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How a record is pressed (Video)

Kyle — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 16:11:26 +0000

Really cool to watch the process. I could throw way too much money at vinyl, have to resist. Also interesting to hear the up tic in how many records are pressed nowadays, definitely a big resurgence in vinyl. How many of you are collecting vinyl right now? Any prized albums to share with us?

[via StudioDog]

Video: How to use Reason’s Spider Audio Merger/Splitter

Kyle — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 16:11:14 +0000

The loop in this video is a custom loop for Misty Edward’s “You Won’t Relent” and can be purchased/downloaded here.

Video: How to create the perfect fadeout in Reason

Kyle — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 19:44:51 +0000

The loop in the video can be downloaded here.

A beginner’s guide to loops

Kyle — Fri, 08 May 2009 17:04:30 +0000

I ran a recent poll here on ORS that asked where your team was at with looping. 25% of you said you’d like to start using loops but don’t know how to get started. This post is intended to address that and hopefully get you some detailed information on how to get going. First here are some articles to help you decide whether you should even consider using loops:

If you’re wanting to get started looping here are some articles helping you with that process:

8 steps to configure Ableton with loop and vocal cue tracks
Configuring Ableton Live to run your click tracks – The link above showed you a more comprehensive loop setup that runs your loops and click. But if you wanted to just use Ableton for running your clicks, this is a great tutorial for that, as well as just general Ableton Live info.
How to send click tracks to monitors and not mains
How to transpose a loop in Reason
How to create your own click track in Garage Band

Some sites where you can download loops:

www.OurRisingSound.com – here of course
www.themonobox.com – Matt hasn’t been posting for a long time, but he does have some good loops and tutorials still available.
www.sacredloops.org – Again, not much content here, but hey there aren’t many people doing this kind of thing.
Bwacks Forums – good place to ask questions on loops

If you have questions that none of these articles and tutorials address please don’t hesitate to ask. If you have any suggestions for loop links above let me know and I’ll add to the list.

How to get notified first of great music gear deals

Kyle — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 19:09:04 +0000

I’m always on the search for music gear that I want/need/lust after. I also have nowhere close to the amount of money I need to get the gear I thirst after. Craigslist is an obvious place to start when looking for local gear that people are trying to part with. The problem is so are thousands of other people in your area so the chances of you searching just at the right time to score the right gear at the right price aren’t all that great. Enter Craigslist RSS feeds.

1. Search in Craigslist for whatever specific gear you’re looking for

2. Copy RSS feed for search criteria

3. Add it to your RSS reader of choice

You can see that I have a few saved searches and I check everyday to see if any new items come up. I’m usually first to respond when they do. Although now maybe a few more Phoenix people are hip to Craigslist RSS feeds and I have some competition on my hands.

In any case this is a great way to score good deals. Happy shopping.

8 steps to configure Ableton with loop and vocal cue tracks

Kyle — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 17:36:08 +0000

A vocal cue track is an audio track set to a click, and usually ran along side of a loop, that is sent to your in ear monitors only and serves as a helper track, guiding you inside your arrangement. The primary purpose is to keep the band in sync with the arrangement and is especially important when using loops. If you get off the loop disaster can come quick and hard.

You can create a vocal cue track in your audio recording software of choice. What I do is just import my loop to GarageBand, create a new vocal cue track and record along side the loop, then just export the vocal cue track by itself. If you are running integrated clicks inside your loop, that is panning a click in the left channel with the loop in the right, then you’d just add the vocal cue track to the left click channel as well. I don’t do this because I use Ableton and it handles my click track dynamically which gives me more flexibility. Once you have a loop track and/or vocal cue track here’s what you do in Ableton, this is a complete tutorial of running loops and vocal cue tracks in Ableton.

1. In Session View add your loop track to the Audio channel

2. Add additional Audio Channel for vocal cue track

3. Add vocal cue track to accompanying loop “scene”

4. Set launch tempo for scene

5. Set proper audio out channels for click, loop and vocal cue tracks

Click on the image below to see it in full size. This diagram shows a 3 song set configured.

6. Turn on the click track

Pay no attention to the BPM counter next to the click track, it will change when you launch from the Master launch tempo.

7. Configure loop audio tracks for proper playback

Here is where some complication comes in. You can enable warping so you can do creative things with tempo, also with dynamically repeating portions of the song, key changes and other nifty things. I will show you both methods below. If you have a loop that you aren’t doing any dynamic repeating, key changes or tempo changes, you basically just want to play the track as is and play along, then do this for both the loop and vocal cue track(click images for full size):

If you have a track that needs warping you do something like I’ve done here for Gloria track. I am modulating the track up 1 full step:

8. And finally…launch the track

You are off and running with loop and/or vocal cue tracks. Let me know if you have any questions on this, if you found this useful please consider tweeting, linking to it on your blog, stumbling, digging…all those links are below. Good luck!

How to sync two live bands

Kyle — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 15:00:17 +0000

Bryan Nelson at Vertical Resonator recently did a post showing how his church actually syncs two live bands in 2 different rooms for their worship service. He leads worship at Topeka Bible Church and is really doing some great creative stuff. The two bands play the same set, at the exact same time in 2 different rooms and are forced to do this due to the bleed through in the rooms they are in. It’s a really awesome and interesting setup. Here’s the full diagram showing the setup.

How to transpose a loop in Reason

Kyle — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:53:17 +0000

I receive a lot of questions and requests for transposing my loops so I thought I might as well give a tutorial on how it’s done. It’s really quite simple to do in Reason, so let’s get started. This tutorial assumes you have Reason and have opened some project.

1. Select pitched midi notes

You want to select all the pitched midi notes, you do not need or want to select non-pitched midi notes like drum kits or percussion instruments. For those changing the midi note actually changes the instrument. So usually what I’ll do is organize my project so that non-pitched instruments are all at the bottom or top to make selecting all the others quite easy.

After drawing a box around all your midi notes it should look something like this:

2. Set the semi-tones in Tool Window

In the Tool Window click the “Tools” menu item. Then set the semi-tone adjustment you want to make. A semi-tone is a half step. So if you want to raise the key a full step you’d set the semi-tones to 2, if you want to lower the key 2 full steps you’d set the semi-tones to -4. A semi-tone level of 0 would be no adjustment, it’s where you are currently.

3. Click apply

Now all that’s left is clicking Apply and you’re all set.

How to create your own click track in Garage Band

Kyle — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 01:42:47 +0000

I created a screencast to show you just how easy it is to create your own click tracks in Garage Band. You might also be interested in my post on an OSX BPM widget that lets you tap out the BPM for songs in your iTunes library. You can click through to the video on Vimeo to see it in HD where you can make out the menu options a bit better.

How to create your own click track in Garage Band from Our Rising Sound on Vimeo.

How do you send a click track to monitors and not mains?

Kyle — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 18:14:34 +0000

Micah D. sent in this question on the “How to introduce click tracks to your band” post.

How do I put the click track through monitors [and] the loop … through the main speakers?

Good question. The goal is to get the loop playing through the mains and available to monitor mixes but the click only in monitors and not through the mains. Getting the loop to play through the mains is just like getting any signal to the mains so I’ll assume that part needs no explanation and focus on getting a click isolated in monitor mixes and not mains. There are a couple ways to do this, I’ll start with the best and most flexible way that I know of.

Route the click signal to the board on an isolated channel. How exactly you do this depends on what is generating your click. In my case I take the left channel from my audio interface which carries the click signal generated by Ableton Live. The right channel carries the loop signal. Ableton makes it easy to split your click signal. In my upcoming posts on how to create your own click tracks I’ll show how to go about doing this.
Take the click channel’s fader all the way down. This of course turns it off in the main house mix.
Use your pre-fade aux sends on the board to control monitor levels. In order for your monitors to pickup the click with the fader all the way down these sends must be on a pre-fade send. That basically means that the fader doesn’t come into play at all in the aux send level. Post-fade takes into account where the fader is at.

Wikipedia does a better job at explaining pre/post fade aux sends:

The Auxiliary send routes a split of the incoming signal to an auxiliary bus which can then be used with external devices. Auxiliary sends can either be pre-fader or post-fader, in that the level of a pre-fade send is set by the Auxiliary send control, whereas post-fade sends depend on the position of the channel fader as well. Auxiliary sends can be used to send the signal to an external processor such as a reverb, which can then be routed back through another channel or designated auxiliary returns on the mixer. These will normally be post-fader. Pre-fade auxiliary sends can be used to provide a monitor mix to musicians onstage, this mix is thus independent of the main mix.

What to watch out for?

You want to listen for channel bleed through where your click is still audible in the house even though the fader is all the way down. We recently had this issue and the cause, besides the board being to blame, is how hot a signal was being sent to the board. The click channel was clipping, so we fixed our gain structure and brought it down a lot and that helped our bleed.

Other options: In ear monitor pack Mix-In

Another way of doing this is using the Mix-In input on your in ear monitor packs. Most in ear monitoring packs have a 1/4″ in. input for mixing in some auxillary signal. You could use a multi-channel headphone amp to carry the click signal and then take the 1/4″ in. outs on each channel to all your monitor packs.

This isn’t a great way of doing this if not for complexity sake then for the cabling mess, but maybe if you had limited aux sends on your board this could come in handy.

I hope that helps.

How to introduce click tracks to your band

Kyle — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 18:11:48 +0000

Why use a click?

I don’t want to assume we all know and appreciate the benefits of a click so I figured I’d start here. A click insures your band plays a song in the correct time and keeps your band in the correct time through the duration of the song. Without using a click it’s very easy to mess up both, either you start the song too slow or fast or you speed up and slow down in the middle of the song. Additionally, now that your band is all synced to perfect time you can use loops or visual effects like a timed lyric presentation.

How do you start using a click?

1. Drummer must get comfortable

If your drummer has never played with a click or metronome before this can be a difficult transition. You’ll quickly discover how good or bad your time is. Some drummers have a great internal clock and are just naturally able to keep great time. Others it takes a lot of practice with a click to stay in time. So first step would be some individual work with the drummer to make sure he’s comfortable and able to play with a click.

2. Monitoring setup

Monitoring requirements will vary greatly depending on factors like if you’re going to use loops, use timed visual effects, use click cued intros, etc… Some bands use in ears for all musicians so they can hear clicks and cues, others only have some players/singers with in ears. Quite simply the goal is to send the click to isolated(in ears or headphone) monitors for whichever players/singers need it and keeping it out of the main house mix so the congregation doesn’t hear it.

At the very minimum the drummer obviously needs the click in their in ears/headphones. The rest of the band would just have to follow the drummer closely and stay on his time because he can’t come off the click. This may be a major adjustment for bands that are used to speeding up(unknowingly) and the drummer typically sped up with them, but that wouldn’t be the case anymore.

For that reason I would strongly suggest the drummer and band leader have the click in their monitor. That will really help stabilize the band time wise. Even in this case you still would have musicians and singers with no click which can get tricky if that musician or singer is performing without any drum/band leader accompaniment. They could easily get off time, so what ends up happening is your drummer has to keep time on stage with the sticks and that just stinks and could ruin the vibe.

So we’re left with the optimal solution which is everyone in the band on in ears, everyone who needs the click has the option to have it sent to their monitor mix. This is the setup my band uses and it’s fantastic. We have quite a few songs where we all come in on 1, vocals and band. We’re able to hit these intros with no problem and without stick hits or other distracting cues. All our cues are isolated from the congregation and we know just where we are in a song.

3. Phase in

Start simply and slowly. Getting comfortable playing to a click takes some time and depending on the skill level of the drummer can take a looong time. Use a click in practice for a while before you start using it live.

Later this week I’ll post on various methods for creating click tracks and playing them live.

How to setup your Mac laptop for live audio

Kyle — Tue, 16 Dec 2008 18:20:08 +0000

This site talks a lot of using loops in worship and I wanted to take a minute and talk about how to setup your laptop for playing any kind of audio live off your Mac. This posts focuses on mac because if you are relying on a windows machine to play any kind of live audio then you’ve already violated rule #1 which is:

When using a computer for any important, enjoyable or useful purpose make sure it’s a Mac.

If you’re still reading I’ll assume you haven’t violated rule #1 and congratulate you on your complete salvation. The 7 steps below will make sure that only your intended audio will be played on not any system alerts, make sure your system is isolated and configure display settings. It won’t get into specific application settings or audio interface settings. I’ll dive into those in separate posts for a specific application. This is a general post for all apps running on a Mac.

1. Quit all non-essential applications

Make sure you “quit” and not close.

2. Turn off Wi-Fi (no network connection)

If your machine has a network connection all sorts of background processes will fire, like MobileMe syncing, Time Machine backups, etc… You don’t want any CPU diverted from your audio apps.

3. Turn off system audio alerts

You don’t want any audio sent to any speaker set that isn’t coming from your main audio app. Goto System Preferences and select Sound.

Uncheck all 3 system alerts options.

Even if you have your system alerts selected to play through internal speakers instead of your audio interface, you still don’t want these alerts to play.

4. Set display settings

You don’t want your display going into a screen saver or sleeping during a live performance. Set your screensaver to never turn on by going to System Preferences and clicking “Desktop & Screen Saver”.

Now set your Energy Saving settings so your display doesn’t just shut off.

Remember to set your display settings back after you’re done performing so you don’t kill your display. You need to have a screen saver and the energy saver on normally.

5. Turn off Bluetooth

Another step that isolates your machine from other devices. You don’t want file transfer requests popping up in the middle of a set.

6. Disable remote controls

A common trick to play on someone with a Mac is to mess up their presentation with the apple remote. If you need to use your apple remote live than pair the remote so only your remote will work. Otherwise if you don’t need it, just easiest to turn it off.

Go into System Preferences and click on Security.

Disable remotes.

7. Configure application to use your audio interface

There are a lot of audio interfaces out there to use with your laptop. Just make sure in your application’s settings that you configure it to use your audio interface.

At this point you should be safe from all unexpected sounds, connections from other devices, malicious remote jokes and unexpected display screen savers and sleeping.

Him that pisseth on thy guitar is blessed!

Kyle — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 16:30:50 +0000

One of my favorite local pastors is Pastor Steven L. Anderson of Faithful Word Baptist Church. It was love at first sight when I read their inviting tagline, “Don’t expect anything contemporary or liberal.” I mean that’s powerful, warm and loving all at the same time! Except I have noticed they do use some contemporary things like blogs, You Tube, websites, cameras, microphones etc… Pastor Anderson of course is best known for his “pisseth against the wall” sermon, but is quickly gaining notoriety for his guitar instructional videos. Pastor Anderson does make certain to explain that they do not play any guitar in their services, but if you find yourself in a more appropriate guitar playing situation like out in the woods where there is no organ you might find playing hymns on acoustic handy(I’m not making this up, just watch).

Worship leaders make sure and use this video as a mentoring tool for those up and coming worship leaders. You can thank me and Pastor Anderson later.

How to properly use simile in worship songwriting

Kyle — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 19:25:25 +0000

sim·i·le
A figure of speech in which two essentially unlike things are compared, often in a phrase introduced by like or as, as in “How like the winter hath my absence been” or “So are you to my thoughts as food to life” (Shakespeare).

A powerful tool of writing and one not much used in modern worship is simile. Metaphor is more commonly uses in modern worship songwriting and we’ll discuss that later, but for now I want to focus on simile. Psalms is full of simile which is no surprise since much of it was originally written as music. Simile helps us associate an abstract idea or theological view with a concrete illustration which helps us define and explain the abstract. Quite simply, an effective simile helps us understand a big idea by comparing it to an idea we all are very familiar with. Simile can also be purely poetic where the object being compared doesn’t require further explanation but the writer chooses to for lyrical clarity, imagery, style and/or conformity. Ideally both should be accomplished.

Let’s summarize things a simile should accomplish and then we’ll look at some examples.

Bring clarity to a big idea or theological view through comparison of a concrete idea or object
Poetically describe a topic so a congregation can sing the same truth through different lenses
Provide a fresh view of an old idea or truth that helps the congregation sing in spirit and truth
Support song topic

Things a simile should not accomplish:

Create confusion through inaccurate, inappropriate, incomplete comparison
Create multiple avenues of interpretation due to an overly vague, or abstract comparison. We should be singing the same truth not reaching different conclusions because you chose a really vague and inaccurate way to describe something.
Use so many fresh views that nobody is quite sure what is being described anymore. Similes should support the song topic, not distract from it.

Let’s look at an intriguing example in Psalms 39:11.

You rebuke and discipline men for their sin; you consume their wealth(beauty) like a moth– each man is but a breath(vanity). Selah

This is great usage because it paints such a vivid picture of how the wicked’s beauty and wealth are consumed. A moth eats bit by bit, leaving holes as it eats. David is a little preoccupied with his enemies not being crushed and dealt with as he’d like. So David talks a lot about this topic and this line does a lot to describe how God is working through David and helps describe an abstract idea of God consuming wealth with a concrete idea of how a moth consumes.

It was really challenging finding modern examples of good simile but I found some great ones after the jump.

“Grace like a river, is falling down on me” -Delirious (Grace Like a River – World Service)

Grace being one of the biggest abstract theological points you can tackle in scripture, Martin Smith uses a river to describe grace’s impact, origin and behavior. A river can be pictured a 1,000 different ways which helps everyone relate to the lyric, but it all points to the same truth. Everyone will agree on a river’s impact, origin and behavior. Amos 5:24 uses similar imagery to describe justice and righteousness. Speaking of grace…

“Let thy goodness like a fetter, bind my wandering heart to thee” -Robert Robinson

Josh did a great job in his exposition of this line. A fetter is a shackle placed on feet to keep you from moving. Using that imagery to describe our desire to be tied to God’s heart is amazingly powerful, effective and beautiful. If there’s a perfect example of how to use simile, this is it. Kevin Prosch uses similar language in one of his songs…

“My innocence and youth, I poured them out like water”…”like horses that are yoked, to the chariots of kings. hook me up to your heart God, never to be free” -Kevin Prosch (Come Down – Palanquin)

A great example of not only using unlike objects in comparison but seemingly antithetical objects of comparison is John Mark McMillan’s usage in How He Loves.

“He is jealous for me, loves like a hurricane I am a tree, bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy.” -John Mark McMillan (How He Loves – The Songs Inside the Sounds of Breaking Down)

What a crazy way to describe God’s love. But the supporting lines in this song paints a picture that is not only beautiful, but incredibly descriptive and accurate. How powerless we are and dependent upon God’s mercy.

One more example for the road.

You shine like the sun in all its strength. -Violet Burning (Like the Sun – Strength)

Now for the fun part, let’s look at some of the worst example of simile. I hate to pick on rap, I love me some hip hop every now and then, but they are the most violent offenders of the rules and dignity of the English language, it gets laughable. Exhibit A

“Like Kathy Lee needs Regis that’s how I need Jesus” -Kanye West (Jesus Walks – The College Dropout)

Talk about an underwhelming comparison. Kathy Lee doesn’t need Regis all that much apparently, she left the show. As much as I can’t stand this line for it’s failure in accuracy or poetry, I love it for it’s comic relief. Kanye is a funny guy and I bounce to his jams for the most part. But nobody spins bad simile like R Kelly

“We be high just like them weeds” -R Kelly (Ghetto Queen)

Maybe they have some really tall weeds in the hood, but where I come from that’s just a bad descriptive illustration. There’s a lot of things higher than weeds.

“Now it’s like Murder She Wrote once I get you out them clothes, privacy is on the door…” -R Kelly (Ignition – Chocolate Factory)

I could type out the remaining 2 minutes of lyrics in this song but this line never EVER resolves. How any of it is like Murder She Wrote I’ll never know.

Our Rising Sound » how to

How a record is pressed (Video)

[via StudioDog]

Related posts

Video: How to use Reason’s Spider Audio Merger/Splitter

Related posts

Video: How to create the perfect fadeout in Reason

Related posts

A beginner’s guide to loops

Some sites where you can download loops:

Related posts

How to get notified first of great music gear deals

1. Search in Craigslist for whatever specific gear you’re looking for

2. Copy RSS feed for search criteria

3. Add it to your RSS reader of choice

Related posts

8 steps to configure Ableton with loop and vocal cue tracks

1. In Session View add your loop track to the Audio channel

2. Add additional Audio Channel for vocal cue track

3. Add vocal cue track to accompanying loop “scene”

4. Set launch tempo for scene

5. Set proper audio out channels for click, loop and vocal cue tracks

6. Turn on the click track

7. Configure loop audio tracks for proper playback

8. And finally…launch the track

Related posts

How to sync two live bands

Related posts

How to transpose a loop in Reason

1. Select pitched midi notes

2. Set the semi-tones in Tool Window

3. Click apply

Related posts

How to create your own click track in Garage Band

Related posts

How do you send a click track to monitors and not mains?

What to watch out for?

Other options: In ear monitor pack Mix-In

Related posts

How to introduce click tracks to your band

Why use a click?

How do you start using a click?

1. Drummer must get comfortable

2. Monitoring setup

3. Phase in

Related posts

How to setup your Mac laptop for live audio

1. Quit all non-essential applications

2. Turn off Wi-Fi (no network connection)

3. Turn off system audio alerts

4. Set display settings

5. Turn off Bluetooth

6. Disable remote controls

7. Configure application to use your audio interface

Related posts

Him that pisseth on thy guitar is blessed!

Related posts

How to properly use simile in worship songwriting

Related posts