The return of the exile (Synthwave)

belldu

My old friend, what are you looking for?
After years abroad you’ve come back
with images you’ve nourished
under foreign skies
far from you own country

https://soundcloud.com/user-154254/the-return-of-the-exile?si=ba2937b9f18d467fb3c837574f87f47f&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

Creative notes
I knew when I found the arp that this would be a Synthwave piece, and I set about learning about the genre. My interpretation of synthwave is that it is a nostalgic look back at the vision of the future seen from an idealised 1980s perspective. Being of an age where I remember the 1980s with fondness, I leaned into the nostalgia, and knowing nostalgia was a greek word, I wondered what the greeks thought of it all... Instead of finding a classical reference, I found a modern one, and the title of the piece comes from this poem:
hellenicantidote.blogspot.com/2009/04/return-of-exile.html

To my ears the piece has something of 'the returned hero' about it, so it all made sense to me at least.

Production notes
This started life as a four bar loop in AUM inspired by the (Synthmaster One) arp.
It then went to Garageband where I completed instrumentation, mostly SM One, SM Two, Tal-U-NO-LX, and a few native GB instruments.
I published the first mix to Soundcloud four months ago, but it sounded 'flat' and adding the width and depth that Synthwave requires has been a challenge, particularly given its busy arrangement with the (nearly) always running arp and octave bouncing bass.
I moved it all to Cubasis, using the MIDI Tape recorder on each track to get it there, then tweaked the arrangement and the stereo field for this second attempt.
It's better, which is encouraging, but I may try again in another six months, as I'm sure it can be better still.

Things I learned were:

• Use Gatelab as a quick way of varying Kick.
• Use Stereo Width to see what's going on with stereo, and also you can 'solo' frequency bands which is very cool.
• Pan automation pans the effect tail. This sounded bad so I instead created Left, Centre, Right tracks and played them as necessary.

GeoTony

Excellent track, very catchy melody, definitely worth pushing to the top again 😊

TheOriginalPaulB

Nice piece. So much synth music doesn’t bother with a proper melodic theme. If you do revisit it, see if you can sort out the timing of the melody, as some bits of each phrase seem to drag, as if the note is slightly late. Also give a thought to using a contrasting lead sound for different sections for a bit of variety.

ReneAsologuitar

Definitely a superhero themed music.
I love the danger and the excitement in the air!
This is a superb musical score and the beat is so loved!
Melody is super nice.
Well done, @belldu !

belldu

Thanks guys, I thought this one had sunk without trace, and I'd finally found the limit of acceptability on the forum.

@TheOriginalPaulB thanks particularly for the specific feedback. I played the melody in for this one and didn't bother quantising, perhaps I should have. I was originally contemplating giving it 'heroic swagger' but realised I didn't know how to do that musically with the timing, so instead, yeah, its variable. Variety was a struggle here too. Having committed to a bouncy bass and busy arp taking up a lot of sonic space I kind of boxed myself in. Adding a super saw Braaam too nearly finished it off and I had phasing issues with that until I tweaked something experimentally and it started working. But I never thought to switch the lead and I'm interested to hear what you were thinking of.

AlterEgo_UK

You captured the 80s vibe very well indeed @belldu - takes me back and, to me, the backing has a Visage/Bronski Beat vibe. The melody adds a different quality - the nostalgic "hero". I really enjoyed it.

Paulieworld

Great track, Duncan! Excellent production with a bullet. This takes me back to 1981. I just graduated from college and was living in my first apartment. On Saturday night me and the dogs went out clubbing. Everybody dressed up for the evening. No ripped jeans or T-shirts. The ladies looked so fine! The music was blasting, the mirror ball was lighting up the dance floor, and everybody was drinking Harvey Wallbangers. This track made me me feel like a young man! I feel so sorry for the “woke” little kiddies. They don’t know what they missed. Check out my track “Midnight At Mother’s”.

MadeofWax

That lead synth line sounds almost like singing. This definitely scratches that 80’s synth itch. Very nostalgic and very enjoyable.

belldu

@Paulieworld, @MadeofWax Thanks so much for the kind words. Glad I brought back some good memories.

I was in England last summer catching up with friends, we're all too old for clubbing now but we saw a group of youths wandering along outside. "Look at them" one of my female friends whispered, "they don't even wear proper shirts anymore!". A scuffle then broke out amongst them. They were drunk before even arriving at a venue.

So yeah, totally agree, things seemed more civilised back then, and I'm glad we get to revisit that era musically :-)

Svetlovska

@belldu : Seeking Ithaca, huh?

“We are not now that strength which in old days
Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;
One equal temper of heroic hearts,
Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.”

Octaving Bassline reminds me a little of Smalltown Boy by Bronski Beat, shades too of The Eurythmics: nails that 80s vibe for sure. Like the Simmons-ish fills, and the Frankie style breakdown… you sure have these tropes under control! Lovely fluid ‘vocal’ melody line too. Take it from someone who was there. (Fun fact: Bronski Beat was the first band I ever interviewed as a professional journalist. I was uncool enough to get them all to autograph a 12” of Smalltown Boy.)

belldu

@Svetlovska, what a beautiful poem that is, it's been a while since I last read it, and I like the 'not quite done yet' tone towards the end.

While I didn't specifically intend to reference all the awesome bands mentioned above, I've definitely thrown in a good number of tropes and listened to them all growing up. Vince Clarke was another hero of mine from that era and he's still going with Erasure to this day.

Svetlovska

Yep, I interviewed him and Andy Bell too, backstage at one of their first gigs at The Marquee in London in December 1985. My relatively brief career in music tech journalism coincided with synthwave, conveniently enough, so I pretty much covered that waterfront.

Frankie was the revelation to naive little me, when I went to the studio while Pleasuredome was being put together. The band spent most of their time playing pool and making gags about Holly and Paul while Trevor Horn was actually putting the album together without any of them…

That and the time I went to see this very young guy who had built a super state of the art digital studio which at the time would have cost millions. I asked him how he had afforded it. He said he’d done a series of very successful drug importation deals, then got out of the game and invested the proceeds in the studio. Interesting times.

belldu

I read somewhere that other than Holly's vocals, the only contribution the band made was to jump into a swimming pool for a splash sample. I tried to recreate Relax in Garageband a while back. I don't know what I was thinking, Trevor Horn's production is stellar to this day.
What an incredible time to be around the music though.

TheOriginalPaulB

The original pre-Horn version of Relax is quite enlightening…

belldu

Omg. I never thought to look for the demo of relax.
And, yeah, confirms everything we already knew about having a good producer, or even an exceptional one.
Watch this only if you're feeling brave:

jwmmakerofmusic

Very nice and smooth mix, and very catchy melodies and harmonies. Now I'm inspired to have another crack at Synthwave myself.

belldu

Do it. Your production is way better than mine and Synthwave definitely lends itself to great production. I know I can improve and am encouraged by the recent words of FINNEAS who said if you can hear it isn't right then you already have good ears, and everything else is just learning techniques.
I feel I need to get a lot better before I try again, and I think I'll leave it for a few months, but would love to hear what others come up with too!

jwmmakerofmusic

@belldu said:
Do it. Your production is way better than mine and Synthwave definitely lends itself to great production.

Bloody hell mate you're making me blush, lol.

I know I can improve and am encouraged by the recent words of FINNEAS who said if you can hear it isn't right then you already have good ears, and everything else is just learning techniques.
I feel I need to get a lot better before I try again, and I think I'll leave it for a few months, but would love to hear what others come up with too!

Well, upon a third and fourth listen, if I had any constructive feedback to give you, it would be to attenuate the lead synth a little bit and bring the drums a little more forward. But as it stands, it's very well done and a nice and smooth mix overall.

If you'd like me to take a crack at mastering it, you could render the unmastered mix, upload to Dropbox or Google Drive, and send me the link via private message. 🫶