No, this isn’t about me; no, this isn’t a cover of a similarly named Billy Idol track. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let’s talk about what this is: a full-blooded, unapologetic dance track that’s not going to require you to understand some odd geeky concept, like several of my other songs do…
I feel lucky to have had this song included in the second album in “The Four Seasons of Bonk Wave” series, entitled “A Midsummer Bonk’s Dream (1)“.
The inspiration for this song, in my usual feel requirements, is something along the lines of one of Shingo Nakamura’s oeuvres. Lots of synths, bass with a bit of oomph, satisfying, but somewhat predicable, chord progressions, and some sweet but essentially meaningless lyrics. This is head-down, late-night boppy stuff, no thinking required.
As for the sounds, well, I’ve long owned GForce’s impOSCar virtual synth, having played with an original OSC Oscar synth in a music shop in Oxford back when it first appeared in the early 80s. However, I’d not really paid it much attention (yes, having too many synth plugins is a problem). GForce released version 3, a very nice upgrade that grabbed my attention. Its arpeggiator, filters, polyphony, built-in effects, and all-round gnarliness just needed to be unleashed in lavish quantities, so here we are.
impOSCar3 is responsible for the bass, two pads, and a twinkly arpeggiator. The strummy guitar is by UJAM’s Amber2 virtual guitarist that I also used on “Pair programming”.
Bass and Drums are played by Logic’s usual players, with some manual overrides. Vocals are by Synthesizer V, as usual, but using the basic “Mai” voice database, which I used on “AI Girlfriend” for its wonderful squeaky artificiality. I’ve toned that down by pitching it lower and pushing the gender and tension sliders around appropriately. The repeat of the chorus has the more believable Solaria II voice on the backing vocal.
I came up with the main chord progression while just noodling about, and then asked Claude to suggest some alternative sections. There’s not a great deal of variation, but no worries, we’re just out to make a bangin’ choon.
To keep things interesting, I learned all about Logic’s Remix FX. This plugin has some fairly basic controls for filtering, repeating, gating, bitcrushing that are individually outdone by other plugins, but they are all in one place, are very easy to use and to automate, making things very dynamic.
There is a lot of automation in this song: filter sweeps, pans, levels, reverb sends, plus all the swirly goodness that the Remix FX plugin provides. This is squarely in the genre of BT’s “Movement in Still Life”, which has production values I can only aspire to, but it’s all just for fun. Now go boogie, by yourself or otherwise!
It doesn’t mean I’m lonely
when I’m dancing by myself.
I’m happy when I’m dancing,
I don’t need your help.
My night-times are for dancing;
you can’t take that away.
Dancing is for everyone,
but you don’t have to stay.
If you like this song, please consider supporting me by buying my albums on Bandcamp, and sharing links to my music on your socials.
One Reply to “Dancing by myself”