Anyone have any experience with online collaborations?

[LeftOfSelf-Centered]

I'm thinking about picking up an old project of mine again, which is a kind of industrial mix of rock/metal and electronic music. But, since I know very little about electronic music, and until now I arranged the electronic parts by trial and error, I wanted to see if I can find somebody to collaborate with, who can take care of the electronic side. In case anybody is curious you can find some of my songs here http://www.myspace.com/chaosunltd/

I was wondering if anybody knew any good sites for finding musicians to collaborate with or if anybody had any experiences with collaborating with other musicians online. I came across this website http://www.indabamusic.com/ which seems to be a site for collaborations, does anybody know it?

Thanks in advance for any info.

[Shankapotomus]

1. Don't recommend Indaba

Someone took some lyrics I posted there and tried to collaborate with someone else on them without even contacting me. That was my experience at Indaba so take it for what it's worth.

Musicians Collaboration (type into Google), on the other hand has some really nice people and professionals as members. Haven't collaborated there in years so don't know how busy it is now but that's where I'd recommend you look for collaborations. You have to register to see the forums, though.

One thing about online collaborations is the stats are like 1 out 20 submissions you make will get picked up for a collab and I personally find online collaboration notoriously slow. That's why, although the few collaborations I've had online have been very rewarding, I haven't bothered with trying to collab in a few years. I'm planning to just get Logic and do it all myself.

But depending on what instrument you play, you might be buried in collaborations at MC before you know it.

Best of luck to you.

[LeftOfSelf-Centered]

2. Thanks for the information.

I'll try to check out Musicians Collaboration.

The thing is that, instead of posting something and then hoping somebody picks it up to work on it, I was hoping to find a site where you first find a musician to collaborate with (kinda like he joins your virtual band), and then you start working on the music. I usually do everything myself for my punk/hard rock project, but for the industrial project I need somebody who can do the electronic parts, because all I can do is play around with the preset sounds of my keyboard.

Unfortunately I just moved to a city I haven't lived in for nearly 20 years so I don't know the musical landscape at all. I will have to find an "in" to the local music scene (none of my friends play music).

By the way, if you have any leftover lyrics you have no use for, you can send them my way. Writing lyrics for me is a slow and painful process, I have a bunch of unfinished instrumental songs going to waste because I can't come up with any decent lyrics.

Thanks again!

[Shankapotomus]

3. Not to discourage you

but in my experience online it's difficult enough to get someone else to collaborate on one of your songs, let alone maintain a band. But I have seen it done before and there are some very successful music and lyric writers online who always have lots of work. I think for that you have to have a lot of single collaborations with different people until you reach a critical point and then it must just snowball from there. But I've never personally had the patience nor inclination to separate with my work like that. But if you're willing to do that I imagine you could build up quite a online resume. Now that I think about it I've had more collaboration offers than I took because I wanted my lyrics to be portrayed musically "just so". If you don't have that stubbornness and are willing to be flexible with your work, you can probably keep very busy with music online.

I think flexibility is the key now that you've caused me to ponder it.

[LeftOfSelf-Centered]

7. I see what you mean.

Flexibility when it comes to music is not exactly my strong suit. I can be somewhat control freaky when I write music. On the other hand I haven't worked with anybody who was really interested in doing original music in a while, so it's not like I have a whole lot of experience with collaboration.

So far, as far as original music is concerned, I've always worked alone. On the other hand, maybe I should see if I can find some lyrics to work with, because often when I write I end up hitting a bottleneck when I get to writing lyrics and the songs just end up in this half-finished limbo, often forever. It'd be nice to be abler to get some new material out.

[Shankapotomus]

4. By the way

Did you ever post your music on YouTube? Something sounds vaguely familiar.

[LeftOfSelf-Centered]

5. Yes, I did.

If you're referring to my username "Left of Self-Centered" is the title of a Butch Walker album from 2002, nothing to do with my music.

My music is divided into two projects:

- Chaos unLtd., which is the pseudo industrial one I referred to in the OP, which isn't on YouTube but on MySpace http://www.myspace.com/chaosunltd

- My hard rock/punk project called ?Syntax Error which is on YouTube:

[Shankapotomus]

6. Ok

I thought I might have heard you before but it must have been somebody else. But I like your work, especially the songs you have on MySpace. You seem to know how to compose on your own just fine. (I would love to have your composition skills). And with today's music software out there, if you don't find collaborators, I wouldn't worry too much, personally.

[LeftOfSelf-Centered]

8. Thanks!

I'm pretty proud of the MySpace stuff, but I also know how I put it together. The electronic parts came about purely by trial and error, or sometimes from the PC equivalent of prerecorded loops for Garage Band. It was a lengthy and sometimes frustrating process.

I don't really need help writing the music, it's more like I need somebody to play an instrument that I can't play. I can listen to a generic rock song and figure out the guitar/bass/drum parts etc. because I know the instruments and know how they work within a song. I could probably produce a pretty close rendition if I wanted to.

On the other hand, if I listen to a Nine Inch Nails song with a very strong electronic component and I get stuck wondering how this kind of music is produced; What kind of equipment is needed (virtual or otherwise)? Where do the sounds come from? Are they created from scratch or do they come from sample packs or something else completely? What kind of effects are used and how? How could all these things be handled in a live situation? So I was hoping to find somebody who knows the "instrument" and from whom I can learn.

Sorry if I go on a bit, but I love to talk shop.

[GReedDiamond]

9. I've been collaborating over the internet for at least the last ten years...

...by recording drum tracks to music sent to me as mp3 files...guitar, bass, vocals, etc...to which I added my drums and percussion (and sometimes, rarely, vocals), which I then mixed down all individual parts to wav files, and sent them back to my collaborator, which he then mixed into his tracks for the final mixed tune.

At first, I was recording to ADAT, now I am using a dedicated audio recording workstation running Cakewalk Sonar 8.5 Producer.

Examples of the results may be heard here and here.