Every two years, on even years, on weeklybeats.com, there’s a sorta kind music contest (without the actual contest part) where the idea is to submit a piece of music, at least one minute long, every week, for the whole year.
I have attempted this twice so far, in 2014 (Where I managed to create 15 beats) and 2018 (14 beats). I always had a phase of joy in the beginning, then it became work and then I quit. This year, at least so far, feels different, as I am giving myself a lot more slack and let stuff be unfinished, if I can’t make it. Let’s see how many beats I can make this year. I thought it would be kinda fun to write up some notes on all of these beats I managed to release so far.
These are more or less the notes I wrote as descriptions on weeklybeats.com plus extra information or thoughts whenever I see fit (Marked as “Editor’s notes”. I’m going to update this article over the year.
This is a continuation from this post containing all beats from Q1.
Week 14
I’ve been watching a ton of historical documentations on old crafts on this youtube channel by the Landschaftsverband Rheinland and one of them was about preparing flax for spinning, including the threshing to free the flaxseed from the pods. Threshing by hand in a group inevitably produces some sort of rhythm and that’s how I ended up sampling that video under the CC license.
I didn’t spend a ton of time on the track except for arranging the voice samples and making sure the threshing was somewhat in rhythm. Lots of warp markers in these.
Editor’s note
I’m a bit torn on this. On one hand I like it, but also I do realise that the music part of this is a bit underdeveloped and primitive while the combination with the old film commentary can feel a bit gimmicky. Also, I guess this is much more enjoyable (and you’ll be able get the small gags I managed to squeeze in by specifically sequencing the spoken words with particular parts of the music) when you are able to understand the german words.
Week 15
This started out with a sound exploration in Serum for the stabby sample (now played through AMIGO) that flies in at the beginning. The timing of that sound was a bit odd which prompted me to try to make this a triplet based Drum’n’Bass thing.
I had a bit more time that anticipated on friday and tried to make this a bit more interesting with a couple of nice transitions and breaks but this is still not my biggest forte.
My plan is to reuse that sample next week in a more dub-techno kinda affair, let’s see if that idea holds up.
Editor’s note
I think this track is a bit weak in the sense that I don’t particularly like the lead that comes in later, it feels a bit flat to me. I am still happy with the outcome, but it could be better. I definitely am not the king of catchy ravey hooks.
Week 16
The title means “secondary utilization” and is part of the bigger compound word Zweitverwertungsrechte which translates to secondary publication rights and I found this fitting because this reuses the main sample from last week’s song. This was a bit of a close shave as I was only able to start on friday and I was lucky in that my SO was unlucky and caught a cold so I basically have an unplanned free weekend.
Nevertheless tonight feels like I need to submit this, as working on this was a bit annoying. Dub tech stabs are usually a bitch to mix, with the filter sweeps and all, but this one didn’t want to gel at all and I still don’t think it is particularly well mixed but I tried.
Last week I was pondering how this year feels different in that I don’t feel particularly burned out (In both 2014 and 2018 I stopped submitting somewhere around this time of the year with a couple of unsuccessful reboots over the rest of the year) but this week felt a little bit more like, you know, work. Maybe I’ll need to pause next week or do a little quick sketch or something so that I can relax a bit.
In any case, 15 Songs per Year is my current record and I just beat that with just one missing (in week two where I was seriously sick), so I should feel pretty good about this.
Let’s see.
Editor’s note
I wrote that longish blob of text on Saturday evening and it does feel accurate still, even though I managed to make some more (different) music on Sunday that may or may not turn into the next beat.
I hope this is just a momentary issue or that I maybe painted myself into a corner with that idea to reuse the sample. Listening to the track a couple more times I start to like it a bit more, so maybe it’s a similar case to the Drum&Bass track “Regulators” where I also had similar issues.
For some reason I managed to export the track from Ableton (twice!) with a cut off tail, not sure how that happened. Usually I listen to the export a couple of times on different devices to check the mix but since I was so annoyed, I seem to have always skipped the end and so I noticed this just before going to bed and had to re-export (twice!) and re-upload. It would help if my ISP would not currently limit my uplink to below 2Mbit, which makes uploading full wav exports to Soundcloud quite the hassle. But that ISP thing is another story. I recently vented about it on LinkedIn in the vain hopes someone from the ISP would see it, but I think it’s worth writing it up in a blog post as well.
Week 17
I started with this track last Sunday by creating the chords and was initially quite happy with the track. Then I ran into a brick wall over the course of the week. This morning I had an idea and then had to wait the whole day to finally be able to try to get a go at it. This isn’t super original or exceptionally funny but I am quite happy with how this turned out in the end.
This uses a sample from freesound: [Amnbiente café México (lluvia, voces, tazas)_02_LR.WAV by vicocintle](https://freesound.org/s/672829/ License: Attribution 4.0
Editor’s note
I really like the beat drop at 1:09, as a friend of mine remarked, you kinda expect someone to come in with some dope rhymes.
Week 18
The base of this is the weird percussion/drum loop that I constructed from some samples I recorded when sitting on deck of a ferry that would bring us back home from a short vacation. For a long time I had no idea where this is going but somehow this slightly jazzy downtempo jungle thing emerged.
Uses a sound from freesound: Catterline Harbour.WAV by inchadney License: Attribution 4.0
Editor’s note
There’s something about the way home from either a really nice vacation or a good workation (See week 26) that makes me do really nice upbeat music.
Week 19
This was a fun one, as this almost 100% turned out the way I wanted it to. The only compromise is the lead melody that was supposed to be an improvisation on top of the rest of the beat but I suck too much at keyboard playing for that to be viable and the result being usable.
I really like the way the chords are repeating at a very odd period - I tried to reign them in a bit, but it made things sound worse, so I kept them at a length of 2.2.2, never really matching the beat which is why the beginning of the song sounds so weird.
Editor’s note
Still vibin’ to this. The only regret that I have is that I had a version of the chords that sounded much more round and mellow but somehow managed to mess it up and somehow being unable to recreate it.
Week 20
So, just to make it clear, the voiceoover is a bit. I am somewhat content with this, I didn’t have much time, so this is more an exploration of different sounds than anything else.
It’s something!
Editor’s note
This was basically a sound design session crammed into a track. I had a couple of sounds in my head I wanted to recreate and then built a slim chassis of drums and melodic elements around it. I does remind me a bit of the beginnings of dub step when people were basically throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks, so you could see it as a kind of hommage to that, I guess.
Week 21
As I have other endeavours that take up most of my time right now, the WeeklyBeats sessions become more and more speedrun sessions. Not the “fruityloops a new beat in 20 seconds” type of thing but this one more or less took an hour. Which is about double of what I had to spare. Again, “It’s something”.
I’d like to have a more normal week next week, please.
Editor’s note
This (or rather, probably last week already) marks the beginning of a rough patch where I was struggling with my health a bit while simultaneously having to finish a conference talk. These are very low effort and it makes me even prouder that I managed to come through with tracks that are actually quite nice.
Week 22
Another quick one, roughly 1:30h in total, I think. It’s always fun to try to load up on various sources for noise when building these atmospheric dub techno/dub house tunes. This one is a bit overcompressed I think but I liked the aesthetics of it so I left it as is.
Hopefully, after next week, I will be back to having a bit more time for the WB stuff.
Editor’s note
Yeah. I mean.
Week 23
Completely impossible to deliver something. In the end I did not even try. I MC’d RubyUnconf on the weekend and as usual was just super knackered after the long days and during the week I was still busy getting my conference talk done.
Week 24
These were two absolutely mad weeks preparing a conference talk with some new jobs starting and, not one but two conferences, so I am happy to at least have one of two weeks checked.
This is again a quick sketch following a similar pattern as the last one with loads of noises, loads of delay etc.
I am absolutely done for and looking forward to a quiet week with nothing but, you know, normal work.
Editor’s note
During Baltic Ruby week I was again struggling quite a bit with my health but managed to get my talk done and enjoy Malmö. What a lovely city it is. I created the foundation for this track on saturday afternoon in my Friend’s apartment before moving out to a last night in a hotel in the old town and finished the track there after a long day in the sun exploring Malmö’s inner city, the palace gardens and the beach. THE BEACH!
Week 25
This is a hot, overcompressed, drowned in reverb and delay, quickly thrown together mess.
It’s a speedrun and I swear one of these weeks I will be able to spend more time on my weekly beats again, but this week wasn’t one of them. Nevertheless, a submission is a submission.
Editor’s note
The first week back after Malmö was challenging, so much to do still and also still a bit brittle, health wise. I kinda like the sound aesthetics of this, despite the overcompressed mess.
Week 26
Still made with relatively little time, but at least I took the time to properly record and edit a more complex lead improv. I did not play this in via a keyboard, though. Instead, when I recorded the adlibs, I just scatted along with the chords and then used “slice to MIDI” in Ableton to turn it into MIDI, it then took quite a bit of editing (I am not a good singer as can be heard in the end of the song, where I offer you a glimpse into the process).
I started this with a completely different set of chords and then had to go back to some preset chords of the latin variant to turn it around because it wasn’t working at all. Then I processed the beats a bit more and was reminded of the Underdog Remix of Risingson by Massive Attack. The switchup in that remix is obviously much more refined, but I liked the idea of going double tempo in the middle of the song.
Editor’s note
I’ve tried the approach of “singing in” the lead melody once before (for week 19) but there it did not work at all. I’m not sure if maybe my voiceover ruins a perfectly fine track, but I felt like doing it and the mic was open anyway for the melody so whatevers.
This marks 50% of the weeks done. I am incredibly happy and proud to have only missed two weeks out of 26 and in contrast to the last years I don’t feel particularly burnt out. I think reducing the effort down to a minimum in weeks where I had no time was crucial, but I also think that I got a lot faster at arranging and I have a lot less anxiety going into arrangement. Sometimes the results are a bit stereotypical but the way I see it, I learn a lot by doing stuff other people have done before and only when being good at that, I feel more comfortable to step outside and find my own aesthetics.
I wish my health would be a bit more stable, I wish I would find more time for making music, but I’m working on both, so let’s see what the second half of the year will bring!
