New supervillain EP done entirely on the Deluge
Bay_Mud
OntarioBeta Tester Posts: 108
I wanted to share my new EP, as it's quirky and fun, but also done entirely on the Deluge. This is my second time participating in the RPM Challenge (make an album in February) and this time I wanted to change it up. The result is a collection of songs as an aging supervillain crooning about the good old days. Ha
https://lordplunder.bandcamp.com
I composed the songs on my piano, but then broke them down into sections and recorded/arranged them in the Deluge (using a Nord Electro as a MIDI controller for the piano stuff). I even recorded the vocals directly into the Deluge via a mic connected to the mic input.
Once I had the tracks sounding as good as possible on the Deluge, I recorded the stereo mix into Reaper for mastering.
The overall workflow was tricky (especially for the track with tempo changes), so I'm happy to answer questions!
Comments
That's something different, I like it.
Thanks! Yeah, I figured it might be interesting, at the very least, as it's a different genre/style than is usually associated with the Deluge (and different than what I usually make with it too).
Love how different it is, and it actually sounds great, too. A billion points for creativity, uniqueness, and the courage it takes to go there. Can't wait to hear the rest...
My ears perk up whenever I hear "Deluge" and "tempo change" in the same sentence. I've fiddled around with a couple different approaches to making that work on the deluge, and I'd love to hear how you approached the challenge.
I love everything about the EP too! I didn't connect the dots at first, but when I put together who posted this, it made a lot of sense. If I'm remembering correctly, you seem to make a lot of more traditional pop songs (or however one describes songs with melodic singing versus pure synthesizer) using the deluge as your DAW? That's something I fumblingly aspire towards myself, and it's inspiring to see someone pull it off so well. I also recall you being located in Ontario? Give a holler if you ever play a show in Peterborough ;0)
Hey thanks! More to come, for sure.
Thanks for checking it out! Yeah, I come from a more guitar-based indie background and have played Peterborough a few times over the years with my wife in our garage-folk duo, Dog Is Blue. Hope to get back there soon!
For the Dog Is Blue stuff I usually use the Deluge as a sort of 4-track recorded to arrange/flesh out demos before moving in to Reaper. I'd love to merge the electronic/folk worlds at some point though.
My Bay Mud stuff is almost all Deluge though.
As for the tempo change, I tried a few different methods.
The simplest was to just create different song projects for the different tempo parts and switch between them, but that felt a bit bloated and harder to keep together/arrange.
Then I tried only one project, but using the undo/redo function to jump back and forth between the different tempos. This worked well enough to get things demoed and time the vocals, but was a bit finicky (especially if I had to undo anything else).
In the end, after I used the undo/redo method to get things timed well enough, I created a Reaper project that had tempo markers at the various spots that changed speeds. The Deluge responded to these tempo changes via MIDI. Finicky to set up, but once I got it right it was very easy to work with.
Most of this EP wouldn't have been nearly as challenging had I not also been trying to record the vocals directly into the Deluge via a mic connected to the mic input. In future, I'd probably record the instrumental stuff into Reaper then do the vocals there, but this was a fun experiment.
Excellent job on the mixing and mastering. Loved it on all levels, reminds of the genius of Lou Reed and Danny Elfman.
Hey thanks for listening! Glad you enjoyed it. I'm very flattered by the comparison
This is much too good.
You should be banned.
Very inspiring.
ant
Great album, quite fun! Impressive that you got that all done on the Deluge!
I'm still trying to figure it out as a song arranger. Would love a bit of overview on how you went from taking your ideas from the piano into the Deluge and then arranging that as a song, since that's pretty much what I try to do too. Might learn something from what you settled on as a good workflow.
You're too kind. Ha.
I was thinking about maybe doing a video where I talked about my experience with the RPM challenge this year, but could maybe focus more on this piano to Deluge workflow too.
Basically, I would start by rehearsing a particular song on piano, in some cases going as far as recording poor quality phone demos, so I knew it worked as a song. Then I created a new Deluge project with different sections for verse/chorus/bridge, etc. I laid down placeholder drum tracks to act as a metronome and connected a Nord Electro keyboard to use as a MIDI controller. I live played the various parts one at a time (experimenting with quantize settings and overall project resolution to get it right, but still keep a human feel occasionally). The laid the parts out in arranger mode, so I could start to get a sense of the overall structure before going back to each section and adding more instruments, etc.
The vocals were the biggest challenge, as I really shouldn't have done them straight into the Deluge. It meant I had more work to do later to clean them up, but it worked well enough in the end.
I don't watch video, but I'd definitely be interested in more info on that. The workflow sounds fascinating. I still struggle with the recording process - setting lengths and punching in and dealing with quantization just don't strike me as intuitive or effective on the Deluge and understanding how others work with these issues might be helpful to get me unblocked. In short, I was hoping it would be a useful multitrack MIDI recorder and lightweight editor/quantizer - a "graphical" (grid-based) Cirklon lite, if you will. But finding a workflow that lets me lay things into clips and build a track from that that doesn't run me into a thousand-and-one micro-roadblocks all the time (clips with fixed lengths so I can't jam into them, having to "learn" and "unlearn" the MIDI for each clip to play into it, can't edit or adjust things like aftertouch, pitchbend, and mod wheel graphically...) has me a bit disillusioned. I'm sure there's a way - you've done it! But I haven't found it yet.
I find it helpful to bounce between song mode and arranger mode depending on what you're trying to achieve. All the vocals for this EP were recorded directly into arranger mode, for example, as it was more flexible (some syllables start before the first beat or extend longer, etc. so the rigidity of song mode wouldn't work).
A lot of trial and error playing with things like quantization settings and zoom resolution, but I was happy with the workflow in the end. Hard to really explain over text though.
I just want to say that I enjoyed your fun-tastic EP. Well done and thank you
Hey thanks! I appreciate you taking the time to listen and let me know. More to come, I hope!
Here's a new Lord Plunder track (a Replacements cover) if anyone is interested:
https://ffm.to/lpwithinyourreach
Started as a challenge from the Deluge Discord to re-interpret a non-synth song. The entire track was done on the Deluge, but I ended up re-recording the vocals in Reaper, where I mixed the track stems too.