Pedals and effects, Effects and pedals

Effects sounds surround us every time we listen to music. Some people wonder whether there is actually enough physical playing going on or are the effects just taking everything over. I'm hear to tell you: who cares? Music is music, regardless of how many effects are used. It takes knowledge, talent, and musicality to be able to fit the effects in the right way. If one were to just jam a ton of effects onto a garbage piece of music, it'd still remain the same thing. So, I'm here to tell you a little about what effects pedals Ryan Cross and Tolik Sirotinsky use in Righteous Love.

On the left is Ryan Cross...i's setup.
Left to Right:
1. Strymon Big Sky Reverberator
2. Strymon Timeline Delay
3. Walrus Audio Janus Fuzz/Tremolo
4. JHS Superbolt
5. Boss PS-5 Pitch Shifter
6. TC Electronics Polytune mini

He just recently got a Walrus Audio Voyager
(Not Pictured) But, such is the ownership of pedalboards. They are never really done, always a work in progress. Trying out new pedals is always great.
Tolik Sirotinsky's setup on the right. (sorry for the terrible angle)
Left to Right, Upper to Lower.
1. Strymon BlueSky Reverberator
2. Strymon El Capistan Tape Machine
3.TC Electronics Flashback X4 Delay
4. Boss VB-2 Vibrato
5. Dunlop Volume Pedal
6. TC Electronics Polytune mini
7. Xotic Effects EP Booster
8. Dwarfcraft... Unknown.. Boost/Fuzz
9. Mojohand FX The Rook Overdrive
10. Boss PS-6 Harmonist
11. Dwarfcraft The Internet
12. Line 6 M9 (Modded by JHV3)
13. Barber Trifecta Fuzz
( I no longer have the Boss VB-2 Vibrato nor the Barber Trifecta, replaced the trifecta with a Walrus Audio Deep Six Compressor.)

Practice space oh practice space, where art thou?

Again, being a indie/post-rock band has difficulties, and those difficulties sure haven't hesitated to present themselves. Finding a place to practice is now more difficult than ever before. The places that used to accept our practice are now unavailable and Righteous Love is left with no good places to practice. On top of our lack of a 'space' schedules are conflicting more than ever, of course this is understandable as its the end of the semester and my band mates have all sorts of things going on. I, Tolik Sirotinsky, have tons of coursework to be completed on top of playing at 'the russian church'. Ryan, Seth and Jordan are busy playing at churches all around town and handsome Zach is off doin Zach stuff.
Although this news seems very uninteresting and unexciting, its the harsh reality we're facing. Only until we find a reliable place to practice can we actually record, when we record we will have a product, and after we have a product we can promote it and perform live.

Elektron Synthesis

 The synthesizer. An instrument that uses audible waveform synthesis to create musical sounds. The modern synthesizer comes in various shapes, sizes, and prices. Synthesis has also changed ridiculous amounts in the past 100+ years. Starting from electronics engineers creating little buzzers that produced nothing more than buzzing noises into our digitally controlled machines that can imitate every instrument ever created; Synthesizers have now become their own instruments rocketing the musician into ethereal realms that were once unreachable. I've had a background in computers and electronic gadgetry for as long as I can remember, so naturally, I just want to share my newest obsession with
Elektron's machines. These synthesizers look like some sort of spaceship console, definitely not the average platform typically associated with music creation. But, these machines are actually very musical in nature. Their interface is and parameter controls are all digital, meaning, software programming is written to house the ways to change or create sounds. Although, the controls themselves are digital, the sounds are all generated the classic way, analog synthesis. You have all sorts of mathematical electronic connections being made inside the unit as opposed to using samples of audio.
Because of the analog synthesis Elektron machines have a very classic sound. Thick lush and expansive sound that can be manipulated very easily with the provided digital controls. What used to take substantial amounts of time things such as: recording manipulations when turning knobs, now takes seconds and is all programmed into the sequencer where it can be looped and further
manipulated/perfected ad-infinite.

Check out what I'm into

#Elektron

Righteous Love: a current tabloid

What's happening with Righteous Love you may ask?

Things. The Handsome Zach Howard is busy being engaged and planning a wedding. 

Ryan Cross, Seth Howard, Jordan Cross, and Tolik Sirotinsky are arranging instrumentation and practicing what they write. 

https://soundcloud.com/righteous-love/who-cares

I little tid-bit of what we've been writing in our practice dungeon. 

Righteous Love is exploring the different avenues each of its band members can provide. 

We want to make music that is awe-inspiring yet something that you can listen to timelessly and whenever. 

This snippet provides just one image of what our band does.

Back to current news: Righteous Love doesn't have any shows booked. We don't have a budget to buy equipment to record, and our practice space doesn't allow us to play anytime desired. And such is the life of an indie-post-rock band. 

Much like this black abyss, it seems like the future is grim. At least to the writer of this blog. There is the possibility of future stability, but until our lead vocalist is able to dedicate time and the band is able to find a place to practice/record we are pressured into a life of circumstance. 

A Tangent, Nonetheless

Speaking of tangents. I, the writer of this blog, aka: Tolik Sirotinsky, would like to go on an aside momentarily. Aside from the music with Righteous Love, I enjoy dabbling in my own solo stuff. I do have some uninteresting recordings on Youtube just like every wannabe musician. But more importantly I have some slightly less interesting yet more accessible music on soundcloud.

www.soundcloud.com/toliksirotinsky

In music I enjoy exploration. Exploring myself within music; exploring musical realms: sound design, tonality, and engineering; and exploring physical and meta-physical places as well. Music takes on a really interesting physical and non-physical existence in our world and deserves exploration just like our oceans and space. I still love pop music, dancing music, groove music, classical music, and occasionally appreciate things in all genres. But exploration is so much more important! I imagine it being selfish to take something that has been done millions of times before you and uninterestingly rip it off for a new audience. Our musical siren doesn't experience anything new from that, she isn't interested, it's similar to going to an ex. You don't want that contact or those feelings/experiences anymore than you want to see that ex.
So why do people continually make music that is just more of the same?
We could talk about pop and dance music, but those are somewhat givens, of course with exceptions.
But I wanna look at indie riff-rock. Are you kidding me, this is the same exact thing and song without variation from artist. These bands and their albums are getting positive reviews also. WHAT?!?  WHY!?!
It's as if people reviewing them and listening to them haven't heard the same album years before it, explore a different genre for the sake of our muse!!
Blend a different genre into what you're currently doing, experiment with different instruments, change your approach, listen to different types of music, and read. These things are all integral parts of writing and playing music why not actually do them?

Influences: Who are they?

As the person writing this blog, I will talk about my main influences.
When talking about influences it's important to mention anything that inspires or attracts you. Personally, I've been influenced greatly by multi-instrumentalist and composer, John Frusciante. I'm proud of being able to mention Frusciante as an influence because he's well versed and has experienced just about everything music.

In light of recent events, i'm drawn to mention the release of his newest solo album: Enclosure. The album is officially released April 8th, 2014, BUT was actually ROCKETED off into space March 31st, 2014 in order to launch the JF-14 app allowing one to stream the entire album once the satellite made contact with your device. This is a revolutionary launch as it's the first of its kind and the buzz created by it is surely to catch the media off guard, much like the music.

His music on this album marks the end of a Frusciantian era. Frusciante has these sections of time where he will stick to certain ideals of his imagination. He will imagine, create, write, and produce the pinnacle of his musical thoughts for that point in time, "Enclosure" marks that point. Looking back, "The Empyrean" (2009) was a close for a certain era, as well as "Curtains" (2005), and in ways "To Record Only Water For Ten Days" (2001) was also a close to his first two solo albums. These eras are all defined by certain qualities and sounds Frusciante was interested in exploring. While the music does differ drastically in sound quality, instrumentation, and focus the concepts somehow continue into his next phase of musical exploration just taking on a different form. For example, looking way back at Enter An Uh... off "Smile From The Streets You Hold" (1997), the melodies and physical way of playing is somewhat emulated in the way Frusciante programs synthesizers on his 4 latest avante-garde synth-pop/hip-hop albums. You can hear the growth and maturation of his musical ideas completely. Back in 1997 he was exploring sounds that he wanted to make on just his guitar. Flash forward to 2009-2014 he can finally bring these conceptual experimental ways of playing his guitar to instruments more suited as well as trying new things with the guitar, raw vocals, and sound engineering/design.

I admire Frusciante because of his ballsy philosophy toward musical exploration and self-realization. He makes the art that he wants to make and what more defines an artist?