#audio tracks format

[whyoneartheven]

le animatic is queued to post 🕺🕺🕺

[perilegs]

i stole the idea for a dead three Charli xcx von Dutch edit from @getmenaced several months ago and didn't get around to finishing it until now

[rednorka]

just so yall know:

Puyo Puyo Puzzle Pop OST is now available officially on YouTube for FREE (like how 20th Anniversary OST and some others do) with tracks from official album release, including bonus 16-BIT arrangements (which, tbh, sound like they were made on PC-98 in 1996 more than Mega Drive)

(Note that most titles are in Japanese. KHinsider album page seems to be scheduled on April 3rd, if anyone would like that option)

[mossdeep]

mmmhmm yep! a great way to encourage people to read is by calling them stupid! that's awesome!

[semi-sketchy]

how the fuck did I lose my endcard audio file

I know I have it, where did I put it

[stellophiliac]

how to build a digital music collection and stuff

spotify sucks aaaass. so start downloading shit!!

file format glossary

.wav is highest quality and biggest

.mp3 is very small, but uses lossy compression which means it's lower quality

.flac is smaller than .wav, but uses lossless compression so it's high quality

.m4a is an audio file format that apple uses. that's all i really know

downloading the music

doubledouble.top is a life saver. you can download from a variety of services including but not limited to apple music, spotify, soundcloud, tidal, deezer, etc.

i'd recommend ripping your music from tidal or apple music since they're the best quality (i think apple music gives you lossless audio anyway. .m4a can be both lossy and lossless, but from the text on doubledouble i assume they're ripping HQ files off apple music)

i also love love love cobalt.tools for ripping audio/video from youtube (they support a lot of other platforms too!)

of course, many artists have their music on bandcamp — purchase or download directly from them if you can. bandcamp offers a variety of file formats for download

file conversion

if you're downloading from apple music with doubledouble, it spits out an .m4a file.

.m4a is ok for some people but if you prefer .flac, you may wanna convert it. ffmpeg is a CLI (terminal) tool to help with media conversion

if you're on linux or macOS, you can use parameter expansion to batch convert all files in a folder. put the files in one place first, then with your terminal, cd into the directory and run:

for i in *.m4a; do ffmpeg -i "$i" "${i%.*}.flac"; done

this converts from .m4a to .flac — change the file extensions if needed.

soulseek

another way to get music is through soulseek. soulseek is a peer-to-peer file sharing network which is mainly used for music. nicotine+ is a pretty intuitive (and open-source) client if you don't like the official one.

you can probably find a better tutorial on soulseek somewhere else. just wanted to make this option known

it's bad etiquette to download from people without sharing files of your own, so make sure you've got something shared. also try to avoid queuing up more than 1-2 albums from one person in a row

tagging & organizing your music

tagging: adding metadata to a music file (eg. song name, artist name, album) that music players can recognize and display

if you've ripped music from a streaming platform, chances are it's already tagged. i've gotten files with slightly incorrect tags from doubledouble though, so if you care about that then you might wanna look into it

i use musicbrainz picard for my tagging. they've got pretty extensive documentation, which will probably be more useful than me

basically, you can look up album data from an online database into the program, and then match each track with its file. the program will tag each file correctly for you (there's also options for renaming the file according to a certain structure if you're into that!)

there's also beets, which is a CLI tool for... a lot of music collection management stuff. i haven't really used it myself, but if you feel up to it then they've got extensive documentation too. for most people, though, it's not really a necessity

how you wanna organize your music is completely up to you. my preferred filestructure is:

artist > album > track # track

using a music player

the options for this are pretty expansive. commonly used players i see include VLC, foobar2000, clementine (or a fork of it called strawberry), and cmus (for the terminal)

you can also totally use iTunes or something. i don't know what audio players other systems come with

i personally use dopamine. it's a little bit slow, but it's got a nice UI and is themeable plus has last.fm support (!!!)

don't let the github page fool you, you don't have to build from source. you can find the releases here

click the "assets" dropdown on the most recent release, and download whichever one is compatible with your OS

syncing

if you're fine with your files just being on one device (perhaps your computer, but perhaps also an USB drive or an mp3 player), you don't have to do this

you can sync with something like google drive, but i hate google more than i hate spotify

you can get a free nextcloud account from one of their providers with 2GB of free storage. you can use webDAV to access your files from an app on your phone or other device (documents by readdle has webDAV support, which is what i use)

disroot and blahaj.land are a couple providers i know that offer other services as well as nextcloud (so you get more with your account), but accounts are manually approved. do give them a look though!!

if you're tech-savvy and have an unused machine lying around, look into self-hosting your own nextcloud, or better yet, your own media server. i've heard that navidrome is a pretty good audio server. i unfortunately don't have experience with self-hosting at the moment so i have like zero advice to give here. yunohost seems to be a really easy way to manage a server

afterword

i don't know if any of this is helpful, but i just wanted to consolidate my personal advice in one place. fuck big tech. own your media, they could take it away from you at any moment

[luimnigh]

So yesterday, Green Day announced that for the 30th Anniversary of their album Dookie, they would be releasing Demastered versions of the album's songs.

Every song on the album has been placed on outdated, lower-quality, inconvenient audio formats, and you can enter a draw to win the chance to buy one of the limited edition copies.

You can maybe get your hands on one of:

3 copies of Burnout on Player Piano Rolls

50 copies of Having A Blast on Floppy Disk

1 copy of Chump on Teddy Ruxpin

1 copy of Longview on a wireless doorbell

25 copies of Welcome to Paradise on Game Boy cartridge

1 copy of Pulling Teeth on Electric Toothbrush

1 copy of Basket Case on Singing Big Mouth Bass

3 copies of She on Hitclip

10 copies of Sassafrass Roots on 8-Track

5 copies of When I Come Around on Gramophone Wax Cylinders

3 copies of Coming Clean on X-Ray Records (records made of used X-Ray plates)

1 copy of Emenius Sleepus on Answering Machine

10 copies of In The End on MiniDisc

20 copies of F.O.D. (Fuck Off and Die) on Fisher Price toy records.

10 copies of All By Myself on hand-cranked music box

Unfortunately, only available in the United States, otherwise I'd love to get my hands on one of these.

[spoocys-glade-of-dreams]

*Murfy extended his hand out for a handshake, he had a smile on his face.*

"Had it not been for your quick thinking, I might've been killed tonight. I really can't thank you enough, Rose. Not just for saving my life, but for helping Mona out too. You are always welcome here. Whenever you need a place to go or some friendly face to talk to, you have a home here when you need it.

Oh, and thanks for treating Rayman well. We may fight a lot but I still care about the guy. Ever since you came along he's been all smiles and never stops talking about you. You really did bring the guy so much joy and that puts a grin on my face! "

*Rayman's face turned beet red and he turned away shyly. Once the food had been set out, Floyd returns to the room and smirks to everyone.*

"Well, I promised you guys a personal show tonight! We are going to party till the sun comes up, baby! Better still, Rayman's got the day off tomorrow so he'll have plenty of time to get some good sleep in later! HIT IT RAYMAN!"

*Rayman began to play the saxophone while Raymona put in a track in their music player. Floyd began to sing along to the music that played. He brought the same energy to the room as he did in the club. Rayman seemed to lose himself into the music and kept playing his heart out. So in sync with each other and just delightful to watch. It was easy to see why Floyd was so respected as an entertainer back at the United of Eden.*

@spoocys-glade-of-dreams

Whoops! She forgot she brought a change of clothes so she could change out of her tuxedo. Scratching behind her head, the woman made her way to the bathroom to get dressed. When she came out, she was no longer in her tuxedo and instead was wearing casual attire. It was not long after that she had seen Floyd and Murfy come down the stairs. She was happy to see that Murfy had returned to normal.

Oh whats this? A feast? The redhead could hardly wait! Ellie couldn't help but chime in and shout hell yeah too and proceeded to giggle. Perhaps what caught her attention the most were the two cases in the corner of the room. Sure one of them was a guitar, but the other one was a saxophone?! He could play the saxophone too?! Is there anything this limbless man can't do?! Call her impressed.

"Apology accepted." The woman smiled, joining them. "I'm sorry for getting as angry as I did. It wasn't appropriate given the situation that had just happened. You needed comfort, not to be scolded at."

[elliespectacular]

how do you go about captioning other peoples' videos? i mean this logistically; like does penny for example just trust you with her youtube account for the sake of writing subtitles into the videos? or is another thing happening

(asking bc i'm impressed by the quality of your subtitles and want to get into making subs for other peoples' videos as a Thing)

Caption files can be generated in any software that supports it. YouTube has an in-house caption editor that gets the job done but it's not very user-friendly. Newer versions of Adobe Premiere Pro and other editing suites have features that let you write and export a caption track (usually in .csv, or .vtt format) that contains the text, timings, and formatting. There are lots of options out there!

All you need in order to write captions for someone else is one such software and the final draft of a video, that way you can line everything up to the exact timing. Doesn't hurt to brush up on proper captioning etiquette too!

@sophie-baybey usually does the captions for Penny and she uses Premiere's caption editor. Personally I use subtitle-horse.com which is browser-based and does just about everything you'll need in the free version.

Since I tend to edit the highlight videos, captioning them is pretty straightforward when I do it - but we also have a production group chat when we need Penny or myself to clarify something that's hard to hear or a reference we don't get etc. I tend to send Sophie the isolated speech as a separate audio file just in case the audio balancing makes certain portions hard to parse. Like any collaborative project, communication between team members is key!

[haberai]

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[sirfrogsworth]

I'm not upset that blu-rays are being phased out. Formats all become obsolete and then die out.

My worry is there is not an adequate replacement for physical media. If you stream a 4K movie, it is usually over compressed and has a lossy audio track. Usually the quality *improves* when you move on to the next thing. But in this case, only the convenience is improved.

And there is no way to truly own the media you buy online. Even on Amazon when you "buy" something, that just means you have indefinite access to the file on their server. But if they lose the rights to that content or decide to delete it for tax purposes, you lose it too.

There is a service called Kaleidescape. It allows you to download blu-ray quality movie files onto local storage. Unfortunately the service has way too many caveats. You can only play the movies on their proprietary equipment. If they go out of business you will lose all of your movie purchases. And while they have a lot of mainstream, big budget movies, their selection is far from vast.

Oh, and their hardware starts at $8,000 and each movie is between $10 and $30 to purchase. And if you want to save more than 125 movies, the cost balloons to nearly $20K for the hardware.

The quality issue will eventually solve itself. New codecs like AV1 and H.266 will allow files to be compressed without losing any quality.

But I have no idea what to do about being unable to truly own your media. No studio will agree to DRM-free downloads that you can store anywhere and play with any device.

Maybe they can create a system where you can register any device you own and be allowed to play the file on those registered devices. So you get a file you can download, but the DRM requires verification you own the device it is being played on.

Perhaps they could designate a few cloud storage services as approved download platforms. You are free to shift your media from cloud to cloud, but it must always stay on the cloud and be registered to you. That way if a cloud storage company bites the dust, you still have the option to move your media to another place.

It's not as good as DRM-free local storage, but I don't see studios agreeing to anything else.

In truth, people are probably never going to buy movies in the future. If you have the option to rent for $3 or buy for $20, people probably aren't going to see the value in spending that much to own a movie.

Maybe the solution lies in some kind of law. If a platform no longer wishes to host a show or movie and they can't sell it to another streaming service, then they must give up the rights and allow the Library of Congress to save and distribute it.

[randomidiocyncrazies]

To Be Hero X Timeline

a rough timeline in an attempt to keep track of when things happen, since we have confirmation that the story isn't told chronologically.

Things will be updated as episodes air! and feel free to lmk if i got something wrong

UPDATE PROGRESS: ep 12

5 Years Before Commission

Notion of "people's Trust Values can forge heroes" came into public consciousness; an era of rapid advancement in sciences (AI, material science, energy conversion and biotech) and heroic activity begins [meta: setting notes 1, 5, 7]

Before Commission

The Dawnfall Fall of Dawn Incident (曙光隕落事件) dealt a devastating blow to society; E-soul fought Zero and won, bringing the tragedy to an end [ep 5 performance contract, setting note 5]

((ngl I think Dawnfall sounds cooler… but i did say i'll update it to the official name once we get it, so Fall of Dawn it is!))

Formation of the Hero Association Committee to prevent a repeat of the Fall of Dawn Incident [meta: setting note 5]

Year 1 After Commission [聯合元年]

Ghostblade born 0828 [meta/source 2]

Year 8

Holoscreen technology (全息屏技術) developed by research lab using AI and material science and incorporated into social landscape after huge success with hero ads [meta: setting note 7]

A female hero became X for the first time, and will be the last for a long while; no other solo female heroes will become X until Bowa in Year 32 [ep 11]

Year 13

Little Johnny born 0808 [meta]

Year 14

Queen born 1018 [meta]

Yang Cheng born 1111 [meta]

Year 16

Nice born 0711 [meta]

Year 18

Dragon Boy born 0214 [meta]

Year 20

Lucky Cyan born 0324 [meta]

Ling Ling born 0522 [meta]

Yang Cheng's (6) parents killed, saved by E-soul [ep 5]

Year 23

Luo Li born 1201 [meta]

Airplane crash with Cyan (3) as the only survivor; crash suspected to be a coverup/clash between heroes [ep 8], and there is suggestion of sabotage according to the chatter on the plane [ep 10]

Liu Zhen gave the audio recording of the plane's interior (which reveals that Cyan survived because of the other passengers' hope/faith for her to survive) to the Dean for safekeeping [ep 10]

Year 26

Queen (12) attends entrance exam of HAC University and gets a perfect score, vows to finish her degree in 2 years [ep 11]

Mr. Matchstick (乾柴) ＆ Ms. Blazing Fire (烈火) won the Hero Tournament as a couple and gain title of X [timeline pieced together from ep 8 and 11]

Year 28

Ahu born 0504 [meta]

Cyan's (8) orphanage becomes a cult with her as the Sacred Maiden [ep 8]

Mr. Matchstick ＆ Ms. Blazing Fire caught in a cheating scandal, which raises tension and interest in gender issues [ep 8, 11]

Specifically, Mr. Matchstick is caught cheating on his partner [Ken's pad in ep 11]. I do wonder why Blazing Fire didn't try to become a solo hero tho

Queen (14) graduates university, declares her intent to become X and replace the Trust Value system, signing with DOS and aims to rank in Top 10 by 18 year old [ep 8, 11]

Her words spark popularity in female heroes and brought on a more feminist cultural attitude (even though she herself did not talk about gender issues; the framing of "girl power!" is from the media)

Baby Luo Li (5) potentially spotted, watching Queen's speech on TV [ep 11]

DOS had dipped under as one of the biggest hero agencies due to conflict with MG, but regains standing after shifting its niche and supporting more female heroes, such as Queen and Bowa [ep 11]

Bowa, the "perfect combination of strength and beauty" and top ranked female hero in DOS, is speculated to break into Top 10 soon [ep 11]

Big and Little Johnny (15) seen in Heroes Tower [ep 11]

"Walking Disaster/Calamity" Luo moves into Cyan's orphanage [ep 8]

Year 30 (?)

Smile won the 15th(?) Hero Tournament and gains title of X

Year 32 (?)

16th Hero Tournament: Bowa defeats Smile, the previous X, and becomes the first solo female hero to take the title of X since Year 8 [ep 11]

People corrupted by Fear shown to attack people [ep 11]

Queen (18) makes it into Top 10 [ep 11]

The Johnnies (Little Johnny: 19) at Rank 15 [ep 11]

Year 33

Yang Cheng (19) starts performing as E-soul in local shows as a part-time job [ep 6 YC's resume]

Year 34

Cyan (14) enters her rebellious phase and turns the church service into a concert; she and Luo try to run away but are thwarted by the orphanage head, who used to be a hero [ep 8]

Cyan escapes and starts busking on the streets, eventually earning fame and attracting her old followers [ep 9]

With the rise of FOMO and changing marketing practices, Mr. Shang left MG to form Treeman [ep 3, 11]

Rock left FOMO and jumped ship to MG, claiming he will make a new legend [ep 11]

MG hero Dragon Boy (16) courts scandal with his extreme actions [ep 11]

Fireman who will become Firm Man rescues the young Wolf Girl [ep 3]

Treeman (Mr. Shang) signs with Firm Man [ep 3]

Year 35

Cyan (15) signs with DOS (Manager Ken) [ep 9, JP website]

Year 36

Lucky Cyan active as a singer whose popularity soared recently [ep 5]

Firm Man's statue unveiled + award ceremony with the little girl who later becomes Wolf Girl [ep 3]*

((The JP website puts the Firm Man statue ceremony after the E-soul arc, but I think we can see the statue present at Heroes' Avenue when Yang Cheng was proven innocent of orchestrating the kidnapping [ep 6]? Which wouldn't make sense if his arc happens before the statue ceremony...))

Yang Cheng (22) rescues Pomelo, gaining Shang Chao and Xia Qing's support and operates as New E-soul [ep 5]; SC confirmed to be the son of Treeman's Mr. Shang [ep 7]

Yang Cheng accused of fraud/setting up the kidnapping, around 1 month before E-soul's 34 Anniversary [ep 6]

Enlighter tasked by Shang Chao/his dad to clear Yang Cheng's name; Yang Cheng declared innocent [ep 6]

Luo hears about rising star Cyan on the radio, and the Dean tells him Cyan was the only survivor in the crash that killed his parents [ep 9, 10]

18th Hero Tournament: Queen (22) instantly defeated by a "darkhorse nobody" who barely squeezed into Top 10 to qualify (who we know as X) [ep 10, 11]

"darkhorse" wins the 18th Tournament, officially gains the title of X [ep 11]

Controversy of Cyan's luck powers creates Fear and possesses the orphanage/people buying into the discourse [ep 10]

Cyan goes to the orphanage to retrieve the audio file of the crashed plane and fights through crowds infected by Fear, defeating the Dean; Cyan and Luo fight, but they hear the contents of the record and become friends again [ep 10]

Shang Chao killed by assailant while wearing Yang Cheng's E-soul helmet at their HQ [ep 6]

Death of the two henchmen by Rock (Mr. Yan), CEO of Mighty Glory [ep 7]

YC challenges OG E-soul to a duel on his 34 Anniversary celebration; at this point OG E-soul 's rank had been below Top 10 for an unknown amount of time [ep 7]

E-soul's 34 Anniversary: Battle of the 2 E-souls ends with one of them dead; Lucky Cyan's concert [ep 7]

((assuming the concert in ep 7 was not the same concert as the one in ep 9, because the timeline gets a bit weird if it's the same one))

E-soul breaks through to Top 10 after the conclusion of the E-soul battle [ep 7]

Year 37

Cyan takes Rank 7 after her history as the only survivor of the plane crash due to the other victim's hope for her to survive was publicized [ep 10, JP website]

Fear officially recognized as the opposite of Trust by the Commission [ep 10]

Year 38

Moon under contractual obligation to play Nice's PR girlfriend ("it's been 3 years!") [ep 2, JP website]

Queen's comeback to the hero scene after her loss in the previous Hero Tournament, qualifying for the 19th Hero Tournament [ep 12]

19th Hero Tournament: Bowa ambushes Queen the day before the Tournament under the delusion that she could get her standing back if she kills Queen. Queen defeats Bowa, but misses the Tournament due to her injuries [ep 12]

X attains title of "X" [ep 12]

Year 39

Queen in rehab for the injuries sustained from the fight with Bowa before the 19th Hero Tournament [ep 12]

Mikey sends Queen and Cyan to a vacation/retreat [ep 12]

Big Johnny goes berserk [ep 12]

Year 41

Death of Nice (25); L0 (21) forced to be Nice's imposter by Miss J, had death faked for him [ep 1]

Faked death of Moon; Spotlight Org contacts Enlighter and turns him into God Eye [ep 2]

L0!Nice replaces Firm Man in Top 10 [ep 3]

L0 sheds Nice's identity and becomes The Commoner; God Eye apprehended [ep 4]

Death of Moon, 15 days away from the 21st Hero Tournament for the title of X [ep 4]

Unaccounted/Misc

E-soul is the first X; since Dawnfall happened before the Committee but he only had a 34-year anniversary in Year 36, he possibly retired for a short time before resuming hero work [ep 5]

X has held the title for 2 consecutive terms—the Hero Tournament happens every 2 years, so X's reign as the #1 hero is at least 4 years long (he's a newcomer who defeated Queen at the tournament in Year 36, implying that's when he becomes X) [meta: PV]

Zac, owner of FOMO, created the social media platform as a university student [meta: setting note 7]

Death/defeat of Magic Shadow (some time between Year 34 and 36 [ep 3] before Yang Cheng's story [ep 6])

the Hero Smile Incident (seems to be fairly recent before Nice's death, so tentatively in Year 41) [ep 1, 2]

Spotlight Org is known as a terrorist organization by Year 41 [ep 1]

Aether Labs existed in Year 23 [ep 8]

[thesiltverses]

How do you do podcasts, beyond the writing stage? The Silt Verses inspired me to try writing audio drama, and I have ideas, but I am only one person and all I can do yet is write. How do you get published, so to speak? How many people do you have to involve at a minimum (beyond VAs)? How do you find those people?

Let me try and tackle this in increments!

#1: With the right story format, you actually don't have to involve anyone else, so don't feel like you're missing some vital component. You don't need anything but yourself to get started.

An intimidating number of the most successful audiodramas ever made are either single-performer or begin that way before expanding to accommodate guests, and that includes both narration format and action-driven shows (WTNV, Old Gods, Knifepoint Horror, Malevolent...). With a lot of these shows, the writer is taking on performing duties despite a lack of formal voice acting experience or training, and acting as the sole producer into the bargain. Sometimes the ambient soundtrack for these shows is very basic and homespun - as it was for us with I Am In Eskew - or sometimes a sound designer has been paid for a higher-quality track that can play out during an episode, but there's no ongoing sound design work required.

Beyond that, the number of roles will entirely depend on your ambitions and your workload (and again, you can take on as many of these roles as you want to and have time for). If you're working with actors, someone needs to direct them and effectively manage the recording schedule, and someone needs to review and edit their takes. If you want action, someone needs to design that action. Plan to your needs, not anybody else's team size. You can always scale upwards as you go.

#2: How do you find collaborators beyond VAs? This can definitely be hard. But you could start at the Audio Drama Hub on Facebook, or advertise on the Fiction Podcast Weekly newsletter, or I just saw the Audio Drama Creators Discord mentioned on the audiodrama reddit (which is also a very helpful resource). If you have local networks - whether it's a university/college drama society or a citywide actors' page - that can be worth seeking out as well. I'm sure there'll be tons more so gonna drop in the audiodrama tag in the hope that we can get you more ideas.

My word of caution would be - I recommend putting a considerable amount of work into both the writing and the initial production plans before you start seeking other people out, particularly if you're operating on low or zero budget. Writing is a more popular pursuit than production, generally speaking, and I feel like over the years I've seen a lot of "looking for a director/producer/sound designer to help me create a show!" requests from someone who's got a largely unwritten idea and a lot of initial excitement fuelling them - when of course internet strangers largely aren't going to want to commit their time and energy to a project until they have some real tangibles and specifics.

#3: There's absolutely no bar to getting published, per se (other than paying for a hosting platform). If you're thinking of an arrangement where you submit your scripts to an already-formed production team, unfortunately that's something that doesn't reliably exist as far as I'm aware! Much better to do it yourself, generally speaking.

Hope that helps and best of luck!

[sleepanonymous]

Once again, a round of applause for Mr. Lever. You will see an obscure photo of Vessel and II if you click that link, fyi. I actually can't find Vessel, but II and George are def in it, and a friend says Vessel is too. For obvious reasons, I did not include the photo while formatting this post.

Full Production, Mixing & Mastering catered to by George Lever here at G1 .

Prelude

Working with Sleep Token is always a pleasure. I get this deep seated selfish enjoyment when we start new projects, mainly because I’m safe in the knowledge that the experience is going to be beautifully intense and incredibly rewarding.

Tracking

We started working on ‘Two’ just before winter started in 2016. Working on maturing the structure and fleshing out tones. Its no surprise that when it came to the final tracking that we changed the sonic balance almost completely (this is a running theme by the looks of things) Time restrictions led to us using programmed drums, however we took samples of the real kit to sequence so that it didn’t ‘feel’ completely robotic or lost. Guitars last time around resulted on leaning on my Kemper, however this time we used a live amp and cab for the majority, the momentum from the tubes / movement of the cab is something I’ve had to accept is difficult to recreate ITB. Its easier just to go down the most direct route. I had recently purchased a one of a kind Randall modded amp from a friend in the states. It turns out its an early prototype from when Fortin partnered up with Randall, its not a looker but its a box of pure filth. The Fortin was fed into my Mesa OS, placed an SM57 on the cap joint of the cone and off we went, pretty straight forward really! Bass is a hybrid setup between two real basses and then a 3rd lane of audio from a programmed bass. Because of the way the song’s have been written, keeping the sub lows consistent is vital to ensuring the song flows without feeling disjointed section to section / genre to genre. Vocals is where the most change happened (from a tracking perspective). Originally we had finished and finalised everything with my go-to setup. Modded Oktava > Germanium Chandler > Empirical Labs Distressor. And for the most part it worked. However halfway through the process I bought a Slate VMS. A modelling microphone. Without going into too much detail, its a microphone that can imitate more expensive vintage setups and it does it without any issue whatsoever. Obviously when testing it out and comparing, the VMS won without breaking a sweat. So back to tracking all the vocals again. (The vocalist is amazing however, the repeat performances were just as good, if not better than the original final takes) 

Gear Used

Guitars

Ibanez Prestige (7 string) – Bare Knuckle Aftermaths Fortin Modded Randall Diezel Einstein Mesa Oversized Cab Beyerdynamic m201 & 57

Vocals

Slate VMS – AKG C12 Emulation into Neve Pre

Drums

Sampled the original kit, programmed performances.

Bass

Fender Jazz Customshop Dingwall Combustion

Synths / Samples

Logic Stock Omnisphere Spitfire Albion LA Scoring Strings

Mixing

Everything with Sleep Token (from a mix perspective) is orientated around the vocal. The vocal here is god and attempting to get the mix to flow any other way would have been very strange indeed. Sleep Token were very clear and concise about the structure for the mix, Vocals, Samples, Drums then everything else equal after the fact. Very much like how pop is built actually. It turned out to be the most happily balanced mix I’ve worked on. I expected to have a harder time balancing moving between a few different genres through out the track but in all honesty, it just worked. Which in itself is testament to the quality of the song writing. We worked on a few different ‘perspectives’ for the mixes, however in all honesty. The mixes came together with very little effort and the tracking stage defined a lot of the movements that would happen later down the line.

Testimonial

“Worship” Vessel doesn’t give quotes. – ST

Mastering

I ended up going against my usual workflow for the master chain, trying out new things always lends to another perspective / approach / result. The signal chain looked something like this;

FG-Bomber Slate VMR – Neve EQ Focusrite Red 3 Slate VMR – Custom EQ UBK-1 (the density control on this is awesome!) Izotope Limiter FabFilter Limiter

Lastly…

If you haven’t already checked out Sleep Tokens first release ‘One’. You should. ‘One’ was also produced here at G1 but resulted in a darker sound overall! – G

[cobalt-knave]

Fiction Podcasts Formatted as Nonfiction Podcasts Recs

I do love an audio drama where the format is a nonfiction podcast, it must be said. Lots of friendship in these because I am a sucker for a good friendship.

The BookMarks

Two best friends, Mark and Marquelle Bookerson (no relation), have a podcast where they review books in an increasingly-wacky-and-fun fantasy alternate modern day. Improvised comedy. The worldbuilding gets weirder with every passing episode, and I love that for it.

Englewood After Dark

Two best friends, Eve and Finn, have a true crime podcast where they unpack cold cases. The pair are college students at a university popularly (and correctly) thought to be haunted. Believer/skeptic dynamic. Horror.

Shelterwood

Nick's sister went missing years ago, leaving a note referencing a town, Shelterwood. When he comes across this strange suburb where time doesn't flow right, Nick follows his lead to find his sister while sending audio back to the normal world to his best friend Solomon to hopefully edit into a full podcast. Hopefully, he can find his sister without being trapped forever in the alluring comfort of Shelterwood. Horror. Warning for kids' toys/cartoons used for horror. (A trope I personally dislike and find very rarely warned for.) Not my favorite on this list, but I love Solomon especially in terms of characters, and I did listen to the full season, actively engaged if not always enjoying it per se.

Rabbits (season 1 only)

Rabbits season 1 follows a journalist, Carly, trying to find her best friend, Yumiko, who went missing while participating in a dodgy ARG. To find her, Carly tracks down and begins to play the ARG, known only as the Game, being pulled deeper and deeper into the reality bending world it entails and creating a shaky allegiance with a fellow player with whom she shares a surprising amount of backstory. Horror, multiverse thriller. Season 1 is incredibly engaging and has a very satisfying plot, and I love Carly's ally Jones so much. If you enjoyed the tv show The OA, especially its second season, you will enjoy this.

DO NOT LISTEN TO SEASON 2. You will be tempted to listen to season 2, but it is not only very bad in terms of characters, plot, and worldbuilding, but it will also kneecap the beats of the first season. Resist temptation. Stick to season 1! Which is good! Warning for unreality, especially the fact that the character has the name name as the actor, and the podcast company is the same as in the fiction.