Overkill for Overkill

I have a tendency to overdo it when I'm working on a project and the intro I made for TESD:Overkill was no exception. For what was originally expected to be a twenty to thirty second intro clip I ended up creating over 20 minutes worth of music in various stages of production. A fair amount would consist of unrealized thoughts and ideas but nearly all of it is something I'll end up using eventually. Here is a sample from that 20 minutes of a near-completed intro that was created as a contingency just in case. File this away under the heading of "could have been."

Unused Overkill Sample Intro by Remedial M-Theory

Overkill Baby

Been quiet for a while but I've been real busy. You can check out my latest intro music on TESD:OVERKILL. The Tell 'Em Steve-Dave boys tackle the dark side X-files style... not so much in episode one, but that first ep is still mighty entertaining.

Thursday Morning

A little something new I'm working on, still trying to nail down all the sounds, but I imagine it won't deviate too far from the instruments you hear in this version (two pianos and a cello) but this one has at least a little more in it before it's done. I'm thinking it will double or triple in length before all is said and done... not everything I do is under a minute. Apologies for the weak-ass stinger on the end, I found that it was slightly better then having nothing in it's place, but that particular bit is indeed temporary.

Thursday Morning by Remedial M-Theory

Wow... more rain.

Rainy Sunday is a new ringtone-length track I put together this morning because I needed pick me up from all the gray outside. Thought I was going to get a lot of music done this week but here it is Sunday and I have nothing new. Except for this, that is... don't know if this counts or not.

Happy Fathers Day

RT - Rainy Sunday by Remedial M-Theory

Take THAT Snowball & Napoleon

Sat down at the computer tonight after getting the kids to bed with every intention of working up some new content for the site and I just looked up and realized it was past my bedtime and I hadn't done much more than Angry Birds... I hate those pigs. I like to play that game after reading Animal Farm, I get extra motivated... "Four legs good," my ass.

But in the interest of posting something new I offer a ringtone I made a couple of months ago. When I do ringtones I try to tailor them specifically to the person I make it for but this one wasn't because I didn't really make it for any one person in particular. Just something I did to fill time perhaps, I can't quite remember.

RT - m01 (ringtone) by Remedial M-Theory

Brought an Oboe to a Gun Fight

None of the music I write for myself has a deadline and I'm not one of those people who can fool themselves into thinking they have a deadline when they really don't. Whats the point? For the most part I'm under no pressure to get anything done at all. To counter this from time to time I enter a music competition just to put some heat on.

Every now and again I do get the pseudo-composer version of writers block and have found that if I enter a remix contest, the deadline gets me motivated. I get something done which comes with the obligatory sense of accomplishing something but as a byproduct, most of the time I get several ideas for projects of my own.

Sometimes I enter a contest because I have nothing else to do. Case in point, the Bleed Electric contest at Acid Planet. They offered the song Birds as High as Planes for remixing. The original was described as "An interesting track; think Electroclash meets Public Enemy via Kanye..." You get the idea. Bottom line, I didn't care for it. This was back in spring 2009 and I was way past auto tuned vocals besides all the other things I didn't really like about the track.

I wasn't going to enter but I started to listening to the other mixes and heard 20 different offerings that included sounds of breaking glass and sirens. The song is about a hold up gone bad, the cops are coming, they don't want to go to jail, blah blah blah. I got a little worked up because all those other mixes pissed me off.

I brought out my big guns for this wannabe gangsta sorta rap - xylophone, cello, orchestral strings, and of course... an oboe. O hell yes. Just to be as different from everyone else as I could. And I did it all because at the time I literally had nothing better to do.

Not that it matters. In the end, no one really cares but me. Of course I didn't win but I do like how it all turned out, and it gave me a ton of ideas. And for the record, no I don't like how everything I do turns out.

With nothing else to blah about this one, here's my Birds as High as Planes (Caged Mix) from June 2009.

The Blur

It might have been that I was sleep deprived or that I'd skipped breakfast. Maybe it was that the gas was cranked up too high or an odd combination of any or all of those things but yesterday at the dentist I was flat out blazed on the nitrous.

I remember thinking that the ceiling was boring. This was disappointing. Later I could vividly make out little imperfections and discolorations in the ceiling tiles. Then it was fascinating. Later still I decided that of all the rooms at this dentist office where I have stared at the ceiling this was my least favorite and I should ask not to be put in this room again.

I had a vision of myself as a rocking horse. I remember thinking that there was a lot of gray in the arm hairs of the dentist. There were also a few moments where I could empathize with those big cats on nature shows that have been anesthetized and have those big glassy eyes, mouth hanging open, drooling while the vets poke and prod...

The rest of the time was split between complete blur and what I can only describe as hyper clarity. I did have one thought that was music related... my dentist needs entrance music. I started crafting in my brain on the drive, went right to work when I got home. I might make a few changes in the next day or two as I tend to do.

Beat DT-005 ver 5 by Remedial M-Theory

More Remixing

Just posted an early draft of a remix of a song called Yellow by Sarah Fimm. Switched out all the instrumentals, sped it up a little, added some reverb and other mild effects to the vocals... It's a departure from what I normally do, I tend to avoid the down tempo electronic sound but there is something about this song that wouldn't let me ignore the possibilities of going even more sparse and minimal than the original.

Gone Kaput

Today I have another short subject that first saw the light of day as a full length track back in September of 2009. Yes, more old crap. That's how it is. I really am working on some new music and I'll try to get some of it up as soon as it isn't completely offensive to the eardrums. It will also help if it ever stops raining. I can't even believe there's any rain left... It's as if it's all part of some sort of continuous cycle...

Gone Kaput by Remedial M-Theory

This was originally from a remix I did for a contest a while back, a mix I was ultimately very unsatisfied with. I was fighting with all sorts of issues with distortion... some that I was purposely adding to vocals and guitars vs some compression, EQ, and software issues that made the whole thing sound much shittier than I would have liked.

I've cleaned this up a little bit, slowed it down some, switched out the guitar cabs and adjusted all of the levels. The reason I don't post the full track is that without the lyrics (which I don't really care for) it gets a little repetitive... yeah sorry, it doesn't get any better than this.

One thing I tried to do when I made this originally was fuse my rock influences with some of the musical styles and techniques I've been introduced to in the last few years. On that level I'm happy with how this one turned out.

I'd like to say thanks to all the folks who've checked out my site thanks to Tell Em Steve Dave. I appreciate you taking the time to look and listen. Feel free to stop by and give me shit any time.

Yellowed

Unreleased 2009

No story today, no insight, and almost no blah at all. Just this piece of something or other from a year and a half ago that I'm still trying to decide whether or not it needs something more.

Yellowed by Remedial M-Theory