Holy hell, who woulda thought? I actually finished the mix I started around this time last year (and abandoned three months later). I lost the Cool Edit Pro source files in a virus-induced reformat a few months back, but luckily had cut a wav of the rough draft shortly before I abandoned it. Technically, this mix isn’t quite up to the standards I’d like it to be. There are a few transition and volume issues, but all the songs I want are in there, and in the order I want them to be. It’s my first effort at this type of thing though…I’m content. I feel like there’s a lot of me in this mix despite that it’s not original music. If you can get through the whole thing, many, many thanks.

I’ve resolved to move in a specific direction with my music, and this mixtape marks the beginning of that. I’d like to focus on writing underground/indie hip-hop lyrics. I just recently got my C-drive files from the reformat back, and along with the mix files I found some old lyrics. If I might say so, they’re pretty good. Also, I’ve been inspired by a recent rediscovery of Aesop Rock. I am no good at making beats, but perhaps that’ll be something to work towards. I’m sure you’ve noticed that I’m using a new pseudonym for my hip-hop stuff- I really like it! Fitting, I think. I’m still going to use Seraphim Mecha for my random electronica junk.

It’s really beyond me why I never uploaded Wheel into this blog. It probably should have gone up with Letterbox Landscape all those months back. So far, this is the only song I’ve abandoned for a long time (about a year?) and actually come back to. It was just such a gawdamn pain to work with- I wrote the whole thing in 1/32 triplets at 45bpm, four-four. Listening to it, you never would’ve guessed. The notes in the middle that sounds like triplets are actually just regular 32nd notes. Honestly, what the hell was I thinking? It was just too pretty not to finish.

Despite the awkward authoring method, I think the track came out well. Okay, the percussion and bass lines are abysmal, but they aren’t the point- I wanted to write a piano piece. Maybe I’ll go back someday and add good drums, an engaging bassline, and chord up the piano lines. Maybe. First I’m going to take some good advice and finish up my mix. Heck, it was damn near done when I abandoned it. A few fixed transitions, some volume normalization and there I go. I spent way too much time on it, and it is way too good to stew anonymously in My Documents. Will be up soon. Yeah, right.

Okay, this isn’t actually a song…more like an exercise. Frankly, I wanted to see how easy it would be to write a bleep-bloop song in 7 with good percussion work. It is incomplete in that I don’t feel like working on it anymore, so I suppose it’s as finished as it’s going to be. Maybe I should make a new category: abandoned. Seems if I don’t finish a song/creative thing in under 2 days, I never will (see also, my first mix and second ambient song, both of which coulda been hella dope). Anyway, I digress. I wanted to find realistic bass and drum sounds and throw some goofy shit on top of them. In that endeavor I think I have succeeded for the most part. It’s a stretch to find realistic-sounding instruments when working with a stock sampler and synth pack. Perhaps I should look beyond Reason…or perhaps I should just find a good pack of drum and instrument samples. I’d like to get into more musical music, that is, music with technical substance. I like traditional Theory, but I’d really like to break Theory and make something original that reflects me. Maybe I’d like to compose a whole collection of pieces along the same lines and compile an album that doesn’t sound like a mix of ripped-off genre samples, which is pretty much what I’ve got going now. Maybe I’d like to add some vocals? More digression! This track is more or less a baby step in that explorative direction…just seeing what I have to work with. I suppose there was a distant influence of Live Human in this little guy. I could emulate a whole lot worse, I suppose.

I didn’t especially feel like making a song today, but I thought I should since I had lots of free time in the complete absence of schoolwork. I’d rather be writing uninspired music than term papers any day. Well, most days at least. This isn’t particularly what I expected to happen, but so it goes! A very sweet, soft and short little guitar piece, dedicated to wee Miss Annie. One track, one piano roll, one nylon-string guitar sample- tha’s it.

I’ve been playing a lot of harmonica recently. Seems every time I take a break from playing, I come back a helluva lot better than when I left off. Negative plateau effect? Whatevs. I got the absolute sweetest effect last night but I can’t for the life of me recreate it. I got the note to bend way the hell down like in Spokey Dokey. Of course, I was rather drunk and in a cowboy way, so it makes sense I was seeing some harmonica muse action.

Hopefully more Reason tunes now that school is deflating. I’ve been listening to a lot of hip-hop, jazz and Motown recently (I got blackity what), so I’ve been inspired a bit. Maybe look into investing in a good mic so I can lay down some harmonica. We shall see.

OLD (worse) VERSION: Seraphim Mecha - Sara’s Theme

Nope, I ain’t even gunna lie. I was missing Miss Sara last night, and I got inspired to write a song. That’s pretty unusual for me- being so particularly inspired. Usually I just catch a creative bug, open up Reason and see what happens. In this case, I knew exactly what I wanted before I touched bar one. I knew I wanted something curious, thoughtful, sad but still hopeful and a bit mischevous. The accordion wasn’t in my original plan though, heh. I think this is my most emotional song- especially as far as computer generated bloops go. I don’t know if it really captures Sara, though. I don’t especially want to talk about that. The song is short and pretty simple, and I don’t really know about writing themes, but I like it. Hope you might too!

EDIT:

I rewrote the second verse entirely!

Gaskin Ave. - Shaman

Gaskin Ave. - Follow Me

Gaskin Ave. - Adam’s Song (Cover)

There was a time when I was part of a pop band. The members lived all over Ohio, but we met, formed and played at an annual summer conference at Kenyon College, which most of us had been attending for many years. We named the band after a street that intersects the main strip of the campus, Gaskin Avenue. We were together making music for a combined total of two weeks, which included a short confab in Cincinnati. In that time we managed to bang out 9 completed songs and a bunch of unfinished dicking-arounds. At the Kenyon conference two years after we formed, there was mad drama between two of the members (the vocalist and the lead guitarist) and we broke up. All but the vocalist reformed as Moon Jumper (named for a pair of pajama pants), a band which never ended up going anywhere.

In the 2 weeks Gaskin Ave. played together, we had an intensely fluid and productive chemistry. I think the songs are really good. That is, if they were performed by real musicians with actual talent, they would be phenomenal. As is they’re kind of crappy, but I still like ‘em. The posted four songs are my favorites of the nine. I didn’t do the bongos on this version of Adam’s Song, ’cause we had to lay the drum track seperate and we were in a rush. My bongoin’ was better than this version though. ;^)

No, I’m not posting the song on which I rap.

Gaskin Ave. credits:
Ben Clemons - Vocals, rhythm guitar
Andy Smith - Lead guitar
Ware Carlton-Ford - Bass
Colin Grover - Percussion, synth

Tracks recorded on a Zoom digi 8-track in Ware’s living room- please excuse the shit quality.

Check his stuff out!!

I don’t care who the fuck you are, this is dope. I wonder if anyone’s ever written a harpsichord/standup bass duet before. I’m sure someone has, but I KNOW they haven’t put an ultra-technical underground hip-hop beat on it. You don’t get to hear that yet. Suffice to say, I’m really happy with the progress of this so far. I’ve never studied (and remembered) chord theory, and I have very, very little knowlege of Baroque harpsichord. I think it came out okay though. I should have the full, finished version in a few days, and I promise I’ll get that damnable mix done. It’s good too, no really it is. It’s no DJ Spooky, but then again, I’m just a kid with pirated software, too much free time and a dream.

…a dream of enslaving the marmots.

Okay, this deserves some explaining. I’m tired of 8-bar patterns. At least for now. Yeah, this is the whole song, and yeah, I actually like it. I don’t know that there’s much else to say, really.

I’m going to finish the other Ambient song soon. I figure I just need to get a little umph into it. Then, on to something different. I feel like everything since Airlock has failed to live up to that standard of song. They can’t all be winners, but I’m going to try to make an enjoyable, well-crafted song next…so it may be a few days. I don’t want to get burnt out on crap- that doesn’t benefit anyone.

This is my favorite piece of music to come out of my computer. I was on some serious Blue Man Group and Four Tet binges at the time, and both influences are quite difficult to miss herein. Hell, just look at the title. Posting up here ’cause I can, and just in case someone missed it. Yeah, I know the percussion work sucks and sounds utterly drum machine. Deal. I would like to make more music like this, but with less of a synthesized sound. I think my more recent shit has been pulling away from the so obviously pad-lead analog influence, which is cool. On the other hand, that makes it a lot harder to sound good. This song is more in that vein, but that doesn’t change the fact that it sounds really dirtycool (IMHOLOLWTFBBQ). I mean come on. You LOVE the old school printer.

I’m working on a song for Sara. I have very mixed feelings about it right now. It is way, way too god-damned ambient. It has serious potential, but it’s not there yet. Hmm.