So I'm still ridiculously busy, but since I've got time for a breather, I thought I'd post this story I heard the other day:

A friend of mine was on the road, listening to my music (Contrast I think). While he's stopped, someone else pulls up, rolls down the window, and says something along the lines of, "Hey, is that Karco?"

Hopefully I didn't mess any of that up, but that story made my day. :D

Now, back to work with me!

Since school's started I've been extraordinarily short on time and smothered in work - music and Newgrounds will, for the most part, have to take the backseat for my studies.

Expect very little activity from me outside of weekends and breaks. :(

The last post's getting stale, so here's a new one. Just putting a few notes down:

Working mostly on Time Without, my goal is to get it signed to a good label, but failing that I'll put it up for free as usual. I'm hoping to finish it off in the next few days. Thanks again to those of you who have given advice. :D

Time For Morning is still in the pipeline. I'm currently waiting on Liralei, though I'm also reconsidering a few aspects of the track.

I've got a few collabs in the works as well, hopefully there's news to come there.

I've dropped a few WIPs as there's no real place for them to go/they're too much work. Perhaps I'll touch them up and put them up for free download as is, but don't count on it.

I'm considering writing a new KarcoReviewAlt article: Giving and Receiving Criticism. Currently I'm still planning it out in my head. Thoughts, ideas I should include, etc.? Also, don't forget to read my Comprehensive Guide to Making Better Music if you haven't yet!

School starts for me on the 17th, anything could happen to my production speed starting then, between a screeching halt or a noticeable increase. I can't say for sure yet.

That's it!

I mentioned a few weeks ago that I would eventually make another previewset since I had so many WIPs - well, here it is! Note that all of these previews are still rough around the edges, as they're WIPs after all. Criticism is still appreciated though, as with many of these I'm looking for a direction to go from this point. Bolded tracks are current WIPs - not listed are one solo project and two collabs.

Download from my Mediafire, under the "Demos" folder. Below are descriptions for each preview:

1. French House (0:00-1:42)
After hearing some French House by other people I was inspired to make my own - this was the result! I started with an incredibly terrible recording of a jazz concert I was a part of and from there cut it up to make the various sounds in this track, exceptions being the drums (VEH1/2) and the bass (guess!). The recording was actually extremely colored, and has zero response above about 10 kHz. Can you tell?

Sadly, I won't be finishing this one, for lack of quality and material to sample from the recording, making it poor in mix and repetitive respectively. A shame too, it was lots of fun to make!

2. Experiment 1 (1:43-3:14)
This preview's related to the last one, who can tell how? ;D I'm probably not going to finish this one but I included it anyway, it was an interesting experiment with layering and an imitation of Jaytech's style in a few senses.

3. Hardcore collab with Nav (3:14-4:08)
Also lots of fun to make, this started as a collab between Nav and I on Mikogo and grew into something very nice, if a bit raw. Hopefully you'll be seeing more of this in the future.

4. Breathless (4:09-7:20)
Anyone remember when I was talking about a WIP named Breathless? I ended up scrapping that one and recycling many of its sounds for my track One Minute Longer, but never deleted the project file. I came back to it and liked the character, so I deleted the recycled sounds and started over. Eventually I transformed the project entirely to something minimal, yet anthemic - I like it. :) It's the project I've been working on most lately. Feedback?

5. Time Without (7:20-9:57)
I've started the arrangement of this track, and this is what I've got so far. I can't say for sure if I'll complete it yet as I'm unsatisfied with the mix, but if I can fix that I'll definitely get it done, as I like it in every other sense.

7-2-09: A word about my various projects:

Time Without is a for-sure WIP now, it's going to be another shot at getting signed but failing that, it'll go up here for free, like usual. :) I'm arranging it as I type this update!

I started a very fun French House project that's sort of in the same vein as some Daft Punk tracks, though that one may not go public for sampling reasons. Bit of a long story behind it, I'll explain if asked though.

Waiting on Liralei now for Time For Morning, it's been in the pipeline for quite a while now but I hope to finish it eventually.

I started a 100% X-Station project a while ago, progress on that one is moving slowly, right now I'm synthesizing the sounds. Recording's going to be hell with that one. :(

The Hide and Seek remix isn't a high priority of mine compared to these other tracks, but now and then I might visit the project file and chip away at it, we'll see.

With all of these different projects, I'm almost certainly going to put together another preview set, be on the lookout for that in the near future.

That's all!

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First news item: I've posted a new KarcoReviewAlt article! Give it a read:
Part 1
Part 2

Second news item, I've been looking into a genre called French House or Filter House, and the filtering techniques used in its production. I've given it a try a few times but it doesn't seem to work as well as I'd like it to, and can't find any tutorials or websites about it - does anyone know how it's done?

Last item, I took another small hiatus from production while writing my article, but that's all done now. Unless something comes up, production should resume uninhibited for the rest of the summer! News still to come, I'm working out where I am on each project and deciding which ones I want to continue.

6-27-09: Watch out for a new article coming very soon! This one's a monster. :D

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Download here under Experiments/Misc., but there's a story behind this one - so read on.

Upon finding the Speak and Spell thread on the BBS, and then the samples further down, I decided I would make a song using them. I started by looking for a phrase that would be the title and define the track, eventually I gave up and settled for the generic "I Love You" - though to be honest this track was a meaningless, for-fun project to me. :D I then vocoded it, with pretty much the same process, settling for a supersaw and two somewhat generic chords.

As a side note, the title has nothing to do with xKore's track with the same name.

This is a bit of an oddball track in terms of structure, but once again, I didn't worry too much about making this track completely perfect anyway. I originally intended it to be a full-length House track and started with a DJ-friendly intro, but by the end realized a full-length track wasn't going to happen, simply because I didn't know how to make one. I took the easy way out of most choices from the end of the peak on, so it may sound rushed or unmixed to some of you.

Regardless - enjoy! News to come on my other projects, including Time Without, the Hide and Seek remix, maybe Time for Morning, and a few others. New headphones and monitors are motivating me to work more. :)

6-14-09: A short update: I've been taking a break from producing lately to get other things done, but with new monitors and headphones coming in soon and a (finally) fully functional X-Station, I hope to come back to make solid progress.

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A quick rundown on where my various WIPs are at right now.

Time For Morning - 80%
I've made contact with Liralei recently and this project is back underway, and the arrangement is complete. All we need now are recordings both Liralei and I are happy with. ;D

Imogen Heap - Hide and Seek (Karco Remix) - 10%
Thanks to xKore for the suggestion, now I've got a lot of slicing ahead of me! This could be something good though. :) I'll also be attempting a mashup of this track with a somewhat recent Trance release after I'm done with my remix, the two work perfectly... anyone want to guess which? :D IM/PM me.

I have various idea files that could grow, and a potential collab or two in the works as well, I'll update here once something happens to them.

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As for the Unleashed Single, I need to contact B0UNC3 about mastering. Sorry for taking so long but now that I've got time, hopefully this will come out early this summer! Once again, the tracklist is as follows:

1. Unleashed (Original Mix)
2. Unleashed (xKore Remix)
3. Unleashed (Mrmilkcarton Remix)

xKore's remix is the first that used to be up here (not the one he posted a 60-second demo of), and Mrmilkcarton's is a new one (not that it makes a difference to most of you, who haven't heard either). Note that this list followed elimination of the rest of the remixes for various reasons.

5-13-09: Added a picture to the bottom of this post, scroll down and take a look. Awesome, yes? :D

Also, replaced the Montauk and Cygnes videos, as they were removed.

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5-12-09: I realize I haven't been very active lately. I plan for all of this to change by this Saturday, when I'll really be able to resume work on the Unleashed single and the Time For Morning remake, as well as begin the arrangement of a new track started just today. For now, just hold tight and be patient. :P

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5-2-09: Added three new tracks:
Sudha feat. Zoe Johnston - Leche (Thomas Schwartz & Fausto Fanizza Vocal Mix)
Mr. Sam feat. Claud9 - Cygnes (Original Mix) (thanks Mrmilkcarton!)
Andrew Bayer - Monolith (This song is INCREDIBLE.)

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I'm copying gregaaron89 who copied Michhimself who copied xKore who copied Sp1r1t.

Hopefully this didn't fail. D:

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^ Supersaws done right! ;D

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^ Awesome fusion of Trance/orchestral. The artist, First & Andre, is Airbase working with his brother under a different alias.

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^ This vocalist is amazing... the bass guitar is awesome too, inspired the bass in my track Sleep, for those of you who've heard it. :)

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^ Best use of FL's voice generator ever. For some reason it's broken on my computer though. :(

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^ Incredible is all I can say. This needs a release. D:

First off - I'm going to be swamped over the next week, so starting this coming Monday expect to hear very little from me.

The Unleashed Single is finally making headway once again! After a deadline and some otherwise elimination, the Single is down to a small three tracks:

Karco - Unleashed - Single
1. Unleashed (Original Mix)
2. Unleashed (xKore Remix)
3. Unleashed (Mrmilkcarton Remix)

Mastering will now be handled by B0UNC3, and hopefully we're looking at a beginning-of-May release date. xKore's remix is his first one that he posted here for a while before removing it, while Mrmilkcarton ditched the Chilled Milkmix and made something new. If anyone's got any questions, now's the time!

As for Time for Morning, I haven't been able to reach Liralei for a few weeks now (not via NG or MSN). If anyone's been in touch with her lately, let me know.

That's all!

Sadly, my picks of the month aren't going to happen this time. March has been a very busy month for me and I haven't really been around to find any favorites of mine - there wouldn't be any point in rushing to pick the first few songs I find that just barely fit my criteria at all, since I don't even have four songs I know I want to promote.

In a month's time I'll try to make a Picks of March and April post (which is unlikely, as I'm going to be even busier during April), but if that doesn't happen I'll do the same at the end of May.

In other news... there is no other news. :(

Sorry!