Here’s me playing “American.”  I filmed this earlier tonight.  I would have done so sooner, but the other day I came home to discover a computer which refused to boot, and I spend a fair number of hours vomiting from dread.  It turns out, however, that I do not need to spend copious amounts of money on a new motherboard or anything like that.  As I had suspected, my system was overheating and shutting itself off, and the reason seemed to be that my heat sink somehow became dislodged from the CPU (I also cleaned from off the surface of the heat sink what could quite reasonably be described as a solid wall of dust, which I’m sure wasn’t helping matters all that much).  Take care of your personal computers, kids, or they’ll be gone before you know it!

Anyway, things are back up and running now (although, strangely, a large portion of my Adobe Premiere program files had vanished from my hard drive, and I had to reinstall it).  As my next big project, I was going to make a SERIOUS video for Existential Pathology, but I’ve got a new song that’s coming along rather nicely, so with fingers crossed, I should have it finished in a few days.  For now, enjoy staring at the hair sticking up in the back of my head!

Okay, here’s me playing another song…If you can’t tell, this was recorded on the same day as the first one.  That’s because I knew I’d be out of time when I needed to post it, so I filmed it ahead of time.  I’m incredibly wily like that.  This one doesn’t have ridiculous annotations.  At least, not yet…

Anyway, I promise I’ll post something soon that’s more exciting than just me and a guitar.  In the meantime, enjoy!

Wow, look!  It’s me performing one of my songs!

There are more of these coming, so don’t touch that dial, folks!  And you know, feel free to share and subscribe and everything (nudge, nudge, poke, poke).  That reminds me…remember poking?  Yeah, that was stupid, wasn’t it?  Anyway, it will probably take an unreasonable amount of time for my video to show up in searches, but my channel is “Matt Glaz”, and my username is mattglaz1, just as on this website.  For now, here’s the url:

http://www.youtube.com/user/mattglaz1

Oh, also, I’ve updated my MySpace music page for the first time in seventeen years.  It now contains all of my full mixes instead of the horrible ones that were on there before.

Have a pleasant Wednesday, mofos!

Gasp!  It’s done!  My God, what a headache!  Seriously, I don’t know what it was about this one, but it caused me much chagrin (look it up; it’s really worth it).  Oh, speaking of obscure words, please forgive the extremely pretentious title of this song.  I was in college when I wrote it.  What do you want?

Anywhom, this time around, the mixing wasn’t a problem.  I think I’ve got the hang of a lot of things.  No, what really took a long time was the artistic decisions behind the arrangement, and as it turns out, this is often the case for me.  One thing I’ve learned about myself recently is that I am particularly terrible at knowing ahead of time what will sound good.  I’ll think, “Hmm, the second verse is missing something.  I need to add a new track.  I think some backup vocal ‘oohs’ would be perfect!”  I then spend a considerable amount of time trying to harmonize on-key with myself (something I’ve also recently found myself to be embarrassingly inept at), only to realize that such an addition actually sounds completely inappropriate.  I then end up playing around with different things and eventually discover that what sounds best is something that I had dismissed in my “mind’s ear.”  Mind you, each new thing I try requires at least a couple of minutes to set up microphones/levels, etc., and I can easily spend several hours finding “10000 ways that don’t work,” to quote Ben Franklin (Jesus, what am I today, a freakin’ high-school English teacher?).  And this is a six-minute song we’re talking about here.

The other thing that took me a while to get right was THAT GOD DAMNED GUITAR SOLO.  HOLY MACKEREL.  Here’s another example of my imagination failing me.  I originally intended this to be an electric guitar solo (which is a significantly easier instrument to play), but I tried it, and it was wrong.  It was all wrong.  Then, when you add the fact that I wrote the solo in my head before forcing myself to learn to actually play it, as well as the fact that my guitar-playing skills in general are downright mediocre, you have a recipe for horrors beyond all human understanding.  Let’s just say that during the recording process, I experienced levels of despair far surpassing those suggested by the lyrics (I think it’s sort of funny listening to the song while imagining that I wrote the words immediately after recording the solo).

One thing I do think is really cool about this song is that, besides the bass guitar part, it’s an entirely acoustic mix.  The percussion was created using random objects that were in my immediate vicinity.  I filmed myself recording everything, so you’ll get to see it all soon.

And that reminds me:  I’m going to start a YouTube channel, which I’ll direct you to in a couple of days, and soon enough, you’ll get to see marvelous videos for My Creed and Existential Pathology.  It will take me some time to edit those, but I’ll be posting other stuff in the meantime.  I’ve realized that it can take me some time to finish these epic mixes, and in the meantime, I think it’s kind of  lame to just post some random video I’ve found on the internet, no matter how cool it is.  So I figure I can at least throw up some videos of me doing something musical, even if it’s simpler than a full mix.  Anyway, stay tuned for that.

For now, you can download my new song for free (and any of my songs on the Music page), and the same copyright rules apply, as it’s under the same Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, so you’re free to distribute, share, perform, or create derivative works, as long as you don’t charge money and as long as you give me credit for the original.  You can find all the info about that on my Music page, as well.

Right.  Well, enjoy!

P.S.  I hope everyone had a happy Easter/Passover/Vernal Equinox/Yadda Yadda

Click HERE!!!!  Click!  CLICK!!!!!!

Yes, yes.  I know.  It’s completely and utterly unbelievable and at the same time, totally amazing.  Plus, it’s awesome.  All of my music is downloadable.  AND FOR FREE.

What?

FOR FREE.

I don’t believe you!

BELIEVE ME.

Free?

FREE.

Like, all-caps free?

YES.  ALL CAPS FREE.  In pristine 192 kbps mp3 format.  BOOM!  The big wheels are in motion.  There’s no stopping me now.  I’ve got official copyrights pending on everything, so don’t try anything funny.

Actually, the exact opposite is true.  I am releasing all of my music under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which means you have the legal right to copy, distribute, share, give away, perform, cover, use, remix, and modify my songs, as long as you credit me for the original creation and as long as you don’t charge money for anything you do with it.  You can find out more about the license here and here, and more about Creative Commons here.

Oh, and did I mention that you can download my music HERE????????

No, but seriously, I figure I’ve got six songs up now, so I’ll keep giving ’em away for free as I upload them until I’ve got a good album’s worth (say, twelve tracks), at which time I’ll maybe start charging money for my OFFICIAL FIRST ALBUM!  So get ’em while they’re free because, you know, later it will be IMPOSSIBLE to acquire them without paying money, just like all musical recordings today!

Enjoy, everyone!

Great Caesar’s Ghost!  It’s been almost a week since my last post!  My girlfriend is visiting me this week, and I must confess that I’m a bit distracted by her delightful presence.  The sheer number of movies being watched astounds even me.  Anyway, I’ve re-uploaded my songs so that everything is roughly the same volume.  In order to do this, however, I had to tweak some levels since the compression of the brick-walling changes how everything sounds, so when I turn the levels back down, things aren’t at the volumes I intend them to be.

Of course, even though I set out only to change some levels, once I revisited the old mixes, I couldn’t resist tampering and making things sound “even better” in general (it’s sort of hard not to when you revisit a song after having learned a bunch of new tricks).  The remixes are, for the most part, very subtle, and you may not even notice the difference (with the exception of one neat effect I added to “American”).  But I do think they sound more polished now.  Sorry to get all George Lucas on you, but in my defense, I haven’t technically “released” them yet, so there.

Speaking of official releases, though, check back later this week because for the first time, my songs will be downloadable!  That’s right.  And if that weren’t exciting enough, I’m going to release them under a Creative Commons license, which will give you permission to do stuff with them that you wouldn’t normally be allowed to do.  I’ll explain all about that in my next post in a few days, and hopefully, one post after that, I will upload A NEW SONG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Right, so…you can listen to the remixed songs on my Music page here.

Oh, and here’s something fun:

Zach King is not a musician.  In fact, I think this is his only “musical” video, but I still recommend checking out his YouTube channel because his ridiculous videos have an almost disturbing ability to make me laugh out loud with pure, innocent delight.

Now back to watching seven thousand movies.  Bye!

Are you excited?  I am!  This is my first “in-depth” (i.e. horrendously long) post!

Okay.  I’m about to explain why my new song, “My Creed,” is quieter than my first five uploaded songs.  I initially wanted to do this rather briefly, but I think it would be fun to talk about it in some length (i.e. AN UNREASONABLY LONG ESSAY).  Consequently, I’ve created (as well as I am able to with my knowledge and experience) what can really be called a full treatment for the layperson on the topic of the Loudness Wars.  Also consequently, if you already have a basic understanding of this topic, you should probably go do something more worth your time, like going over to Aunt Ruthie’s with a few buddies of yours and playing a nice game of Bridge because, you know, Aunt Ruthie doesn’t really have anybody and she would just be so happy if she had a visitor once in a while.  Besides, it would be really neat to learn to play Bridge, don’t you think?  And it would make her feel special to teach someone something new.  It would be a great bonding experience for the two of you.  And then, at her inevitable funeral, you’d have something to say, like, “I’ll never forget all those wonderful evenings of Bridge.  She taught us all how to play, you know.”  As opposed to, “Wait, Mom, Aunt Ruthie…she was the one in the wheelchair, right?”

However, if you aren’t knowledgeable about the topic, or if you’re perfectly content harboring a lifetime of bitter family regrets, then I invite you to stay!  It might be interesting for you.  I’ve added some sound clips and visual aids, so it’ll be fun as a nice game of Bridge!

Also, if I’ve played my cards right (Get it? Get it?), you should leave this site with a solid understanding of:

1.  What the Loudness Wars are and why music today sounds louder than it did twenty years ago.
2.  How easily we can be tricked into believing that louder mixes are better.
3.  How to keep your man interested.
3.  How this has negatively affected music and why mixing engineers hate it.

Here we go!

Click here, if you dare…

MY CREED

Seven exclamation points means this post is seven times as exciting as my average post. What do you mean? Of course I’ve figured out a way to quantify excitement. Haven’t you? Man, you’re, like, three to five times lamer than me.

Anyway, I’m sure no one cares right now because it’s Friday night and you’re all at Da Club, but here’s a new song, fresh off the virtual mixer. I know it’s two days late, but this bass line really kicked me in the center of my face. Not that it’s insanely difficult to play, but I’m no bass player (I can barely call myself a guitar player), so my other mixes were recorded with a guitar pick, and I just covered up the harsh pick attacks with EQ. But this time, I wanted to do it right (not that there’s anything wrong with playing bass guitar with a pick, but I think for this type of song, finger-picking is more appropriate). Basically, I gave myself a few hours to learn to play a bass guitar finger-style in such a way that the result wasn’t COMPLETELY EMBARRASSING to listen to.  So that was an ambitious goal, and it was a mistake.

Anyway, if the recording process weren’t tedious enough, I then had a hell of a time mixing everything, as I always do, but the good news is, I think I’ve finally learned how to actually EQ a bass track! You know, in a way that sounds decent. It’s all thanks to this post by Joe Gilder at HomeStudioCorner.com:

http://www.homestudiocorner.com/mixing-bass-part-2-eq/

I’d already been doing the high-pass filter stuff, but the section on “Curing the Headache” was like a magical potion of sonic pleasantries.  Anyway, check it out if you do any mixing or care.

Finally, on the topic of mixing and/or mastering, you may notice that this song is not as loud as the others I’ve posted.  There’s a reason for that.  I’ve decided that I’m giving up my fight in the Loudness Wars.  If you don’t know what that means, I’m going to tell you all about it in my next post, by which time I will have also re-uploaded my first five songs after I’ve made them quieter to match the sound of this new one.

Oh, and don’t worry, I’ve got another couple of songs in the works.  I’m gonna keep these things coming.

Packing up my things to go back home tomorrow. I got a bunch of raw recording done (and some mixing – I couldn’t help it), and I’ll have a new song up within the next few days, so check back this week. I seem to have developed a Wednesday/Sunday pattern for posting. I don’t know if it’ll stay that way yet, but I’m going to try to make it my goal to get a new song posted by Wednesday. Gulp.

Oh, hey, look! A link to a really well-written song by Honor Finnegan!

Pictures of Snow – Honor Finnegan

I like good songs because they motivate me to write good songs. I also happen to like good things in general. I figure good things are good. But that’s just me.

Still recording in Michigan!  I’ve got two songs mostly done and am working on a third.  I’m basically dwelling almost exclusively inside a closet this week, playing Tetris with awkwardly-shaped equipment.  Oh, look!  Below there appears to be a video on the subject!