Posts filed under 'Miscellaneous'
Peace be unto thee, my fellow astronaughts!
It recently dawned on me that we’re now well into the fourth year of our journey to the stars. Our Good Lady, the starship USC Voxager, took off in september 2006, and since then, the ETA has been pushed back a little… too often. But we’re getting there, I promise.
So, where are we standing today? The post below this one still holds true. I’ve just finished song #5 “Ship of The Moon” with real synths, and will proceed to song #6 “Greed and Gold” soon. If all goes well (which is unlikely to tell you the truth… it pretty much never does! 
) I should be through the lot sometime in april.
While working on song #5, I had two epiphanies regarding mixing. The first one about a concept that I had never fully mastered, albeit I knew about it for years: depth offset using reverb. This never worked for me… until recently. Here’s how it’s done: pull down the fader on the desired channel strip while simultaneously dialing in lots of reverb using the channel’s send pot. That’s all, folks. Easy, right? Okay, the second thing I figured out is the proper usage of stereo width limiting. I’ve been fooling around with this for a while now, but it hit me only recently how it should be used: Mainly (and manly ) on subgroups. Give the atmo subgroup all the available stereo width, also the rhythm guitars, limit the keys subgroup stereo width a little, and the drums subgroup even a little more. Also the fx return subgroup. This, and the depth offset trick, make it much easier to differentiate between instruments in the mix. Took me five fuckin’ years to figure that super easy shit out, can you believe it? Anyways…
tl;dr: All well. Carry on.
Signing off,
Helge of voXager
January 15th, 2010
Peace be unto you!
Many things have happened during the last few months, neither of which, unfortunately, had much to do with voXager. To get the shit moving once again I’ve made a few decisions, some of them pretty tough ones:
- Drums: We’re going to ditch the “real” drums. They’re just too problematic, timing-, mixing- and otherwise. That was quite a costly error.
- Guitars: We’ll have to carefully review what of the stuff already recorded can actually be used, and re-record if neccessary.
- Synth: All software synth are off the table, except, of course, samples, which goes without saying, right?
- Most importantly: I’m going to finish all 16 songs in a row now without guitars and vocals — just drums, bass, keys & fx. Only after I’m through with that we’re going to review guitars and re-record vocals, or start thinking about additional guest musicians.
- Reviewing, fixing, mixing, mastering only after everything else has been said and done.
- Mixing and mastering must be done here at the voXager study. There’s just no budget left to have it done elsewhere.
- That’s it.
And lo and behold, dear brain eating space monsters, here’s the first thing coming out of the new strategy. It’s the well known Song No. 1, “Unto the Stars”, with only drums, bass, real synth, fx and no guitars yet. It is, in effect, Space Metal without Metal. Have fun.
Unto The Stars:
And lookie what we got here, more songs, same procedure applied as above!
Lizards:
Wheel in Space:
Split Seconds:
Ship Of The Moon:
Helge of voXager
November 13th, 2009
Booh! Haha, did I scare you? You know what? Five months later, and we’re back. During the last few days I struggled with mixing real drums for song #3 Wheel in Space. I also threw in a few Real Synths for good measure, and here I present to thee the newly re-mixed version, albeit without vocals yet. I will tackle this sometime during the coming week.
Helge of voXager
July 17th, 2009
As you were probably completely unaware, all synths heard on the voXager project so far are coming from VA synthesizers — that is, software synthesizers. As much as I love Arturia’s Analog Factory, Gforce’s Minimonsta & Co. and Korg’s Legacy Collection, they’re most definitely not the real deal. Thus, the plan always had it to replace them with real synths when possible. Or at least don’t tell anybody we were essentially faking synths
But, dear brain-sucking alien monsters (especially those always complaining blonde teacher-monsters from the Ruhrgebiet — you know who you are 
), these days have finally come to an end. In january and february I shelled out some cash on eBay to buy two real analog synthesizers, a 25 year old Roland JX-8P, and a not quite that old DSI Mono Evolver. I would also like to add a Moog Little Phatty to the machinery one time or another, but presently, that would be too expensive for a cheap hack like yours truly
That’s what voXager’s new vintage gear looks like:
Nice, huh? I’d also fancy a Solina String Ensemble, but I suppose Elton John had bought them all by 1977, so the chances of me getting one are not all that great. Same with the Mellotron, although those were probably out-bought by Genesis before Peter Gabriel left, and albeit they sound just too cool, I’d rather not own one for the sheer insanity of their weight, handling, and maintenance (tape frames, for fork’s sake?!) So, these synth will suffice for the time being… and right thereafter.
Well then. Knowing that you can’t escape those robotic contraptions anyway, why don’t you just join me in welcoming our new synthetic Overlords? That’s not a plea. It’s mandatory. You’ll hear from them shortly. Promise!
Helge of voXager,
kissing some shiny metal ass
February 10th, 2009
Dear Aliens.
For reasons unexplained, yesterday a song jumped me in the face boots first. At first, I didn’t want to keep it and considered song abortion. It was unplanned after all, and there’s not really space for it on the album, right? But then it somehow grew on me. It’s a short one, instrumental at that. It might just be the interlude between disc #1 and disc #2 of the album. I’ve not made up my mind completely yet, but listen for yourself:
And for the keyboard haters among you: This is the song with the all-time-low amount of keys in it. Go for it and be quiet for evermore!
Don’t zoo me,
Helge of voXager
January 20th, 2009
The shouter is dead, long live the shouter! 
I have been notified by Uli that he can no longer continue his part as Kyle Brennan’s voice on the voXager project because of time restraints and other purely personal reasons. I regret this very much, but of course, respect his decision. Good bye, Uli, and thanks for everything. See you in another live, brother!
So voXager is looking for a good rock/metal vocalist anyhwere on the planet, who is capable of the following:
- clean rock and metal vocals. I’m not so much looking for a perfect or plain voice, but for something a little rough and exciting.
- some death metal growling in the vein of Six Feet Under would be in order, but it’s not mandatory.
- either drop by here and record vocals at the voXager study OR
- record his own vocals at home in a GOOD quality and upload the tracks
Please have a listen at the songs “Unto The Stars” and “Lizards” in the downloads section.
Since the project is privately funded out of my own not very deep pocket, I can’t pay any kind of deep money upfront. If and when the project should generate some money in the future, it will be evenly split between project members.
Please, do not bother if you don’t know if you’ll have the time, or the energy to see this baby through to the end. It’ll be late in 2009 until we’re finished here.
Still interested? Drop me a note at helge@voxager.de
Helge of voXager
November 15th, 2008
Here’s “Lizards” with real drums. New roughmix, too. Have fun.
Helge
November 5th, 2008
This is site is a blog about the attempt to record a Prog Rock album at home, while learning the skills as we go along. We’re trying to document the progress we make, and also our mistakes. The project started end of 2006 and will probably, if everything goes well, have a finished album by end of 2009.
In the download area you’ll find a couple of roughmixes. We’re posting everything that is nearly completed there, but be aware, that the final mixing and mastering will be done by professional mixing engineers once all songs have been recorded. The musicians are listed in the musicians area. On the blog main page, you’ll also find drafts, failed versions, vocal only stuff, and so on.
All in all, there will be 16 songs, plus intro and extro, and most of them are a little longish. They contain great guitars (played by Sven, not by me, so this pic here is a lie ), lots of synth, and very good vocalists!
Hope you like it!
Take care
Helge
a.k.a. Zeitlos
October 5th, 2008
NOT!
Hey guys, I’m busy writing a novel these days, and this doesn’t leave me with too much time on my hands for anything else. But don’t hold your breath, I’ll be fully back on board again by mid of september or so. However, naturally I did have some time to buy a new computer. As usually, a Macintosh, because my beloved sequencer software Logic Pro runs on Macs only, and well, I’m not overly ashamed to admit it, I do like them apples bunches. Small, but nicely shaped apples, right? Who wouldn’t love ‘em? 
Here’s a nice pic of the new computer at the voXager study. To the right, you’ll see the old G5. It’s in perfect health, so if you wanna have it at €600,- drop me a note. For an extra fifty bucks I’ll consider not deleting the porn folder
Below there’s song 6 in a new version. Not much changed here. It’s just the first song bounced with the new intel Mac. I had to change a few instruments, but not too many. The guitars are now much wider, which increases overall transparency. I upped the mastering compressor gain by 1.5db, and the limiter by 2db. So perhaps this is already too loud. Do you hear distortion? I think there’s some, but hey. Somebody’s gonna fix that someday, right? Not me, and not today.
Cheers, and greetings to all you zombies
Helge of voXager
PS: Titten sind Macht!
August 8th, 2008
Konichiwa everyone!
Please welcome with me our two latest crew members, Laura and Cheryl-Renée!
Laura has already appeared on “Ship of the Moon” and will lend her beautiful and mystic voice to a couple of more songs shortly. Cheryl has just recorded vocals for “Wheel in Space”, and we’re going to show you a bit of that later this spring; Cheryl’s range of voicings also includes an amazing operatic style. Go to the “Musicians” area to find Laura’s and Cheryl’s mini-bio.
 |
 |
| Laura |
Cheryl-Renée |
It is safe to assume that the female vocalist section for voXager is now complete with Henny, Laura & Cheryl. There will be another addition to the crew on the male vocalist front shortly — more about that later this millennium
Nobody’s gonna be sued today, right?
Alrighty then, off you go!
Helge
March 18th, 2008
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