This is me practicing my video skills, although I have to admit the first camera doesn’t help me.
Growing Video
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Another one!
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Another song… I’m getting back to the Berlin “6 songs per day” workflow. This is good!
Room Quest in NYC
This is probably a very interesting post for those of you that are planning to come live in New York.
Here is my take on it. Lived it and walked it.
Intro:
I was blessed to have a home since the beginning here in New York. I moved in with three roommates, two of which I already had met in other excursions over Chile. That was all joy, a house with more experienced friends that also are involved in the music business. Like all in life though, nothing is forever. Long story short… Everybody moved out in less than a week.
Where am I going to live now?
Plan B Lifestyle:
I was really fortunate to have already been searching for apartments in New York because a chance to move in with friends from SAE was presenting itself. Although that didn’t work out, it did sharpen my knife. Navigating in Craigslist turned out to be easy. I had already picked the neighborhoods I wanted so I just had to rapidly go through articles. I did take the time to write a good introductory email, which I can say helped bump my initial 20-30% response to 70-80%. So that’s the first tip.
Here goes my email:
Hello. My name is Yokandesh and I’m interested in the room.
Here is a LITTLE about me:
Brazilian, singer, audio-engineer student, life coach and loyal friend.
More?
I’m organized and clean, plus like to cook if more than one will eat. Love to meet new people and learn new languages. Travel a lot and came to New York to start some music-related business, probably a production company.
I currently live in West New York – NJ and don’t like the commute time. Want to optimize my precious time. I go every day to SAE (Study Audio Engineering) on Herald Square from 2pm-6pm. Mornings I’m usually at school recording and evening’s at the studio I work. Weekends sometimes I work too.
My artistic pitch:
Spicy Latin rhythms, exotic harmonies and fiery passion embody the samba-pop music of Yokandesh. The Jack Johnson of Brazilian Pop.
Dates Intended:
December 2010 – April 2011
yokandesh.com
facebook.com/yokandesh
Live As You Want,
Yokandesh
718 *** ****
Well, that said this is the rest of the story…
I met various people, all kinds to be more vague. I narrowed down my options to two: Good 2 bedroom apartments prioritizing comfort or Lofts to hang out with more artists. Well I did run into a “best of both worlds” situation. I arranged to view the apartment and everything went too smooth it wasn’t even hard to decide. I had found it! 2 bedroom apartment with a musician living in it.
BAD NEWS: Two days later I receive a call… It wasn’t happening anymore. “The current roommate gave up on moving”
ACTION: I got really Gangster on Craigslist again. Saw various apartments/lofts during the week including on that was almost as good as the one I loved, but I didn’t really match 100% with the roommate. I did send that option to the roommate of the original apartment I liked and she showed it to her roommate. Kinda of confusing, I know, but you’ll get it. Lined up was a perfect setup of visits for Saturday.
Full on schedule to find my one room.
SATURDAY: Woke up and went straight to SAE to record a song on the Mackie Analog 8 Bus… That was awesome by the way, brand new song created and recorded live thanks to Alan Tavares’s magical riff/melody and Bruno’s always surprising meditative energy.
Here goes the hook: “When you begin to know the truth, a path opens up to you.”
This is no joke.
A couple of hours later I get a message that the one room I told about to the roommate that gave up moving out was perfect for her. I cancelled all my appointments for Saturday and was officially in the zone! Moving to Greenpoint!
The best movie I’ve seen by far!
No motion picture has brilliantly exposed an spiritual awakening or life changing experience before like “127 hours” has. You can live together with Aron Ralston the battles that we go through life in a beautifully elaborated script. The magic is that Aron, played by James Franco, overcame a “lifetime” worth of difficulties in only 127 hours. You can’t top that. Danny Boyle has done his master-piece. Oscars guaranteed for this one. A Warrior amongst Warriors!
White Swan
Today is a very good friend’s birthday. Her name is Lamty and she deserves a song! Happy Birthday!
Clasp
Today I was at a Clasp presentation at my school SAE. At the beginning I was frustrated because I didn’t get to sign up for it. So I really wasn’t expecting to attend. Needless to say, those who didn’t show up lost their opportunity to meet Chris and his marvelous invention Clasp. Lucky for me, I could attend, since there was a bunch of “no show”. One more reason to point out how people refuse to see what’s right in front of their eyes.
Now more on the magic. First “the man” Chris Estes. As many may know, we from the music business are not well seen or described. Also, as many may know, if you do find the real deal people, you are truly finding gold and music. So, Chris is one of these. Humble, motivated and music lover. So in love with music that his passion towards Tape saturation, distortion, feel or as he would describe it HUG made him find a solution to what many argued to him that was impossible. Marry DAW workflow and TAPE quality. How awesome is that?
A little spec – Clasp basically processes all audio from the Mic Pres to the AD Converters. It has it’s own magic sync inside that makes your DAW record everything with no latency by changing the audio files timecode. You also get the oldies vibe with no latency monitoring or headphone mix because you are fed right off the tape head. This is the basic schematics he showed, more details on his website.
We recorded Beatles song “Dear Prudence”. As you go thorough all the steps of recording and you end up mixing you realize what real records sounded like. You barelly need any effects, just the correct mic positioning and performance. At the end Mr. Estes even made a comment I had heard before, but actually never seen it happen. “This is how it was done in the good old Tape days. All the faders in unity and you already have a Mix.” Good thing those days are back thanks to him! One more amazing BONUS. You can change tape speed at any and every punch, meaning multiple characteristics to the instrument tracked or region of the song.
As all loving companies, they run by word of mouth. And he spreads the word himself. Still carries that young adventurous inside him although he is clearly well experienced and wise.
Now, I’ve been pondering what is the next step for music. What hasn’t been done? Where are the pioneers. This is definitely a tool to be explored. I do have a vision. The blending of the Synthesis and Tape. Synthesis has also come a long way with digital and to me had this digital-analog marriage already: Kyma.
My guess is, the first who wraps his head around Kyma and Clasp and combines them may have a totally vibrant new sound designing road to explore. This is big fish game though, both Kyma and Clasp are price heavy-weights, but they do deliver more than their price tag.
Peace,
Yokandesh
Clasp Presentation with Chris Estes - SAE NYC
Come back!
So the goal this week is for YOU, reader, to come back to my interesting website.
How do I do that? Creating desirable content. So I will definitely give a song away and make a video on how I made the song. (more on that in a few)
First I wanna review the past two weeks in Ariel’s “Music Success in Nine Weeks” Program. I feel I’m constantly in week 1 analyzing my goals and future. Long term commitments haven’t been that easy to make. I’m happy with all the progress in the short term goals. Week two was hard because Brazilian music doesn’t really have icons here in USA, so I had to broaden up my Pitch. So the last post is pretty much overwritten. Here is the come back:
Spicy Latin rhythms, exotic harmonies and fiery passion embody Yokandesh; the Jack Johnson of Brazilian Pop.
So, now back to the video. My room is cozy and creative (will post the picture eventually) and I can make a video explaining how the first song was made.
Om Music,
Yokandesh
Brazilian Pop
If you are into Brazilian Pop you need to listen to Yokandesh!
After week one and all the goals set, I have to confess I did take a sneak peek at the second chapter of the book Music Success in Nine Weeks and already had the Pitch Bug.
Sunday (10/17) as I was talking about music, plans, business and living in NYC with a friend the Pitch came just like a present. We already knew witch main artists I sound like or remind people of, but the Pitch was still far from READY.
So, again. If you are into Brazilian Pop, you already know these three names: Seu Jorge, Caetano Veloso and Cazuza. If you don’t know one or all, PLEASE, check them out. And if you let me even pick the records, listen to this:
Farofa Carioca (Seu Jorge’s First Band) – Moro no Brasil
Caetano Veloso – Serie Grandes Nomes (Disc 3) [this is a 6 CD compilation]
Cazuza – Ideologia
Great! Now, what’s the pitch?!?!?
*Drums Rolling…*
Yokandesh sounds like:
Seu Jorge singing Caetano Veloso featuring Cazuza on Harmonies
Yeah! Love it.
LISTEN TO BRAZILIAN MUSIC!!!
It will motivate you, captivate you + get you up on your feet and running.
Silence to Listen,
Yokandesh