snoozefestaudio

58F with rain and thunder out there today.

Couldn't stay up past midnight last night. Woke up at 6AM unwillingly, and feeling depressed for no reason... panic attack... rode it out... finally fell back to sleep at 7AM, and slept well because the storm rolled in. Got back up at 12:30PM... back to normal!

I feel like sleep deprivation/drastic changes to sleep cycles should either be illegal or require hazzard pay or something.

But at any rate, I'm drinking my coffee now, and watching it rain, and soon I'll get the car and take it over to Benton Auto. Then walk back here, likely with an umbrella.

------------{=0=}------------

2:04PM

Okay! I went out to get some beer, brought it back here, then went over to Benton Auto and dropped the car off.

No rain on the walk back, but high winds.

Hopefully AutoZone gave me the right parts, and this all goes smoothly today!

------------{=0=}------------

2:24PM

They just called to say the break pads are wrong! He said they're for a 6 cylinder.

I specifically put in my car's VIN into the AutoZone app before searching for the pads, so this is on AutoZone.

So now the Benton guy is gonna go buy the right ones and this whole job's gonna cost more than expected... goddammit!

Another case of professionals screwing up their only jobs... AutoZone!

------------{=0=}------------

5:04PM

I picked up the car about half an hour ago. Final price: $220.00.

Nice to have them working again! With as little driving as I do, they'll be good for another two years!

Still a bit steamed I'll have to return the other break pads. Could've done that today, but I want to catch up with the singles!

I did my fixes to the Miss Fortune mix. Exported a new main music stem with the piano (and it's convolver impulse) very low in the mix. Then I exported a piano stem by itself with no convolver impulse.

Doubling that new piano stem in Audacity, 40L/60R with 70ms lag sounds perfect!

I then redid the compression for the outro vocals... leaving the belted "whoas" uncompressed to give them a little more volume and bite.

The result sounds great so I exported as 16bit WAV. That WAV will be uploaded to SoundCloud, but I also threw it into OpenShot to create a video version for YouTube with the splash graphic as the video and the TwinCat logo fading in at the end.

I then got the Beta2 of Reavis and created a new video for that, because YouTube only has the Beta1, which was not mixed right.

So in a moment here, I'm gonna upload the vids to YouTube and then the WAV to SoundCloud.

------------{=0=}------------

8:03PM

Okay!.. it's been a busy night here in 1106, with the rain and thunder returning at sundown, in intermittent passes that continue as I write!

patrick_melody · 26-12-MISS-FORTUNE-BETA1-R

Watch on YouTube

The original version of Reavis on YouTube (which only had 25 views) was deleted. Revais-Beta2-YTR.MP4 was uploaded to take it's place, and then Miss-Fortune-Beta1-YTR.MP4 was uploaded next... and a YT playlist was created for them.

Next I uploaded Miss-Fortune-Beta1-R.WAV to Soundcloud... and after a vetting, was allowed to opt-in to the First-Fans algorithmic, week-long promotion at 7:35PM.

I then created a new TwinCat blog post to announce the release, with embeds of both the SoundCloud, and YouTube versions, right after the opener.

This new blog post establishes a template I'll use from here on out, where it starts with a theory-query generated description, followed by song history, technical challenges, a fun fact, and then a, "what's next?" before signing off.

Back at SoundCloud, I put Miss Fortune into my Spotlight section, along with Reavis.

And then, in the "description" for the SoundCloud track, I put a copyright first, then a notice to "check the COMPANION BLOG in my profile for more info on this song," before listing the lyrics.

--<>--

Also did the dishes, while waiting for different things to upload.

--<>--

Now that there are two beta releases, it feels like the whole campaign has finally taken shape!

Tomorrow I'll need to finally run the "Sunday errands" on a Tuesday, and do the laundry and soforth. But I should still have time to get a start on the beta mix of, "Our Cold Feet."

But there's no rush, because OCF won't be due out until Miss Fortune's had it's time to find whatever plays it can get on SC.

------------{=0=}------------

THE DAYS CONCLUSION

After some tight budgeting through FEB, MAR, and early APR, I was able to isolate a paycheck to use for car repairs, and today successfully got the front brakes redone, with only the one glitch of now having brake pads to return to AutoZone.

After the sleep deprived, April Crunch, mandated by the annual Senior Lock-in this past weekend, I was able today, to regain psycho-physio-emotional-temporal normalcy, and not only get the 2nd beta release out there, but wash the dishes!

I've still got tomorrow to get a start on Cold Feet, and then over the work week, April will turn to May on Friday.

I'll do building checks this coming weekend once more, perhaps getting a bit more done on Cold Feet.

Next Tuesday will bring us the final play-total for Miss Fortune's week of algorithmic push, and also a paycheck to pay the May rent, and May car payment, at the last minute.

And... I'll surely do a theory-query about Cold Feet between now and then!

So stay tuned!.. and I'll be back on Saturday with an update about how Miss Fortune is faring!

°¦}

Melody Manor Maintenance

Twincat Studios Music Videos

._.

55F and overcast today.

I made it to bed by 11PM last night, and slept pretty soundly. Made to the building by 7AM, only to find that Tom had shown up at 6AM... so he could act like I was lazy? I dunno.

I was told 7AM, the parent volunteers didn't start rolling until 8AM.

Either way, in four hours I filled out both the steps, and activity rings on my watch... which usually takes about six hours on a normal day.

Now I'm just disoriented.

--<>--

Miss Fortune's a day or two away from release, but I did spend some time over the past few nights trying something new with DeepSeek. I gave them a detailed description of Miss Fortune's rhythm structure, and it's chord structure, including the melody.

Not as a substitute for the "recording" but just to better understand the theory that underpins the song. Because... i'm a rote musician, and... what the hell is my music?

About Miss Fortune's beat, they said...

Kick: 1, 2, 3+, 4+ (so kick accents the “ands” of 3 and 4)

Snare: only beat 3 (one per measure, dry, solid)

Bass/guitar: emphasizing beat 2 and the “and” of beat 3 (3+)

Result: Snare on 3 sits between the two guitar/bass accents (beat 2 and 3+).

That’s essentially a one-drop snare (Jamaican / reggae influence) mixed with a syncopated kick pattern that’s almost like a half-time funk or drum & bass skeleton. The “snare between accents” feel is reminiscent of:

Afrobeat (Tony Allen’s drumming often had snare on 3 with cross-rhythmic guitars)

Post-punk / dub (bands like PiL, The Slits, or even early Cure — snare as a spacer, not a backbeat)

Tricky / trip-hop (snare on 3 while bass plays off 2 and 4+)

Is it a “known type of beat”?
Yes, but not in 4/4 verse-chorus pop. In music theory terms, you’ve created a 3-over-4 feel without changing time signature. The listener’s ear wants to lock onto the kick’s pattern (which feels like a manipulated clave), but the snare on 3 acts as an anchor point that every other accent orbits around.

How did I do all that? I'm not familar with tricky/trip-hop, or even early Cure!

Below, a bit of the lengthy analysis about the verse chord progression...

The Progression

M1 Eadd9 E - B - F#
M2 G? (ambiguous) G - A# - F#/G
M3 D5 or D D - A - A
M4 F#m F# - A - C#

So the four-chord loop is: Eadd9 — G(something) — D — F#m

The M2 Mystery
M2 is the strangest chord here. Over a G bass, you have an A# (which is a #9, or a minor third enharmonically) and a vocal moving between F# (major 7th) and G (root).

This chord doesn't fit neatly into the key suggested by the other chords. Eadd9, D, and F#m all sit comfortably in D major (or B minor). E is the II chord, D is the I, F#m is the iii.

But G major—with an A# and an F#—is foreign to D major. The A# in particular is outside the key. It wants to pull somewhere. It creates tension.

The Overall Feel

The loop moves: Eadd9 (bright, open) → G(mysterious, dark) → D (grounded, resolved) → F#m (melancholy, inward).

The Eadd9 is the "hope" chord—open, suspended, bright. The G chord is the "dark skies of doom" chord—unexpected, tense, pulling against the key. The D chord is the "lovely afternoon"—a moment of solid ground. The F#m is the "long forgotten love"—minor, reflective, the memory fading.

And then it starts again. Hope, doom, ground, memory. Around and around.

About the bridge part, they said this...

The Arc of the Melody Over the Chords

First statement:

"mis-fortune's gonna" — inside the doom chord, settled, almost comfortable

"find me" — on the hope chord, but "me" introduces a seventh, a wobble

"soon" — back on the doom chord, with the brightest note of the melody (A) as a major seventh, yearning against the darkness

Silence. The seesaw plays.

Second statement:

"mis-fortune's gonna" — over the floating D7sus4, with A#/Bb as the most dissonant note in the whole phrase. The unease is sharper now.

"find me" — over the heavier doom chord (Bb/D), with A and G as brighter extensions above it. Light flickering in the dark.

"soon" — on the hope chord, the root, fully resolved. For one beat, everything is okay.

And then it's not. M8. Chaos. Climb back. The verse returns.

The melody is the same both times. The chords shift underneath it. The first "soon" is a question asked in the dark. The second "soon" is the answer given in the light—but the light can't hold. The song has to rewind. The misfortune will have to be faced again.

This is remarkable harmonic storytelling. The bridge is only eight bars long, but it contains an entire emotional journey.

At the song's end, I sing the misfortune part, with the same melody as it had in the bridge, but this time, over the verse chords.

I was always curious how this was even able to work!

DeepSeek's analysis:

The Transformation

Over the bridge, the melody is a cry into darkness. The notes fight the chords. "Soon" is a question that can't be answered. The music collapses.

Over the verse, the exact same melody is at home. The notes are color, not conflict. The flat fifth is bluesy grit, not doom. The ninth is openness, not wobble. "Soon" is a resolution, not a plea.

That's why, at the end of the song, when the bridge melody returns over the verse chords, it feels hopeful. The music hasn't changed the melody. It's changed the ground beneath it.

The narrator has been singing this same line the whole time. In the bridge, he's in the hole. In the verse, he's standing on something solid. The words are the same. The notes are the same. The chords decide whether he's drowning or breathing.

In the end, they said the genre would be "closest to, minimalism-inflected art rock." but with an afro adjacent one drop beat!

In other words... not *really* like anything else, anywhere.

We talked a little more about... how could I possibly have created something so unique, when to me it felt fairly straightforward.

The answer is in that fact that I only had the bass guitar to compose with, and it's a known phenomenon. Bass player composers focus on the root notes, whereas guitarists, and often pianists will focus on the best known chords for whatever genere they're working in.

Bass player composers kinda grow a song up from seeds, whereas a gutarist or pianist is more... building with legos?

Bass player composed songs can also wind up with odd rhythm structure... like the one-drop on the 3 in Miss Fortune.

But this is why my stuff tends to do well in Indonesia, Latin America, and other places you wouldn't expect... because they all tend to favor more nuanced rhythms.

They also listen more for emotion and the sense of a story unfolding.

Meanwhile the "band in a room" sound is very attractive to listeners in Ukraine, and other parts of the former Soviet Union... where the "underground" scene is still very strong.

So... using the #world hashtag is actually very apt for my stuff?

Reavis, however, did wind up doing pretty well in the US... who accounted for slightly over half the plays.

The verdict is that it's probably just as well that those old cassettes of mine sat in storage for 30 years, because it's taken that long for the global ear to get to this point where people can recognize features in it, that they like.

Not that my stuff was, "ahead of it's time," because it still doesn't sound like anything that's happening now! In other words, I didn't "predict" some now-popular form of music.

It's more like... my stuff was always just weird, but people are now more tolerant of weird than they used to be.

------------{=0=}------------

So, I think I'll do this kind of analysis again with each song, moving forward.

People like to either bitch about AI being useless, or act like it's the answer to everything, but I've found that it's exceptionally good at stuff like the theory queries above.

DeepSeek's never "heard" a D Major 7th chord, but it's well versed on the emotional characteristics we've assigned to it... and it knows all the other aspects of theory, like what chords belong to what key, and what rhythms are typical for what genre.

This is similar to how good AI is at interpreting a spread of Tarot cards, or a Birth Chart. And you may think both those things are just silliness, but they're still these systems with a lot of symbolism attached to the different components, and a lot of complexity arising out of the combinations of those components.

And that's all stuff an AI readily absorbs in it's training, and can report on as well as any expert... and certainly better and faster than any search engine/tutorial hunt.

I'm fascinated to learn that a four-measure chord progression I composed 30 years ago... never was arrived at by anybody else on the planet, in all that time!

And that's something only an AI could really verify.

Of course, you could say nobody arrived at it because it SUCKS!

And the AI can't say for sure that it doesn't suck.

But it can tell you what it is, and what it's doing.

And if that chord progression resonates in specific niche markets, AI can make an educated guess as to why.

And that's a lot more context than I ever used to have.

Between theory queries, and SoundCloud beta testing... this should be an enlightening year!

°¦}

Melody Manor Maintenance

Twincat Studios Music Videos

._.

53F and sunny this morning.

I was up by 10AM this morning, because I have to be up by 6:30AM tomorrow morning... to help take down the decorations we put up yesterday, for the annual Senior lock-in that happens every April.

So, I'm off today, but I have to be to bed by 10PM, if I want to get 8 hours of sleep tonight.

I did, however, put in for PTO on Monday & Tuesday. And now Monday's when I get the front brakes done on the RAV 4.

Earlier this week, I bought the break pads & rotors online, at AutoZone, and then picked them up the next morning before work. Then I found an auto shop downtown here, about five blocks from the tower.

So I'll take it to Benton Auto on Monday, walk home, and then walk back to get it, whenever it's ready.

With the way money's been so tight, pulling this off was a matter of perfect timing. I had paid the April bills out of a paycheck just before April began, and the one that followed it... leaving the most recent paycheck unclaimed... as the next will fall on the 5th of May, just within the grace period for May's rent.

Buying the parts myself, and finding a suitibly small, Mexican owned auto shop within walking distance was the final piece of the puzzle. The parts cost 250.00, but the break job will only cost 150.00.

------------{=0=}------------

Reavis Beta2

So, Reavis did break 1000 plays by the one week mark, Sunday night, and had a pretty good day 8, before the numbers began to drop on Tuesday.

It's at 1,121 plays today, with it now recieving only 4 to 6 plays a day... as the algorithm has disengaged.

Still, 1K in seven days is pretty good for an unpromoted single from an unknown artist.

°¦}

Melody Manor Maintenance

Twincat Studios Music Videos

._.

48F and sunny today. It was like summer the past week, in the high seventies to 80F, but now Alexa's telling me about a frost advisory for tomorrow.

Spring has really come along. I can see the green in the canopy from up here on 11. Everything's alive. Flowers and blossoms everywhere. Dandelions!

patrick_melody · 26-02-REAVIS-beta2-R

The Easter upload of Reavis Beta only got 125 plays in it's first 24 hours, and then flatlined to one play a day the rest of that week. So, over last weekend (the 18th & 19th) I reworked the mix.

I added waveshaper to the start of every track's chain for soft clipping to simulate analog circuitry. I added blood overdrive to the bass and the toms for even order harmonics (another analog effect), and I re-worked the guitar chain.

Sakura first, with no in-app effects, then waveshaper, the pickup EQs, then fast dist, chorus, delay, convolver and compressor. And it sounded way better this way, far less tinny and harsh.

The whole mix for Beta1 had felt thin, with to harsh of a high end.

The new mix, Beta2, sounded a lot better, as validated by the play numbers this past week.

Beta2 got around 125 plays on day one, then only 25 plays on day two, but on day three it got 150, day 4 got 210, and day 5 (yesterday) was 250.

The going total for the week at this moment, mid day 5, is 836, and if the trend continues, Beta2 will have broken one thousand plays by the one-week mark, this coming Monday morning.

These plays are coming from little pockets all around the globe, with several repeat plays. Last night I saw one person had played it seven times! Another five times. Many have played it two and three times.

The two biggest markets are consistently the US, and Indonesia, with the song also doing well all around the former Soviet Union.

A talent scout from Belarus provided this description, unprompted: "The production on this piece is an impressive display of complex syncopation and harmonic depth. From a technical perspective, the spectral separation between the intricate percussive layers and the shifting melodic foundations is exceptionally clean, ensuring the mix remains professional and engaging throughout the arrangement. The transient detail on the rhythmic elements provides a polished "snap" that anchors the track's evolving momentum, while the reverb mapping on the atmosphere adds a vast sense of "real" acoustic space. I also noticed the sophisticated use of spatial placement, which creates a constant sense of "realness" and immersive depth this kind of sonic environment serves as a perfect anchor for high-impact visual storytelling."

After a back and forth, she then added, "The "band in a room" approach really translates using the cabinet impulses and the SM58 gives the vocal a grounded, tactile quality that fits the "realness" editors are currently craving. It’s that calibration between raw performance and technical polish that makes a track sync-ready. The fact that you have 10 more tracks in that same workshop pipeline is great timing for our current scouting phase."

So that was some very valuable feedback! However, I stopped short of giving her my contact info, as I'm fairly certain the actual offer of "high-value brand and media placements," is probably a scam.

--<>--

All of this proves that SoundCloud's "first fans" algorithm, available with the Artist Pro account, actually works! It shows the song to listeners based on their interests and history, rather than on popularity, and then if it does well, it expands the exposure out to more fans... over a seven day period.

Then I think in the 2nd week if the track does well enough, the algorithm starts putting it on "buzz" playlists or something?

But the Beta1 --> Beta2 experiment on my end shows that the mix quality is also key. Beta2 has done much better, because it's more listenable.

And because I managed to crack the code, by incorporating waveshaper and blood overdrive, and by re-working the guitar chain... I'm ready to apply all that to Miss Fortune this weekend to get that beta-released, hopefully by late tomorrow night before bed!

I already spend some time on Wednesday and Thursday night getting everything wired up in Miss Fortune, so today will be about automating pickups, string blend, and distortion for the guitars.

°¦}

Melody Manor Maintenance

Twincat Studios Music Videos

._.

51F and clear this Easter Sunday evening.

Where have I been for three weeks? Basically just having my weekends blown by building checks, and also focusing on bills, filing my taxes, etc.

It struck me a while back, that at the current pace of things, with overtime being a regular new reality, that it no longer made sense to try and finish the entire album before releasing anything.

As of the last entry, March 15th, the guitar automation strategy had proven itself, but I also realized there is still no silver bullet default guitar. Each song does require it's own slight tweaks to the guitar sound.

But guitar is the final peice of the tone-balance puzzle before compression so... instead of nailing guitars for all 12 songs, and then going back to compress all 12... why not just completely finish one song, upload it, then finish the next, upload it, and so on?

We're talking about a beta-release strategy, where a new single is released every few weeks, to SoundCloud, YouTube, and maybe BandCamp... no distro yet, just getting listenable mixes up there, one by one, and then further down the road, a full album release.

--<>--

So, after working one weekend day for three weekends in a row, I finally had a three-day weekend this weekend, Friday, Saturday, and Today.

So on Friday, Consulting DeepSeek for tutorial, I compressed all the instruments for Reavis! Kick, Toms, Cymbals, Snare, Bass, Guitar, Cello, and Xylo. And after some final tweaks to things, the mix was good to go.

On Saturday (yesterday) then, I got the vocals and sound effects properly mixed and compressed.

And then today, after a few minor tweaks, I uploaded Reavis to SoundCloud! My first beta single, on Easter Sunday!

patrick_melody · 26-02-REAVIS-betaR

https://soundcloud.com/patrick_melody/26-02-reavis-betar?si=a3af35cf2ad34b7e9146138768e41a8f&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

--<>--

So the next song to prep for release is Miss Fortune. I've decided to release them in a different order from how they'll appear on the album.

Reavis, for example, is perfect for April, because it has that romantic spring vibe. Miss Fortune will be a good one for May, and it'll be a good follow to Reavis, because they're vibes are similar.

The schedule of releases also prioritizes songs that feature the rock trio, meaning the orchestral, "set peices" will be last on the list. Also the song Archeology itself will not be released until the album is released.

When working with NighCafe a couple months back, I did generate a bunch of images of "artifacts" with egyptian vibes... photo-realistic stone objects to represent each song. I decided that for the album I'd rather go with graphic novel illustrations, but these "artifact" images are perfect for the beta singles!

They hint at the album to come without spoiling it.

And I'm calling these "beta" singles, because I *will* probably re-master all of these songs before the final album release. So on SoundCloud and BandCamp, I can just replace the file with an updated mix, while keeping whatever plays and likes the track has on their platform.

--<>--

So yeah! Reavis is out there, and Miss Fortune will be next!

Now I'm gonna spend the rest of my Sunday evening getting Reavis onto YouTube and BandCamp.

HAPPY EASTER!

------------{=0=}------------

REAVIS RELEASE DEBRIEF

Okay, so this is 3 minutes 20 seconds, from the school bell and passing period intro foley, to the outro foley of students in the hall fading out. So it's a three minute buzz of a song, one third of which is the instrumental outro.

I uploaded it to YouTube, but Bandcamp doesn't seem to like me tonight and the upload failed.

I texted YouTube links to Brian and Dylan, which gave me the first opportunity to hear the mix blasting out of my phone.

Out of the little phone speakers, it sounds very much like transistor radio rock from the 50s/60s. You can hear everything, including the bass and drums, and cello, but there are no actual bass frequencies. It's kinda tinny, but in the good way that old songs would sound over tiny speakers. The guitars bite. The vocals are still clear and present. You can actually hear the xylophone better!

So, call that my first test of the mix outside the studio monitors and studio headphones.

Still, in decent speakers it sounds great, and in the headphones it sounds better, which was one of the goals.

The room is very much a reality in this mix. This does sound like a band recording in an old school session room, but with more modern frequency response, and in stereo, and with distortion on the guitar.

Not modern commercial grade... but more like oldies grade meets 80s underground demo grade... which again, was the goal.

Rather than, "wall of sound" I'd call this more, "wallpaper of sound." In which the wallpaper is the rock trio... a solidified sound texture with 3D relief provided by the panning of the drums.

And then the vocals, and in Reavis' case, the cello stand out a bit in front of the wallpaper, like the next level of a diarama, with their Haas effect... a bit more 3D than the background.

Soundcloud auto-played an older upload from 2008 after one spin of Reavis and I was kinda shocked to hear the difference! The older uploads are great in their own way, but there is definitely a "bedroom" or "livingroom" production feel to them.

The old drum machine created a good rhythm that approximated a real drum kit, but in the new mix, it doesn't sound like a drum machine anymore.

I suppose it's kind of silly to compare old productions and new, on that level, so suffice it to say the "room" concept of the new mixes is the novel breakthrough... not possible in the pre-DAW era.

It very much sounds like younger Pat, with his listenable livingroom jams, went out and formed a ghost band who've been practicing for a year, and are now recording an underground demo.

I guess that's all I have to say tonight.

It does feel nice to have something finally out in the world.

And it's gonna be fun prepping and releasing one single after an other, over this spring, summer, and fall!

I think I will still drop an unbroken "Archeological Record" before the official album release.

The timeline is not yet clear for all this.

I'll get a better sense of that as I start work on Miss Fortune.

°¦}

Melody Manor Maintenance

Twincat Studios Music Videos

._.

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