Fancy Delusions

Disclaimer: If you are a reviewer from midi-contest.com, please do not read any further!!!! Some of these are actively submitted to a contest!

I'm making these even more infrequently now! These date from August 2008 to June 2009 Perhaps the joy of composing music is wearing off? It seems that I'm not progressing very much anymore--I'm mostly recycling my old ideas--but I think as a whole these are easily some of my better compositions. ...So, here you go.

Wisteria (6:15)

I'm not too sure I like this, but for better or worse I spent the better part of two days on this... It starts out as an Ennio Morricone wannabe. Turns into a bad rock 'n' roll song in the middle. Then back to the Morricone. Then, I think the ending is more like John Williams. I wrote a Neil Young guitar solo for the rock 'n' roll bit. ...Or maybe that's Robert Fripp. Who knows? midi-contest score: TBD.

Poinsetta (3:22)

I gotta admit, this one was pretty forced... although I like some of those textures. midi-contest score: 7.96

Neon Waves (3:20)

I had a hard time making it flow together. The best thing about it is the introduction, which is weird and spacey... The chorus is really awkward, though. I don't think it deserved the low rating, though. midi-contest score: 7.12

Dreams (6:47)

I remember this took me five days over Christmas break. I was eating a lot of fruit cake. I think this is probably the best thing I ever wrote, though. It has everything. The melodies could have been better I guess. midi-contest score: 8.39

Party (At the End of the World) (5:13)

This has a few good things, I guess, but I really don't like it at all. It's very bad '80s music. midi-contest score: 7.89

Dawn (2:12)

I hadn't written anything for months at this point, and I wanted to try to jumpstart it by rewriting "One Misty Evening." It probably sounds nicer now, but it's not nearly as epic. midi-contest score: 7.89

Starry Night (1:51)

I was just goofing off, really. This might be something I could expand on later. (It's a pretty bad Ravel impersonation!) midi-contest score: 7.69

The following bits are the things I worked on from about June 2007 to February 2008. Though I haven't been composing as frequently as I used to, my composer scores have been increasing on midi-contest quite a bit! (yaaaaaay.)

Haunted Mansion (4:27)

Very close to what I used to compose when I just started, except there are more than three chord changes. midi-contest score: TBD

Northern Travels (4:41)

Made up mostly of unused portions from "Christmas Past" and "Trotter's Lullaby." midi-contest score: TBD

Trotter's Lullaby (3:42)

A fairly uncomplicated flute piece. As a matter of fact, it used to be more complicated, but I decided to keep it short. (I had a part that switched over to 4/4 time... But I guess I'm not that advanced yet!) midi-contest score: TBD

Fountain of Youth (6:19)

I think I was feeling a little romantic when I wrote this. There are some problems with it, but overall I don't think it's too horrible... Even though it's an ultra serious cinematic thing with a pretentious theme... midi-contest score: 8.39

The Painted Lady (6:11)

Apologies for the length of this one. This is titled after that Ray Bradbury novel I read sometime in the '90s. Yeah... I used to read novels. midi-contest score: 8.28

The Thespian (3:26)

Originally called "Ghost of Christmas Present," but I decided the new title fits better. And I hate trilogies anyway. There are quite a few problems with this, but I'm not going to work on it anymore! :-P midi-contest score: 8.39

Christmas Past (3:56)

It's meant to be some sort of Dickens tale, but after that initial thought I just let it write itself. midi-contest score: 8.53

North Pole (4:20)

I wrote this on Christmas Eve (the first thing I composed since August), and it's a bit of pop-rock. I purposefully only spent a day on it (with part of a second for polishing), because I didn't want to burn myself out again. midi-contest score: 8.48

Topaz (5:23)

I purposefully set out to write a song that would score well on midi-contest, and I surprised at how well it did. It's a cinematic song. (It won first place, which is something that I never approached before.) I was surprised because I felt so bitter about it at the end. I think the song went through something like 21 drafts before I was done... and I wasn't too happy with the way it turned out. midi-contest score: 8.78

Fond Frogs (2:36)

Very much a rip-off of Kate Bush's "Running Up That Hill." (Or maybe it's a homage?) I just wanted to see what made Bush's songs tick, since I liked them so much. The ending is really botched up... I meant to delete a couple of bars, but I forgot. I was so sick of working on this by the time I submitted it that I just left it there. I can't fix it now, because my hard drive fried! Oh well... midi-contest score: 8.05

Outer Space Steven (4:05)

Right now I think this is my favorite. It's a mix between my weird, sci-fi, sound effects rambling that I always love, though a rather legitimate song in its own right. midi-contest score: 8.01

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I don't quite have enough songs for another 40-some minute album, but I do think this new batch of songs is probably my nicest and most wildly creative. Remember, these are just instrumental tracks. I can't sing and I can't even write lyrics. (And if I did write lyrics, then they probably wouldn't mean anything!!!)

One Misty Evening (5:34)

This is a rewrite of an earlier song I wrote called "Rings." This one's much better in my opinion ... much more atmospheric. And, it scored well on midi-contest.com! Hooray!

Rift Through the Fifth Dimension (8:20)

This is my quirkiest song. It's a sci-fi epic about a group of hillbillies in a jam at the same time and place a race of beings in a parallel universe are jamming. This causes the dimensions to collide, and they jam together. (Shouldn't I get a job writing screenplays for Star Trek? I think so.) I went way overboard with the running length, and I can think of a good two or three minutes I can cut from this. I probably should one day.

Falling Expectations (3:31)

Either few people on midi-contest understood this song or it genuinely sucks. (It's my second lowest scoring composition submitted there ... And I'm responsible for quite a few stinkers.) Anyway, this is probably the most "original" song I've done ... It came from becoming obsessed with Astor Piazzolla, and it predominantly features the bandoneon.

Oscar's Wild Ride (6:48)

I was surprised this scored so high on midi-contest.com (an 8.23). It's another quirky sound effects song.

A Scientific Breakthrough (4:57)

This took almost five solid days to write, and it left me emotionally drained! At the time I'm writing this sentence, this song hadn't been scored on midi-contest.com. If it doesn't do well, then I'll have to do some serious karate chops on a few souls! Or maybe I'll just shrivel up in a corner and cry. Who knows.

Theory of Jumps (3:59)

This is a toss off that I somehow managed to force myself to write after "A Scientific Breakthrough." I wanted to see how it would compare to something I put a lot more effort in. I don't think it's a bad song, really.

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I wrote this album in the summer of '06. There's some interesting stuff in here... I think I got better at it later on, though.

Prime Time (1:35)

This song is pretty weird. It's like weird art-rock. It starts out with this chord progression I got from some game I was playing (true story). It then turns briefly into a pop-rock song, and then the end of it is all creepy like. Then, it just ends.

Fancy Delusions (4:31)

This was sort of an attempt at combining pop-rock with avant-garde. Well, the avant-garde bits could have lived up to that name, but ... whatever. I think it's kind of fun. Mayhaps a bit halfhearted.

Daydreams (4:24)

This is a pop-rock song that's also kind of weird. I was trying to go New Wave with this at first, but it turned out to be something perhaps a bit different.

Notorious (3:36)

I accepted a challenge by someone at midi-contest.com to write an organ piece. This is what I came up with. I should really try to do something like this again.

Words in Music (5:39)

I got a pretty nice score when I entered this at midi-contest.com, so I guess I'm pretty happy with it! Technically, I wrote this in April, but ... close enough. The crazy bit at the beginning spells out words if you were to look at the midi file. Not that that does you a lot of good.

Journey to Andromeda (4:50)

I really like this song because it's kind of progressive rock and kind of outerspace-ish. I also finally took some people's advice and spiced up the rhythm section a little bit for this one.

Changing Skies (5:16)

This really could have been better, but it's different for me in a way. I should make a more wholehearted effort in this direction in the future. (This is a classical music suite that kind of goes off in random directions.)

Peace of Mind (3:23)

This is a joke about a string quartet trying to play but sound effects get in the way.

The Seventh Coin (5:26)

This is by far my most elaborate undertaking. I worked nearly nonstop for 36 hours on this!! Believe me, I needed a lot of sleep when I finally got through with it. So, was it worth all the work? (I originally worked a military section in here that I had to take out because it didn't fit ... I must salvage that some other day.)