Hey dudes. I've had an ace idea. Was just listening to Sufjan Stevens Christmas boxset - and I thought why can't I do that. I'll record a CD full of Chrimbo songs in ANLB stylee!THEN I HAD AN EVEN BETTER IDEA!
Instead of me doing everything, why don't we all make a Christmas album! Yay! What an ace wheeze. Really.
So here's the jist of what I think we should do:
Everyone in the Chaos Crew, whoever they may be, pulls their thumb out of their arse and records TWO special Christmas songs and submits them to the blog (or to me or Foggy) by December 20th. Yep DECEMBER 20th 2006. The song can be an all new original composition or a traditional chrimbo song done chaos style. BTW - if you're going to do a "standard", please let everyone know before you start. We don't want half a dozen versions of "Jingle Bells".
Then, when everything is in I'll do a CD cover, sequence the tracks and make the compilation available for download from here in time for Christmas day and Christmas Eve distribution.
Who's up for it?
94 comments:
yeah i'm defo up for that! ace idea - beside a downloadable mp3 version could we also do a straight CD release with WAV files? I don't mind doing the burning printing and distro. Extra Xmas gifts for everybody! I guess the CVC6 comp should be pushed back to the new year sometime so as not to exhaust people with a CVC overdose!
if anyone needs some inspiration or samples heres a page with some mentalist retro xmas songs which may yeild some mad mirth!
I'm defo gonna use some of this stuff - I'll post on here to let you know which stuff i'm sampling so that we don't duplicate each other.
http://checkthecoolwax.blogspot.com/
Check this out - i'm definately using this one for samples
http://ernienotbert.blogspot.com/2006/11/outer-space-santa.html
This is a read along for Santa Claus Conquers the Martians!
I don't see why we can't do a straight CD for distribution! Sounds like ace fun.
I'm seeing Tom and Jon tonight - will try to solicit their help. Maybe ask Jon to do the cover.
Great stuff!
Nice one Karl/Fog, sounds totally awesome, man I can't wait just got my sampler sorted out in time, demonic santa & twisted mutant reindeer sonic orgy coming your way!
Good news Jussy. Can't wait to hear what you come up with as I've been enjoying your tunes.
Spoke to Kips and he's going to come up with something - and maybe we'll have something from Jeff too.
Tom and I are recording his contributions this Wednesday - and Jon's agreed to do the cover. It's all happening!
1st track from me nearly finished - Santa Claus V the Martians!
Fog, could you do a mad instrumental of silent night on that Technics keyboard? Then put it somewhere I can pick it up so I can lay some vocals on it? Is 2006 the year of a Gibs comeback?
Oh my god, what did I do...ha ha ha ha!
lol! Sure i'll do it - I just need to get some adaptors so I can plug the keyboard direct into the computer - next time I get a chance to go to town i'll pick some up! Yay!
Just to light a fire under everyone, Tom and I laid down THREE tracks tomight in ANLB style.
Good King Wenceslas
Santa Claus is Coming to Town
and
Here Comes Santa Claus
Sounds cool! Me and Ebs have just done a Euro Techno mix of Winter Wonderland - final mix will be uploaded to you soon Karl! ;-)
Hey dudes/dudettes, just finished a single contribution (there might be another - unsure yet)! It’s original & spawned from the depths of hell (a new xmas carol sung by demons: inspired by the film gremlins) man this album is going to be hilarious, will upload it onto the CVC right away!
For now, can we stick all the final mixes in one folder on the FTP server? I'll log in and create one now called "christmas"
Oh - hang on - someone beat me to it :)
Yeah - it was me! Anyway, I have uploaded 3 tracks to the folder:
2 0=2 tracks - Santa Claus V the Martians & Light up the Whole World. The third track is a collab between me and Ebony called Winter Wonderland.
hey karl could you upload the tracks you did with tom in MP3 to give us a taster? unless you want to keep them for a suprise! cheers - fog
Need to mix them first - what with them having real instruments on 'em and that. Two are completely finished, one needs some sound effects and samples adding and we started a fourth, which needs more work.
right ho - looking forward to having a listen to 'em
Just uploaded - 'Jingle Hell' - Took me 10 mins and is awful. I tried to recreate a bit of the gibs vibe but cheated cos' I nicked a midi file from the web and re-assigned the instruments to be a bit less plinky. The voice was done in one take as you can probably guess. If you think it's funny, put it on cvc6, else go to 10.
File under Gibs.
ooops, mean't cvc xmas not cvc6...
Jingle on and on -- ha! Nice one - i've got the adaptor for the keyboard so i'll lay down a Silent Night track for you soon
Jussy - your track is disturbing!
By the way Karl - if you feel any of my tracks are not what you are after for the comp let me know - I can do some more - hopefully your tracks will counterbalance the electronic mayhem of everyone elses.
Fog said: hopefully your tracks will counterbalance the electronic mayhem of everyone elses.
- Not according to what Karl and I were just speaking about on the phone!
do tell mon frere
Jasmeister:
Don't be too worried about your 'Jingle Hell', when you here the abomination that I spawned it will probably sound quite pleasant in comparison!
Karl:
With relevance to what foggy said about any tracks not being what your after, same goes triple for me, I won't be offended if you’d prefer something 'nicer'...ha ha ha...just let us know dude!
Max respect to all concerned this really is a lot of fun, can't wait to have a beer with you all at the Sair so that we can enjoy some hysterics over all this festive madness!
Nah... not going to micromanage everything. I'm just hoping it'll all be *funny* - in one way or another.
...It's cvc afterall, stick it all in - that's the spirit. The Examiner will never write about this. but just incase they ask, refuse ok? !
I can just see it now high profile media worker suspended on accusations of insanity!
I couldn't help it --- i'm going back and adding some new stuff to some of the tracks so Karl please note that I might be posting some slightly different versions for the final album - foggy (I can't leave tracks alone) phillips
Now worries. I'm not even touching the track sequencing until 20th December.
BTW - could you get in touch with Kips? He agreed to do some tracks, but I think he'll need a hand digitising them.
He's here right now - he wants to mix it down himself on audio tape and then i'll sample it here and upload it.
I've just finished off the final recording from wednesday and I've also done a remake of the GWF's "It Isn't Even Christmas".
Have uploaded the WAV files to the folder for eventual compilation.
Tom and I are planning to record at least one more track tonight - and Jason and I are doing a collaboration too. Think we'll have enough?
never enough! there's lots of room on a CD! Kipz is hoping to do 2 tracks one with Jeff. I had a listen to the two tracks you uploaded last night - great stuff especially Good King Wensclesnas.
i've just listened to Santa Claus is Coming to Town - this is possibly the best Christmas song in the history of the universe - well done Karl!
Thank you very much. It was designed to frighten children, but I managed to scare myself a bit too.
You inspired me to do a killer santa track Karl but i think i went to far - have a listen to 'Silent Night Deadly Night' on the webspace - not sure if i'm gonna put this one on the CD though - what does anyone else think? If I put it on it will probably be called 'Xmas Nightmare' so as not to get confused with the GIBS Silent Night track.
Talking of which, I have recorded 4 keyboard takes of Silent Night in a Gibs stylee - you can get 'em on the webspace JASE --- do what you want with them - cut / paste - effects anything you like or just leave 'em straight.
I can't decide which is the best take - if you can come up with a viable reason maybe we could have Silent Night parts 1 & 2 and use two different takes and 2 different parts of a story?
Jussy - loved the track you played me down the phone looking forward to hearing the full version.
I think that should go on - it's great!
In fact, what I'd like to do is mix them so Santa Claus is Coming to Town segues directly into it.
Give it a go! I had a go myself and I couldn't get a decent mix (too many overlapping sounds with the screams and intro speech) it works well as a follow up track though - let me know if you manage a better job ;-)
di'm listening to the silent night takes now and I'm pissin' mi kecks. I'll decide which one to use in 3 mins.
arrgh! they're all ace... I might have to do em all.
"I had a go myself and I couldn't get a decent mix..."
I'll add a note or some wind noise to the end of mine and overlap them that way.
Oh - I think I'm getting the cover from Jon tonight.
lol! This is proper old school gibs style - I couldn't find the adaptors for the direct connect to the PC so I had to use a Mic resting on the speaker!
I'm not sure which one I would use either I guess if you did do all of them we could then decide which one we liked best between us! ;-)
Karl - "I'll add a note or some wind noise to the end of mine and overlap them that way."
Yeah that'll work -- nice one!! Santa's gonna get ya!
Can't wait to see Gonzo's cover - is there gonna be any Radio Bingo on this album?
Jase - I think take 2 is my favourite of the Silent Nights - whaddaya you think?
I like 2 and 3 best - can't do much on it till monday. Stay tuned.
Sadly, Jon had a go at creating a cover and didn't like the result - so he's given up. He also refused overtures to sing and he can't do Radio Bingo because he hasn't got any recording equipment now. So - I'm going to do the cover now :(
"Jussy - loved the track you played me down the phone looking forward to hearing the full version"
Thanks fotswana, well its pretty much finished going to try and mix it down now! I'll let you know when its done & upload it!
A little announcement:
To make things easier for me, could you please name your files so they include your "recording" name as well as the name of the track, like this:
name_nameoftrack.wav
For example:
anlb_goodkingwenceslas.wav
Could you also rename any files you've already placed on the FTP server to match this system.
Ta very much.
"He also refused overtures to sing and he can't do Radio Bingo because he hasn't got any recording equipment now"
Couldn't he just scream into a tape recorder and use kitchen utensils for instruments? Shame about the cover as he's really good at them usually.
Karl - I've uploaded the final mixes of all my tracks and renamed them as you asked - please download the new versions of 'SANTA CLAUS V THE MARTIANS' & 'LIGHT UP THE WHOLE WORLD' for the final comp as they have been tweaked. 'WINTER WONDERLAND' & 'SILENT NIGHT DEADLY NIGHT' you don't need to download these if you have done so allready as these are unaltered mixes with just the new filename added. I think i'll stick with silent night deadly night as a title over xmas nightmare as i really like it! Cheers.
Well guys I feel totally screwed, been up all night mixing down my latest offering entitled 'Yuletide Spirit' (Leanne wants to Kill me as we're going out to a surf club party tonight (meaning: no rest until the weekend) & I got a driving lesson tomorrow (going to be deaded for it) & she had an important uni meeting today - on no sleep thanks to me) I honestly think it was worth the trauma though!
I also think this is the nicest/best produced track I've ever created, and it has inspired the shit out of me to make more in the New Year when I will be launching my new musical project (Koretex) with this track forming a taster for what’s to come!
Anyway, sorry for the babble feeling rather scatty: hope you like it guys/girls & look forward to seeing you all soon for some festive banter! Peace out...
Hi Jus - You have to make sacrifices for your Art - plus it's great fun! I'm listening to the track now and luvving it large baby. I'm looking out the window at a grey and rainy Crimble and the track is really conjuring up images of the skies filled with Snow - just like the Christmas we had I think 2 years ago when it was a blizzard of snow just for Christmas day. Where did you get the 'Snow id Falling Throught the Sky' sample from? The production sound makes me think of that 'Interloper' album if you remember that - really high end almost audiophile techno stuff.
I've had a crack at the cover. Posted a draft as a PDF on the FTP server if anyone wants to comment. Of course, it's missing the track listing so far.
I've just been listening to tracks to get a preliminary idea how i'm going to sequence them. Santa Claus Vs The Martians is fricking superb! I'm opening the CD with that, deffo.
Cover looks good Karl! Glad you like SC V The Martians - I'm gonna get in touch with Kipz soon about his tracks 'cos I think we need all the guitar based stuff we can get hold of to balance out the 'Electro' stuff - Anything else coming from Twain?
We've got one more ANLB track to do. Recorded one version that didn't come out well, so we're redoing it.
I have another song written that I was goign to give a big 80s production treament on... but as time's running out now I think I might just bang it out as an acoustic song! We should end up with about 18 tracks...
Yuletide Spirit is brilliant Jussy!
This album kicks ass!
Hey foggy & Karl, thanks for your comments dudes; it means the world to me!
Fog:
Regarding where I got the 'Snow is Falling Throught the Sky' sample from: That's me singing into my sampler!
Nice one u2: glad you like it (there will be more in the new year for sure)! This album's gonna be wicked - enjoying contributing to it a great deal I can tell you!
I'm going to do a Kraftwerk inspired for Karl to do some robot singing over - can you remind me what the carol is supposed to be? I was thinking it would be good to have some of the lyrics in German and perhaps Japanese if at all possible - you know, to keep it in a Kraftwerky vibe... (tongue planted firmly in cheek).
The song's "Merry Christmas (War is Over)" - and we've actually had a German bloke dictate the words in a dictaphone already for us! They just need to be cut and pasted in...
It's shaping up.
OK, Karl - There's a rough guideline track for the vocals in the CVCXMAS folder, under 'war is over...' See what you think, I wont change the main melody but I may want to add a few effects to/or additional to the vocals.
Couldn't help having a sneak preview - lush!
Karl can you republish the blog at your end - the icons seem to have messed up and i keep getting popup messages about nonsecure items on the page. Also has anyone else upgraded their Blogger accounts yet - I did it before realising that they are merging with Google - soon we will all be googled...
Yes, I've been googleised.
The blog was swapped over to Google yesterday - so icons from old comments have disappeared. If you get the warning message you can tick a box in the dialogue so that it doesn't show up again.
talked to kipz tonight - we're off to see Hawkwind in Holmfirth tomorrow - should be interesting!
Anyway, also talked to Jeff and it seems like Kipz is planning on doing up to 3 individual tracks one of which is recorded allready and just needs to be mixed. He has all next week off work so he's gonna be devoting some proper time to the tracks so expect some crazy 4 tracked madness coming soon.
Jeff is gonna do a few songs that we can choose from including Christmas Spiderman which he amuses kids with when he's busking. He was really into doing Good King Wensclasnes, I told him there was allready a version so it might not get on but go ahead and do it anyway.
Merry Christmas (War Is Over) - Now complete. I credited it to myself cos' I did all the work! But thanks to Karl for the idea and Tom for sampling the German dude who should also have credit. I think it worked out well. jason_warisover.wav
Foggy - good news all round.
But this is the last push now. Anything that isn't digitised and *on the server* by Thursday will *not* be sequenced into the CD or be listed on the cover. I'm going to finalise everything on Thursday evening for distro on Christmas Eve.
ok - had a good night with kipz and the hawklords last night - great stuff! He knows about the deadline so it should all be in on time. The three tracks he wants to do are a remake of an old Priapus song called 'Winter Song' a version of a carol called 'The Angel Gabriel' and the third track is another remake of a Pagans track I think - can't remember the title now.
gibs_silentnight - now uploaded...
15 years later, it felt wrong but I hope you like it!
Silent Night is a fine addition to the Gibs canon. Tom and I have completed two additional songs too... Yay!
That CDs going to be FULL.
o shit - i've just got a tape with 4 more songs on it - 2 from kipz and 2 from Jeff - I hope we have enough room - have you any idea how much room is left Karl?
Jase - I haven't had a chance to listen to Gibs yet - downloading now ;-)
Maybe it's going to be a double CD. But they don't sell double CD-r's do they. I don't mind if Jingle Hell goes from the list.
We've got close to 20 songs, but most are pretty short. Hopefully we won't have to cut anything.
piss funny - specially the intro!
that was gibs i was referring to of course - kipz stuff is pure vintage kipling - lovly! might not get a chance to upload it till tomorrow night tho - have to go out soon!
ok - 4 new tracks uploading as i type - off out now - njoi!
Whee! I've just finished the last ANLB track too - so I can sequence the CD tomorrow evening.
652MB so far - how high can we go before it becomes unreasonable? Hopefully we'll get it under 700MB! Will we have to cut a track or 2?
Hey Karl - Are your tracks at a higher bit rate and does that make a difference? I.e. will they have to be downconverted to be put on CD or can a CD play above 16bit?
i made a mistake - 603MB!
I've just sequenced the tracks - and it comes in at 56 minutes. I left one track off - Jeff's version of Good Kind Wenceslas, as we already have one. I also had a weird problem with all the tracks I produced where Nero wouldn't read the WAV files (even though they were Windows PCM WAVs, just like everyone elses) - so I had to save them out as AIFF...
Will upload the amended versions of my tunes tomorrow then will add numbers to the filenames in the FTP folder and finish the cover. Should be able to start burning discs tomorrow evening.
Jolly dee!
I suspect that the qualty of your tracks was maybe too high for CD (32bit) - the file size of 'em is twice as big for the same amount of space as the other WAV files - e.g. instead of a 2 minute song being 20mb it is 40mb.
Is there anything in this or am i talking shite?
I think you might be - as the AIFF files are 32 bit too, but Nero doesn't mind them.
Will this effect playback - can a CD player playback a 32bit file? Anyway if we need to save space (it would be good to keep the total MB to under 650MB) we can downconvert some of the 32bit files to 16bit.
The files for conversion should ideally be 16bit 44.1Khz. This will ensure the best compatibility across old and new CD players.
It doesn't really matter if these files are WAV or AIFF as these formats are based on lossless PCM (pulse code modulation) principles. WAV was invented by Microsoft, AIFF by Apple. Conversion between the two does not affect quality as its just a case of altering the byte orders within the files and not the actual data.
Your burning software will convert this further anyway to comply with the RedBook audio standard for Audio CD - what this does is strips the WAV/AIFF headers and fits the data in to the CD's sector size. Redbook is also based on PCM.
I think Jase is right here. We need to ensure all the files are 16bit 44.1khz - so the files that will need converting are - all Karl / Tom's - And maybe Jasons? All my files are allready CD ready! ;-)
Nero does it on the fly anyway - which is good enough for me.
I'll create a disc image and upload that too.
collio - let's go! ;-)
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