Weeklybeats is a 52 week long music project in which artists compose and publicly release 1 song a week for the entire year.
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Catching Knives

By miraclemiles on April 1, 2018 9:23 pm

As I was doing the vocal weirdness onto this track, just the usual grunting, percussiveness, moaning and whistling practices,  I heard a yell from the other room "You should call your song Catching Knives!" Apparently some scissors had just been thrown, and fortunately caught. Happy that people were safe, I realized how perfect that concept was. I feel like life has been throwing a few knives at me, and so far, I'm catching them with only a few knicks so far.

I was a little worried this week, Saturday came around and I had no idea what the Weekly Beat would be. I dug through the Ideas In Progress folder and found one called Whistling Jam. Created this quick when trying the Whistling pack from AfroDJMac and pATCHES (https://patches.zone/the-whistle-pack-from-patches-and-afrodjmac/). Discovered that it also had some tracks where I was trying out AfroDJMac's Ukelele sample pack (http://www.afrodjmac.com/blog/ukulele) - which is main chords in this song, with the whistling pack sounds making up the rest. What those guys did with whistling samples is pretty impressive, some good Live instruments to play with. A lot of what these folks do they share for free so I want to be sure and spread the word. The tempo change in here is kind of different for me ... kind of an accident, I think the tempo had been raised after recording the first clips, so had some in two tempos, decided to roll with it, two tempos. Vocals are me through the Kaoss pad, then messed in Live, including sending through AfroDJMac's Glitch FX (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEk7XSnbcJI), which are setup to use dummy tracks and follow actions, very fun glitchiness.


Another great piece. Inteligent use of the materials.

Hope the crab is OK.

This is pretty rad.  I like when the vocals and whistles show up.  Nice variations in the track.  I like how it switches from chill to tense to chill. 

That crab is like DON'T COOK ME, BRO.

i had to come back to see if i was still on the same track, but couldn't word my feelings any better than "chill to tense to chill", and i dig it. nice work dodging those blades

A lot of strange and cool sounds to dig through here and some changes in the vibe, but it somehow hangs together well.

Very nice voice processing! And i love those high synth sounds...
I really like feel of being kept in this short guitar-loop and being released with that awooow...

Cool! Very nice progression from laid back funk and back again.

hope it stops raining knives soon - this was a neat piece

Jim Wood wrote:

Another great piece. Inteligent use of the materials.

Hope the crab is OK.

Thanks, I appreciate that! Yeah, I hope the crab's ok too.

orangedrink wrote:

This is pretty rad.  I like when the vocals and whistles show up.  Nice variations in the track.  I like how it switches from chill to tense to chill. 

That crab is like DON'T COOK ME, BRO.

Ha, exactly! Yeah, I think whistling is pretty great. Thanks!

ahhsumx wrote:

i had to come back to see if i was still on the same track, but couldn't word my feelings any better than "chill to tense to chill", and i dig it. nice work dodging those blades

Awesome, thanks for listening and comment. I like it when tracks make you think a new one has started. All about dodging those blades!

CosmicCairns wrote:

A lot of strange and cool sounds to dig through here and some changes in the vibe, but it somehow hangs together well.

Thanks much, yeah, barely hanging together by the thread of strangeness wink

theGuen wrote:

Very nice voice processing! And i love those high synth sounds...
I really like feel of being kept in this short guitar-loop and being released with that awooow...

Thanks very much, that hold and release was something I thought about.

Plantrain wrote:

Cool! Very nice progression from laid back funk and back again.

Thanks for listening and comment!

kaedo sevaada wrote:

hope it stops raining knives soon - this was a neat piece

Thanks, me too! appreciate the comment, love that image.


Looking forward to catching up on everyone's music this week!

Nice sense of space and color. That guitar (or mandolin? hammer dulcimer?) is tasty. I like the tempo change, really evokes the juggling. Lots going on here but it didn't feel overwhelming or crazy.

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