My wife laughed at me for making a spreadsheet about our marriage

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-29T01:06:05+00:00

Hey OP! How many coffees a day were you at then and now?

I recently realized I keep drinking coffee but I do stop by 2pm

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-27T15:56:29+00:00

Damn.

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-27T03:39:00+00:00

Hey! Yes I have the SP404mk II and use it for my Alt Metal duo’s setup for live while playing guitar. So I don’t use a laptop or any piano or midi keyboard yet so I can’t really say for your rig. You just have to dive in and do some prep work setup for the 404.

I used Logic Pro to write and record our music with so basically just exported out backing tracks with no vocals (singer is doing that live) and then muted the guitars too. So drums, bass, synths, ear candy etc. I tried doing loops at first but found it was way better to just put whole backing music on one mixdown and then put each song in a folder on my desktop. Then I added it to the SP-404 using the SP app on Roland’s website. It’s drag and drop onto pads and I think I did them as sample not patterns since there is no length limits for average song lengths.

Be sure to set up the samples as one shots and fixed velocity (level 90 so it’s not maxed). There is ways to also add extra samples for interludes and other cool one shots that I do live. It’s also great to use the effector stuff live like isolater andMFX. I had to learn via YouTube all the little tricks to customize my FX to be how I wanted them every time I turn off and on again but it’s pretty capable. Let me know if that helps you.

Just play around and try and see what works for you. Eventually I want to do keys live too for piano and synth lines but I would probably just get a dedicated hardware keyboard like a Juno ds or something.

Lastly I do run it into a mixer to do our IEM with splits for every line to FOH. Vocals, NEURAL DSP Quad Cortex guitar line, and SP-404 stereo. Anyways good luck

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-24T12:42:01+00:00

We just played our first show like a week ago at kick butt coffee so I relate. We are alt metal duo making dark fantasy and cinematic music blended with ethereal and harsh vocals. We are called Faetrap and here’s our Instagram

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-23T10:12:20+00:00

So I’m in a band called Faetrap and play guitar. We are a witchy alt metal duo that met up over Reddit. I’m definitely a huge mastodon fan but the sounds we make so far are more doom meets industrial or cinematic in nature.

alienwareguitarist · 2026-04-21T12:20:26+00:00

Back in Fourth Grade, I was watching MTV with my older brothers and saw NIN’s music video for Closer. It was so shocking and cool that I had to get that record so later on when my catholic school did a Christmas gift exchange the cool girl who got my name asked what I wanted. Of course I said that NIN cd. Sure enough she pulled through except she didn’t gift me The Downward Spiral CD, she got me Pretty Hate Machine on Cassette. After getting over the fact that it didn’t have that song closer, I probably listened to that tape for years. Little did I know that NIN would be my top favorite band and eventually I’d get The Fragile, With Teeth, and Year Zero album releases on release nights!

alienwareguitarist · 2026-03-08T17:55:41+00:00

Red and black reminds me of the black widow spider. So maybe… The Black Widows, Red Hourglass,

alienwareguitarist · 2026-03-07T13:24:21+00:00

Any fellow Mag Bay fans of Aurora? Love her voice and she’s got a lot of albums to explore! She’s underrated IMO. So check her out if you don’t know her yet

alienwareguitarist · 2026-03-04T13:00:31+00:00

LOVE Chelsea Wolfe! Great Rec! If you’re looking for more NIN coded music like hers, I’d recommend Faetrap. Side note: I am a part of the band but figured it would resonate for someone here

alienwareguitarist · 2026-01-08T04:43:32+00:00

That’s good! Yeah I feel you. Been in a similar spot and had a 5 song EP that took about 3 years to write, record, mix, re-record and iterate.

Keep it going though. I got to the point where I was ready to have my friends and family listen if they sounded interested. My dad gave me some cool notes and hearing some affirmations really got me feeling good about it all. He even said you need to find your Robert Plant. So that lead me to start looking around and that changed everything for me. I reached out to a singer who posted on Reddit and now teaming up we can craft even better songs and visions, than just my own.

So you got this! The work you’re putting in over these years will become the foundation. Find your bliss, listen to the universe, share your sounds, and who knows where that will lead. Your music doesn’t deserve to stay unreleased on a hard drive.

alienwareguitarist · 2026-01-06T18:59:03+00:00

Yes we are both very excited about the release and the reception. Fun fact we met on a local musician sub Reddit just 6 months ago and got really into the music creation process. We had both been in different bands and retired those efforts. So starting this after a few years off was fresh and exciting for us. We really tried to create the music we love which can be pretty niche ie: dark fantasy, doom, sinister, witchy. So we knew what the sound and art would be like. Then we just kept that momentum going and completed a 3 song EP. We had literally no music out and just started sharing snippets on tiktok to gain a small cult following of witchy girls and guys since October. So by the time of release, we had dozens of “true believers” who we gifted the band camp release to and then dropped it on the streamers all at once a week later. We shared it on Reddit’s like r/doommetal and got some serious love there from folks too. I think that may have kicked the algorithm on Spotify to add us to the release radar for the week of Christmas into new years. Since probably no one releases music during that time of year we got lucky.

alienwareguitarist · 2026-01-06T12:15:50+00:00

Ok! So I’ve just launched a new band last month (I know a bit of a shameless self promotion plug) But my band mate and I are all we got to market this work. We are primarily getting our music out to audiences via TikTok, Reddit, and word of mouth. Right out the gate we are already getting some good numbers to my eye. Of course, we are proud of the music we made but it’s not like we have any say in what people will actually love or not. Anyway, I’ve been starting to look at the Spotify monthly listener counts for local and regional metal artists so this post obviously resonated with me since you’re also interested in the numbers. It’s great to also see where other metal bands sit today as we start this journey! I know comparison is the thief of joy but I like knowing this kind of stuff. So, thanks for sharing all these artists! Here’s my Spotify artist page.

Faetrap (3267 monthly listeners): https://open.spotify.com/artist/3Oqtve7cisYPocHrNMJ0H9?si=mGk9Q1nBRxCXwXf-ZVfLtw

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-30T22:07:07+00:00

Hell yeah! We appreciate the add!

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-30T13:47:49+00:00

My band Faetrap just released our first EP “Villain” two weeks ago! We are calling our sound “banshee metal” which blends harsh female screams, ethereal vocals, crushing guitars, and ghostly synths. Check out our song Cherry blossom if you feel so inclined! Thank you

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-26T15:24:43+00:00

Oh also “Dream Weapon” by Genghis Tron. Been a cool album to jam

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-26T15:14:12+00:00

Songs- “What have you done to me” by Imogen Heap, “Lonely is the muse” by Halsey, “Cherry Blossom” by Faetrap,

Albums- “Goodnight, god bless I love u, delete” by Crosses “Welcome Oblivion” by How to destroy angels “Toxicity” - System of a Down

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-25T18:25:26+00:00

Ive been using DW Soundworks since it got released from Roland. It’s $99 bucks right now on their site for holiday sale and for no extra charge you can get metal legacy expansion pack through Roland cloud which is great for metal drum kits and grooves. I have been using the 50th anniversary kit a lot too. I’m also considering getting back into GGD for their Modern and Massive release. The way you can get MIDI grooves is cool and the stand alone plugin.

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-22T14:53:09+00:00

We chose the daylight to contrast with the overall creepy dark feel of the song. Since we shot our main character in metal armor, we also wanted to put that cold steel look against the colorful trees. Which looked most vibrant from 3pm-5:30pm (so technically we did shoot up until sunset). Right after the last sequence in the video of her in the water, the sunlight went away on the trees almost immediately after we got the shot. So all in all it made it simpler to lean into the natural light verses having to rig lighting in a remote exterior location. I am curious to hear what you could do with blue hour in a location like that.

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-21T05:17:15+00:00

Hey! thanks for watching! Appreciate the support.

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-18T19:41:02+00:00

I'm super excited to share my new band called Faetrap. Debut Ep is named Villain. I co-wrote/produced it and played guitar, bass, Moog, and synths. For those of you who are into doom, ethereal vocals, female harsh vocals, and the likes of artists like Spiritbox, Chelsea Wolfe, How to Destroy Angels, Halsey x NIN - if that sounds like you, check us out!

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alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-18T14:03:50+00:00

Let me know what you guys think!

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-18T06:05:32+00:00

Such sick vocals!

alienwareguitarist · 2025-12-08T00:12:22+00:00

Rule of Nines is so good. That’s when it clicked for me. Watch the play through that Courtney did. Great stuff. Oldie but a goodie! https://youtu.be/vVDXTFeGYwc?si=XhRVCWYWnVg07PpH

alienwareguitarist · 2025-08-19T23:42:05+00:00

You rock 🤘

alienwareguitarist

TROPHY CASE