Sinister Forces

[NKB]

Here's my latest little creation for your listening and critiquing pleasure.

Sinister Forces

This is just a little sampling of something larger I just started. Recorded and mixed in Reaper of course.

[morgon]

Hey great vibes first rate. -m

[bob]

First class.Great use of sounds.Quality outstanding.What would you do with this music?soundtrack or similar?

just listened to your other music.Very nice.You definitely have a certain style that would appeal to many.Hard to classify.

[maxdembo]

Oooh, yeah, I wanna hear the rest of this!

[maxdembo]

The guitar delays, or whatever it is, are marvelous.

[bob]

Originally Posted by NKB

Here's my latest little creation for your listening and critiquing pleasure.

Sinister Forces

This is just a little sampling of something larger I just started. Recorded and mixed in Reaper of course.

whats with the title?Sinister Forces?

[NKB]

It's funny you ask about the title at this moment Bob because I just added a quote from Inspector Clouseau in the description for the song on SoundCloud: "Sinister forces are at work!" But I initially took the title from a three volume book by Peter Levenda of the same name (which also includes that same quote somewhere in its pages). When I was saving it on Reaper I needed some kind of title and in looking around the room that book caught my eye and it seemed to fit the mood of it so there it is.

Thanks for all the compliments everyone. It's much appreciated and motivating.

Other questions answered...

...guitar delays, or whatever it is

Mostly whatever it is. I use Guitar Rig for most of my electric guitar work. In this case I don't remember off the top of my head what amp was used but I do remember adding Psychedelay to it and tweaking it a little. The "whatever it is" comes from the fact that I'm not very good with guitar soloing (I just play out of necessity because I want real guitars in my songs) and tend to always fall back on similar sounding motifs. So instead of doing endless recording until I get something that sounds as if I know what I'm doing I just went with something quick and basic and then added DBlue Glitch to mangled it, making it a little more interesting than what I actually did.

What would you do with this music?soundtrack or similar?

I don't have much of a goal for what to do with it. I primarily make music to listen to. On a personal level it has to do with my head being so full of sounds and combinations of sounds that I have an urge to put it all down somehow. Most of the stuff I'm putting on SoundCloud are just ideas which is why most of them are fairly short. When I got seriously back into music about a year ago (when I started using Reaper and all of this new music making technology) I was attempting to make full songs with all the changes tailored with the hopes of vocals being added later. There are a few of those on my page. I gave that up until someone comes along and says "hey I like what you're doing and I think I have some vocal ideas for some of it", then I can work out more song composition-type stuff.

[zeekat]

Originally Posted by NKB

Mostly whatever it is. I use Guitar Rig for most of my electric guitar work. In this case I don't remember off the top of my head what amp was used but I do remember adding Psychedelay to it and tweaking it a little. The "whatever it is" comes from the fact that I'm not very good with guitar soloing (I just play out of necessity because I want real guitars in my songs) and tend to always fall back on similar sounding motifs. So instead of doing endless recording until I get something that sounds as if I know what I'm doing I just went with something quick and basic and then added DBlue Glitch to mangled it, making it a little more interesting than what I actually did.

I'm a huge fan of hiding mediocre guitar playing in effects, delays are best thing ever. Dblue glitch is satan though - One Click Cool Generator with no effort needed, instant -25 points to creativity. Stopped using it after realising best sounding moments in a tune I just did are from automated stutter machine, terrifying :>

[NKB]

You can say the same thing about Reaper itself; it takes hardly any effort to record and mix a high quality, one-click cool, sounding song in it, at all. 15 years ago I would have worked for days trying really hard to still not even come close to the sound I can get in Reaper now in about 15 minutes.

However, when it comes to production, for me at least, it's not about how technically easy it was or how much effort it was (or even what plug-in was used) to get the final result. It's only about the final result.

[zeekat]

Hey, talk for yourself, it takes me ages to achieve anything in Reaper! I think of it as a fancy multitrack, so I'd rather not have it doing to much stuff by itself. Glitch makes new grooves by itself, so crosses my personal "too much automating" threshold.

BTW, tune's of course excellent, with glitch or not.

[NKB]

If it will make you feel any better, just know that it did take more than one click on Glitch to get that to meet my satisfaction. I think it took about seven clicks.

Thanks for the compliments though. It's just music and all in good fun anyway.

[bob]

Some real nice tunes on your site.I won´t let you fall for example.
There is one sung in German,,whats viel saltz un lachen etcneed to let the wife hear that.

[MichaJo]

Sorry for being OT but @NKB how did you disable the "related" feature on soundcloud? I hate this automatically streaming of other pieces once the song i've linked is finished.

MichaJo

[NKB]

Not sure exactly what you mean but all I did was click the song where it is isolated on the page. Then just link that page.

[bob]

I love your tune.It could be the soundtrack to the Boston Marathon thing.Sinister Forces

[kindafishy]

I'm glad you didn't give this a label like electronic/ambient/etc because I'm a bit biased towards more traditional instruments, so I likely wouldn't have listened.

Really glad, actually. Shame on my preconceived notions.

The feel of this piece got to me very quickly and I ended up listening all the way through and then played it again a few more times.

Forgive me for drawing comparisons, but it's a bit of human nature to do so, and it's part of the honesty of real feedback, so I'll share what I'm thinking. This has a decidedly Portishead vibe for me. I love Dummy. It's one of my favourite albums ever. Ever. As a matter of fact, I'm going to listen to that album now.

This is great. I'm really happy that I checked it out.

[maxdembo]

Relistening to this track, I can hear dblue glitch doing its work now. It sounds great. Reminds me a little of Michael Brook.

I've been using glitch for a while, but mainly on ambient recordings taken from outside my living room window, which run quietly the background of various tracks, or glitching the reverb on a track and/or sticking it through a leslie speaker emulator. Great fun.

Anyway, love the track. Love the way it builds, I just wish it was longer

[NKB]

Thanks for the further comments/compliments. I recently posted another section of this particular project for those who would like more - Entering the Mauve Zone

You may hear a little influence of The Stooges' "1969" in the first part. That was deliberate. I woke up the morning I made that with The Stooges' song on my mind and the influence was coming from my memory of that song.

[Vendetta V]

Wow I have to say this is totally awesome! I like the macabre feel!

and I like the new feel with the guitar and more melodic expansion at the end!

Now it's Entering the Mauve zone.I like the whole sound of the mix.

In general, this is some awesome stuff!

I'llprobably have you listed on the links page on my website

[jalan]

Not sure what I just listened to, but I liked it Very cool vibe from a very different type of tune. Nice work!

[NKB]

Thanks for the compliments.

I'm currently working on several little ideas and will probably have a few finished some time next week. Will upload them if they turn out good.