SEPTEMBER 2012 But first, for those who don't know... What Is the LPA Monthly Mix-Up? LPA Monthly Mix-Up is a new and ambitious concept intended to showcase the massive amount of musical talent currently unheard among the Linkin Park fan community. Every month, we here at the LPA will be challenging fans to compete and show off their musical skills, using any and all tools available to them to create their entry. At the conclusion of each competition period, our staff will then go through each entry submitted, and pick our absolute favorite to be featured on the site as the "Winner Of The Month" with the next round of competition starting the moment the winner from the previous month is chosen. To promote fairness, runner ups will also be shown, but only one Linkin Park fan will walk away with the honor of being featured as the "Monthly Winner" So, How Does It Work? (Official Rules) In order to make the contest more interesting and more challenging for those who enter, every month we will be posting a theme that all entrants are required to abide by to be considered for feature on the site. There will be no limitations on key, BPM or length (so go ahead and make a 10 minute entry!), but each submission MUST adhere to the genre (or genres) provided by us to be eligible for the competition. Users must submit their entry as a reply to the this thread, and may use SoundCloud or YouTube to host their works. All SoundCloud submissions must feature THIS GRAPHIC as the album art, and likewise all YouTube videos must contain the aforementioned graphic in some format with the words "LPASSOCIATION.COM Monthly Mix-Up Entry:" appearing somewhere within the video/soundcloud upload title. This is done to help spread word about the monthly competitions so that more submissions can be made possible. [Note: Including the above graphic in your submission (as either soundcloud album art, or somewhere in your youtube video) is a requirement. Failure to do so will make your entry unable to be considered in the competition. ALSO IF YOU USE SOUNDCLOUD, PLEASE ENABLE DOWNLOADS OF YOUR TRACK AS WELL AS EMBEDDING.] ALSO ALL ENTRIES MUST BE COMPLETELY ORIGINAL, AND MAY NOT CONTAIN BACKGROUND MUSIC FROM ANOTHER ARTIST. THIS IS YOUR OWN WORK, APART FROM THE LINKIN PARK VOCALS. To keep in good standing with Warner Bros Records, The Linkin Park Association will NOT be providing links to legit instrumentals/multitracks at this time (due to licensing/copyright restrictions), so it is the sole responsibility of the entrants to obtain the files needed to create their entries. It is possible (and very easy) to find these tracks via a search in Google, however; to protect ourselves we will not be hosting these files until we one day hopefully receive permission from Warner Brothers to do so. How Can I Enter? Easy! Just upload your submission to Soundcloud/YouTube following the rules above, and submit it via a reply to this thread. One month from today's date (October 1st, 2012) we will go through every submission and pick our favorite(s) for feature on the front page of the LPA. We encourage everyone to submit their entries (regardless of technical/musical/vocal proficiency) as we really would like this project to become something that every fan feels welcome to become involved in. The staff here all agree that the music community for Linkin Park has for the most part (apart from official competitions) gone completely unnoticed, and this is our way of giving attention to fans out there looking to get their talents heard! Now That We Have That Out Of The Way... Our official theme for the month of SEPTEMBER 2012 is: AMBIENT/DARK AMBIENT MUSIC (Read the wikipedia article on this genre here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ambient_music) After having practically two "free-for-all" months back to back, it's time to return to a solitary theme by asking our remix community to create an ambient track based off of Linkin Park's music. For those who do not wish to read the article above, Ambient music and all it's sub-genres can be described as the following: "As a genre, ambient focuses on creating a mood or atmosphere through synthesizers and timbral qualities. It often lacks the presence of any net composition, beat, or structured melody. Due to its relatively open style, ambient music often takes influences from many other genres, ranging from house, dub, industrial and new age, amongst several others. Since it is a relatively ambiguous term, ambient has no distinct characteristics, and its style can vary a lot. In essence, it is a term to describe any form of electronic music which puts an emphasis on tone and atmosphere over songwriting, composition and craftsmanship, hence often lacking musical structure or rhythm. Ambient music is often highly conceptual and experimental in style, while it is said to evoke an "atmospheric", "visual" or "unobtrusive" quality." As the above description states, we are challenging our users to make a moody/atmospheric track using samples of Linkin Park's music, or pieces influenced by their music. You can use as many Linkin Park tracks as you wish, as long as the music is "ambient" in style, and is experimental in nature. This has the potential to be one of our most creative months to date, and we are anxious to see how creative our remix community can be with such an open ended genre. For influence we highly recommend listening to Basil Kirchin and Brian Eno as well as checking out the Ambient Music Guide to gain inspiration. As mentioned last month, our LOST IN THE ECHO theme will run until September 5th, with this theme starting today and ending October 1st. Good luck!
This is going to be Dope with a capital D! I stand by my belief that LP's fan base is comprised of some of the most talented people on this planet.
it would be very kind if someone post some examples of Ambient AND Dark Ambient, just to see the difference
Remember you can write your own instrumental pieces, just the LP samples/inspiration must be obvious. Dark Ambient: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZGIxu2U4pd4 Ambient: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zlFK8zXUqYY Very close in style, not much of a difference. Ambient music as opposed to "Dark" generally sounds a bit more serene, whereas Dark usually is very moody sounding. But this month covers ALL Ambient Music. Even Tribal Ambient. So basically we're asking you to make a piece that moves us. That envokes feeling, whether or not that's a feeling of serenity, or a haunted feeling. Just dig deep and make something with atmosphere, that gives us a visual and is emotive and is of Ambient style.
This ones awesome! I'd love to do one myself but technology has been a right pain for me at the moment, so instead I've told a fellow mate of mine if he would like to have a go at this. He loves the genre and makes loads of great instrumental pieces for our band and his own work. I just hope he has the time to do a piece for this . I'll keep you guys posted if he does. and of course, get him to sign up on LPA
This has the potential to be an incredible month - I'm really looking forward to these entries. There really is no limit to just how diverse the entries are likely to be. I'm reminded of something that Brad said on the 'Making Of Meteora' DVD. He said: "I like music that's really cinematic, that has a really huge sonic landscape." At the time, he was talking about huge heavy guitars, but I think Ambient music can be equally cinematic and 'soundtrack-worthy'. So let's have it LPA. I can't wait to hear some stuff.
I'll try, I just don't know how to work with these programs... Hopefully I'll make something! Still, chances are small.
Tony, as I said to you in Twitter, I think it is brilliant. Serious. Very good job. And it makes me shiver.