Nigel Sifantus » V-Drums

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.

I write a song…”For Soul”

Nigel — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 06:15:03 +0000

For the past year since I’ve been on this Progtronica quest, I’ve had the compositional approach of beginning with the idea of “What if I did this?” A lot of great music has been written with this type of inspiration, trying to figure out something one doesn’t know and then making a musical statement out of the trial and discovery. This has been especially true for me with computer based music as there is always so much to learn and infinite ways to approach the same ideas. Ableton Live as a program exacerbates this even further with the flexibility of the compositional, programming and performing platform. Everyone does things differently, often producing similar results.

For this track however, I set about writing a simple house tune stringing a few chords together as more of a keyboard exercise, getting back in touch with a little of my music theory roots. After a while I liked what I was playing and tracked the simplest part of the track. Then the magic of the arpeggiator kicked in and I started applying all of the usual techniques I have been working on, slicing, dicing, mixing, and remixing and finally performing. In the end it has a different sound than most of what I’ve been doing while keeping the same Progtronica characteristics.

Many thanks to the people at Matrixsynth.com and especially Synthtopia.com who made it their “Sunday Synth Jam”, writing a nice introduction to the video. Props to all who link and anything I do.

The debut Progtronica EP “Live For No One” is out and available for free preview!

Nigel — Sat, 23 Oct 2010 19:01:49 +0000

The time has finally come. The long awaited Progronica debut Ep has been officially released. In the coming weeks it will be available for all to purchase on iTunes, Amazon, Rhapsody, Napster, and a host of other sites. In the meantime, I’m offering to preview and download for free the entire album. Check it out, pass it along, and watch out for the live Progtronica show coming to a venue near you.

Creativity has a way of coming in waves

Nigel — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 04:09:42 +0000

Well I must say it has been a powerful and challenging month…better make that 6 months…okay the entire past year. My will as well as all those around me has been tested, the limits of exhaustion have been met and surpassed, tough decisions have been made, and emotions have been raw. As a result creativity has had a way of coming in waves. First crashing so hard it is hard to keep riding, than rolling back leaving me with the sometimes confusing decision of where to go next. Right now, however, all things are starting fresh and in this I have absolutely no doubt. I may have proclaimed myself an atheist, but I still believe in synchronicity, and that patterns and coincidences do exist and they can lead us in the right directions if we pay attention. This is my own version of “everything happens for a reason” which I don’t believe is exactly the case. What I do believe in is logic and the possibility of order when the combination of people, nature, and machines work together in harmony. It is in these situations that humans are capable of what seems impossible, and it is in these cases that coincidences and “signs” seem to pop up all around. Recently has certainly been one of those times.

With that being said, I’ve been hard at work finishing up the debut Progtronica album. We have a cover, most of the tracks are done, and I’m just deciding whether I want to add some of the new things I’ve been working on. Here are my two most recent video/tracks, both with a different feel and tempo then where my comfort zone usually resides. This has not been a time for “comfort zones” anyway.
This first one is called “Five Four on the Floor”, a house track in 5/5 with a kind of Brazilian feel. I’m mixing 7 tracks in Ableton Live using the Novation Launchpad while playing the drums live. No post production on this, fully live.

This second one is a live remix of my recent track “Candle that Burns From Both Ends”. On this one I decided to film it outside at sunset with no power cables used at all. The controllers are running off the computer’s battery through USB and I’m hearing the sound from a boombox. Ableton Live Anywhere!

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.