Saturn's Ramblings

2 in 1 day! Here's another tune, fresh off the digital presses...

This one's kind of a rock techno style. Fast-paced, and so I named it "Energy".

Feedback is always appreciated. However, due to the excessive amount of spam this site seems to attract, I was forced to permanently disable the comment feature. Instead, please feel free to email me any comments. =)

As always, best played using good headphones for the fullness of sound...

http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Energy.mp3

Length: 3:11
Bitrate: 192kbit CBR
Size: 4.38mb
Created with: Sony Acid Pro 6.0
Time to produce (start to finish): 1.0 hours

Wow! Only 2 days go by and insiration strikes for yet another tune!

Named it Raindance because of the nifty rainy intro and extro to the song. It kind of has a watery feel to it... I think this one is best classified as Ambient style.

Feedback is always appreciated. However, due to the excessive amount of spam this site seems to attract, I was forced to permanently disable the comment feature. Instead, please feel free to email me any comments. =)

As always, best played using good headphones for the fullness of sound...

http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Raindance.mp3

Length: 5:04
Bitrate: 192kbit CBR
Size: 6.95mb
Created with: Sony Acid Pro 6.0
Time to produce (start to finish): 1.0 hours

It's been a while, but I've finally spat out a new tune. Originally intended to make a promo for a friend's radio show, and got severely sidetracked..

I was auditioning some of my 18,000+ loops and samples, and one thing led to another. Not sure it's the best thing I've ever made, but I think it does have a cool sound to it. The name was chosen because that's kinda how the song feels -- a nice trance tune, perfect for that codeine high. Given I'm on painkillers so much, that's one thing I do know about! =)

Feedback is always appreciated. However, due to the excessive amount of spam this site seems ot attract, I was forced to permanently disable the comment feature. Instead, please feel free to email me any comments. Those that know me, know my many email addresses. Those that don't .. too bad! =)

As always, best played using good headphones for the fullness of sound...

http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Narcotic%20Trance.mp3

Length: 3:44
Bitrate: 192kbit CBR
Size: 5.12mb
Created with: Sony Acid Pro 6.0
Time to produce (start to finish): 1.5 hours

Finally had a chance to make some new music... This is not a remix, it's a wholly new arrangement by yours truly...

Kinda has dark and light overtones interlaced in it... Found a nifty Vader sample and played off that... The end result isn't half bad

As always, best played using good headphones for the fullness of sound...

http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Vader%20Will%20Destroy%20You.mp3

Length: 3:07
Bitrate: 192kbit CBR
Size: 4.3mb
Created with: Sony Acid Pro 6.0
Time to produce (start to finish): 3.5 hours

OMFG I finally made new music!

Recently started watching House ... everybody kept telling me how great it was, so I finally broke down and started watching it from the beginning...

And I was entranced by the intro music! It SCREAMED for a remix... so here it is.

I call it Vicodin because that seems to be Dr House's painkiller of choice (guys, Vicodin is just Tylenol #3 with a codeine substitute. That's it, nothing special)...

Turns out the ORIGINAL full length song is "Teardrop" by Massive Attack... However, since this was inspired by the elements they used for the intro and extro of House, I felt the naming needed to be related to the show... So there.

Have a listen, I welcome feedback =)

http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Vicodin%20[Remix]_192kbit.mp3

Length: 2:09
Bitrate: 192kbit CBR
Size: 3mb
Created with: Sony Acid Pro 6.0
Time to produce (start to finish): 2 hours

Well I FINALLY managed to come up with a new tune... something original this time around.. Took a couple hours today just noodling around with various loops and samples till i found a few that just kinda jumped over and tapped me on the head and whispered "use us!"

No, I haven't gone insane... no more than usual anyhow...

Anyhow, this is I think quite a bit different from my past stuff.. Maybe I'm mellowing or something.. it's kind of Ambient Trance (or something). I was kinda stuck for a name for it till I listened to it a few (dozen) times and thought.. "This is kinda liquid sounding......"

And so "Liquid" is born!

Have a listen, and please post your comments!!

Title: Liquid
Format: MP3, 192kbit, 44.1kHz, 16-bit
Length: 3 minutes, 46 seconds
Size: 5,305 KB (5.18 MB)

Link: http://saturn.titanblogs.com/links/David%20Taylor%20(Saturn)%20-%20Liquid_192kbit.mp3

We recently got all hooked on the series Angel after having enjoyed (I'm shamed to admit) Buffy the Vampire Slayer..

Angel was the spin-off show that ran 5 seasons with the character (vampire-with-a-soul) Angel in the lead role.

The Intro song on the show always struck me as very sad, wistful, almost despairing song, with a hint of "we'll make it despite it all!" attitude in it.. Well, to me anyhow...

Holly turned to me one day and said "Here, now I'd be interested in THIS remixed..." (obliquely referring of course to my dabblings with anime music, which she doesn't much care for.)

So here we go. I don't know if it's good or bad, but this whole track took me about 45 minutes to complete. I might tweak it more, but I don't think so; I quite like it the way it is now. (Note the fun effect on the music toward the end, with the transistor radio thing and the echos..)

Anyhoo, check it out and please post your comments =) It's about 1 minute and 20 seconds long. The original music was 43 seconds long.

Download here: David Taylor (Saturn) - Angelis Reloaded

Wow! Two new songs in as many weeks! OK so the last one wasn't entirely original (I stole samples from anime songs, and remixed em) and this week's addition to my collection is another stab at remixing music.

I find the japanese anime songs to be a lot easier to work with and remix in part because the language is foreign and in part because the syllables of the lyrics is almost alwasy lined up nicely on the beats. Makes for easier cutting and looping and beat-matching.

I'm using these as a way to practice my remixing skills to prepare for more complex projects. That, and I do like these original songs =)

I have posted my latest remix here.. It's from the title theme to the series Ai Yori Aoshi (2003) - The title translates as "Bluer than Indigo" which is a reference to an old Chinese proverb: blue dye is made from indigo colored grass, yet the blue dye's color is much deeper than the color of its origin (The main female character is Aoi, and "ao" in Japanese represents the colour blue). All in all, a very touching romance/comedy story. If you like to watch anime at all, I highly recommend this series!

The song is called "Towa No Hana" by Toshio Masuda. The song title (as mentioned earlier) means" Eternal Flower", which is why I've named my remix the English version of this name.

To allow people to compare and contrast (if so inclined) I am also posting the ORIGINAL song along with my remix. Both are quite short in length... The original is barely 1 minute and a half, my version adds another 30 seconds or so.

I really welcome any comments or opinions on my remix of this song, so please let me know what you think!!

Download my remix here: Eternal Flower (Remix)

Check out the ORIGINAL song here: Ai Yori Aoshi - Towa No Hana

Yup a new song!

This time around, I was inspired by some loops form various anime shows I've been watching. For the few out there who don't know what it is, Anime is basically cartoons from Japan. They're almost always in Japanese, with subtitles -- once in a while they are dubbed in English, but usually the dubbing sucks anyhow, so you're better off with subtitles..

ANYHOO, most of the shows I personally like have some neat music for the themes and in the soundtracks.. Today's song (completed yesterday actually), was inspired by small segments of two different songs and shows .. one song is from the opening theme to a sequel series called "FutaKoi Alternative" and the other is a tune that was played during a particularly climactic scene in episode 12 of "Kokoro Toshokan" ...

Of course, the samples are just small clips... I've arranged them and added beats and whatnot... I call this one "Triumphant" and you'll understand why if and when you hear it...

Please note: as with most of my tunes, this one in particular needs either a really decent stereo or good headphones to fully appreciate all the nuances of it. It has both high sounds and low, and they are designed to work off each other. Lower-quality speakers or headphones will give you the basic song, but will miss some of those important low-note nuances... Once of these days, I'm gonna have to figure out how to make music that DOESN'T require headphones and whatnot to sound OK.. In the meantime............

Please have a listen and please feel free to post your comments!

Download/Listen to: David Taylor (Saturn) - Triumphant

Hey!! I finally made another song! Yay me!

OK, that bullshit aside... Yeah, I've arranged another tune.. runs 3:48 (not bad) and took about 3 hours, start to finish...

I'm proud, cause this is both the quickest project, and I feel one of, if not the best tune I've made so far. It's different from my norm anyhow.

I use short and long "loops" or clips of sound -- beats, harmonies, etc.. Up til now I've used primarily pre-made beat loops and then added one or two extra sounds to them to make them unique. That, or combining multiple beat loops together to make a new beat... either way, it meant that I was basically using a beat pattern that was pre-made.. There's nothing WRONG with that; a LOT of other artists do it.. but I wanted to challenge myself and design a beat totally on my own.

So, I just grabbed single samples... a snare drum hit, a bass drum hit... single hits, then I built a beat digitally, the same way a drummer would tap out his own beat... Since I can't play drums, and don't have a drumset... well, I have to do it digitally instead =)

So I came up with a snare and kick beat (most evident at the beginning of the song, but runs throughout), and then purely by chance, happened to break it up so that out of 4/4 time (4 beats per measure), it would keep missing a hit every 8th beat.. that's that pause you hear in the snare section. Then I added a nice big bass drum kicker to it all, and started playing with other samples.

I also used a lot fewer total samples than I have in the past. Instead I tried mixing it up and keeping it interesting by shortening clips, repeating segments of a master clip, and so on.. I also played with some filtered effects...

Of course, early on, I was inspired to include the voice clip (for those that wonder, it's Paul Harvey, the guy who does those radio spots called "The Rest of the Story")... Ever since i first heard the original clip, I was stuck on the mental image of those words..

Now, since I don't yet have any turntables, I have to get creative with Acid Pro to add the turntable-style effects that I like so much.. I figured I'd augment it as well by making the echos sound like they're on TV or an AM radio or something.. It's a neat effect, and the cool result is that one can use the echos way more with the effect present than I could get away with, without the effect... If that makes any sense.. =)

Anyhow, the song is (of course) called "Somebody Singed A Kitten" -- Much thanks to Diamond for her feedback and for being so nice while still being repeatedly subjected to clips (over and over and over and over and over and...) and segments of the song during the creative process... "How's this sound? How about now? What do you mean 'What's the difference?'??? No there! I changed THAT! What does a shrug mean?" and so forth... =)

Please please leave a comment here if you do listen to it. I always value feedback, good and bad!!!

Download/Listen to: David Taylor (Saturn) - Somebody Singed A Kitten