music - tm

"Marching Morons 3" [mp3 removed]

Same backing track of pitched, gritty Doepfer LFO sweeps as "Etherial Serial" but with new rhythms and foreground tunes (keyboard counterpoint permutations).

"Analog_Sketch_a8" [mp3 removed]

Same staccato LFO'd syncopation as "Ghost Laser" but instead of using midi -- > voltage controlled pitches I'm just toggling between octaves in real time. Some percussion and FM modulated bass notes added.

"Ghost Laser" [mp3 removed]

The sort of quacking, '80s style pulse that runs through this is an analog-generated signal - two LFOs modulating a combination square and triangle wave. The intersecting waveforms create interesting syncopations. Pitch is then added via control voltage--an ascending four note pattern. This pulse is then sampled and the beats counted so it can be put on a timing grid and other instruments added via MIDI. The rather absurd Reaktor Lazerbass makes another appearance for the "lead" lines. The rhythms are analog or analog-modeling with MIDI-generated triplet echoes.

"Ethereal Serial" [mp3 removed -- updated version is on Bandcamp]

Doepfer mini-synth, Vermona Kick Lancet, and two Reaktor synths (Rhythmmaker and three Titan patches).
Am enumerating the gear because it's getting harder in these descriptions to come with synonyms for analog and digital. The distinction is still important, I think: the former two synths give the sound a plausible bottom and slight unpredictable lurch, and the softsynths have all the complex time-stretching programming. Composition-wise, this work is unabashedly nostalgic for the '90s. I wasn't making music, then, just soaking up rave riffs.

The title is an in-joke for Putney Swope fans.

"Rotary Connection 2" [mp3 removed]

A somewhat sweet e-piano melody vies for supremacy with a somewhat dorky and post-tonal pair of analog synth riffs. A beatbox wanders in and takes about a minute to find the groove.