Post your set up and your sexy cat...

[quandry]

updated my space some, and just finished building my edge lit 1" acrylic pimp shelf, so chill at night!

Man, you don't have a "space", you have a small musical universe!

Are you basically a one man plays everything musician, or are there other contributers as well?

I look forward to checking out your music.

Thanks! Sadly I have been too busy/lazy to update the music on my website for three years--still trying to finish a solo album. I do play with other people, but for my solo stuff I'm playing everything (for better or for worse!). Mainly a bassist, and okay at guitar, but really enjoy composing and arranging with a somewhat odd mix of instruments and more electronic keyboard elemnents.

Here's some of the new stuff, still unfinished mixes, but getting close:

http://www.ryan-hughes.net/Audio/Batesville.mp3

http://www.ryan-hughes.net/Audio/Montuckey.mp3

http://www.ryan-hughes.net/Audio/Lexington.mp3

[Tone Deft]

sweet studio, cool tunes. there's great cohesion between the instruments, they have more the sound of a few people playing together than one guy playing over a track, I have no clue how you do that.

[electro zerepc]

sweet studio, cool tunes. there's great cohesion between the instruments, they have more the sound of a few people playing together than one guy playing over a track, I have no clue how you do that.

not the only thing you have no clue about.

[jesso]

Great tunes Quandry. Good to see your putting all that gear to proper use!
Jesse

P.S. your band (rule of Thump) rocks too. I'm listening to yo mama at the moment. I love that African Carrebian groove.
If you haven't heard it yet, you should check out Vampire Weekend's album. Quite commercial, but very successful at getting that nice sparkly guitar goove across.

[bosonHavoc]

pretty dope quandry.

how do you have your drum kit midi routed?
i use a DK10 also and some day i would love to add a snare drum and hat stand to go with it. part of me wants acoustic though.. in the end i think the cost would be the same for quality acoustic hat/snare plus mics and midi triggers compared to quality electronic hat/snare plus brain.
its all in dream state right now though

[madhattared]

Nice beard!

[quandry]

wow, thanks Tone! Long time no see, hope you're enjoying our SF "summer"--sure beats the heatwaves though! Thanks danzel (I shoot you a private message on the cd).

I'll have to check out the Vampire Weekend album, thanks jesso! IF you haven't heard of them, Monthy Alexander (piano) and Ernest Ranglin (my favorite guitaris) are both incredible musicians from Jamaica that play Reggae/Ska/Calyspos/Carribean-influenced jazz--check Ernest's "Below the Bassline" album, incredible.

bosonHavoc--I started with a Drumkat EZ (really old unit I got on ebay), which is much like the DK10. Over time I really longed for the snare and hi hat, like yourself. It is not a cheap road, I bought everything at a good price on ebay and it still was close to $2k. To use an actual two-piece roland hi hat (vh12, or VH11, which is what I have) to it's fullest capabilities, it must plug into a roland TD-10, TD-12, or TD-20 brain, and they are all pretty pricy. The TD-10 wasn't out when I was getting the pieces together, so I got the TD-12. I also got a pd125 mesh share and kd85 mesh kit. I waas basically in the same boat as you (plus liviing in an apartment bldg!)--buy a good kit, all the mics and pre amps and piles of cables, or get a legit and compact e-drum setup. I plug in the kick, snare, and hats into the TD12, and I use the Drumkat's ten pads for cymbals and toms, where I am fine with just pads and nothing fancy, and it saves a ton of space vs. having all the toms and cymbals. The midi chain is drumkat>TD12>Motu micro lite(midi usb thang)>Ableton>BGD2 as a vst instrument.

Now for the bad news--I really wasn't feeling the sound/processing of the Roland factory kits. You can buy 50-packs of kits from various kit-making companies (you just get a sysex midi file to load onto the head)--I tried these and they were better, but ultimately I wasn't digging the sound in my mixes, and porting over each individual track was a drag. The solution was to just send midi to my computer and use BFD2 vst drum software inside Live for my sounds. I could go on an on about BFD2, it is brilliant and the amount of control just within this vst is incredible--it's like having a range or incredible drums and mics and having a level of control of them that isn't even possible in the real world (like a knob that controls the amount of snare bleed, or how much kick goes into the overhead and room mics!). After starting with banging out beats on a keyboard for years, I feel like I finally have the edrum setup of my dreams. IF you count BFD2 as part of the equation, it is wayyy cheaper to go the e-drum route than the real kit+mics+mic pres--the mics and pres and ten or so drum kits used on BFD2 are all top-of-the-line. Sorry to go on and on, but your post is exactly where I was about 2+ years ago!

[OvertoneZero]

Nice info on the drum setup, really cool tunes too.. lots of LIVE recording

Cool..

[ResonanceMan]

A few things aren't in the pics. my acoustic and classical guitars, trumpet, flute, 88 weighted keybed, microphones, didjeridoo, djembe.

http://www.nativeacoustics.com/images/DSCI0241.JPG
http://www.nativeacoustics.com/images/DSCI0242.JPG

my bad, didn't place the images.

meah, my normal set up is a bit different, but just wanted to post something up. wanted to get most of it in one/two shots.

[slirak]

To use an actual two-piece roland hi hat (vh12, or VH11, which is what I have) to it's fullest capabilities, it must plug into a roland TD-10, TD-12, or TD-20 brain, and they are all pretty pricy.

Actually, the new TD4 module supports the VH11. The module's still not cheap, but it's less than half the price of a TD12 module.

I use the full TD12 kit myself, with Session Drums. You have to tweak Session Drums' hi-hat sounds quite a bit to make them respond naturally to the VH-11 but then it works pretty nicely.

Having that natural hi-hat feeling was what made me fork out the dough for the TD12 kit, that and the mesh heads and cymbals. If you're not a drummer, you may be quite happy with some of the much cheaper options. You can get a used TD3 kit for the price of a new TD4 module and that's still not a bad kit. Much more sturdy and responsive than most of the not-so-well-known brands.

I was looking into BFD, but at least with my system, it felt like Session Drums responded faster. (I suppose they should. As I understand it, native Live devices have an edge as compared to VST or AU plug-ins, when it comes to latency.) Integrates nicely with Live's mixer tracks too.

You've got more options with something like BFD of course though and in many respects a better UI. Drum racks can get really convoluted with sound sets as complex as Session Drums.

[quandry]

Nice info on the drum setup, really cool tunes too.. lots of LIVE recording

Cool..

thanks! Word, it's pretty much all live stuff edited together, no samples (except if you count BFD2 drum samples)

[quandry]

To use an actual two-piece roland hi hat (vh12, or VH11, which is what I have) to it's fullest capabilities, it must plug into a roland TD-10, TD-12, or TD-20 brain, and they are all pretty pricy.

Actually, the new TD4 module supports the VH11. The module's still not cheap, but it's less than half the price of a TD12 module.

I use the full TD12 kit myself, with Session Drums. You have to tweak Session Drums' hi-hat sounds quite a bit to make them respond naturally to the VH-11 but then it works pretty nicely.

Having that natural hi-hat feeling was what made me fork out the dough for the TD12 kit, that and the mesh heads and cymbals. If you're not a drummer, you may be quite happy with some of the much cheaper options. You can get a used TD3 kit for the price of a new TD4 module and that's still not a bad kit. Much more sturdy and responsive than most of the not-so-well-known brands.

I was looking into BFD, but at least with my system, it felt like Session Drums responded faster. (I suppose they should. As I understand it, native Live devices have an edge as compared to VST or AU plug-ins, when it comes to latency.) Integrates nicely with Live's mixer tracks too.

You've got more options with something like BFD of course though and in many respects a better UI. Drum racks can get really convoluted with sound sets as complex as Session Drums.

Cool man, thanks for sharing, glad to know the Roland finally came up with a more-affordable solution to using VH11/12 hats....it hurts me to know that I am basically using the $$$ TD-12 as a trigger interface to make the VH11s work (just over two years ago...), not using any of the onboard sounds.

You are right--I think session drums can get lower latencies that vst drum plugins, but after a lot of research, the BFD2 interface(s) and logical all-in-one solution with an analog-style approach to the BFD2 mixer was the winner. I'm able to have my latency st 128 samples`5 ms total with my RME multiface on almost any live set, even with lots of plugins, and down to 64 samples on simpler sets. On ocassion, when I've got a huge set going, I'll monitor the Roland sounds on the TD12 to have no latency, while recording the midi to BFD2 for playback. Thanks again on the TD4 tip, maybe I should sell my TD12 and get that and some $ back!!!

[the_antagonist]

meet Lamont, my stuffed animal cat and some new additions


new HD widescreens on adjustable arms.. I got the arms from the IT department.. always make good friends with them.. I happen to buy this guy a few beers.. They switched a workstation at work to triple 30 inch lcds (microscopy use) so they had no use for the dual arm..

mission control

[EddieJ]

[dhilsabeck]