Danie Nel Music - Stone

I wrote this tune about 19 years ago! Alice in Chains Unplugged was on my player a lot back then. I think that might've influenced the grunge chord progression and slightly demure mood!

It is a song, mainly about Christ and his sacrifice and suffering on our behalf, but now, looking back, I think the metaphors might be stretched and vague in some areas of the song, but it works in the phrasing and that's what I felt then, so I didn't feel like rewriting it. It is what it is.

The acoustic guitar bit is exactly like I wrote it back then, in my flat in Goodwood, Nevside 26, Spencer Street. (My song "My Plek" from Painting with Light is about that flat). As I started recording I wasn't sure if I was gonna go slow, or fast with arrangement, heavy or stripped down, but given electric guitars and time, I will lean to adding more and more guitars, most of the time.

I really really enjoyed writing and playing this solo. I doubt I'll get it exactly right again. It took literally about 50 different takes and I got the final down at something like 2:30am one morning, almost 18 months ago! Yes, this song has taken almost 2 years to record in it entirety.

Up to this morning I was still contemplating re-recording the vocals, and trying to write a better melody, but I feel like this song has existed long enough to warrant no further structural and basic changes. 

Anyways, enjoy listening to it, share it with your friends, download it and burn it on discs, make mix-tapes and just go wild.

Instrumental version to follow soon.

Vortex One....?

I've briefly mentioned where the name of the "label", Vortex Afternoon, comes from, but actually, the whole era of electronic music I made in the late 90's, I labelled as "Vortex One". Why "Vortex One"? I couldn't think of a cooler name, or something like that, I suppose. I was 17 when I started.

My brother came home from university one holiday, and on his kick-butt 486 (pre-Pentium days) machine with a Genius sound-card, was a program called "Impulse Tracker";  a mod-tracking programme in the vein of Mod Tracker and later, Windows versions like "Fast Tracker" etc. Some who are in the know might remember "Future Crew", "Enigma" (my brother's name) and a bunch of others, who featured in this underground music scene. You can read about the software, here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impulse_Tracker. Come to think of it, he first arrived with Scream Tracker, and I very well might've written and composed my first songs ever, on Scream Tracker. In time - probably a couple of months, we ended up doing our thing on Impulse Tracker, due to it's superior workflow. I still wish modern tracking programs, or midi, could be this easy.

Herewith a screen-shot of Impulse Tracker:

 

And the pre-cursor of Impulse Tracker, Scream Tracker.

 

As you can see, it was like staring at The Matrix. However, it's actually deceptively simple, intuitive and quite powerful, once you understand the basics. It's pretty much a drum machine, with more sounds. Some of the music composed then still rivals any of today's uber-electro-compositions in terms of complexity and quality.

Tracking consisted of using sound and instrument samples and programming the notes and effects into a scrolling tab. A bit like midi. The samples in our case were ripped from other peoples .IT files, the native file format in which these compositions were saved. It opened as a project, and you had access to all the bits and bobs in it.

In my case, most of the samples were 8-bit, but some guys were next level and was doing 16-bit. Because of the lack of guitar samples and way to use it, this music gravitated towards dance, and post-rock type styles, highly progressive in some cases. I did manage to record some guitar on a pc-mic and integrated bits into the music, as in "Serious News". That line I was playing around with on my 12-string President, and I ended up recording a single middle-C note from the guitar, and used the program to program the arpeggio I have been playing on the guitar. The quality, understandably, is not fantastic. Nowadays people use effects-pedals to get a guitar sounding that bad, mind you.

But enough about the intricacies of the software we used. Let's talk songs.

Next time.

Danie Nel - "Hosea Said" Official Music Video

 

 

I decided to re-edit some old footage I had from 2011, of my song "Hosea Said" from the 2006 "Painting with Light" album. Hopefully it looks a bit better now in full HD!

Crashtackle - Hammerfall

So, in the spirit of the new endeavour, I thought I'd add, as posts, various different videos regarding my music.

This one is from Crashtacke - Hammerfall. My second ever release from Crashtackle.

I shot everything, by myself, recorded everything, by myself, and programmed the drums, and played and sung everything else... by myself. This is as DIY as it gets, baby. Even released...

You can get this tune on iTunes or direct from CDBaby:

...or just watch it over and over on YouTube!

If you feel like downloading it for free (times are tough and if my tune can make you smile, then have it for free), and promise to tell others about it (read TWITTER, FACEBOOK, INSTAGRAM, GOOGLE+ AND EVERY OTHER MEANS POSSIBLE), then go here:

JAMENDO

Music by Danie Nel and Crashtackle.

So, finally a dedicated, yet consolidated account to the different musical musings and projects of Danie Nel, Crashtackle and who knows what else.

Why the name? Vortex Afternoon is the name of a 8-bit electronic tune I released in the late 90's during the mod-tracking craze. It was all instrumental, but it was cool to write poems to accompany your track. I wrote "Vortex Afternoon" as a somewhat sublime, surreal take on the tune I had composed. One strange afternoon in my flat in Goodwood, Cape Town.

The "album" or collection of releases was also called "Vortex One". Listen or stream for free here:



Well, anyways, this will be the new home, almost like a "label" for the music that I'm setting free into the world, with discussion, links, videos and the like.

I hope to see you back here soon. I will also be discussing recording, instruments and the like, whatever really shakes my tree, and encourage your input. I'm also creating a Youtube Channel for all this content, so watch this space!