alionmind News May 2017 - The progress, so far

Yes, it is already June, and I wanted to post this alionmind News blog since a few days. The reason why this didn't happen is, that I hoped to get the alionmind website up and running and also a new AlionLive video uploaded. This issue of the alionmind news would have been far more impressive then. So, before we dive into the things that have been accomplished in May 2017, we get into the things that haven't:

Website(s)?
I had to learn about a lot of things in May, regarding to webdesign. The internet has changed somewhat since I dived into the depths of webdesign, web programming and all that for the last time. Thus my recent websites always looked not just a bit oldschool...in a bad way ;) And also, websites have to be flawlessly viewable on a lot of different devices today. Mobile is a must. Another thing is, that people are used to fancy multimedia elements on websites these days. And these are just the few things I can tell you about, without drifting into the tech details. So I had to learn about new web standards, features of new versions of software frameworks and last but not least, new tools. Aside from the ongoing learning process, I had to come up with a new concept for the website(s) and also re-write all of the text content, as the old content doesn't meet my current standard. A last, but not very unimportant fact is, that I do not just build one website currently, but actually five. The work, I am currently doing, is not just used to create the main alionmind records website. It will be re-used for the sites of alionsonny, Cimelium and Willma Poppen also. So, once the alionmind site is finished, which will happen in a few days, all the other websites will also be finished in about 2 or 3 days. Enough about that ;)

Another AlionLive video?
Yepp, and while having the illusion of getting the website(s) done, I also thought that I might be able to finish the last real part of the 'Spring in Madeira' series. Simply no time for it. The raw cut is done, but I have to write tons of subtitles, do hundreds of transitions. Nope, didn't happen. I'll work on that video, once the main workload of the website(s) is finished. May take a bit of time. After that last part, I'll record a short, but necessary aftermath and then the eternal series will finally end.

The 'Madeira' album by Cimelium is OUT!
If you follow me on Facebook or read the Cimelium blog, you'll already know it: The third album by Cimelium in total and the second alionmind album this year is out in the wild. You can buy it in all well-sorted online shops for music, for example GooglePlay (CLICK!) and iTunes(CLICK!). And if you are stingy and if you don't want me to get rich, you can also stream it on all well known streaming platforms, such as Spotify (CLICK!). So finally, after all the other backlog has shrunken a bit, I'll be able to work at another alionsonny album. So, friends of the weird kind of Reggae, be ready. By the way: did you know, that the alionmind records portfolio now has 14 album releases? Yepp, time for a 15th. :D

AlionLive is alive with a new video!
As I already mentioned, I wanted to get out another one, because it is about time. But I am glad to announce also here, that after over a year of silence, the 'Spring in Madeira' series has finally a new part. It was uploaded about 3 weeks ago, so I suppose, some people will already be grudgy again, because they think I broke my promise of continuing AlionLive again. Folks: Making videos is NOT my main job. If I would get paid properly for it, my output would be larger. But currently, making music is quite more rewarding. Once I get more subscribers and a significant increase of views, I could put more focus on AlionLive. Ok, but here's the new video. It is the next to the last real part of 'Spring in Madeira'and we go hiking again. The sountrack is completely from the 2009 alionsonny album 'Reggae?'. You like the music? You can get the album on GooglePlay, iTunes and everywhere else. Streaming is also possible on Spotify. And here's the video:

What's next?
Well you know already, and EXACTLY in that order:
1. Finishing the website(s)
2. Finishing the 2014 Madeira video series
3. Starting to work at the new alionsonny album 'Phoenix'
4. Starting to work at the 'Bike ride to the North Sea' video series
So, let's work!

New music video: "Brainforest"!

Yeah, it has been a while since I wrote something new here. This has reasons ;). Currently I am still messing around a lot with the new Willma Poppen album. YES, it will be out very soon! Now I needed a bit distraction, and so I created a little humble music video for a classic. By chance I found a folder full of forest photos on my hard drive, which Malina shot someday. Because I never planned to create a full featured music video for that dusted old track "Brainforest" from my first album "XperiMental Reggae WorX" (2004), I decided to simply use that folder full of photos. I think the result is quite good. Have fun!

alionmind News February 10. 2015 - Rising from the ruins ;)

Hello, and welcome to the first alionmind news since a long time and also the first in 2015. Why has this blog suddenly been awakened from it's deep sleep? The reason will please the friends of music and the friends of the videos will maybe get a little grumpy: Due to recent events, I have decided to restrict work on videos and finally put more work into creating new music. This is now possible and necessary.

The Situation
I had a musical creative crisis, which meant that I could not work on music since last fall. To compensate for this, I then decided to work more on videos section and even started 3 new Youtube channels. For whatever reason - but we are happy about it - it seems that the music crisis somehow "dissolves". Just like that ... And now it would be stupid if I would continue to invest a large part of my time in creating various kinds of videos. The listeners of Cimelium and Willma Poppen music are not just slowly getting a bit grumpy, because they are waiting for ages for the promised albums. And I also do not ommit the fact, that the sales of songs and albums still bring more profit than the advertising revenue on Youtube. So we start again with the music, and that with full force, so you finally get new music.

AlionLive - Spring in Madeira?
Friends of the videos, don't be sad. I'll still work on videos from time to time. The "AlionLive - Spring in Madeira" series is completed just to slightly more than 50%, the next Madeira trip is already booked and the series will be finished in any case until the start of the trip. No, I will not tell you the date for security reasons, but let's say I have about 3 months left.

Tutorials?
Since this takes a huge amount of time to prepare and create, I'll will restrict this most of all video formats. Currently the channel is indeed amazingly well visited, but not as much that I could say that it would have the highest priority. But it will definitely go on.

Music videos?
Since one can always work a bit on those and most of them can be done fairly quickly, there'll be something going on from time to time. Let me surprise you.

Let's Play videos?
I guess I'll still do a lot of those. If I work hard on music again, of course I need one or the other hour of leisure that I can spend on a little game. One can then also record the gameplay and we get a lot of nice little Let's Play videos. So this will go on!

Ok, that was it actually for this news. As usual, and as in the previous news, I want to briefly wrap up again the little that has been done at the house of alionmind since the last blog entry. There is only one, somewhat strange, new piece in music, but a lot of new videos.

Willma Poppen - Ding Dong Merrily On High
Quite unnoticed, because not announced on the official Willma Poppen blog, I created a little christmas song, just for fun. It's a pop-techno version of the old Christmas song that I've already dished out sometime ago for the alionsonny project in a Reggae style. I think it is, despite the creative crisis, quite well done ;) The song is available for free download on Soundcloud, so: Grab it!

AlionLive - Spring in Madeira
I worked on the video material of a total of two days and created four videos out of it. Sometimes it makes sense and sometimes it is necessary to divide a day in two videos. For both, day 7 and 8 this was the case. Otherwise, the videos would have simply became too long, and one or the other has already complained that those four videos are still too long, despite of the cutting. Overall these four new videos are a whooping 2 hours, 35 minutes and 22 seconds long!

Day 7 - Part 1 - The Fortress
At the beginning of the 7th day, we visited the fortress "Fortaleza de São João do Pico". More info on the official AlionLive blog!

Day 7 - Part 2 - ART!
Then we went into the old town to extensively visit the artists' quarter. More info on the official AlionLive blog!

Day 8 - Part 1 - Ponta de São Lourenço 2014
This video shows a wonderful hike in best weather at a place we visited in absolutely bad weather already in 2012. More info on the official AlionLive blog!

Day 8 - Part 2 - Bus ride Ponta de São Lourenço - Funchal
A veeery long video for the, surprisingly enough, not just a few friends of bus ride videos. More info on the official AlionLive blog!

Tutorials on "Multiversity of Alion"
Here we have just the series on audio visualization in Blender still, but it already grew by as much as 4 videos. By now everything is already quite complex. So, if you are able to endure my lousy English, are not completely inexperienced in Blender and want to learn a bit, have fun:

Let's Plays on AlionLiveLP
Now, that finally the problem with Youtube blocking my videos in Germany is solved (do not ask how), I have recorded a bit for you again. There's currently no AlionLiveLP blog, but all the info can be found in the video descriptions. A total of 18 (!!!) new videos have been uploaded. If I embed them all here in the usual size, this blog will be totally "unloadable". Therefore I just embed mini previews here. Simply switch to full screen, or just visit the channel ;)

The Forest - English Edition
If you want to experience my lousy English again, there's a little "The Forest" series, in which I steal a native's house and defend it against the owners, sometimes using evil tricks. Here are the videos in order:

       


       

The Forest - German Edition
Yes, if you are able to understand German, there's also a series. Unfortunately, after an update of horror, the game started to stutter like hell. After a time, this was really no fun anymore. However, some funny and some amazing moments happened during this series. See for yourself:

       


      

The Elder Scrolls III - Morrowind (German)
Yes, my very first Let's Play series was also continued. A total of 7 (!!!) videos have been added, of which the first 4 show the rather arduous life of a weak cat in the dangerous Vaardenfell. BUT: The last 3 parts are very "special". Actually I wanted to play while being a little drunk on New Year's Eve, but the glorious idea was then to also record and upload it. Oh well...

       


       

alionmind records music videos
On the music video channel unfortunately only three new videos have been uploaded. More is in the works. Patience: Sometime the complete alionmind catalog will be available. I promise! Here are the latest 3 additions:

alionsonny - Exploring Alion Forest
For this song from the 2010 album "Alion - The Original Soundtrack" I have decided to create a video from pictures that Malina and I have taken some time ago in a forest near Hamburg.

alionsonny - Individuality
The video for this alionsonny classic from the album "Dub Antiquities"  was once more created using  the ZGame Editor visualization software.

alionsonny - The Cursed Cemetery
For this song, which is also from the album "Alion - The Original Soundtrack", I decided to go the easy route and simply cut together some pictures of the official cover art. Not every song needs a complex video ;

And this is the end!
Yes, it was more news than I actually expected ;). There could have been just a bit more music. We will change this now. Let's get to work!

alionmind News September 14, 2014 - AND WHAT NEWS !!!

I think I have to organize the alionmind news differently this time. There is in fact so much to report that it is otherwise difficult not to keep track of everything. Let's start with the topic that was quite underrepresented during the recent editions of the alionmind news: MUSIC. Only the alionsonny project got no new sound material this time, but:

Cimelium
Here a piece of music for both, the more friendly album "Madeira" and a dark one for the psycho album "Ad Hominem" was produced. Nevertheless, we still lack two pieces of music for "Madeira" and for "Ad Hominem" we have almost 50% of the tracks finished. So the release of a new Cimelium album will probably take some time, but one will still be released this year.

Cimelium - Queimadas
Fitting for the recently uploaded part of the "AlionLive - Spring on Madeira" series, the latest title for "Madeira" album describes the picturesque location Queimadas. As quite often recently it is in a "semiorchestral" style, even though at about 50% of the playing time a fairly unexpected pop rhythm section drops in. It is again a nice positive track for the lovers of the more beautiful music ;). Listen for yourself and read more details on the official Cimelium blog.



Cimelium - Nihil Verum
Nothing is true ... if this does not awfully sound like "Ad Hominem" ;). Well, the new addition to the dark album in my opinion is not sounding very dark. Rather once again spiced with unusual and funny filter experiments. Someone already said, the piece would be too happy. Well, people always have to exaggerate :). Listen for yourself and read the details on the Cimelium blog.



Willma Poppen
The Friends of danceable madness and Funfair Techno (TM) jubilate and rejoice, because finally it's done: All 13 tracks needed for the album are complete in their first version (pre-release version). Now we just need to polish it all. Yeah, keep talking... Joking aside: There is still a good piece of work ahead, but a release date is now inside a foreseeable time range.

Willma Poppen - Liebe
Strange title? Yepp! And a beautifully fitting song for "Willma im Wunderland"! Because I didn't count correctly, I actually thought that this would be the last song for the album and thought, "What a great finishing track!". Well, but then there was still one missing. Learn more about this a little further down. And you can read more about the song "Liebe" on the Willma Blog.



Willma Poppen - Abendspaziergang
...and no: This is not a "Strandspaziergang reloaded", even if some folks say this and actually a certain amount of inspiration flew from one song to the other. No, it is an absolutely new song and a great capstone for the album. Read more on the Willma Blog.



AlionLive - Spring in Madeira 06 - Santana, Queimadas, Faial
Where there is fullness on one side there must be a lack on the other side. The music lovers really had to experience this during the last months. This time it is the other way and there is only a single AlionLive video. But what a video it is: This time we went hiking again in the north of the island. And before I now describe the whole thing again, read the AlionLive blog for more information.

Audio Visualization in Blender - Creating a Frequency Analyzer - Tutorial
Although all videos are blocked in Germany on my two new channels by default because of nonsensical GEMA claims by Youtube, I do not give up. This time I show you how to build a working frequency analyzer in Blender.

Three new Let's Play videos on Morrowind
Yes, and both the first part and these 3 were blocked by Youtube promptly because of nonsensical GEMA claims. This is especially great because videos in German language that are not available in Germany make incredibly much sense ;). I still do not give up and keep going. I hope more and more people use ProxTube, Proxmate & Co. to show Google that this is not ok. Here are the latest Morrowind videos.

The Forest Gameplay - Welcome to Novo Funchal!
Also blocked in Germany, but in  English language and therefore less tragic ;). Actually that was just a test shot of the Early Access Games "The Forest". But then everything went wonderfully out of hand and I did not have the heart to deny you that ;). WARNING: VIOLENCE, BLOOD AND STRONG LANGUAGE!

alionmind records music videos
As many as four new of them we have again. And thus the alionmind music video channel grows at least in terms of available videos. Regarding to viewers it is unfortunately still a bit meager, but the channel is not even six months old and currently I upload exclusively antique material. So there is still room to grow ;).

alionsonny - 80s 4 Ever (Electronic Space Rock)
This was real madness. In the context of training for my tutorial channel I had modelled a classic VU meter in Blender and then also uploaded a little video of it on Facebook. This video got such a great reception that I was so crazy to render a 5 minutes video of an animation of it. Result: 120 hours of rendering time. My pretty quiet laptop rendered a whole week during the night hours. Sorry: NEVER AGAIN! ;) However, the result fits very well with the, incidentally very popular, track "80s 4 Ever" from the album "Electronic Space Rock".

alionsonny - Exploring Alion Forest (Alion - The Original Soundtrack)
Somewhere I had a few photos, taken during a little walk in the woods in northern Hamburg, on the hard disk. I decided to create some kind of a music video in the style of the video for "Autumn" out of them. And actually it fits very well for the song "Exploring Alion Forest" from the album "Alion - The Original Soundtrack".

alionsonny - Individuality (Dub Antiquities)
This is the only one of the four videos that you actually can really call a music video. Once again I used the visualization plugin ZGame editor, integrated in FL Studio, and the result is in my opinion very good. And since this visualization software works quite well with the old dubby alionsonny sound, "Individuality" is another track from the album "Dub Antiquities" which has a fitting music video now.

alionsonny - The Cursed Cemetery (Alion - The Original Soundtrack)
The video for the classic "The Cursed Cemetery" from the album "Alion - The Original Soundtrack" is the simplest: I just put together the images from the cover art set of the album and some private graphic experiments in a slideshow and the result is quite nice :).

Ok, and this is the work of the past month, plus 5 days. I think: Not bad! But let us see if we can beat it all the next month ;).

alionmind News August 10, 2014

Unfortunately again no new music this time. First this is because of a slight creative block at the house of alionmind and also I have, as already last month, more focused on my activities in creating videos. And here really a lot has happened. So without further ado, let's get right into it:

AlionLive - Spring in Madeira 04 - From Vale Paraiso Parque Ecologico do Funchal
This fourth part is quite short and leads us once again on the trails of my journey in the year 2012. We hiked from Vale Paraiso, near Camacha, to the Parque Ecologico do Funchal. All other information can be read on the AlionLive blog.

AlionLive - Spring in Madeira 05 - Chillax in Funchal
The fifth part of this series was also completed this month. After the partly chaotic events of the previous days, we granted ourselves a day of rest in Funchal. However, we were anything but idle. A detailed description with some images can be found on the AlionLive blog.

Audio Visualization in Blender 01 - Creating a Level Meter - Tutorial
I did it: My tutorial channel on YouTube has been created. It does not yet get very much attention, which is probably caused by the fact that it only contains one video yet. This will change soon. I also have promoted the channel not very much so far. However, the largest share of the lack of audience may have a different reason: The video is unfortunately blocked in Germany because of completely insubstantial GEMA claims, although the video contains only my own music. The background music is from my project Cimelium. Because by now quite a lot of videos on the AlionLive channel contain just the same music at full volume and are available in Germany without any problems, the whole thing is very strange. In addition, some short parts of a yet unpublished work of the Willma Poppen project are included for demonstration purposes. I recommend to the interested viewers in Germany to use the absolutely legal Browser plugin ProxTube or the even better-functioning plugin Proxmate. Ok, and here is the tutorial, which explains creating a simple level meter in Blender. In the next part we will build a 16 band frequency analyzer!

Let's Play Morrowind - The birth of Chlach Tharr
And there's another new video channel! After one or two people recommended to also to create a so-called. Let's Play channel, I've done it. Also not much happens there. And also the first video on this channel is blocked with the typical GEMA message  in Germany. Here I can maybe understand why this is, because the soundtrack of the game Morrowind was unfortunately released on CD and therefore may fall under the reign of terror of the GEMA ;). Nevertheless, the soundtrack was created specifically for this game. And because the publisher of the game, Bethesda, has agreed with the uploading of Let's Plays and their monetization, everything should really be fine. Anyway: Here also ProxTube or Proxmate helps.

Two REAL music videos on the alionmind records Youtube channel
Yes, in this video channel I have invested most of the work last month. Again, however, the number of viewers is relatively small. This may have to do with the fact that I am currently uploading only ancient sound material. I will indeed, as already mentioned, make my entire repertoire available on this channel. In addition, 5 of the 7 (!!!) freshly uploaded videos consist only of a still image, showing the respective album cover, while the music is playing. I've told you that it is not worthwhile to create a proper video for any old track. But I also created two REAL music videos. I will embed them now and the still image videos can be found at the end of this blog.

alionsonny - Message To Planet Earth Music Video
Since this classic from the debut album sounds a lot like running water, I have decided to cut together the best matching sequences from the videos of my trip to Madeira in 2012. In addition I have added some fun color manipulation and also integrated some of my experiments in the field of Audio Visualization in Blender. And by the way: I'll explain the techniques for creating those visualizations in the future on my tutorial channel :). Here's the video:

alionsonny - Victory Dub Music Video
And for another song from the debut album "XperiMental Reggae WorX" there is a music video now! This time it is a pure audio visualization video. To create it, I have decided to use the ZGame Editor plugin, which is included in FL Studio. This plugin makes creating the pure functionality a lot easier than if you want to achieve the same with Blender. The downside is that this tool holds some unexpected surprises that one needs to circumvent. Anyway: I have created something quite good, I think so, as my first attempt of using that tool. Judge for yourselves:

The still image "videos"
For these I have not done more than to throw the particular album cover of the respective album and the particular piece of music in the video editor. This is a work of just a few minutes. So I can showcase those old tracks again to you all while not spending too much time doing it. In total I made 5 of them. I embed them below:

So, that's it for this month! I will try to focus next month more on the production of new music. Let's see if this works ;). See you next month!

alionmind records News 08.06.2014

Exactly a month ago, the last alionmind news were published. And I can well be proud of all that happened during this one month. In short: 3 new songs were presented in form of pre-release versions and in addition also 2 new AlionLive videos with a total running time of over an hour were finished and uploaded. This is still not a record, because there were quite more fruitful months in the past. It would have happened a lot more, if not again technical and personal difficulties had disrupted the workflow. Especially I want to mention here, that after less than a year of use my studio headphones lost a stereo channel and had to be sent in for repair. If you remember the review in the Audio Arsenal blog, I want you to know that I now strongly relativize this review. Anyway: Without studio headphones I am hardly able to do anything related to making music currently. Anyway, soon it goes on. Let's now go through the events of the past month in detail. Let's start with the music:

"Poiso" for Cimeliums album "Madeira"
This is now the 10th title for the more "happy" of the two Cimelium albums in progress. Just 3 more and I can start creating the release versions! The present work is probably again a little surprise for those who follow the progress on the "Madeira" album. It will be a very colorful album with many different styles and experiments. This time I decided to go for an orchestral approach without the use of rhythm instruments. Read more about the piece in the official Cimelium blog.

"Nachtwanderer" by Willma Poppen
There is only one project, where is more progress going on than at the next Cimelium album. And this project is the new Willma Poppen album! Well... with 11 completed pre-release versions, the upcoming album "Willma im Wunderland" is just one track in advance. But if I tell you that the completion of the remaining two tracks is only a matter of minutes, you will understand that we are really very close to a a new album release. Stupid headphones! ;) The latest song by Willma Poppen: Once again, it is a piece which does not really fit into any genre. Just as you know it from me already. I experimented a lot. Just for example: The typical offbeat Techno Bass has been replaced by a damped acoustic rhythm guitar. Also I placed a lot of rhythm changes, "sonic surprises" etc. in this track again. So this piece is anything but boring. A listener described it quite appropriate, I think: "A journey through the past four decades of electronic music, a part of everything thrown in a blender, mixed well and you have a cocktail that makes everyone dance". Thank you, Bernd! This actually very well describes the entire album "Willma im Wunderland" and I'll probably just steal this for the albums description ;). More about "Nachtwanderer" in the official Willma Poppen blog

alionsonny's "Farm Dub"
Last, but not least, there's also something new from alionsonny project. Yes, the condemned live longer! The first track since the release of the "Continuity" album is stylistically a trip back to the roots of alionsonny project. Not quite back to 2004. For this it lacks the very exaggerated bass and muddy mix ;). But otherwise everything is back and you feel transported back to the year...  let's say in 2006? Wild Dub experiments and absolute disregard for the reggae purists who actually want that Reggae remains as it was between 1960-1980. Who thought I would finally step off the path of provocation, gets a well deserved slap with this track. More on "Farm Dub" can be read in the official alionsonny blog.

Sorry, fans of the dark side of Cimelium!
Before we get to the videos, I now have to apologize to those Cimelium listeners who do not like the path the Cimelium project went on with the "Madeira" album. I call them jokingly the "Cimelium Goths" ;). You wait longingly that more happens on the dark sister album "Ad Hominem" and I'm sorry that you are this time the only ones getting nothing new to hear. But also for you I was not idle, but then came the problems with the headphones... Also you can look forward to one of the next songs for the "Madeira" album, which will sound quite more "dark". And I promise you: As soon as the headphones are back, your demands have highest priority for me.

AlionLive Frühling auf Madeira - Part 1
Let's get to the videos! Here of course the new Madeira series has currently priority. There's quite very slow progress going on, since I currently generally, let's say, have to struggle with a problem of motivation in the video field. On May 20th the introductory part of this brand new video series about my trip in April 2014 has been uploaded. As usual with the introductory parts of large video series, this includes a long "opening speech" (about 10 minutes) from me. But quite a bit of springtime Funchal is shown during the remaining 15 minutes. In the next part we really start. Read more about this video in the official AlionLive blog.

AlionLive Bikeride Lüneburg Heath 2013 - Day 2
Did I write a bit earlier about the condemned living longer? This is even more true for this video series! So many who stumbled across the first part while searching on Youtube, wondered when this series would be finally continued. Also the regular viewers asked this question one time or another. The latter rather less because they knew about the last Madeira series and that I absolutely wanted to finish it and therefore it had priority. Now, that I got some air, I decided to deliver the missing 3 parts as soon as possible. Indeed, it is quite a nice little series and before the next bike ride begins (it is season again ;)) I would like to have finished at least a big portion of this series. In this part we explore the impressive Lüneburg Old Town and then ride on to the heath, where we visit a Stone Age heath cemetery. More on this video? You know -> AlionLive blog!

So, that's it for this month! Let's see what the next one brings. However, I must point out that I recently started to develop software again (programming). Yes, I have re-discovered my love for this kind of work again and have therefore perhaps less time for making music and editing video. Let's see, how do I get this managed. For now I say goodbye. Keep an eye on the blogs and Youtube! If something new happens, you read it first there. And do not forget Facebook and Twitter. Since everything is even more up to date there. I also have a few places left on my Facebook friend list. So if you want to always be completely up to date, just send me a request!

alionmind News April 02. 2014

Once more quite late, but here are the, to some extent, monthly alionmind news. While I had to complain about a lack of news when publishing the recent editions of the alionmind news, this is really not the case in this issue. 5 new AlionLive videos with a total of almost 2 hours of exciting action, two new pieces of music and the availability of the alionsonny album "Continuity" on the, as I think, most important sales and streaming platforms, give me a reason  to look back on the past almost 1 1/2 months with satisfaction. The news in detail:

"Continuity" is available on iTunes and Spotify
For some time now you can easily buy or stream the latest alionsonny album on iTunes and Spotify. Both, Amazon and emusic are still asleep. But if they don't want to make money, then that's fine. Especially since both platforms, as I can't say often enough, rather rip off the artists, both through their pricing, as well as in respect of the shares the artists receive from the sales. A detailed blog post about the availability of the album can be found on the alionsonny blog.

Willma Poppen - Blauer Montag
The newest track for the soon to be released album "Willma im Wunderland" has not only an unusual title, but also a, for "Willma Poppen", unusual creative approach and sound. The meaning of the title is likely to open up to anyone who has at least once heard the piece completely and has lived in the 80s. Thus 10 of the traditionally 13 songs for the album are now finished in the form of pre-release versions. Read more about the song on the "Willma Poppen" blog.

Cimelium - Santo da Serra
Also for Cimeliums album "Madeira", you can now listen to a new pre-release version, which is about the picturesque mountain village of Santo da Serra this time. However, this version is with a 100% certainty very far from the final album version. Therefore there's a need for a particularly large number of feedbacks, suggestions, etc. Read more on this song on the Cimelium blog.

5 new AlionLive videos
For AlionLive, since the last aliomind news, there has been such a large output that it may be considered erroneously, that creating video would be from now on the new main field of my person. This is by no means the case. Various factors, which I will not describe in detail here, contributed to this amount of new video. This had however, and that should not be left unmentioned, a rather positive effect on the viewer and subscriber numbers of AlionLive channel. For the first time, the number of monthly views exceeded 1000 Views. However, this was probably also caused by the separation of the AlionLive project from the alionsonny project, particularly the Facebook page. Anyway: Here are the videos in detail:

AlionLive Return 2 Madeira - Day 12 - Hike from Faial to Portela
More information about this video on the AlionLive blog!

AlionLive Return 2 Madeira - Day 13 - Hiking with Beatrice
More information about this video on the AlionLive blog!

AlionLive Return 2 Madeira - Day 14 - Weather Apokalypso
More information about this video on the AlionLive blog!

General Rundkopf
About this, I would like to write a few words ;). As you can see from the viewer count of both videos, this two-part nonsense- and information series is probably not responsible for the "viewers boom" on AlionLive. I also got quite a lot of negative feedback concerning this format. And in fact there are plenty nonsense Youtubers out there with an increasing tendency for making fools out of themselves. Nevertheless, this will have been certainly NOT the last trip to the pure nonsense domain. Here are the two short videos, the first of which explains why I wear military clothing recently and the second with a short fashion show on them. Read more information on the "General Rundkopf" videos on the AlionLive blog.

Ok, and that's it for this time! But I can promise you, that I will have a big surprise for you the next time :).

alionmind News December 17. 2013

And again, the monthly news blog is  a bit late ;) . The reason is roughly the same as last month, and if we continue like this, we will eventually get back to the first of the month ;). As I said, there is  not exactly much new to report. This is of course once again caused by winter time when my creative output is rather moderate in general. In addition, I am currently working hard to bring the alionsonny album "Continuity" in shape. Hah! I have an idea: I fill the space that remains free due to the lack of new releases with a small, long due explanation of how the process of production, quality management and quality assurance works here. I have indeed already explained it all several times on Facebook etc., but there's still allways somone who missed it... and someone is usually unfortunately the majority. So I will outline briefly the process from a song idea idea to the final album version (release version). Here we go:

The Creative Process

1. I have an idea for a song and create a small rough sketch.
2. This sketch is stretched to a length of 4-5 minutes and extended to a rough arrangement.
3. From this sketch I render snippets that appear promising and publish them on the official alionmind Work-In-Progress SoundCloud. This is to give a first early opportunity for listeners suggestions and comments. Here you can say "I like the idea (not)" and give suggestions for improvement for the first time.
4. This work remains for a period of a few days to several months, more or less untouched, on the hard disk.
5. Sometime I grab the thing and complete it to an audience compliant version. This is the so-called pre-release version.
6. This version will be uploaded to the SoundCloud of the project and is now until the completion of the release version available for commenting and criticizing. The Sound Clouds of the projects are:
• alionsonny
• Cimelium
• Willma Poppen
7. Once the (traditionaly) 13 songs for a project are finished in form of pre-release versions, I take a close look at each song again and improve what I recognized as improvable since the uploading of the pre-release version. Also I now look at any comments and suggestions from listeners and refer them in the improvement process. The changes between pre-release and release version can be just a few cosmetic improvements such as fixing the mix. But it can also be, that the entire song is changed drastically, as in the case of "Green Hills" (alionsonny album "Continuity"), that there is nothing left of the pre-release version.
8. Once all 13 tracks are in good shape, the album is finally released.

So you see : You, my listeners, are involved in the entire creative process of the creation of my music. I have already clearly understood one thing during my time as a software developer and IT consultant: A really good product can only be developed in cooperation with the customer. The more the customer is involved in the creative process, the more the product will also be his product. And this in turn increases customer loyalty to HIS product. And I 'm doing my music for you, so it should be your music. With the opportunity for each of you to place your own requests and suggestions at every moment of the creative process, I reach this goal.

So much for the explanation ;) . Finally, I want also to present the sparse creative fruits of the past month:

Willma Poppen - Maschinenmensch
We are joking already here, if Willma Poppen will beat alionsonny at the end regarding to to the album's release date. After all, with the publication of the pre-release version of "Maschinenmensch" the ninth title for the album "Willma im Wunderland" has been completed. And who was able to witness the development of the album "Heroes of the Popp-Culture" in 2012, knows that everything can go pretty fast with Willma sometimes. And four remaining songs are done quickly. Well, I do not promise anything. I recently like to say: It's finished when it's finished ;). With "Maschinenmensch" I have consistently continued what I have already announced shortly after the release of "Heroes of the Popp-Culture" as a future development direction of the Willma Poppen Project: The sound is going more experimental. if you listen to the pre-release versions of the already finished 9 tracks for "Willma im Wunderland" you will notice one thing: This album is colorful. Read more about the genesis of "Maschinenmensch" in the Willma Poppen Blog. And here is "Maschinenmensch":



alionsonny - Brainforest Chapter III
It iss done! The 13th track for the album "Continuity" is here and thus the album is complete in terms of the song material. But as I already said, now the album versions must be created. Since the second part of the "Brainforest" series was published in 2006, some listeners asked again and again if there would be a sequel. For an album with the title "Continuity" I found it only fitting to produce not only tracks detached from the past, but also the continuation of an old, quite popular, idea. Since the first part of the series I had a specific scenario in mind on which I built the "soundscape" of the respective song. It should always have a "mystical jungle feel". In my opinion I achieved that goal with the third part even more successful than with the predecessors. However, "Brainforest Chapter III" is also a lot more complex than the previous parts. Read more about the song on the alionsonny blog. And here's "Brainforest Chapter III":



AlionLive - Return 2 Madeira - Day 11 - Part 3
Finally, the last short part of day 11 was uploaded. This probably most "alcoholic" of all AlionLive video finishes the chaotic 11. day of my trip to Madeira in an absolutely fitting way. But what do I tell? See for yourself:

Continuity?
Ok, and that was it for this time with the news ... STOOOOOP! I just remembered that it might be of interest, for the alionsonny listeners who wait for the album, to know how the progress on "Continuity" is going. And some also do not know which songs will are destined for the album also. Read the absolute up-to-date status on the alionsonny blog.