Grant Overend's blog

Two New Tracks

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Mon, 23 Nov 2009 12:11:06 +1100

Two new pieces of music. Wildly different. One takes a more retro experimental-electronic approach inspired by listening to Ursula Bogner's recent work.

The second is quite a cheery, mid 90's Nightmares on Wax-like downtempo thing.

Have also been reading a lot about Spiral Dynamics recently:

At each stage of human existence the adult is off on his quest of the holy grail, the way of life he seeks by which to live. At his first level he is on a quest for automatic physiological satisfaction. At the second level he seeks a safe mode of living, and this is followed in turn by a search for herioc status, for power and glory, by a search for ultimate peace; a search for material pleasure, a search for affectionate relations, a search for respect of self, and a search for peace in an incomprehensible world. And, when he find he will not find that peace, he will be off on his ninth level quest.
As he sets off on each quest, he believes he will find the answer to his existence. Yet, much to his surprise and much to his dismay, he find at every stage that the solution to existence is not the solution he has come to find. Every stage he reaches leaves him disconcerted and perplexed. It is simply that as he solves one set of human problems he finds a new set in their place. The quest he find is never ending."
-- Dr. Clare W.Graves (Spiral Dynamics originator)

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New Track - Gerry's Antics

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 17:01:27 +1100

09.10.20 - Gerry's Antics

The beginnings a new minimal tech/house number. Fun-kee

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New Tune - The Road

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 08:39:53 +1000

09.10.17 - The Road

A new piece of minimal, dubbed out ambience.

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Some New Photos

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 18:11:25 +1000

I took these a couple of days ago through my bedroom window using a new lens.

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3 New Pieces of Music

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 12:00:27 +1000

09.04.13 - Lucky Number

Firstly, a close-to-finished, buoyant, atmospheric electro-pop number I've been working on.
btw. If you like any of these and would like a copy, please let me know and I'll happy email you one.

09.04.28 - Chao

Something a bit more crazy and playful.

09.04.28 - Down to Sleep

Lastly a surreal sample-fest.

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Freesound Fun

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 14:34:35 +1000

If you're a frustrated musician with a day-job (like me) enjoy experimenting and have been trying to find ways in which you can still explore musical ideas while at work. Here's one for you:
Goto www.freesound.org click on their search feature and type in a random word. You'll be presented with a webpage full of samples which you can preview. The fun thing is that you can play a whole bunch of them simultaneously. That's where the fun part of it comes in.
I'm sitting at work right now with an earbud from my headphones in my left ear listening to a melee
The 'metal' yielded:
Heavy Metal-overdriven guitar strumming
A sonar-like ambience
A clangy door-shutting
A chiming two-tone doorbell
A sword being removed from it's sheath
A musicbox rendition of Happy Birthday
A tibetan bell.

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Brisbane Ranges / Steiglitz Photos

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 12:20:26 +1000

Photo (1 of 1)

Taken in the Brisbane Ranges National Park.

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The Makings of Ambient

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 22:10:08 +1100

09.03.02 - Wings

Interested in discovering the mechanics of an ambient piece of music?
The sustained ambient sound which fades in at the start is actually a sample from Augustus Pablo's - East of the River Nile. It's actually two notes played simultaneously (Piano and Bass). I fed them into a software instrument called 'Time Freezer'. Time Freezer is like a sampler, only, it's a granular sampler.
Granular synthesis/sampling for those of you who aren't familiar basically involves splitting a sample into segments of between 1 to 50 ms in length. VERY short they are. These small pieces are called grains. Multiple grains may be layered on top of each other all playing at different speed, phase and volume. The resultant sound is a fairly easily recognisable one. It has a distinct characteristic.

Anyway, after feeding it into Time Freezer I EQ'd it, cutting out a lot of the lower frequencies and some mid/high range. I then ran it through a reverb.

The second sound to come which sounds a little reminscent of a submerged vocal sound is actually a synthesizer. Native Instruments Absynth, to be precise. It's an incredibly powerful synthesizer which offers a hell of a lot of options and flexibility for complex sound sculpting.

Lastly there's a Flute sample in there with some reverb, EQ'ing and delay. Through out the track I tweaked EQ settings on the tracks and added some subtle flanging in spots as well as a few other minor effects.

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New Ambient Music

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 22:53:52 +1100

09.02.07 - Glint

A new ambient piece slightly reminiscent of Brian Eno's Apollo LP.

09.02.07 - InnerVision TM

This one's had a more analog psychedelic raw vibe.

“There can be no thought of finishing, for ‘aiming at the stars’ – both figuratively and literally – is a problem to occupy generations, so that no matter how much progress one makes, there is always the thrill of just beginning.”

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Art and Validity/Richness

nobody@vox.com(Grant Overend) — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 14:43:45 +1100

I'm reading 'Audio Culture' by Christoph Cox again. This particular quote from Umberto Eco's Poetics of the Open Work I found quite interesting.

"…the form of the work of art gains its aesthetic validity precisely in proportion to the number of different perspecties from which it can be viewed and understood. These give it a wealth of different resonsances and echoes without impairing its original essence; a road traffic sign, on the other hand, can only be viewed in one sense, and, if it is transfigured into some fantastic meaning by an imaginative driver, it merely ceases to be THAT particular traffic sign with that particular meaning."

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