Key Of Grey

August 29th, 2010 - Way back when first started this site in 2008, I talked briefly about how video games like Guitar Hero or Rockband, might inspire a whole new generation of musicians. Well I just wanted to share that I met one. Today, I recorded a demo for a young man who is going to give Dave Mustaine (of Megadeth) a CD this Friday. He started playing Guitar Hero, mastered all the songs on Expert Mode, which got him interested in learning ... Read More

August 26th, 2010 - I'm working on a track for my brother's upcoming album, and while I was working with the drum part, I thought of a tip that might help some of you out. In situations where we cannot record live drums (definitely the case for a lot of us home studio guys), it's pretty easy to pull up a great sounding drum plugin. Many producers I know use Addictive, BFD, or Superior drums, and I'm also partial to the Steve Slate ... Read More

August 20th, 2010 - Lately I've been working on fixing an old Powerbook. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it, but I'm thinking that it might be cool to build it into a dedicated live rig. I remember when I got it and installed Logic for the first time. I was super excited to try out my new production rig. Imagine my disappointment when within the first 5 minutes I experienced a core audio overload; my shiny new (at ... Read More

August 12, 2010 - Have you ever seen the send fader (usually it's a rotary pot) and wondered what it was for? Why send the signal somewhere else for effects? After all, in DAWs, you can insert an effect directly on the channel strip without having to send the signal elsewhere. You can think of a send like running parallel processing. While inserting an effect directly on a channel strip sends the signal in a linear flow (audio > effect > out), ... Read More

Photo courtesy of John Bell August 9th, 2010 - Thanks to DigitalLush for the question. As always, please feel free to email me questions and I will do my best to answer them. Stumbled upon your site the other day and have been checking back reading different articles of interest. I came across one you had written on mixing. So here's a question that I don't know if it was covered indirectly, but I'm still curious about: When mixing for live performance or ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Dan Machold August 6th, 2010 - I love TED presentations; I could waste all day watching them (and have). The talk below by Matt Ridley is about "idea sex". While the sexification of the subject matter is a little iffy, I do agree with collaboration being a key factor in our personal evolution. For musician/songwriter/producers, collaboration is an important part of expanding your own abilities. This may seem like an oxymoron, but working with someone else who has different skills and ... Read More

June 22nd, 2010 - Okay, it seems a little weird to be editorializing on a game but Harmonix's Rockband series is something different. Introducing what Konami did 10 years ago with the Guitar/Drum/Keyboard Mania series, to an American audience at the right time allowed Harmonix to tap into a video game market that isn't just for kids anymore. A decade ago, only children and hardcore gamers played video games. But contemporary consoles like the Wii and games tailored to subjects suitable for families ... Read More

May 18th, 2010 - A while back, I posted about an online music discovery tool. One of the artists I got as a recommendation when I typed in Nujabes, was Nomak. At the time, I enjoyed the music that I was able to get my hands on, but I felt that he was too similar to Nujabes. Downtempo, jazzy, hip hop is not a new thing, and I think that there were probably many artists in Japan who were producing it, but it ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Mourner May 11th, 2010 - Today I was able to meet up with David Chick of the "Inside Home Recording" podcast (Hi David!). One of the things we talked about was how to get a music job for film. He told me that one of the questions he gets asked a lot, is how to get film composing gigs. David's advice is to just get out there and do it, even if you have to work for free for the ... Read More

Photo courtesy of Joe Moore May 3rd, 2010 - Today I thought I'd talk a bit about producing vocals. Vocals are a pretty complex topic, and whole books could be written on recording, arranging, and producing them properly so I thought I'd stick to a pretty straightforward technique that many don't think about: doubling vocals. When many record vocals for the first time and begin applying the principles of active listening, they'll record the main vocal line, and add harmonies. If they're really paying ... Read More