New {ELSE} Album Later This Year
September 15th, 2019
It’s been another long writing, recording, mixing, and mastering journey, but the end is nigh! {ELSE} released a two-track preview of our new album, Through What We Knew. Take a listen!
Posts Tagged ‘guitar’
A Life Elided Releases “Lear”
January 30th, 2016
{ELSE} Releases “Who WIll Cry”
March 20th, 2015
After a ton of hard work which began all the way back in December of 2013, {ELSE} is releasing our debut album! It’s 8 songs long but still clocks in at 40 minutes and took probably hundreds of hours to finish. I laid down most of my guitar parts and recorded our bassist in December of 2013, and then things sort of stalled as our original singer quit and we hunted for a new one. During that hunt, I ended up recording ALL of the remaining guitar parts and added FX and mixed and mixed and re-mixed and mixed some more. Finally, in September of 2014 we had a new singer and new vocal parts so we recorded those. In February of this year, guitar tracks from our other guitarist and drums were finally added. I ended up going back and removing some of my guitar parts to add Nate’s in, and mixed drums for the first time in my life. There were TONS of mistakes and lessons learned along the way, including one frantic call to the CD pressing company to throw out a disc which had an error on it. We’re holding a CD release party tonight and I don’t think I’ve been more excited for many other things in my life, except maybe my wedding and the 1-year anniversary trip to Europe I have planned with my lovely wife!
Heironymus Bosch – Garden of Earthly Delights, A Metal Tribute
February 21st, 2014
Last week, the internet, or at least the internet if a lot of your friends are musicians and historians, blew up with the transcription of music written on a man’s butt in the depiction of hell in Hieronymus Bosch’s painting, The Garden of Earthly Delights. The hymn reminded me a lot of the stuff I heard in early music history, very simple, kind of plodding, and close to modern harmony with just a few odd cadences. It was definitely a decent minor key melody though, so I decided that given the melody’s history, I’d adapt it as an orchestral metal tune.
The melody was only available as an audio file, so I first had to transcribe the transcription. The only difficult part about this was that I wouldn’t exactly call the phrasing natural, or at least not as I’d like it, so I did slightly change some of the rhythmic values. I then determined what chord structure to put underneath the melody and started writing parts. The bass part, a bit more active than in traditional metal, came first. Rhythm guitars came next and focused on galloping rhythms, palm muting, and opened chords in the 2nd half of the progression. I was able to do all this between midnight and 2 last Friday, after I returned home after a party.
Saturday morning I recorded those and programmed the drums in FL Studio, then set to work on writing out the strings and brass. After rendering the orchestral elements with EWQL Symphonic Gold, I mixed what I had so far together. Then it was time for the leads.
I first wrote two additional lead guitars providing some counter-melodies and arpeggios towards the end of the song. You can hear those split hard left and right. The final piece was recording the hymn as the lead guitar part with a good dose of pinch harmonics and vibrato.
A few rounds of mixing, some quick intro and outro slides for the video, and it went up on YouTube. What a way to spend a weekend.
Else Shows
July 21st, 2013
Else played last night at the Whammy Bar, has another show next weekend in Madison, and two shows set up in August now. We’re really settling into a groove with our setlists and having a great time playing. We’ve met some fantastic bands along the way and are going to look to set up more shows with them in the upcoming months. For complete details, check out Else’s calendar ».
48 Hour Film Fest
June 17th, 2013
This last weekend I acted as music supervisor, recording engineer, composer, and performer for a film entered into the 48 Hour Film Fest. The genre we drew was Western so I partnered with my friends in Pay the Devil and Of the North, using some originals from each band as well as new music written for the short film. The writing and recording was a blast and everything turned out well. I’m incredibly proud of how the music integrates into the film, and I really think the film crew, writers, actors, directors, did an amazing job.
The film, “Tooth and Nail” premieres this Thursday at the Oriental Theater at 7 pm. You can see it and the rest of the entries for $10.
New A Life Elided Song – In It Now
December 10th, 2012
As I’m burning some PTO time before the end of the year (use it or lose it), I decided to re-purpose an unused Else track for A Life Elided.
Check out “In It Now” on A Life Elided’s website »
New A Life Elided Song – Just This
May 25th, 2012
Another song that started off as an Else track, this heavy song is in drop D and 5/8. This song was sort of a flop in the Else playlist, but I knew it had potential. Some serious reworking of the guitar and bass tones, a new approach to the song order, and of course a heavy dose of electronics really turned this one around. Take a listen on aLifeElided.net »
Myst
April 28th, 2012
A post-rock soundtrack for a video tribute to the video game series, Myst. Electronic samples come from Absynth, and guitars were recorded on my ESP LTC EC1000 Deluxe using a Line6 POD X3 Live.
New A Life Elided Song – We’re There
April 15th, 2012
“We’re There” was originally an Else song, but was deemed to not truly be in the Else style. I rerecorded the guitar and bass parts with some different sounds, added new layers of drums and fx, and then finally wrote a melody over the top. It’s the first new ALE song in quite some time, and it’s good to be back. Take a listen on aLifeElided.net »
My Bands and Activities
An industrial/hard rock band I founded. I play guitar and serve as the main songwriter.
{ELSE} »
My Lo-fi glitch pop side project.
Hey, Barely »
Dabbling in dark ambient.
Akin to Being »
I sub in for this bluegrass string band on spoons, snare, and suitcase bass drum. Pay the Devil »
I have several string quartet arrangements for sale on MusicNotes.com »
A techno side project since 2005, I write most of the music and perform bass, guitar, and FX. A Life Elided »
I wrote album and concert reviews, thinkpieces, and music news forThose Who Dig »
My wife and I played in Whiskey Doubles, an orchestral-folk outfit. Whiskey Doubles »
I played drums, wrote most of the songs, and acted as a manager for Effigy from 2002-2008. Effigy »