Here's The Story . . .

I relish the opportunity to write music whenever possible, especially when there are constraints involved. The hardest thing about writing music is the vastness of possibilities. This is the nonsense, the space, the absence of form or wit. This is why I write my blog and my fascination with creation and form.

When I write music for myself, I start with the guitar – a riff, a chord change. From there, a melody is born. Out of the melody comes a mood and then words coalesce on the tip of my tongue. At first I usually mumble some sounds but eventually, meaning takes shape and I develop a theme. The rhythm of language and the melody, and the mood drive the lyrics and then the force of will and the cerebrum takes over. From there comes a song.

Working as a professional composer, the contraints are much tighter. Take Nickelodeon. Take irony. Nick at Nite bought the rights to play the Brady Bunch on the network but through some strange contractual snafu, they were not allowed to use the theme song in the promos. So they called me up and said – Tim, do what you do. The constraints this time was to create a piece of music that evoked the Brady Bunch theme song but did not impinge on the copyright. I must come as close to stealing as I possibly can without stealing.

Arrangement, rhythm, timbre, bpm, performance (in a manner), tonality . . . none of that can be copyrighted. So I take those things as much as I can and change the melody, which can be copyrighted. In the case of the Brady Bunch theme, I actually created a harmony part (mostly) and used that as a melody. This is probably pushing the envelope. No law suits yet (knock on wood).

This is the theme song we all know and love:



It's cool in a shitty 80's TV Theme Song kinda way. It's got a great white-boy groove. I can almost see the band – eyes cloyed, overbite in full force . . .

Here is what I wrote:



OK yeah I don't have a good white-boy groove, nor do I have a real drummer or horns. I mixed the horns low because frankly they don't sound that good. Fake horns never do. But I think I nailed the breakdown and the guitar/bass. That I can rock out on.

Here's the spot. The opening music is stock music.



And here's the spot with music only. I had to cut it up a bit to fit the spot, as you will see.

Longmire

Can you say BOOM? This promo just drips with the Boom Sound Effects Library. In a pinch, that library can take you from zero to that's a wrap in less than 2 hours. That's about how long it takes me to mix a promo like this puppy.

Cheers to an awesome voiceover by the lead actor, Robert Taylor. Other than my killer SFX, the voiceover truly makes the spot. The music sets a nice mood too. Oh and the cinematography. Don't ya just love Wyoming? My favorite state in the Union, hands down.

"Watch the moon . . . smiling in the sky, hum a tune – prairie lullaby. Peaceful wind. Old coyotes cry. Song of home, my Sweet Wyoming Home." Cheers, Danny Gotham.

As always, here is the SFX split out. Boom. Boom.

Dog the Bounty Hunter

Breakin' the law. Breakin' the law! Don't skip bail when Dog the Bounty Hunter is in your neck of the woods. I usually avoid him at all costs when I skip bail.

Cheers to the producers at A&E that always pick great music. Made this spot happen. I think this was Leigh Ornstein.

As always, here is the SFX split out. I had fun with this one. Guns, chases, drama. Gotta love it.

Nick Holiday Giveaway

500 iPads????!!!!!!



I had plenty of time to work on this spot but somehow it came down to the wire. Still, it's nice to be able to really explore the sound to go with such cool looking 3D graphics. And as always, for your listening please, the SFX Splits:

Winx Club

Just wrapped a long week with my friends at Nickelodeon putting together the finishing touches on the promos for a new show – Winx Club. Toward the beginning of the campaign, we spent a few days looking for the perfect piece of music and never found it so I offered up to compose something. In the end, we used two pieces of music – it started off with drop music and then went into my piece. This is the music track by itself:



Here's the full music track I composed:

Nick WinxClub ID Music Full MSTR by noisepatterns

And as always, here is the sound effects split out:

Bag Of Bones Behind The Scenes

This behind the scenes interview with Pierce Brosnan is particularly funny when he talks about shooting 3 sex scenes in one day. You can practically hear him thinking – "jealous much?" Oh Pierce.

Apparently this scene will be playing in theaters across the country. I really pushed the dynamic range more than I normally would for TV. Although not as much as an actual film since I figure they're going to be playing it while people are finding their seats and talking to each other. But hopefully the big hits and the bass will get their attention. I hope I can find out when it's airing and check it out.

Oh and if you can't tell, that's me making the labored breathing sounds at the top and the end. I'll add the FX only version later for you fanboys out there. Come on, I know you're out there.

To be honest, I had tried to be a lot more subtle with some of the sound FX but they kept saying more more more. And what Johnny wants – Johnny gets.