How To Write a Really Annoying 'Boom, Boom, Boom' Sub-Woofer Piece?

• Dec 29, 2013 - 02:42

I badly need to fight back to a couple of neighbours who play music ALL day and night long - yes, 24 hours sometimes - and use Sub-woofers on pieces of music that have a bass line that seems to do nothing more than boom, boom, boom, boom.

You understand? Ever experienced anything like it? You can't hear any music, but you can't not hear this insistent almost inaudible thump, thump, thump....

It drives me insane. I'm insane right now because of it.

Seems to me the best thing is to give them a taste of their own medicine.

Just had a go at Musescore to write a few bars that'd make that sound but couldn't even find the way to put a single drumbeat in there.

Rather than the learning curve it might be better to just ask...

Can anyone give me a few bars that'd do the job?

p.s. How am going to know if anyone replies?


Comments

Hehe - 24 hours of the 1812 Overture with the speakers pressed against the wall might do the trick :)

But before engaging such extreme measures.

Have you tried talking to them about the problem?

They're probably blissfully unaware of the distress they are causing you.

As I read this, my son has just come in and asked if he can practice his bagpipes (that's with all guns blazing and not just the chanter) in the run-up to New Year. As I wipe the blood from my eardrums I can readily recommend that you take up this instrument and introduce it to your neighbours.

Hmm.. can't see the other posts when commenting. Shame.

I still haven't done this thing. Probably easy enough to write a drum line going boom, boom, boom. Don't remember what the hassle was when I tried it.

But what I thought I might get was some techie advice on perhaps the best way to write such a thing - maybe it'd be better with a chord? From a wind instrument? Along with the drum. And maybe more than one drum? And drum beats at a specified note (I saw that option there)?

The whole thing is a question of frequency, really. It is the sub-woofer frequencies and the cheap powerful sub-woofer speakers kids seem to be able to get these days that cause the trouble. The ground actually trembles.

Low frequency sound travels so well they use it to communicate with submarines.

I was once a night-clubbing raver and I well remember the bass shaking the floor and feeling it in the soles of my feet right up to the stomach.

Very primitive. Very strong. Very atavistic.

I understand why they like it. The more repressed the child the more inclined to like it as a compensatory mechanism. I sympathise. But not the extent of wanting to experience it here.

Let them go to a club or something.

Headphones can give a wonderfully realistic portrayal of music. Sufficient to satisfy aficionados everywhere. But they can't tremble your tummy and excite those primitive aspects like powerful low frequency beats can. That's why they won't switch to phones.

They want the bang, bang, bang. They literally want to feel it. Well okay. But not here. It is not appropriate here. I often quote my firearms. I'd like to play with them maybe (not really) but is a suburban street the place to do it? No.

Oh yes, fully aware. Been approached a number of times. Real phoney ass-licking smarmy creep assures you he fully understands and will immediately fix the problem, etc., etc...

Bagpipes I quite like actually. The phrase 'skirl of the pipes' has significance to me. They are elemental, too, just like these subwoofer beats. They have their venue. Best on the mountains of Scotland, amongst the heather, amidst the wind blowing the sound hither and yon is where they come into their own.

Or perhaps the field of battle.

Movement, I'd hazard, is the essence of the pipes. March with them or hear them coming, pass and fade in the distance. Stirring stuff I think.

Many good pipe bands in Australia I think. I've heard a few.

Yep. But pipes, symphonies, opera, they won't have the penetrating power of the low frequency stuff. They just won't hear them enough to care unless it's deafening to all around.

What's really needed is a directional low frequency speaker array. I'm not likely to get that though.

Lovely prog this Musescore, isn't it? Back to the pleasant world of music.... :)

MuseScore is an amazing piece of software, but it's not intended as a tool for making music. Rather, it's a tool for WRITING music. I think you should try something in the VST realm. You can get some free software that can host VST plug-ins for free, like VSTHost ( www.hermannseib.com/english/vsthost.htm ) or SAVIHost ( http://www.hermannseib.com/english/savihost.htm ), than grab some drum-oriented free VST plug-in like "KickMe! Too" ( http://www.vst4free.com/free_vst.php?id=804 ) or one of the many around ( http://freemusicsoftware.org/category/free-vst/drums ).
As an alternative, you could look for some free kick drum samples, load them in any free audio editor and activate the "loop" feature.
Tah-dah! Now you can let your techno-like sub-drum flow forever or, at least, until the next blackout.
Oh, I was leaving out the most important thing: get a gun as well, just in case your neighbour--

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