[Ambient Album] Ambient Stories 2 (mp3)

[Saga Musix]

Well, if there's no other option, I can provide you with some FTP space to upload to.

[cubaxd]

As Jojo requested them, here are the source files of the tracks "Paper Plane" and "Alltag".
After cleaning them up, downsampling some of the larger samples and converting some actual
mono samples from stereo to mono, it was possible to reduce the size of the mods dramatically.
The comments of the modules contain links to the needed VST plugins.

as2_paperplane_alltag.tar.bz2 (24MB)

If you're using Windows and don't know how to extract the archive, you can use 7-zip, a great free tool which supports many formats.

P.S.: Hope the download doesn't make much problems this time!

@jojo
It's not so much a question of space, than it is a question of my upload speed. No matter where I'm uploading it, it's just sloooooooow.

[Saga Musix]

Can't be worse than the problems that i currently have with my DLAN. It took me quite some time to download that file (and I'm still on it) as it always loses connection. anyway, thanks for sharing!
(and it looks like i have to download it AGAIN because it doesn't want to resume after 95%.... ._.)

[cubaxd]

Are you sure it's you DLAN (never heard of that before btw)? Because my site seems to have some trouble, too.
I would recommend wget. And then enter in a command line window

Code Select Expand

wget -c http://cubaxd.net/music/as2_paperplane_alltag.tar.bz2
As long as you add the -c option, wget will continue at the position of the current file size.
(but to make it work that way, wget must be in a %PATH% (for example: copying all wget files to C:\WINDOWS\system32) or you must enter the absolute address (i.e. C:\Wherever\wget -c http:...))
There are of course tools that are easier to use, it's just that I don't know them

[Saga Musix]

DLAN may also be known as powerline or homeplug. it's been very unstable tonight, i had connection timeouts everywhere all the time. got the file within a few minutes now.

[KrazyKatz]

Way to go Cubaxd. You have a lot of really interesting ideas here. Your sense of patience given way to moments of loveliness is hard to find.

Great album. You should eventually get all your albums professionally mastered. They are certainly worth it.

Y.

[Harbinger]

Notes as i'm listening:

Beautiful album! Could easily fit into the New Age category, but the sonic methods are too modern for that genre perhaps. (Maybe New Age should be redefined! :wink:) Anyway, most of the songs are too theme-driven to be called just Ambient, but that is clearly the intent of the music. Perhaps we should call it Rhythmic Ambient.

Paper Plane is also one of my favorites. And Sam_Zen is right -- you could keep this going for another 8 minutes and it wouldn't sound tedious, just very "hypnogenic."

Some the sounds in Blaue Toene were also a little bitter ma non troppo. But Brummschlieffe is one of THE most interesting compositions i've ever heard. At first i thought i was listening to a song of drippy faucets. Then a soft kick is added using a 7/8 rhythm that transitions into a 4/4 as smoothly as soft soap. I couldn't keep my mind on my work, it was so capturing.

Alltag: industrial ambience, but somehow keenly disturbing. Either i'm wandering around in a sewer, or within the mangled machine of a madman's mind. The mixture of reverbed sounds with non-reverbed ones really adds 3D perspective to this piece, and could serve as a teaching point for advanced users.

Singing Machine is as interesting as the others but it makes me yearn for the future technology when the human voice can be perfectly synthesized. This song is an excellent stew of phenomes (for me it sounds like a garbled group of syllables; if these are words in another language i wouldn't know). Needless to say this song is entirely too short.

And if you're weather falls into drought, play Nur Regen to be reminded of the music within rain. The composer introduces musical elements midway thru the song, but mostly keeps it in the background.

Over an hours worth of relaxing (or at least interesting) music that is good enough to be marketed. I could hear alot of these tracks as backdrop for movie scenes, they're that good. A well-thought-out collection of brainstrokers that is well worth the download (if Ambient doesn't bore you). And thanks cubaxd, for sharing it with us at no charge. You're a true artist in my book!

[cubaxd]

@KrazyKatz
Thx a lot. As for the mastering, you've once said that I would make progress, so I'm still having hope that I'll get the job done myself one day.
On the other hand, it isn't that bad (in my opinion) if the mastering quality is "average" (as long as it's not poor ...).

@Harbinger
I like your review much more than my album

Perhaps we should call it Rhythmic Ambient.

I call it "Electronica with a lot of Ambient in it", but Rhythmic Ambient would be an apposite term as well.

Singing Machine (...) for me it sounds like a garbled group of syllables; if these are words in another language i wouldn't know

I wouldn't know either. It is a simple text file with some commands the program txt2pho (German only) can read and convert to an mbrola file (mbrola supports many languages). I already wrote something about this programs in some other thread, but not how to make a voice sing.
This is some of the text of Singing Machine (it's really just gibberish, same as used by yodelers ):

Code Select Expand


{SetSingingTempo:180}
{SetOctave:c}
{Singing:16,c;16,d';4,e;4,g}
hehurodi
{Singing:16,a;16,g';4,f;4,d}
jadalodi
... (and that goes on for a while :))

Each syllable has it's own note and txt2pho recognizes every syllable automagically. The numbers stand for the speed (ie 16 for 1/16), and a single quote after a note means this note is one octave higher than the others (the standard octave is defined by SetOctave)). It's obvious that one can make very interesting sounds with txt2pho, in both German and Gibberish (since it only supports German).

And thanks cubaxd, for sharing it with us at no charge.

No prob. Making money is one of the biggest problems of mankind.