11/07/1999:
I've been playing around with a program that came with my SBLive! called Creative Rhythmania lately. (Note: Creative Labs seems to have abandoned this program and little, if any, add-ons or information is available about it. If you get Creative Labs to tell you anything about Rhytmania, please let me know.) It's a piece of software that let's you make MIDI accompaniments easily (kinda like Band in a Box). It has a chord "sequencer", different "patterns" in many different musical styles to choose from, and allows you to set up a virtual soundstage with bass, drums, a solo instrument and 2 backing instruments. All you do is choose a pattern from about 100 different musical styles, layout the chord progression, choose the instruments, etc. Another cool feature is what's called "section". You can label parts of the song as "intro", "normal", "break 1", "break 2", "variation", or "end". This adds variety to the accompaniment parts - some of the different song sections have dramatic differences in the parts played by the various instruments. A couple of the songs on this page were made using Creative Rhythmania.
GOOD NEWS! You CAN actually record on a PC without having a bunch of unexplained crackle and clicky sounds! I was at the point of yet another reinstall of Windows on my PC at home (I just reinstalled it about 2 weeks ago!) when I solved a problem with my hard drive. To make a long story short, my system was trying to use the hard drive in a mode that it wasn't supposed to be capable of... but of course it SEEMED to be work fine. So I fixed that and now I can suddenly record without getting all of those subtle, random, crackly poppy sounds! It's always great when solving one problem fixes another supposedly unrelated problem! I was on the verge of thinking the SBLive! was broken, or not up to the job, or we have too many cosmic rays in my computer room, or maybe sunspots are directed at my house, or probably it's because I just have plain bad luck with computers...
So, now I'm gonna tell everybody - GO GET AN SBLive!!! It kicks! It's taken me a while to start to realize the full potential of this baby, but I must say for $99, with my very own crappy cables, without wrapping tin-foil around my computer room, and without buying any expensive software or hardware add-ons, etc., the SBLive! has been one of the best computer and music investments I've ever bought (the POD being my best music investment). Plus, Creative Labs continues to support it with new drivers, new software, sound fonts, etc. I just picked up the new Live!Ware 3.0 CD and it has some amazing sound fonts, a much improved mixer, an improved "player" that can now play MP3 files and some other stuff that I don't care too much about. On the downside, the Creative Digital Audio Center program that is supposed to let you rip CD tracks and encode your own MP3s craps out when I try to set it up for my CD drives.
Oh yeah... I recently acquired a Zip650 CD burner. It works great! I guess it's time to get enough tunes together so that I can burn my own music CD and go commercial.... hahahaha! Hmmm... EddieRay's Short Elevator Hits... get it now.... 99 rocking song impression clips on one CD for $9.95 + shipping! Send money order or cashier's check to........ ;-)
Drums! There are some really good, free drum sound fonts. I tried out Real Acoustic Drums 1 (from UpMetalStudios) and I was pretty amazed... somebody went to some serious trouble to mike up a good drum kit and hand-craft these sound fonts! Excellent! I'll be including these drum sounds into some songs in the near future...
Recording software: I'm looking at a new program called Music Studio Deluxe V2000 by Magix. It has a lot of features and costs around $60 on the street. 16 tracks of digital audio and all the MIDI you could want. It's a Windows 9x program, which would be nice because Power Tracks is a Windows 3.1 program... hence it doesn't take advantage of the GUI (I want popup menus on the right mouse button!) and could be a lot more streamlined. I downloaded the demo, which can't save any files of course, but maybe I'll be able to tell if it's any good. Of course, I'm still dreaming about Emagic Logic Audio Gold... but I need to hock my amp in order to get that. It's around $325 on the street. Then there's CakewalkHome Studio 9, with 8 tracks of audio (instead of the 4 in Home Studio 8) and a pretty good list of other features... it runs $129 list, but there's no demo available yet. Cakewalk Guitar Studio 2 is out too, but that's $249 list and although it sounds cool, it's missing some features that even Home Studio 9 has. Another contender might be n-Track Studio by FASoft... I still gotta try out the demo of that. Oh well, the perfect recording software is still eluding me. This kind of software is so much a matter of taste, a completely insane feature list versus price game, and annoying carrot-dangling tactics by companies trying to get you to buy the most expensive of a line of 3 or 4 products... it makes my head hurt just researching it.
11/15/1999:
More on recording software: Well, I've decided to go with Cakewalk Home Studio 9 since is priced right ($69 from some of the online stores), my birthday is coming up, the Moon is lined up with Jupiter, Cakewalk is supposedly a good brand, it has a lot of features I like, I can upgrade to Pro Audio 9 for $149 (which makes it cheaper than just buying Pro Audio 9 by itself), and I'm tired of thinking about it! I'll let you know how it works out... I have high hopes. I think I've boiled my requirements down to a few simple NEEDS for the software:
11/29/1999:
Hey... I got a copy of Home Studio 9 from my loving wife for my birthday! I'll post some details later, but this software really ROCKS!
Also, check out the new song I Thank You. It's actually a complete song!
Old news:
It has come to my attention that some of you don't have an MP3 player, or keep losing it (Biff!)... so get the one I use here or get the latest version straight from Audio Active.
Check out the new Spider amps and effects pedals from Line6!
1/13/2000:
Well it's been a while... I've been fighting with
my PC. The latest SBLive drivers caused Home Studio 9 to not
be able to playback audio correctly. I'm still trying to find out
from Cakewalk if it's HS9 or the new drivers. I still haven't
made it through the
second half of the HS9 manual... so I'm still lacking some knowledge
about Mixer Automation, etc. HS9 is looking great so far.
I recently received an 8GB hard drive for my birthday, so I've been
installing all kind of games that I never had space for on my PC.
The holidays were devoted mostly to relaxation with a whole week away from
the work thing, and "Need For Speeed III" has been calling my name
(a racing game) relentlessly... so I haven't done very much in the way
of recording lately until the last week or so.
Check out two new recordings I did with parts of The Black Crowes' Struttin' Blues! I'm not very happy with the results, but I'm kinda picky that way. ;-) I got kinda burned out trying to get the EXACT guitar sound like Rich's... which I didn't. But if I spent another couple hours with the POD and SoundDiver, added the ending of the song, added a keyboard part,.... ugggghhh this is starting to sound like WORK! I'm not sure if I like the song THAT much... ;-) Let me know what you think!
I've added a 16-band stereo graphic EQ to my setup - between the POD and the SBLive. It helps for dialing in a specific tone... with all the differnt amp/speaker combinations in the POD, it can really bring out what you need, and cut back want you don't want. A poor man's AX2! ;-)
1/18/2000:
Well, PCs are just great. I spent the whole day Sunday re-installing my system from scratch! I made the mistake of trying to upgrade DirectX, SBLive drivers, and video drivers. At one point last week, I couldn't even record with Home Studio 9 because the sound drivers were so screwed up. Then I started to notice how terribly some of my favorite games (Need For Speed III, Interstate '76, Age of Empires, etc.) were running. After a week of research... I decided that the problem was, in fact, DirectX 7.0a. Of course, once you install the latest version of DirectX, you can't go back!!! Darn Microsoft! So... I reinstalled from scratch.
Standard rule of thumb: Be prepared to completely reinstall your Windows computer from scratch at any time!
Fortunately, I've done it 4 times since last October, so I was ready. It's just a major pain because I had installed about 7GB of games and stuff... it took a whole week of installing a few here and there and now it's all gone... I have to reinstall it all over again. That's easy to do, but what a waste of time. Needless to say the only software on my system now is Netscape, Cakewalk Home Studio 9, and Need For Speed III (they should call that "Need For Crack III" because it's just about the most addictive racing simulation I've ever played on any computer).
So, on Monday, after I got my system back in order, I started working on the 3rd cut of Struttin' Blues. Completely re-recorded all the guitars, finished the drum and bass parts, added the solos, added a B3 organ part (8rock11e's "Perc B3" sound), and started working on a POD tone to add the vocal. I'll do the vocal tonight before Molly's hits the sack. I can't really sing this song at all so don't expect too much. ;-) Check back tomorrow and hopefully I'll have the (mostly) finished track up for your enjoyment.
Note to self: must fix phrasing for right guitar during the verses.
1/19/2000:
Well... it ain't pretty but I put my sad, strained vocal part on my Struttin' Blues rendition. I used the POD "tube preamp" and some post-EQ. I spent a good hour with the Shure Beta 58 and the EQ trying to get it to sound good... it's "okay" I guess. It might be the best I can do without a better quality mic (or a better voice). ;-)
Download Struttin3 and check out the results of my ongoing recording shenanigan! Crank it up LOUD!
1/24/2000:
After I got the new garbage disposal and light fixture installed in the kitchen, went to the Education Expo with the family to hunt down a school (2-year-old program) for Molly, and did some various chores around the house, I somehow managed to squeak in a little recording time. I remixed the Struttin' Blues track... and I think it made a big difference. Check it out below - it's called Struttin4.mp3!
1/26/2000:
Got snowed in for a day... so I had a chance to record a quick and dirty mix of Stevie Ray Vaughan's Empty Arms. Check it out below - it's called EmptyArms1.mp3!
1/27/2000:
UpMetal! Studios seems to be having trouble with their ftp server so some of you are having trouble getting the Real Acoustic Drums soundfonts. I've sent a note to them asking if it's okay to make them availble here.
2/2/2000:
Got together with a buddy of mine, Tom Lyness, who plays some kickin' bass guitar and is a member of an area rock band called, The Snap (insert URL here). I demonstrated my setup of Cakewalk + computer + POD (he hadn't seen it in person yet) and we laid down a bass track for the second cut of Empty Arms - keep an eye out for that sometime next week. It was SO nice to have some REAL BASS GUITAR (YEAH!) instead of MIDI bass for a change. It came out great! Hopefully, Tom and I will be able to come up with some original tunes in the next couple months!
By the way, we didn't have much luck getting Tom's bass to sound "normal" through the POD. There was the kind of "envelope" sound with every pluck of the bass strings. Almost like some kind of "auto phase shifter" effect that triggered with the pluck of each string. I didn't have an easy way to run him direct into the SBLive, so we kinda had to just live with it. Maybe next time I'll record a little sample of it to post to the POD Users mailing list for discussion.
2/3/2000:
Duh... it says right in the README file with the soundfonts that they are "freely distributable". It's a little disappointing that they never answered me though. By the way, RealAcousticDrumsPlus.zip is corrupted, so I've removed it. If anyone has a good copy of RealAcousticDrumsPlus.zip, PLEASE email it to me and I'll put it up. You can now download the Real Acoustic Drums soundfonts from my page - check out the SoundFonts section.
2/8/2000:
Check out EmptyArms4.mp3 or EmptyArms4x.mp3! Same music, different "room" reverb applied to the whole "band".
2/16/2000:
Well, I successfully made a new mix - EmptyArms5E - download it from the recordings section below. I finally got Cakewalk and the SBLive Recorder to cooperate so I could play the song in Cakewalk, and record the "What U Hear" device (including SBLive reverb) using the SBLive Recorder program. Please ignore the click at the beginning and the long pause... that's a result of having to switch between the two applications to start the recording. Kinda like the old days where you push RECORD on one box and the quickly push PLAY on the other box... except it's Windows so it's more complicated and fool-prone (computers make life SO much easier right?)! ;-) Check it out, let me know if you think I "got it right" this time!
Also, I've put up a new version of my POD library that includes the Empty Arms preset and my new JCM800-based preset. Check it out!
While making the ER Versa-JCM preset, it was sounding so good I just had to take notes and record my guitar noodling. I made a new section below called EddieRay Goes Off... to link in the sound clips and documentary. I'll get the JCM page up ASAP... you won't believe how easy it is to twiddle this JCM preset in dramatic and amazingly useful ways! Also, this is one of the most Strat friendly POD tones I've come up with, and requires minimal twiddling to compensate for pickup selection.
6/9/2000:
Hey... I haven't fallen off the face of the Earth! Just haven't had much time to do any serious recording. So, rather than bore you with a bunch of talk about what I want to record or why I haven't been recording, I've been waiting until I could start getting something together. I started working on some original tunes about a month or so ago. I'm lacking some basic lyric-writing ability, but maybe I'll come up with something... it's probably more a lack of inspiration than anything else. I've also worked up a couple more cool POD presets along the way. I hope to get them posted soon. Feel free to send me email if you want to chat or find out what's happenin'. I'll try to get some new recordings up in the next couple weeks. I'm itchin' to cover some more SRV with a new, insanely delectible POD preset I came up with a couple nights ago... ;-) Also, I'll to get the chance to perform at a friends wedding "gig" this weekend with the POD through my Peavey Classic 50 (no I still haven't sold it yet - $300 and it's yours! ;-) so I'll let you know how that goes.
Someone requested that I send them the MIDI accompaniment for I Thank You available so I decided to make it generally available for those of you who'd like to twiddle with it in Home Studio 9 or whatever. Look for links to the MIDI and HS9 files below in the Recordings section. Enjoy!!!
8/21/2000:
Okay... I still haven't posted anything new. Shame on me. I have a lot to post, but I've been preoccupied with family (Molly's 2nd birtday is coming up) and hobbies, home improvement, work (go figure!), etc. I know... lame, lame, LAME. Sorry! Anyway, I'm still have some unfinished originals that I want to finish and post and some news about the POD 2.0 Upgrade Kit I installed (it rocks!). Also, I have received several emails asking that I put up the Cakewalk MIDI tracks from my recordings. I want to do it all! It's just a matter of when. Thanks for your patience! The fountain will flow once again... ;-)
11/2/2000:
Okay... I'm _actually_ putting up a new POD tone-clip. Check it out in the EddieRay goes off section!
11/2/2000:
I've fixed up the Soundfont section to make it clear that I'm providing the Real Acoustic Drums soundfonts for you to download. The author contacted me and said it'd be great if I could mirror the soundfonts. My birthday is coming up, so I'll probably have some time to do a little recording soon. ;-)
01/02/2001:
Hey! Well, Santa Claus was good to me... he brought me a Cakewalk Pro Audio 9 upgrade! Off the top of my head, the most notable features that Pro Audio has over and above Home Studio are:
Also, for your enjoyment, here are a couple of pictures of the tools I use to "make it all happen"... I took them with our new digital camera (thanks for the Christmas present, Dave!). 03/19/2001:
I've posted a few clips of the some stuff I've been working on. Grab them in the Recordings section below - SRVThangMix2.mp3 and Weather1.mp3. Complete POD goodness.
I hope you like them... ;-)
I finally got my old Cakewalk recordings backed up to .BUN files and installed the Pro Audio 9 upgrade. The install went flawlessly. I've already notice a few tiny things that are fixed in PA9 (compared to HS9) and it seems to be working well (no unexplained are detrimental problems yet). I'll give you the run-down on PA9 as I discover the way-too-cool features first hand. Right now, I'm just using it likes it's HS9. ;-P
05/09/2001:
Well, didn't get much feedback on SRVThangMix2.mp3... guess it's a little too pop-ish for most of you tone-meisters out there. I thought Weather1.mp3 turned out pretty good... both cuts have some tasty POD tones IMHO.
I received the POD 2.2 firmware a few weeks ago, and it's supposed to be a very nice improvement in some subtle areas with the amp models, and an overall improvement in the balance of the loudness of the amp models relative to each other. Some people have raved about it...
I have a few recordings going at the same time. You know... when one gets boring, start another, and eventually after you get about a dozen going at one time, one will eventually get finished. ;-)
I uploaded my latest preset library for SoundDiver... check it out below in the POD Presets section.
06/07/2001:
I put up two full-length cuts today. Check the recordings section below... AreYouGonna2.mp3 and Barracuda3.mp3. They're unfinished, but hopefully inspirational nonetheless. I'll try to upload the latest greatest EddieRay3.LIB soon with all my POD tones for these other tunes I've been working on.
08/09/2001:
A later version of Barracuda - Barracuda4.mp3 is now available. Enjoy!
12/12/2001:
Hello!
Well, I ran into some computer troubles recently... isn't that always the case with PCs? ;-) My burner decided it didn't want to burn CD-Rs any more, but it would burn CD-RWs fine?!? So, I recovered my system from a backup I did in October and still it wouldn't work. I got a new burner and installed it... problem fixed. Then, to top it off, I acquired a new barebones system upgrade for my B-Day (thanks Mom!) and I've spent the last couple weeks getting all the parts to play nice together, getting Windows 98SE to work, etc. The current configuration is:
AMD Athlon Thunderbird 900MHz processor 128MB PC100 SDRAM memory ECS K7S5A motherboard revision 4 SBLive! Value sound card 2 Hard Drives (ATA33 - couldn't get ATA66 to work) Acer 40X CD-ROM drive LiteOn 16x10x40 burner (burns a full CD-R in around 5 minutes!) Windows 98 Second EditionI'm in the process of getting all my applications (like Cakewalk Pro Audio 9) and games installed again. This puppy SCREAMS! I'm anxious to see how many DirectX plug-ins, and how many tracks I can run simultaneously... ;-)
To add to the mayhem, I had cable-modem service installed last week - of course, they couldn't actually make it work at my house. I had to go out and buy a 100-foot coax video cable to run (myself) from the computer room directly to the main splitter where the main feed enters the house in our basement. What a major pain in the neck! But sure enough, within minutes of putting in the ad-hoc cable, it was working like a charm.
So... I've been busy... but unfortunately NOT with music recording stuff. One of my old giggin' buddies is coming over during the holidays to jam so who knows... we might even get something recorded with the POD. ;-)
04/25/2002:
Hey there... been busy... just like you I bet. I've been getting a little more time to play and record lately (i.e., giving up more sleep!) and I came up with a rough recording of some Back in the Saddle tone-ification. Check it out below in the recordings section. Take care and thanks for listening! 01/21/2003:
How have you been? Let me know! I usually get a few emails a week with questions, comments and general talk about POD stuff and recording. Thanks and keep it coming!
I've been busy as usual. Things are starting to settle down from the holidays so I'm getting a chance to have more music time. I've updated the page with my latest POD library: EddieRay5. Grab it from the POD Presets section below. I've been spending most of my music time working on three originals we used to perform in my old band Time Check. The band members and I have been getting together (physically sometimes, via email most of the time) and exchanging tracks and recording. We have the first song pretty much done and we have two more to record. It's slow going - 10 minutes of guitar playing, an hour twiddling the POD for sounds, and many, many, hours futzing with the mix... UGH!
05/15/2003:
I've been working on some songs for a computer game soundtrack. It's nice to try something different for a change, and it's really fun to venture out into the different styles of music. There's a lot of rocking POD tone going on... that's for sure. ;-)
We're still working on the songs from my old band Time Check... we finished the first song, and we're working on the second. Hopefully, over the summer the band members will have more time to spend and we can finish up the three songs and move on to something new.
Stay cool... and KEEP ROCKIN!
11/8/2004:
Howdy! I've been busy recording another song from my old band, recording more "game soundtrack" type stuff, etc. My buddy was kind enough to lend me his Alesis QS6 keyboard - whew that thing is sweet (but I'm not a keyboard player). I can just sit and plinck on it all night (and not get anything else done - but hey, you gotta have fun SOMEtimes, right?). I hope you're all doing well out there... make sure to "play every day"! Drop me an email and let me know what you're up to...
We've finally gotten settled in after moving into our new house back in July... I can't believe how MUCH STUFF we've acquired over the years. We're just now finishing off the garage (which became a "catch-all" during the move). Ugh!
6/9/2004:
Hey! I hope you're rockin' out there... :-) I've been busy with "everything under the sun"... as usual... family, fun, life, programming, graphics, beta-testing software, rock-n-roll music, etc. Busy, busy, BUSY! Oh yeah, and I bought a new house, so that takes just a tiny bit of my time getting ready for the move... ;-)
Lot's of new stuff happening since my last update...
I finally got a chance to install my new Cakewalk Home Studio 2004 XL a couple weeks ago (my wife gave it to me for Christmas... DOH!). I'm so psyched... HS2004XL is awesome! I have the best of both worlds now... I can make MIDI tracks for drums, bass, organ, etc., and I can mix everything as audio all the time, thanks to the synth plug-in feature HS (and Sonar, etc.). And the XL version comes with a synth plug-in that can play soundfonts (.SF2 instrument files), and a hefty collection of soundfonts (several hundred megs). I can finally avoid the long process of re-recording all my MIDI tracks as audio tracks before creating the final audio mix of my songs. It saves GOBS of time! For $79 (for registered Cakewalk customers), it's a no-brainer!
PODxt... finally, I HAVE ONE!!! And, it completely ROCKS! I still haven't scratched the surface of what this baby can do, but from what I've played and heard so far, it's hands down the best device of it's kind! More amps, more mics, more speakers, and 22+ stompbox/effects modelled (like the Tube Screamer, UniVibe, etc.). I didn't like spending another $389 on the PODxt, after already spending $329 for the POD, but the PODxt is just too incredibly great... I don't even care about the money now! You know you want it... go get one!
I've been continuing work on my "game soundtrack" originals... the first project didn't pan out, but there's another project starting and I'm hoping to get some tracks made for it... in between trying to pack my house into boxes. ;-)