Posts

Announcement Time! Just a short post to say that within the last couple of weeks I have signed to Monochrome Motif to produce a new album in the same vein as Kintovia II, but better! This Kintovia II, but more like Tired Bones - I know right! I want to say a huge thank you to Mario, Troisnyx, OnlyTheHost and CosmicBos, without whom these events wouldn’t have taken place. A special thank you also to Andrew from Monochrome Motif, who has been absolutely stellar at answering all my weird questions and making the process incredibly painless....

Education is important Tutorials are important. There is absolutely nothing wrong with gaining knowledge on subjects, and having someone explain the process you are trying to perform, be it in written form, or in a video, is extremely important and worthwhile. Lately though, I have found myself in a kind of loop. It’s almost like hitting the snooze button. Instead of ‘getting up’ and getting to work, I instead sat there consuming more more and more tutorials....

Nothing wrong with being perfect, am I right? “Would someone notice if I made this change or not? (Not, would I notice?)”Hi. I’m Cobey, and I used to be a dedicated perfectionist. Perfectionism, for me, wasn’t just something I did now and then; I was a serial perfectionist. Everything I did had to be absolutely pristine. I strived for hours on each project, sanding hair thicknesses off, trimming tolerances to the nth degree, all so that when I sat back, I could say, “This project could not be improved upon; at all....

“It's so easy to get caught up in the numbers game and to feel like you're not good enough or that your music isn't worth sharing.” A quiet void… As a new composer, writing and producing your own music can be an exciting and rewarding experience. However, it can also be incredibly disheartening to upload your fresh new track on Spotify, Bandcamp and the like, only to receive no plays, no shares, and no feedback....

Introduction As an amateur composer with a full-time job and family responsibilities, finding time to pursue my passion for music can be a real challenge. However, I’ve learned that with a different approach, it’s possible to make the most of my precious studio time. By taking a deliberate and strategic approach to the creative process, I’ve been able to optimize my available time and make real progress on my projects, even in the face of competing demands on my attention and energy....

When I was young… When I first started composing, I had already completed grades 1-5 of the ABRSM music exams for piano. However, I am pretty sure I had not taken the separate music theory exam. I composed largely by ear, with only a basic understanding of chords and scales. When writing songs, I usually chose a key, typically C or G, and stuck to the diatonic chords present in the key, occasionally adding a dominant seventh....

Basic premise The Fall of Weyn (feat. Joshua Taipale) by cbx33 The Fall of Weyn is my latest track and it was an absolute blast to compose and produce. It’s a track that’s been in my head for over a year, going around and around. I was playing with the main theme for Kintovia II one day and gave a minor version a try and then decided to just see where it went, originally just singing it into a voice recorder app....

A little problem It’s time to announce - over the next few days/week you’ll notice a shift from me from using my old pseudonym cbx33, to my new one Cobey Rokes. It was a very hard thing to do, and I agonised over it a lot. cbx33 has been with me for a very long time, but the truth was it was not memorable, nor did it stand out. Most of my friends had to ask me for links to my pages, songs etc, and visually it was just too short and got lost....

I wanted to talk about the Post-Release Depressive Death Spiral, something which I feel a lot of new and seasoned composers struggle with. What do I mean by the Post-Release Depressive Death Spiral? Read on. I think when we’re composing music we build it up in our minds. Sometimes, we build it up to a point where we think, “This is going to be the track that defines me”. We’ve worked so hard on it, often for days, weeks or even months and we build up this track to be something extraordinary....

I’ve been working in the Open Source community now for a long time. It all started around 2004 after I graduated from university studying Acoustical Engineering and started working in web development for a small firm. (Nothing related to music or acoustics - I know. I’ll save that for another post.) I used Red Hat 9 on my desktop and quickly moved through Fedora Core 1 to 4. It felt great....