Studio maintenance

Yesterday, my father-in-law helped me out with soms equipment repairs. Because I am not really a technician myself.
There were a number of synthesizers with some minor issues.
From a couple of instruments he managed to solve the problems, but for example my Quasimidi Quasar still has some serious problems (a lot of noise through all outputs, as well as a yet undefined power supply issue), which definitely need some further inspection.
And there are still some other devices which should be revised, but for now most important equipment (including the part for my current live setup) is functioning again. So, back to work!

Archives 1

Tomorrow I will be present again with Deserted Island Music at the annual E-Day Festival in Theater De Enck Oirschot.

In first instance to sell my physical albums (I also have available some discounted products; just drop by if you are at the festival too), but also to promote my new digital download release "Archives 1", which will be released on this same day.

Here are details about the "Archives 1" release:

Since the early 90s, Remy registered an uncountable amount of compositions, improvisations, try-outs, sketches, studies and performances.
Remy always felt the need to release a lot of this material, but with such a huge variety of recordings, it was never possible to release everthing.
During the selection process for the released REMY-albums, a lot of music was rejected. Simply because these tracks didn't fit into the concept or feeling of the specific release.
A large amount of unfinished tracks, sketches, etc. will definitely never be released. And there also is enough stuff that is absolutely not good enough by means of technique and recording.
But through “Archives” there is this possibility to publish and share a lot of these recordings. Recordings that otherwise would never have seen the light.
Besides the fact that “Archives” offers music that could never be heard before, it gives the perfect insight into Remy's musical and artistic world, as well as it might also help to understand the direction Remy's music evolved into.
“Archives 1” contains material from 2004 until 2006.


Tracklist:
1. To The Sea (studio, 20-12-2005) 9'11
2. Sleep Music (improvisation, 1-7-2006) 15'00
3. Silent Hill (improvisation, 20-1-2004) 20'09
4. Turn Of The Tides (concert, 8-4-2006) 25'11

Here you can hear excerpts from each song:

"Archives 1" consists of mastered archives recordings and will be available as 320 kbps MP3 and 16 bit / 44,1 kHz FLAC. The accompanied artwork contains the necessary background information on each of the tracks, as well as some photos from the period of the specific music pieces.

The digital download only release "Archives 1" coincides with the launch of the renewed Deserted Island Music website/webshop: www.desertedislandmusic.nl.

Although there still have to be made some more adjustments, feel free to already let me know your opinion and experience with the site. Indeed as soon as it is online.

New music pc in the studio

Last week I picked up a new music pc.
My previous computer had been in my studio since 2007 (after having worked for years with my precious Atari ST), and after having done the maximum cpu and memory upgrades and having installed Windows 7, last year, this 'oldie' seemed to have more and more problems to run stable.
Within the last years I got more demanding concerning sound quality and useage of VST's, so I was asking more of the computer's cpu and memory.

Since a couple of weeks I already got some harddisc error-messages, and the rebooting seemed to be a problem more and more.
Recently I didn't manage to get the pc turned on anymore. When switching on the computer, only the fan started to rotate.
Although I did already plan to buy a new system somewhere later this year, I was really hoping for a replacement after the upcoming "Chill at the Castle - Electric Edition", for which I still have to do some production work. So it would have been really great if my workstation could have served me at least for another month.

My previous music-pc was built by i4-Muzique in Eindhoven, and because I was very satisfied, I also bought the new one from them this time. They customize rather silent computers, built in 19" units, so it fits perfectly into my studio rack. One of the advantages was that my old housing could just be re-used for the new system.

Within the coming days I hope to reinstall all software, connect all equipment, and get the new pc running again, so I can continue working on the last bits for the Free Arts Lab performance and collaboration with Wolfram Spyra, on June 27th.
After this I am already really looking forward to work on more upcoming planned projects with Gert Emmens, Synth.nl, C-Jay and Free Arts Lab, as well as on the continuation of a very long-running exciting project for which I finally might have some more time again. Hope to reveal some details about this soon.