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These are the next three music videos I made for my Rivers songs using films in the public domain which I’ve done to avoid copywrite. The films used are The Green Promise (Always Get By), The Man With The Golden Arm (Dream On) and The City Of The Dead (Ain’t Even Begun).
I also spent 2 months adding instrumentation on an acoustic track called Always Get By. I sampled bass and drums from Glen Campbell’s song Wichita Lineman and added bass, piano and strings using virtual piano played on my PC and some violin and cello samples.
I also did better mixes for Ain’t Even Begun and The Things I Say with the tape glitches removed and added piano and a bell sample to the latter. I got about half way through The Things I Say video but took a break. That video will be in Music Videos Part 3 along with the next 2 or 3 I make. I’ve completed 7 video’s so far and there’s 7 more to do, so I’m half way through.
My work is shadow banned on Youtube so I’ve provided the Bitchute links instead. My blog is shadow banned too, but whatever, this is my work and I’m very proud of it.
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From 1st Aug to Dec 11th 2023 (from bottom up)
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The bells, the bells..
I’ve put piano and church bells on it and got rid of the acoustic. I must have done a thousand mixes of this song. I couldn’t separate the tracks well enough so had to create the best balance with the tracks bleeding into one another. I’m trying to get it sounding good before doing the video.
The Things I Say [with Piano & Bells]
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25th Nov
Been having trouble with the mix for this song, the new mixes lost a lot of treble so I’ve gone back to the original mix but with a most of the glitches removed. I might add the acoustic guitar again if I can keep the same clear sound. So it’s back to the old one for now:
The Things I Say [with glitches removed]
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Once I’m happy with the mix I’ll do the video for it.
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16th Nov
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I’m going to set the song to Detour which is a classic Film Noir from 1945. I wanted a film with a couple arguing in it which might compliment the lyrics and this was the closest I could find. I’ve already done the title font but haven’t started editing it yet.
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8th Nov
Ain’t Even Begun set to The City Of The Dead (1960)
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This one is set to The City Of The Dead from 1960 a supernatural occult horror film about Witchcraft. I’ve not used any of the witchcraft elements of the film in the video so there’s no Christopher Lee in it, or the witch. I used minor scenes with the spooky stuff and tried to create a kind of Twilight Zone feel where the characters get stuck in a time loop. There’s also a mini intro from the film at the start.
I’ve also done a better mix of the track with all the crackling noise removed. This is up on the The Rivers page where it can be downloaded.
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30th Oct
I’m doing Ain’t Even Begun next, I’ve had an idea for the video. The film I’ll be using is The City Of The Dead (1960) which has some great visuals in it.
I’m hoping to create a kind of time loop using repeating scenes which will go thematically with the song, or the hook-line at least. If I can pull off the effect then it might be quite good. The visuals seem to suit the song but I’m only experimenting with it for now. 🎃
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27th Oct
Dream On set to The Man With The Golden Arm (1955)
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For this video I used The Man With The Golden Arm (1955) starring Frank Sinatra as a drug addict and Kim Novak as his lover. It’s the best known film I’ve used so far and was a box office hit at the time with Oscar nominations for Sinatra and for it’s soundtrack by Elmer Bernstein which Frank used for his stage entrance at concerts. The film also features a famous opening credit sequence by Saul Bass.
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16th Oct
Just to be clear, the ‘river flowing into the sea’ image I use for the Rivers cover was inspired by the theme song to the film Easy Rider and NOT the Palestinian song about massacring Jews!
It’s also a metaphor for the songs (the river) flowing into the sea (the world) and becoming something bigger.
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11th Oct
ALWAYS GET BY SET TO THE GREEN PROMISE (1949)
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The film I used for the video is The Green Promise (1949) which had an interesting scene near the end where a young Natalie Wood rescues her lambs in the middle of a torrential thunder storm while dressed as a white rabbit. The film is in the public domain. The song itself took me 2 months to complete.
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10th Oct
I’ve finished the video for Always Get By and I’ll upload it soon.
I’ve also posted the first 4 music videos as The Rivers Music Videos Part 1 which are now up in ARCHIVES. That’s all my work from January to July 2023. The songs are Take A Little Longer, Shining, On You and Tender Me. Plus there’s Dream On with piano and a new song called Never Felt Love Like This Before.
THE RIVERS MUSIC VIDEOS PART 1
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2nd Oct
Always Get By (with bass, drums, piano and strings)
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video coming soon.
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27th Sept
I’m still doing the strings on Always Get By. It’s incredibly difficult as you’ll see.
I’ve got 25 tracks going at once editing the individual notes one by one and having to re-pitch them all and blend them together so they last longer than the 2 second samples . The bendy notes are particularly tricky. I’ve had to take breaks from it but I’ve got a small section in the middle which goes into the last verses and then the section at the end before it’s finished. Then I have to finish a bit of percussion and get sections of the vocal sorted out.
Here’s what the strings for the chorus, verse and middle 8 sound like isolated. There’s a second set of atmospheric strings that go underneath this.
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This is what the 25 tracks look like when merged together:
These are the 25 string tracks:
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7th Sept
I’m pulling out all the stops for this.
It’s got 2 string sections on it, one proper sounding strings and a second atmospheric set of strings underneath. It’s got 2 basslines, one sampled and one played on virtual bass, plus piano, percussion, and drums. I’m trying to get the vocals in tune after managing to separate them from the guitar.
I’m about a third the way through it.
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2nd Sept
I finally got the tempo flowing alright and I’m doing percussion and strings. This is going to be tough as I’ve never tried to do proper sounding strings before and I’m working with little 2 second sampled notes of a violin and a cello that I downloaded so I’ll need to extend them and mix them together. This could take a while yet.
This song might suit a more scenic video with the sea in it but the only public domain film I can think of is this. Which might not be suitable.
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25th Aug
I’m still doing Always Get By with instruments but it’s taking ages because I didn’t plan it out properly. The tempo was all over the place. I should have edited the acoustic version to a click track at the start before laying all the drums, bass, piano on it and saved a lot of trouble speeding things up and down so it stays at the same pace all the way through.
Anyway it finally sounds okay tempo-wise and I can start doing some strings for it and maybe something else to fill it out. I’m on mix 58. It’ll probably be mix 100 before it’s finished.
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12th Aug
I’ve finished editing the drums on Always Get By and completed the basic track . The drums took me about a week to do. I had to edit it beat by beat to get it to fit the song. Now I’ve got to edit the bass.
The drums from Wichita Lineman are played by Jim Gordon who was in Derek & The Dominos. He wrote that great piano section at the end of “Layla” and played drums on some classic records like Pet Sounds and All Thing Must Pass.
The bass is by Carol Kaye who played on hundreds of hits from the 60’s as a member of the famed session band The Wrecking Crew, which also featured Glen Campbell before he became famous.
I wanted to sample the strings from Wichita Lineman but I couldn’t separate them from the main track so I’ll have to overlay something else to fill the song out. The sound quality isn’t great but it’s much better than the acoustic version and I can probably make a video for it.
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1st Aug
Extremely rough mix of Always Get By [opening verses and choruses] with bass, piano and drums. Drums sampled from Wicheta Lineman by Glen Campbell. Bass and piano done on virtual keyboard. Needs a lot of work on it, this is just the first half of the song.
Always Get By (rough edit with bass, piano, drums)
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ALWAYS GET BY (Original Acoustic Version)
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