(Single) Album Release and Full Coming

I know, I rarely update my blog any more, but I am not gone. If you haven't kept up with my Soundcloud or Facebook I got a lot going on right now.

I just release "Starry Nights & Bright Skies (Single)" album out on Bandcamp and soon will be available on CDbaby, amazon MP3, iTunes, and many other digital distribution sites!
But if you MUST have it now, then I suggest going to Bandcamp to make the purchase. All purchases are greatly appreciated! They put a smile on my face, so let's all buy a copy today!

With that said, the question remains "When is the release of your full album?"
Well, my computer has been wiped clean for hardware updates (fried mobo then a OS update) and unfortunately has caused me to lose a lot of the resources that were used to make some of my first songs. But here is the thing; those are kid songs compared to the work I do now. 50% of them require tons of remastering to their mix and production. No, instead, I am keep some of my favorite songs on the setlist for the album, but a lot of the songs will be replaced.
Airborne is the first of them to be replaced. For the sake of this song, it's more of a "re-imagining" of the song rather than a whole new song altogether. It will still have that familiar arpeggiating melody, but this time around I'm throwing a little four on the floor.

I'll try to keep you guys up to date as this album gets closer to being finished.

Until then;
Mr. Flyte

New Post, New Music (Troubles With Mixcraft)

It's been awhile since I did an update here on my blog, but I feel like I should.
For those who aren't in the loop, I have since upgraded my DAW from version 5 to the brand new Version 6, but with that came a lot of bugs. I shortly contacted Acoustica about these problems and it has been an ongoing conversation between me and them for about 2 weeks now. I figured I would use my blogspot here to share the entire conversation, because if anyone has ever done customer service/support right, it's Acoustica.

Hello,
Thank you for choosing our software! The next time you run into the virtual instrument problem, quit Mixcraft and send us your mixcraft-log.txt file. The log file is in this folder:
%appdata%\Acoustica\Mixcraft\
Another way to find it is to click on the Windows Start Menu, select All Programs, then Acoustica Mixcraft 6 (or 5) and finally Logs. That will pop up the folder with the mixcraft-log.txt file. Attach it to your email reply.

Best Regards,

Greg
Acoustica Support
http://www.acoustica.com/

I went ahead and attached the Crash text file as well. Not sure if that would help any more than the log but doesn't hurt to send it.

Thank you.

Hi,
Thank you for sending in those log files. We'll have a new build today or early next week. Please install that when it comes out and let us know how it works for you.
Best Regards,

Greg

Thanks for the kind help! Always have appreciated your customer support. 

Something I should mention is that I was loading a project file I was in the midst of working on during MX5, and when I got the upgrade I decided to load the MX5 project in MX6. I don't know if there is a compatibility issue there or not. I am certain you guys made sure older projects were compatible in the new version but maybe something got overlooked.

The whole project runs kind of funny, and - again - I don't know if this is because the project is an MX5 project file, but even just doing play back it seems to have a moments hesitation before playing back.

But, thank you again (and I probably can't say it enough times) for helping me out!

Hi Nolan,
We don't know of any compatibility problems with Mixcraft 5 projects. What happens if you start a project from scratch in Mixcraft 6? Do you have the same problems?
Best Regards,

Greg

I loaded another unfinished project in Mixcraft 6 and it so far has been stable except one instance where it crashed, but that was partly my fault for overloading things.

In this project I am using a lot less stuff, from VI instruments and plugins to less audio tracks as well.

Additionally, the playback hesitation seems to be gone as well. Perhaps the problems I experienced on the other project were related to my CPU? But that doesn't seem right since Mixcraft 5 was able to run the other project without any trouble.

Thanks again

Nolan

Hi,
Huh, it's hard to say. We'll have a new build of Mixcraft 6 soon, so you can try that. It has some minor bug fixes.
If you've got a Mixcraft 5 project that definitely causes problems in Mixcraft 6, you can send it to us.
Best Regards,

Greg

It mostly seems to happen with that one project. I loaded up a project (and I think I said this already, so forgive me, I'm a bit tired right now) that had only maybe an hours worth of work done on it - and that work was done in MX5 - and loaded into MX6 and it seems to run clean and smooth no problem. In fact, I think the trouble comes from that one VSTi instrument I was using. I haven't tested this yet, but I bet if I mute the tracks using it, the project will run smooth.

I am upgrading my machine here soon to hopefully maximize it's performance. Just bought a quad core processor (unfortunately my motherboard doesn't support it's mhz so I will have to wait until I get a new mobo to see if a new processor fixes some of the problems)

As of right now I am using an Intel Core 2 Duo at 1.8Ghz with 3 gigs of RAM on Windows 7 32 bit.

I attached the MX5 project from when it was worked on in JUST MX5 and the modified version that I did work on in MX6 (for comparison's sake)

Thanks for the continued support!

Nolan

Hi,

We have some fixes for plugin problems in the beta version. You can try it if you want, it's build 183:
http://www.acoustica.com/beta/mixcraft.htm
There will be at least one more build after that, because we've found things to fix in 183.
Best Regards,

Greg

Thanks, I really appreciate the beta testing, unfortunately I think the new build just made mixcraft even more unstable.

Upon loading the project that worked fine in Mixcraft 6 (and originated in MX5) it crashes immediately, telling me 3 plugins crashed, one of them is Voxengo Spectrum Analyzer which comes with Mixcraft! Then one of them is a freeware plugin which has given me no stability problems in the past (part of the reaper plugin series, it was ReaEQ) and the last plugin is my $150 commercial reverb plugin...

New crash and data log have been attached.

For the other project that initially caused me to open this ticket, it still seems to suffer the same stability issues, which is quite weird because that project uses ReaEQ, Redline Reverb, and Voxengo Spectrum Analyzer too, but none of those seemed to crash on load.

So, on that note, any quick ways of restoring Mixcraft before the patch?

Hi,

I'm sorry, but it turns out that build 183 had some problems with its sound engine. Please try build 184:
http://www.acoustica.com/beta/mixcraft.htm
That should definitely improve things. If it doesn't work out, you can always go back to build 180 by uninstalling the new version and then installing 180 again. Please let us know what happens.
Best Regards,

Greg

Hmmmm, still not quite there.

I am still experiencing the problem with the second project where it tells me 3 plugins crashed right on start up, while the first project seems to continue to remain the same. It does open, but later tells me one of my plugins crashed.

---

Upon taking another look in mixcraft, when I loaded the project Mixcraft stayed open, it just informed me the plugins crashed. I found 2 of the 3 plugins crashed on a submix track, one of them I was able to reactivate while the other would continue to tell me it had crashed every time I tried activating it. The third plugin was on the master bus (the spectrum analyzer) and I was able to reactivate it without Mixcraft having any problems.

To resolve the issue I was having with the second plugin, I removed, then re-added it to the project with no problem.

I saved Mixcraft, closed it out and reopened and it still presents me with the same problem where the 3 projects crash on start, but I do seem to be able to reactivate all of them without any troubles.

However, on playback, it tells me that the same plugin that was giving me troubles when trying to reactivate it crashed and does what ti did before I saved and closed out.

Hope you guys get this resolved soon, but thanks for the continued support - as usual.

Nolan

Hi, what are the 3 plugins that have the issue?
Sincerely,

Eric

Did Greg get tired of trying to help me?

The 3 plugins are

ReaEQ (part of the Reaper plugin series) http://www.reaper.fm/reaplugs/

112 dB's Redline Reverb http://112db.com/redline/reverb/

Voxengo Spectrum Analyzer

It's odd that the spectrum analyzer crashes because that one comes with Mixcraft!

Hi, no Greg doesn't work on weekends, just me :-)
The reaper plugins might be 54 bit, that would cause an issue. Do you know if you installed the 32 or 64 bit version of reaper?
Sincerely,

Eric

Well the ReaPlugs that were installed (not reaper the daw) worked perfectly on MX5, and they worked just fine on the mx6 180 build add well. it wasn't until I tried the beta for 183 and 184 that the ReaPlugs that they stopped working and only on certain protects. Additionally it want until the bets builds that the other two plugins started messing up add well.

Sent from my Samsung Epic™ 4G Touch

Oh ok, well that scratches the 64 bit theory then.
I will have one of the developers look at the log file you sent, see if they can tell us anything.
Sincerely,

Eric

Thank you very much. I also sent two project files to be looked at. They originally prompted me to contact customer support in the first place. It started with a plugin called Super DrumFX that kept crashing after short use of Mixcraft 6, though in Mixcraft 5 it worked fine.
Let me know the result, and thank you for the continued support!
Nolan

Sent from my Samsung Epic™ 4G Touch

Hi, our developer looked at your log file and found that "Redline Reverb" is crashing, which is probably causing the other plugins to crash as well.
Can you remove that plugin and see how everything else runs?
I downloaded the demo of redline reverb, and noticed they ask for my version of windows, I chose windows 7, but not 64 bit. Is it possible you downloaded a 64 bit version of that plugin?
It runs fine here for me.
Sincerely,

Eric

Well, I mean it could be possible be cause I didn't pay that much attention when I downloaded it, but worked perfect pollen MX5 and the 180 build.
When I get home I'll try removing it, but do hope this will not be a permanent solution because its a $150 plugin and one of my favorites to use.
Thanks
Nolan!

Sent from my Samsung Epic™ 4G Touch

--later--

I went ahead and pulled Redline Reverb out of my plugin folder and it still told me ReaEQ and Voxengo Spectrum Analyzer crashed.

I mean, I am no software programmer, so my understanding may be limited and my suggestion may be unwanted, but wouldn't it be ideal to look at MX5 against MX6 to see why version 5 would run the plugins no problem, but version 6 won't?

Thanks,

Hi Nolan,
If you remove ReaEQ also, does the problem go away? If not, send us the mixcraft-log.txt file again.
What kind of audio files are you working with? Are they wav files with a sample rate of 44100 Hz or something else?

Best Regards,

Greg

Okay, my project that was mostly written in version 6 seems to load up just fine (didn't test it during multiple play back, just 1 playback to make sure it worked)

however the project I had started before version 6 and got most the way through still has the same problem that prompted me to contact you guys in the first place:

Super Drum FX's continues to crash after I use playback a couple of times.

I tried seeing if updating the plugins fixed the problem, but sadly, no.

Thanks,

Hi,

That log file was from build 184. Be sure to get build 185:
http://www.acoustica.com/mixcraft/download.htm
Did you see what it said about removing old files from SuperdrumFX before you upgraded?
http://www.superdrumfx.com/index.php?site=download

Best Regards,

Greg

Okay, I tested a few things this time around.

The main thing I tried different was writing a new project file (of course) so I don't ruin what I have already, then remove the ReaEQ plugin from the submix track - which was the one that kept crashing. All other ReaEQ's in the project seemed to work just fine.

Before doing this, I patched to 185 and tested it straight like that. See attached picture.

Nothing changed.

So, that's when I decided to see what happens when I remove the one instance of ReaEQ on the submix track. Saved, closed out, opened the test project, was greeted with the "Voxengo Spectrum Analyzer has crashed, blah blah blah" text, but I turned it back and, gave it a few play backs and everything seems to operate fine.

In my (humble) opinion, take it for what it is since I am not a software programmer, I think there may be some sort of conflict with not only the submix but also the instance of ReaEQ was being automated, and I believe its also the automation that helped cause the crash. But, this is just my guess.

Moving on to the other project, I gave it a few play throughs and it never said anything about SDFX crashing, but I feel like it wants to. I'll continue to keep an eye on that, but otherwise, THAT problem has been solved.

**And this is where we are at at present.

And now you know the story. You also know that my phone's autocorrect sucks...

FlyteCast 03/25/12 And More!

This is being posted a couple of days after it's release, I do apologize about that. But the new FlyteCast is up and ready for the ears of my fans and boy is it a good one!
There's a story on how it almost didn't get released, but I will come back to that in just a second.

The youtube video for it will be up soon-ish too. I am a little behind on those, I still need to take care of the last podcast's youtube video, so that will come first before this one.
But, let's move on to the story.
I received barely any responses from any of the artists I wanted to feature, so I would up having to re-include a couple of my favorite artists - which I wanted to do eventually anyways, I just didn't think it would be so soon.
However, when I thought I had everything under control, XY Glitch backed down last minute because I was telling him his song needed some work. Actually, it was really frustrating that he would do this since it was the day before the release and as my podcast was at the time, it was BARELY going to have enough artists in it as is, if I had lost one of those songs, there would have been no way I could have released the podcast.
Well, he had given me a rough draft of the song prior. The problem was that the lead synthesizer was way too in-your-face. It was loud! There were some other mixing problems but nothing as bad as that, so all I was asking was for him to do was at the least drop the lead's volume, but he got frustrated, and I know I am making him sound kind of like a whiny person in this blogpost, but trust me, he is a good guy. He just needs a push. He's been a bit down.

Anyways, I took it upon myself to try and master the song in the completed final mix. I used some really rough techniques to do the job, but basically in the podcast XY Glitch's song is playing twice in layers - kind of like in photoshop. One has been specificaly produced to cut out most of what is going on around that lead sound. I couldn't cut everything out, but I did my best. Then of course with a couple more effects I was able to fix it. The on the second "layer" I cut out that lead sound in it's mix (again very roughly) using a couple of tools and mixing the two together. problem was, the way I had to cut sounds out created valley's in it music frequency range, so to fill them in I actually had to re-create the lead sound (and it's not spot-on perfect, so it more became an element layered underneath the lead) to help fill those gaps in. Then finally to top it off, buried the rest of the ugliness under a new drum track. This was not that easy to do, but I am glad the end result isn't that awful.

Anyways, no telling when I will have new music up, but cross your fingers it is soon.

Mr. Flyte

FlyteCast for 3/10/12

I got to feature some cool artists for this week's podcast!
I have to say though, I am disappointed in myself when it came to mixing this podcast. See, all these songs gave me a lot of difficulty when it came to mixing them...mostly the transitioning from one song to another.
I was also particularly lazy and rather than breaking out all these tools to do super-smooth transitions, I just kind of did what I could with a few basic tools, so it all in all sounds a little "rough cut" on a couple of the transitions.

Also, I didn't know that I would be working Saturdays, but I will be, so I think I will be releasing FlyteCast on Sunday's from now on. So, if that is the case, unless I write a new song between now and then, then I will see you guys on Sunday.

Mr. Flyte

FlyteCast Is Back!

Yep, finally I got my premium subscription to soundcloud back up and I was able to do the first FlyteCast Radio podcast since it had to be shut down back in April of '11.
The format of it was changed up to save some time, so you get more time jamming and less time of listening to me ramble on about unimportant stuff. Also, it has been set up, somewhat, like a DJ setlist. The first song is an opening song and is set to it's own tempo, then I talk shortly, then the "body" of the podcast is tempo-synced songs (in this podcast they were synced at 130 BPM) and played without a break, then I talk some more and have a closing setlist which is set at a different tempo (this time it was 126)

You can listen to it here

There are 2 Mr. Flyte songs played in this one, one of those songs were not posted here on the blog. That song I released last night and is a minimal techno song that I put tons of work into. There is a story to it as well, but I will spare you the boring story and just mention: It was suppose to have lyrics in it but because I couldn't get permission the final version was released without the lyrics. The podcast version of my song (shhh, this is a secret) contains SOME of the lyric-effects I did that was in the original song, but all "clear and understood" vocals were still left out.
You can listen to that here

Thanks, friends!
Mr. Flyte

A Dash of Russia

Well it had been nearly a month since I last released any new content...well aside from a few joke-songs and updates and all that. Of course, it has been a mess trying to get new content up! I worked on two songs that didn't get released, both with their own separate complications.
Finally, I said, screw it! And went ahead and did something easy and short. I give you, Korobeiniki!

Melody sounds familiar, huh?
Well Korobeiniki (or in english: Peddler) is a Russian Folk song. But, if you grew up in America, or really, around the Gameboy version of Tetris, you'll be more familiar with this song as "Type A".

Really, I wasn't too happy with the song, and apparently a few people have spoken about it and feel the same. But that's not to say you don't like a little chip tuning, four-on-the-floor and some other hard tarncy stuff, so here it is for your listening pleasure.

Mr. Flyte

Jazz and Darnce

Well it certainly has been awhile since I dropped an update here. Don't worry, you haven't missed much...well except for 3 songs and a fourth that has been in the works for about a month.
I am here today to talk about the release of my 2 newest songs which were both released today!
One of them you guys might be familiar with for my older readers. About a year ago I had recorded a monologue and asked fellow musicians to make it musical as a contest.

Runner up, Gamma-UT, helped me out with writing my own musical score for the monologue and the product was Cigarettes & Scotch.
Of course, it has been a year since the release of the original monologue and I had decided to go back and really do some major house cleaning on it. De-essed the song, cleaned up the frequencies, and added tons of nasty, dripping wet reverb.
Here is the product:
Cigarettes & Scotch Remastered

But as an added bonus, since it had been a little while since I had a new content release, I decided I would do something new...go back to my roots of EDM music and make a very hard tarncy remix of the song. I hope you guys love it!
Cigarettes & Scotch (Black N' Mild Remix)

Thank you friends for listening!
Flyte