A Hobby

April 04, 2024

Hi FAU Bloggers,

Today I'd like to tell you about my main hobby, which is making music. It's something I've done for most of my life. I have lots of other hobbies like reading, walking in natural places, playing football or cooking (to name a few ), but making music is my current favourite. I do this hobby whenever I have free time. Obviously, it's better if I can dedicate a few hours to doing it, but often I'll just make minor adjustments to songs or pieces of music I'm working on. The equipment I use most is my computer, a microphone, a midi-keyboard (that connects to my computer) and a guitar. Then I use a programme, a DAW (Digital Audio Workstation), to record and mix my creations. I've had this hobby for many years. I wrote my first song when I was about 13 or 14 and started recording when I was about 18. After that, I played in bands and did lots of home recording for at least 10 years. Nowadays, Technology has made music making a lot more accessible The equipment and techniques have changed over the years and now it's possible to create amazing sounds in a home studio.
I guess I love this hobby because I love music:)

I currently have 3 different musical projects: Amateur Beauty, The Regular Cats & Experiment SH1310.

Amateur Beauty is a duo with a Colombian designer & photographer who I met in China. So far we have released 2 concept albums and a 3-track Ep. All our songs were written using a technique we created based on converting letters into music by assigning a chord to each letter of the alphabet. Yeah, it may sound a bit weird but it's lots of fun (https://the-alphabet-files-project.com/). Our music is experimental, electronic, and occasionally, pop. We will have a new single out later this month.

The Regular Cats is a Santiago based duo with a Chilean Hip-Hop producer who was an ex-student of mine. We created a hip-hop alphabet using the same alphabet technique described above. Initially we released it as 3 albums, but later released the full alphabet album. We also released a 3-track Ep.

My third project is as a solo artist, Experiment SH1310, but I have collaborated on a couple of songs. I first started using this name about 15 years ago (it appeals to my sense of humour). Initially I released stuff on retro platforms like Soundcloud and MySpace but last year I got a Spotify distribution. Since then I've released 2 albums, 2 Eps and a single. I think my music is very eclectic and I don't stick to one style. It includes Pop, Electro-Indie-Pop, Hip-Hop, Punk, Rock, Electronic, House, Soundscapes, Experimental and no doubt some other stuff too like Rock n' Roll or Soul:). I have a new EP out on April 4th and a new single on April 22nd.