Attempting to rewrite history...

[chaosmachine]

Over the last year, I've been exploring using stem separation to pull parts out of old tracks and create new stuff with them. The tech is getting pretty good, I guess even the Beatles are using it now.

Anyway, I spent a few months making a new track from this really stunning Karen Beth song from 1969. I wrote new piano, drum, string, and synth parts, keeping the original vocals and acoustic guitar. Also did a bunch of tricky stuff to create vocal harmonies from the original single-tracked mono vocals.

And then I spent way too many hours making this video.

Hope you like it. :)

Also, if you want to download just the audio:

https://www.johnf.ca/music/nothing-lasts.mp3

[auxien]

that was really, really nice. simple but poignant song, tasteful treatment/addition (not that i've heard the original, don't think i've ever heard of the artist at all in fact). good job on the video too, really enhanced the vibe of the tune.

[Zooluus]

this is amazing! I love it. Just had a listen to the original, I love what you've added to it. The video you made is incredible. I've been using some of Hoffman's stuff to make videos, aiming for a similar vibe. A kind of mashup of clips with no purpose but to serve emotion, but it pales in comparison to this. His stuff is really spectacular, I could watch his footage all day. But the combo with the music and the clips you picked is amazing. The way it syncs in parts is really incredible. I really appreciate it. Makes me nostalgic for a time I never experienced. 

[aderei]

Well done great stuff. 

[o00o]

4 hours ago, chaosmachine said:

Over the last year, I've been exploring using stem separation to pull parts out of old tracks and create new stuff with them. The tech is getting pretty good, I guess even the Beatles are using it now

this sounds really solid 

Can you elaborate on the software used and the process itself ?

Edited November 4, 2023 by o00o

[chaosmachine]

On 11/4/2023 at 2:01 AM, o00o said:

this sounds really solid 

Can you elaborate on the software used and the process itself ?

It was a lot of trial and error, but the first step is getting good stems.

I use a slightly tweaked version of this: https://github.com/facebookresearch/demucs

But this is way easier, and can produce better results depending on your source:

https://studio.gaudiolab.io/gsep

Try to start with lossless audio if you have it, splitting mp3s gives much worse results because the compression removes a lot of (normally) inaudible detail that you actually want when the tracks are split out.

 

[o00o]

Cool thx going to give this a spin - I tried some software like Melodyne and some other tools some years ago. The notes were pretty accurate but it got pretty confused feeding it more complex stuff like a whole analord track. But looking at Peter Jackson’s work on the Beatles that might have changed recently 

Edited November 14, 2023 by o00o

[o00o]

Wow tried it with phonatacid and the result is really solid

sometimes the track returns but it works really well

 

Edited November 14, 2023 by o00o

[Alzado]

This is dope. And those harmonies sound great. Hard to believe it’s from a single mono track. Nice work.