Saturday 26 October 2013

Foray into gaming Videos with MachinimaRealm


Hi Folks

Happy to "blog in" today with news that I've found a good home for one of my stray musical compositions that has been loitering on "soundcloud" for far too long. MachinimaRealm is a subscription YouTube channel forum for gamers interested in a number of games, one of which is titled 'League of Legends' (LoL). Suffice to day, LoL is huge and so is this channel. They post videos regularly and the latest episode Random LoL Moments - episode 162 (League of Legends) features, among other artists, yours truly, Beerubaraoyaji. I had a little trouble with embedding the html for the link so if you check it out you will have to fast forward to around 1:50 minutes on the video to go straight to my stuff but if you are interested you might as well sit back and enjoy the whole 1 minute and 50 seconds that precedes it. I might add that the team were great to work with and I look forward to some more collaboration.

The song is titled QY20 BGM and is something I did way back in the 90s. At the time, I was living in a small apartment in the North of Osaka, Japan and Yamaha had just come out with this crazy concept - a music sequencer in a box that ran on batteries that you could use to compose your own music while riding the train to work in the morning. Oh yeah, as if anything like that would take off said the critics at the time. Anyway, I bought a Yamaha QY20 and sat on the train and composed an instrumental and appropriately titled it QY20 BGM. I always really loved the track but I remember playing it to some much younger friends at the time who laughed at me because it sounded like it was being played by a computer. My how things have changed...

Anyway, a minute on the lips, a life time in the mind - there it sat for years being under-appreciated when I eventually decided to make an mp3 of it in case I broke the sequencer or something. I stored it on a CD until someone invented soundcloud then uploaded it a year or so ago and then in 2013 it gets picked up by MachininaRealm and posted on YouTube.

Wow... hell of a journey for such a humble composition.

As of today the statistics for plays are up by 13000 % percent and climbing and the music has been downloaded frenetically. If you do check it out don't forget to like the track (assuming you do like it).

In other news, I have still lost Memoirs of a Vending Machine on kindle but it seems to be popping up ubiquitously on Amazon and its for sale. I seem to have lost control of it but what the hell, I'm happy that its available and is being read. Time for me to move on from Memoirs I feel. There is a hard copy floating around and is also available on Amazon as well as ebay from vairous sellers, too many to mention or link to on this blog.

I did a bit of key tapping the other day ( well... yesterday actually) and had another look at the band novel. Being picked up on soundcloud as a music publisher has reinvigorated my enthusiasm for creating and so I intend spending my summer break (southern hemisphere if you are confused) developing the plot and characters to the point of editing. Yes... editing and not publishing as I have learned the hard lessons from the Memoirs of a Vending Machine experience. I will not post until it is perfect this time.

Anyway, thats all for now. I'll be back sooner than later for further updates and anectodes.

Beerubaraoyaji




Saturday 7 September 2013

I Give Up

Hi Folks

I have been away for far too long. I've been off my blog but with good reason. I'll touch on that later but for now I'll explain the title of this blog. I have given up on Kindle. Try as I may, I could not get a good review or earn a brass razoo on that forum. I was humiliated, insulted and undermined to the point of depression but still I soldiered on - "never give up," I said over and over - but to no avail. Kindle seem to have introduced new terms that you have to agree to when you sign in that give them the right to take down your book. I signed and they took down my books! That's it - no ceremony, apology or reason. Sometimes I think you just have to concede that some fights are just not worth fighting. So that's it... goodbye Kindle, I give up.

I went back to my Smashwords site and re-priced "Memoirs of a Vending Machine" for free and the downloads have just zoomed along. No complaints, no insults, no problems. I think I now know which forum I prefer and I'm feeling much better now that I don't have to battle for recognition or acceptance. Having given up on Kindle, I have an overwhelming feeling of freedom of expression.

Just so you know, I have been off my blog for so long due to my wife's disturbing and emotional battle with illness. Unfortunately I lost her. The experience has left me empty but much wiser as to what is important in life and one of those things is NOT Kindle. I will return to my writing in due course but need a little time to adjust to the new paradigm in which I now exist.

I the mean-time, I have found a little time to almost finish off a project I have had bubbling away in the background for quite some time. Having written a few children's songs including "A Mouse on the Table" and " Tuck Me Into Bed " I challenged myself a while a go to come up with an alternative ABC song. Have a Listen to "ABC -sample" on soundcloud and let me know what you think, be it on this forum or soundcloud. I have included a quick link to the right of this page if you want to connect that way.

Just for fun, I've also posted another instrumental titled "Red Arpeggio" It's a composition dear to my heart as it was intended to represent some of the good times I shared with my wife. Ironically, I put it together about a month before she was diagnosed with what eventually took her away. If you have a listen, try and keep someone special to you in mind as you remember happy times - works for me.


Thats all for now

Beerubaraoyaji


Sunday 6 January 2013

New Track on Soundcloud

Long live the 80s

Hi Folks

You may have worked out that I am on holidays and have all the time in the world to post interesting little snippets on my blog. I really enjoyed the Kyoto post and am planning another trip to Japan this year. As I settle on my itinerary, I'll do some more travel posts as the Kyoto post has proved to be very popular.

This post has nothing to do with travel. The photograph is a promo shot from the late 80s - a band I was in for a couple of years. I used to play brass so I'll leave it to you to work out who is who. I went a bit crazy with Logic pro after christmas and have come up with a few compositions that have been downloaded all over the world. The christmas songs were vey popular and I felt good about spreading a certain amount of goodwill by offering them for free. 

I have decided for the time being to finish off some little projects I had in mind when I was a music student many moons ago. I have already promoted Pirates and have come up with another track that I envision being used as a theme for some kind of drama or other video. It's got some electronic brass in it which is why I used the photo above - you know... 'cause I used to play brass. Its called Remember ans is downloadable although I have licensed it to Getty Images on a non exclusive basis through Soundcloud if any one is interested in using it commercially. I have provided a link on the right if you want a quick listen.

I have picked up the trumpet recently and intend to use it for some future projects so keep an eye out if you like trumpet ballads.

Thats all for now

Beerubaraoyaji