I came across a great artist yesterday and I thought I would drop you their music and see what you thought. The artist is SergioLoops and he is a DJ/Producer from Spain. Take a look at his Myspace or official site.
The track below is called Darien and I really like the style.
Stefani Germanotta, aka Lady Gaga is both suing and being sued by her ex-producer and ex-boyfriend Rob Fusari. Fusari, who has had two songs with other artists hit the top spot in the Billboard top 100, claims that he was instrumental in the creation of LG’s persona, sound, style and everything that has come together to make her so successful. There’s no doubt that he is partly responsible for the development of the Gaga entity, as he’s already been paid over $600,000 for the part he played, but he’s looking for a lot more: 20% of royalties (plays, sales, etc) and 15% of merchandising revenue (!!!). He’s got a contract that he’s putting under the court’s collective nose, but “The above described arrangement was structured in such a way as to mask its true purpose – to provide to the Defendants unlawful compensation for their services as unlicensed employment agents,” according to Germanotta’s attorneys.
Ex-lovers’ tiff or business-world backstabbing? The stakes are high in either case, as Lusari’s career and a huge chunk of revenue are riding on the outcome of the case. It all reminds me a bit of that Human League song… *sings* “You were working as a waitress in a cocktail bar…”
When it comes to sequencing drum tracks, there are a whole load of different plugins available, for free or otherwise. The first one we’re going to look at is a little home-grown number called MyDrumSet from Norwegian site Blue Noise. It’s a .vst plugin made from recordings of the producer’s Ludwig kit, with separate mic outputs from each drum, as well as a couple of overheads. No strange or fantastic sounds here, but a solid basic drumkit that you can drop in to your tracks.
If you’re unwilling to get your wallet out but you’re looking for something a little less basic, there are loads and loads of other free plugins listed over at the AudioMastermind database. It might take a little sifting, but you’re not going to spend any money.
Working on something with a more live feel? Fully sequenced drums not giving you the juice you need, or just unhappy with the sound you’re able to record? You can replace the drum tracks you’ve got with sounds from this plugin – Drumagog which uses the existing drum hits as triggers for the sounds in it’s databank (which contains 4 gig worth of samples), retaining the rhythm and feel of anything you’ve recorded but replacing the sound.
Next up is the number 2 application on the market, Toontrack’s Superior Drummer – this is the second version of their DFH Superior software, and they’ve made significant improvements to the graphic user interface, and the detailed control you have over your mix. Sound-On-Sound has this to say about it:
Unfortunately there’s not a demo version for you to try out, and this product does have a pretty hefty price tag on it unless you’re of a piratical bent, which we certainly can’t condone.
If you’re considering spending $400 on a new plugin synth then you should also take a look at FXpansion’s BFD2. This is the Ferrari of plugins, offering you a vast battery of sounds, principally recorded at Hampstead’s phenomenal looking AIR studios, it’s also got a load of dedicated EQ’s filters and other gubbins built in. It’s getting massively good reviews all over, and there are some sample tracks mixed using the plugin on their product listing page that demonstrate what it can do.
RecordProduction.com is a site built for and by producers. There’s a punt-load of video interviews with famous and well respected music producers, plus video and photo tours of their studios. If you want to know how your producing idol went about getting a particular sound, or worked on a particular song, or just to sneak a look at what bits of kit they’ve got in their studio, it’s worth browsing the videos to see if they’re there. There are loads of links to production job finding sites, tips and reviews on equipmen, plus good places to buy it. There’s also a forum where jobs and kit are posted and a load of other like-minded people to kick your music production ideas around with, and ask about music distribution, marketing, tech stuff etc. Go watch some videos and recommend us around!
