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Centre Number:
Candidate Number:
Centre Name:
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Area of Study: 3
Initial Intentions (this must include intended choice of resources):
I have decided to compose my club dance track in the style of late 80s acid house. Acid House.
I will set the tempo at around 120BPM, as most acid was around this tempo mark. I will also
keep a simple 4/4 time signature, making the track easy to dance to. After listening to many
examples of 80's acid house from both sides of the Atlantic, I have decided I want to layer the
drums in my track to create the same fat and full sounding texture heard on those examples. I
also want to create heavy bass lines that are played through fat and squelchy synth sounds,
with distorted, flanging and filtering effects to give achieve an authentic acid house feel. In
acid house there are often vocal and sound effect samples, so I will aim to find some samples
which will suit this genre from films and records. Overall, I mainly want to make references
towards a late 80's sound with this track, but also want to make use of a few beats and sounds
which will also add a bit of a contemporary edge. I'm going to use an iMac to compose my
piece, using the software "Logic 9".
Progress
Jan
14th
Jan
21st
Notes/Advice
given/Targets
Given that your bass line
and (and other parts which
will follow) is programmed,
I'd say the higher synth part
could do with some editing
to get the timing sounding
tighter against the
quantized parts, and give
your track more of an
electronic feel.
Jan
28th
Feb 4th
Feb
11th
Remember to include
speech samples that have a
rhythmic, almost rap like
element to them as well as
just spoken sentences, as
this is one of acid house's
traits.
Feb
18th
Mar
4th
Mar
11th
Mar
18th
Mar
25th
Apr 1st
Evaluation of piece
I think my piece fits the acid house genre pretty well. The bass line in particular, with its
gradual filtered effect, plays a big part in giving my composition that acid house feel. The
bass line changing octave at bar 58 and bar 86 is probably the most effective point of my
composition, creating a noticeable but still relevant change. The 2nd factor that helps it fit
into the acid house genre is the vocal samples. If you listen closely, you can even hear the
crackle at the start of some of the samples, just as you would on original acid tracks from the
80s. I also really like the layered sound of the drum parts, and think the open hi-hat sound is
pretty unique. It serves the function of the off beat house hi-hat, but with a sound that's a
little more industrial or white-noise like.I found it difficult to keep creating new parts for my
composition as most Acid House is continuous and repetitive, using loops and lasting an
average of 8 minuets, but without the need to change in the way a pop song might.
Therefore, it took more work to think of new parts, and I think for an Acid House track, it has
a lot in it. One of the problems I faced was that because I had so many sounds going on at
once, they would drown each other out, giving me problems when trying to bring new parts
in, which made mixing the piece a challenge. But overall, I think my piece is successful as a
dance track.