Dreams Of Noise

Release The Unreleased is a bunch of things I've written and recorded over the past few years, including a few commissioned songs, a couple of FuMP releases, a couple of traditional Irish drinking songs... it's an eclectic mix.

I'll have the lyrics, graphics for the CD label and the inserts and such, up as quickly as I can -- I hope tonight, certainly something by Friday -- but you can go listen to, and download, the whole album for free right now. (It's another pay-what-you-want deal.) (Subscribers -- don't pay. It's already in your folder, along with something else I think you'll like.) I hope you enjoy it!

So here's the deal.

I'm not in any danger of being thrown out on the street or anything, but I have got a few pending things that I need some cash for -- dental work, GenCon, stuff like that.

So I'm working frantically to get some new concerts up, and to finish a couple of paid-for projects so I can get back to other projects, including, y'know, long-overdue new albums.

First up is my concert at ConTemporal this year. And I think I've done a pretty good job of spiffing up the package. Best possible audio. Lyrics and notes all over the individual song pages. All the JPGs for the CD, tray, and insert. (Subscribers, I'm uploading the MP3s right now, and later this evening I'll upload a disk image for you, already registered with Gracenote [sans cover art -- that's an ass-pain].)

Aaaaaand it's free. You don't have to pay a thing.

What's the catch?

None. I'm gonna start putting ALL my concerts up on BandCamp that way, and update things on tomsmithonline.com soon as well. The concerts will be free.

Unless you'd like to pay me something for them, to help support an artist.

(I repeat: Subscribers, this is already in your folder or will be within about fifteen minutes. You're good, and thanks again.)

Anyway. It was a pretty damn good concert. We had lots of fun, and a bunch of people hadn't heard my stuff, and we laughed and sang and et cetera and I even improv'd a song about a lady carrying on a conversation right near the stage, and I think managed to not offend anyone or come off looking like a jerk.

48 minutes of Tomedy (... okay, that word dies a quick death starting nnnNOW), free for nothin'.

Thanks to you all.

At least until Saturday. Anne and I think it rocks -- good voice acting, fast-moving tight script, good animation, Black Widow's cheekbones -- what else do you want?

Toontrack has released EZdrummer Lite and EZmix 2 Lite for free. (You do have to sign up for a Toontrack account if you don't already have one.) The authorization process is a bit of a pain. Available for both PC and Mac.

And, if you have an iDevice, especially an iPad, you should try Zap Guitar, a free app that lets you "strum" a "guitar". It's pretty cool. (Although not quite as cool as its big brother, Songful, that comes with a huge database of songs. But that app costs $2.99.)

Any other cool software we should know about?

I'll post later about ConFusion (short form: excellent!), but I wanted to take the chance to emphasize something I mentioned in the Home Recording panel.

I said that the only real hardware you need to start with is a good microphone. (Decent headphones and speakers are also important, but you can get those later if you're really working on the cheap.) And I suggested that Musician's Friend is a good place to look, especially their Stupid Deal of the Day.

Which, today, is a decent-quality Audio Technica USB microphone for fifty bucks, half-price.

There were also a few cheap and free programs I pointed out:

• First, of course, is Audacity, which may be enough for all your basic recording needs and certainly is enough for all your audio processing needs.
• For those who would like to quickly lay out a song, but aren't ready yet to shell out for Band In A Box, the inexpensive and quite handy all-MIDI auto-accompaniment program ChordPulse does a nice job, and also has a free version.
• Sony's free Acid Xpress is great for beginners, as long as you don't need to use third-party VST plugins.
• Open Labs' StageLight is easy to figure out and surprisingly full-featured for only $9.99.
• KVR Audio is the place to go for news about new products, forums with lots of information, product sales, tech advice, and a fairly nice community of musicians from around the world.
• Even more tech advice and gentle hand-holding can be found at AudioTuts+ and The Recording Revolution.
• Some of the best information on the indie music business can be found at IndieGuide.com.
• Last but not least, there are many sources for excellent free VST effect and instrument plugins. Some of my favorites include:
  • Camel Audio, where you can get the Camel Crusher effect and the fantastic Alchemy Player
  • Variety of Sound (especially epicVerb, Thrillseeker, and TesslaPRO)
  • u-he (mostly commercial products, but two superb free synths, Zebralette and TyrellN6
  • HG Fortune, your one-stop shop for all things electronica and ambient -- he's got a lot of free versions of his synths, and even the full-price versions are pretty cheap
  • Okay, I lied -- depending on the type of ambient you like, you may need some of Krakli's stuff, especially Harm, Gargoyle, and Cygnus
  • And, the Antress Modern series of effects plugins is constantly expanding.

Any other cool audio stuff we need to know about?

The Amazon Cloud, specifically. For those of you looking for an absolutely free gift for yourself, it's not a bad day to check out Amazon's selection of free MP3 albums and singles. You can download 'em right away, or stream 'em to your various devices.

I'll have a few other musical freebies/cheapies of note in the next couple of days.

Any particular online freebies we should know about?

I use lots of different music tools. Just as there are game companies that I tend to buy from en masse, e.g., Popcap, there are certain music software companies that just do most everything right -- solid products, solid support, excellent sound. Cockos, Cakewalk, PG Music, Camel Audio, MeldaProduction, XLN Audio (the lameness of Addictive Keys notwithstanding).

And IK Multimedia.

For reasons that escape me, IK has something of a bad rep. I have no idea why -- I've used SampleTank and Amplitube for years, and I've never had a problem with software nor web site. Their service has always been excellent, they've really streamlined their product registration, and -- by far the most important of all -- their products sound great. If there is a flaw with their products, it's that you have to buy them on sale, because they've been way overpriced for a long time now.

Ahem.

IK has just overhauled their price structure. And come up with a couple of bundle deals that you simply cannot let pass.

Okay, actually, unless you fervently hate a stupid good deal on effects, you technically can let pass the really great deal, and just get the Total Workstation XL, which has some 43 GB of instruments for $299. Whoops, did I say $299? Until Oct. 31, that's $199.

But Total Studio 3 (normally $399 under new pricing) gives you all that plus Amplitube 3 (with the Metal and Jimi Hendrix expansions), the T-RackS 3 Deluxe effects suite, and Classic Studio Reverb, all for $249 until Oct. 31 -- that is, an extra fifty bucks.

If you create music on a PC or Mac, you really should look at the Total Studio 3 deal. Fortunately, you have a month and a half to do so before the price goes up.

What computer noisemakers do you like? I'll throw in a couple more, just for fun -- and best of all, they all are free or have free versions!

• the ambient music synths of H.G. Fortune
• TyrellN6 by u-he (definitely check out the rest of their stuff)
• Applied Acoustic Systems' Swatches (e-mail sign-up required). I love AAS's stuff, but you have to get it on sale.
• Variety of Sound (another great bunch of free effects)

Busy busy busy:

• The past several days have been filled with Real Life (my sister has a Master's Degree -- IN SCIENCE!), and I've been delayed on finishing up some music. Ideally, I should have a ton of stuff -- literally, two or three new concert sets and at least four new tracks -- by the end of the week. Thanks for your patience, subscribers.
• Thanks, too, for everyone waiting for me to update the main web site. That's also coming this week.
• And I've got a couple of commission songs going. 'Sfunny, but this time just four months ago I would've been -- was -- emotionally paralyzed, unable to do jack on anything. Now, I'm just warming up.
• The extra-spiffy free Piano One VST/AU for PC and Mac has been updated to version 1.2. They've improved CPU usage, and added a preset system.
• If you want a hit of instant nostalgia, and have nine or ten hours (or days) to spare, check out the online archive of Radio Shack catalogs. I used to go through those like I go through the Micro Center and Sweetwater catalog nowadays, and it's wonderful remembering all that stuff. It's a fantastic resource. And you will look at the prices for computers and parts -- especially hard drives -- and laugh and laugh and laugh until you cry as you remember that you paid those prices back then.
• Last but no way least, Steve Jackson's Ogre Kickstarter has four days to go. The original $20,000 goal has been smashed to jelly; they're currently well over $600K. If they get to $700K, SJ Games will launch another Kickstarter for a new edition of Car Wars. They've added donation levels for people to get cool T-shirts for this.

Anything else? Open thread.

For everyone using the Audacity open-source audio editor, it's now officially at 2.0. For everyone not using it, it's a superb free editor for Windows, Mac, and Gnu/Linux, with a smallish download (<20 MB for the full Windows installer, <8 MB for the .zip), and the newest release squashes bugs and adds new features.

The Creation Kit (the newest version of the venerable Elder Scrolls Construction Set) hasn't even been released yet, and there are already well over a hundred mods to try for the PC version of the game at Skyrim Nexus. May I recommend a few?

• FXAA Post Process Injector will improve your graphics quality amazingly. I installed the version with "Lower Saturation", and a touch of the Pause key shows you the difference between the original (lighter and blurrier) and the new (darker and sharper). There are also a number of profiles people have posted to get their preferred visual quality, lower the hit to frame rate, etc. -- you just have to replace one file with their file.
• Display time on loading screen puts a little clock on the load screen so you have some idea of what you should have been doing in the real world before you started playing Skyrim.
• There are already a number of retextures, including (of course) a few nudes. I won't even begin to suggest which ones you might like or not. But Enhanced Blood Textures and Enhanced Night Skyrim are very cool.