A strange day. I'm making good progress on the album, very keen to get it complete, not worry about details or quality too much. The key thing is to stick to the original vision, there are no right or wrong songs; no writing is right or wrong, so that must be raced though BUT there can be a right and wrong mix and master, those are skills not arts. Overthinking can sometimes produce good results, but is often less efficient than moving on quickly and simply making something new in future, should a new idea or option present itself.
I must remember to push onwards and avoid being tied by the tar-trap of perfectionism. It something will do, it will do, but there are always exceptions and complexities to this rule! It seems that as I become more skilled, I want better and better results, but 'quality' is so subjective. I find at times that I can get better results by not trying to get better results.
Today I did a little more work on 'Daytime Teevee', paring back the complexity, and deciding to largely stick with what was there with the first version. Then, a similar change to the last track, 'Walls (And How To Hit Them)'; which now includes parentheses! I always imagined a megaphone-like voice speaking here, so today added that and discarded the other harmonies that were there. The album so far, with it's 12 tracks and 38 minutes, is complete, though I may add more if there needs to be more structural unity. This takes listening back - ah! This process, this proofing, is that very tar-trap!
The title will be 'Another Violet Night', which was my original title idea, no need to think more on it. I need to finish and move on quickly.
I also started work on a new EP, though I plan on moving to painting as soon as I can. This was inspired by the recent wars. Step 1 is a new version of the Radioactive theme, 'Radiation'. It sounds like a new mix, but actually it's a total re-creation, moving instrument by instrument, effect by effect to duplicate the Noise Station 1 sequence in Prometheus. It's amazing how the algorithms are theoretically the same, saw waves, filters and other code that is so similar, yet, the result is really different. There's no way I can duplicate the Noise Station original, though, of course, it sounds close. One of the hardest things to match was the high-pitched darting notes that zip up and down the frequency range. It's saw-saw-pulse combination fed though a flange, then peaking filter modulated by a sine wave, but even though the filter should be the same, the way it processes the parameters is very slightly different, so it sounded different.
The biggest problem with the Noise Station version is the overpowering bass, but it's not at all bad, it's one of my best sounding sequences from that era. I've turned the bass down by 25% and will include this version on the album too. The new version isn't intended to be identical, I've limited the bass, and changed that peaking sound a little, used more of a hollow-phaser type effect (with negative feedback on the flange), and added more stereo to the instruments. Overall, it sounds similar but cleaner, particularly with the fizzy high-frequencies which are a bit ear-jangling in their distortion.
I'll also include 'Written On Rice' here. This song is a bit sleepy and boring in pace, so I need to work on it. I can't and won't spend long. Onwards!
