Steve Mueske

I've been working pretty intensely on a remix of Sevish's "Some Things Must," which I'm calling "Let's Begin." It's way over the top ATM, but it's such an honor to be working with his stems and I'm trying to honor his sense of largesse. Right now it's the top track on my working reel. I'll post newer versions tonight and tomorrow, after each session. I will be adding some rhythmic elements, a pad, and a lead, as well as dialing back some of the more isoteric delay elements. https://play.reelcrafter.com/whoisthemuesk/musicistheriver

@Emily Quinn Your piece made me cry. Your voice is so beautiful and the message here is so raw and honest. One of the things I love most about NMF is seeing artists really open up. It's such a privilege.

@john You seriously don't hear the Thom York vibe in your work? My God, the search for the uncanny and beautiful in your songs is very striking. I love what you are doing.

I've had a long intense week, and will finally have some time free tomorrow and Sunday. I will post an update on my remix of Sevish's Some Things Must, & listen & comment on music in this thread. I am heartened to see this continuing.

I get that, bro! I'm f*cked up. I'm doing the best I can. We can talk privately. I can't always give you all the info you want, but I can assure you that I am safe (for the moment) and working.

@VoiceEx Holy shit, brother, I can't I didn't find this till just now, but here is a track with meat and chops for days.

Oh, I'm well aware of that. I'm careful. I filed for a business LLC today, which is a necessary first step. The post you responded to originally was me talking out loud to myself. I appreciate your care.

I filed for an LLC today through the state's recommended third party registrar. It included the application, EID filing, Articles of Incorporation filing, a forwarded business phone, and personal info kept off public records. Special thanks to @Clay Anderson Johnson for information and a kick in the ass (in a good way). Once it is official (it's supposed to take 4 business days), I will open a business checking account, get real and virtual business cards, and start scrapping to build it. The website I've started will be to generate leads for production work and to promote Pentachrist music (which will come later). The next step, I think, is to finish the first track, create a promotional video, and start looking for funding.

I'm not at that point yet. I have a million ideas and they are all time-consuming. I'm talking, right now, about a sounding board for ideas and pragmatic steps to take. There are a thousand people with ideas, advice, etc., etc. Articles, videos, friends of friends, methods, advice. I want to hire people for various professional tasks in establishing a viable presence. Right now, I specifically need someone to help me organize my thinking so that I can keep growing and paying for the right people to move forward. Enough to sustain a working creative model.

Someone to help me figure all this shit out. How I can create, go public, and not sell my soul. Someone to bounce ideas off, help me figure out courses of action, etc. Setting up a business. Who to hire for what purpose. Pragmatic steps to take. I've already hired a technical consultant for Bitwig, the DAW I'm migrating to. There's so much to consider, so many avenues. I don't want it to become a quagmire.

A start... https://pentachrist.com/

I need to hire a creative consultant.

Wow, I really like this! Keep 'em coming.

These kinds of experiments, I believe, are integral to creating and understanding a personal mixing style.

I still dig the simplicity and honesty. Lots of inspired flourishes and production choices. I think the snare is too loud, and could use a little more body. Just for yucks, throw a spectrum analyzer on it and find out where the upper mid peaks are, then use a notch filter with a very narrow band and poke it right in the middle.

Thanks! Let's Begin is my remix of Sevish's Some Things Must, which I hope to premier in May. It's in 22edo, which is such a beautiful temperament. Brendan Byrnes almost exclusively in 22. The second piece I sent to you privately after taking a first pass at a concept. RE: The Death of Love. It was formerly called Bereft. It was added to Look and comes right after Slow Motion Suicide. I think you should already have it? Looking forward to listening and commenting on your track after work tonight!

Ha! I would never have gotten the reference otherwise. Intercessor, perhaps? Doula?

? I don't undetstand?

I paid for three years of the basic level website. Yes, good points RE business. All I want, literally, is time & space to work. Everything else is just necessary capitalist bullshit. I'm not a star, nor do I care to be one. I have, variously, described my role in working with others as priest. I will do whatever it takes, suffer any ignoble obstacle as long as I can honestly and forthrightly explore my art. All I have is my soul. It is the one thing I refuse to relinquish.

Hi, I've been gone a week or two, but now I'm back. I often don't know when I've reached a breaking point until I get there. John graciously installed a plugin that allows me to temporarily deactivate my account when I get overwhelmed (like I do for Twitter and Facebook). I hired a consultant to work with me about learning Bitwig better. Reaper I know inside and out, and I love it, but Bitwig is much more robust with modulation options. I'm trying to figure out a way to get away from the grind of retail work, whether it's forming an LLC and scrapping for work or moving to a subscription type model and providing early access to audio from projects with deeper access into my creative process. I know I need to start incorporating video as well. As first steps, I bought an Office 365 subscription so I can create documents and metacommunication from anywhere. I also bought a 3-year subscription from Blue Host and hope to start designing a website soon. I'm still transitioning from müesk to Pentachrist and decided to keep adding müesk pieces to Look, which will be a "living retrospective." I replaced "How to End a Story," which now includes Jon L. Smith's sound design contributions, and added "Bereft" and "Sequences."

Okay, I've not been around much for two weeks. I'm trying to figure out boundaries, commitments, etc. Sorry. We all mean the best, and I'm crazy. John and others, thank you for the patience (and the tools necessary for me to create in public). My live reel, as always, is here: https://play.reelcrafter.com/whoisthemuesk/musicistheriver This week I have been focusing on two pieces. The first in this reel is an extremely cut and mixed version of Sevish's "Let's Begin," which I hope to premier on a panel for Microtonal Adventures Fest. The second is an early sketch of a new piece in Bitwig utilizing an ultra-hi-def digital interpretation of tape-style "printing." I'm really trying to develop a comprehensive, new style of sound. Please don't hurt me. ------ I'm listening and will participate this week.

Just got here (from a link in the newsletter). I second Cakewalk and Spitfire labs. The free suite of Reaper plugins, though ugly as sin, are also good. Reafir, in particular, is very useful. I popped in to share a link to Surge XT. I have a lot of high-end synths, samplers, suites, etc., all of which I love, and Surge XT is one of the best synths available, period. It's completely open source and has a wide community of users and developers contributing. It's easily in my top five favorite synths. https://surge-synthesizer.github.io//

Bill, I remember you sending me a very early version of this. I will listen and comment later.

Just so there's no weirdness, we are not involved in any way except my producing and mixing her work. All of the music and instrumentation are hers (with one very small exception). I'm just trying to be an aural priest, to really dig in and listen, and to interpret to the best of my abilities.

TY! There's still plenty to tweak, for sure. This is just my best take so far on how to make this work. The tail is not actuality a reverb. It's a delay in which I'm modulating ratio and wet parameters with LFOs.