Fun little nugget of trivia here: the song used in Really Big Sky and Big Sky Infinity for the hell cascade event (is one of mine but also) wasn’t originally composed for this purpose. Though it fits perfectly it was actually originally part of the soundtrack to a 2007 project of mine called The Cheese Factory Incident (a remake of a 2003 game of the same name for any interested) maybe one day i’ll actually make that game again but who knows.
it was for an ice level but came out a little too sinister. i’m just glad it found a home in a game which not only saw the light of day but was actually a bit of a runaway hit! huzzah for unused songs i say! i have a bunch more random bits and bobs in the bank made for projects that never happened.. so when i’m in a fix i can just reach for the nearest hard drive!
The game is out in europe today. US got it yesterday even though it’s (to my knowlege) an all british production team and such… but we get 12/12/12 so we win at number alliteration basically. go have a looksee at this pile of graphical eyeporn!
The cool thing about this release for me is that it’s for playstation 3 and playstation vita, a much larger audience than ever before for the likes of my silly music and vocal noises! yes like Really Big Sky i provided all the annoying narration parts and maybe half of all the songs you’ll hear.
Recording the voiceovers was fun… the nice chaps at ripstone dragged me across the length of the country to their fair city to stand in a vocal recording booth for the day and call them a tit in a variety of tones. that was a very strange day actually, i had little to no sleep the prvious night so i was working in a haze. you’d be surprised how often that seems to help. a certain unhinged defocussed feel which helped me not to over think things. also powerful radioactive strength coffee helps. There exists a huuuuuge amount of outtakes too. or at least i hope they kept them. i know i messed up the lines enough times. i just couldnt stop saying “flip the drill around” instead of “engage the drill”!
The lines were always utterly silly and where possible a quote or referance to something that myself or james (James Whitehead, bossbaddie boss man) are into. so lots of british comedy referances, some running gags, some futurama referances and some things that i would just say in real life. back in the Really big sky days i’d say most of the narration script was written by me but as time went on it grew from both of us. When it came to Big sky infinity james wrote a whole load of new lines to correspond to the huge amount of new features which i hadn’t seen yet and so couldnt comment on… also some terrible puns may have found their way in.
The way i found myself in this role is pretty odd really, i’m a musician. i’m not a voice actor. but we needed something to add some extra flavour to Really big sky and i had recently bought myself a half way decent microphone. we just put it in for a laugh but it worked. it was really a case of me saying what i would say if i was the annoying friend watching you play over your shoulder… over time it got more and more exadurated but still based on myself. i guess the moral of the story is don’t play a game if i’m sitting behind you because i’ll likely call you a tit when you die.
In other news i’m releasing a new bandcamp albumoid soon, it’s only 25 minutes long but i cant sit on it any longer, it’s making my bum hurt.
…a portfAUDIO if you will (and i will) i’ve been meaning to put one together for ages now. in fact i had one ready. there is now a page on this here site go look you buggers.
So things have been a little quiet round these parts of late. They have, don’t look at me like that. I’ve been busy and lazy in fairly equal measure… it’s important to find a ballance in life i feel.
Big Sky Infinity is happening and i’m recording the voiceover parts for that around now. I also made a new song for it just to see if i still could and because mister James always said he could find a home for more chiptunes! i have no idea when that will be done and dusted but i expect it won’t take all THAT long. obviously i’ll mention/link/whatevoir it here because i’m proud of my work with bossbaddie. ummmmm.
A few months ago i told mister David Brain of Ornsack ‘fame’ he can gut my albums/EPs/downloads/whaturvurr for music as he needs…. first come first serve, he came first i served. You may have noticed the introductiory riff to TGFO has been adopted as their ident tune.. all dine and fandy. BUT (and mine is a capital but) i’m always open to spreading my music whore-ing further. If anyone wants some… i’ll make some! simp-hole.
My live band is taking shape… in fact we’re ready to kick bottom. Only trouble is we still havent found a drummer who’s stuck with us.. (or indeed who we’ve stuck with) theres always something. either we’re too weird for them or they love us but are too far away… etc.
finally for now. since this IS a blog… here’s what i had for breakfast today:
this new release o’ mine (which includes the cat fight track) will be out very soon. i’ve been having massive audio problems which have been keeping me from finishing the last song on the ep but it all SEEMS to be working now. other thing to consider is i’m waiting on album art too which i’m trying to squeeze out of a very busy, stressed man with a cold.
it’s called Human Sense Common Problem and it’s tracklist goes thusly:
1 intro thing (silly noises and such)
2 your noodles ma’am (a subdued guitar wank)
3 TGFO (an actual song ish)
4 i fought a cat and the cat won (full version of the cat fight track)
5 ninja versus vampire (i’m ashamed of it but the guitar solo is fun)
oh for any wondering why i’ve been having problems: i upgraded to windows 7 the other day (after procrastinating and lollygagging OS-wise for ages) so you know.. teething problems and all that lark.
i’m not a very good band leader. i’m just not naturally that sort of a person. i dont like singing and i dont enjoy ordering my peers around. BUT I MUST. this is really an ability i need to work on. i’m so used to just playing on my own that now the full wall of sound provided by a full band at full volume seems overwhelming. i need to keep track of the noises i’m making to make sure they’re right. this is all stuff that one needs to get the hang of and i will. i just havent nailed it yet.
anyway in actual news i have an EP on the way (to bandcamp) very soon. just need to do the vocals for one track on there. its going to be pay-what-you-want with no minimum. 5 tracks, 2 actual decent ones. (plus secret bonus stuff)
oh and that song i did for a comedic youtube video, as far as i’m aware thats still on the way although already about a month overdue. still the person(s) responsible for that have done lots of brilliant stuff in the past so i dont doubt they’ll get it done one day. oh and the track for this video… yeah its on the EP too. because why not.
ayarrnd finally. i’ve been getting into this sort of thing lately. you may or may not spot the influences of those sorts of noises sneaking their way into more of my music in future. who knows!
i dont feel the slightest bit festive but thats no reason not to say merry christmas to the internet now is it.
couple of little things on the way, one is music for someone’s super cool video which should be released very soon and the other is another EP because i feel the need for such things to happen. 2012 should hold plenty for me… the live band and at least 1 more album. keep an eye out and stuff.
Jadies and lentilmen here’s my album. The one i’ve been working on since april 2010, yes! free to stream, pay-what-you-want to download. you can’t say fairer than that.
There’s oh so many things on their way from me in the very near future. The game bossbaddie are working on is going to be released in the next weekish or so (proper details on that will be here when it happens) to which i contributed 4 tracks, all the narration and a whole load of time testing. I have what i arrogantly insist on referring to as a free EP ready, finished and raring for release. All it needs is the final version of the artwork which can’t be done until above game is released as it’s the same (very busy) person doing both! i also have 2/3 of a full album done which will most likely be released on the iTunes later this year. but thats perhaps a little way off still.
the only thing more frustrating than not getting things done is getting things done and realising you have to wait on other people to find a spare moment to help!
Anyway yeah this EP type thing is going to contain 5 tracks (possibly 6 depending on a whole turd-load of variables) Theme from Scblerge, Ode to eyelid spasms, Knees done, the meat song (2008 OR 2011 version), copperoxide and possibly my insulting song about windows which i’ve been sitting on for months trying to arrange a video for. Anyway I expect the music section here will have to be updated to accommodate this.
This week has been a hectic one so far, lots of traveling and rapid completion of musics i’ve been working on for ages. but i’ll be able to relax soon… in fact i’m off to the pub in a bit to do just that.
i have a few things basically finished but since my audio has decided it doesn’t want to work properly any more i’m reinstalling windows.. this however involves backing up 300 gigs of documents and projects onto an old somewhat iffy 300 gig hard drive which i don’t entirely trust .. if i suddenly stop releasing new songs for a while and go temporarily insane i think it’ll be safe to assume the drive died with my stuff on it.
