Marsocalypse / Steemit Music League Challenge Week #10 / Alien Invasion
Merry Christmas Steemians, friends, followers and future friends and followers.
Here goes my entry for the Steemit Music League Challenge Week #10 . The theme was Alien Invasion.
I created this one with sampling chunks out of the Mars, the Bringer of War sequel from The Planets Op. 32 composed by Gustav Holst from 1914 to 1916. I did my MIDI work as usual here and there, but the main theme is from Mars, the bringer of War.
Gustav Holst was an extraordinary composer and one of my favorites among Debussy, Messiaen, Rachmaninoff, and Ravel. This are all the compositions included on the Planets Op.32
(1914-16) The Planets Op. 32
- Mars, the Bringer of War
- Venus, the Bringer of Peace
- Mercury, the Winged Messenger
- Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity
- Saturn, the Bringer of Old Age
- Uranus, the Magician
- Neptune, the Mystic
Gustav Holst seemed to consider The Planets a progression of life. "Mars" perhaps serves as a rocky and tormenting beginning. In fact, some have called this movement the most devastaing piece of music ever written!
The Planets was first performed in a private concert in 1918 with Adrian Boult conducting as a gift from Henry Balfour Gardiner, who was also responsible for the premieres of Holst's Two Eastern Pictures and The Cloud Messenger. The first complete performance of the piece was under Albert Coates in Queen's Hall in 1920.
Holst never wrote another piece like The Planets again. He hated its popularity. When people would ask for his autograph, he gave them a typed sheet of paper that stated that he didn't give out autographs. How ironic that the piece that made his name famous throughout the world brought him the least joy in the end.
Here is a excerpt from wikipedia, I'm sure the ones that are interested about this extraordinary man can research the rest.
Gustav Theodore Holst (born Gustavus Theodore von Holst ; 21 September 1874 – 25 May 1934) was an English composer, arranger and teacher. Best known for his orchestral suite The Planets, he composed a large number of other works across a range of genres, although none achieved comparable success. His distinctive compositional style was the product of many influences, Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss being most crucial early in his development. The subsequent inspiration of the English folksong revival of the early 20th century, and the example of such rising modern composers as Maurice Ravel, led Holst to develop and refine an individual style.
I hope Ya'll have a great Holidays season and wish you all the best. ☺ Lets beat it. (;
Marsocalypse
Thanks for stopping by.
yes some class up in here. some original goodness as well!
Hey ...you know how I roll @hilladigahackles (; Thanks for stopping by pal, and glad you liked the content. ☺
Wow wow wwwwwwww so much epicness in this entry.
Such incredible knowledge you shared about Gustav Holst. I learned so much about him from your post and now have a new sense of appreciation/perspective of the planets :)
And holy smokes this beat drives such emotion and sounds incredible in my opinion. You use the first 22 seconds to hit us with a flurry of sounds ultimately setting the tone for us. That Mars, bringer of war, theme you chose with this one you most definitely succeeded. I feel like this beat could beat the war song of Mars .
And love those spacey sounds you bring in around 1:52 and at 2:53 o weee. And the sound quality on this one makes me smile. You can hear the dimensions of the sounds so clearly makes my ears so happy.
Appreciate all the time and effort you put into this entry. I learned so much and really enjoyed the masterpiece you created.
Much love God bless
Yeah Mr. Holst was an extraordinary composer and very humbled and shy man, glad you could learn something about him. (:
The intro is kind of cartoon~ish and then it gets serious all of a sudden, wasn't easy setting the proper tone for the next bar and I'm glad it worked well. The Mars, bringer of war composition is really up front and marching, really unique vibe of the composition that is everything but conventional. You should manage to hear all the sequels from the Planets Op.32, it's like watching a sci - fi show with all the emotions involved. I actually feel like it is the Mars composition per se and i'm glad I could do it justice with the sounds I added onto it.
Yeah the spacey sounds I bring would be nothing without the plugins I own, glad it can be heard. ☺
No problem Chief, your appreciation is being appreciated and i'm really happy you enjoyed this piece as well. (:
God is Love. ☺
Amennnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn :))
Thank you for these additional insights it really helps me learn and understand more every day. Appreciate you dialing me in with your knowledge and insights.
Much love and respect.
Your friend,
Paul :)
You are pretty welcome my friend. Have a great one. ☺
You're killing me dude. This is dope! The image is like a video for the song. Good stuff!
It's scary ain't it? :D It's like a surreal new perspective of sci fi~ism huh? ☺Glad you dig it homie, you know I owe you my presence on here. Thanks for encouraging me. ☺
Congrats my friend, on another fine entry. I dig the intro, and epic beat throughout, and the spacey sounds added into the mix. ;-)
Thanks @inthenow glad you dig it. (;
Great art and great thinking god bless u wish you have a successfull life dear
Thank you @mohammadsaleh and wish you all the best in your life too. ☺
Though of the artist is actually known as art. Your art is the best
Why thank you @aliakbar2 I very much appreciate that. ☺
Wow thats beauty, your posts are interesting.
Thanks a lot. ☺ Glad you enjoying my posts @asgharali
@beatseb listen man, Marsocalypse I really dig 😀 you are playing dirty, this are the kind of tracks that are played on repeat and get under you skin, good game sir, good game indeed 🤞 keep it up
Also it would be great if you share some insight on the tools you used in the production, you really cleared up this track good compared with the last one, I think it be cool we all share this knowledge on Steemit so we grow together, I know there is tons of info online, but it's different when you hear it first hand, you get into that zone of how it was made.
This track man, makes you shake your head up and down haha, or think about the gangster slowmo cam
Oh wow thanks @ivan.atman really glad to hear a fellow producer digging my track, I appreciate it and glad it made you nod your head. ☺
Here are some insights of how I created it:
♦ The drum set is a HipHop kit I created years ago for the Battery 3 which I can also upload on Battery 4.
♦ The first synthesizer sound is from the Mini V3 from the Arturia V Collection 6.
♦ The second synthesizer sound towards the end is from the Prophet V3 from the Arturia V Collection 6.
♦ The Bass / Sub line is also from the Mini V3 from the Arturia V Collection 6. (Yeah I'm a big fan of Arturia products since day one)
♦ The sample add on sounds are from a sound package I own called "Cartoon sounds".
♦ The mastering plug ins I used was the Ozone 7 bundle.
♦ It's all created and mastered on Steinberg Cubase Pro 9.5 on a PC.
When I create the MIDI sounds I always make sure the input peaks are bellow the 0 db in order to leave some space for the mastering to have a cleaner effect. After I arranged the whole track, I add Limiters or EQ's on some of the melody lines and also add the Ozone 7 to the master of the mixer, set to neutral.
Then I begin to mix. After I'm done mixing I'm setting the cycle on the loudest 8 bars of the track and press play. I start playing with the plug in on the master (Ozone) and set the EQ first, then the Dynamics, the Vintage Limiter or Maximizer and the most important tool for me in that bundle, the Imager.
I listen to the track couple of times while I tweak the knobs of the above mentioned tools, and at a desirable point I stop and save my work. The next day I open the so far mixed project, listen to it and start tweaking knobs again while meanwhile switching back and forth to headphones and active monitors. It's very important doing that in my opinion, it helps balancing the whole frequency into a friendly peak.
So the tracks that you heard from me that might be minimally fogged with disturbing frequencies, are the ones that I mixed and mastered in one day...that's a no go, but I did it anyways cause sometimes my time is limited and I have to hurry up to upload my entry for the Steemit challenges. ☺
I hope my explanation was an useful insight, and hope to hear some future tracks of yours created with the same principle. ♪ Have a good one. ☺
Cool @beatseb we are using a very similar approach 😃 very similar indeed
Below zero for the master, Ozone Dynamics, Vintage and Master, Battery for the beats 👍
Yes of course this was a useful insight and I think others will also agree.
Everything you mentioned I also use, only difference is that I use Massive synth and Ableton Live 9.5 instead, good thing you mentioned Ozone Imager, I actually overlooked this tool, I usually use Haas Effect that I make manually in Ableton, but I wanted to try Mono Stereo Imaging tools for some time but I just forgot, I actually noticed the space you have in this track that is felt in the mono also, so that be the Imager. I understand what you mean when you leave it and check it tomorrow, yeah yeah that feeling when you lose perception of the production and don't know are you making it better or worse hahaha 😄
keep this up with, see how I just learned about something I overlooked for some time, you never know and this is why its cool to hear this stuff
Yeah that's great you are using the same principle and you should consider studying your sound with the Imager, it's really a great tool to widen the spaces on each Chanel. Glad you could learn something new and hope I'll get inspired by one of your future tunes as well and ask you how you did it. ☺ Steem on.
SO cool man !!! Hip shuffle beat to a well-loved, nicely sliced-n-diced masterwork! Well done!
A few years back I took the kids to see The Planets performed by our local symphony, in front of a big screen for viewing photos from NASA, what a memorable experience! ... I've had the London Symphony conducted by André Previn in my vinyl collection for about 35 years now.
Woow. That's a blast Zig. I actually have that Performance on my bucket list...you and your kids sure got very lucky and privileged witnessing that performance. That's beyond amazing dude. You sure have an extraordinary vinyl collection having such a rare gem in it. Awesomazing. ☺