This is a little 30 second ditty I wrote with the book “The Lean Startup” in mind.  The super condensed version is that businesses must rapidly increase product development and their innovation cycle if they hope to survive in the modern market.  The book encourages quick releases of imperfect products, getting immediate customer feedback, and speedy revisions.  Speed trumps polish.

So the challenge was to crank out something catchy, quick, simple, and flexible.  Super thin texture, and little effects.  I shot for a 30 second loop with a 30 second ending variation to make it broadcast friendly and versatile.

So here it is.  Tuba & orchestral bells only with nothing but a small amount of EQ and reverb.  This is the ending version – the looped version is only a few tuba notes different.

I can’t neglect the Logos and idents.  They’re short, they’re simple, people need them, and they buy them.  This one is the last phrase of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.”  Only 5 seconds, and it uses piano, low strings, and a little pizzi on the last note.  Light reverb.  No complicated Mozart variation here.

The last one was pretty complicated, so I was in the mood for a short jingle.  This one makes a 32 second loop.

These are the instruments that I used for this song: a backscratcher, ceramic bowl, small air pump, “Trouble” board game, “Nerf” sword, couch, pewter goblet, marker, container of glitter, mailing tube, ping pong ball gun, and a rubber band.  Not pictured are three lamps and a softdrink.  I got thirsty.

I sampled everything with my Korg Triton, recorded it in ProTools, and juiced things up a little with effects chains. I called it “Game On” because the dice popper was the first sound I sampled. It worked as well as anything else I could think of.

I put together my own percussion loop and figured, why stop there?  So here’s what it sounds like….

I picked the kick drum out after auditioning about 50 different types, then used a high pass filter and compression on it.

The snare came faster, probably the 30th I listened to, and I decided it didn’t need any processing.

The high hat is actually made up of 3 different hat sounds, but I chopped them up, accidentally quantized them with the wrong groove injector, fixed it, and then went back to the screwed up version because I liked it better.  (BTW, isn’t it cool that such a thing as a “groove injector” exists?)

I auditioned about 3 dozen bass patches before I found the one I liked, then completely changed it by running it through a 4 band EQ, compressor, and decaying plate reverb.

The overdriven electric guitar actually comes from the synth;  sorry to disappoint.  Believe it or not, it’s actually a combination of 5 different patches, and includes a ton of effects processing that is also from the synth.  Can’t have the Mac do all the work.

The synth arpeggios were actually all recorded separately so I could make sure they were perfectly in sync with my percussion loop.  The track is 76 bpm, but the synth was running at 152, and I didn’t even bother attempting to do it live.  Better no arpeggio at all than a complicated one that is a fraction off.  Thankfully, ProTools lets you zoom in to the molecular level so you can line up that wave file right on the money.

I did play the high, detuned synth patch live.  It’s electronic and robotic sounding enough in itself, so I figured a little human feel wouldn’t hurt it too much.

So what do you do when you are trying to make looped audio, but have a bunch of soupy sounding effects sloshing around at the end of your track?  The beginning isn’t nearly as juicy;  in fact, the percussion, although processed, are dry as a bone when it comes to reverb.  If you start pouring reverb into your percussion tracks, it isn’t hip hop anymore.

I decided to clear mine out with a snare sample, drawn out, and reversed.  It makes a sound that’s the percussive equivalent of the “big bang” played in reverse.  Kind of like an instant of a black hole before the galaxy is reborn again on measure one beat one.  A sort of phunky phoenix with a 1:15 life cycle.

So that’s how much thought and effort goes into a 1:15 loop.  Maybe next time I’ll create my own samples from scratch so it can take even longer.

An obnoxious, 5 second long power chord clip for identification purposes.  You can use it to set off segments of an extreme sports podcast or something.  Not recommended for people using nail guns.

This is a mellow theme played on a piano.  It also includes bass, drums, and other subtle delightful warm sounds that imbue you with a sense of contentment and well-being.  Can you feel it?