Harper Lee RIP and Strange Happenings

I know it's been a while but I was very sad to just hear of Harper Lee's passing. A brilliant book I read at school in English lessons as you do and made into a classic film staring Gregory Peck. 

What was strange - while scanning through IMDB's list of top films earlier today I stopped at "To Kill A Mockingbird" and played the first few minutes, I then stopped it and went back to work. My thoughts at the time were, she's only written 2 books and those a life time apart, she must be getting on a bit now. Meaning she must be quite old.

This all before I knew she had passed... This is all probably some kind of ‪#‎weird‬ ‪#‎coincidence‬ but it makes you wonder how the mind really works and how much we understand of it.

Was it really by chance or have my eyes seen some snippet of the news somewhere reporting her death. My subconscious picking this up has registered it in a part of my brain that is only accessed in a different way. Subliminally making me choose the said film.

Maybe we pick up on things through other media, extra sensory perception perhaps, brain waves, radio waves, ghosts! Who knows? 

I'd like to think that there's much more to the human brain than meets the eye but I very much doubt it in my case. Made me think though. Food for thought and maybe for you too.

Thanks for stopping by and it won't be very long until the next post. 

Yeah! I can hear you say....

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Praise for my Album!

Here's my first review on Amazon for my new album, well chuffed with this!

Chris’s Picton’s latest album, Journey of Broken Dreams, is a mixture of new material and some spirited reworking of older songs from his Quecia days. But these aren’t just rehashed offerings, he’s obviously spent careful time in the studio to breathe new life into them.

The opening track, Awakening, does exactly what it says on the tin. An inspiring and powerful theme with some perfectly timed dynamic shifts in the overall tempo.

The title track is a pacey instrumental song with some solid guitar work over driving drums and haunting keyboard runs.

The Rhythm (a song from the criminally underrated Quecia II album) is led by Kirsty McCarrick’s beautiful and haunting vocals. Strong lyrics are perfectly matched to Chris’s solid instrumentals.

Don’t Stay Away’s delicate and evocative guitar work dictates a fine instrumental track that paints a picture of longing and melancholy that usually only meaningful, well-sung lyrics manage to do.

Calling Me Back has a lighter, jazzier feel with some funky overtones on guitar. There’s a very natural, unhurried flow to this track that never ceases to engage.

Road of Bones is another Kirsty Mc Carrick vocal over reworked instrumentals. Dignified sorrow and yearning suffuse this gentle and moving song.

Back Thru’ Time lightens the mood with a weaving interplay of guitar, drums and keyboards. Dynamically, the most adventurous song on the album. The changing moods and rhythm paint a journey through life’s ups and downs that is never maudling and ultimately sanguine.

Line in the Sand (another strong song from Quecia II) ends the album with more fine vocals from Kirsty McCarrick over Chris’s clever instrumentals.

This is another solid production from Chris that I’d wholeheartedly recommend to anyone interested in progressive/ambient/instrumental music made by a talented musician who writes with his head and his heart.

New Album - Journey Of Broken Dreams

I have just released my new album "Journey Of Broken Dreams".  
Again a predominately instrumental album, 8 tracks in total with 2 remixed songs from the old days and a previously unreleased track "Road of Bones" from around that time. 
Its taken me a couple of years (far too long) to put this album together having to work in fits and starts balancing "real life" with writing, recording and mixing, which is frustrating to say the least, but here we are again. 
I hope there's a slightly harder edge to this collection, but still hoping to keep the melodic progressive feel I am trying to achieve in my music. 
I've tried to use a lot of different instrumentation this time around, with mellotron sounds, acoustic guitars, flutes and my guitar synth, helping me be a little more expressive in some of the textures and solo's. 
Also a big thanks to my friend Sharon Coupe for letting me use the wonderful photograph for the cover. You can find her on Facebook for more great pictures. 
I hope you enjoy the album and it won't be as long until the next one! 
And finally a huge thanks to my family for keeping me going lately - Karen my wife and my sons Jamie, Josh and Lucas. (You don't have to listen to the mixes any more!)

Mastering Time - Part 2

I'm very close to finalizing the music on my new album. Of course I still have to decide on a title and get the artwork done but that's another story. The final part of mastering for me is to create a montage of all the tracks, which I do in Steinberg's Wavelab software. Basically the single audio files are dropped into the Montage workspace (as opposed to the Track Editing workspace) in a linear format, in the order they will appear on the finished CD.

Start and stop markers can be placed either end of each file and gaps inserted between tracks. You can also crossfade tracks into each other so there are no gaps, but as long as you have inserted markers the finished CD will still play continuously or you can still skip from track to track.

The best feature for me of this software is allowing you to match the volumes of each individual track to one another. By simply clicking an icon and holding down the mouse key you can raise or lower the volume of any individual track without affecting any others in the montage. You can tweak away until your hears content, getting levels right until you're completely happy and the sound is balanced across the whole of the finished CD. An obvious but great tool.

There are so many more features I could waffle on about such as track naming, fade in/outs, ISRC codes and so on, but just to get your basic CD sounding professional this is a great piece of software.

There are numerous video tutorials on Youtube for Wavelab and I would recommend checking them out. As the old saying goes - Knowledge is Power! Best of Luck...

The Rolling Stones - just the feel!

Just watching "The Rolling Stones Return To Hyde Park"  in 2013. It was 44 years to the day since they first played there in 1969.

What strikes me has they go through their classic songs is not only the energy they can still bring to the show, but the passion and feel they play with.

Of course as a bunch of musicians playing together for over 50 years now they are something special. But it is the sum of the parts that makes them unique.

I wouldn't class any of them as virtuoso players but its the emotion that each one can put into a single note, lick or song. Along with that is knowing what to play and when to play it. They always seem to leave the right gaps in the right places and just gell as a unit, like no other.

My take is that its not what you play or how many notes you play, but how much feel and expressiveness you are able to convey and this comes across in bundles from The Stones to their live audience and through the TV screen. Long may they continue...

Mastering Time - Part 1

As I work for myself I sometimes get quiet times in the day and this I find is an ideal time to work on my music. The house is empty and I can make some noise MWah!!
This week I've been mastering my third album (which is close to completion) in a program called "Wavelab" by Steinberg. This is a great program as it simply allows you to drag and drop music files into the work space and use up to 8 plugins simultaneously, to affect the sound.
I tend to use a similar sequence of plugins usually (but not always) in this order.
1. EQ - firstly to get rid of low end rumble
2. Another EQ  with more options just to give me more to play with.
3. A Multi-Band Compressor, split into 3 to 5 bands across the frequency range. So I can just compress the bass/mids/top or wherever I think is needed
4. A Limiter - to allow me to bring up and maximise the volume if needed.
5. A Leveler - in case I am comparing 2 or more files (usually a reference track) so I can hear the tracks at the same volume for comparison. As its easy to misjudge sound if the volumes are even slightly different.
6. A Stereo Expander - I don't always use this but it widens the stereo field and can excite the sound (make it brighter and bigger) but this can sometimes be too harsh I find, but is a useful tool to have.
7. and 8. Then one or two Analyzers to help visually look at the sound frequencies and dynamic range of the track. Although these can be great at times they can also mislead and its always best to use your ears rather than your eyes when mixing and mastering.
I would always add into the work-space a reference track that you know well, so you can compare your own music to an industry standard piece of work. I tend to use tracks by Peter Gabriel - usually "Red Rain" from the "So" album.
An excellent resource if you do master your own music is a great website run by top mastering engineer Ian Shepherd called "Production Advice". You should check this out as it is full of great articles, videos and advice to help the home studio musician. I've certainly learned a lot from Ian