Cluster Drone

Yesterday, I played around with my old idea of random and control of music with hardware interface.
So I assigned the volume of 8 notes to the 8 knobs of my Trigger Finger, plus other controls for the filter.
This morning, I listent to it on my MP3 player, it was fresh, though theoritically very dissonant.


Guess what are the notes they are ;-)
(it's an idea that comes from some experience of SonicBrat)

CITY OF GLASS

It's been sometime...
[Please listen with headphones for a better sonic ride :) Thanks!]

An ambient sound art piece made up by sampling kitchen wares, faulty cables,
synths, guitar drones and piano.



CITY OF GLASS

I closed my eyes
And got carried away by darkness
When I opened them again
I was standing in a city made of glass
The only people I saw
Were my own distorted reflections...

Locking on sinewaves

This morning, took some moments of calm (or almost) in the Montsouris park to experiment a track on my Palm TX with simple sine waves and buffer lock effect.
The result is here, experimented/tweaked live on the Palm plugged into my EHX tube preamp.

The first track is harsher than the second one, more melodic. If you can't stand the listening on the first, please go directly to the second. Don't be afraid of that noise ;-)

Don't try to adjust your speaker system, the glitches are "normal".

Into space

Few days ago, I bought a T-Rex Bass Juice (bass distortion), and a Morley Little Alligator volume pedal.
The Morley choice was due to its optical technology which prevent from cracks from regular pot volume pedals.
I bought it because my regular volume pedal (George Dennis) was cracking.
For helping me with ambiance during the recording, I used my BOSS DD-20 Giga Delay, but the actual delay that you can hear is the Analog Delay VST plugin from MDSP at mdsp.smartelectronix.com/classic (and also the round-pan).
I recorded four loop drones today, and especially one improvized with 2001 Space Odissey chapter 29 in background, so you can listen to the track almost in sync with chapter 29 of 2001.

In Conversation With Rain [s o n i c b r a t]

Have you ever watched the rain from the comfort of shelter, and these little tear drops hit helplessly on your window pane... as if they are yearning for you?

Today it rained magnificently. The rain washed our land as it cleansed our tired souls, sending whispers that slipped into our concrete lives impishly. I had a conversation with the rain. But it ended abruptly. A mindless improvisation in response to what the rain told me; with no form nor structure, just reactions. It's an imperfect track that's random... but I guess that's the beauty of it...

A home brewed DIY minimalistic video clip of the track, using my mini casio digital camera, oh well... :) Do listen with headphones, thank you!

THE UNSPOKEN TALE OF RAIN

It tapped on my window
Asking to be let in...
Told me a tale of tomorrow
And slipped away unseen...

At least some fun

Using the BOSS RC-2 as background

Yesterday, I was jamming alone, trying to find a way of putting an electric bass on my forthcoming new version of Light Tube ().
I'll probably add this bass melodic line or something similar, but it was actually also fun, I wanted to play the idiot for the video.
The background loop is performed by the BOSS RC-2 (the bass line was by myself).

Some Updates: s o n i c b r a t

Phase II had ended. So while we try to find a new direction for Phase III, we are on a hiatus. Taking a break from it for awhile. As you can see we will be updating on our own little ventures in synths, gears, softwares... music and sounds. So while being away, we will continue to load snippets of stuffs here.

I have been meddling a bit with my Doepfer A100 Modular system. Hooking up my "modularly modded" Roland SH101 to it. I am still quite new to this but I am definitely having fun, the old way :). I have yet to record stuffs down due to work commitments. But here's some pictures for tease. Will upload a demo track once I've done so.

Between the phases : Eric August 3rd 2007

Aaahhhh, I wish I could sleep a moment under the trees of LDT's land ...

But not for now.
Now is between the phases ... between phase II and phase "what?"
So let's have fun with some new (hardware/software) gear.
I purchased DrumSynth plugin for FL Studio because I discovered that some parameters could be tweaked in real-time ...

WEEK 4: LDT

THE JUNGLE OUTPOST


Tempo: 120 BPM

LDT: LDT: Korg MicroKorg, Korg ER-1, Novation XioSynth, Ebo, Traveler Guitar with Roland GK-2 pickup, Boss WP-20G Wave Processor, Cloud 9 Distortion, Digitech DigiDelay, Electro Harmonix LPB 2ube, Line 6 Otto Filter, Zoom MRS8, assembled with Sound Forge and Acid Pro

WEEK 4: LDT [Adding Things]

This final track has proven to be a real challenge to complete. On Thursday evening I added some additional elements using my new Line 6 Otto Filter in conjunction with the Boss WP-20G and Cloud 9 Distortion. For echo I used the Digitech Digideay. I drove the WP-20G with my GK2 fitted Traveler Guitar and used both a flat pick and Ebo on the tracks I recorded.

This weekend was the beginning of Buddhist Lent so I traveled to the area around Korat to stay with my Girlfriend Sandy's family. Her parents home is a traditional old style Thai wooden house on stilts and the area around is rural. There is not much in the way of a cellular signal and no internet at all. I brought my Zoom MRS8 and Novation XioSynth along with me as I had hoped that I would find some time to finish off the recording.

After being there for a day what I had recorded previously sounded completely different to me. I was suddenly inspired to record additional tracks with the XioSynth and at around midnight on Sunday night I snuck outside and recorded ten minutes of the strange night noised made by the bugs and other creatures. I took these sounds and made several loops from them at various speeds including the orignal. The slowed loops sound truly spooky.

As for Eric and Darren's samples I believe the only one that will be truly recognizable will be Darren's drum loop. The other samples which I used, including one of Eric's guitar bits, have been put through sound forge in such a way that they fit in with the dreamy jungle journey.

WEEK 4 : E r i c

Angels of the garden


For this last rendition of the month, I used only the samples provided by Darren and LDT.
At first, I didn't know how to make my way with all these samples (especially mines ;-), but with a nice reverb over the harmonics of bass notes, inspiration comes. I love reverb, you must be knowing this, now.
And I tried not to pitch up/down the samples; they are only sliced, granulized or stretched.
I don't usually make songs in "multi parts" nowadays, I used to do this in my first years of play with FastTrackerII but this commontone song in multi parts is almost novelty.
Though I had some doubts about the idea of this phase II, I think now that it can be a good thing to do this samples exchange but with deeper direction to make a kind of offline jam session between us.

WEEK 4: s o n i c b r a t

HIGHWAY FELO-DE-SE

Tempo: 120 Bpm
Key: E

This time round I did not use any gear recordings, just samples provided and some soft-synth sound-scaping using Reaktor 5. I've used a couple of LDT's samples, 2 guitar samples and one vocal sample of Eric's. I've pitched them, stretched them, ring modulated them, reversing them till they are just drones. Only Eric's bass guitar sample was left untouched with a little tidying and eq to clean the sample up plus time corrections; and the rest I've used mine... using the guitar synth sample I've provided in Week4, reversing and pitching it all the way up to underlay as the ethereal drone in the back ground. The bass drone get a stereo spread and the square arp get's ring modulated in one track and gated (plus getting the cracking residues of a crackle removal plug-in) in another to get the glitchy clicks. I've also used samples I've provided in the past weeks for the drums. Final touch ups were done by adding Reaktor 5 synths drones, reversing them and such. The loops were edited, warped and got a make over using Sound Forge, mixed on Acid, and mastered on Sound Forge. And here it is, a whiney IDM piece again.

WEEK 4: Eric [contributor]

Here is my contribution for the week 4.
Alas, I just saw that the MP3 versions of my samples are pitched up for a unknown reason (I used RazorLame) :-(
Anyway, Darren and LDT have received the WAV vresions that are in the good sample rate.
For this contribution, I recorded my LAG guitar, my CORT 5-string bass (with and without distorsion, with and without EHX Small Clone chorus), and my voice. All of this passing thru a EHX Black Finger compressor and a EHX LP2ube preamp. I used a SHURE SM-58 for the voice. And AmbiLoop for recording on the computer.

(sorry for the pictures, I didn't manage to post them)

WEEK 4: LDT [contributor]

Week 4 Contribution



This week I have decided to provide Eric and Darren samples that were created using three of my Korg units. The first four tones I recorded were from my Korg MicroKorg. I spend much of Friday evening tweaking some sounds specifically for this week. These are the sounds I've decided to share. The others may appear in my final contribution along side Darren and Eirc's samples.



The second group of samples are beats created on my Korg ER1. I varied the BPM halving it from the prescribed 120 BPM to 60 BPM to make it a little more interresting. I also recorded two loops with distortions from inboard effects on my Zoom MRS8 recorder. I didn't use the Sherman.



The last group of sounds was created using my old Korg Sigma. I ran it through my Cloud 9 Flanger and Digitech Digiday since it has no inboard effects of its own. The Sigma has great oscillators. The problem I'm having with it now is none of them seem to want to stay in tune for more than three seconds and some of the dials are suffering from their age as well.

Hopefully there are enough things here to be of use.

WEEK 4: s o n i c b r a t [contributor]

Tempo: 120 bpm
Key: E

These are my samples created using only KORG Triton ST88. Everything was played and recorded (sequenced) on the Triton... nothing done outside of it and all sounds were designed on the Triton itself. This project has led me to exploring this workhorse in a way I wouldn't usually (due to the nature of my work). Effects and filters (on board) were employed as a design to play with the sound and timbre. Have fun guys.

WEEK 4: s o n i c b r a t [NOTES]

Hello everyone. We have come to the final week of Phase 2. What to expect? Well, in this final week, all 3 of us will be supplying samples/loops in the Key of E and tempo 120bpm. At the same time, all 3 of us will be using these samples to cut a track each. So that's 3 different renditions of the same set of samples. Take it as a show down between us 3 or simply interpretations of music. I am sure it will be interesting to see what music can be churned out of 3 different individuals, using the same set of samples/loops. Stay tuned.

WEEK 3 : Eric [originator]

And voila, here is the tune I made with the samples provided by Darren and LDT. Tempo 115 Key D.
Please note that I use no other samples.
I re-sequenced the drums manually (then quantized) with my TriggerFinger.
I used Morphine VST additive synth to bend the vocal sample.

Plus, I also include a little experiment with some of the samples that I tried to mix like a Oval song ;-)

WEEK 3: s o n i c b r a t [contributor]

Tempo: 115 Bpm
Key: E

So here's my samples. Created solely using my old trusty KORG TRITON ST88. All parts are played and sequenced, including filtering on the Triton itself. The drum beats were played and recorded, not using arpeggiators. The vocal samples are old recording samples of mine, warped on Max/Msp. All samples are kept dry and uneffected unless filtering intended. Anyway, for the fun of it, I've placed the dry samples all together to hear how it sounds. So here's the mix track of all my samples (minus vocals):

KORGATRONICS

Do listen with a pair of headphones for better listening experience :)

Have fun Eric!

WEEK 3 : Eric [originator]

Hello,
It's now up to me to make the mix.
I have the intention to perform heavy destruction on the samples I will be given by Sonic Darren and LDT.
Perhaps using granular, or just slicing, or using my brand new VST plugin : Morphine (additive synth).

Deeps,

WEEK 3: LDT [contributor]

For this weeks contribution I decided to work with my now rarely used Roland MC-303 Groove Box. This is not the original one I bought back ten years ago. That one is packed safely in a water proof storage container in Oakville. I picked this used one up here a few years ago at Pantip Plaza.

The MC-303 was a little work horse for me back in the day. It provided drums, sequences and backing pads for the band I had with Chris Chiasson (Stick) and Richard Forsley (Guitar). It later provided the same for Snowmelter. By 1999 I was very good at programming it and its only limitation seemed to be the lack of memory available for the user. There was no way to delete the hundreds of stupid preset "grooves" (which how sound hilariously dated) and the user was only allowed a measly 50 slots.

The MC-303 sound engine is basically the Roland Sound Canvas which features PCM sample based wave forms as the tonal building blocks. They can be filtered and messed with extensively and the drum sets contain the TR-808 and TR-909 kits. The other tone sets include lots of synth, piano, bell, and other sounds. There are some rather useless sound effects but if they are pitched down enough they can be used to create some wonderfully strange and spooky sounds.

For today's experiment I worked up several sound sets for Eric. For processing I ran the MC-303 through the Electro Harmonix LPB 2ube tube preamp and into the Zoom MRS8 recorder. The MC-303 was slaved to the Zoom's MIDI clock for tempo. I used the Zoom's internal effects to process the signal further. I recorded a few variations of a string pad to start. Afterwards I recorded several drum loops through some heavy distortion and some odd EQing and compression.

I used my Novation Bass Station for a MIDI control and the remaining bits were recorded with the MC-303's tone back slaved to the Bass Station. Once I'd recorded 12 short tracks I imported the tracks to Lappy and normalized all the tracks in Sound Forge before sending them off.