john

Hey Barbara, welcome to Songstuff!

Sadly, right now there is no gig scene. Still under lockdown just now, and who knows what venues will survive? Venues, artists, fans are all really keen to get back to a regular gigging schedule.

The elephant in the room. Before I had COVID-19 I thought it was a bit like a bad cold for most people. I was pretty isolated at home and mainly got shopping delivered. I thought I was pretty safe. Then, one Thursday evening my head started spinning, my balance was going, and the pain in my head was incredible. My breath became quite short, accompanied by the occasional cough which caused my head pain to explode each time. My temperature soared to 39 degrees. I had had bad head colds before but this was on a different scale. For that reason alone I suspected COVID-19. So next day I got a test. It came back positive a day later. A friend who had just got home from hospital told me to get an oxygen saturation meter. If your oxygen saturation goes below 90% you need to phone for an ambulance. Once it is lower than 90% it can nosedive and is one of the biggest killers at home. So I ordered one from Amazon. Next day, Sunday, the oxygen meter arrived about 7pm. My wife Karen was 88. I was 87. Damn. I called the emergency line. We were both admitted to hospital and put on oxygen. Lucky we did that. Apparently there was a chance that if we had just gone to bed that night, one or both of us might not have woken up. Statistically each of us now had a 1 in 16 chance of dying. We were now on a regimen of steroids, antibiotics and daily stomach injections of anti-clotting agent. I forget how many times my blood was taken, but it was a lot! Several times a day. A few days in, I developed diabetes type 2, bad enough to be having to take medication everyday for the foreseeable future. Normal glucose level is 5. My glucose level, 18. We both went through the first six days very similarly. My wife was off oxygen, but now had pneumonia. I developed a lung infection, a urine infection and an eye infection. Day 7, COVID had a second go at me. It doesn’t happen to everyone, but a percentage of COVID patients will experience a second wave of COVID about day 7. They kept increasing my oxygen but my saturation kept well below 90. My temp went back above 39. I was fighting for my breath. I got to about 16 or 18 litres of oxygen and was being assessed for being intubated and sent to intensive care when my temp stabilised and my oxygen saturation stopped getting worse. So, thankfully, no need for high dependency or intensive care. Statistically if you go to intensive care with COVID you have a 1 in 4 chance of dying. So I was on oxygen for days, getting antibiotics, stomach injections steroids, anti-diabetic meds. I had never thought of secondary issues being triggered by COVID-19 but it seems to attack your system in such a way that it finds weaknesses and exploits them. Additionally, the steroids they give you, suppress the immune system so they can tackle COVID-19 more effectively. Unfortunately it leaves your body vulnerable to infection, hence my infections and Karen’s pneumonia. 7 days fighting to breathe later I was off oxygen. What a horrible experience. Once I got home I was told not to exert myself. I didn’t realise just how true that was. I had lost 20 pounds in 12 days. I have been home from hospital 3 weeks today. I am exhausted walking across a room. If I keep going I am soon back breathing heavily and then coughing and fighting for breath. Don’t be complacent. You really, really don’t want COVID-19. Wearing a mask, if you can smell something, you can inhale particles someone breathes out. If you can catch a cold you can catch COVID-19. Take it seriously. Stay safe. Be vigilant. Believe me, it is nothing like a cold. Nothing. You might hear stories from some who barely have symptoms. I figured you should hear the other side.

I haven’t recorded anything yet, just been sound exploring. I would have tried by now, but I got my first vaccination. Trouble is, it was after only 2 1/2 weeks since I was clear of COVID, and so I had a pretty full on reaction with my temp at 39 degrees, splitting head-cold-like-headache etc. I might get started today or tomorrow. We will see!

Welcome to Songstuff man made material! Good to meet you. Have you posted any songs online?

Hey Richard... you mean this (very much not deleted) account? https://forums.songstuff.com/profile/23920-richard-watashi/?wr=eyJhcHAiOiJmb3J1bXMiLCJtb2R1bGUiOiJmb3J1bXMtY29tbWVudCIsImlkXzEiOjU0OTM2LCJpZF8yIjozNTU1NTN9

Hey Wriggle! Good to meet you. What modular synths zapped your cash?

Yay! A working studio. All connected together. Flashy lights, things that go beep and everything! A brief tidy up required and I should be good to go. I can’t wait. Some experimenting will come fist. Maybe a track or two will drop out of the process, maybe nothing.

Welcome to Songstuff! Thanks for taking time out from ruling the civilised universe to bestow your awesome music upon us mere minions. Of course you have now set the bar very high, so I expect great things!

I haven’t used it much since the move to Bandlab, but I did use all versions since the first version was released many moons ago. Post switch to Bandlab it seems very good. Initially it didn’t have all the nice VSTs that Sonar provided as standard. I think they now bundle some good VSTs? I have it installed. I really should update it and have a play.

In Glasgow city centre there’s a whisky shop with 400+ different whiskies, so there’s a lot to choose from!

They’ve had 3rd party VST since at least version 3, you just had to add all VST folders to the path. Otherwise the only issue was 32 bit or 64.

Hi Another series of Studio One tutorials. Pretty good series too. Well explained and suitable for beginners. Here’s a channel link: Thomas Foster musicproduction and here’s his first tutorial for Studio One 5: Cheers John

Hi gang What’s your monitor set up? I use Tannoy M1’s with Presonus Eris E4.5 Nearfield Monitors. Cheers John

It’s different when you know one of the contestants. I hope he does well.

Hey Bikes have always been a passion of mine, though because of my back it’s been a while since I’ve been able to ride one. I was never much of one for racing bikes. That said, I loved my Yamaha RD400 and my Kawasaki GPz900R. Slow by modern standards, but both racing bikes of their day. My favourite was my Yamaha XJ650. Big enough for fun, small enough to be light and easy to handle. I always fancied getting an old Triumph Bonneville 750 and a Harley Davidson 1300. I enjoyed fixing bikes up, and my dream project bike was always an old Indian motorcycle. Trouble is that they are rare and expensive. Any one else into their motorbikes? cheers John

Hey Barry Welcome to Songstuff! Sounds interesting. Does your studio work more at the demo end of the market or on finished releases? Planning a US tour must have been fun. Did you work with a US based Booking Agent to arrange the dates? Cheers John

This topic should help:

Hey immortal pancake! Awesome user name

He has a nice tone to his voice

I only watch the blind auditions. Thereafter my interest evaporates

Hey If you could only pick 5 VST (effects and processors) and 5 VSTi (instruments), what would they be and why? Cheers John

Many thanks Mike. Much appreciated. If I hadn’t gone in to hospital when I did it was entirely possible I might not have woken up in the morning. Additionally I had a COVID relapse around day 7 that only rallied at the last minute as they assessed me for being intubated in intensive care where the consultant refused to give a prognosis. The survivability from intensive care from this strain being around 1 in 4. I developed 3 secondary infections and diabetes as a result of COVID. Lost 20 pounds in 12 days. Who knows how long it will take to get back to some semblance of normal, but I dodged a bullet for sure.

I just took delivery of a bunch of gear to revitalise my studio. It’s going to take a bit or rework in the studio, and means some old gear being sold, but that’s ok. Might as well get some cash back for gear I no longer use. The only issue becomes when I want to recreate an old track. If I sell the gear I won’t be able to recreate them entirely.... but keeping the stems and draft mixes does mean I can rework them, and I am satisfied with that! There are two new keyboards: A Nord Grand (the playability of this make it the best piano I have ever played, and the quality I’d the sounds? Unbelievable) Native Instruments Komplete Kontrol S61, as a controller keyboard. Sound wise, Nord aside, I have the Komplete Select that came with the S61 and an Output bundle of all their instruments. Tasty. Just now I have set up the basics to enable me to play with my Nord.I will continue ripping gear out and replacing it. In addition to the music gear, I have invested a little in lighting, mic etc for better quality audio and video recordings. This includes live streaming. I still need to get the primary camera but plan on ordering it soon.

A good range of skills to have. Welcome to Songstuff!