In the last couple days I started a quick project in Sonar just to get back into things and play around a bit. Came up with this little idea i'm working on.
Troy had let me borrow his old Ibanez guitar to play around with and get in tune. I opened up Sonar and just screwed around with some plugins, noteably this really cool feedback looper I was messing around with. I laid down a couple takes and panned them wide in stereo and that started the track.
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| What the project looks like so far.... |
I wasn't sure what I wanted to do but I liked the idea of a pulse so I immediately looked for something bassy I could use. There's a few synths I had in mind but I also wanted to play around with sound design so I kept that in mind as i built the track. I played around with a bunch of synths for a few hours and then proceeded to tweak and dial in sounds until i landed on a couple that i liked, i simply played a single sustained note and some really cool ambient drones laid right over the guitar track I had, gave it life.
Since I hadn't done it in a long time, I started dropping some buses in to the project and using aux sends to create some alternate sounds with and start mangling up the ambiances I had started. The guitar tracks were fairly simple and got old quick so after the idea of the feedback loop had run its course the with the regular bass pulsing on, I created an aux send for the pulse to go to a bus called Pulse where I put some plugins called Betabugs Chorrosive and then into Absynth 5 to get this really cool sounding distorted heartbeat effect out of the bass pulse.
The other bus I created for an aux send was for one of the synth elements called Synth Drone which fills in for the guitar with the muddy distorted mid-range droning and the high end metal tones that come in and out throughout the rest of the mix.
I moved on in the piece quickly to piano and strings. I used the piano sound to try and play around with the chord Ideas I have in my head that I can hear the strings playing. I still have some work to do on it as I hear some other changes with suspended 7ths that I can't quite get down yet. I also fully intend on expanding on this idea and take it somewhere else.
I hope you enjoyed this quick mix. The strings are still just a bit harsh thought i did want the more intimate close feel, I used several Divisi sections, when layered with the piano make the symphonic components feel separate in the mix from the electronic sound-scape.
I didn't want the typical "LARGE" hall sound but that Sony sound-stage feel from a quieter more direct passage with strings. I used a subtle reverb on the whole symphony bus and it helped blend and marry the strings to the track without creating a tail or smearing the details of the string movements.
It's actually been really fun writing this piece with all the Divisi sections and a real learning experience. These are all just legato sections being played so it's actually fairly easy to get through.
My next phase for the piece is to move into a more symphonic movement that keeps the pulse coming and going to pay homage to the track, with some of the dystopian electronic elements sprinkled throughout for the original flavor as the movement turns more action oriented. I can definitely imagine some type of spy scene of the Bourne supremacy likes or even Body of Lies, modern techno covert turns action.
Divisi (interesting article for reference) is a really cool way of dividing up a complex combination of notes to be played amongst the group of musicians. Especially strings which often account for a majority of the instruments in a modern or classical symphony. Usually these softer passages require the attention during a production recording to get in closer to the instruments with close or section mics, so you get more of the natural phenomena of the instrument (the sound of the bow scraping across the string producing a hissing or scratching sound) which is often diminished when larger groups play together, i.e.: the "chorus" effect. Breaking down the whole group of violins (1st and 2nd) into smaller sections and having them play the passage this way allows to get the softer dynamics and more intimate feel (granted the close/section microphones are available in the sample libraries).
The whole thing inspires me in the way John Powell's work on Bourne Supremacy soundtrack meets something like Battlefield 3's score (which is very electronic ambient; very different from their previous works). Even a little bit of Alexandre DeSplat with the fusion of electronic (much cleaner) and symphonic in Syriana.
There's also something else to the space created in the sounds, all the dystopia electronic drone work going on with the glitches and panning effects, coupled with the heart beat and pulse, then this distant washed out piano comes in with a sparse melodic chord change which is met with an intimate and close string section. I'd like to know what everyone's thoughts are on the picture being painted here. Please feel free to leave comments, flaming remarks, doodles, power-point presentations, links to unrelated events, even cast your vote for American Idol, whatever you like! Just kidding, but please if you have feedback of any kind I absolutely love to hear it!
