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::: SPECIAL FEATURES::: (Frequently Asked Questions)

Question Glossary: I) Can I buy your works from anywhere? II) How do you design your music? III) Why Akira Yamoka and his music? IV) How did your group form? V) What does "Broken Notes" mean? VI) Does Akira Yamaoka know of your works? VII) Can you guys do music for my project? VIII) Who is the webmaster of this site? IX) What are your goals for Broken Notes? X) Can I use your music for my own personal and business use? XI) What programs are used to make this website? XII) I'm noticing some remixes on some of your albums, is that allowed? XIII) Has your works inspired people to do their own "fan soundtracks"? XIV) What is and where can I get WinRAR when I download your albums? XV) Who the hell is that in your top banner? XVI) Where can I buy Silent Hill soundtracks? Can I get mp3's from you? I) Can I buy your works from anywhere? No, you are unable to purchase our works at this time. The reason is because our group does not have a publisher to distribute our works. We simply cannot afford to fund the distribution of these albums on our own wallet. We are still open for discussion on this particular topic however. II) How do you design your music? Each member of Broken Notes has their own way of doing their tracks. Here is the way each artist does their music: Jason Gervais (Sound Program: FruityLoops 5.x - Studio Edition), (Editiing and Mixing: Cool Edit Pro). Live recorded effects using a microphone are also used for tracks. Samantha Dean (Sound Program: Reason 2.x - With Added Sound Packs), (Editing and Mixing: ReCycle, Macromedia SoundEdit 16). Sound libraries also used. John Anthony Mathewson (Sound Program: Adobe Audition, FruityLoops - Version x, Gigastudio - Version x), (Additional Record Methods: Digital Mixing Board at John's University, DAT Recorder (sound effects), and real human voice work is also used for some tracks). Christopher So (Sound Program: FruityLoops 5.x - Studio Edition), (Editing and Mixing: Acid Pro). Derrick Koo (Sound Program: Sibelius - Version x, Fruity Loops 5.x - Studio Edition, LiveSynth Pro), (Intrsument, Sound, and Voice Recorder: Total Recorder), (Sequencing: Sonar 2.x), (Editing and Mixing: Cool Edit Pro), (Guitar Recording: Fender Stratocaster directly-recorded through a Behringer V-Amp 2. Dunlop, Boss and Digitech effect pedals), (Vocal Recording: Shure SM57, Audio Technica AT3031 Cardioid Condensor Microphone). Christophe Frutuoso - Temporarily unavailable. Sunburst - Temporarily unavailable. Samuel Drower - Temporarily unavailable. III) Why Akira Yamoka and his music? The answer is really simple, why not? Akira Yamaoka is an incredibly talented individual, and we are highly inspired by the works he has done. One of the reasons we do Silent Hill styled music is because it's different than music you would normally listen to. This style of music allows you to explore your creativity in endless ways. IV) How did your group form? Jason Gervais is the founder of Broken Notes and the idea of doing fan soundtracks based around the Silent Hill franchise. It first formed when Jason Gervais presented a simple idea to Samantha Dean to do a fan soundtrack dedicated to Akira Yamaoka and his music. The idea then grew from there and eventually the Silent Hill Fan Soundtrack released in December of 2002 featuring their music. No sooner had production started to begin for a follow up album, and that is where John Anthony Mathewson comes into play. Jason Gervais met John Anthony Mathewson and they quickly formed a friendship. John Anthony Mathewson was at the time working on making his own "fan soundtrack" inspired by our first album, but it was Jason Gervais who invited John to have his tracks featured on the follow up album Broken Notes. Our name Broken Notes is the title of our most successful album, and we figured we might as well use that for our name. John Anthony Mathewson claims ownership of our group name, and it was brainstormed for one of the working titles for the Broken Notes album. Obviously it's one we used. V) What does "Broken Notes" mean? John Anthony Mathewson formed the name "Broken Notes" based on that if Silent Hill music could be categorized, it would be music notes that are broken and doesn't always make sense musically. John visualized a broken piano, with piano sheets that didn't make any sense. Thus forming the collaboration of the words "Broken" and "Notes". VI) Does Akira Yamaoka know of your works? Yes, he is aware of our projects. We became aware of his knowledge in us as artwork buddy Kevin Michael James (artwork designer for Broken Notes, and Broken Notes Melancholy) attended a Game Conference held in San Fransisco in March of 2005 and simply asked Akira if he was aware of us. He responded that he knew of Broken Notes and our project. We know nothing more than that however at this point. We do not know if he has listened to our works yet, but it has been reported that he was given CD's of both Broken Notes and Broken Notes Melancholy by Kevin Michael James personally. VII) Can you guys do music for my project? No ...I'm just kidding! There is projects we take into serious considerations, and they are: independant film productions, videogames, and theatrical film productions. We will however take all requests into consideration and let you know if we are interested. Please visit our Contact page to get in touch with certain people who you are interested in doing music for your project. Please keep in mind that we are busy at times and it may take some time to get a reply to your messages. VIII) Who is the webmaster of this site? Jason Gervais is the webmaster. To contact the webmaster, visit the Contact section. IX) What are your goals for Broken Notes? We started out as fans of the Silent Hill games, and will end as fans of the Silent Hill games. With that in mind, we've created works inspired by Silent Hill, and as well it's composer, Akira Yamaoka. We've designed this music not just for Akira and his team, but we've also designed this music for fans of the games. Basically, music by fans for fans. Another goal is to improve each and every single time we do a project. By doing that, we listen closely on what people think of our works. We keep in good contact with all of our fans, and are very interested to hear what you have to say. While we didn't intend such to happen, we've even grabbed the attention of people in the gaming industry. While we don't consider ourselves "Video Game Music Composers", we certainly consider ourselves artists to some fashion. Another one of our goals is to make sure people are well aware of our intentions with these projects. We're not in it for the money. We're in it because we love doing what we do. We're just fans. X) Can I use your music for my own personal and business use? That would violate our right to our own creations. You cannot use our music for your own personal gain. None of our music or files may be linked on your source of publication. Doing so will result in necessary actions being taken against you and your company. You must ask us for permission before you use our music for anything. To discuss these matters you must contact the correct person. If you'd like to use a track by Samantha Dean for example, you must ask her. You cannot ask John Anthony Mathewson, and you can't even ask Jason Gervais. Each artist has a right to their own creations, as stated. Our website offers detailed information on who did each and every single track, so it should never be confusing as to who did what. Please visit our Contact page for contact information. XI) What programs are used to make this website? The site is designed with: Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004. Image and Graphics: Macromedia Fireworks MX 2004. Additional Image Editing: Jasc Animation Shop 3. XII) I'm noticing some remixes on some of your albums, is that allowed? Certainly not. We have never asked for permission or paid a fee to do remixes based on Akira Yamaoka's or any other artists music. This could spell trouble for our website, but until then we will keep the questionable material on the site until notified otherwise. Broken Notes is a non-profit group and we do not make any money off of doing remixes. As long as Broken Notes remains a non-profit group, I don't see how it could be a problem. Akira Yamaoka is aware of this project, so if there was a problem, then something would have been done already about it. XIII) Has your works inspired people to do their own "fan soundtracks"? Yes, they have. I've seen a few times already people attempting to do their own "fan soundtrack" dedicated to the Silent Hill franchise. To put it flat out on the table, we are the original/first "fan soundtrack" people who dedicated music to Akira Yamaoka specifically. There is people who "copy" (I hate to use such a word) us. We did this music for Akira Yamaoka and the Silent Hill fans. If people want to do their own "fan soundtrack", well, that's perfectly alright with us and we definitely encourage it. XIV) What is and where can I get WinRAR when I download your albums? WinRAR is an extraction program used to compress our files for download and make available. It makes it much easier for users to download our music, because you get everything all in one shot as opposed to like how it was before, where users had to download track by track. To avoid the stress we've decided to do this. To download an evaluation copy of WinRAR, you can visit their website: http://www.rarlab.com/download.htm. It is free to download, although you can purchase the program if you need to. From experience, the trial version doesn't have any limits for how long you can use it. So you can download it and use it pernamently. XV) Who is that in your top banner? Akira Yamaoka. XVI) Where can I buy Silent Hill soundtracks? Can I get mp3's from your team? You can likely find the Silent Hill soundtracks for purchase at CDJapan, and Game Music Online. While we don't recommend it, Ebay is also another place you can probably find the soundtracks for purchase. We will most certainly not give you downloads for of any of the Silent Hill soundtracks, so don't bother asking us. I'm sure Akira Yamaoka wouldn't be very comfortable with us sharing his work on the Internet, and if you're such a fan of his music you'd pay to buy his incredible albums! Notice: All questions are answered by Jason Gervais.