Squidfanny Trance Gate

--------------------------------------------------------

Circuit Bent

'TRANCE-GATE' AMSTRAD CKX100 Synthesizer.

By Dave Bradbury - SQUIDFANNY

--------------------------------------------------------

--------------------------------------------------------

Up for auction - FINAL EVER 'TRANCE-GATE' AMSTRAD SYNTHESIZER

Hacked, Modded & Circuit Bent AMSTRAD CKX100 Synthesizer.

This is an original 8-bit synthesizer from the late 80's. The machine has been heavily modified and upgraded with an array of new custom circuitry to expand it's features and sounds well beyond it's original specs.
It is now capable of producing a range of unique sounds and modulations, many of which are well beyond the capabilities of conventional synthesizers and often beyond description....

Please scroll down to see a demo vid, and details of the mods and features -



The Amstrad CKX100 is an original 8-Bit artifact from the late 1980's. It has a distinctive lo-fi sound and uses WAVETABLE synthesis to produce a warm, pleasing and ultra-harmonic tones from a bank of very grainy 8-Bit waveforms. It has a distinctive sound, which is quirky and unique.

The CKX100 has grainy Digital Drums with preset Rhythms & Accompaniment, Bleepy Electronic Instruments (presets only) & Lush Chord with a very cool 'Computer Aided Harmony' Feature (similar to the OMNICHORD).

It also has a MIDI output, so that you can use the 'Computer Aided Harmony' feature to play other MIDI synths, VST's, etc.

More info on the CKX100 HERE.

Click photo's for full screen and full album.
--------------------------------------------------------

• This machine works perfectly and can be used 'as stock' when required.

• This machine comes with a new set of Patch-Leads, a suitable power supply (for UK plug), and printed Quick-Start guide with instructions.

--------------------------------------------------------

Metallic Keys are nicely painted in various shades and multiple colours of Metallic Paint, and sealed with lacquer to protect the finnish.

--------------------------------------------------------

-------------------------

-------------------------

Click Play below for a DEMO VID showing this machine in action -

-------------------------
The various New Mods and features are briefly described below.

This machine comes with a printed DIY manual & Quick Start guide, with more details on the mods and features.-------------------------

Left Panel contains 'Trance-Gate' Analog Step-Sequencer - ------------------------- ------------------------- This machine contains an integrated Step-Sequencer, which performs three distinct functions, and can be synced to other suitable gear such as Monotribe's, Volca's or other suitable vintage or DIY gear. TRANCE-GATE - A programmable GATE, with with controls for GATE LENGTH, an INVERT switch, a master ON/OFF switch & LED lights to indicate the status and GATE length. PITCH-MOD - Programmable pitch modulation, with a DECAY knob, AMOUNT knob, master ON/OFF switch & LED lights to indicate the status and DECAY shape. BOLT-BAY ARPEGGIATOR - Use the included Patch-leads to connect the bolts together and generate unique Arpeggiator effects made from different tones of Ring-Mods and disrupted distortion effects. This mod has a master ON/OFF switch and LED light to indicate the status. The STEP-SEQUENCER has controls for SPEED, and a large chrome Rotary knob to change from 8-Steps, to 7, 6, 5, etc.  In 2-Step mode, the Step-Sequencer will act as a standard LFO, with the DECAY knob changing the waveform from Square to Triangle & something closely approximating a Sine wave. On the back of the machine are 3.5mm jack sockets, which provide Sync Input, Output and Reset. They will respond to a standard +5volt pulse from any suitable device (such as Monotribe, Volca, vintage drum machines, DIY gear or a MIDI-TRIGGER converter. -------------------------     -------------------------

-------------------------Right Panel contains Digital Glitch mods.

The real power of the Amstrad comes from these Digital mods, which are able to completely transform the Instruments, Chord, Accompaniment and Drums into unique sonic forms, many of which are beyond what can be achieved with conventional synthesizers.
Expect to find Lush Chords, Complex and Harmonic Arpeggios, Strange Delays / Echos, De-tuned Effects, Extended Envelope Effects, Digital Filtering, Ring Mods and an array of Modulating Compression, Strained Distortion and Bleepy modulating Sub-Tones.....

The CKX100 is able to produce some excellent 'Aphex' style Granular Effects and Dramatic Glitch Sounds which often defy description.... Use the GLITCH BUTTONS to generate Chorded Drones, Screaming Digital Noise and Granular Drum Rolls. Use the RESET BUTTON to Instantly reset the sound to normal again.
-------------------------

Right Panel Contains Digital & Glitch Mods - ------------------------- ------------------------- The new Knobs / Switches / Buttons & Lights are mounted on Thick Green PCB (circuit board), and the Flashing LED Lights above are mounted on Chrome LED Holders. The Mods are activated and controlled by an assortment of Rotary Switches, Metal Toggle Switches and Push buttons - Large Rotary Knob -  On the right of the panel is a large Silver Rotary Knob, with a toggle Switch below it and a Purple UV LED Light in a chrome bezel. This knob contains Bleepy squarewave tones, which modulate along with the rhythms, and can be used as a Sub-Oscillator along with the instruments. Use the Toggle Switch to activate & de-activate the tones. The LED light will Glow to indicate that the mod is active. Small Rotary Knob - In the center of the panel is a small silver Rotary Knob, along with a Toggle Switch and a Purple UV LED Light in a Chrome Bezel. This knob contains 6 x Instrument / Chord Glitches which provide Beautiful Complex Arpeggios, Strange Echos, Lush Chords and Extended Envelope Effects. Use the Toggle Switch to activate the mod. The LED Light will Glow to indicate the mod being active. 6 x Glitch Switches on the left of the panel - Use these switches on the Rhythms / Chord / Accompaniment for Dark Electronic Techno-esque rhythm Accompaniment and de-tuned chords. Use with the drums for weird pitch shifting and drum shifting Rhythmic effects. Glitch Buttons - Scramble the Digital Circuits with dramatic sonic results. . . Use with the drums for Granular Effects and Grinding 'Aphex' Style Rolls. Use with the Chord / Instrument to generate Chorded Drones, Digital Noise, Instrument/Drum Cross Modulation & General Havok and Glitch Chaos..... RESET BUTTON - Small Green Button below the right corner of the panel is used to Instantly reset Glitched sound back to it's normal state. This button allows the user to completely Scramble, Mangle & Corrupt the audio beyond recognition, and then instantly return the sound again. Flashing Lights - 3 x Flashing LED Lights above the panel will pulse and flash along with the sound. The lights are housed in chrome bezels. The Blue LED will flash to indicate the Vibrate (when active). ------------------------- -------------------------

When the various modification switches are turned 'Off', the machine will function exactly like a standard CKX100.

I don't have a manual for this machine, but operation is very simple and you'll most likely not need one. Give me a shout if you've got any probs.

And so it is...........

------------------------- Things to know before bidding - This machine is 100% stable and reliable, however you will encounter random oscillation when switching between the Glitch Switches. Simply tap the RESET Button to instantly return the sound to normal. This machine comes with a suitable 12 volt PSU for UK plug. It can also be powered with 6 x 'C' Type Batteries (not included). I've added a Polarity Diode, which will protect the circuits from in-correct power supply. A new set of Patch-Leads are included with the synth. This machine functions perfectly and can be used 'as stock' if required. Simply turn all Glitch Switches to the 'off' position. This machine is sold with a 12 Month 'Repair or Replace' guarantee. -------------------------

Thanks for looking, be sure to read usual Terms & Conditions below.

----------------------- ------------------------

Chop's Sleeper

Woven Audiobiography

The Junto this week caught a bizarre moment in my life:

The steps for this week’s project are as follows:

Step A: Choose a number from 1 through 6. You can roll a die or use an online number generator, or come to a decision on your own.

Step B: Write a 100-word text beginning with one of the following phrases, depending on the number you selected. Where there are brackets fill them in with the appropriate information.

“I was born in [ ] and I like …”

“My name is [ ] and I was thinking …”

“This morning I had a sense that …”

“Try as I might, the same thing …”

“The last book I read was and …”

“On a Sunday morning I usually …”

Step C: Write a 90-word text beginning with the same phrase.

Step D: Write an 80-word text beginning with the same phrase.

Step E: Record yourself reading the three texts as three separate tracks. Record each at the same pace. Speak slowly and take an extended pause after any period.

Step F: Layer the three tracks into one track. They should all begin at the same point and the first few words should, more or less, overlap to the point of being indistinguishable.

Step G: Take a couple passed through audio, lightly balancing relative volume levels to emphasize key phrases or, for that matter, to enhance the low-key cacophony.

Step H: If you desire to, weave in one tonal element, though not so loud as to overpower the speaking.

Deadline: Monday, November 18, 2013, at 11:59pm wherever you are.

Length: Your track’s length will be determined by the longest of your three recordings.

Background: This week’s project originated as part of the Oulipo Sound Workshop that was included in the Subtle Channels series of events held in San Francisco earlier this month (November 2013). The three-hour workshop provided an opportunity to explore the role that Oulipo literary constraints play in the restricted rules of the weekly Disquiet Junto projects. There were four projects that day, including a listening exercise, a word-based one based similar to last week’s Junto project, and a subtractive one along the lines of the 7th Disquiet Junto project from back in February 2012. The fourth was a simpler version of this week’s Junto.

Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: Include the term “disquiet0098-wovenaudiobio” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: Please consider employing a license that allows for attributed, commerce-free remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, be sure to include this information:

More on this 98th Disquiet Junto project, in which three original spoken texts are combined into one track, at:

http://disquiet.com/2013/11/14/disquiet0098-wovenaudiobio/

More details on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

- end -

On Saturday morning I wrote my pieces for the Junto:

This morning I had a sense that I should've slept longer. It was still dark but the rumbling in my stomach suggested it was the right time for me to awaken. So I got up and had some diluted apple cider vinegar, which has become a favourite drink and I'm told is good for my health. Then I returned to bed with my laptop and began visiting the usual sites, news and social media. There was a mix of outrage at the government and some mirth.

This morning I had a sense that it was going to be a good day. In a large part because it's Saturday and I've had a busy week, flying to Sydney for a meeting early on and returning to multiple deadlines for a theatre show and an upcoming exhibition. A catalogue for the latter is currently in the back of my mind but it'll have to wait until Monday -- which is when I'll be bumping in the theatre show anyway. Should be another busy week but that can be a good thing.

This morning I had a sense that I wasn't alone. My daughter had snuck into my bed at some point in the night, which isn't unusual. She seems to endure nightmares frequently. I'd had a dream myself. It involved discovering someone burgling my home and when I called the police I got an answering machine message, which isn't all that uncommon as the local police station is often unattended. The really dramatic part that had awoken me was that the burglar had confronted me. When he realised the police weren't coming, he'd turned away and I saw a second face on the back of his head.

It's funny, in hindsight, because there was a strange kinda foresight in the text. I've written about the weird dreams on my ShowcaseJase blog.

When recording the pieces I took the opportunity to try different microphones:

1. I used an Audio Technica AT2020 for the 80-word piece. It sounded a bit dull and I added the most reverb to it. 
2. A Rode NT1 recorded the 90-word piece. I think it has a metalic-sorta edge.
3. A Shure SM7 captured the 100-word piece, it's great on male voices and you can hear the difference in proximity as it was closer to my mouth.

When mixing I panned the second recording to the left a bit and third went a bit to the right with some widening with the EQ. The first seems more legible with the reverb. Delay was added to the third and longest part, as well as some resonator. The echo effect at the end seemed right for the dramatic ending but might be pushing the constraints of the Junto this week.

Jack Ruby's greatest hit

Nabbed this from Facebook, so I don't know who is responsible for this audacious photoshopping. I like to think it's the same wit who gave Jimi Hendrix an accordion.

Grayson Perry on the value of art

"...the person who’s getting the most out of any artistic activity is the person who makes it because they’re sort of expressing themselves and enjoying it, and they’re in the zone and you know it’s a nice thing to do."

From the Reith lectures earlier this year, so the hyperlinked quote above goes to a PDF. All four Grayson Perry lectures can be found here.

Recently I was introduced to Perry's work via this great conversation with Brian Eno.

Beastie drum machine

Joe Mansfield's forthcoming book Beat Box: A Drum Machine Obsession has been on a few sites this week. This pic was on The Wire's website. It makes me feel a lot better about owning five drum machines!

The Maestro Rhythm N Sound for Guitar G2 shown here featured on the Beastie Boys' underrated Check Your Head album and I wonder if it inspired the track below.



PS -- Really like this idea of retrofitting MIDI. It's beyond me but tickles my recent obsession with circuit bent gear. Cheers Techdef!

Orson Welles' enemy

"The enemy of art is the absence of limitation."

Ask Autechre anything

Autechre are answering questions on the We Are The Music Makers forum and revealing little about their role in Metroid Prime.

Tabletop hip hop

Disquiet Junto aluminium remix

The Disquiet Junto this week is a tribute to Lou Reed:

Using the phrase "Metal Machine Muse" as your guide, create a tribute to Metal Machine Music. Please employ at least one actual metal in your work, and note it in the title of your track.

It neatly dovetailed with my plan to remix the fence at Leeton Child Care Centre that I've previously posted about, although I had to edit it to under five minutes as per the guidelines. Hopefully the full version can also go up on Ventdeguitares.com, although to be blunt it still shits me this recording doesn't get the "evil double bass" tone here.



Pretty sure the fence is made of aluminium and this remix also features nickel in the strings on my Yamaha fretless bass. The rhythm reminded me of Corey's performance on this fence earlier this year. The drums are from Audio Damage's Tatttoo via Ohmforce Frohmage filter. There are a bunch of effects too.

I saw Lou Reed play at the ANU Refectory around the turn of the century. A friend of mine had won tickets but couldn't go, so I pretended to be Andrew Pippos for the night. Mr Reed picked a fight with someone in the crowd but played a good set, supported by a drummer who seemed to be giving directions to the bassist.

Big Beat comeback

Chris Randall posted this video on his blog with a description of Big Beat and the acts that popularised this style of EDM in the late '90s. It struck me as being the sorta track I'd more likely call Electronica, as it has less of a focus on samples from (sometimes cheese-y) sources that characterised the Big Beat tracks of Fatboy Slim, Bentley Rhythm Ace and The Propellerheads.

Not to look like a pedant because it seems the use of the term Big Beat varies depending on which side of the Atlantic you reside on:

Big beat later gained popularity and commercial success in the American market, largely due to the "rock-like" qualities and influences cited in the work of The Chemical Brothers and The Prodigy, who were featuring loud and heavy guitar sounds more and more in their material at the time.

One of my favourite sources of Big Beat was the Dope On Plastic compilations, which started in 1994 and successfully picked a number of tracks that went on to find popularity like Blueboy's 'Remember Me', DJ Kool's 'Let Me Clear My Throat' and 'B-Boy Stance' (featuring Tenor Fly) by The Freestylers.

Found this beaut mix of Plastic tracks while googling:

Of fence

Naturalist trio

The Disquiet Junto this week was a bit like an Iron Chef-style challenge to create a song from only three ingredients:

Combine the following three field recordings of animals into an unlikely vocal trio: 
Bird: http://www.freesound.org/people/keweldog/sounds/184870/ 
Kitten: http://www.freesound.org/people/Kyster/sounds/82274/ 
Pig: http://www.freesound.org/people/confusion_music/sounds/103421/ 

You can manipulate the sounds as you see fit, but at some point in the finished piece each sound should be recognizable by its source material. You may not add external sound sources.

My approach was to find a rhythm first. I used the bird recording because the gain on it was going to be a problem without gating anyway. Then I tried to make a bassline from the pig but it ended up sounding better as a kind of synth sound with a resonator. I looped the kitten to make the bassline, using my favourite Ohymboyz preset for the swelling drone.

To give the piece some structure I automated a few fades, as well as re-looping the pig and re-pitching the kitten. During mastering I ran the track through an EMT140-style reverb for that chrome character.

Arovane on field recordings

i've made some very special field recordings around an old garden at the countryside. i made a lot of samples out of rusty objects, found in that garden, like an old engine, big tubes and metal clusters. i love to transform this sounds in absynth, reaktor and plug ins like spectrumworx. great inspiration for new tracks!

Drunken Trumpet

Netlabel hybrid

The Disquiet Junto this week asked for a remix drawing on sections from three tracks released under Creative Commons.

I settled on a few short loops from Archean by PlotKA for the drums and the bass comes from Dark City by Marc Pastco, although I reversed it. My remix opens with a short loop from Zamenhof Blues by Digital_Me, which you can hear pitched up four octaves and after that it adds grainy bursts of texture.

Most of the effects come from Ableton Live, particularly Beat Repeat, Gate, Autofilter and Resonator.

Dubbed step

The instructions for the Disquiet Junto this week were "simple":

You will make four recordings of yourself walking. You will then combine those recordings as you see fit into a single original piece of music. You will add nothing to the four recordings. You can cut up and otherwise transform the source audio as you see fit, but it should always be recognizable as the sound of walking. The resulting track will explore various themes, including texture, rhythm, percussion, momentum, and the inherent musical qualities of field recordings.

Simple but easy to complicate. I began thinking about ways to record footsteps, like using a contact microphone on a nearby metal footbridge, but decided I should see what sounds I could get from different footwear and try to capture them sounding more like they do.

My shoes are all sneakers and they had different squeaks on the tiles in the kitchen. I decided to work with those and used my Rode NT4 microphone to make the most of the stereo effect as I walked around the room.

I experimented with different microphone positions and different shoes and also recorded one take barefoot to emphasise a couple of creaks.

After settling on four recordings, I sought short loops to find percussive tones. These were gated and given a little EQ for definition. Ableton's Beat Repeat was used for the variations.

There were a few different loops using the four recordings and one using four loops from one recording but only one collection caught my ear, which is the main part of this track. It seems to swing in a way my other loops did not. In the middle-eight section I changed the pitches of some loops.

The title 'Dubbed Step' doesn't really capture the style of this track but I liked it too much not to use it.

This song reminds me of basketball, particularly a Michael Franti lyric about "the squeaking of the sneakers and the echo in the hall". This afternoon I played it to my partner and suggested some of the sounds might not be recognisable as walking. "The Junto haven't seen you walk," she replied, which has some merit as my walk has been mocked and ridiculed at times. Her father once remarked it "looks like there's something up his backside and he enjoys it"!

Anyway, I think this is my 30th Junto.

Give it a good bash

Percussive Maintenance from Duncan Robson on Vimeo.

Damian Taylor on a friend's view of sampling

Another friend of mine in England suggested that with sampling you’re not just sampling the notes and the sounds, but the essence of the recording, you’re somehow using the spirit that’s in there. 

If you start getting into quantum physics, there’s really nice stuff about a particle that’s simultaneously in two different locations in space and time. That’s what’s amazing about recording, the tension of a particle existing simultaneously in a studio in 1998 and coming out of your speaker in 2012. 

When you layer up samples recorded in different eras and different locations with different people that quantum voodoo is amplified exponentially. I really believe in that, but it’s tricky to explain!

River sounds

These are excerpts from a recording to accompany an exhibition called Re-imagining the Murrumbidgee that'll open in Leeton this December. This will be my first release using my given name.

I was excited to be involved in this project as I've lived near this river most of my life, from being born on the tributary Molonglo River at Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra and then moving to Wagga Wagga and now Leeton in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area.

On average the body of an adult human being contains 60% water. Since I've been drinking water from this river and its tributaries pretty much all my life, the Murrumbidgee is a significant part of me.

Keen ears will recognise the sound of frogs, who featured in a Disquiet Junto piece last month.

Disquiet Junto Voyager I

This week the Disquiet Junto asked for a short piece of music to farewell the Voyager I satellite as it heads into interstellar space:

On its voyage beyond the bounds of our solar system, the Voyager 1 recorded two bursts of sound, which NASA has uploaded...

Those sounds will serve as the source material for your track. Now that Voyager 1 has left the solar system, you will write a short piece of goodbye music to send it on its way, using these sounds recorded in the outer space. You can add whatever you want to them, and you can transform the noise as you see fit, but you should retain elements of the original source material so that it remains recognizable to the listener. In particular, pay attention to the source audio's melodic content.

On Friday night I developed the basic elements of my track, manipulating Voyager's recordings to create percussive elements and a pitched down loop for the bass. This bassline was then treated using Sinevibes' Reactive and Frequency effects, which are great for making noises into something more musical.

Then I added a few notes using one of Ableton Live's organ instruments, thinking it was the sort of sound that came from the decade of the satellite's construction. The 707 drum machine came about a decade later though.

Sunday morning I started arranging the parts, settling on introducing the Voyager loops first and keeping a grainy texture throughout. Live's Utility effect was used to invert the phase of some loops for stereo effect and Autopan was used to exaggerate this width. Aside from the subject matter, creating space has been on my mind since the last Junto.

Valhalla's Shimmer was used to create the synth-like reverb effect on the organ at the beginning and I automated the shift function towards the end to create that descending sound. Tape delay effects can also be heard as I've read the satellite uses tape.

Guess I reversed the melodic content of the recording, dropping pitches rather than raising them like the plasma waves in the Voyager recordings but I'm happy with the result.

Disquiet Junto 3D

This week's Disquiet Junto asked for an exploration of spatial effects:

Your track will last one minute and thirty seconds. For the first 30 seconds, the drone and the beat will remain consistent, but the melodic fragment will move around in 3D. For the second 30 seconds, only the beat will move around, and for the final 30 seconds, only the drone will move around.

Recently I've enthused about the Junto for providing a sound education and this exercise encouraged me to try new processes as well as providing an opportunity to use new effects.

The title of my track refers to the national election being held today in Australia. I haven't been in to vote yet and the polls are saying that the conservatives will win the lower house but hopefully not the upper too.

My melodic fragment is a section of a bassline from an old song, Wandered. This morning I recorded the bass and the opening guitar chord, which became the drone using the infinite button in Audio Damage's Eos reverb. The beat was quickly assembled in Ableton Live using their percussion kit.

You can hear the bass come panning in from the right and into focus by automating the wet/dry ratio on the reverb. The percussion goes the opposite way, becoming wetter but also gaining stereo separation with Live's utility on the 'difference' preset -- which I think is mid/side processing.

And, finally, the drone goes out to the right while being pushed around by a pan effect and gaining reverb. It was difficult to get much sense of movement with this part, since there weren't any transients to colour with reverb.

Musical fences

This "dangerous" fence looks like it'd play a melody when you run a stick along it. My father sent these pictures, so I've sent him back to the town of Carseldine in Queensland to let me know what song.

Queensland is also home to another musical fence in the town of Winton, which was designed by Graeme Leak and has inspired popular musician Gotye, according to the video below -- which I found (along with myself) on the Playgroundology blog.


The Making of Eyes Wide Open from Gotye on Vimeo.

And apparently there are many more musical fences to be found in Europe. Thanks to Herofukutu for the link.

Disquiet Junto 3 Parts

The Disquiet Junto this week called for three parts: a beat from an oscillator, form from a drum machine and a field recording for melody.

After experimenting with the low frequency oscillator in my Sherman Filterbank, I recorded a slow 'blap' sorta sound using one of the four in my Utopia synth going into the aforementioned filterbank, which really warped the waveform.

This was then manipulated with various effects in Ableton Live, including re-pitching, compression, transient designing and gating to get a big kick sound and another on a slower loop.




Drum sounds came from an Alessis HR-16 circuit bent by Diabolical Devices. I recorded a few passes with different bends, before editing takes together.



The field recording is a wetland on the banks of the Murrumbidgee River in Wagga Wagga. You can sort of see it about a third of the way down the left-hand side below, opposite the water works on Marshall Creek that source town water from the Murrumbidgee aquifer. I have a theory that the reason the city has earned a reputation for sportspeople is partly due to this mineral-rich water supply but it does add a murky taste.

New Abre Ojos

Light On Our Foreheads from abre ojos on Vimeo.

Redacted Disquiet Junto

  Disquiet Junto this week is an open-ended exploration of surveillance and graphic notation.

The image presented is page 8 of recently declassified documents related to NSA collection of telephone metadata records.

It's became the musical score for this piece I recorded using a Casiotone MT-36 circuit bent by Frankenmusik, a kick drum and my voice.

I considered recording this interpretation in the opposite direction to the score as a form of protest to the widespread surveillance being reported since Edward Snowden's brave decision.

The Junto is an opportunity for me to try something different so I decided to record live because I liked the idea of events happening in real-tiem being recorded. Then I cast my mind about for suitable instruments.

It had to be something quick and dirty, the score was rough and black but the content was human. So there needed to be a vocal and the time signature was suggested by the page number, although I wasn't too strict once it started.

I like the sound like a dot matrix printer, it's dated but seems apt for a government record.

Current set-up

This weekend I'm making acid, driving basslines from the Mochika and looping snippets of crunchy circuit bent beats from this diabolical Yamaha device. Enjoying it so much I might not get around to recording the Junto piece that's losing my attention.

Matthew Herbert on music as documentary

...there is a huge revolution happening in music, which is that music has been kind of impressionism, it has been painting basically, for the last four million years and now it is documentary film making effectively.

If I wanted to make a record about a pig 100 years ago I would have had to use imitation or simulation whereas now I can record that pig and turn it into music. It is a hugely provocative political shift in music that we can now make music out of the fabric and matter and materials and texture of the world, it is a undisputed and fundamental revolution in the very idea of what music is and the materials and tools we have to hand.

Church of Slayer

Slayer At Church-Angel Of Death from Viatcheslav on Vimeo.

Disquiet Junto Minimal Haydn

This week's Disquiet Junto proposed a minimal techno remix of Franz Haydn’s String Quartet in F Major.

It took a couple of attempts before I found short loops of a bar or less were best for a techno feel.

The violin sounded a bit like Bernard Hermann's score for Psycho until I threw it down a flight of stairs.

The deep bass runs provided a nice kick sound by looping a small but dynamic section and adding a gate. I re-pitched loops, starting a 12-bar blues riff before it got patchy.

The structure was done on the fly for a live warehouse party in the early '90s-type vibe but the main influence was Ritchie Hawtin's music as Plastikman.

P.S. -- I've revised this remix after listening back and realising the glitch was a bit overdone. It was a sore thumb.

Harrison Young on poetry

Poetry is full of metaphor, and metaphor is where one thing means another, it is saying two things at once. And this to my mind is like reality, there are often two aspects. Or more.

Tools of the Trade

Mike Davis's Tools of the Trade

Chachi Jones on circuit bending

The instinct to make music with jugs, musical saws and washboards is an instinct that takes the abundant, inexpensive artifacts from your life and transforms them into something roughly musical. I don’t think there’s anything else that parallels that tradition more than transforming dollar-bin thrift store toys into magically glitchy musical instruments.

It’s really like a 21st-century junkyard band aesthetic. I think this generation is particularly reluctant to acknowledge the phenomena, possibly because many of the toys that are subject to the transformation — like the Speak & Spell, Casio SK-1, Touch & Tell — still have this aura of childhood futurism. It’s as if admitting that these toys are obsolete is to admit that the promise that they held for us in childhood is no longer relevant today. The reality, however, is that circuit-benders are turning trash into sonic treasure, a concept that I feel is rooted in American folk music.

Disquiet Junto Cheap Generative

This week's Disquiet Junto is based on a four-loop composition, specifically one 2 seconds in length, one 3 seconds, one 5 seconds, and one 7 seconds long with a 3-second pause to one of the elements and a 1-second pause to another of these elements.

The material comes from a recent collaboration and it was challenging settling on the final loop. The bass and bell-like pipe were given but I spent a while trying out other loops. I also cheated a bit I think, the loops length mightn't all be strictly following the rules.

It was an interesting approach to composition and one I'd like to try again. I like writing haiku for the framework and this offers a similar set of rules but I'd probably shorten it.

Kinda reminded me of John Cage:

In Zen they say, 'If something is boring after two minutes, try it after four. If still boring, try it for eight, 16, 32 and so on. Eventually one discovers that it is not boring at all, but very interesting.

Recent collaboration

Another result from my community recording sessions during the school holidays, this time in and around Leeton's Mountford Park.

The pipe organ sits in a church just across the road, so I bent the rules a bit but it really deserved to be part of the track as it's also celebrating a centenary. And I love pipes, so it was an opportunity to hear how it sounds without sitting through a sermon.

Thanks to local maestro Dominic Vella for the melody and thanks to the kids who joined in too.

PS -- Nice follow-up piece in The Irrigator today

Karl Bartos' purity

When I was young and studying music, like most music students of the time I was into Jazz. My professor once said to me, 'Why are they playing so many different notes? They're searching for the right note.' So I have nothing against improvisation but I'm more into defining what note I want to have. That's why I've always been keen on visual pictograms, like traffic-signs as its pure information. If you can find a chord progression and a pure, authentic melody it's all you need. The most important information is definite pitch because it's the purest information our brain can remember. That's why everyone can remember so many different melodies.

Beatreport

After having a laugh and then shaking my head about this post on the homogenous sounds in Beatport's EDM chart, one talented producer whose work appears on that service pointed me toward the video above. Ha!

David Lynch's seed

You have ideas, and I always say ideas are the most important thing, and the idea tells you everything. The idea is like a seed. The tree is in the seed, but it doesn’t look like the tree. So, when you finally see the tree, you might make some changes, but when you get an idea you really do see the whole tree, but it’s in an abstract form.

More Dinosaur Park

Think I should call this track 'Having a Barney' for the role of the purple dinosaur. As mentioned elsewhere, this song is one of many remixes made from playground recordings. I'm really keen on this Belgian producer's take on the material:

Screenings

Tonight was the last of the three screenings. Mountford Park looks magic at night and tonight it sounded magic too, as the church bells chimed six o'clock during one of the Mountford remixes.

The response was positive and it was satisfying to see my work projected large.

From last night's screening

This is one of the videos I've made from the community recording sessions held last week. It was screened on the water tower in Leeton's Central Park last night.

Recording around town

My local paper have this story on the screenings organised for later this week.

Roger Linn on drum machines and drummers

If you’re comparing a drum machine to a master drummer I would be one of those who argue that drum machines and quantization don’t have the same feel as a real drummer. But I don’t think most people use drum machines to replace history’s great drummers. They use drum machines to create a particular looped groove that works well in a particular musical context, with full knowledge that the drum machine won’t respond in dynamics or tempo to the other musicians, won’t spontaneously think of creative and complimentary drum parts drawn from a lifetime knowledge of thousands of recordings, and won’t produce subtly-nuanced percussive timbres by tapping, rubbing and bending a drum in hundreds of possible ways.

Playground recording workshop

This month I'm revisiting my project remixing Leeton playgrounds for the centenary, as it's closing and I wanted to give my videos a local screening before they join Albury's urban art programme in August and September.

I promoted that people could come and record with me and appear in the screenings. The first recording session was in Central Park on Monday and I was joined by about half a dozen with three kids taking an active interest.

They encouraged me to try the contact microphone on a couple of things I hadn't tried, such as listening to my pulse and recording the water tower in the park. It was really gratifying to see how enthused they were about the sounds and their potential. The youngest at one point exclaimed there were hundreds of sounds to discover.

Mountford Park revisited

My second arrangement using recent recordings from Mountford Park. This track emphasises the flying fox and features the feet of some kids who were fascinated to hear the equipment through a contact microphone.

Rick Rubin's inner voice

I never decide if an idea is good or bad until I try it. So much of what gets in the way of things being good is thinking that we know. And the more that we can remove any baggage we’re carrying with us, and just be in the moment, use our ears, and pay attention to what’s happening, and just listen to the inner voice that directs us, the better. But it’s not the voice in your head. It’s a different voice. It’s not intellect. It’s not a brain function. It’s a body function, like running from a tiger.

New Mountford Park

A lot has changed in the park at the heart of Leeton, so I returned last Sunday with my contact mic and camera to hear how the new flying fox and basket swing sound. This is my first go at using the samples.

Teaser

This video features percussion isolated from the track below. I'm working on a full video that will debut at the screenings I'm organising in Leeton next month.

Ableton Live has this FANTASTIC feature where you can manipulate the audio of video samples as easily as just audio and then export video with basic edits. I think they updated the codecs it'd accept in version eight but it still seems limited to standard definition, which is a great start. I'd really like to see them improve what the program will export, such as reversing footage when this is done to the audio.

Number five is alive

Jim Jarmusch #5

Nothing is original. Steal from anywhere that resonates with inspiration or fuels your imagination... 
Select only things to steal from that speak directly to your soul. If you do this, your work (and theft) will be authentic. Authenticity is invaluable; originality is nonexistent. And don’t bother concealing your thievery—celebrate it if you feel like it. In any case, always remember what Jean-Luc Godard said: “It’s not where you take things from—it’s where you take them to.”

Dinosaur Park

Here's an early experiment with material recorded at the park my kids have named for the purple dinosaur. I'm working through my park recordings and generating new material to screen next month. This is okay, I've already got a couple of reservations but I've also already got another remix underway too.

Below is a remix of Dinosaur Park in a techouse style from a talented Belgian producer.

Bug music

Waipukurau Park

Knowing that my neighbour Corey plays drums, I invited him to try playing our local playground. He settled into a rhythm on the slide and then experimented on the fence around the child care centre. I've looped parts of the former and added a slowed-down section of the latter.

Borrowed dream

The Disquiet Junto this week was a challenge for me, because (a) I don't usually remember much of my dreams (which is good because they often seem to involve my kids falling to their deaths) and (b) my room is very quiet aside from the noise of my daughter usually stumbling in around 1AM. So I borrowed my youngest's dream and added a few effects.

I like that it's a running dream. Many dreams I remember from my childhood involved running from things.

More Gossamer Park

Playground magic

Been revisiting my recordings of Leeton playgrounds and remixing them again but this recording seemed interesting enough without treatment. My plan is to screen a short presentation in a couple of parks this July to mark the anniversary of the For 100 Years album, the closing of town's centenary and to collect together new material that will appear on the DVD I'm finally going to finish.

This recording was made at Gossamer Park, which benefits from being one of the last parks I recorded. I used two types of piezo contact microphone, on the left channel is my homemade one and on the right is the cheap clamp-on variety. There's a little EQ but otherwise no further production.

Below is the mastered version, which sounds massive.

Return to Central Park

After the Junto, I returned to samples of Leeton's Central Park, last heard closing For 100 Years. It's been about a year since I manipulated these recordings and it's interesting returning to find new possibilities but I'm looking to record there again in July too.

Junto clap remix

This week's Disquiet Junto involved recording clapping and remixing applause. It's another interesting exercise in revealing how different people approach the same material because claps seem to produce very similar transients, so everyone is almost using the same ingredients.

To record my clapping I used a Rode NT1 with an Audio Technica AT4040 (I think, it's the cheap version of that model) in an XY position. I thought it would be interesting to compare these two mics as I don't use them much and was thinking of Ebaying them. The NT1 is a bit brittle and the AT4040 is kinda quiet but the waveforms showed quite a bit of difference between the two, although my ears didn't register much as the placement of my hands varied the results more.

It was interesting to experiment with hunching over the mics to get more lower frequencies reflected around them and leaning back to get more attack with the reflections from the roof. I think this was the case, I was also extenuating the treble in the slap at the time too.

Manipulating the recordings in Ableton Live led me to loop a couple of claps, vary the loop placement and then have them follow each other with a bit of a Beat Repeat effect. It sounded like I couldn't clap in time for a while but eventually I got a minimal percussive part going and lost interest. At this point I often think it's best to start afresh with a clearer idea of what results can be achieved, but instead I continued.

Returning to the track I sought to develop a harmonic progression but the short transients wouldn't give me much joy. Then I remembered the Sine Vibes plug-ins and used a few of their presets. After that I arranged those parts, added some dynamics with effects and mastered.

My clap trap