Disconnectica

Hi John, This is Robert Webb from Melbourne, Australia, making music as Disconnectica. Many years ago I wrote music while at school and early uni, but left it for decades, occasionally writing a piano solo. But a few years ago I set myself up to get back into it. It's all created at the computer. I also make videos for some of my tracks, and write software to create effects for those videos, allowing me to bring many of my interests together. I tend to make dark theatrical alternative rock, at least that's the best description I've come up with. But my pieces have many different styles. My first album is almost ready to go, and after much tweaking I'm finally uploading some stuff to Spotify etc. Below is the only instrumental on the album. So this track was written as a soundtrack for a zombie movie or game. Something along the lines of 28 Days Later, and also drawing inspiration from Hans Zimmer's work. But also intended to work as a standalone track. YouTube: Spotify: SoundCloud:

Been making my own videos, and writing my own software to do effects in them. Ends up taking a lot of time, but at least they don't look like every other video. Most home-made videos these days seem to be montages of free stock footage thrown together. This one uses a mind-bending effect called slit scan or time displacement. After that I decided I should put myself in my videos more, and made this one using a Droste effect. I also made a couple for my piano solos. This one also uses the Droste effect. And lastly this one, not using software I wrote, but rather Photo Mirage, which animates still images, in this case photos I took in Iceland. There was no video taken for this at all, it's just still photos that have been animated.

Great song. The video wasn't bad. I like the time-lapse parts zooming down the road. I'd like to see the changes from time-lapse to stationary more synchronised with the music. Some where, but often not. And the stationary shots might be better with the camera on a tripod and not panning at all. Alternating between stills and time-lapse could be more dramatic I think.

First music video I've made for one of my songs. The effect was done using software I'm writing based on a slit-scan effect. Would love to know what people think.

Hi guys! Very sorry for taking so long to reply back to my own thread. I really appreciate everyone's feedback and intended to reply earlier, but now a few months later I'm in a better position to reply so here I am. I could never get The Grandeur sounding very good on most of my pieces, but despite liking the free Piano One it still sounded a bit cheap. In the end I saw the Session Keys bundle on special and bought that. Of those, Session Keys Grand S was the one that stood out. I'm using that on most of my tracks now. One track still works best with The Grandeur, but overall Session Keys sounds much better to me. Here are the two tracks I posted originally using Session Keys (plus a few other tweaks). @john the free Piano One is apparently a sampled Yamaha Grand C7, though I agree it sounds more like an upright. Something lost in the translation to such a small VST maybe. But maybe for these fast pieces it's good to lose something? Too many rich harmonics on every note may be part of the problem? @starise yeah I tried all the pianos in Komplete when I got it, but The Grandeur was the one that stood out. Was really interested in The Giant, but disappointed it didn't really sound that impressive in the end. Listen to just the first few notes of The Remaining Rag played with The Grandeur, and I don't think any amount of tweaking would fix it. There's some sort of popping or something on the attach of each note that I just found really annoying, whereas Piano One sounded so smooth. In some ways I still prefer those first few notes on the old free piano, but with Session Keys I think it now sounds best overall. I've also automated some different reverb effects in and out a bit to add life, and one reverb is there throughout which makes it sound like an older wonkier piano, which works for that piece. @Leon T yeah I know everyone raves about The Grandeur, and yet for some of my pieces it sounded terrible. In the first track I embedded in the original post, that was using the free Piano One for treble, and the free Salamander, which you mentioned, in the bass. I found Salamander wasn't good up top, and Piano One wasn't good in the bass range. For a while I played with Piano One for treble and The Grandeur for bass, which was a bit better, but still not that great. Thanks again for the advice, but for the most part, I just wasn't happy with the best piano which came with Komplete, and am happy to have found a new one that is working well.

Hi folks, I bought Native Instruments Komplete recently, and was looking forward to finally having some awesome pianos. It includes 4 high quality ones, around 4 Gig or more each in size. For some reason though, they mostly sound really bad to me. The Grandeur was the only usable one, and I went about converting some old piano pieces to use this instead. Problem is, many of the pieces sounded better before. And I'd like to know why. Anyone have any insights?! I tried adjusting velocities, settings, reverb etc and just can't get the paid piano to sound like it has any life, so have gone back to the old free VST I had instead for some tracks. The free one I mostly use is Piano One version 1.0. Yep even if I try the newer versions it doesn't sound anywhere near as good! Again, why? Here are some comparisons... Using free piano: (actually uses Piano One for treble and Salamander for the bass, plus a little of something else I mixed in occasionally for oomf) And same piece using The Grandeur paid piano: The main way I'd describe it is that the free piano just sounds much more lively, while The Grandeur just sounds kind of dead and muffled. The free one has higher frequencies too, and sounds more light and airy, but I couldn't get The Grandeur to match it despite adjusting EQ and the many settings The Grandeur comes with. One more example... With free piano: (just Piano One this time) With The Grandeur: I really want to use my new paid pianos because... well, I paid for them! The Grandeur has sympathetic resonance which I really like. And Piano One sounds kind of tinny at times, and isn't great in the bass range, but even if the quality isn't technically as good, I just can't go past the fact that the result sounds better. Would love it if anyone could shed light on this. Most people seem to rave about The Grandeur, and even the other Komplete pianos, so I don't get it.

Ah, I know what it was. I changed my artist name at some point, so the links changed. I thought I'd changed them all. Possibly the caching made it appear not to be a problem earlier. Thanks, Rob.

I looked at my old posts (tracks for critiquing). I noticed all the posts more than about 5 months old no longer show the embedded SoundCloud player. Anyone know why? Should we expect old posts to lose their players over time? Is it a SoundCloud thing or a forum thing? I was thinking about editing the old posts to put the player back in, but wanted to check if that's an acceptable thing to do. I don't like the idea that people might find my old post but not be able to hear my tracks. As an example, here's one of my old posts: https://forums.songstuff.com/topic/50842-the-shape-of-pears/ The SoundCloud player appears to be loading, and then vanishes. Thanks, Rob.

Cool. What's the deadline? And when will we be informed about your decision? Thanks.

My second track is up for critiquing now too:

So I've read (here), so I'll see how that goes. Lots of tracks I listen to I just can't think of anything to say about. It's not my style of music or I just don't know enough about that style to have any real opinions about what they've done. But I've found a few to comment on. I have posted my first track for critique now too, so anyone reading this, please go critique me there rather than here:

Great thread! I love the idea of concept albums, but man there's few worth the label out there. I love Tarkus by Emerson Lake and Palmer and didn't even know it WAS a concept album. Mostly because I don't know what they're talking about. But side 1 certainly had a cohesive feel running through it, both musically and lyrically. Side 2 then had some stuff that really sounded out of place. I think Pink Floyd were really the masters of this, with The Wall being the best example. You could have an actual story that runs throughout, like say Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds. But that's more musical theatre as mentioned. The Wall does something else. They take the simple concept of a wall and then expand it in every direction possible. Mostly as a metaphor for barriers people put up between each other, around themselves and so on. I'd like to think of a simple cohesive idea like this which could go in so many directions while still following the theme. Rather than being restrictive, I think a good theme could help to motivate ideas radiating out from it.

Thanks Roymega. You're the second person to mention the Cookie Monster! Maybe I should change it to "Gonna have myself a cookie", but I prefer the ambiguity Actually I think I'm up to 10 posts now. Mostly been replying in the critique forum.

Hmm, looks like I might need another 5! I promise they won't all be posts like this

Ah OK, thanks for the tip. It says I'm on 4 posts now, so I guess this will be 5 and I'll find out soon enough! Thanks, Rob.