EDIT: How on earth does this have 2000 views? DOUBLE EDIT: Now it has over 8000. I give up.

TRIPLE EDIT: OVER 9000!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If you want to listen to more cool tunes, follow me on Newgrounds: http://johnfn.newgrounds.com/follow

May as well tell you to follow me on soundcloud too https://soundcloud.com/johnfn

NGADM Finals!

The title is referring to a metaphorical battle, not a literal one. The fight against insecurity and complacency.

4.5 days, 40 hours, 5 cups of coffee, 3 Ableton crashes, 900 patterns (but most of them are drum slices - probably something closer to 200 unique patterns), and an uncountable amount of automation.

Notes

0. Before even bothering to read this, go check out Steampianist's stuff. It will bowl you over.
1. Welp, it's the last round. I was listening to the final round pieces from last NGADM and I was like "dang, these are amazing," and I wanted to do something special because it's the final round. So I took my electronica ideas from before and added EVEN MORE NOTES. Then I made everything explode. Then I automated literally every parameter of everything.
2. I am so pleased with this song. I would call it my favorite, and I'm so glad that I was able to enjoy this piece in particular (since it's a contest piece and all) so much. For a long time I thought it was only okay, but I kept pushing on it and pushing on it.
3. 2:37 is probably my best melody.
4. I came up with that melody at 2AM, like 4 hours before the deadline, and it made the whole song fall together. Why can't this sort of thing happen earlier?!?
5. All sounds synthesized by me in the second half. In the first half I'm just using some stock famitracker waveforms. :)
6. If you're hearing random white noise, that's because I'm using the demo version of dblue glitch. LOL. I'm poor. ;.;
7. By day 4 this song was invading my dreams.
8. I've noticed a really curious pattern in my NGADM songs: the longer I've spent working on them, the shorter they are. This pattern is 100% accurate. I spent the least time on the traveller and the most time on this song.
9. I probably spent more time on 3:21 - 3:33 than any other part in the song. Getting those glitches to work correctly was really difficult.
10. If someone woulda told me that I would make it all the way to the finals when I first started NGADM, I would have laughed at them. I wasn't even sure if I would make auditions.
11. WHEN ARE YOU MODS GONNA ADD THAT CHIPTUNE SECTION JESUS
12. One final thank you to the judges for making this awesome event happen. Judges, if you are ever in San Francisco, PM me and I'll buy you a beer. Or coffee or whatever. (I'm starting to realize that burying this in a tl;dr wall of text is probably not the best idea.)

I'm so happy to be done. Also so tired.

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P.S. One last story, and then I'll stop talking. Promise.

When I was working on my NGADM2 piece "inside the machine" my 10 year old cousin was in the same house and wanted to know what I was working on. I told here I was writing a song, so she naturally wanted to listen to it. But I was like "pff she won't like this crazy electronic thing", so I played her another song I wrote called Market Town which is nice happy orchestral.

But she wasn't having any of it because she knew that wasn't the song I was working on. So I played her the actual song, still not expecting her to like it at all. She was quiet when she listened to it, and when it was over she was like "wow, this is like crazy alien music!" She spent the rest of the night making weird alien noises.