Synoiz Music Blog

Posted 12th October 2013

Finally some music news, I've been really busy lately with so many things that aren't Synoiz related it's unreal. A week or two ago I scored a short horror filmed called "Summer's Night" which is apparently going to be released as part of a horror compilation at some point. I'd like to say I enjoyed making it but at the time I was really ill, the film edit had overrun and when I got it to start on there was only a weekend before the submission deadline and no time to get better, so it was a weekend full of Lemsip, hot chocolate and playing long cello patches on the keyboard with a wild disregard for tempo. I liked that though, the more soundtracks I work on, the better I get with them. The first one I did I treated like a collection of songs, finding a tempo and key for each scene (compromising when I had to) and making it very mechanical, now I've loosened up a bit and seen that when most people edit films they're not counting the beats in their head between one shot and the next, they're working the flow around many different factors and so a fixed time signature and tempo can hinder rather than help in some cases. 

Anyway that's enough on that, the new Synoiz album is in that horrible unending 99% complete stage that a lot of other artists have told me they get also. The songs are written, I'm playing about with some voice acting parts and the production is really close to being good but it's just been stuck for the last few months where I tweak little bits and fiddle about with patches and sounds rather than going "sod it, this is done". I'm aiming for a February release date and while I don't want any singles from the album there might be an EP with instrumentals of the vocal tracks and some outtakes. There will be music videos too but while myself and 12 Ft Beast Productions are bandying around ideas for them I don't want to think of all that stuff until I'm done with my music. 

I do hope you'll like the album, it's not as varied as Ambients I don't think but really nice to just slap on your headphones while you're out and about. 

Over and out, for our unity,

Synoiz 

Posted 22nd March 2009

Righto, I'm doing this on the train because it's the only time that I actually seem able to sit down and not get distracted by anything (speaking of which, try typing "distracted" on your QWERTY keyboard, it's a very soothing circular motion when you can touch-type lol, oh yeah getting distracted...).

I just thought I'd do another blog so soon because loads has been happening lately (I've barely had time to sit down for the past 3 weeks) and if I don't force myself to type it up I never will!

New Album "Soundtract" News
Quite a bit of news on the new album, I've got like 31 tracks out of the 40 I intended to get done, now I'm going to write like 4 proper songs for it (3 "ending themes" and one in-game vocal track) and then try to sort out the remaining 5. So any ideas of game music/emotions you'd like to see attempted, post me a comment!
It's really strange seeing how this album has shaped up. I can't really remember being at the same stage with "Ambients" because that just flew by in a few weeks, this is 40 tracks so even if it flew by I'd probably still be catching the tail end of it somehow.
I think the reason why I'm getting a bit strained with Soundtract is because I've been putting off some of the more stressful tracks (things like the opening themes or general walking-about music) as they're so tough to get right.
Also I'm a bit worried about what people will think of it all, I mean, when I step back and think about it, it's a 40-track album of just background music ranging from chill out techno -> fantastical new age -> experimental horror. Now I know that I'd like to stick that in my HiFi regardless but I'd really like to know if anyone else would!
Maybe I should release it in three parts... So if you only really want the horror stuff you just download that or such. I dunno. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Lori Cunningham / Ghostsmut Giveaways
More important than anything I'm up to however is the fact that there's lots of free-stuff up for grabs from two of my favourite artists. Lori Cunningham is (for a limited time only, she said) is offering a free three-track download from her amazing debut album "Unseen" (seriously, if you like female vocals in any way Enya/Evanescence/Kate Bush etc then you really should check her out). You can find out more about it on her blog here:
Get free sample pack of Lori Cunningham's album "Unseen"

Also while we're on the subject of free stuff, my brother Ghostsmut released a compilation of all the b-side-type-tracks he has left over after completing his debut album. The tracks were all cut due to length restrictions or because they were too samey to tracks already on the album. The album is called "Besides & Suicides" and is pretty damn good, you can download the whole album here (Including my favourite track of his "Let's Live As If We're Dead" which I argued a lot with him about when he took it off his first album):
Download "Besides & Suicides" by Ghostsmut on Last.FM

Ambients / Music Videos
Yes, yes, they are coming, however we're doing them all at once because of time restraints on our locations and so it means all the editing will need to be done before anything can actually be seen.
As for the actual release of Ambients, I'm still trying to sort things out with Konami about the sample in Another World. They say it's okay if I only make a small-run of physical CDs but not if I put it on iTunes which is ideally where I'd like it to go :(


Free Tracks on Twitter
Oh yeah... you know, if you want some free songs you should really start following me on Twitter, I've got a nasty habit of putting demo versions of tracks I'm working on there for people to download and listen to...
http://www.twitter.com/synoiz


Happy Birthday Ghostsmut!!!
In more important news, my brother (the artist known as Ghostsmut) had his 30th birthday on Thursday. I can't believe it either as he's always seemed to me like the youngest person I know (he's pretty damn immature lol), doesn't look like the age landmark will affect him at all though so huzzah!
Me and my mum were visiting him in Edinburgh on Wednesday so I'll put some pictures from that in another blog soon when I'm back on my main computer. Oh I think there's a video too, me and my bro being very, very un-PC :D

It was a wonderful day there on Wednesday, I think I'll post some more videos on YouTube, or maybe just a big crazy montage. Yeah a montage would be best I think. One day I'll move to Edinburgh I hope.

As I say I'm heading back up there now because we knew that with bro's party being tonight that he wouldn't really have enough time to distribute between everyone while also playing the host (I know I'm always dashing around at these kinds of occasions). The theme of the party is Arnie. Yes... some of the costumes should be amazing (mine is not lol). MY NAME IS NOT QUAAAAAID!!!

Posted 11th March 2009

Hey again,
I can't sleep, went to bed at like 1:30am and have just woken up at 8 and unable to get back to sleep so thought I'd double check everything again and post a new blog to wake myself up.
Today is a big day for me as we are filming the main scenes for one of my music videos. Essentially these are the "oooh fancy" bits which we only have one shot at (you'll have to wait for the video to find out why - or join the Facebook group...) and it's been chaos to organise. I have been at work fulltime for the last month or so, so yesterday I was at work till 5, then I had a singing lesson until half 7, then I had to meet with the directors and ended up arguing with them for 2 hours cos I want it done exactly how I imagined it and they think it'll work better this other way etc, they're right I know, however the case I was making was "Well we only have one evening to do all this section, so can't we attempt to film my version of this shot as well just incase we decide to use it in editing after all?" I'd rather not walk away with "Oh yeah it would have been nice to have a shot like that..." bits when we can't shoot them again.
Okay, okay, maybe I'm not the easiest person to work with! Mark Liddle (Co-directing) stated it as "You have your artistic vision and we have our directoral vision". I think they're just happy cos when I'm on set tonight I've said I'll keep quiet and just do as they say, after all they're the directors but I just want to be sure that we're both aiming for the same video here.



Anyway it should be fun, but today is me running around all day buying last-minute props for new extras and then getting things like hair sorted and slightly dolled up, just to get mucked up again for the video, weird how these things work eh? So I start running about in 10 minutes and then finish at 11pm tonight only to go to work again tomorrow at 7, huzzah!

Just to keep you entertained though, here are some photos I forgot about from the location hunting for this, as you can see the place is horrible and looks worse than these pictures can show, but it works so well for the song and video:







New Album Update
Oh and if you're waiting for information on the new album "Soundtract" (new name that has recently been kinda decided on... by me and Anguaji) don't worry, it's coming and I'm working my little rear off on it, but there will be a website made for it so that you can actively participate in the finalising of the songs. All very exciting but that's stuff for another blog methinks.

"The Esoteric Order of Dagon" on OurStage (Again)
This has totally taken me by surprise but I thought, after hitting the top ten with my track in Experimental on OurStage, that this month it would just get thrown to the back of the charts, and that's what happened, it dropped right down to like #200-odd, but now I wake up and check and after a lot of lovely fans voting for it, it's back at #4 lol. How amazing is that? It's cheered me up a bit when all I can think of is work right now.

I'll try to post another blog tomorrow if I'm not too knacked,
Wish me luck!

Posted 27th February 2009

Hello again all you delightful people (and even the non-delightful ones, you know, the ones who drown kittens and stuff).

I'm in a really good mood today, things are going very well right now, I'm just a bit tired from it all as I've been very busy. My week has been taken up with my new job, working on the soundscapes album and singing lessons (I have to get back on form for the vocal album) plus my good mate Lee (of "On The Nightwaves") has moved into the spare room in my house, it's pretty awesome having someone else here, but I'm terrorfied it might distract me from my music a bit. He has an XBox and it lures me toward it with sweet promises of Silent Hill: Homecoming and Too Human :( 
Below is an artist's representation (I'm not gonna say who as it's obviously me) of the XBox/Synoiz scenario:



"The Esoteric Order of Dagon" makes Top 10 on OurStage
Oh yeah, much more importantly, judging finishes on this month's OurStage entries today (around 4am GMT I think, that's like Midnight in America I think) and the b-side to Long Lost... "The Esoteric Order of Dagon" has made the top 10 in Experimental! I am so pleased you would not believe! It's the first time I've finished in the top ten (the closest was "Revelation, Despair" which finished at #14). If you're reading this and you've been judging on OurStage then thank you so much :) 
Of course there's still time to vote on what order you want the top ten in, so if you have an OurStage account (or wouldn't mind signing up for one) you can still help the track out by voting for it to stay in the top 5:



If you'd like to help out then just register for an account and then go to "Judge" in the main menu bar, and then select "Experimental" from the channel dropdown. There's only the top ten to vote for now so my entry should pop up at some point! 

New Tracks for Soundscapes
Just to say thank you again to anyone who voted for me on OurStage, here are some of this week's latest demos for the Soundscapes album, "Alien Architecture" is a kinda sci-fi one (I was thinking of X-Com/UFO if you know what that is), and "Realisation of the Truth" and "...Abandoned" are ones for the horror section, they're both very Resident Evil-inspired!

That's it for now, hope you're all doing okay, I've got my fingers crossed for the OurStage results!!!