Archive for the Featuring Trudi McBoody category
Grant
October 7, 2017
Totally Fictional #5
Seven tracks inspired by the Cassini mission this week, various takes on the space theme; some serious, some wimsical.
Grant
October 1, 2017
Totally Fictional #4
Five tracks made over one week plus one from earlier in the year, all very synth and beat heavy. Two are jams; I am experimenting with ways to build up a live set.
Grant
September 13, 2017
Totally Fictional #3
It’s been a while but I finally got around to making another radio episode for Mixcloud.
It’s a concept that I’ve been developing as another way to showcase my tunes and as a fun way to indulge myself in a little fantasy; so I have the lovely but totally fictional Trudi Mcboody run her own radio show.
The previous episodes had tunes all made in one week but since it’s been a year between shows I’ve included tracks made from September 2015 to June this year.
I hope you enjoy it.
Grant
August 26, 2016
Day 364: Friday 26 August 2016
Under A Stone:
Only one more post and my Year Of Posting will be complete.
Today I have a Soundscape for you. Chaotic rhythms, voices, and eventually an ambient scene chase each other across the landscape in a six part tango.
iDensity is the star here, I loaded my own files into all six streams but I used an existing preset from Red Sky Lullaby which I adjusted as needed. The whole thing was jammed three times into AudioShare; this is the third jam (it got more and more defined as I went).
Tracks like this illustrate the need to work regularly and often as it takes advantage of multple tracks from multiple days over months. At least two of the files have already been used in previous tracks but I have no issue with introducing the same sounds etc to new contexts. Helper apps today include: iMPC Pro, ApeFilter, Dedalus, ApeDelay, Auria, Xynthesizr, TwistedWave, AUFX:Dub, AUFX:Space, Patterning, and FLUX:FX.
Grant
August 25, 2016
Day 363: Thursday 25 August 2016
Wandering Womb:
Another Gadget excursion featuring many of my own samples via Bilbao, today also featuring the vocal stylings of the inimitable Trudi McBoody.
Trudi as usual brought to you be iSpeech TTS and TwistedWave. Batteries not included.
Grant
August 21, 2016
Day 359: Sunday 21 August 2016
It”s Moments Like These:
Of Bilbao and Abu Dhabi in Gadget, how I love thee.
Special thanks to Trudi for a last minute performance 😉
Grant
August 14, 2016
Day 352: Sunday 14 August 2016
Silent Sound – featuring Trudi McBoody:
Another Gadget foray into the land of beats and bass, this time with a little spoken word thrown in thanks to the ever fictional Trudi McBoody.
Most sounds were made in Gadget, though today I used iFretless Bass as a midi controller to record the second bass line. I added a little AUFX:Dub in AudioShare before I decided to try that second bass, so I exported just that track and used Auria to mix the two parts together.
Then I felt it needed some words so I called in Trudi. In the form of iSpeech TTS and TwistedWave.
Grant
May 28, 2016
Day 274: Saturday 28 May 2016
When?:
An Ambient piece today, long and slow and gentle. Must be the hangover speaking.
Mainly Shoom but with a little DM2 and a little Trudi spoken word (iSpeech TTS, AltiSpace, TwistedWave). Also some help from Auria, AudioShare, Caramel, Crystalline, DubFilter, and ApeDelay.
I particularly recommend the Shoom, DubFilter, ApeDelay, Crystalline combination. It sure is a thing of beauty.
Peace Out trackers, I hope that you enjoy your saturday.
Grant
May 13, 2016
Day 259: Friday 13 May 2016
He Wept:
iMaschine 2 and Alchemy provided the raw materials for today, combined in Auria, shaken then stirred, effected with FLUX:FX, and flavoured with a little Addictive Synth and a little Trudi (iSpeech TTS, AudioShare, TwistedWave).
Peace Out Tracklings.
Grant
May 10, 2016
Day 256: Tuesday 10 May 2016
Trudi Muses #1 (Clementine):
Today is a bit of an experiment for me in a couple of ways.
Firstly I began by playing with Blocs Wave which I bought as soon as it came out but had never gotten around to using before, in fact I could’t even remember what sort of app it was so I began by watching a few vids before I plunged in.
If you don’t know; Blocs Wave is a looper app by Novation who also brought us LaunchPad which I have used a few times in this blog. Now I’m not really a huge user of looper apps like these, especially using the inbuilt loops or the in-app-purchase sound packs, mainly because it’s hard to feel something is yours if it’s made up exclusively of other peoples loops. I do it from time to time though. Both LaunchPad and Blocs Wave allow you to import your own loops into them and Blocs Wave allows you to record as you are playing, and that is where they both get very interesting to me. But for today, as I had my first feel around with the app, I did use the built in loops, and I must say I had a ball. I love the way this app works and I can imagine many ways of using it in the future.
I loaded loops at random until I got a combination that I liked then recorded a jam into AudioShare with Dedalus and FLUX:FX in the effects chain. Then I started from scratch and did it again. Next, and this was really to assuage my guilt about using pre-made loops and to make it sound a little more like me, I put them into TwistedWave and slowed them by 80%.
Now I had two loops with the same key and BPM but with different feels because of the different drum and percussion loops used, so I decided to load then into Auria and see if they made sense together (I suspected that they would). I arranged them by going backwards and forwards between them as I felt fit, and though I liked the results I felt there was more lurking within this track.
The next step was to include a simple beat from Patterning to tie everything together.
The final element I added was the words and this is where the second experiment came in.
If you are a regular ‘Tracker’ you will know that when I add words I sometimes speak or ‘sing’ them myself and I sometimes use the Female UK English voice in iSpeech TTS. In fact I’ve used her so much that I call her Trudi and have developed a character and ongoing back story for her. Well she put in an appearance today but instead of reading a lyric or poem I gave her part of a musing that I have been writing, a little autobiographical rambling on my childhood and road to music making. I wasn’t sure if this would work, and though I’ve had it mind for a while I’ve kept putting it off, but today was the day.
Anyway I’m really happy with the results and I hope that you enjoy.