Nigel Sifantus » Drummer

Mad Live Beats, Drum n’ Bass style

Nigel — Sat, 02 Jul 2011 04:37:50 +0000

This Video is the last in the “Dj’ing from behind the drums” Progtronica series as I move on to 2 exciting new projects that build of the foundation built here on these videos. Here I’ve introduced a new key piece of the arsenal the Roland SPD-30 octopad to play the live drumming. With this small pad and a set of external triggers, I’m able to compress my whole performance rig bring all of the controls closer to my fingertips. Smaller size and bigger sound is a constant pursuit. Plus check the beats!

Progtronica presents: “Twisted Digits”

Nigel — Mon, 24 Jan 2011 23:13:41 +0000

I’ve never liked the modern emergence of “sub-genres”, the incessant need these days to boil down each kind of music into dozens of sub-categories. I have found that, although it provides a decent description of the sound of the music, rarely can music be so pigeonholed as to be put into a place that is so pre-defined. It also leads music fans to gravitate towards more music similar to what they already have heard rather than expanding their sonic horizons. I would never be the player I am today if I had this kind of mentality towards music “I like hard house but not deep house”. My approach through Progtronica is to take all of my influences and boil them into one succinct concept. Other than the basic forms of “electronic dance music” I have always has a secret love of progressive “math rock” and have played some form of that kind of music in many of my bands over the years. I had been looking for a way to do a tribute to this affinity in a Progtronica performance (mainly for my own self pleasure) since the beginning of the project. I can play a little guitar but mostly for making weird sonic feedback textures but then I found a secret weapon: the iPhone pocket guitar combined with Ableton Live 8’s new “Amp” and “Cabinet” effects. So I made this little ditty, switching from 7/8 to 6/8 with interweaving Don Caballero/King Crimson guitar lines all remixed live while playing the drums. This is a little bit different then my other recent videos but I like how it turned out and I’m sure you won’t find anyone using Ableton quite this way anywhere else.

Happy 2011 From Progtronica “Rumbling Sleep”

Nigel — Fri, 14 Jan 2011 19:00:04 +0000

2011 is upon us and I couldn’t be happier about it. Don’t get me wrong, 2010 was far from a bad year, but the challenges, distractions, and relentless work load has lead to a perfect time for a reboot. Despite this need, I am very proud of where things have gone for Progtronica in the past 12 months. Last January the concept was just beginning to take an initial form, but needed time and experimentation to find what shape the project would end up taking. I wish I had more time this past year but learned to make the absolute most of what I had and along with molding what has become the Progtronica project, I have also refined my theory of creativity through speedy production. All too often in my musical live I have found myself in great creative projects that ended up losing all their momentum by constant tinkering to the point where no one involved liked what they heard anymore and all perspective was lost. I have taken the opposite approach: focusing on bringing an idea to some sort of finished piece in as quick a time as I possibly can, almost like a game. This often leads to things being rough around the edges, but at least I have something to show for the original idea before it is lost in creative oblivion. Nearly all of the videos I produced this past year (around 20) have been done in a single day from tracking the individual sounds, to the final video editing. What I have found consistently is that I have much more perspective on the music after a couple of weeks have gone by, and I’m usually much happier with it than I was mid-process. The main lesson for me is that the first idea is usually best, and if it isn’t I won’t come up with a better one until some time has passed and I can look/listen back to it with fresh ears and eyes.

The other aspect of what I have been doing that has become more clear to me over this past year is exactly what kind of performance I am after. Sometimes I have been working towards full Ableton controlled laptop performance using just a computer and controllers to make all the music. There are lots of aspects to this approach I find appealing and challenging. For one thing, there is very little actual gear I need to bring with me to make an immense amount of live improvised sound. Also It brings me more into the realms of the digital DJ world opening my music up to a much different audience more interested in the dance floor than the performer. This gives me the opportunity to slip my own creative ideas into a setting that might not be used to it, but is ready to hear it nonetheless. After working hard at this for most of the year though, I started bringing the focus back to my main skill, playing the drums, and using Ableton to create something of a futuristic one man band. For live performance this would bring me into different sorts of venues being that much more equipment is necessary (I can’t really set up a kit in a DJ booth) but it also has proved to be one of the more unique musical statements I have made and has regularly been met with an “I’ve never seen anything quite like that before” response which I must say I like.

In the end what I have settled on is doing a little bit of both. My goal for 2011 is not only to bring the Progtronica show to a live stage/club but to be able to do a show that works in a House club, or a rock concert and anything in-between (I’m going to try to stay away from the state fair circuit). With the freshness of the new year passing, I hope that I will be doing just that in the near future.

Cheers and Happy New Year!

Progtronica Weekly Set #4

Nigel — Sun, 21 Feb 2010 20:25:48 +0000

Progtronica Ableton Live/Novation Launchpad weekly dj set. 2-11-20 by Progtronica

This week’s performance is the longest to date and has the most aggressive time signature changes. Here is the YouTube edit of the performance. To see the full thing visit this Vimeo link. Also I have provided the full audio to listen to here and download for free from soundcloud.

In other news, I’ve been experimenting with Ableton live’s “looper”effect which is loaded with live performance possibilities, but is also a tricky little animal. For those familiar with Ableton, a looper effect almost seems redundant since the whole program is based on looping. The effect, however, is a totally independent effect that works more like a “boomerang” guitar effect looper but is quantized to the tempo of the song. Using it I was able to do this little experiment creating a track with live layered drums. I haven’t yet totally figured out hot to have total control of this feature but I think is will work it’s way into my regular performance arsenal being that it is so dope nasty.

Progtronica Weekly Ableton DJ Series week 3. This Week with Live Drums.

Nigel — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 02:46:09 +0000

Progtronica Ableton Live Weekly DJ set Week 3, 2/11/10 by Progtronica

Performed on February 11th 2010, this is the 3rd installment of My “Progtronica Weekly Dj Performance Series”. All music created using Ableton live, mixed, re-sampled, edited, and mixed live using Novation’s Launchpad dedicated Ableton controller. This mix features the songs “The Beat Repeater” “Dreaming (feat beatboxing by Taylor McFerrin, Ryat and Shara Dae on vocals)”, “Progtronica 1 (with a small Cinematic Orchestra sample)”, and “Rolling with Strings” all from the upcoming album: “Progtronica – Live From Nowhere” due out later this spring. All the drum parts are recorded live me, then sampled, edited, and re-mixed. However, for this weeks broadcast there is some “real” live drumming mixed in to a couple of the tunes. All Live, all solo, all Raw! Progtronia weekly DJ Series 2010!

Progtronica Weekly DJ series part 2!

Nigel — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 19:39:42 +0000

Progtronica weekly Ableton DJ set part 2 – 2/4/10 by Progtronica

Here it is! Part 2 of the weekly Progtronica DJ series. This one is a little bit longer then the first one and incorporates a few new tunes. Featured in This week’s performance I mixed the tunes “Drum n bass for a Rainy day”, “Lets Face the music”, “Rolling with Strings” “Progtronica 2″ and part of “Progtronica 1″. The video in this post contains highlights from the 16 minute performance because with the restrictions of YouTube, I can only post 10 minutes of material. To hear the entire set click on the sound cloud player directly below the video. You can also download the mix for free. To do this simply click on the downward pointing arrow on the right of the waveform! Enjoy

Progtronica Weekly Dj Set Series Begins

Nigel — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 06:22:22 +0000

For the past 6 months or so I have been creating “Progtronica” tracks as solo performances using Ableton Live software and a few different controllers most notably the Novation Launchpad which has completely changed my musical approach. I have been creating music usually centering around samples of my own drumming mixed with found sounds musically based and otherwise, then manipulated them, re-sampled them, and arraigning them so that I could make live interpretations of my own composed music. I have been publishing these solo tracks as single song entities here on this site and on youtube, Vimeo, and now on Soundcloud where the tracks can be download for free (for the time being). The tracks I have compiled are in the process of being mixed, mastered and will soon be available as an album: Progtronica- Live From Nowhere.

My other main goal however, has been to find a way to perform more then just one track at a time, but to mix them together as a DJ and put on full sets of this music, complete with time signature and tempo changes. I have tried out several different techniques that all had some flaws in execution, but recently I had a lesson with LA based Ableton guru Thavius Beck who gave me a few key pointers that totally opened my mind to an approach that works. Many thanks to Thavius for giving me a few key pointers and understanding completely what I was going after. That was the first “music” lesson I had had in years!

So now I’m hard at work re-arraigning my tracks into one mega set that I can take into clubs and bring a totally new face and sound to electronica/breakbeat/drum n’ bass/ downtempo/whatever. In the meantime I am starting weekly DJ set broadcasts, the first of which is featured here with the full set available on soundcloud for streaming and free download! Performed on January 30 2010 on a full moon, this is the first full dj style Progtronica mashup. Featuring 5 songs from the upcoming Progtronica Album, ‘American Dream”, Progtronica 2, “Rolling with Strings”, “Progtronica, and “Lets Face the Music” are all mixed together live using Novation’s Launchpad.

Progtronica “Full Moon” dj style mega mix live 1/30/10 by Progtronica

This one is about 15 minutes long and is my first real attempt but I’m going to be doing these every week so in a little while this stuff should get pretty crazy. I also plan to get some live drums involved but for now I can create amazingly vast music with just my Laptop, a couple wires, and 2 little controllers. Kind of nice for a guy who’s lugged around a huge drum set, samplers, and midi controllers for years. Stay tuned…

The Beat Repeater video and Tutorial from Progtronica

Nigel — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 17:55:19 +0000

Over the winter break I spent time experimenting with mapping different effects on the Novation Launchpad using Ableton Live and stumbled upon this great technique to alter audio (mostly drum) loops live using this effect in real time using only the launchpad. It inspired me to create the video “The Beat Repeater” which featured this effect as well as some live drumming and many of my other Progtronica techniques.
After posting it I got many twitter inquiries on how I was executing this so I just posted this tutorial on just my special Progtronica Novation Launchpad “beat repeat” technique which will allow you to freak the beatz in real time a la squarepusher. Here is both the original video and the tutorial.

"The Imaginative Executioner solo" Live w/ Grandfather Ridiculous 5/03

Nigel — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:15:48 +0000

This is a great old video I dug up playing my “Last of the Imaginative Executioners” drum ‘n bass drum solo that I used to play with Grandfather Ridiculous in the 2003 era. There are not a lot of good video’s at all of that band so this is kind of a cool time capsule. This was from a show at a club in downtown NYC called Tribeka and was probably one of that last times I performed this solo. the video kind of shows the infancy stage of the progtronica project I’m working on now. At this point I was using a Roland MC-909 sampler/sequencer with a electronic kick and Roland midi drum trigger along with my acoustic drums.

"Dreaming" feat. Taylor McFerrin, Shara Dae, and Ryat (Update!) New Launchpad Remix added

Nigel — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 19:30:54 +0000

Just added to this post is the last of my 4 part video series of Novation Launchpad live remixes of the music from some of my films produced in the last few months. Now you can see my live performance of “Dreaming” using the Novation Launchpad to arrange all the parts live, and the original film.

This is the first music video production from my new Long Beach studio, live drums and video by me, and featuring the Beatboxing skills of Taylor McFerrin as well as vocals from Philadelphia area vocalists Ryat, (as Human) and Shara Dae. The music was almost entirely written and produced on a quick coast to coast trip from California to Philadelphia for a old friend’s wedding, mostly on the many connecting flights and train rides. Following the slamming reception, extended after party, and impromptu late night hotel break-in pool party, I got these 3 artists to come back to my hotel room to lay down some of their stuff along to the semi abstract 7/8 Drum and bass piece I was working on. After getting home, I did a little mixing and editing, then re-recorded the drums live. The results are what you see here.