EMBRACE - The
Midi Album.
EMBRACE - The
Midi Album.
The midi album is packed as a self executing zip file. To down load it, click on the eye icon in the top left hand corner of this screen. Down load it to your temp directory and the run it. Run the "midi_alb" program - it has simple CD like controls and a help file if these aren't obvious. It's a PC program but the music comes in the form of standard midi files which are available on request for those of you lucky enough to use other computers.
Although the album is free to download it's still mine and covered by copyright so don't try nicking my tunes and passing them off as your own 'cause it'll mean I'll have to start paying lawyers which I really resent doing.
A few years back I decided I wasn't going to make a living as a musician and composer. I wasn't even going to try. This was about the time when midi gear was getting to be cheap enough and good enough to make professional sounding music on a home setup.
It seemed to me that to make money out of music you either convince a record company to give you loadsa money to be a star or you do adverts, radio jingles etc. - anything to keep the bills paid. The former's fantasy land and I decided the latter would be as bad as the nine to five grind - without the salary check at the end of the month.
No, much better go into the technology side of things - designing stuff for all the other bedroom hopefuls - and keep making music as a hobby.
Trouble is I've written all this music over the years which no-one except myself and my friends ever hear. I wanted it to be heard by a wider audience. Again ruling out trying to convince record companies I'm a genius, I'm left with self financing a CD and somehow selling enough of them to make my money back - or not.
The idea for an alternative came to me as a result of working on a project which involved midi files and General Midi. Standard midi files (SMFs) are a method of storing midi data which does not depend on a particular sequencer - or for that matter computer. General midi (GM) is a way of organising synthesizer voices so that a GM compatible midi file will (hopefully) sound the same on all GM equipment.
This standardization has led to a number of companies publishing instrumental versions of "golden oldies" in this format. A sort of computer kareoke. Hmm.
It seemed to me that it would be an interesting to do to put out an "album" of original material in this format. This would come on a humble floppy disk so it would cost peanuts to duplicate. Trouble is I'd still have to promote it somehow - how much would I charge for it - how could I stop it being pirated - how much of my spare time am I prepared to spend copying disks and putting them in envelopes.
OK - I'm not in it for the money so why worry about money at all. Why not just put it out into the public domain and let you all get on with it. Not doing it because there's money to be made - doing it because its there.
Enjoy.
Embrace (Intro).
The album's called Embrace, the first track's called Embrace and the last track's called Embrace. I guess this just about makes it a 'concept album'. Ignore memories of nineteen seventy's pretentious intellectual types trying to get justify really dull music. I set out to produce a collection of stuff embracing all the work I do and if that seems a bit nebulous - well maybe I needed some way of getting hold of the project!
Teenage Angst.
This was originally written as a piano piece when I was thirteen or fourteen (and then differently titled). It paints a graphic picture of the anger and frustration life as a teenager in the punk era. Was I really like that?
Funqui Drift.
Right, each part is basically the same bit of music but padded out with silence to a specific number of bars. Guitar 23 bars, piano 20 bars, bass 13 bars, brass 19 bars, strings 29 bars and drums 7 bars. These are all continuously looped round so they get out of sync producing a piece which is constantly changing. It will repeat eventually, after several days, but I figured you probably wouldn't want to wait that long so I've faded it in and out.
Tour de Force.
It's always the trouble with instrumentals - you've written the piece but what do you call it. On this occasion, while I was trying to think of a title, I happened to have an English motorcycle magazine open in front of me. Guess what the title of the article was.
This was the first piece of music I ever wrote using midi and a sequencer. It was unbelievable - half a dozen parts at once - all spot on the beat - none of my erratic keyboard playing. I'd done the first minute and a half and I stayed up until 4 a.m. listening to it over and over again.
Exciting times.
Relativity.
Ah - e = mc2 and all that. A long time ago I learnt all about relativity - one of the central assumptions of which every observers point of view is equally valid. I get really annoyed by people who think that all the music they like is brilliant and all the music they don't like is rubbish. So here you have two different view points on the same music. And a drum solo.
Tenere.
The Tenere desert is part of the Sahara situated in Southern Niger. I haven't been there and have no particular wish to go - the inspiration for the piece came from watching a television program.
The Tenere is a two hundred mile stretch of flat sand. When driving across the Tenere you don't need to look where your going you just make sure the compass needle pointing in the right direction. Also, you don't drive across the Tenere alone since if you break down on your own - you're dead.
I still have a clear image, in my head, of a totally flat piece of sand, burning sun and a Land Rover gradually materializing out of the heat haze. It struck me as the grimmest place on the planet.
Song for Jo.
Not only did it not win the lady's heart, she never even got to hear it. I managed to loose touch with her before the piece was finished. Still the middle of a bog is not the most romantic place to meet.
Fanfare.
Question. Can you repeat the same tune seven times and still keep the listener interested? I'll leave you to make your own mind up.
Mice & Men.
Trouble with all this hi-tech. music is, usually, the only thing you've got to input your ideas is a standard, black and white type, piano style keyboard. To overcome this I wrote "Mouse Play" which uses the mouse to "play" on a rectangular area of the computer screen. The pitch gets higher as you go to the right, and the volume increases as you go up. The left mouse button turns the note on and off. It's playing the solo line through a synth voice. Mice as in computer, men as in me. Sorry.
The Watcher.
The watcher, he holds no gold.
The watcher, he holds no time.
The watcher, he holds nothing that I - I could call mine.
This is the instrumental version of the song of the same name - the above is the chorus.
Embrace (Finale).
Sub-bass piano and trashed, improvised, guitar samples - the embrace returns with a big squeeze and signs off. Good night and thank you.