Some advice concerning manipulative people. Again, mostly reminding myself lessons I continually relearn. Also, hopefully encouraging others who’ve been victimized.

I’ve had many encounters with manipulators over the years. They come in many shapes, sizes and flavors. One of the primary objectives of a manipulator is to first disarm your mental defenses. One of their primary tools is to use your own emotions again you. The game: Get you in a disposition so if you become emotional over injustices inflicted upon your person, YOU look like the guilty party.

Above all else manipulators are obsessed with being clever and being in control of other people (sick).

Manipulating someone is by function an attempt to bypass their free will. Thus the nature of it is dishonest, usually malevolent and always self serving. Easily 99% of the time, the person being manipulated does NOT benefit. Manipulators are self centered. Self enthroned and often conceited. Projecting into others, a deep hatred for themselves or for what they feel they will not achieve (crab pot syndrome).

Conceited [con-ceit-ed]: Adjective. Ingeniously contrived. Holding to fantasies that falsify a discouraging reality.  

Crab Mentality: In human behavior members of a group will attempt to reduce the self-confidence of any member who achieves success beyond the others, or halt their progress, out of envy, resentment, spite, conspiracy, or competitive feelings.

Some most noted attributes of manipulative people:

Sudden attitude change

Projection (hypocrisy)

Disingenuous apologies

Exploiting plausible deniability

Using illegitimate parallels (comparing apples to oranges)

Disproportionate Aggression (being overly aggressive without factual justification)

Filibustering

Denial (ignoring factual evidence)

Mob Tactics (playing people off of one another)

Extortion

Intellectual thievery

Blackmail

Though these traits are not exclusive to manipulators, at least a few will always correlate well. Along those lines manipulators can be very petty. No illogic is often bared from use. A manipulator might claim, I am manipulating people simply buy writing this article (projection).

A general example of manipulation: Lets say, a person gains your trust, then comes to you for help with barely a rough sketch for a tune. With the promise of cross promotion, you fill in the remaining 90% of the material, creating a finished product. However, upon completion, said person takes full credit for your 90% and if/when you protest, are framed as attempting to steal said person’s ideas/work. The manipulator got what they wanted, with the bonus of all guilt projected onto the victim.

You do not need to feel ashamed if you have fallen victim to these things. You are not alone and in most cases, you do NOT have to play these people’s sick games.  

~Continued in part 2~

~Part 2~

The disingenuous teacher:

A common persona manipulators adopt is of the “teacher” or “mentor”. Naturally this suits their modus operandi quite well. Putting them in a prime position to manipulate unsuspecting people. Promising wisdom and better prosperity, as they take your existing knowledge for themselves. All the while leading you down a non-beneficial path. At first this type of manipulator often encourages you with great positivity. Usually the attitude then slowly morphs into one expecting/demanding your subservience. If at any time the manipulator suspects rebellion or feels your mind/talents can/will surpass their own, they might snap into a hostile aggression (sudden attitude changes). Oppressing your development. If a teacher/mentor who first appeared very friendly, suddenly looses their venom on you, simply for questioning them (asking the “wrong” question), you are probably dealing with a manipulator of some sort.

The very function of a true teacher or mentor is one of selflessness and honesty, which can be said, is a form of humility. In most cases a manipulator is completely incompatible with this function.

Example of a false mentor:

Say a mentor invites you under their wing. You present sophisticated, original artwork that you wish to market. They say you must simplify your art for marketability. You oblige, only to find they then claim you are only capable of creating simple unoriginal works. That you never created anything else. The manipulator brought you down to their level. They became superficially equal or greater than you, through clever means. In a way, manipulators are psychotic. Often preferring, for example, to spend vast time learning how to manipulate you into looking less educated than they are. Instead of simply spending said time, educating themselves to make it a true fact.

Manipulators are clever hypocrites. This can not be emphasized enough. To the point it could be said, they worship their own cleverness. A manipulator, for example, might find an alternative definition to terms used herein, in an attempt to discredit this article's arguments.

Clever [klev-er]: Adjective. Superficially skillful, witty or Facile [fas-il]: Acting or working with ease sometimes superficially.  

Mendacious [men-da-cious]: Adjective. Given to or characterized by deception or falsehood or divergence from absolute truth.

My message to anyone reading is simple: Be careful of anyone posing as a leader. If they turn out to be a manipulator, you will probably find them subjugating you. Making you do THEIR dirty work to further THEIR subversive ambitions. The only "friendly" relation you will likely end up with is, serving your tyrannical leader, wondering why you should feel obliged to.

The world is full of manipulators. Mainly because they are widely tolerated. Though there may be times you are forced to deal with them, most times you do NOT have to tolerate them. You should NEVER feel obliged to tolerate them or their games. A fundamental part of their tactic is to keep you engaged in their game. You can say NO. The sooner the better. Manipulators will attempt to make you look weak for walking away but IT IS IN YOUR BEST INTEREST TO DO SO. The more you engage with a manipulator, the more you inevitably loose. In this regard they are much like TROLLS. Even if you can outwit them, you still have lost your precious time. Time much better spent furthering your career. Your art. Your beneficial relations. Your life.  

Bit of advice. To remind myself things I’ve learned too many times. Also, perhaps encouraging people, like myself, who might not be aggressive enough defending what they know to be tried and true.

The 12 (don’t)s

#1 Don’t rely on 1 set of monitors or 1 room to test mixes (especially an untreated room)

#2 Don’t close your mind to critique

#3 Don’t fail to test the validity of critique with proven scientific method

#4 Don’t mistake opinion for factual observation

#5 Don’t mistake a strong opinion for an educated one

#6 Don’t let uneducated, unproven, opinions dictate to you

#7 Don’t let people, who do not do what you do, take away the value of what you do

#8 Don’t allow yourself to be intimidated by social mob mentality or those who may wield it

#9 Don’t trust opinion over your gear (a spectral analyzer has no opinion to obscure the facts)

#10 Don’t stop furthering your education in your field

#11 Don’t let armatures convince you the utility of your education or gear is worthless

#12 Don’t let people take from you the merit of your own work and original ideas

So what inspired this? Since the move, I’ve been without a proper mixing room. I hadn’t tested my new room and thus, been in the dark concerning mixes. My past room and methods had given decent results. I’d learned better methods since then and expected better mixes. Newer peer pressure led me to believe, I was mixing poorly. So, instead of trusting my education and actually testing the claims with gear, I just ran with the critique. Making the adjustments I was pressured into, the mix sounded fine in the new room. My better knowledge said there was a bad reason why. The peer pressure insisted this was my “arrogance”.

The car stereo proved them wrong.

In the car, the mixes sucked out loud. In a way my better knowledge predicted. I tried blaming the car stereo to protect the peer’s image. Then I remembered, I didn’t learn all I had in the past, by blindly ignoring the science of audio engineering. Quite the contrary. So, I grabbed my old real time analyzer and gear, tested the new room and checked the car stereo for malfunction. Surprise surprise, training and gear wasn’t lying before and it didn’t lie now. Switched the room's monitors. Was forced to admit there was nothing wrong with the car. Took some notes. Did an EQ session and the mix came back to life, in the car, in the room, on phones. Kinda reminds me the time, way back when, someone in collage convinced me to mix on tracking monitors instead of mixing monitors (because they didn't know what they were doing).

Just wow. I have to say after all this is, be careful of social “leaders”. Just because someone’s knowledgeable or good at one set of things, doesn’t mean they are at others. Worse, if you dare to be knowledgeable or good at something they aren’t, they may try to drag you down. Making you look like the fool.

Unfortunately, some people, usually the aggressive kind, just plain don’t know what they are talking about sometimes. Worse, they often attempt to make up for unwillingness to educate themselves in your field, by pressuring you into a false narrative. One where your training or gear is “of little value”, “elitist”, "unneeded" or “outdated”. Like the loud guy at the gas station who strongly insists you take bad advice and your car suffers for it. Now, I have to fix numerous tunes. A bummer for sure. The silver lining though, is, to my embarrassment, life proves again, a simple set of truths when it comes to audio: Trust your education, use your gear, test critique, ignore the ignorant and stay confidant in your own hard work.  

In other words, if you have invested the time to develop the tools/talent to do a job well, don't let people take away those tools, simply because they are compelled to feel superior or whatever.

Found this channel a while back: https://www.youtube.com/user/mixbustv/featured 

Even if he's not covering the genre you are mixing, there's still some neat tricks to learn that can be applied to projects. 

Know of other mixing/mastering sites/channels? Post um. :)  

Best budget mixing monitors: Just dug up my Yamaha HS5s again and I am totally selling my more expensive ones and going back to using the HS5s.

For anyone who's done studio work, you know you need good mixing monitors. Now please note, I'm talking about mixing monitors, not tracking monitors. Many mixing monitors are expensive as dick and for that reason I can't say I've ever owned the much pricer ones. that being said, high prices don't mean the budget producer can't have mixing monitors that will give a good or even great mix. To date the best I've ever found are also some of the cheapest. The Yamaha HS5 https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/HS5--yamaha-hs5-5-inch-powered-studio-monitor . Over the years I've owned a few different monitors, smaller, larger, more expensive, less expensive, but I always keep coming back to the HS5. Reason is simple, they produce good mixes. Not perfect mixes but GOOD mixes. Now being imperfect and small you have to have a little engineering experience to get the low bass mixed right but for the price you really can't beat these. At least not from my experience. The key is, they don't "sound good". They sound dull, flat and boring. This means you are inclined to mix your tracks on the sweeter side, to make up for it. The end result is a good sounding mix, that will sound good no matter where you bring it. It further proves the rule of thumb, that, if your monitors sound amazing, your mixes will likely sound the opposite. If your monitors sound uninspiring, your mixes will sound the opposite. Not surprising these are by Yamaha. The same company responsible, way back when, for the “shrill boxes” that helped revolutionize mixing.

If any of you all have stories about your fave or least fave monitors, please share. :)

Peace.

Breath of the wild. Please don't post spoilers.

So I have finally gotten around to playing it. Haven’t done a zelda game since SNES. Really makes me appreciate how far things have come, and also, how much they managed to pack into those old 16 bit games.

I REALLY love how breath of the wild takes an ambient and minimalist approach to the music. One of the things that always puts me off, is being hammered by non stop music. This games gets the music right. That and the open world, makes this a winner for me so far. I’ve only just started, on the 2nd area of the game right now.

Got the hard cover extended guide, just in case I run into a stumper. So far, only thing I’ve actually looked up are recipes for cooking. I’ll probably stick mostly to using it for items and “what’s this thing?” situations. For once, I actually don’t want to spoil the game. I know you can look that stuff up on line but my eyes enjoy a rest from lit screens. The book is nice old school anyway and looks beautiful.

There doesn’t seem to be a ticking clock to save the princess, though they tell you otherwise. I really hope the game isn’t going to punish me for taking my time. There’s a literal shitload of side quests and extras, so, I’m assuming you don’t have to hurry through the story portion of the game. Some one said this was 110 hours to complete but I’m totally not seeing that. I could see this taking years to complete 100% and I am totally fine with that.

Peace. :)

Pretty straight forward question. I'm just curious because I post both types and am a little surprised at what gets a good download count sometimes. So, you like it simple or complex? Stuff that keeps changing, grabbing your attention to brain stimulate? Or stuff that's more homogeneous, mellowing you to sleep?

example simple: https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/803874

example complex: https://www.newgrounds.com/audio/listen/757441

Hey this guy's doing great work to get exposure for artists. Great tracks. Please like share subscribe and click the litttle bell: https://www.youtube.com/user/TheLostAtmosphere 

Promised I would make a modular grid to show my rig, for those who are eurorack nerds.

https://www.modulargrid.net/e/racks/view/492202

Sound path is all analog synthesis, with the exception of the reverb units. It's a rather humble setup. I HAD plans on having 2x times this size but after looking at how much money it cost, yeah, that isn't happening. Had to ebay off quite a few of my things to get it up and running. It's ok though, I can do a LOT with this little rig.

If anyone else has a MG, share links.

Peace :)

It seems people are liking some of my uploads, so I created a bandcamp for the full length tracks. I'll be filling it as I have time. I may also make an album for the more popular loops and shorts. I know a lot of people are doing patrion but I'm not sure I feel comfortable, since I can't really commit to producing a given volume of material each month. I just do what I can as life allows.

All my uploads on newgrounds are free ofcourse, to download and share with friends. The bandcamp just makes it possible for people to also download in HD and support the art, if they so wish. The link will appear below featured tracks and on my main page. If anyone wants to use my material in games and such, I'm usually cool with that. Just PM me with a quick description of the project, so I can give the green light to use my works.

Peace. :)