2021
Other
2020
reset
The first song in 19 tone equal temperament (19-TET), also known as 19 equal divisions of the octave (19-EDO), with many more to follow.
Honestly, the production of this song was somewhat “mythical” because it was the crazy idea I’d had for years, to build up all the “infrastructure” of 19 tone songs and then have a song called Reset be the first one. In order to make even the first full production song, I needed a guitar customized with a 19-EDO fretboard - which apparently is an extremely weird request when talking to even custom guitar shops and such… only a few people seem to really offer this, as either new or modified guitars - then do the same for bass, then figure out how to reprogram or otherwise mess around with all my software that handles piano and strings and everything… oh, and while I’m at it, figure out what on earth to do in terms of songwriting. In a sense it is a rediscovery of the initial thrill of figuring out how music works for the first time.
However, this first song itself doesn’t actually have that much significance - in fact I intentionally chose one of the “easy to listen to” songs and deliberately avoided even saying anything about the tuning so this could be a sort of experiment in whether it sounds normal or repulsive. After all, one of the main goals in these songs is to simply make music rather than to try and get all avant-garde like microtonal musicians sometimes do.
That said, if you do want to get into all the musical/mathematical details: this song has plenty of thirds, and I think they sound great. The meaning of a “third” in 12 tone equal temperament, as I define it (meaning ignoring the actual descriptions typically used in music theory) is to play notes that are either 3 or 4 notes apart. In 19 tone equal temperament, though, a “third” comes about when you play notes that are either 5 or 6 notes apart. (The meaning of “notes apart” is different) The frequency ratios between the two notes in the resulting chords are:
For 12-EDO: “Minor third” = 2^(3/12) ~ 1.1892. “Major third” = 2^(4/12) ~ 1.2599.
For 19-EDO: “Minor third” = 2^(5/19) ~ 1.2001. “Major third” = 2^(6/19) ~ 1.2447.
Obviously there are no true rules about what makes something sound “good.” But there are musical benefits to playing chords that fit into the harmonic series well, which means multiple notes in a chord approximating frequency ratios between whole numbers. (For example, the ratio between C and G is extremely close to 3/2). And unfortunately for 12-TET instruments, even though fifths (like C and G) are good, the thirds are often “off”: the ratios between the two notes is not very close to an integer ratio.
For 12-EDO: “Minor third” error from 6/5: .0108. “Major third” error from 5/4: 0.0099
For 19-EDO: “Minor third” error from 6/5: .0001. “Major third” error from 5/4: 0.0053
So while they might take some getting used to at first, the thirds from 19-TET just sort of “click” better.
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taste of life
In my defense, when I wrote about feeling the sun, it was springtime. It just took until the end of November to actually finish and release the song.
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tear it down
To some, 2020 was a year of putting everything on hold, of isolation and loss of inspiration. To others, it provided fresh opportunities to finally work on projects kicking around in the back of their heads. To Iron Krill, it made absolutely no difference whatsoever.
The overall plan, with or without a pandemic, was to recover from Treatment and experiment with 19-EDO music (more on that later), in preparation for what would eventually be Iron Krill’s next album “Recovery” entirely in 19-EDO. As a bonus though, on the side, I’d perhaps make a couple more 12-EDO songs - and just go ahead and finish/release them as “singles” since they won’t appear on another full-length album for years… the next one after Recovery. Rather than waiting years before releasing another song, like I’m so used to doing, I figured it was time to finally just release “singles” now and then.
The first of these, “Tear It Down”, jokingly took musical inspiration from “Reach Out” (one possible title was “Reach In” but that didn’t pan out) and I think it worked out pretty well because the songwriting backbone is in just sort of following a groove rather than trying too hard to be complicated or interesting. After all, with the solid groove in place, the complications can be added into it and it sounds more natural anyways. So maybe this shouldn’t be so groundbreaking but to me I feel like it is.
Lyrically, this song is a lot more serious, or should I say, sincere than most others I’ve written. It actually pertains to real issues instead of hiding behind dozens of layers of metaphors or deliberately vague language. Here is the post I wrote along with it:
A few months back, I posted a rambling and mostly nonsensical post that tangentially made reference to racial inequality but didn't have much of a conclusion other than that it was a good idea to click on a link. While it made perfect sense to me at the time - basically, "go here instead of listening to me and other people like me talk to themselves about themselves" - it was not the end of that particular train of thought. No, that train of thought just wouldn't stop. Eventually it found itself deep into the farthest depths of the Southern Ocean, the home of the Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba).
Two seemingly contradictory thoughts were at war within me. One is that it is disingenuous or self-serving to give some big speech about racism as though it's something I've got all figured out and should therefore be considered blameless. The other is that it's also wrong to avoid the issue just because I don't have it all figured out.
There's no simple answer; the balancing act between the two is a legitimate "stance". We should always be seeking to understand things better, and we should also always be seeking to fight injustice better. The point is just not to hide behind either one as an excuse. Being continually reminded of As I Lay Dying's lyrics "... trying to complicate everything that I believe so that while paralyzed in thought I will always have an alibi... delaying true progress with passivity," I figured I had to make a song about it.
This song isn't the solution, and I know I don't exactly have a fan base either, but with any luck, it'll help just one person think about it as a deeper issue, worthy of more thought than a hashtag or a black square.
For those who prefer goose-based or smart car-themed lyrics, though, stay put, I'll get to some more of those too.
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error
Experiment with Pearl, covering a song “outside my genre” to see how much more we can potentially collaborate in the future…?
Más Allá Del Sol / La Mañana Gloriosa
As the next in my series of trying to mess with my dad and/or get on the radio in Guatemala, I made a metal cover of this song by Steve Green. This goal was met on 06/26/2020 when it appeared twice on Radio Cultural TGN.
Noise
I’ve been fascinated by symphonic metal for quite a long time, but typically I take metalcore and make it “more symphonic” to create my preferred blend between the two genres. Here I mixed things up by just trying to imagine how it would have turned out if Nightwish were a metalcore band. It was also great finally having Gavin in a video.
Majorspeaker
Does this really merit an entire “entry” in this archive? That is debatable.
I spearheaded an April Fool’s joke with Tragedy By Design where I switched our single Oathspeaker to be in a major key. The end product was produced to the same extent as my real songs and I did all the rearranging/recording/etc. myself so it oddly enough remains one of my signature contributions to the band even though it just appeared in a Facebook post and that was it.