Wolfram

Ok, this is faaaaar from finished - work has been insane this month - but I managed to carve out a couple of hours this evening to throw something together. An ethereal soundtrack-style musing on the serpent, the fruit and temptation. The tech: all of the synth, bass and vocal sounds are all from Zero-G Ethera Gold 2.5, except the massive drum from EastWest Stormdrum 2. The guitar is the first outing for my new (to me) PRS Singlecut 245, played though my Line6 Helix. Glue reverb is Relab LX480, delay from the magnificent Mountain Road DSP Lumina, and there's a sprinkling of Ozone for good measure.

Great advice here. In particular I would say: Tune up. Be as rehearsed as you can be. Play the bass(es) you know you're comfortable with - I would not advise getting a setup or new strings right before the session, unless you're used to that way of working (e.g. I know acoustic guitarists who put on a fresh set of strings before every gig). If your strings are cruddy, changer them well before the session, then see point 2 again. And don't turn up with a special instrument just because it's 'better' than what you normally play. It won't be. Enjoy yourself! Tune up. A story: I recorded my late father playing his acoustic guitar about 15 years ago now. He was an awesome player, but was very lackadaisical about tuning the instrument. Somehow it wasn't so noticeable when he was playing in the room, but listening back to that recording.... argh. Alas, I can't do it again now. Keep your instrument in tune!

Sorry for any misunderstanding; all good.

This is a dig at my September entry; I'll bite. Here's a screenshot of part of my "Telegraph Hill" Cubase project - each part was created and arranged separately, with sampler tracks used to re-pitch elements. The workflow was pretty much the same as musicians who use loops and samples to create music, but I used elements created using AI with input prompts that I crafted myself; is that any more or less 'composition' than using loops or samples created by a complete stranger with absolutely no input from myself? I'm sure the debate will rage on...

I go by many names 😆

Thank you! It was great to be back in the competition and I had a lot of fun with this one.

It doesn't matter if you're travelling with it or not, and there is no particular concession for musical instruments. You have an allowance of £390 worth of goods (other than alcohol, cigarettes); legally, if the total value of goods you are importing (i.e. purchased abroad and are bringing back to the UK) then you must declare it at customs and pay the duty and VAT. If you don't declare, legally it is smuggling. Obviously, items that you already own can be carried with you to and from another country freely; that's different. The info is all here: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5fe05e488fa8f5148f633267/6.7005__SE_CUS_v3.pdf Now of course I'm sure many people chance it and do not declare everything or would argue they've had the guitar for years and years, and you may be lucky, but think the burden of proof would be on you - returning from Germany with a brand-new German-made Warwick might land you in hot water!

The £135 threshold applies only to duty; 20% VAT applies to everything (unless it's a gift worth less than £39). It's on that website- in the VAT section: It's a real pain... especially as VAT is charged on the value of the item + the shipping cost + any duty due.

Ok, after a long absence I actually managed to rush something together for this month's competition. "This road's seen joy, this road has killed. Telegraph Hill haunts me still." The tech stuff: this was a bit of an experiment. I created every individual element using AI tools - there are no "real" instruments or human voices in this track; vocals, guitar, bass and drum sections were all created using AI prompts and lyric sections I wrote. I wanted to try using AI in the same way many of us use more conventional tools like ezDrummer, ezBass, ezKeys, UJAM Virtual Guitarist and other such tools to provide us with drum, guitar, keyboard parts etc., with a nod to the sampling scene and workflows of yore. I arranged and sequenced all the elements conventionally in Cubase, mostly using Sampler Tracks. I'm working abroad at the moment so didn't have my studio machine or any plugins except what comes with Cubase, so there's just a bit of compression, eq, delay and reverb to glue it together, and it's squeezed through Cubase's brickwall limiter.

Hah, I was about to re-post that myself! Not really my cup of tea, but if I was after a Jazz that's the one I would buy right now. Every Sei bass I've played has been exceptional, and I've been hankering after one for a while now - but it will be a headless Flamboyant sixer.

If you're talking about the USB cable from the interface to the Max then USB2 max length is 5 metres and USB3 is 3 metres (unless you get into using special active cables) so that won't work. The Behringer ADA8200 is not an interface, it is an ADAT 8-channel expander and will not work with a computer or iPad on its own. To use it you would need to make sure your existing two-channel interface has an ADAT digital input, and connect it through that - beware, it would be a rare 2-channel interface that does have ADAT and not a single one comes to mind. I have no experience using an iPad for recording so don't know anything about compatibility or how many channels it can manage, so can't advise there unfortunately. It all sounds very complicated! I would definitely either move the Mac, or I would acquire a single digital multitracker with enough channels to track everything in one place (e.g. Tascam DP-24, Zoom R12/R20 etc.) then move to Logic Pro for mixing. You may even want to keep it all in the multitracker - many of my best songs were recorded on an old Korg D1600, which I still have and still works some 20 years later. Good luck!

As a small business who used to sell on Amazon, I could say much about my experience. Except I can't, because Amazon makes every seller sign an NDA.

Firstly, you don't need to bounce audio into and out of a Mac like that. Use Existential Audio's Blackhole audio driver - you set iTunes output to Blackhole's output, Audacity's input to Blackhole's input and it loops it back entirely digitally in the Mac. It's $10 I think. https://existential.audio/blackhole/ For a small audio interface, I highly rate MOTU's M2 or M4 depending on your needs. I use one as a portable interface with my Macbook Pro; the converters sound great and it's been completely bulletproof.

Steinberg Spectralayers is the tool you want - you don't need a(nother) DAW if it's speech. I'm still on version 10 but 11 has just been released and I will upgrade. I've also used iZotope RX but not for a few versions now; I found Spectralayers' approach far more intuitive and effective for a musician so have stuck with it. You'll probably find it useful for other tasks too. I recently used it to remove the lead vocal from a song to create a practice backing track and pitch that down two tones to bring it into the range of a singer for practice. Job done in a couple of minutes to a very high standard.

I've failed - the last two weeks have been super-busy and I was away for Le Mans - it's still just an intro 😢. I was rather proud of the Uilleann pipes. Maybe next time.