'Vital2' - New Original Music - A 10 Minute Timed Writing Challenge - Electronic/Instrumental + Walkthrough

almost 3 years ago

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I was a little busy yesterday,

Track 3, Pianoteq Plug-in

so I figured I'd give myself 10 minutes, and see what happens. I wound up with 6 tracks, though only 5 are used here, which isn't bad. I started with Track 2, which uses one of the presets in Vital. This has a cool timbre, and adds a major chord to any single note, so I figured I'd use that, and write something simple and diatonic, but with the major chords, could be a little more interesting. In the image below, it's also pictured a half step above where it's actually sounding (we're in Db major). There are two parts, Pink and Teal; the pink section happens over 10 bars, which I figured would be a cool variation, without doing any odd-meter stuff. The teal part is just 8 bars, and plays (note wise) I, V, Vi, ii, but again, with all major chords, so it has a much more strange sound, yet still feels sort of happy and quirky. Track 3 was added next, which uses a plug-in demo I almost never use, PianoTeq. I really should use it more, as it has some awesome sounds. This specifically uses a 'bamboo' keyboard, and plays the chords, but with some extra flair. I used the 'Raum' reverb, Valhalla's Supermassive Echo, and the Polyverse Wider tool on it.

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Track 2, Vital Synth (tuned down a half step, adds major chord to each single note played)

Listen to Vital2 here...

Track 4 uses a CR-78 drumit in Kontakt Player, which is

Track 6, ROLI 'Throbbing Sub' Bass

included in Native Instruments' free Komplete Start package. I've used this kit before, but it has a VERY specific sound, which sounded a little odd at first. I put a really tight, quick gate on it, compressed it quite a bit, and added Ableton's Autofilter to it, which slides up on the snare hits, just giving it a little more motion. Track 5 was a quick hi-hat loop recorded from the Nerve demo from Xfer. Track 6 uses a bass synth from that new Stargaze Synth ROLI soundpack, the 'Throbbing Sub', and plays the line pictured to the left of this paragraph. I really like the sound of this synth, so I'll definitely revisit it on other songs. Finally, we have Track 7, which was recorded from another ROLI synth. It just plays single notes with a 1/16th note LFO. I chopped up each note, and reversed the audio, so instead of swelling up, it hits and fades out. Honestly, I don't really love this sound, but I was at the end of the clock, so it had to stay, hehe.