Someone once told me, "Music is meant to go somewhere, not to just be." What a sad, lost soul. This kind of music is all about just being.
Initially, 2600 Hz set out to produce ambient music. This is seen in the song Space Ages. But when ideas hit the recorder, the stuff that comes out are more of the chilled groove sort. Perhaps this diversity will continue to show through as I progress as a musician.
Jeff Johnson's album, "Similitudes" (Google it, it can be listened to online for free), was my first discovery of ambient music. I've been hooked on "background music" as a hobby ever since. However, as a youth I also played guitar, keys, and sang. (And I played the tuba, but that's beside the point.)
My name is Jon Davis and I listen to everything from Jazz to Classical to rock, but when I sing it's probably Christian music, and I go by Jonathan Michael. When I'm just making instrumental music, it's usually electronic, and I go by 2600 Hz. My musical influences are Jeff Johnson, the early works of Michael W. Smith such as his pop/rock instrumentals, a CD from Roland (the musical equipment company) called "Roland: A Sound Approach", the original Unreal game soundtrack, a tracked tune called 1984 (yes I literally put the song on a loop for hours), and the Jazz and Electronica charts of the original MP3.com, a web site that at the time was much like SoundClick is today.
Lately I've been listing to a lot of Groove Salad. (It's a WinAmp/ShoutCast station. http://somafm.com/play/groovesalad ) I've recently decided to start lurking there to find inspiration and influence.
Hardware: homebuilt PC w/ quad core CPU, dual Raptor drives (RAID 0), 4GB RAM; Soundcraft Compact4; Korg KONTROL49; Casio PX-310 (88-key controller); 2 MXL mics; Ibanez electric guitar; Simon & Patrick acoustic guitar
Software: Vista, FL Studio, lots of VSTi's (most of the top-rated free ones at http://www.kvraudio.com/)!! I've made a lot of investments in East West / Quantum Leap soft synths/samplers such as Colossus/Goliath (features the brass in "That Funky 'Fulfilled' Feeling", Symphonic Orchestra Gold XP and Symphonic Choirs (neither of which I'll likely produce much output under this "band name"), Hardcore Bass w/ XP (featured in "That Funky 'Fulfilled' Feeling), Ra, and Storm Drum. And I have and use ezDrummer which has some really nice drum samples and MIDI patterns. I used Wusikstation v1 (I currently own v5) and Delay Lama on "Much Hipmonk", and have found the UgoAudio.com plug-ins to be pretty useful as I used them on "Space Ages", "Much Hipmonk", and "Moon Surfing" ("Much Hipmonk" makes heavy use of String Theory). And "Moon Surfing" makes heavy use of Sytrus (www.sytrus.com).
One of my favorite free soft synths is the original ProtoPlasm by H.G. Fortune.
I use Audacity 1.2 and Adobe Audition 2.0 to master the tracks for distribution, but I'm still not pleased with my skills set and/or tools set for mastering...
Totally just getting started. Well, not totally ...
Hey what's this button do?