Anti-Boredom Team Records

I’ve started planning the next album. The tentative track names are:

• The Plastic Colors of Summer
• Virus in the Cloud
• FTFM
• Electric Soup
• The Laws of Physics Breakdown
• Hueco Mundo
• Some Stars
• Escape Velocity
• Schwarzschild radius

These things tend to change…

My progress on the album will depend on the weather (my studio heats up to 90 computer punishing degrees on hot days) and other distractions.

SakanaYasha facts!

1. SakanaYahsha is the 10th song on the album Aquatic Ape Hypothesis.
2. Some might call SakanaYasha an American kaiju.
3. SakanaYasha is a giant mutant Sea Robin demon fish that inhabits the east coast of North America.
4. SakanaYasha has three forms.
5. The first and second forms are that of a mutant Sea Robin with human arms and feet.
6. In its first form, SakanaYasha is 63 meters tall, and spends most of its time underwater.
7. In its second form, SakanaYasha is 6’2″ tall, and spends most of its time watching TV, on the internet, recording music, and consuming human foods and beverages.
8. Its third form is a shapeless fluid sludge-like mass that SakanaYasha can assume when it needs to hide, rest or recoup from a battle. It is believed it can assume this form due to its incredibly high mercury content.
9. SakanaYasha is infamous for endangering aquatic life off the east coast of North America due to its high toxicity and voracious appetite.
10. Legend has it that SakanaYasha was “defeated” by a JPL satellite retrofitted to function underwater. Their epic battle was captured in the song BOSS FIGHT!. At the conclusion of the battle SakanaYasha assumed its third form and dissolved into the muddy sands off the New Jersey shore.
11. Legend has it that SakanaYasha resumed its first and second form in 2010 after being summoned by a fish demon cult. More likely: it just wanted to get some pizza and watch some movies on NetFlix. The song SakanaYasha captures SakanaYasha’s return.
12. SakanaYasha is male.
13. Those aren’t potato chips — they are gills.
14. Legend has it that SakanaYasha has “dated” human women in his second form, but only on Halloween.
15. No one knows what the four tube like structures are on the front of its body. Perhaps they are used to drag itself along the ocean floor, or to drag itself from the couch to the refrigerator.
16. SakanaYasha can play bass, violin and keyboards.

Second form:

Aquatic Ape Hypothesis is an audio odyssey spanning the genres of electronic rock, ambient, acid rock, funk and soundtrack instrumental music, and inspired by futurism, B-movies, science fiction, science fact, NASA, space exploration, Japanese giant monsters, fish, cicada insects, and even Flipper. Instruments used include: mandolin, bass, electric guitar, Stylophone, various Korg keyboards & sound devices, a Bliptronic 5000, BOSS drum machine, a “Take Back the Noise” bent-circuit noise device, an iMac, and my throat.

The album was recorded as part of the 2010 RPM challenge, so it had to be competed in the month of February of 2010, and it had to be 10 tracks of original music. I recorded the album after work on weekdays and on weekends — it might have taken 100 hours to plan, write, record, mix, edit and review.

Early reviews:

Baggsy says: “I freaking loved this album. It sounds like a space rock Kenneth Anger soundtrack about Horis sinking all of Earth’s submarines.”

Leif from }Hexdump{ says: “Long-time friend and super-genius Dan Century (aka The Milkshake Daddy) has a freshly minted new album that just hit the Intert00bz called “Aquatic Ape Hypothesis.” Listen to this and you will yearn for halcyon days of public television soundtracks and fuzzy, low-fi acid rock guitar. It is weird and awesome and you should download it now.”

The tracks I think are the best are:

Light Dispelling Darkness by Milkshake Daddy

Aquatic Ape Hypothesis by Milkshake Daddy

Super Sloppy Space Junk by Milkshake Daddy

My new album Aquatic Ape Hypothesis is out. Download it, listen to it.

I’ll post more information tomorrow. Now I need some rest.

Apparently I’ve made an album of science fiction soundtrack music, and 1970′s sexy-time music.

Song of the day… Super Sloppy Space Junk.

Looks like Sound Cloud (who most the track) are having issues. Please stand by…

Super Sloppy Space Junk demo by Milkshake Daddy

The 2009 album is out now!

The Milkshake Daddy
Triglidae Cosplay Facsimile

Here’s the songs! This album is FREE as in BEER! You’re free to download, share, play it where ever you like, and remix it. You just can’t sell it.

Zip of all songs (80MB ish)

This album was created for the 2009 RPM Challenge (http://www.rpmchallenge.com/component/option,com_comprofiler/Itemid,296/), and it is a follow up to the 2008 album, The Secret Lives of Probes, Satellites and Rovers.

Triglide Cosplay Facsimile is a concept album about a satellite that develops artificial intelligence and decides that it wants to explore earth’s oceans instead of space. On earth it meets Mr. Sprinkles, the Cat, who directs him to Sakanayokai the fish demon whom it does battle with to free the Sea Robins off the Jersey Shore. Yes really. Crazy right? Music has fallen behind ART in terms of weirdness, and it’s time to catch up.

I recorded the album during February 2009, during which time I was working 50 hours a week at my jobby job, drinking lots of black tea, eating about a loaf of bread a day (not kidding). I also lost 6 pounds. I used Guitar Band to record this mess (that’s my excuse for any quality issues, like low volume or clipping), with a little help from Audacity, a Shure microphone and lots of cables.

Much more information here.

This is the artwork for my new album.

Korg’s Kaossilator is a fun little music device that allows you to compose strange and wondrous musical compositions with a twist of a knob and a swipe of a finger. It’s ridiculously easy to master. I’ve started working on my next album, and I’ll feature the Kaossilator on it. In the mean time, here’s a small sample of what it can do:

After 8 nights of strumming, plucking, tapping, twisting, clicking, typing and sliding, the new Milkshake Daddy album is complete. The album is titled Secret Lives of Probes, Satellites and Rovers and it is a concept album. The album was created as part of the RPM Challenge; the challenge was to create an album in the month of February — I accepted the challenge and completed on time.

Tracks:
1. Launch!
2. Voyager 1
3. Voyager 2
4. America, I Love You (USA 193)
5. SKYLAB
6. Kaguya
7. Communication (Satcom 1)
8. Hubble
9. Good Life! (Opportunity and Spirit Rovers)
10. Sojourner Rover
11. Sputnik 2

Getting the album:

The album is free to download, share, burn, remix, etc, but not to resell. Here is a link to a zip of the album. Listen to the songs in order — it is a concept album.

Why record an album?

Why not?

In spite of having no musical talent, I do enjoy making music. It might take me 10 years between recordings, but the interest is always there, but not the passion or drive. This time around, the RPM Challenge provided me with a reason to record something. My long time friend Leif had joined the challenge, and that was another reason.

What is the Milkshake Daddy?

Back in the mid-1990’s my life revolved around partying, and enjoying music and B movies, in particular Funkadelic and blaxspoitation films. I’m a huge fan of Dolemite, and the Milkshake Daddy was more or less a “pimp name”. Around 1995 I was unemployed for a while and started to experiment with guitars and drum machines. I recorded about 2 hours of material — in retrospect, I came up with 3 good songs: My Ass is In Good Shape, and two versions of a Funkadelic-inspired song called Ephedrine ( trucker speed ). They’re on the MySpace page.

Back in the future, 12 years later, I needed a band name for the RPM Challenge. My standard aliases — Dan Century, Last King of Seabright, Dan the Fan, Lord Sesshomaru, P. Destruction, That Bastard! — they weren’t as good as The Milkshake Daddy, so I used that.

What kind of music is it? What does it sound like?

It’s happy and positive love songs in the vein of the Beatles or Beyonce. Just kidding. The music is experimental. The closest genre to it would be ambient electronic music, but there is definitely noise, jazz, hip-hop and 80’s rock in the mix. You won’t hear music like this on the radio, unless the station is WFMU, a college station or maybe an obscure satellite station, but it does exist.

I designed the album to sound like what all the information and experience coursing through the circuits of the satellites and probes might sound like if it was transformed into music. I think of the Mars rovers as having more human personalities, so those songs are low-fidelity pop songs. Some songs you might find uplifting (Hubble) or cheerful (Good Life), while others are intentionally sad (America I Love You and Sputnik 2).

Moments might remind you of Nova or Carl Sagan specials, Brian Eno, Kraftwerk, Black Flag, or Devo.

Technical information

Instruments:
A Korg Electribe MX was used as a keyboard, noise generator, and drum machine.
A Boss DR 550 was used as a drum machine and bass.
A Gibson SG was used for the guitar parts, either filtered through the Boss or a POD. Both the Guitar and Bass PODs were disappointing in their inability to produce a loud enough signal to produce a nice recording.
A Schecter bass was used for bass and to make the sound of the rocket launching.
The Women Take Back the Noise bent circuit boxed set was used to generate noise.
Other: a Polaroid camera, various sounds off the Nasa site (public domain) and various speech synthesizers were used.

I used a PC to record some of the speech synthesis, but 99.9% of the recording was done on an 2005 iMac using Garage Band. Garage Band is good for stuff like podcasts, but I was disappointed by it’s lack of features (I was unable to do fades and panning during the mixdowns), and it makes these awful ear-shattering popping noises every now and then. Steve Jobs owes me damages for hearing loss. I used a PreSonus Firefox to get all the sounds from the machines and in the Mac.

What next?

No immediate plans for recording music, but I am inspired to do more.

Here’s my schedule for the RPM Challenge:

Week 1: Read KLF’s book The Manual, rebuild my Mac for recording, check equipment and cables, study programming the Korg and Boss. Attempt to get a good sound out of the Schecter bass. Build a playlist of the 20 cheeziest “alternative” pop hits as my inspiration (I ordered Tubthumping for a cent online). List ideas for songs, and develop lyrics. Spend an hour adding people on my MySpace page.

Week 2: Write the songs according to patterns found in The Manual. Lyrics and melodies should be done by end of the week. Start programming.

Week 3: Finish programming and start recording.

Week 4: Complete recording, master and mail the disk. Make a video of one of the songs.

Current status: yesterday I read a few chapters of The Manual. As I am not on the dole, following the plan to the letter might be a challenge — skipping to the bit about writing the songs. Not getting any interesting sounds by running the bass through the Boss, so I will default to the Bass Pod. Today (2/2) is a waste: I need to pay bills, clean the apartment, do the laundry, buy more beer and snacks, go to the roller derby and Supersuckers show tonight (not my idea).

Status on state vector collapses project.

Have you heard of the RPM Challenge: record an album in a month!

In February, record an album. Send it to them. That’s it. And I’ve accepted the challenge!!!

See ya’ll in March when I’m done recording more of the worst music ever.

Thanks state vector collapse!

And yeah, I walked out into the ocean during this one. Not sure which is more impressive: the costume, or the fact that it is October 31st and the ocean is warm as a bathtub (in New Jersey).

My Sister and I:

My pizza and I:

You can almost tell that my sister and I are part Asian:

Full length view:

The highlight of the night came when a dude, fishing on a nearby bridge, walks over to me with pole in hand and told me to “watch out”!