The last couple of months have been a bit of a journey. It all started on Christmas Day. I’d spent more than enough time being sorely beaten at Wii tennis and thought I’d have a look around the iPhone App Store. BeatMaker caught my eye so I downloaded a copy and started playing around. Half an hour later, I’d put together a pattern which developed into a track called Bad Habit.

Inspired by BeatMaker’s simple interface, I began to dig into DAW software by researching product features – Reason, Ableton, Cubase. I settled on Cubase and bought myself version 4.5 (wish I’d waited a couple of weeks until 5 came out as now I’m enduring the rigmarole of Steinberg’s rather onerous upgrade path). Since then, I’ve composed a couple of pieces, using the grid editor to hand key each note on the screen – a process even more tedious than upgrading Cubase! But that’s all about to change and I’m really stoked about how the Axiom 49 will impact upon the composition to mixdown time.

Time to pull the wrapper off.

I’ve been working on the drum patterns and the synth part, but the big problem is the time it takes to input anything. Until I get my hands on my Axiom 49 Midi Controller, I’m stuck with the pencil tool in Cubase. Long-winded to say the least and I really can’t be ar%ed to write the melody out this way.

If I’ve time to move it forward tomorrow, I’ll upload some work in progress, but I’ve not got too far tonight, so I’m not holding my breath! (Nor, I doubt, are you.)