Posts in category: Poly Gecko News

Hi friends,

How are you? Good? Good. I feel like we haven’t talked in a while, even though we did less than two weeks ago. Let me update you with the current affairs in GeckoLand.

Tupper Ware Remix Party picked the winner for their remix contest for The Hit (featuring Ninja Sex Party). It was a Polish gentleman by the name of Phortify, and it’s dope as heck. A previous me would’ve been jealous and sad but the current me is rockin’ out so hard to this. When they announced that Phority won I was actually so happy. I went to work with a spring in my step. I just truly enjoyed the process and am so thankful they released their stems for me and many others to play around with. TWRP just released their new EP, Believe In Your Dreams. I just purchased from BandCamp and can’t wait to listen to it.

Download my version of their remix here: [purchase_link id=”416″ style=”button” color=”green” text=”Download The Hit Remix!”]

I’ve been practising a lot with the talk box lately and damn, it’s hard. I can get all the vowels down alright but sounds like B, H, P and V are actually so tricky. In due time… I’ve met with Poly Gecko’s live drummer now a few times and now the live keys / guitar player once. We’re going through PGEP and another unreleased song and deciding what parts we should each do and which parts Ableton can do. Obviously the more we can do live, the better – but we can’t do everything live.

I’m also really exciting to be going back to school in September. I’m going to Berklee School of Music. But no, not in Boston… I’M GOING TO THE INTERWEBS. I’m going to be taking Producing & Composing Electronic Music online for 12 weeks starting next Monday. Having gone to school for Recording Arts, some of this may not be new knowledge but there sure will be plenty of songwriting tools I will pick up. I’m really excited to learn more about this genre and put things I’m learning into action in current songs and upcoming ones.

Finally, the mid-month tradition of the music I’m listening to! Emiliana Torrini has been in heavy rotation lately with her album, Tookah. I’m truly a sucker for female vocals and she is no exception. My drummer Andrew has got me really deep into London Grammar and their album If You Wait. This is some very ethereal stuff that lets loose from time to time and oh man it feels good. Check out their live performance from Montreal to see what they’re all about. And finally, Wolfgang Gartner. I always meant to check out Wolfgang Gartner ever since he collaborated with Deadmau5 on Animal Rights and then again on Channel 42 and I’m DEVASTATED I put it off for so long. His 2012 album Back Story is absolutely so money. Almost every tune from the album is unreal. I can totally see why him and Deadmau5 got together – they have a lot of the same sort of ear candy and I love it deeply.

Stay dope,

Ryan

Hey friends,
Sorry I’ve been terribly delinquent about blogging this last month. Jeez. I’ve been putting a lot of energy lately into a remix of The Hit by Tupperware Remix Party. It’s due at the end of the month and I’m only about half done so the pressure is on. I’ve got the basic gist of it but it’s actually a steep challenge to remix a song that is perfect to me already. Here’s their video, also quite possibly the best music video of all time:

<iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/uOWWaRbZucE” frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen></iframe>

I saw them live earlier this month at the Seahorse in Halifax and god damn… what an experience. My knees are almost done recovering from all the bruises incurred from my run-ins with the stage. Much like when I saw St. Vincent and she inspired me to buy an analog synth, TWRP has inspired me to buy a talk box. And I shall do just that today!

I’ve also been working hard on The Narrows with my friend / live drummer, Drew. He’s a really good writer and it’s awesome to have his input on my songs. The songs make sense to me but he’s really good at trying to make them make sense to everyone else.

My graphic designer / colleague / friend James and I are also working on a cover of Immigrant Song by Led Zeppelin. I’m playing Maschine and synth on it while he’s doing the guitar, vocals and piano. We’re going to spend some more time working on some of his originals and other covers and see where it takes us.

I’ve been listen to Random Access Memories by Daft Punk like crazy lately. The song Beyond has been in my head seemingly for days now, which further justifies the purchase of a talk box. The whole album is really great though. Of course the hits like Giorgio by Moroder and Get Lucky are the most popular but songs like Beyond, Contact, The Game of Love, and Within are solid tunes as well. It’s a little bit of departure of what I hear in my head when I think of Daft Punk but for me, it was instantly a timeless album.

Talk soon,

Ryan

Hey friends,

I just thought I’d do a quick post to keep everyone in the loop of thingys. PGEP was released on Monday and I’m pretty happy with the feedback I’m getting so far 🙂 Thanks to everyone who’s downloaded or checked it out! If you’ve yet to download it, use this free button to add it to your cart: [purchase_link id=”109″ style=”button” color=”white” text=”Purchase”]

I was going to try to take the rest of July away from writing and just mentally unwind a little bit and make sure all my ducks are in a row for “chapter two”. I took about 70 hours and then dove back into some tunes, mostly collaborations that with any luck will be released by the end of the year.  I’ve decided that my next EP will be titled The Narrows EP and will probably three or four songs on it. As for a due date, I’m uncertain. There’s a few other collaborative projects that I’m putting most of my energy into.

Most importantly, I’m ramping up for a live show. Poly Gecko has never played live and it does present some challenges but I’m waist-deep in tackling it. Hopefully this ol’ MacBook can handle it. I’ll be running Ableton Live to spit out a few stems while I attempt to play a combination of Maschine, synths, vocals, vocoder live. Oh, and I think I found a really cool drummer who’s willing to do this stuff live with me. That’s a big deal. Not only will it be unreal to have drums coming live from someone’s capable hands but he’ll feed me energy live and it’ll be a way better show overall. I’m also looking at picking up a DMX interface and writing a sick live show to go along with these tunes. I’ve got plenty on my plate entering the later half of 2015.

As always, I’ll include some music that’s entertaining me of late. Solar Echoes by Nigel Stanford is an amazing instrumental guide to why I love electronic music: nothin’ but ear candy. Meridian EP by Zola Blood has also caught my attention. The group reminds me of Tremors by SOHN. Super fat synths, really spacious songs and beautiful hooky vocals that’ll stick in your head all day, but in a good way. Last by certainly not least, Transition Roads by Ominar. You know when an album starts with the lyric “Like a candle strike, we are the perfect match” that it’s going to be amazing. Every single song from this album is really great but my favourite has to be Distance. This is my favourite album to come out of Halifax in a little while. Ominar calls herself Dream Pop and it is most certainly that. It’s super chill and I urge you to take a listen for yourself.

Until later,

Ryan

Hey friends,

It’s now only 10 days until I release my debut EP, PGEP. It’s kinda weird because it feels like I’ve always been working to release something, anything. And now that it’s finally done and nearly ready to be released, I’m still rather shocked. That being said, I have plenty of upcoming musical adventures to keep myself occupied – and you entertained, of course. For each of the songs on PGEP, I made a short teaser video. So far I’ve uploaded one of Forrest, Num3rology, 82 and Infancy <See below>. This Sunday I shall upload the final one, Only. Only is probably my favourite song on PGEP, but ask me tomorrow and maybe it’ll be a different one…

After PGEP, I’m going to piece together a live set. I’m aiming for about 30:00 to start and play a few shows and see how I feel. I really have very little experience playing live, let alone by myself so it’s a bit nerve-wracking. I’ll get over it though, this is what I want to do. I think my live setup will consist of triggering stems from Ableton Live using my APC40 MkII, then using Maschine and a Roland JDXI live for synths and drums. And of course, an SM7B for vocals. It’s challenging to do everything live off-the-floor so I’ll employ Ableton to spit out some basic stems and I’ll play and loop overtop. Oh, also, a lot of lights and lasers.

Alongside the work for a live set, I’ll start work on my follow-up EP, tentatively titled Thresholds. I really haven’t decided many details but I have a rough picture of what songs should be on it. One is called Utifi and you can find a demo of it on my SoundCloud. Listening back to that now, woah, it’s come a long way. There’s about 5 other songs in contention to be on Thresholds but I’ll narrow it down more as it draws near.

I’ve been working a lot on my music theory as of late and I’m learning a lot. A year ago, I knew shit all when it came to the language of music. I knew a major scale on my bass and that was about it. I’m finding my writing is improving immensely as I spend more time learning the theory behind it.

I’ll check back in on Monday I imagine after the album is mixed and mastered by my good friend Luke Batiot. I’ll probably post a comparison of my songs pre-mix and post-mix and you’ll be able to tell why a good mixing engineer is worth every penny.

A long slow goodbye,

Ryan

Hey Friends,

Just checking in with ya. PGEP is coming along swimmingly now. Of the 5 songs, 3 are absolutely complete, waiting to be mixed and two more need just a little bit of work before I’m done. Check out the premix of 82 here! It’s truly so excited being this close to finishing this project; it has taken me years.

At the same time the EP will be mixed, I’m also getting my remix of Take My Hand (Joel Freck ft. Cameron Hawes) mixed for release. It’ll be released this summer and will need to be danced to pronto.

There are some cool acoustic guitar and Maschine songs coming down the proverbial pipe, too – inspired heavily by To Record Only Water For Ten Days. Also, another collaborative song with Karver is in the oven and baking on 450°. There’s plenty of projects to keep both you and I entertained.

Lately I’ve been listening to Noontide by Canadian electronic duo known as Humans. I’m devastated that they played in Halifax in March and I didn’t know of them at the time because I would’ve loved to see their jams live. It’s the perfect mixture of dance, techno, and reverb. I love all the different sounds they employ on their songs: huge, badass synths and then another synth part over it, so tranquil. The vocals are also excellent. Whenever I hear some awesome electronic music like this, it lights a fire under my ass.

Until there’s more,

Ryan

Hey friends,

I am really excited to announce that my debut EP, titled PGEP, will be released on July 20, 2015 and available for immediate free download from this website!

PGEP track listing:

1. 82
2. Only
3. Forrest
4. Infancy
5. Num3rology

PGEP – Artwork by James Densley

PGEP was an interesting venture. I started four of these songs (82, Forrest, Infancy, Num3rology) in 2012 and Only in 2015. It essentially acts as a time capsule and reaches back into my development of becoming an electronic musician. For a few years, most of these songs collected dust. In late 2014, I decided to revamp them and make them into something I could be proud of. Like many artists, my style has changed over the years; where I was musically in 2012 is very different where I feel I am now. I had to adapt these songs’ arrangements and structures into something I was going to be happy with. I kept a lot of the same instruments and core elements but tried to change the atmosphere surrounding the songs. I wrote all the music myself but had some help from friends Joel MacLean and Ken LeBlanc for lyrics / vocoder parts. I wanted to try to do as much on my own as possible but having them aid me turned out to be very beneficial.

I’ll be posting some videos and songs as the date nears. I’m truly so excited to finally have some of my own music released; it’s a huge weight off my shoulders. And there are so many more things waiting in the wings for you all to hear. This the first small step of what I hope lasts a very long time.

I hope that PGEP is as fun to listen to as it was to make.

-Ryan

Hey guys,

I hope the sun is out wherever you are. I’m working on a lot of really cool things right now that I’ll be releasing this summer. Primarily, I’ll be releasing my debut EP titled PGEP (Poly Gecko Extended Play, I suppose). It’s going to contain five original songs that are written, performed and compared by yours exclusively. I’ll do an actual announcement when the time is right and I can release some mixed songs to tide you over until the main course. I expect this to be released in July but life is a busy thing and could be more August but we’ll see. I’ve got all the arrangements and music complete, it’s now just recording vocals that remains.

I’m also in the mixing stage for the remix I did of Joel Freck & Cameron Hawes’ Take My Hand. Like the EP, I will have it posted as soon as it’s ready and presentable.

Along with those two musical projects, I have also taken on the task of creating and maintaining this website with absolutely no experience or knowledge. It’s proving to be difficult at times, but nonetheless a worthwhile learning experience. Soon I’ll be posting songs at this address and you can directly download here instead of going to a variety of sites. I already have Posture primed for download, a song by Karver Hitchcock and I from December 2014. The button below will add it to your life for free: [purchase_link id=”93″ style=”button” color=”white” text=”Purchase”]

I wanted to also take a sec and express what music has captured my attention as of late. I’ve been really enjoying Voices by Phantogram (Indica Records). If you observed my iTunes library, you’d know I’m a total sucker for female vocals and this is no exception. Siren EP by ATTLAS (Mau5trap Records) has also caught my attention and really inspired that spacey-percussive side of me. One final one before I get back to work is Policy by Will Butler (Merge Records). Will is a member of Arcade Fire who I am also very fond of and his groovy jams on this album are striking. Anna, the single is just so catchy and primes me for a long-awaited summer.

On March 8, 2015, Wayne Hunt and I played a three-song set at the Carleton Music Bar. Wayne has been playing this festival for a few years now and each year he invites different musicians to occupancy him – this year, it was me with the Maschine. It was a pleasure to play live with one of the best songwriters that I’ve ever met.

The March Hare is a touring festival that originated in Cornerbrook, Newfoundland is 1988 and showcases Newfoundland & Labrador arts across the country. Hailing from Newfoundland, Wayne’s music fits right in. He has a collection of smokin’ tunes but he narrowed down to three for us to play together at the Festival. Wayne was really interested in the Maschine and integrating it in with his folk music. It’s an interesting juxtapose for sure and we spent a lot of the time practicing just getting the right samples for Maschine. Two of the songs (Bonfire Night; The Symphony) are a little more laid back while the final song, Little Harbour Deep is (in Wayne’s words) “a little more industrial”. We drew a lot of inspiration of drum patterns and samples from Lorde and her producer Joel Little.

It was the first time I had played live in a very long time – and the first with Maschine / without a bass guitar. It’s a very cool feeling to have my first performance in years in front of a sold-out crowd at my favourite music bar in Halifax. Overall, the March Hare was a blast and I’d love to play in front of all those salty Newfoudlanders again.  See the performance of the set here: