'Night Thoughts' the making of

 

 

 

 

'Night Thoughts' idea came about from listening to Lofi girl at work in the background. I thought just for fun, over the weekend - and trying to stay away from  doomscrolling over things I have apparently little or no control about in world events. I thought it would be better for my spiritual and mental health to spend my time trying to write some music. 

This time I did something different than usual,
I set myself the task to < start and finish > <and upload > a tune
in one day. 

 

I started with an 80 Bpm drum pattern on LMMS

From this one beat, I made a few other similar ones with minor variation

 

 

 

The beats still needed something, so I found a drum loop to go underneath. I changed the tempo from 82 to 80.

Next I went through all the loops I had looking for a repetitive chord sequence (I also thought I'd not write a 'middle 8' for a change).

 

I found this one which I changed the tempo down to 80 Bpm.

And so the drums and chord sequence were beginning to build.
I still LMMS, a "free, open source, multiplatform digital audio workstation" as it does the work I ask of it for getting tunes started.

 

 

 

So after getting the beats and chords going, it needed a bass guitar.

My actual bass guitar is over at someones house, so I used a free midi VSTi bass, which is works well enough. Ample Bass PII Lite.

 

 

I played this with the midi keyboard and got it down in just  a few takes, as I wanted it to sound improvised, which it was, against the loops. 

So, here is some of the piano roll showing the notes

The tune was starting to sound more like a song with the natural bass runs.

Next I improvised a clean guitar track over it. LMMS doesn't record audio so, I want to another DAW to record it and fed it back into LMMS.

In LMMS I stacked on the FX. I haven't done this before, as LMMS is really for EDM and so I thought I'd try it out. 

 

 

 

 

 

Back into the DAW (Sonar Lite)

 It needed some juicy loops for atmosphere so I went to Looperman which is one of my favourite sites for loops, as it also is free. In return, I have uploaded a few guitar loops a few years back which appear to have been used well. ('eastperson' is my username there)

Anyway, I digress.

 

I searched in Loopeman through many different loops in A minor at 80 Bpm until I could compile a list of loops.

With these loops I cut and pasted, removed, split, deleted, added in again, walked away from, came back to for hours until I thought I should stop. It looked something like this:

 

Mastering and mixing isn't really my forte but I always just mix until it sounds good to my own ears (I'm not pretending to be professional). Finally, I use Ozone 8 in Audacity to give it more sparkle.

 

I could have gone on for days (which I usually do) but I stuck to finishing it and uploading it.

 

And so there it is.

 

Here is a short video putting it together:

 

 

 

 

There's a Place

 There's a Place

 

Original first version written sometime between 1984 and 1987 .

I dug it out from a cassette. I don't remember what inspired it? But the first chords are maybe similar to bands like Santana or America...or it could have been something else... I really don't remember? It's A to D-ish with a Latin feel

I wanted to revisit it.

 

I dug around and found the chords. They were actually much more complicated then I remembered.

 

 

 

Once I got the chords, it actually took me a very long time to work out the melody and instrumental part.I tried different combinations of sounds. Originally I wasn't going to use a lead guitar for the melody but the synth sounds were not cutting through, that's why you hear a mixture of sounds playing the melody. In the end, I was happy with the result.

 

 

Not in pure order but these are the chords I used, according to the scraps of paper I worked from:

A9       D2           A9     D2

A9          D2       A9      D2

 

F Major 7            C Major7

Eb    Dm

A major 7        C Major 7      F    Esus4    E


A9       D2           A9     D2

A9          D2       A9      D2

 

A major 7      D major 7

F              E minor

A Major 7     C Major 7      Fsus4   Esus4  E



D minor (bass e-eb-e)  E minor

D minor                E minor



Em  (bass e-f#-g) G

Em  (bass e-f#-g) G

Em

Some of the screenshots I took on the way:

I used LMMS to work on the melody and try out a LOT of different VSTi's

 

 

 

 

Here are some of the VSTi's and settings I kept:

I used a mixture of 'live' guitar through RP50 and Boss Delay pedal and also through Cakewalk's modelling guitars.

 

How's that? Boom.

 

 

'Love' the making of...

 

'Love' a fairly bold title, however, I didn't write the lyrics. they were written between 1000 and 2000 years back, so it stands the test of time :-)

 

Music: the tune started off with chords. The last tune I wrote was fairly dark and so I wanted to swing back to the better things. 

I was interested in the IV-V-III-VI pattern that is sometimes used in Japan. So I started with that and just took it to what sounded good to me, so chords came first. (I think it was F-G-Em-Am, that I tried first)

After that, I wrote a melody based on the C. Once again, just listening to it to see where it goes.

I checked my written notes and at some stage I was listening to this song - possibly trying to find a 'feel'  - not that my end product sounds anything like it, or anything as good as it. However, it shows the weird journey of the creative process:

Anyway, I decided to start with chords and melody on 2007 Tunafish software, as it is very simple and I can concentrated on writing. 

From there, I went to LMMS through a few versions and then to SONAR to clean it up. I also finally went through Audacity to add Ozone 8 mastering, normalizing and compression. 

The voice over is from the WEB Bible, 1 Corinthians 13 - the Love chapter. It is public domain. I only altered it slightly. The words are like a constitution or a strategic plan, something to keep coming back to daily: https://worldenglish.bible/

This is a short vid of the process between the end of 2022 and beginning of 2023

 

Making of Welcome to Reality

 The final video:

 

Yes, this is directly against the current moronic offensive war. There are always leaders in every country who are happy to sacrifice innocent people for their own ends to 'control' or 'regain power'. 

This is for those of us who just want to live simple lives.

Jesus speaking:

The Beatitudes

He said:

³ “Blessed are the poor in spirit,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
⁴ Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted.
⁵ Blessed are the meek,
    for they will inherit the earth.
⁶ Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
    for they will be filled.
⁷ Blessed are the merciful,
    for they will be shown mercy.
⁸ Blessed are the pure in heart,
    for they will see God.
⁹ Blessed are the peacemakers,
    for they will be called children of God.
¹⁰ Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

 

Thanks to Ghosthack for the vocals. Looperman for the drums and loops. I wrote and played the rest:

 

Making of Lightning Sky

 

This song started with the vocals from Ghosthack. Next I built a chord progression. In fact, I over built it and lost my way for a while. I eventually came back. i Added live instruments (bass, acoustic and electric guitars) and also used some samples from looperman for effect. 

I wanted to use the vocals and the lyrics to build the song from the singers point of view, while using the tools at my disposal.

 It took me a few months on and off to complete it. The most difficult task was to simplify it after over-orchestrating the chords.

 Video of some of the progression:

 Making electronic based music is no easier than any other writing. You still need to go through a process of shaping, chipping away and re-shaping.

 

For the music nerds, some of the VSTi's i used:

 

 

 

Thanks for having a look. Hope you got something out of it.

 

 

 

'Somehow' the making of

I follow a number of production posts, as I always like to keep learning. Ghosthack gave out a few acapellas recently and so, with gratitude, I was able to start with a few vocals this time (as I mostly do instrumentals). I always think in 'song' as I cut my teeth playing in dance bands. The end result is this: 

 

 

I wrote the chords and the hook using the 2007 Bram Bos Tunafish DAW (he still has a great output of Mac OS software if you want to look him up), however, I often find this a good starting point for writing a song, as it is very simple and I want to concentrate on what I am hearing and not get distracted by the DAW itself.

 

I was going to move it over to LMMS but skipped straight to Sonar Lite where I worked with it. 

 

The melody and the words really shaped the song for me. I hope you can listen through to the end as it rises and falls.

 

Here are some of the VSTi's I used to make it:

 

 

 

and of course the vocals:

The drum loops 140 Bpm and some of the background 'risers' and sounds all came from the kind people at looperman 

and a quick vid of these VSTis and then some of the sounds on Tunafish and Sonar after about 20 seconds

 

 

 

 

 

'Keep Walking' the making of

 Keep Walking

Though there is very little guitar in the end tune (above), it really started out as a loud guitar jam over a loop of E minor-D- C- D. I put the bass line together very quickly over the 'Amen Break' drum loop, as I was just hanging out for a guitar blast. I recorded it live and put it on my music FB page. I left it at that until a few months later when I re-found the bass line looking for other stuff. 

I set myself the goal to write a tune over a simple bass line, as I have a natural tenancy to overthink writing.

I actually enjoyed the parameters I put on myself and it led itself into a more electronic based tune. After I had written the electronics and the piano (and removed the 'Amen Break' and replaced it with a a different public domain beat), it become a different beast.

Finally, I could 'hear' a bass guitar playing the melody (probably from my 80's influences such as Joy Division, early The Cure and the song Blue Monday). I tried a number of different sounds, until I settled on a - highly compressed - and equalized bass line. Behind it, I also have a doubled it up in octaves to lift it our a bit more, though the octave line is a lot softer.

Compressor and Equalizer 

Same Bass Guitar I've been playing since the 1980's. Still booming.

Here are some of the background instruments (choir, onboard FX, organ Vstis) 

This video shows the progression (in short) of how the tune came together.

It rarely ends the way I start it, which is part of why I like making music. There are always a lot of unknown influences and paths that make the end tune.

Here is the 'making of' Keep Walking:

    

Here is the direct link to the making of video: https://youtu.be/D5DeqGT5YYY

Here is the link to my somewhat 'official' page, which I don't take too seriously, though you do get the end products of my work: https://www.youtube.com/c/TimOestmann/videos

Also

If you are interested:

I rarely collaborate (nowadays) but worked with UR Udoy on a tune he wrote in 2021: https://youtu.be/8psjaUPv5O