my name is shoe.

ANDREW SHOEMAKER - OCEAN OF NOISE (KRAUTROCK EDITION)

One afternoon some time ago, I sat in my living room and strummed along to one of my favorite songs, Arcade Fire’s ‘Ocean of Noise.’ I found myself getting lost in the bass line, a bouncy, classic soul cadence that really drives the whole song and keeps it centered. I started to play along with it, and subtly altered it into a pulsing krautrock beat. Immediately, I became obsessed with wanting to hear the whole song in that style, and so a new project was born.

I’ve been working for several weeks now, and after about a dozen iterations I finally completed the cover today. This was my first attempt at a lot of different things with my Pro Tools studio, most obviously vocals. I also built the beat using a drum computer instead of sequencing it. As a result of that, I had to learn to record my MIDI tracks onto audio files, and that has opened a lot of new possibilities for me. Strangely a project that felt like a lark at its inception has grown into the most ambitious thing I’ve done thus far. I’m very proud of this song, and my hope is that it does the source material justice.

in your daydreams

The site I composed music for has gone live at last. Head over to http://inyourdaydreams.com and bring some much needed time-wastage to your otherwise productive workday. The site was written by Heather Apple, designed and built by Tofer Moran and Callie Peck, and creepy-whispered over by this moi. It’s tough to really describe this site. You just need to experience it for yourself. 

ANDREW SHOEMAKER - “DAYDREAMS”

Heather and Tofer are working on a website project and asked me to compose some music for the site. Their request was fairly specific and clear, so naturally I sat down to work and wrote something completely different than what they wanted. I don’t know if all musicians and composers have this experience, but sometimes you start to write something that seems to have popped into existence fully-formed in your brain. I played the two chords here that mostly comprise “Daydreams” and heard everything I needed to hear. I recorded this in about three takes, did some brief editing of the MIDI data, and bounced the track. It can’t have taken more than a couple hours. It’s more cinematic than my work usually is. I could hear it in a film score perhaps. I may continue to work with this song more to build it out a little, but something tells me that maybe I should just leave it alone. It was a daydream, alive for a moment, and then gone, half-forgotten.

UPDATE: I went back into this song and fixed a few notes that were bothering me. I also added some little bits of embellishment to fill some spaces that were a little too big. Maybe the imperfections of the original were what made it special, but I like this version too.

ANDREW SHOEMAKER - “WINTER CHILL”

Well I finally did it. I took the plunge, made the investment, and now I’m in my bedroom working with a Pro Tools Mbox system. After getting everything set up on Tuesday, I spent today experimenting, and I wanted to share my results. I’m thrilled with the quality of both the MIDI sounds I’m able to create with Reason and Pro Tools and the recording quality of my AT2020 mic.

For this song, I recorded a few ukulele tracks and applied some thick delay to create a densely textured wash of percussive sound. I also created a bed of cool, minimal synth pads. The goal was to give the listener the sensation of an icy, desolate landscape. It’s been cold here in the city lately, and it’s only going to get worse. I’ll be sure to keep working with this track, and I’ll share pictures soon.