Music has a great impact

In the last six months, a lot has happened in our small studio in Asternstreet Emsbüren Germany. We have bought several electric guitars. Top brands such as Fender, Gretsch and an Epiphone Les Paul are now part of our studio inventory.

Also an e-drum kit and the hottest software of the moment, most notably Superior Drummer 3 as well as Hitmaker SK with original Hugh Padgham drum sounds. In order to bring a digital recording studio to life, we converted our basement and use the space we have now. This offers not only us, but also professional musicians the opportunity to record sounds for various purposes. I can't play professionally myself yet, but I'm full of enthusiasm, passion and ready to start a long way anew. After all, there is YouTube, Udemy and help everywhere, what more could you ask for.

My riding career is coming to an end

My riding career, now slowly coming to an end at the age of sixty, now gives me more time to fulfill a deep inner desire. I started studying synthesizers back in the early 2000s, but it took another twenty years before I decided to learn music seriously. I'm from Gronau near the Dutch border, so it doesn't surprise me that there's even a Rock'N'Pop museum in my town since a few years, that much in advance.

Saturday evening in our street

One thing should not be forgotten; Udo Lindenberg is Gronauer, great memories are awakened here. When I was a child at the Schieferkuhle, a bathing lake in the settlement, the first time I heard of Rudi Ratlos (comes in a Udo Lindenberg song) was clear to me, in this city everything is possible. On Saturday evenings there is always something going on in our street, a hit song by Peter Maffay, of course we know it. Again from my time - and so it was indeed. Hits nonstop, in the pubs was mood, even among the most hopeless contemporaries, after all, a means to escape the brutal frustration. At least that's how I felt as a kid, if it hadn't been for the music that regularly blasted from the speakers well into the evening. My parents had a small local beer company, and when the pubs closed, it liked to go on at our house. Again with the hip music, which sometimes could be really sentimental.

Four pubs in our street and loud booming music

With four pubs on no more than two kilometers of street, the neighborhood where I grew up was simply a small-town sensation. In the seventies and eighties, Gronau was characterized by old textile factory buildings, high unemployment and perceived frustration. But in fact positively shaken up by a musical drumfire of the hottest sounds, hits -and artists of the seventies. It should be emphasized, with absolute unique selling point - and that made a lot of things more bearable.

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Music has always been a great longing in my soul. Since my childhood days, music played in every corner of our house on Duke Street from morning to night. I paid close attention to who and what music was hot at the moment, because I come from the sixties and naturally internalized the Beatles, Stones and many cult bands of that time.

The hit parade on Saturday night

Ilja Richter's Disco, the Hit Parade with Dieter Thomas Heck -and many other great music shows of the time were very popular and were always a family event on Saturday nights. Very early I came into possession of an electric guitar, even with effect pedal and amplifier. I don't remember what kind of guitar it was, but a Fender would have a certain resale value today, that's for sure. The image of many musicians at that time was not always flawless and of course not without reason, the seventies were a very revolutionary era. Thus, the media were dominated by war scenarios from Vietnam, and the gray atmosphere in the midst of the Cold War. A lot of things were spread in the media in a scary way, social and societal tragedies were expressed mainly in music.

On the summer beaches music everywhere

If you wanted to listen to music, you had to turn on your suitcase radio. On the summer beaches, the songs of the Stones and Beatles were playing up and down. Then came the time of synth pop, the German wave with Nena "99 Luftballons" Markus "Ich gib Gas, ich will Spaß." Kraftwerk with Autobahn, Soft Cell with "Tainted Love" or Talk Talk with "It's my live". Just like the seventies, the eighties delivered a musical drumfire of great acoustic sounds and big world hits, which, by the way, are still popular today. The younger generation in particular is rediscovering the music of the seventies and eighties, thanks to YouTube and social media.

Time stops only at the devil

Time doesn't stop, does it? As Barry Ryan raushaute in the seventies in one of his hits, "Time stops only before the devil because he never gets old hell does not get cold" so it said in the track. That is indeed timeless, a piece of reality, isn't it? But: it goes on and on, as we know. Not only in the expression of music, but also in technology, we are experiencing quantum leaps, which we do not call the digital age without reason.

Digital music is the reality of today

Our reality has given us digital production tools that are revolutionary and allow people like you and me to produce professional-style music from the comfort of our own homes. Music today is not only produced digitally, but also in bits and bytes and sent across time zones. Digital sequencers like Cubase, Pro Tools or Propellerhead Reason are DAWS (Digital Audio Workstation) that allow you to record music from your guitars, drums or other instruments directly into your computer. Plugins are software implants that can recreate, simulate or produce any sound. You no longer need an elaborate studio and it's much more space efficient. E-drums can be played in an apartment because they can be heard through headphones. With no loss of quality, the sounds can be transferred, either to your own computer where they can be post-processed, or to friends, other musicians, recording studios, and so on. The possibilities are immense and you can even test and correct entire productions on your own computer. The possibilities are enormous, offering not only amateur musicians but also professional producers the ability to mix sounds in ways that were not possible in Beatles' day.

Professional musical instruments more affordable than ever

Cost is a consideration for young musicians - musical instrument manufacturers have known this for years. Whether analog, such as an acoustic guitar, or electrically powered, such as an electric drum or electric guitar, the quality is outstanding. A Fender Squire electric guitar can be had today for as little as 200 euros. The sound quality is impressive, the workmanship with today's CNC mills and machine manufacturing methods simply professional. So strict quality control is essential for any company that makes musical instruments if it wants to stand a chance in the competitive market.

Music stars on YouTube even without live performances

This has led to a worldwide boom. Music doesn't necessarily have to be performed live anymore. We have also learned this through Covid-19. Musicians and especially music teachers today often have 1-2 million subscribers on YouTube. On TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook, you can connect with anyone and everyone, which naturally leads to interactive exchanges across borders.

Continue to reinvent yourself

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All of this has also led to enormous changes in the world of music. I have also realized this and am using the years I have left to learn something new. I'm excited and reinventing myself. That's what I've been looking for and everything that has to do with computers has been part of my everyday life for years anyway. And so, in addition to a production basement for websites, a recording studio has been added, bringing digital media together even more. Welcome to the family - Welcome to Intimeon - Digital Media