The Great Computer Crash—How Did It Affect X-Secular And A Candle In The Darkness?
Bodi-wan
October 21, 2021
It was the setback that no musician ever wants to go through! It was in the days where computers had come a long ways and were excellent tools, but things were still limited in hosts of ways.
Music files, like .wav files, are big files for those days. USB ports had just become a thing in standard computers, but most didn’t have them yet. I was using Windows 98, just to give you an idea of the timeframe and era of computers. USB ports were part of the Second edition of Win 98, where I was on a first edition. This computer was a virgin computer (i.e., it was a machine that didn’t get connected to the internet and files didn’t go to it, but it was used to provide music files as a source computer). I kept this thing safe!
Thumb drives were not a thing yet, so an easy backup, I didn’t have. I did back things up though. I had an external optical/CD burner 2x speed. Yes—that is super slow by today’s standards. So I backed up a number of files in this slow tedious way. But it was time consuming and slow.
After I had several weeks/months of files. I would back up the new stuff—as I remembered it. I had recently transferred to a digital system using Cakewalk—an excellent and cost effective program for recording. I loved it by the way.
Many of my files were still tape-studio based, lower quality but effective for the pre-digital age. But even those files were being transferred digitally. Thing were going well, I could see the end in sight to get these first two albums out. Then bang—it happened. The blue screen of death. For those in modern times, the blue screen of death was almost equivalent to smashing your entire computer and hard drive with a sledge hammer over and over again.
Everything on the hard drive was “toast”. Nothing. Nada. The latest files, the final vocal tracks, editable files, tracks awaiting vocals, all gone. All I had was some CDs with some back up files from, literally, months before.
It was devastating. No longer was I trying to finish up the albums and polish them, but instead I was in scavenge mode to see what I even had. It took months of time spread out over years to find what I had. Then I had to get a new computer, which I did and as I got things transferred to it, that one gave up the ghost as well! So back to my backups, twice now. It was heart breaking.
By the time I had assessed what I had, I realized I had files without bass lines, or in one case a mixed down .wav file without vocals (that was a great find as that one was a ready-to-use file to easily build on). A number of files were unusable or not the final takes. I had lost a lot of files and tracks where I had fixed something but now I was stuck with the old files, that was no longer fixable (i.e., in mixed down form). These songs contain little glitches that will annoy me.
For example, there was a bass note that I didn’t strike perfectly in Flood Epic. But I’m left with an un-editable file as all I have was the mixed file. There is a glitch in Allegiance with drum timing that was easily fixable but lost.
Another example is Wise Men, which I was working on as the computer self-destructed. It’s a great tune, but it will always annoy me because the vocal track on it was a trial test take that I laid down to give me an idea of what I wanted. The file that survived was the very first take of me roughing though it. I was about to go back and put down the final vocal track properly with the “p” popper and slightly varied melodies and so forth. When bang, it was all gone.
Wise Men, as we now know it, was all that was left and the file was mixed down into a .wav so I couldn’t edit out the vocals and replace them. Oh well. I almost left this song in the realms of file folder on my hard drive and not release it because I’m not pleased with the vocals; but at the last moment, I decided it was too good of a song to leave in a hidden digital room forever. So I hope it one can appreciate it as I do, knowing it could have been better.
With the song Armor of God, the vocal tracks are too loud in my assessment (and a few other fixable things) but all I had was a mix down .wav file so there is nothing I could do about it.
Another big setback was that many of my backup files were Cakewalk-specific files that no longer exists as it was purchased by another company and largely taken down the road of extinction. In retrospect, I’m actually surprised I was able to retrieve as much as I did.
I’ve been working with Audacity now to help finish the albums. So when listening to the individual songs bear in mind that this was the best I could do with what survived. Nevertheless, it was satisfying to see the albums with a release date.
Are the albums X-Secular
and A Candle in the Darkness perfect?
By no means and I’ll be the first to admit it. But like a sinner saved by
grace, these songs were essentially dead, and by grace of what was saved (and
what I’ve been able to do since then) they have been resurrected to new
life. I thank my Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ for that kind blessing and pray He receives the glory in these
songs.
