of my more rock/metal productions have been enjoying this approach. It’s especially good on acoustic drums and guitars to bring out texture and harmonics. Not so precise for synths or electronic sounds.

Most of my production work thus far has been for Distaudio and Hunz. Both projects have been really exciting and rewarding to work on. Watch this space for updates on when those two projects finish. I’ve also written another article for Renoise In:Depth, and have more planned. And finally, I’ve been working with Alex Zaia to make a website for Stormformer Productions, which you can preview here. I’ll announce things more formally with a full breakdown on services once that project is complete. In meantime, if you need audio production work done, please get in touch.

I know I have been banging on about it for years, but it finally feels like I’m getting some seriously consistent work done on my next album, The Paradox. In fact, I think I’m doing some of the best mixing I’m ever done, and the songs are transforming from obscure and awkward suites to assertive and clear music. What has helped a great deal is the use of Google Document’s spreadsheet tool. I’ve been using that tool with clients to organise large projects into stages of production (it is also handy for sharing production notes over distance). My spreadsheet has the songs listed down the left, and the headings across the top are as follows:

• Renoise Mix Translation
• Stems Rendered, Reaper session created
• Select Stems run to tape
• Guitars recorded / mixed
• Vocals recorded / mixed
• Extra production notes
• Final Mix
• Album flow and continuity edits
• Mastering
• Album artwork / lyrics / credits = PDF
• Track artworks
• FLACs / tagging

As I achieve each of these stages I’ll mark each cell with “Done” or whatever relevant comment. Seeing all the work planned out for me like this has helped motivate me to work systematically on all the tracks. Already I have a few cells marked “Done”. There’s so much to do, but hopefully I can keep this momentum going to finally fishing this bloody album that’s been hanging over my head since 2004. I make it sound like it is a curse, but it isn’t: there’s a lot of music in here that I’m very excited about. It just takes me forever to get it right and finish it.

Sometimes I feel like I’m just only hanging in there. Winter is tough for me, although I know it shouldn’t have to be so. I find the cold gnaws at your resolve, puts you in a state of agitation that opens the doors to a blackness so cruel and vile. It’s very hard to fight that malicious river of wrongness off, hard to maintain resolve… I falter and have moments of such negativity, only to later regret it and swear that I’ll never feel like that again. It gets pretty lonely here all day, and I miss the company of real people. But there aren’t many real people I vibe with and feel like I can be myself with, so it is not like I can just go down the pub and that’s that. Anyway, I’m trying and it’s up to me to kick my own arse into productivity. And in a month or so the weather will warm again and I’ll find peace in the warmth and beauty outside.

Thanks for reading.

I feel like I’m finally emerging from some sort of fuzzy nightmare. It has been nearly five months of attempted life in Brisbane and finding that it really wasn’t for me. There is a feeling of the fog clearing to a lovely blank canvass on which I can paint anything I want to. I feel a little wobbly, but excited for fresh beginnings in an old setting that I feel at home with and know how it works.

I start some part time casual work up at the university today, working back in the audio studio! I’ll be taking the role as ‘helper’ under the direction of Michael, who had the assistant job when I was there last year. So the roles are reversed! It should be an easy time to find my feet again in the university work environment. I’ll be keeping an ear out for any suitable permanent work that might come up. I’m also looking forward to approaching work with a little less stress than before, and try to maintain a good work-life balance. We’ll see.

I’ve only half set up my studio, which is a largish bedroom at the back of the house we’re staying at. I’ve already done a preliminary sine wave test of the bass response of the room and I’m happy to say the sweep is very smooth and maybe even the best response I’ve had in a room yet (although the room isn’t as big as I’d like). Anyway, I’ll be chipping away at it all over the next few weeks and I’ll post some photos soon. It even has a cat flap!

To other matters…

I don’t usually use this blog to do this sort of thing, but I’d like to write about the recent death of Type O Negative bassist Peter Steele. As some of you might know, Peter died on April 14th at the age of 48 years old. This loss comes with a sadness that I haven’t really felt for other dying artists, and we’re in the process of experiencing a sort of fan-grief. In a strange coincidence I was listening to their album Life Is Killing Me while driving on the 14th, wondering if the band were going to keep making music after all these years. And then he dies. Dying at 48 is just too young, but I guess I could speculate that the rock and roll lifestyle might not have helped. The irony is that Peter has recently become sober and was really making a productive turn around in his life. I read since they were gearing up to make another record, so the sense of loss is very real.

Type O Negative are one of those special highly influential bands for me – much of their music has had strong emotional potency for me over the years, particularly their World Coming Down album. I had an ‘ah-ha!’ moment with the title track of that album. One day I was working with my uncle in the western suburbs of Sydney in a gardening and lawn mowing business. Early one cool foggy morning we had to go to a house that had a lovely pool with a massive wall of ivory on the back side of the property. We had to trim the ivy into a respectable looking shape. I remember spending hours cutting that ivory in that eerie atmosphere by the calm pool water. I had recently bought World Coming Down and I had the quiet mid section of that song floating around in my head. The very sombre etherial mood, and the band’s deep green imagery, matched well being lost in all the deep green ivy. Those haunted atmospheres; the lyrics struggling against depression; Kenny’s sustained guitar lead; the Gregorian choir melodies; and of course Peter’s emotional and mournful singing, all together was just a sublime synchronicity of music and life’s dramas. I remember trying to re-create that mood many times by getting up very very early in the morning and playing the album on my headphones watching the magic unfold out of the morning’s gloaming. That song, and others liked it, helped me deal with the challenges I had in my own life, simply by knowing that someone else out there, someone respected, has those challenges too.

World Coming Down is a record that’s stood the test of time, and I still particularly love songs like White Slavery; Who Will Save The Sane?; the organ mid section in Creepy Green Light (or ANY of Josh’s epic cathedral organ sections); and the deathly end section to Everything Dies. On their other albums I really love many songs and sections, including the songs Love You To Death; Green Man; Red Water; Wolf Moon; Haunted; Unsuccessfully Coping with the Natural Beauty of Infidelity; Glass Walls of Limbo; I Don’t Wanna Be Me; IYDKMIGTHTKY (Gimme That); Anesthesia; and September Sun. If you haven’t checked this wonderful band out by now then no time like now. They’ve been a massive influence to my musical thinking over the years, and will continue to do so.

Goodbye Peter. Your song writing will be missed. Your truly amazing bass voice will be missed (I dare anyone to listen to Nettie and not get goosebumps in the intro). Your bass tone, in all its unique fuzz and power will be missed. Your wit and black sense of humor, sorely needed in a world of drab posing seriousness, will be missed. Your lyrical candor dealing with all matter of issues both social and personal will be missed. Your recent struggle for sobriety was inspirational and whatever new music was to come of that growth now is lost. The dream is dead. Everything dies. Thank you, may you rest in peace.

The stars move through the seasons
New constellations emerge from the north east horizon
Winter’s icy air and long nights
Give clarity and darkness to brilliant tract of dusty jewels
Spread out overhead in long freezing nights
We count the satellites and shooting stars
We rise in the early hours hoping to catch a meteor shower
Or the unbelievable tail of distant comet.

When we return to sleep
The stars appear on the back of our eyelids
They float and spiral in the blackness of our dreams
Sometimes we dream of daylight
And we see bright stars glistening against the blue sky
We see nebulae and galaxies floating with beautiful wrongness,
Overly large upon the perfectly blue sky
They beckon weirdly, silently, like the eyes of deities
We do not know why we are attracted
We do not understand the pull.

These odd feelings linger with us while we are awake
The images reappear in the corners of our vision, unexpected
They form again in our moments of imagination
They exist in the melting point of our memory,
Our dreaming, and our creativity.

Their signal is transmitted on the carrier wave of ordinary magic:
Quiet atmospheric music
Moments of calm silence
The echo of a forest
The song of rare birds, free in the wild
The long delicate language of wind through leaves
The murmur of the water sweeping by
The mothering of fog
The slow drama of clouds
The canvas of the desert.

We sometimes forget that the stars are there
Sometimes we spend so long with ceilings above our heads
That we do not remember how to look above.

Then, by accident we notice a point of light at night
And it holds us in silent reminder
It welcomes us back to the weird otherness we do not understand,
But absolutely know is real
We give ourselves and open wide
To receive this subtle transmission
We regain peace and focus
On ordinary magic.

You can stream the tracks for free, or if you’d like a higher quality download there is a payment system set up. Enjoy, and please share it with the world!

After much personal drama, both in my own head and with my partner R – we have decided strongly to give up on this whole Brisbane idea and move back to Armidale. More on why we came to this realisation later; but already R has an excellent job secured in her interest-area and I have been chasing work back at UNE. And, it looks like we have a rental lined up as well – a cat friendly RSPCA friend has offered an old house close to town. R’s job starts very, very soon and the rental may be available in much the same time – which means we could be negotiating a move back up that hill to New England quick smart! To sum up without the rambling, we’re both really happy about this and I’m looking forward to getting back to that lifestyle, and I am looking forward to getting back to a stable headspace to pick up my artistic projects again.

Even before the move to Brisbane I was becoming aware of a lost feeling between R and I, and a growing amount of undefined agitation. This sensation became even worse when we got here. I felt really confused and kept telling myself to ‘think positive of the situation’ and keep on with the Brisbane idea. I couldn’t easily get work as an audio technician and my free lance work was never going to pay for much. So I tried to get more training to broaden my professional options. I got the Certificate IV Workplace and Training Certificate successfully – but I needed more qualifications to actually be able to teaching something in the adult education sector. I had a real hard time getting some straight answers out of South Bank Institute of Technology about whether or not their Vocational Graduate Certificate in Adult Literacy and Numeracy Teaching course was the ‘right fit’ for me. A little bit frustrated and confused I though “bugger it” and enrolled in the course anyway, at an expense of $3000 upfront. Well, it turns out the expected study load and level of difficulty was a little beyond me at the moment, given that I’ve not studied at a formal academic level since 2003. But there were other things going wrong that added to my struggle…

I just couldn’t concentrate. I could feel myself gradually slipping into a bit of an emotional hole, fed by these factors- loosing confidence due to not being able to find a job, still confused why there was all this strain between R and I, and being in an odd lifestyle of city living that is still all rather new to me as a person who has always lived in modest regional towns. Out of this fragile zone came all the nasty black thoughts that had been sitting there in the background all along. Self doubt. Sadness. Weirdness. Emotional agony. Second guessing. And above all else in epic proportions: GUILT. I name this fucking mental disease for what it is: a latent pattern of thinking that has been so ingrained in me that it was only a matter of time before a vulnerable moment would appear and I would fall prey to it’s maddening illogical cycle. I’ve broken down to wailing tears and destructive anguish in the last few month more times than I have ever before. I would feel so guilty that I couldn’t even bare to think of working on music, let alone making the attempt and being filled with doom and uneasy terror.

There came a point somehow that I realised that, yes, I have a very real problem.

In fact, I had started realise that I was putting pressure on R to somehow fix this problem for me, or somehow help me escape to some fantasy where the problem didn’t appear to exist. It became plain as day that this was a poisonous way to think! I had started to make my happiness contingent on external things, when really my happiness is my own responsibility and my own to sort out by myself. All this made me think that really I’ve had this problem for a very long time, maybe even since I was a teenager. Periods of calm like the last 5 years in Armidale in a stable job and environment had only protected and coveted the problem from raising it’s ugly head. But it has been deeply driving me all along. Fuck it, I became so over breaking down and being an absolute muddle that it was time to do something about it. So I went to a GP, here at the local mall. Pretty quickly after assessment I was recommended to see a Mental Health Psychologist and receive formal assessment and a short program of therapy. The doctor also gave me a written certificate which I’ve used to add evidence to an application to South Bank Institute of Technology for a partial refund of the $3000 I paid to do this course. I’d like to get part of that money back and I’m withdrawing my enrollment. I’m not risking failure and wasting that money just because I’m not up for it in this time of my life. I’ve got bigger more important problems to work through.

I realise now that for at least the last 12 months I have been pushing, pushing R into joining me on this idea of living in Brisbane. And that pushing has come from me as a faulty way of me trying to avoid dealing with my own problems, without even knowing that I was doing that. I seriously thought, mistakenly thought, that moving here would make me happy, would sort out whatever vague tensions I had about my career or relationship, and would be delivered unto some sub-tropical bliss in a parade of cultural opportunity. How wrong was I! Brisbane is a crazy place! Sure there are some good things about this lifestyle, but it’s certainly not for us. I had a day of casual work up at Redcliffe TAFE and the hour long car commute through traffic completely set it in stone for me: people crawl like this every working day for years and happily call it ‘life’. Well, no thanks. I’d rather be back in a quite room in a quiet street working on my music. Ride my bike to work. No traffic stress. The feeling of community in Armidale is a very real thing, and traveling back there for visits has made me realise that I took it all for granted. I really regret pushing R so selfishly for so long, when all along she knew she didn’t want to be here. She grew up in Brisbane and is so totally over it. It’s crazy, I had to come here myself to get it out of my system, dive into the deep end and really appreciate what it’s like to get wet. Lesson learned I guess! I will never ever again put that much pressure on someone I love in the name of something so vague as a feeling that “I want to go there and I don’t know why”. Never again!

I’ve seen Porcupine Tree live and felt ‘not there’ even though I appreciated it as a great live gig. I saw Devin Townsend live and felt so absolutely terrible within myself that I hardly know whether or not it was a great gig or not. Time and drama passed. Then I saw Massive Attack at the Brisbane Riverstage and had an amazingly good time! Best gig I’ve been to in ages! Read the reviews. Brisbane can be such a cool city to visit for gigs. Just to visit. Not to live in.

I can hear some people saying “what about your music, won’t being in a city help you with a musical career?”. I now say, not so. Even if I were the most amazing creative album producer in Australia I think Brisbane isn’t really the right city to be doing this in – maybe Melbourne would be the place. But even then I don’t think city living is for me. And the reality of the situation is that I’m not ready for beginning that process proper. I don’t have an album ready, my performance skills aren’t sharp enough, and I haven’t worked up the confidence and tenacity for taking on the impossible task of gaining some tiny slice of success in the dwindling music industry. No. I’d rather be back in Armidale, working slowly on my projects, practicing and developing things, than being in any city slaving away pushing music that isn’t fully formed in an unconfident way to an audience that’s probably only mildly interested at best. I’d rather chip away steadily on my music and get it out there via the web to people all around the world who are truly interested. I can always play live at the Armidale Club if i want to develop my confidence. I can always take that show to a city if it ever gets that serious, just like other touring bands do. Having a wholesome lifestyle is much more important than ‘suffering for your art’ in some place you don’t want to be. Each to their own.

Hopefully I can get a job back at UNE in some sort of area that uses a cross between my technology skills and my desire to help educators in an ethical way. And hopefully I can eventually get something part time again so I can have ample spare time to work on music. I need a job. I need that regularity, otherwise I flounder around. I think it’s only a matter of time until something good turns up. I’ll even work casual in new areas just to get me from A-B. I’m really looking forward to being back in that humble, low key environment. Yeah, I moaned about some things about Armidale, the cold and gloom in particular; but really no place is perfect. I used to love all those aspects of Armidale! If you’re happy with who you are and what your lifestyle is, then I think you can live anywhere. Knowing what you want, specifically, is half the problem. I’ll be working hard on actively challenging my negative thoughts, these counterproductive ways of thinking. It’ll be a long slow process.

I’m winding up my mixing and mastering freelance work for good. I’m just not interested in it anymore and I’d rather be using that time on other things. However, I’m finishing off some cool work, including an awesome album project by Distaudio. I also finished mastering the latest Helvetikone EP Numerical Exercises, which has been released here. I may be helping local Australian acts in the future, and maybe some overseas friends. But no more open-door commercial work.

Which leads to another development: I’m in negotiating with taktik of the Renoise team about taking up a paid role to write an ongoing series of blog articles about audio and song production using Renoise. Some of you might remember Renoise In:Depth – this is where I’ll be writing from. I feel writing about production techniques in an open/public manner is a much more efficient way of helping people, rather than working with a select few who want me to do most the work for them. Writing is less time consuming than mastering, less monotonous than going over endless audio material doing very fiddly detailed work. This knowledge can be taught, people can adapt these ideas for their own – all that needs to be done is to put the knowledge into words within the Renoise context. Production advice is common on the internet, but there still isn’t a lot of quality material on how to use Renoise to do all this. Our little community will hopefully benefit from this. So, if you have any ideas about articles and things you’d like to see me write about, then please let me know. I’m aiming to start publishing by the end of April, after the move is all done.

There’s probably much more to say, but that’ll do for now. Thanks so much for your interest and support.

Edit: Trying out this:

• Photostream

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To start things off I’ve added my 2008 album 3 Smargaid Maerd. So far I’m impressed with what this system has to offer and I’m thinking of using it as my main way of sharing and distributing my music from now on. My existing mp3s and media will still remain on this server to retain linkage, but anything new from now on will be Bandcamp only. I’ll be adding more to it when I can, so I’ll let you all know when I do.