pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

I've been away WAY too damn long. My (pretentious art school) finals came in while i was making some progress learning the ropes of LSDJ. Not to be over dramatic or anything, but those final weeks of my last college year were a gruesome battle of man ans brush versus empty canvas. it really set me straight on my career path to be a painter. That, and a long episode of piety at around the same time which turned me more Buddhist than you can possibly imagine. (I've been a Theravada Buddhist for a good while now, though). My gameboy was not touched since. Just a few days ago, I was struck with the sound of a sweet digital melody, and I was almost brought to tears. What had happened? shortly before the finals, I used to spend at least an hour a day scratching my head over LSDJ, getting uber excited when i got something half decent, and frustratingly scowling at the screen to see what i was doing wrong when it sounded like shit. Now, it's more like me giving a glance at my gameboy in the morning as it gathers dust.

Chipmusic is one f the most amazing kinds of music that I've heard in this life. I don't just want to hear it. i want it to come from me. But with my painting career picking up speed, school coming up in a few days (I'm an early bird for school classes), and religious practice, among all the other shit I do like applying for work, keeping the house clean, kung fu classes, painting, practicing the drawing, having a social life, etc. it's hard to divert ATTENTION to my gameboy. I know it sounds stupid. if you want to play music, just go ahead and do it, shithead. but it's like, when all of the other things are done, i go to my gameboy and look at it, remembering that i barely learned a few things and i still have to climb a big ass mountain of knowledge. after that, im pretty discouraged and decide to leave it for another day and the cycle repeats, where i feel worse and worse every day for not spending time coming back to this art form.

how do you guys do it? how do you go along with your careers, part time jobs, school, social life, parenting, relationships, religious practice (if any), and all that shit and still look at the gameboy and be able to say "FUCK YEAH let's do some chiptunes" rather than "I have other stuff to do"?, or how DID you do it, when you were just a beginner who didn't know jack? how did you overcome the challenge?

pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

and also: andaruGO, wheres the WAVE instrument tutorial, man? it's been like a fucking year already.

defPREMIUM
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http://chipmusic.org/forums/topic/10231 … ite-music/

n00bstar
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Montreal, Canada

Whiskey and speed.

pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

n00bstar you always know exactly what to say...

n00bstar
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Montreal, Canada

I stole that one from Twiggy Ramirez heh smile

roboctopus
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Madison, Alabama

I think you have to get over that initial hump where you're figuring things out, honestly.

I have an okay understanding of LSDJ, so I can just sit in bed in the evening and track some music (as opposed to watching TV, playing a video game, etc.) I have a job, wife, toddler, and I find time to work on music nearly every day.

BUT, it would sure be harder to get motivated if I had to read tutorials. So I think you just need to push through the learning phase.

chunter
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Brunswick, GA USA

I remember pivot.

"Life is what happens when you're busy making other plans."

robotoctopus makes a good point, if you really like LSDJ, it doesn't take much to plunk a few ideas in a game boy before/after a meditation. If you want making music to be a part of your life, you'll make space for it. Good luck in the meantime.

pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

the tutorial thing has a little truth in it. specially since most of the tutorials out there aren't really centralized. sure, there's the nullsleep tutorial and etc etc. but I've seen and gone over those basic tutorials already. most tutorials out there are for one specific instrument, not for the whole LSDJ experience. One tutorial among the dozen I've seen just told me to fuck around with the program. I don't think LSDJ is the kind of art medium that you master by fucking around with it.... at least not effectively. it might be true for figure drawing or painting to an extent, but not for a musical instrument which requires CODING and knowledge of a NUMERICAL LANGUAGE. I would REALLY love it if there was a tutorial series out there that would sit you down, and go through every part of the LSDJ program with you from the very beginning to extremely complex things. But as far as I know, that kind of tutorial is not out there. I'd like to see your tutorials and go through with them, but I still don't think I'm ready because some of the stuff you cover still looks like greek to me, so I still feel like i have to climb through a lot of shit to even get to the interesting stuff.

Saskrotch
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Chicago IL

Yeah as someone who went out of the way to convince us (and probably subconsciously himself) that he's an artist, and that whole buddhism thing, you should probably know that you can't force passion or inspiration. If you wanted to do it, you'd be doing it already.

roboctopus
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Madison, Alabama
pivot. wrote:

I would REALLY love it if there was a tutorial series out there that would sit you down, and go through every part of the LSDJ program with you from the very beginning to extremely complex things. But as far as I know, that kind of tutorial is not out there. I'd like to see your tutorials and go through with them, but I still don't think I'm ready because some of the stuff you cover still looks like greek to me, so I still feel like i have to climb through a lot of shit to even get to the interesting stuff.


Read the manual. It's detailed, well-written, and covers pretty much everything. When I was starting out all I did was that nullsleep tutorial and read the manual.

Infinity Curve
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Toronto, Canada
pivot. wrote:

I don't think LSDJ is the kind of art medium that you master by fucking around with it.... at least not effectively.

This might be part of what is holding you back.  Even if you find a tutorial that is to make some particular instrument, perhaps not of any use to you as is, just by learning what bits make what and even just 'fucking around' with the original sound and messing with parameters to see how it changes the sound are great building blocks and will eventually teach you a lot.  Once you get a bit of that under your belt, it becomes easier to approach things intelligently and have an idea of how to get to sound A from nothing, and then you can morph sound A into sound B and it snowballs.  Pretty soon you are making awesome bleeps and bloops and it starts to become less of a task to make sounds, and just a matter of composing them into songs.

Keep at it.  It sounds like you have the passion, just not the drive/motivation.

Something to try when you are short on time and want to have a quick go without resorting to turotrials, try just making little single channel loops with basic sounds, let it keep looping and start messing with parameters.  It may seem like random 'fucking around', but eventually you start to get an understanding of how to get to certain sounds.

Don't give up.

pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

Saskrotch has a point. I dont know if by artist he means chiptune artist. If thats the case, then im no artist. Im a visual artist, yes, but when it comes to 8bit music, im still a wanna-be. One thing i have to work on, both with my gameboy and brush, is to tackle HUGE projects and theres only one way to do that: get off your ass and do it. To be fair, i havent had the balls to get back in the saddle and try again.

defPREMIUM
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ok well what do you want from this thread? seriously read that thread that i linked to because it is the same thread as this..

jefftheworld
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Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Make love, wake up early - around 5 or 6 in the morning, just after the sun has come up. Put a pot of coffee on and do some stretches to really wake up but don't linger. Pack a small bag with some portable music equipment and an energy drink to stay hydrated and to keep your focus. Head out to some quiet, out of the way place - a public park, shady bench, whatever feels right - but don't start making music right away. Spend some time just enjoying the morning, avoid thinking about anything in particular, just let yourself relax. Just before you start, close your eyes and clear your mind and spend about a minute just focusing on your breathing. Open your eyes and begin to write.



Alternatively, you can just chug like 4-5 energy drinks and get about the same effect.

pivot.
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Andromeda's Black Hole

Ive been playfully thinking about doing a series of paintings depicting screenshots from dramatic scenes of Miami Vice. It would be pretty cool to incorporate sound into thecollection and add my own 80s like soundtrack made with LSDJ. Nothing fancy, of course, but maybe learning some good synths and long, heavy bass lines. This actually sounds like a good idea: incorporating chiptunes to my other work. At least while im learning. Then i can have a hobby AND be the DJ to my own gallery shows to present a specific mood..... hmmmmmmmmmm.

And Miami Vice is pretty hot shit, so watching a few episodes so i can study the audio doesnt sound bad at all.