Archives (Page 2 of 4)

Music For Photographers

Posted on 4th February 2021 in Patreon

After the positive response, we had to last year’s “Fragments”, we’ve decided to start a new project exclusively for our supporters: Music For Photographers.

We’ll deliver a new track each month on Patreon to build what may, or may not, be full album somewhere in the distant future. These demos are currently exclusive to our supporters, so head over to Patreon if you’d like to get involved.

https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

Project Background
Music For Photographers was born out of necessity. Many of you will know that I’m a photographer and so, we are incorporating some of that into our work with The Black Dog. It made total sense to do this because strong imagery has always been a large part of our work. In 2021, you’ll see more of this integrated into our new projects starting with Dubs and Brutal, both of which have been slowly developing behind the scenes for the last 2 years.

Photography has made me question many things and more than any other art I’ve been involved in before. It’s knocked my confidence for six and then kicked me again while I’m on the ground. Not because it’s technically difficult, it isn’t, but it is hard to define the story, find the lines and compose the image.

Sometimes, I’d have to visit place 5 or 6 times because I’d failed, rushed or missed focus. It was frustrating, but I’m persistent if not yet consistent. I needed to slow the fuck down, take my time and relax into a place. This sounds so easy, but it was a hard lesson to learn.

So, we started recording music for visits to places and playing them on loop, over and over. The only rule for a day of shooting was that I had to listen to 7 tracks before leaving. When creating the music, we specified “no human voices” or anything to pull you out of that head-space. It had an immediate effect. Not only did I capture what I wanted on the first visit, but the quality of the shots went up considerably. Now, I’m not saying the music was a silver bullet, but it did help to slow me down and consider the environment far more. Things just clicked.

Now we are sharing this music exclusively with you, our Patreon supporters. We’ll be releasing at least one new track per month for you to download. We hope it finds a place in your working day.

Sample Pack 06: Drones (Vol. 2)

Posted on 1st September 2020 in Patreon, Studio & Production

In the second drone pack, we deliver 82 new tones shifting to further extremes; On one set, we toy with the unusual harmonics of complex, layered source tones, while the second explores the purity of primary waveforms. Sometimes dirty and uncomfortable, they all demonstrate beauty in raw simplicity.

This release contains two different packages: 24-bit WAV audio samples (2.1GB!) for use in any compatible music production software and a collection of Ableton Live Instrument Racks (1.2GB). It’s available for our Patreon supporters to download right now:
https://www.theblackdogma.com/patreon-downloads/

If you’re interested in supporting us and our work, you’ll get access to loads more too, including all of the current sample packs, our recent Allegory EPs and the demos of our forthcoming “Fragments” album. It only costs the price of a nice beer each month and there are no dirty contracts or long term commitments, so you can easily cancel your membership at any time.

For full details, take a look at:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

“Amberly House” – New Fragments Track

Posted on 29th July 2020 in News, Patreon

Final track going up on our Patreon album https://t.co/fLbfqBeWTj pic.twitter.com/7UOCmVU9pd

— TheBlackDog (@TheBlackDog) July 29, 2020

The latest (and potentially last) demo track from our “Fragments” album, called “Amberly House”, is now available for our Patreon supporters.

“Fragments” is a new album project that has been developing month-by-month for the last year. The demo versions of the tracks are available to download exclusively to our monthly supporters. You can get more information about the project and how to support us, here:
https://www.theblackdogma.com/fragments-creating-an-album-bit-by-byte/

Our supporters can download all of the tracks right now at:
https://www.theblackdogma.com/patreon-downloads/

Sample Pack 05: Drones (Vol. 1)

Posted on 19th June 2020 in Patreon, Studio & Production

Drones are a simple concept, to reduce a world of complex sounds to their core elements. This pack features 90 sustained, loopable samples, all with subtle movement throughout. Useable as single instruments, deep background elements or unique minimalist pieces to be played in their own right.

This release contains two different packages: 24-bit WAV audio samples (2.1GB!) for use in any compatible music production software and a collection of Ableton Live Instrument Racks (1.1GB).

It’s currently available exclusively for our Patreon supporters, so if you’d like to join, you can find the details at:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

Kärntnertor Remix Project

Posted on 10th June 2020 in Patreon, Studio & Production

Kärntnertor Remix Pack: Ableton Live and WAV Stems

<a href="http://duststoredigital.com/album/allegory-1-red">Allegory 1 [Red] by The Black Dog</a>

People do regularly ask how we make stuff, so for our supporters on Patreon, we’ve provided an Ableton Live Pack (.alp) and 24-bit stems (.zip) for our track “Kärntnertor”, taken from the “Allegory 1 [Red]” EP.

This should give you an idea of how it’s made and what’s actually happening to create the mix. The track runs at 123bpm, which is fairly sedate compared to a lot of techno at the moment, but it’s all centred around that big filthy bass groove, so the speed isn’t all that important.

We’ve simplified things slightly by swapping custom VSTs for stock Ableton plugins and flattening parts where necessary and for those working with other DAW software, we’ve provided a separate download containing the bus stems as 24bit WAV files.

To get this and loads more exclusive stuff, you can join for the price of a decent beer:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

Sample Pack 04: Pads & Synths

Posted on 4th May 2020 in News, Patreon, Studio & Production

115 Universal WAV Audio Samples and 114 Instrument Rack Presets for Ableton Live, by The Black Dog.

Powerful and unusual instrumentation has been the backbone of electronic music since it’s inception. Here we’ve created a pack of sounds designed to be interesting and highly usable, ranging from epic to abstract, and consisting of smooth pads, synthetic strings, analogue sweeps and unique tones.

The package contains two parts: 24-bit WAV audio samples for use in any compatible music production software and a collection of Ableton Live Instrument Racks.

The Ableton Live racks have been set up with basic macros to control the envelopes, low pass filters and drive. Other than that, they are left intentionally dry, with little additional processing. Anything more than that should be a creative decision for you.

Available to download now for our Patreon supporters:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

Sample Pack 03: Heavy Bass

Posted on 2nd April 2020 in News, Patreon, Studio & Production

215 Universal WAV Audio Samples and 3 Instrument Rack Presets for Ableton Live, by The Black Dog.

“Everyone thinks Sheffield is about the bleeps but it never was, it was always about the bass. Here we present 215 bass synth samples, with 3 Ableton Live Instrument Racks, providing a wide range of instantly useable core tones, from pure sine waves to aggressive distorted noise.”

Available to download now for our Patreon supporters:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

Sample Pack 02: Matrix 1000

Posted on 27th February 2020 in News, Patreon, Studio & Production

The Oberheim Matrix 1000 was always a favourite synth in our studio and this Ableton Live Instrument Rack provides an easy-to-use collection of 130 presets. They’re naturally bright, rich, warm, deep, and provide simple shaping controls to fit your needs. Just drop them into your projects and play.

It’s currently available to our Patreon supporters as a free download:
https://www.patreon.com/theblackdogma

We’ve got a few other sample packs and production tools on the way, so keep an eye out.