Sonikmatter Releases 2nd in Logic Video Tutorial Series

We’ve released the 2nd in our series of Logic Video Tutorials, created for Sonikmatter by James Muir.

The tutorial focuses on “Dynamics Processing” within Logic. It joins the “Sidechain” tutorial launched in April and is also available in the Backstage area.

Backstage is available to Sonikmatter Supporters and Benefactors. You can become a Supporter or Benefactor by visiting the Sonikmatter Store and selecting your choice.

Future tutorials in the series include:

- Guitar Amp
- Beat Slice/ EXS 24
- SD IR
- Groups Comp

and others.

Crazy Sumnabech Convicted of Second Degree Murder

Phil Spector, the OJ Simpson of the music world, is guilty of murder.

Long known for how to write a catchy tune or to shoot someone just because…well…there really isn’t a story here. He did it…got caught…and now probably going to spend the rest of his life behind bars.

His wig, however, remains out on bond awaiting conspiracy and destruction of evidence charges. The prosecutor has vowed to “spray that sucker”.

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The Chanel Guitar

Karl Lagerfield says, “Coco Chanel had an affair with Stravinsky, mine was with a guitar.”

http://ifitshipitshere.blogspot.com/2009/02/rocking-runway-literally-chanels.html
http://www.justluxe.com/fine-living/fashion/article-240005.php

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Nurds: In search of the click track

Over at the Music Machinery blahg, Paul Lamere explores the use of the click track in music production.

Sometime in the last 10 or 20 years, rock drumming has changed. Many drummers will now don headphones in the studio (and sometimes even for live performances) and synchronize their playing to an electronic metronome - the click track. This allows for easier digital editing of the recording. Since all of the measures are of equal duration, it is easy to move measures or phrases around without worry that the timing may be off. The click track has a down side - some say that songs recorded against a click track sound sterile, that the missing tempo deviations added life to a song.

Blah blah blah…being a child of the industrial (music) revolution and one that has never felt the need to practice relentlessly to the strong armed overlord that is the metronome, my own sense of time is, how you say, lacking. Four on the Floor is the only way we do it and then judicious use of the quantize button. Either way, this is rather interesting seeing which artists obviously use clicks, and which don’t. Hell, I’d be hard pressed to even say ‘played to click, as tools like Mixosaurus/ make it very easy to replace these stick monkeys with something virtual and on time.

Read more at Music Machinery.

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The Laptop Warriors Last Stand

Found over on the Cool Hunting site, a website entirely devoted to proving that you and your bitchin camaro are not trendy, have never been trendy except for metal heads and pot addicts, and shoves your lack of cool in your face:

Thanks in part to laptop stands like this two-tiered one by Staton, the days of lugging around crates of vinyl are slowly fading as DJs trade their decks in for laptop setups. Although we’re the first to argue that nothing quite compares to a record, advancements in programs like Serato and the ease of carrying thousands of mp3 tracks have made going digital more palatable to audiophiles.

The Uberstand solves the issue of what to do with your laptop when you get there. After several precarious situations, I upgraded to Staton’s Uberstand Laptop Stand. Unlike most stands on the market, it’s made of aircraft grade lightweight aluminum and quickly folds flat into a 12” zippered bag. An included shelf makes a good spot for amps or external hard-drives, minimizing the entire footprint of the setup and allowing for cramming into small spaces. While it suffers a bit from stability issues, it is by far the best option we’ve seen for the traveling DJ.

Find out more at Coolhunting or buy it at Amazon (and help a Sonik brotha out…$75 at last price check).

For those of you that cannot and will not ever believe that your and your ratty trans-am wannabe will never not be cool, nuh-uh man, we have a value added item, the Meritline Faux-Wood Laptop Desk:

It comes with no joy that you will ever be anything more than who you are. Fake wood graphics, harsh welds, a build that makes Ikea say Damn! It’s so bad, I had to buy two…one for the studio and one for my living room. Priced at right around $40, it is a great buy, but an even better buy if you sign up for that annoying and near daily spam mail letter from the ‘line where you can occasionally snag these for about a Jackson including shipping.

Buy the Meritline Laptop Desk and show the cool kids it really isn’t about looks or style or the ability to have a physical relationship with someone you find remotely attractive…

Et tu Chicago?

We’ve always known Sheryl Crow was a willing money grubbing wh#re that was willing to throw her best friends under the bus for the fast buck, but Chicago? Writers of classics like 25 or 6 to 4? Whatcha doing to us? Taking tax payers money from failing banks collecting money that is supposed to support the economy.

Trash pap-site TMZ in a shockingly legitimate piece of journalism brings this expose:

“Northern Trust, a Chicago-based bank, sponsored the Northern Trust Open at the Riviera Country Club in L.A. We’re told Northern Trust paid millions to sponsor the PGA event which ended Sunday, but what happened off the golf course is even more shocking.”

“Northern Trust flew hundreds of clients and employees to L.A. and put many of them up at some of the fanciest and priciest hotels in the city. We’re told more than a hundred people were put up at the Beverly Wilshire in Bev Hills, and another hundred stayed at the Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel. Still more stayed at the Ritz Carlton in Marina Del Rey and others at Casa Del Mar in Santa Monica.”

“As for what all that costs: Well, the company isn’t talking. We spoke with a rep from the band Chicago who said Northern Trust paid them around $100,000. A House of Blues source told us it cost more than $50,000 to close the joint down last Saturday night. As for Sheryl Crow’s fee, her rep didn’t get back to us.”

Who can we trust if not the soft-prog-rocking adult contemporary bands made up of 6.7% of their original line up without a hit in 20 some years???

Read more at TMZ.

Even more YYZ

Our troubled youth. YYZ has become an obsession. This time for a 13 year old drummer who also shows some purty fancy stick technique.

Really bad General MIDI soundtrack that she’s playing along with, though.

What The #&!@ Is Up Wit' Sonikmatter?

As one can readily tell, we here at Sonikmatter, LLC. are a bunch of slack-jaw, slack-ass, lazy mutha#&!@s. Months without posts to our front page…but hey man, that’s alright, because the igteligensia all know that it is where it is at. If you are reading this note, you are missing out on the great posts in the community forums.

So What’s new?

David, The Baldone (1), Mondrup gives us a kickass review of the new Pianissimo software. Cheap Cheap Windows-based VST piano software with a Pro Pro sound.

Monsdrum’s Pianissimo Review

Our backend is changing! Brand new server with ten times the old capacity! Seem faster to you? Great! Slower? Tell us about it. We’ve been running it for about a month now. We are also testing a new version of Movabletype, our content publishing system. It rocks! It rolls! It sleeps with your girlfriend behind your back (2). When will you see it? Actually, you are staring at it right now. We hope to have comments and other good stuff enabled soon, but kickin’ the tires a few more times to see what will make it chimp-out and rip your face off. Third, we have been internally testing the new forum software…what’s it look like? Check out Invision’s Beta site for cool features…a much slicker and modern forum, but with all the features you’ve learned to love.

http://ipb3preview.ipslink.com/

In the world of Kurzweil, we find out that rat-bastard with the initials DW has instructed his minions into producing a few more Ribbon Controllers for the PC3 and the K2661. Does this mean Falgor will come out of retirement? He will be able to prog out with his surgically reconstructed nubbin out (3)??? C’mon, make your Ribbon Love Youtuber live again! Sadly, this also means the futures market on the stack of Ribbons Sonikmatter has been holding back is now worthless…stoopid hording of products that are no longer unobtainable.

Ribbon Controller Manufacturing Update
Falgor on the ‘Tube

Speaking of PC3s, anyone know how to make the eff’n sustain pedal change sounds? You know, so that you don’t have to take your finger off the keyboard for even a split second and hit ARROW DOWN? Because my sound is sooooooo important that if I don’t use that one trick that some lameass rocker talked about once in an obscure interview and now I believe I know him on a first name basis and will ask about his ‘technique’ with said first name as if everyone knows who I’m talkin’ about and if I don’t no it, I’ll never be able to wear the magical kneepads?

If only someone could write a post asking about how to do this so that I wouldn’t have to…

[Video: Progrock at its finest]

In our Member’s MP3 and Musicmatters section, we have tons of great posts, from folks asking for advice on taking their mixes from the synthetic to the real or even making the synthetic sound more real than anything we will ever produce (4).

Additionally, forum member Trifonic posted this:

[http://www.apple.com/quicktime/guide/hd/parks_on_fire.html]

It is his latest work, featured over at Apple’s Quicktime HighDef showcase. Fantabulous dood! Looks great and sounds even better! Pull it up in full screen and enjoy the visuals!

Finally, if certain moderator’s parents would stop dropping dead (5), we might get around to posting some of the killer toys we found at NAMM in January, along with interviews from extinct reptilian drum-lizards!

More great stuff in the forums and don’t sue us or anything, but we might even get our wiki back in shape for viewing!

Footnotes:

1. Don’t worry, all the Rogain in the world is not preventing this dear moderator from joining the same ranks.
2. We aren’t misogynist here…we know the ladies read this site too…we also understand that we all let our freakflags fly and you leatherbound hussies are more man than most of us here…you are more likely to steal our significant other than the popped collared sunbathed jerseyboy staring across the Applebee’s bar on half-priced ‘tini’s night.
3. Reconstructed? Probably the wrong term for shredders who picked the keys to be their main axe.
4. Seriously Piet, do you live to embarrass those of us with no talent even making the birthday song sound as if it were high art???
5. Warning: Don’t take the trip of a lifetime until you have prepared for it to be the trip of the lifetime! Crazy old-man spent two weeks on a cruise courtesy of the step-brother, another few weeks in Keywest getting some sun, and on the way back hung out with some insanely great musicians who showed him the best time of his life. Thanks to my friend Bobby Summers, founder of the Deele and former music director of the Al Green band for showing my father a great time in the leading up to my father’s passing. Friends and family are what makes running sites like this meaningful.