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Original Composition Work
Birth of Moonichi [ acidplanet mp3 audio ]
This is a rather cheesy pseudo-house track I whipped up for Moon, a very dear friend of mine, for her wedding. I originally had a rather lofty goal of producing a full-fledged performance track, but given my utter lack of discipline it became painfully obvious that the timeframe was unrealistic. ^^; So this is what I was able to come up with 2 days before leaving for her wedding. ^^; Yes, I'm a big procrastinator!! =) Well, the point of the cheesy track is to get everyone's congratulation messages into one place, so I hope it did its job. ;)
Although quite simple and cheesy, I must say that it was quite fun producing the track! Enjoy! =)
Experience Identity [ millim mp3 audio ]
This is an original piece that was composed to become a thematic introduction to iFS' performance at Lunar Gala 2003. It took sometime to find all those sound bites to create an entire dialogue, but I think the end result sounds pretty smooth. I wanted to create a mood that gave off the impression that I was speaking in a gentle voice yet the message was strongly overpowering the listener, hence the minor scale and the bass-heavy beats. I didn't want to put any overly technical scratches into it, since the main vocal section of the track are the sound bites, and not the scratches. I think the scratches play off pretty nicely to complement the overall beat without grabbing too much attention. At the end of the day it still shows how much I suck at mastering the audio, tho... grrr...
Harvest Moon [ millim mp3 audio ]
This is my pathetic attempt at soft Drum N' Bass - composed for Korean student designers @ CMU. I had a lot of ideas for a drum N' bass track... I don't listen to a lot of drum N' bass, but I'm very interested in the drum patterns that many drum N' bass tracks employ... it reminds me very much of how many Traditional Korean drum patterns sound... so I wanted to somehow incorporate the two.. At the same time the song was to be played for a modern-remake of the Korean traditional costume so I also wanted to use sound bites from Korean traditional music as well. I ended up picking samples from a tune that was played to a folk dance called "Gong Gong Sool Leh". The dance was performed by a group of females during harvesting season or on the night of the full moon after Lunar New Year. That seemed to go well with the theme of the fashion show ( Lunar Gala ). The atmosphere is very ironic since the original track from which the samples have been extracted from are supposed to be cheerful, but the way I used the samples in a way of a chant with an added dark bass makes it feel exactly the opposite. I'm quite unsatisfied with the quality of the sound, however... I would, of course, like to blame my equipment, but I bet it's due to my poor mastering abilities.
Welcome to the Now ( running wild mix ) [ acidplanet wma audio ]
Quite honestly, this was a last minute rush to get something in for the remix contest that had the most bling prize to date. ;) I'm blinded by materials... *SIGH* such pitiful human being I am. ;)
The attempt was to take a stab at a "rock" remix that had a bid of funk and a bit of hypnotic flavor to it. Seeing myself try all these different genres these days, I'm starting to get a lil worried about the unfocused nature of my work. ^^;
Bosoms ( bLiNdEd N FuNkTiFiEd mix ) [ acidplanet wma audio ]
When I found out I was able to work with the acapella tracks of Wordsworth, J-Live, Soullive I hopped on the opportunity and produced this remix. Again, I really suck at mastering so the sound gets washed out on many stereo systems and sound cards... In order to hear it the way I hear it you'll need audiophile 2496 hooked up to a pretty damn nice set of speakers... ^^; I really need to work on my mastering skills... For this remix I had nevered heard of the original (they didn't provide us with one), so I just tried to produce a track that felt "right" in my head. In other words, this is a complete from-the-ground-up original composition work. So I decided to try for a funky and live sound and the result is what you can hear when you click on the link below.
We're in This Love ( R U wit me or whut? mix ) [ acidplanet wma audio ]
I stumbled across a remix contest held by Warner Brothers and Acidplanet.com. I ended up taking this rather jazzy tune by the almighty Al Jarreau and turned it into mainstream R&B influeced hip hop. Although it didn't place, I still like the way it turned out. The mastering job I did is terrible, however.
Spellbound ( bound to feel good mix ) [ acidplanet wma audio ]
This is also a remix I did for the WB Jazz competition held by Acidplanet.com. It's a remix I feel very good about, but not confident that many people will dig it. It starts off with a straight-up rearrange of the original to give my take on the original by giving it a bit more upbeat yet misty feel to it. Since I thought the piano solo was beautiful I thought I'd make that the star of my remix. Then I ventured into a bit of a house-y twist after the halfway mark. The result is a somewhat bizarre journey into sound.... ^^;. This remix is pretty near and near to my ears cuz the soundscape goes along very well with my taste. The production on it is a bit weak in certain spots cuz I had decided to spend more time on the "We're in This Love" remix cuz I thought that had a much more mainstream appeal that I believed had a better chance of winning. Born to be a sell out!! Heh heh~~ ^^; So to be honest I didn't really want to put it up cuz I feel that it's an incomplete product, but I'm putting it up in the hopes that it can inspire others to pursue a similar sound spectrum.
If you need Real Player you can download it here!
Dancers Symposium Fall 2004 [ mp3 audio | YouTube video]
Although I had retired from Lunar Gala, I really wanted to get a chance to work with Ellein before she graduated. So I approached her one day to see if she thought it would be a good idea to collaborate on her next Dancers Symposium choreography. She told me she had one last choreography she wanted to do for the show, so we agreed right then and there that we'd work up a storm and present a grand finale! :) I kinda knew what I was getting myself into since I have had the pleasure of working with Caro on her DS piece. It's definitely more challenging to work on a DS piece than a LG piece largely because of the fact that the track has to be much shorter. This leaves very little room for any sort of fillers that the choregraphers can use to swap formations or create breathing rooms for the dancers. The short track also work against us when we don't necessarily have a team of professional dancers that can nail down rather complicated moves in synch, as we end up needing a good amount of simple moves that eat up the time.
We started out with a general concept that geared around three main goals: build up, sustain, and drop. What I mean by those phrases is that since the track itself spans only about 3 minutes we didn't have the luxury of bringing the mood up and down too much; the typical verse - bridge - chorus - verse type arrangements end up being too "fatty" for this type of choregprahy piece. So what we needed was a way to take it higher and higher until the very end. However, the choreography would suffer from a sense of being overly rushed if it simply went uphill from beginning to end, so we also wanted points of sustain that would provide a period of suspense where the music and the choreograpy would work together to create a sort of an audio cliff hanger that would make it more interesting. And lastly we wanted to make sure that when we couldn't go any higher, we'd drop them down cold without dragging it on. It was indeed a plan for a completely fat free choreography piece; we liked it.
We went with a pretty rigorous schedule and had weekly meetings in order to bounce ideas off of one another, and to also flesh out concepts into tangible prototypes that would work both musically and choreographically. One of the best sessions we had was where we spontaneously came up with the idea for the intro and the setting of the track: the subway scene. I think it was the week after I had pitched the idea of using "Rhythm Nation" for the second half of the mix. Ellein really liked the idea and wanted to pursue it further, so we were watching the music video at my place for inspiration. It was then when Ellein brought up the idea of a subway station and we just started shooting back and forth all sorts of concepts related to the setting of a subway station, and the entire storyline of the intro was born. I should add that the clips you hear on the track are real clips heard on the Hong Kong subway trains. ;)
The first track, "Party to Damascus" is largely a rework from the acapella. I laid out a more cheerful and carefree percussion arrangement over it, then borrowed the main melody lines from the original. A big part of the transition into Rhythm Nation was a chopped up overhaul from various bits and pieces of Rhythm Nation as well. You might also notice the use of harmonic mixing technique in the transition from Damascus to Rhythm Nation that allowed me to go from one key to another while giving the illusion of the two belonging to a natural harmonic progression. The underlying drum track for Rhythm Nation was also spiced up with congo percussions for a more upbeat twist.
I do feel that the overall track can sound like it's a bit rushed, and I wish we'd have had more freedom in terms of how long we could have made the track... But we didn't, and I think we did the best we could given all the constraints we had.
As usual, there were constant reworkings on the track as the choreography matured, so as to accentuate any substantial movements that needed attention. The choreography also worked to reflect the music if it so happened that the music came before it. So there were constant cross-polinations going on in terms of music and the choreography maturing together in parallel. It's always a fascinating thing to see this process happen in a rather organic fashion, and I think that's what really makes remixing for choreography quite an enjoyable endeavor.
Well with all said and done I have my gripes about the final product, but all in all it turned out pretty decent. The dancers did a great job putting on a splendid performance in all white colored gear against a nice blue lighted backdrop. You should've been there. ;) Great job soldiers of the Rhythm Nation!
S/W used:
Acid Pro 4.0
Cool Edit 2000
Reason 2.0
click here to talk about the Dancers Symposium Fall 2004 Remix
Lunar Gala 2003 [ mp3 audio | real video]
For Lunar Gala 2003 we performed as an official organization dubbed iFS, and I, again, performed with our dance crew. However, this time around I actually went one step further and composed an entire track to fit the theme of the Fashion show: "Experience Identity". Thanks to Jeremy for putting together a video feed that went along with the music! (I've heard many complements about the video!). You may or may not notice, but I think this year's remix has a level of completeness that surpasses the other years. You'll also notice that I've used twice as many s/w this time around. It was certainly a painful process yet an extremely rewarding one as well.
The first track is my remix of Shakkazombie's "So Tight, So Deep" which is basically a very laid back track that Erika had picked out from a few other obscure tracks I had in store for her. I proceeded to lay down a completely different beat to make it more fun for Erika to choreograph to, added scratches and samples as well as some tense pauses here and there and topped it off with an original break in the end with the time signature of Gossip Folk's drum pattern. The transition was inspired by me getting all frustrated thinking up of a transition between the first and the second track. I had just slammed on the keyboard in frustration and it actually sounded good... ^^;;; so I kept it and matched the pitch to blend nicely with a quick build up in to "Can you see the light" which served as a hint for the funky electro stuff that was just around the corner. Of course, it would have been too boring to just go straight into the next track, so I added another original break of mine that was specifically requested by Steve to be simple, raw and "poppable". The actual second track is a remix of "Axel F." and "Rock it" (I like to call it, "Axel F*** it" ) which I spiced up with various samples with an original beat, again, requested by Steve to be simple and "poppable". The next track was very hard to fit in, since all I got from Khalil and Chewy was the sample for "Love to the world". The original wasn't exciting enough to fit with the mood coming off from the previous track, so I overlayed a funky break beat and made a quick remix of another LTD track, "We party hearty", and added it to the beginning to prep the crowd for the extravaganza that was about to ensue. Then by popular demand I mixed in the theme from "Black Belt Jones" and added freeze points in it for the breakers to, well... freeze. ;) Now the last track came in at 140BPM which was 20BPM faster than the track I had for the breakers. So I decided to take the beat of "It takes two" and cut it up so that I can gradually increase the speed without making it annoying to the listeners. As for the last track, I took a pretty drastic approach in throwing the entire beginning out and remaking it my style. Sam wanted some progression in the beginning for contrasting dance routines, so I came up with the idea of using glow sticks and building the song up from a complete darkness and silence. The problem was that we had this conversation like 2 weeks before the show or something like that... *SIGH* -.-;; Well, so I didn't get much sleep coming up with the totally remade intro. The end result is my trancified remix of Turbo's "My Childhood Dream". Enjoy!
S/W used:
Acid Pro 4.0
Cool Edit 2000
Fruity Loops 3.5
Vegas 1.0
Lunar Gala 2002 [ mp3 audio | real video]
At 2002 Lunar Gala, I actually got to perform with the dancers. I now refer to them as our crew, heh heh. ^^ Having 4 groups of dancers (2 free styler groups, 1 breaker group, 1 popper group) posed quite an interesting challenge; going from Michael Jackson to KPop to Break Beat to be more exact. I had to rework quite a bit of P.Y.T. to spice it up enough so that it doesn't sound overly plain. Since the Kpop track right after P.Y.T. wasn't exactly the most hyped-up track, I tried to enhance the groove by adding some samples and beats from American Pop: namely Britney Spears. Much of the next track had to be reworked as well with added beats, samples and vocals to give it a richer vibe. For the breakers I got a chance to mix various break beats and samples from one of my favorite old skool track Time 4 Sum Akshun. I actually put a little intro and a storyline in the beginning. I thought of going all out and actually putting a rather involved intro where I can juggle and stuff, but given the way the stage is setup and that the main part of the show is the dancers and not me, I just created a brief intro with a few scratches. I really like how the mix turned out. Most of the transitions were also very involved. Trying to strike a balance between making the choreographers happy and making my harmonic mixing buds happy. :)
S/W used:
Cool Edit 2000
Vegas 1.0
Lunar Gala 2001 [ mp3 audio | real video ]
I think I struggled a bit with the intro here, trying to come up with a catchy melody to fill it in until I found the Janet Jackson sample. Adding more bass and snare drum to the track gave it a heavier/snappier sound, and adding scratches I think made it a bit more fun. I tried to keep the sort of a dark/cold mood by modifying the bridge to make it seem even darker. I'm not perfectly happy with how I go back to the verses after the bridge, tho... On a brighter note, the harmonic mixing attempt from the bridge to the ending of the girls' part worked pretty well, I thought. Going to the guys' part was somewhat unlike what I'd normally do... which was totally stopping the mix. I was kinda bummed out after getting a request for "stomp" beats... -.-; So I had to kinda rebuild the beat from after the stomps using very simple beat patterns and scratching over it (and shamelessly plugging my name - the real slim - ) The last break "Tap the bottle" was on a seven up or coca cola commercial one of the days I was working on the remix, and I just had to put it in there... impulse mixing??? ;)
S/W used:
Cool Edit 2000
Vegas 1.0
Lunar Gala 2000 [ mp3 audio | real video ]
This is the first time I really remixed tracks for the crew. I was basically given two main tracks that varied in about 25BPM... so I decided I'm going to speed up the mix really fast then bring it down all the way down. I think it turned out to be a pretty effective strategy. At least I like how the transition turned out... ;) As I always like to do with my mixes, I paid attention to the harmonics to make sure that things wouldn't feel out of place with awkward melody. I added various elements in there which I thought the choreographer could play with, and they sure looked like they were having fun choreographing for it. ;) I just wish I had played around more with the guys' part... I had to retain most of it since the choreography was built around the original version of the song.
S/W used:
Cool Edit 2000
Vegas 1.0
( Last Updated 4/21/2023 11:09:37 AM )
