Thursday, 11 June 2009

Warp 20 'Elemental' Mix.


Warp Records have announced the release of their "Warp 20" boxset, a deluxe special-edition of music and art. As a long time fan of the label I'm incredibly excited by the prospect of a box set that includes so many goodies (check out Warp.net for all the details), but as this is the osymyso blog I'd like to draw your attention to the 'Elemental' album included in the box. This is a 66 minute mix created by yours truly that includes as much music from the label's two decades as I felt comfortable cramming in to an hour. I'm personally really happy with the mix, even more so now I've seen how Warp are releasing it. All the details you need to know can be found on the Warp site.

Thursday, 4 June 2009

Week something


So, to follow on from the last post where I revealed my crippling perfectionist tendencies I'd like to add another reason for delays in my album getting finished and that is the mysterious world of pointlessly self-imposed rules. 

I have a set of unwritten rules that I've been following for as long as I can remember. It's a code of conduct that I've always adhered to and yet very rarely questioned properly. It's become clear to me recently that these rules I work to are not only very restrictive but also pretty stupid. So, I've tried to identify these rules and I've been wondering if they're actually the main reason progress has been so slow.

Let me give you some examples; 

1-Don't use big samples of well known songs on you're album.
2-The majority of your album should be made up from melodies you wrote, beats you constructed using as many real instruments and vocals as possible.
3-Never use the same sound twice.
4-Aim to make music that has a good 'song structure' (whatever that means)
5-No rough edges, the production should always be perfect.

There are more but you should get the point from those examples.

Now when I think about the things I've done that have been successful it's seems pretty clear that they didn't follow any of the rules I follow when trying to write an album. When I freely sample anything I want to and ignore any traditional song structures I come up with some pretty good stuff and yet I still straight jacket myself with unhelpful rules. 

One area I have a problem with is the idea of making a track that is mostly made up from one big sample, a technique taken to the extreme by Daft Punk (here's an example) and Girl Talk, not to forget it's the reason Norman Cook is a multi-millionaire. It's not that I don't like sample based music, when it's done well I absolutely love it, no it's more to do with my own desire to prove to people I can do more than just cut and paste bits of old records. I suppose all those opinionated muso types telling me I'm not a real musician got to me. It's ludicrous when you think about it because I've essentially turned my back on the one thing I'm really good at. So, I've decided it's now OK to make tracks that use big chunks of other tracks as the basis. Everyone else is shamelessly using other people music as the foundation for a new ideas and I'm not going to beat myself up about this anymore. It's still creative, it's still art and it's what I do best.

Another thing that slows me down is my insistence on creating so many of the elements myself. Spending hours to create a new hi-hat sound that most people just won't notice. I've come to realise that it's not worth the effort, yet again I can look back to my own music from the past that people liked as proof that when I don't stick to my own daft rules I can still come up with something people can enjoy. My best work was made quickly and without thinking too much so from now on it will be OK to use a hi-hat sound or a bass noise more than once if it speeds up the process. No one will notice or care.

I could go on but you probably get the point here. I'm over-complicating matters by inventing rules for myself that are proven to be unhelpful. I've needlessly ventured down many creative dead end because of my desire to prove my impressive musicianship only to realise people don't expect me to be a Jazz master, they just want some good and honest cut and paste nonsense. Now that the penny has finally dropped for me I feel free to create and the ideas are pouring out of me. So yes, the album is still in production and will be finished...erm...soon.

Thursday, 21 May 2009

21 weeks of Groundhog Day


My life is like Bill Murray's in Groundhog Day but without the ice-sculptures and Andie MacDowell. Every week that passes has a remarkable similarity to the one that preceded it. I feel like I'm stuck in some never ending tortuous loop and no matter how hard I try to break the cycle I end up here, 7 days later typing the same old rubbish into my blog that I've been typing for the past 20 weeks. I've put some thought into why this is the case and I've reached some pretty convincing conclusions which I find deeply interesting. Fortunately for you, I'm prepared to keep the tepid ocean of psycho-babble inside my own confused mind for now. I don't see any reason to add any more self-obsessed cod-psychology to the huge mountain of drivel that makes up 99% of blogs out there. I can condense months of muddle-headed thinking into one simple concept; I'm a perfectionist. I know people throw that notion around a lot and it's used to describe people who are simply very thorough but believe me, I'm tortured by my own perfectionism, it cripples me. It's the number one reason why I'm not prolific, most of my work ends up getting deleted. It's seriously doing my head in now and I refuse to be beaten by something so stupid. So, despite there being some delays brought on by this problem I haven't lost hope, OK so things haven't gone exactly to plan but as ever I'll cut my losses and carry on regardless.  If there is anyone still out there reading this, just hold on, I'm getting there.

Thursday, 14 May 2009

20th Week

I'm very close to having an album now, I could probably put an album out next week but I've had some ideas this week regarding a couple of collaborative efforts that I'd like to use for this release. Not sure if I'll be able to do them yet but if I can get them recorded in the next couple of weeks it'll be worth the wait, well for me at least. I'm getting very frustrated at how slow things are happening and I'm going to have to learn how to churn music out like Guillermo Scott Herren or Johann Sebastian Bach. Once I've got an album out I'm planning to do a load of mindless cut and paste monstrosities and a couple of 'mix-tape' style mixes. That should speed things up a bit. OK, sorry for the repetitive and dull blog, I might just quit this weekly nonsense until my life becomes interesting on a
weekly basis. 

Thursday, 7 May 2009

Week 19-one week closer.

Yeah, not much to report. I'm one week closer to finishing this album though. I think I'll meet the deadline I set myself unless something unexpected happens between now and the end of the month. I've got loads of other ideas I want to explore so as soon as I've finished Bunkerbusterwaldernuts I'll get cracking on them straight away. I see my 'work' as falling into two categories, the straight forward cut-up, mash-up, plunderphonic stuff and the original composition type music, the album is more of the latter and some of the ideas I have lined up are more of the former. I think people prefer it when I make the mash-ups, I'm probably better at that sort of thing but I'm also keen to make new music that's got little or no samples in so I guess people will have to pick through my releases for the bits they like or hopefully they'll like all of it which would be the desired result. Anyway, I'm sick of all this speculative drivel, I need to launch some new musics into the atmosphere for your ears to suck in. Almost there...

Wednesday, 29 April 2009

Week 18-Follow the Legs

This week I have the honour to present to you a track from the forthcoming album Bunkerbusterwaldernuts and not only that, it's accompanied by a video that's been animated by the incredibly talented Rafianimates. I have nothing more to say right now, let the video do the talking, or should I say walking?


Wednesday, 22 April 2009

The 17 week.

I love PRS statements, how else would I know that a little known track I'd written called Bebabee had been played on a Hungarian radio station? It's great to receive a royalty statement not only because some money appears in my bank account but also because it's physical evidence that my music is still being played on the radio now and then. Since I've stopped DJing it can feel like the outside world has forgotten about me. I never really interact with real people anymore so how else would I know if people still want osymyso or if they've just moved on to the next stupid thing? Anyway, the point is this, I sometimes feel like my career is dead in the water and this week I had a reminder that it's not the case. OK, things have been pretty slow round here the past couple of years but it isn't a sign that the end is near it's just a hiatus that's now coming to an end. I strongly believe that I still have my best work ahead of me and that I'm also about to be more prolific than I've ever been. I'm happy to say that I'm bursting with ideas and I'm dying to get them out of my head and into your ears.

Mind you, having said that, this blog is still just me saying I'm going to do things instead of me actually uploading mixes and tunes but just hold on there for a few more weeks cos I've got some new tunes and not just any old new tunes these are brand new old tunes that I've made completely new, just for you, prepare yourself for the Bunkerbusterwaldernuts!