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Hi everyone and hope you're having a great (and much cooler) final week of July so far! It's been a busy time here at JabunAudio plodding along with editing for Better Than The Book's 3rd album project as well as getting my final Covid vaccination and being a little bit under the weather as expected in the aftermath. More Patreon rewards to share with you today so let's get straight to that and the rest of the news!
Yesterday was the final Wednesday of the month which means its time for another dose of $5+ Patreon rewards and this time we're continuing with some more soundtracky (but slightly different) stuff with another track from 2013, "Piggyback Ride"! Piggyback Ride is an interesting one in my catalogue in that it combines orchestral and chiptune elements for a retro videogame-esq vibe with the clarity of more traditional scoring. This piece was originally written for a game on Newgrounds asking for people to submit tunes for the soundtrack, but after sending it over and some feedback, the makers decided to go with something else. I was a bit disappointed at the time as this would have been one of my first compositional rejections, but as I wasn't sure how else to improve on the track, I ended up releasing it as-is for people to listen to at the very least, as I was still pleased with the way it had turned out. As it so happened, while the originally intended audience wasn't so keen on Piggyback Ride, the track was eventually picked up by a MUCH higher profile interested party: EDF Energy & The British Science Association for their online "A to Bee" game which you can still play online: https://jointhepod.org/teachers/games/a-to-bee-game It's a great example of how one track even if not initially well received might lead to something big (and that's happened to me a few times throughout my career as I'm sure you know by now). Piggyback Ride has been featured in a number of other multi-media productions since then and is a fun one I look back on with fondness! Since it was designed for use in games as well as for listening, I'm including 2 versions in this months rewards: the looping version which was featured in various games, and an edited version with a fade out for your personal listening pleasure! Grab Piggyback Ride when you become a supporter on Patreon, and listen to the track on YouTube below: Piggyback Ride: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukGJmuw057E $5+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164462/ And for the $10+ patrons, this month you have an exclusive LIVE Jabun ambient modular synth performance to look forward to! Become a $10+ patron to access that and many more rewards now, and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! With the newly updated REWARD ARCHIVE it's never been easier to catch up with all those posts and music downloads you've missed too! I hope you enjoy them! $10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/53164465/ Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021): https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842 That's it for the rewards this time and Piggyback Ride will be available for the $1+ patrons next Wednesday! Something a little different will be coming in the next set of rewards, but until then, I hope you have a great August to come and thanks as always for supporting my music on Patreon! Next in the news, in case you missed it last week, it's currently 50% off on anything from the Better Than The Book Bandcamp store to celebrate 2 years of "Hopes and Dreams"! Use the code "2years" and hope you enjoy it! https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/ Offer ends next Sunday 8/8/21 so grab a discount while you can! Finally this week, some nice radio news to share as Better Than The Book was back on Button Down Radio with The Hardest Part again! Thanks so much to BDR for sharing the music and you can read more about what they have to say on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/buttondownradio5446/posts/2965822327022918 That's it for this week's news! Next time I'll have the $1+ Patreon rewards to share as well as the usual monthly goals to set and reflect on, and we'll see if there's any further exciting updates to share as well! Until then, thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects however you can and hope you have a great week to come! Take care and all the best!
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Hi everyone and hope you’re having a great July so far! It's been a super busy time here at JabunAudio since the last post finishing off organ and guitar recording for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album project as well as consolidating edits ready to start recording vocals! Still a few more tracks to edit to make my monthly target but we'll see how it all goes! Meanwhile I have something huge to celebrate with you today from Better Than The Book's previous album! Let's get started with the news and a limited time special offer! Time really does fly and would you believe this week marks two years since the release of Better Than The Book’s 2nd full-length album Hopes and Dreams?! With 9/10 tracks from the album airing on radio stations from as far as the west coast of the USA, to here in the UK (including 2 tracks on BBC Introducing), to even Australia, a tonne of online features and coverage from various web magazines, and even one track appearing on a ska music compilation album by The Ska Show with Beefy (the second most listened to Ska music podcast in the world), Hopes and Dreams was undoubtedly my most well received project to date, and I want express my sincerest gratitude to everyone who made that happen! A HUGE thank you to the BTTB (not quite yet) LIVE band, Sam, Andy and Eamon, the radio DJs with special mention to Beefy and Melita, Meg, the album’s PR extraordinaire, my subscribers on Patreon with special mention to top tier supporters past and present Michael White, Bob Roberts, David Klein II and Nathan Puray, and of course everyone else who’s made some noise for BTTB over the years! You folks really do make my dreams come true! To celebrate a fantastic two years on from Hopes and Dreams (puns intended), I’m launching my very first Better Than The Book Bandcamp discount sale! From now until August 8th (the end of the weekend following the next Bandcamp Friday), you can get a whopping 50% off anything on the Better Than The Book Bandcamp store below using the code “2years” at the checkout. Enjoy! https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/ Or if you’re feeling extra keen, you can grab the entire Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and more including many exclusive downloads and bonus tracks when you support my music with a front row seat over on Patreon for as little as $1/£1 a month! New rewards are published monthly and I hope to see you there in the comments! https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding That’s it for this post and I’ll be back with another reminder before August 6th for the next Bandcamp Friday! Next week's post will be announcing the next set of Patreon rewards at the very least, but until then, I hope you have a great week to come and thanks as always for supporting Better Than The Book, JabunAudio and my various music project in all the ways you can! Take care, stay safe and all the best! Hi everyone and hope you've had a great week since the last post! It's been a lovely one over here, not so much in the studio, but instead visiting my hometown, family and friends for the first time in 11 months (due to the pandemic)! A long overdue and fun visit, and apart from the demolition of a gig venue close to my heart, it seems that most of my usual haunts have made it through this tough past year which is great to know! I also had the pleasure of listening to in the flesh a LOVELY Moog Modular at GAK which was amazing, though also a space-launch away from my budget level at almost £12,000! Whoa! I did however also see a special something which IS at my price range and I now have on pre-order, but I'll wait until it arrives to reveal it! Been meaning to get another one of these for about a year and a half now, but with a special edition released to celebrate its 40th anniversary of uninterrupted production, I thought it'd be very nice to own a limited piece of history! No more clues, and it should hopefully be arriving later this month! Onto the main news for this week, there's not a whole lot to report since I've been away apart from some more $1 Patreon rewards being released! Let's get to it:
As of yesterday, last week's $5 Patreon rewards are now out for the $1 patrons: "Closing scene" and "See Ya Later" (+ an exclusive work in progress studio demo from Better Than The Book's next album for the $10+ patrons)! In case you missed last week's post you can read more about this month's rewards below and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! Hope to see you there and thanks as always for supporting my work on Patreon! Read more: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804846/ $1+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804859/ $10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804790/ Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021): https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842 That's it for the rewards this month and we'll be continuing with more soundtracky work next time! And that about wraps things up for this blog post too! The coming week looks to be filled with some usual beginning of the month chores/admin such as backing up the computers, as well as sorting out the next few sets of Patreon rewards, and hopefully I'll be back to some organ recording later this week too! Until the next post which'll likely be in a fortnight or on the 29th, I hope you have a great July to come and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects in all the ways you can. All the best, take care and stay safe!  Hi everyone and hope you've had a great few weeks since the last post. It's been a super busy time over here recording Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd full-length album, and by a stroke of good progress and fortune, ALL (ish) the guitar parts are now complete! That includes electric, acoustic AND bass guitar! Great stuff! As such I've moved onto recording organs and piano now which has been incredible fun and is going well! With 9 tracks to do in total, only 3 remain, and I cannot tell you how wonderful it is to be recording with a REAL combo organ this time, my Yamaha YC-25D (see above), rather than just some (still excellent) digital emulations and a midi keyboard! It's not just the sound, but the tactile experience too! Been a blast! As with such good times though, I also realised after taking apart my guitar recording rigs that I missed just one small thing... some feedback in one of the tracks, so there will be some minor guitar parts to pick up once organs are finished... Such is the way! Onto other news, yesterday was the final (Wednes)day of the month and so more $5+ Patreon rewards have just been released! Let's look at that! For this month's Patreon rewards we're continuing with more 2013 soundtracky pieces, this time a pair of them! "Closing Scene" and "See Ya Later" are variations on the same musical theme both released in May 2013. The first is a musical box style track and the second a subsequent string orchestra version of the same piece! At the time I composed Closing Scene, I'd just been given some new samples to play with including a set of thumb piano notes (if I remember correctly) and I thought it would be fun to compose a simple musical box theme with them. Interestingly, at the same time, one of the rooms in my parents' house where I was living at the time was being redecorated and had no carpet on the floor, giving this really cool and lively ambience. I ended up dragging some computer speakers to the room and playing the piece out loud with a microphone set up to capture the reverb on the other side of the room. Mixing the original dry piece with the live recorded room reverb gave a really nice effect for the final track! I do love taking advantage of these rare acoustic opportunities! After recording Closing Scene, I got the feeling that there was more I could do with this theme, and by swapping the thumb piano samples for my usual pizzicato strings, I thought it gave a really nice and different vibe. With a few extra tweaks, some added percussion and woodwinds, See Ya Later was created! When I listen to See Ya Later, it evokes images of being in an old wooden floor house, early on a sunny summer Sunday, tiptoeing tired around the house before making my way outside for a day of adventure, like something in a Hayao Miyazaki film. Those of you who have been following my work for years may also recognise See Ya Later as the credits music to much of the Fun Station 4 Kids videos, and indeed this piece was another door-opener for a tonne of amazing collaborations in the years to follow (totalling to over 30 MILLION YouTube views last time I checked)! I really should get back to more of this orchestral work soon (maybe even more variations on this theme), but until then, I hope you enjoy Closing Scene and See Ya Later! Grab Closing Scene and See Ya Later when you become a supporter on Patreon, or listen to the tracks on YouTube below: $5+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804674/ Closing Scene: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TDdv7YpNYY See Ya Later: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SAM40nKQ9UI And for the $10+ patrons, this month you have the first work-in-progress studio recording demo from Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album to look forward to! Become a $10+ patron to access that and many more rewards now, and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! With the newly updated REWARD ARCHIVE it's never been easier to catch up with all those posts and music downloads you've missed too! I hope you enjoy them! $10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804790/ Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021): https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842 That's it for the rewards this month, and "Closing Scene" and "See Ya Later" will be released to the $1+ patrons next week! We'll be continuing with more soundtracky work in the next set of rewards I'm sure, but until then, I hope you have a great July to come and thanks as always for supporting my music on Patreon! Enjoy! Finally this week, it's time to look back at last month's goals and set some new ones for July! Here's what I set for June: 1) Finish recording electric lead guitars for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album Just one goal as I was unsure what the month would have in store, but with all the electric, acoustic AND bass guitars as well as over half the organ/piano parts on the album complete, I think I very much exceeded expectations on this one! Great! Continuing with the BTTB theme, I think the next month of goals should be easy to set: 1) Finish recording organs for Better Than The Book's upcoming album 2) Finish recording any pick-up guitars for ^^^ 3) Start consolidating edits and set up sessions ready for vocal recording (at least 5 tracks) 4) Sort Patreon Rewards for the next 2 months These should keep me busy on top of some other personal goals I need to take care of. 1) should be ok (it's just 3 tracks left, though they're quite in depth), and I think 2) is just that little bit of feedback I mentioned previously, though I'll have to do another check to make sure I don't miss anything else again. For 3), it seems like a good idea to get edits for the instrumental stuff (minus horns and production extras), solid before recording vocals, so this feels like a good idea as to not be overwhelmed with edits later down the line. 5 tracks might be overly ambitious but we'll see how it goes. 4) Should be a piece of cake, just some writing to do! Overall I think it's going to be a busy time, but if I can get goals 1), 2) & 4) complete, and make good progress with 3), that'd be great! Wish me luck and feel free to comment with your own goals below! And that about wraps things up for this post! Looks like it'll be a very busy month ahead, but we'll see how it goes! I'll be back next week to post about the $1 Patreon rewards, and hopefully there'll be more exciting news to share then too! Until next time, I hope you enjoy the music and are excited for more to come soon, and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio, Jabun, Better Than The Book and my various projects however you can! Take care, stay safe and all the best! Hi everyone and hope you're having a great June so far! It's been a busy few weeks since the last post, mostly recording lead guitars for Better Than The Book's next album, though I did find some time to do some acoustic guitar recording as well as a bit of Jabun jamming / recording too! Productive! If all goes well, I might have ALL the guitar work for BTTB's next album finished by the end of the month, though we'll have to see how it all goes. I suppose it'll be onto organ after that which I'm looking very forward too! Anyways, onto the news for this week, there's a surprise new video to share from World Beyond as well as a special Juneteenth Bandcamp Friday fundraiser tomorrow to help in the fight against racism (always a good thing). Let's get started! First of all this week, the collaborative music project I've been part of for many years now, World Beyond has just released the final video from its Nobody Asked For This So I Did It album which came out in December 2018: NOT THE END! It's been a grand few years since the album was released and thanks so much for supporting the project over the years! Vlad sure kept this one quiet as even I didn't know this video was coming out and I was playing bass (and guitar maybe) for it! I hope you enjoy this epilogue/conclusion to the album and I'm looking forward to sharing WB's next project with you all soonish (super exciting stuff coming)! Check out the video below: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtDWwxfJZQ0
And pick up Nobody Asked For This So I Did It on Bandcamp: https://worldbeyond.bandcamp.com/album/nobody-asked-for-this-so-i-did-it Finally this week, a special event and time for some serious talk. Tomorrow is a special Juneteenth Bandcamp Friday event to raise funds for some important stuff I think we can all support: putting a stop to racism and making the world a safer and more accepting place for everyone. Instead of a usual Bandcamp Friday where all Bandcamp's reveune shares go directly to the artists, this Friday June 18th from midnight to midnight Pacific Time, Bandcamp will be donating 100% of its usual cut to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund to support their ongoing efforts to promote racial justice through litigation, advocacy and public education. You can find out more on Bandcamp here: https://daily.bandcamp.com/features/juneteenth-fundraiser-2021 With the ongoing Black Lives Matter and Stop Asian Hate movements (amongst others), I think it's clear there is something terribly wrong with society which really can't be ignored any longer, and that instead of "not being racist" (which should be obvious), it's time if you haven't already and are able to to actively look out for your friends, neighbours and community to make a stand and say enough is enough, we will not ignore or condone any acts of racism. The same can be said for acts of homophobia, biphobia, transphobia, etc... (and a Happy Pride month to all by the way). I know it's not always easy or comfortable to talk about this stuff let alone actively do something about it, but if we all make even the smallest effort to look after one another and make the world a better place, I think that'd be pretty neat! So if you've been thinking of picking up some music on Bandcamp, do it this Friday! It doesn't have to be from me, but whatever you buy I'm sure will help put the world on a better path, and if you do decide to pick up one of my albums, then it really means a lot too. You know where to find my Bandcamp stores below and I hope you're able to help: Better Than The Book (Ska punk): https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/ Jabun (Ambient and experimental electronic): https://jabun.bandcamp.com/ Nick Standing (other older stuff): https://nickstanding.bandcamp.com/ And if your wallet is empty or there's nothing you want at the moment music-wise, you can help by simply talking to your friends and family about this stuff and raising awareness of the issue. Remember it's not about who's lives matter over who's or one group of people against another, it's about everyone working together to put a stop against racism and allow everyone to live their lives feeling safe and respected regardless of ethnicity, culture or skin colour (or gender or preferences too), and I don't think there's anyone who can reasonably argue against that. Thanks for doing your bit to help however you can. And that about wraps things up for this post! I'll be continuing with guitar recording as much as I can until that's finished and if there's no post next week I'll definitely be back on July 1st for the next one! Until then I hope you have a great rest of June and Pride Month, look after and be kind to each other, stay safe, keep hydrated, and thanks as always for supporting my projects however you can! Take care and all the best! Hi everyone and hope you've been having a great and sunny start to June so far! I've been away for much of the past week so there's not been too much going on over here at JabunAudio, but it's been a nice week on my end nonetheless! Finally got my first Covid vaccination too (along with the expected achy arm), so feels like things will hopefully be returning to normal in the UK soon? I hope so! A little bit of lead guitar recording for Better Than The Book since the last post which has been fun, but other than that, not too much to report, so let's just get to some quick Patreon news before setting and reflecting on the usual monthly goals!
As of yesterday, last week's $5 Patreon rewards are now out for the $1 patrons: "Mayhem Market" (+ an exclusive unreleased Jabun demo from the writing sessions of 2019/2020: "Arc-welder" for the $10+ patrons)! In case you missed last week's post you can read more about this month's rewards below and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! Hope to see you there and thanks as always for supporting my work on Patreon! Read more: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804671 $1 rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804654 Become a Patreon supporter: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Explore past rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842 Finally this week, it's time to reflect on last month's goals and set some new ones for June. Here's what I had set for May: 1) Sort Patreon reward posts for the next 2 months 2) Finish the Generation Supernova promo period 3) Record all but one of the bass parts for Better Than The Book's upcoming album (12/13) 4) Launch my custom white noise generator for the Korg NTS-1 as a downloadable product! And overall a successful month I think! Patreon rewards have been set, Generation Supernova promo has been concluded, BTTB bass parts are done and I've started on lead guitars already + my custom oscillator for KORG's NTS-1 synth has been released and well received! Not much else to say on that. A productive month! Onto goals for June, maybe it's because I've only just got back from a break, but I've really no idea what to set for this month, as I'm not sure what's going on and what availability I'll have for acoustic recording... As such I'll just be setting one concrete goal this month which should hopefully be doable: 1) Finish recording electric lead guitars for Better Than The Book's upcoming 3rd album There's 7 tracks left to go, 5 of which are just the solos, though I still need to practice and write those up. If possible it'd be great to start on acoustic guitar or organ recording though we'll have to see how things go and I've got a fair few personal things I need to sort out this month as well. Not much set for this month but hopefully it goes smoothly. All the best with your own goals too and feel free to post them below in the comments! And that about wraps things up for this post! As I'm not sure there'll be a lot to report in the coming weeks, I'll be going a bit more sporadic on the weekly blog posts for a little while, but you can be sure there'll be at least 2 updates a month coinciding with the Patreon rewards coming out, and I'll be sure to post up anything interesting in the mean time as and when too! Until the next one, I hope you have a great June to come, stay cool and hydrated and thanks as always for supporting my music in any way you can. All the best, stay safe and take care! Hi everyone and hope you've been having a great final full week of May so far! It's been a busy and chaotic time here at JabunAudio, mixed in with a bit of illness (not covid thankfully) and a lovely overdue visit from family for some well earned break time too. Some cool Better Than The Book updates: bass recording was concluded (for now) last Friday with just one track left to go for after acoustic guitars are finished, shortly after which I snapped my glasses which put work on hold for the rest of the week... Luckily I've fixed them now until I can get a new pair, which is great because writing this blog post without them would be heck! Onto lead guitars next which I'll hopefully be starting today; exciting times! Anyways, onto the main news for this week: more Patreon rewards and another cool feature for JabunAudio! Let's get started! After Jabun's big Generation Supernova album release in April and the updated Patreon REWARD ARCHIVES, we're back to the usual schedule, and as yesterday was the final Wednesday of the month, that means it's time for some more rewards for the $5+ patrons! This time I'm heading back down memory lane for more of my tracks as plain old Nick Standing, and today I'm sharing with you the first in a new set of orchestral / soundtracky works "Mayhem Market"! Mayhem Market was released back in March 2013, and was the first track I recorded with the Shure SM27 microphone I was gifted for Christmas the previous year! Much of the inspiration for this track came after finally getting around to watching Disney's "Tangled" (good fun btw), which features an amazingly scored scene running through a market. Super inspired and itching to do some more recording, Mayhem Market was the result of the shortly followed recording session! The description I wrote back then when I uploaded it to Newgrounds is as follows: "I finally got round to recording with the SM27 I got for Christmas! Just a little soundtracky piece that sprung to mind. Imagine playfully racing through a crowed fantasy market with a good friend, rival or the love of your life, perhaps being chased by some half-wit bad guys or the fuzz! If I could do this as my job, I would be sooo happy XD" Mayhem Market is a blast from my past which I'm still super pleased with, especially from an acoustic guitar performance point of view. As chance had it, it also ended up being heard by the amazing World Beyond shortly after its release, opening the door for me to join that epic music production team (thanks so much to World Beyond for that opportinuty and praise) and help create much of the amazing stuff we've released together over the past almost decade! Mayhem Market unfortunately doesn't have any associated artwork, and this is the case for much of my soundtrack type work as Nick Standing from around this time. Nevertheless, I'm sure the music speaks for itself, so close your eyes and imagine a scene, and I'm sure it will be even more vivid than any painting or photo I could provide! I hope you enjoy it whether you've heard it before or this is your first listen! Grab Mayhem Market when you become a supporter on Patreon, or listen to the track on YouTube below: $5+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804595 YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oCVXEw_uJjA And for the $10+ patrons, you've also got an exclusive unreleased Jabun demo from the writing sessions of 2019/20 to look forward to, the hyper-experimental and glitchy "Arc-welder"! Become a $10+ patron to access that and many more rewards now, and remember that you'll gain access to all historic rewards and posts for your Patreon tier too when you become a supporter including the full Better Than The Book and Jabun discographies and much more! With the newly updated REWARD ARCHIVE it's never been easier to catch up with all those posts and music downloads you've missed too! I hope you enjoy them! $10+ rewards: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50804613 Become a Patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Discover the Reward Archive (4th October 2018 -> 1st May 2021): https://www.patreon.com/posts/announcing-posts-50344842 That's it for this month's rewards! Next time we'll be continuing with some more soundtracky work, but until then, I hope you have an amazing June to come and thanks as always for supporting my music on Patreon! Enjoy the music! Next and finally this week, an amazingly cool feature as KORG's official Facebook page posted about JabunAudio's very own custom oscillator for their Nu:Tekt NTS-1 Synth Kit: NOISE which was released earlier this month! Thanks so much to KORG for sharing my work and you can check out their post below! Neat! https://www.facebook.com/KORGusa/posts/319558136208101 And that about wraps things up for this week! Next time will have some more $1+ Patreon rewards as well as the usual monthly setting and reflecting of goals at the very least, but hopefully there'll be some more things to report too (now that my glasses are fixed). Until then, I hope you have a wonderful week ahead and start of June and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects however you can! Take care, stay safe, and all the best! Hi everyone and hope you're having a great week so far! It's been a busy but painful week here at JabunAudio, as I seem to have injured my back (slowly but surely getting better), so I've spent the time mostly doing admin and promo work, as well as writing up all the Patreon reward posts for the next 2 months (finished), all while trying not to move around too much... No bass recording for me this week (at the time of writing at least), but before the pain kicked in, I had a very productive Saturday finally repairing my Roland Tr-505 drum machine! Last week's 505 Day jam was a fun one, though I noticed that the volume control on my own machine was playing up worse than ever... The 505 had been an amazing 29th birthday present from my twin Eamon, a 1980s vintage unit with Eamon's own handmade battery cover to replace the missing one it didn't come with. Even when I was first given it though, it was difficult to dial in the volume low, as the control was crackly and the right channel tended to get super loud at low volumes for some reason. I thought it was a faulty potentiometer, but man oh man the 505 has a very specialised part for that (next to impossible to find) and while I had been keeping my eye out for one for the past few years, I've still yet to see or find any. After the amazing success simply cleaning the (what I thought were unserviceable) pots on my homemade double-neck guitar in March though, I figured I'd give it a shot for the 505, and sure enough, with a good spray of contact cleaner and some touched up solder joints, it worked wonders! The volume control (my only sonic gripe with it) is all smooth and working perfectly now, which also means I can play it in headphones again without fear of blowing my ears out! While I had the drum machine apart too, I also took the liberty of removing a tiny bit of fluff trapped between the clear protective plastic cover and the LCD display too. That'd been bugging me for YEARS! Happy times for the Tr-505 and wishing it many more decades of good health to come! Another small update before we get onto the main news for this week: on the front page (and a few other pages) of this site there's a statistic which makes me truly proud: the fact that the work I've done as JabunAudio has contributed to over 200 music tracks and over 20 MILLION views of YouTube animations! That's still mind-blowing to me. While I'd only recently updated that number to over 200 music tracks though, I remembered that I hadn't actually checked the number of YouTube views in a long while, and after a short investigation, it turns out that it's now WELL OVER 40 MILLION! Just astonishing, and thanks so much to everyone who's been watching and still watching all the hard work myself and my various collaborators have worked on. It really means a lot to me that people are still enjoying all these animations, and I hope there'll be more to share with you in the not too distant future! Onto the main news for this week, I have 2 things to share with you: first of all something I made I'm super pleased with and is free to download (I'm sure you can tell by the post title), and next, the final new music upload for Jabun's Generation Supernova album! Let's start with that mystery make! As you may know, I recently was gifted a KORG Nu:Tekt NTS-1 build it yourself digital synth kit for my birthday last month (huge thanks again to my twin Eamon), an exciting compact digital synthesizer which you put together yourself (IKEA style), that KORG also released a free software development kit (the logue-sdk) so you can create your own custom sound sources (oscillators) and audio effects for it (IF you know how to program in C++ (which I admittedly do not, but that's no problem))! You can use it standalone, or as an audio processor or sound module and it's incredibly versatile! There was one thing which seemed missing out of the box though... Among all the custom user oscillators people had made and distributed on the internet (and there are a tonne of great ones), for the life of me I could not find anything which was just a simple noise generator (free or otherwise) so after some research, I figured I'd do some code tinkering try to make my own... and it was a success! No point in keeping it to myself soooooo.. Introducing NOISE: a simple white noise oscillator with adjustable soft-clipping for the KORG Nu:Tekt NTS-1 so you can shape the noise with the envelopes, filters and effects for making percussion sounds, sweeps and the such! NOISE is free to download with an optional donation here on the JabunAudio website, and you can find out more about it along with a quick demo video explaining the features and giving some usage examples below: https://www.jabunaudio.com/news/introducing-noise-a-custom-white-noise-user-oscillator-for-the-korg-nutekt-nts-1-digital-synth-kit-free-download-or-donation I'm still new to the coding for this synth so it's a VERY basic user oscillator, but as I learn more, I look forward to creating some more exciting custom content in the future! If anyone else has one of these fine DIY synths, then I hope you like my very first program for it and enjoy making some noise, with NOISE! Check out the intro video below: Since its release my notifications have been filled with some lovely comments, and I'm so pleased that everyone is enjoying it so far! Fingers crossed that KORG adds it to their official user oscillator database! That would be the final seal of approval! Lastly this week, the final (for now) weekly new music upload is here and Jabun's full Generation Supernova album is now available for streaming on YouTube and Newgrounds! Check out the full Generation Supernova album below: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAGi_mCVc30 Newgrounds: https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/1031625 Or check out the playlisted songs on the platform or your choice: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6tKVPNjy1_BP9Em-lnNl3w9M8_pOjMxZ Newgrounds: https://www.newgrounds.com/playlists/view/a78406727321023caf886e4645d4c5b2 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/album/1I3XVBjn5hqjUdrg1HWaMT And if you like what you hear, pick up the Generation Supernova album on Bandcamp: https://jabun.bandcamp.com/album/generation-supernova Or grab it with the entire Jabun and Better Than The Book discographies when you become a supporter on Patreon for as little as $1 a month (The reward archives have just been updated too)! Hope to see you there! Become a patron: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Explore the rewards archives: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50344842 That wraps up the promo posts and uploads for Jabun's Generation Supernova album! I hope you've enjoyed these generative soundscapes and experiments over the last few months and I'm sure I'll be back in the not too distant future with another grand Jabun adventure to share with you (still sitting on over 70 minutes of demos from last year's writing sessions)! And that's it for this post! I'll be aiming to get back to bass recording very shortly, though apart from that, I'm not too sure what this coming week will have in store! The next set of $5+ Patreon rewards will be out at the end of month again as usual (with the $1+ rewards following a week later on the first Wednesday of June), so at the very latest, the next blog post will be in 2 weeks time, unless there's anything particularly interesting to report next week. Until then, I hope you have a great May ahead filled with good times and vibes and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio, Jabun, Better Than The Book and my various projects in all the ways you can! All the best, enjoy the music and take care! Hi everyone and hope you're having a great start to May and the week so far! It's been a SUPER busy week here at JabunAudio, so much so that I couldn't even fit everything into the post title this time! Electric rhythm guitars for Better Than The Book's in progress 3rd full-length album are complete, and after a quick service I've started laying down some basslines too! On Tuesday my debut album as Jabun "Daydream" celebrated its 4th anniversary which feels crazy! Thanks so much to everyone who's listened to and shared the music throughout the years (and you can listen to and read more over on bandcamp). And Wednesday was 505 day in celebration of the lesser appreciated Roland TR-505 drum machine which made for some fun celebratory jams on Wednesday night! Happy 505 Day for yesterday everyone! On top of all this, after much research and some code tinkering, I built my first very own custom oscillator for the Korg NTS-1 digital synth I received for my birthday last week, a super simple but incredibly useful white noise generator! I'll be running some further tests in the coming week when I can, but I plan to make the program a free public download with optional donation for anyone to use shortly (maybe I can even get it featured on Korg's official database?)! Some more work to do before that can happen, but I'll keep you updated! Expect to hear more about it later this month! With all those extra bits of news out of the way, let's get down to some of the bigger pieces (from a writing point of view), starting with a HUGE Patreon update! First of all this week, I announce the updated set of Patreon reward archive posts for all rewards covering from 4th October 2018 (when I started on Patreon) to 1st May 2021 for the convenience of Patreon supporters and new patrons! These months' rewards cover the full discographies (as of 1st May 2021) for my ska punk / pop punk project Better Than The Book and electronic / cinematic / ambient project Jabun, as well as a few bonus tracks, covers, and some of my discography as plain old Nick Standing, and the REWARD ARCHIVE is here for your convenience so you can pick up all these rewards (Mp3s, WAVs, artwork and more depending on your tier) in one place when you sign up. No need to search through all the posts manually: Just click the link to the REWARD ARCHIVE below (which will be pinned to the top of your feed when you sign up), select the archive for your tier, dig in and enjoy the music! Hope to see you in the comments! Become a patron for as little as $1 a month to access the REWARD ARCHIVE below and all new music as it's released: REWARD ARCHIVE: https://www.patreon.com/posts/44580119 And find out more on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Music rewards include: Better Than The Book's full discography (as of 1st May 2021):
Jabun's full discography (as of 1st May 2021):
As well as:
For those of you on the $10+ DEMOlition Pigeon tier, you also have access to all the work in progress, demos and behind the scenes monthly articles too including:
More Better Than The Book will be coming soon as you know as I'm busy recording the project's 3rd album, but the next few months of rewards will be focused on more of my other music as plain old Nick Standing! Until the next set of rewards and then, thanks so much for supporting Better Than The Book, Jabun and my various music projects on Patreon, I hope you enjoy the music (and articles) above and to come! Next this week, some amazing news to share as Jabun's Deep Space (Track 02 from the Generation Supernova album) just received a Front Page Award on Newgrounds.com! Thanks so much for the love folks! https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/1026374 And speaking of the Generation Supernova album, it's time for the next weekly music upload for Jabun's 3rd album, and this week, track 04 Voyagers is now available to listen to on YouTube and Newgrounds! Check it out below: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRBhbdrAB3o
Newgrounds: https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/1029193 And if you like what you hear, pick up the Generation Supernova album on Bandcamp: https://jabun.bandcamp.com/album/generation-supernova Or grab it with the entire Jabun and Better Than The Book discographies when you become a supporter on Patreon for as little as $1 a month! Hope to see you there! https://www.patreon.com/NickStanding Rewards archives: https://www.patreon.com/posts/50344842 The full Generation Supernova album is also now available to stream on Spotify as well: https://open.spotify.com/album/1I3XVBjn5hqjUdrg1HWaMT And while we're on the topic of Bandcamp, it's once again Bandcamp Friday tomorrow and in case you're not familiar with it, in support of musicians impacted by the coronavirus, Bandcamp is waiving its revenue share fees on the first Friday of the month from midnight to midnight Pacific Time, meaning that if you purchase anything from Bandcamp this Friday 7th of May, the artists you support (including myself) will get more of the sales revenue than usual since Bandcamp doesn't take its cut, and you'll be able to support the music you love more directly than ever on the platform! If you've been itching to purchase Jabun's new "Generation Supernova" album or pick up one of my other albums as Jabun or Better Than The Book, now's the best time to do so! Check out the Bandcamp pages below and thanks again for supporting my music in any way you can, it really means a lot: Better Than The Book https://betterthanthebook.bandcamp.com/ Jabun https://jabun.bandcamp.com/ Nick Standing (< The sillier old stuff) https://nickstanding.bandcamp.com/ And if you're not sure whether it's Bandcamp Friday in your time-zone, you can check using the tool right here: https://isitbandcampfriday.com/ Finally this week, it's time to reflect on the usual monthly goals! Here's what I set for April: 1) Release Jabun's Generation Supernova album 2) Update the Patreon Reward Archive posts ready to release in May 3) Finish recording electric rhythm guitars for the upcoming Better Than The Book projects 4) Service and start recording bass for ^^^ And overall a productive month it has been! All done, no need to elaborate, so for May I'd like to set some more: 1) Sort Patreon reward posts for the next 2 months 2) Finish the Generation Supernova promo period 3) Record all but one of the bass parts for Better Than The Book's upcoming album (12/13) 4) Launch my custom white noise generator for the Korg NTS-1 as a downloadable product! Should be a busy month ahead but hopefully doable (on top of the other non-JabunAudio related stuff on my to-do list). 1) I've already decided what the rewards will be, it's just a case of writing up the 10 posts. 2) should be finished in another 2 weeks. 3) I've currently got 2 bass parts done which means there's 10 left to go! Should be doable unless I have any major problems or delays. If you're wondering why I'm not doing that one last bass part it's because that track has only acoustic guitar and I've yet to record any of the acoustic parts yet. I'll try bass for that once the acoustic parts are recorded. Finally 4) My original goal for the month was just to be able to program such a custom oscillator, but since it seems to have gone so well I figured, heck, why not share it with the world and give back a little! I'll need to do some further tests and checks, then make a product page at the very least, contact a few people and possibly do a demo video for it so it should be an exciting endeavor! Hopefully all goes smoothly, and if this goes well I'd like to try making some more custom content for the NTS-1 in the future! Wish me luck and what are your goals for the month? Feel free to comment below and let's keep eachother motivated! Phew! That's it for this post! I'll be back next week at the very least with the full album streams and playlists for the entire Generation Supernova album, but hopefully more updates on recording or custom oscillators or something as well! Until then, I hope you have a great week to come whatever you're up to, and thanks as always for supporting JabunAudio and my various projects however you can! See you next time, take care and enjoy the new music! NOISE is a basic white noise generator for the KORG Nu:Tekt NTS-1 digital synth kit, an invaluable tool for creating percussion sounds, sweeps and other non-pitched sound effects! NOISE is my first custom created user oscillator for the NTS-1 and is based on the sine_test code in KORG's logue-sdk. Parameter A has no effect, while Parameter B adds soft clipping to the white noise core signal, slightly boosting the level, reducing the dynamic range, and adding some extra overall presence. [Note: shape/pitch modulation will have no audible effect on NOISE. Also, the same sound will be produced regardless of keyboard pitch information.] The code has been optimised (to the best of my ability) by editing the logue-sdk's original sine_test code to produce a Gaussian white noise output, then removing any extra code related to parameters with no audible effect (such as the original Parameter A shape control). While NOISE works well for me on the NTS-1, I've not been able to test it on the Prologue or Minilogue XD platforms, but since those already have more flexible noise sources, I doubt you'll be needing this custom oscillator for those synths. NOISE is provided as-is, at your own risk, and will not be offered any formal technical support, though I'll do my best to help where possible. Use NOISE along with the NTS-1's multi-mode filters to create a variety of timbres to be shaped by the on board envelopes, effects and more, or use NOISE to turn your NTS-1 into a white noise generator to use with external synths such as the KORG Volca Modular! NOISE is free to download below, though if you'd like to make a donation I'd be truly grateful for the support, and I hope to learn more and create more custom user oscillators for the KORG Nu:Tekt NTS-1 in the future! Have fun, and enjoy making some noise, with NOISE! NOISE VERSION 1.0 (Any updates will be posted on this page) 
Make a donation: https://www.paypal.me/NickStanding
And feel free to leave a review of NOISE below! I hope you enjoy it! MINOR UPDATE: I've had reports that the file isn't downloading correctly for some users on mobile devices. It should download as just the single file "noise.ntkdigunit" as above, NOT a .zip or .bin or .json file. If the latter is the case, try downloading from your desktop browser instead (Chrome or Firefox works on my end) and that should fix the issue. Hope that helps! |
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