#104

It’s interesting that you say " My main problem with the piano has been the limitation that when you strike a key, the sound that will be produced by the piano will vanish rapidly without any possibility to manipulate it, if you only use the keys." Because to these ears, for the first 53 seconds of this piece, I wish that there were more space between the notes, more time for the sounds to decay. Everything after the :53 mark is much more interesting to me, I’m wondering if it’s necessary to bring back the actual chords as you do at 1:47. It’s hard to say, the chords do root the piece, hmmmmm… maybe
they do have to be there, I’m not sure at this point. I do know that I am a sucker for decay, and am sometimes iffy on attack, that’s just me though.
Great piece!

( and I owe you an email)

1 Like
#105

Hey folks, just finished this right now:

1 Like
#106

Thank you for listening @tomixndr !
Some background on using this contact mic - I saw this mod-synth musician @alphastare perform, and he used a modded altoids tin, which you can see in the second slide here: https://www.instagram.com/p/B82NhvDnHyv/

He told me it was from a maker on etsy, CrankSturgeon, so props to them: https://www.etsy.com/shop/CrankSturgeon?ref=pr2018_faveshops

Having already seen cheap contact mics on amazon, I finally ordered, thrifted some metal boxes, then procrastinated on it for two months haha… and then punched this one out. So, if you can get past the procrastination part, punching holes into the thin metal with an awl is pretty straight-forward. The manufacture and using as an instrument are both very hands-on, compared to working purely in DAW.

This is a little tea box(?) and maybe 3 inches tall. I was able to get all the parts onto the box and nothing on the lid - so no wires straddling the two. This may be a engineering concern favoring a bigger box (compared to altoids tins) to consider. The mic itself I just taped against the side with electrical tape, though you can probably glue it.

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#107

Hello, all – here’s what I came up with: https://soundcloud.com/plusch/a-touch-of-chaos-disquiet0435

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#108

John O’Brien (@jmob77) and I have created a shared patch game in order to collaborate remotely during lockdown that results in a series of solo pieces. Each week we both create a new patch on the Make Noise 0-Coast and record a short track using only the 0-Coast for both sound and interaction. We share the patch chart (The Prompt) and in the second half of the week we each record a track (The Response) using the patch the other sent.

My Junto track is this week’s Response to John’s patch.

(We’ll share more details about how the game is played on another thread once we’ve worked out the kinks. DM me if you want me to give you a heads up when we do that).

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#109

As my first contribution to Disquiet Junto, I’m presenting my Response piece from week three of the aforementioned 0-Coast collaboration with Damon Holzborn (@damon).

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#110

I haven’t participated in a junto in a bit but I’m due. made this on my modular last night. kind of sludgy. i recorded for about an hour but selected different bits as individual tracks. this is one of the shorter ones.

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#111

Here’s an animated drone made from field recordings I made in November, 2019 of a heavy, squeaky iron gate out at the Drombeg Stone Circle in County Cork, Ireland. The sound tells the story of a gate opening and closing, in great detail.

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#112

I hear the sense of history of the place in this. A branch of my family is from Cork, I visited once on a solo trip and sought out a number of off-the-beaten-path stone circles.

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#113

I really like the harmonic relationships in this.

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#114

Thanks! That’s what i was going for! I think this was a result of turing machine mode on my disting to plaits and morphagene with various cv from wogglebug.

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#115

Thanks! I’m glad you had a chance to listen to it and that it evoked something of that for you.

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#116

Hi!
I waited until the last minute to record this so I wouldn’t have time to stress about it. First time participating, and have wanted to for a long time and kinda felt bad, but not too bad. This weeks Project seemed plenty doable.

I waited until I had 3 hours because I was playing video games. A big constraint for me was time in this recording because I knew I had such limited time. For this, I record improvised plucky cello first. I was planning on doing looping but I ended up just recording 5 times over over the plucky bits. I am using a pickup on a cello going into a LR baggs DI that has a lot of settings to adjust the sound. This recording I was trying really hard to cancel out the muddiness my cello sound like sometimes. I am using a microphone as well as the pickup. I was playing around with having the microphone and pickup in separate L/R channels. I recorded to a mixpre6 and did the render on that and messed with the volume while it was playing.

Its really fun to hit the record button, not knowing what I am gonna play. Little mistakes can turn into big dramatic things and after several runs, it usually becomes so busy that I am not as worried about what I play and can be more comfortable.

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#117

Wow this is great! Transports me into another world. I love how many sounds there are and how they flow in and out.

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#118

Thanks a lot Ben! Glad you enjoyed it.

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#119

Fantastic texture and worthwhile balance between notes & noises. As my own drones tend to drone? boom? mud? to much I like especially that it feels not that heavy.

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#120

Thank you, getting that balance right can be tough. Too musical and it becomes one thing, too “hold down C” and it becomes another. I struggle getting that balance myself often so don’t be discouraged. I find using field recordings, singing bowls and sparse notations can really bring these pieces alive

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#121

I like this very much for being an example of what you can do as a single person.

#122
  • @bassling - I enjoy the way that, though it is ambient, it has elements of rhythm and isn’t afraid of pitch. It also evolves slowly enough to feel calm and pensive, but not so slowly as to feel boring: great work!
  • @3Keay - I really enjoy the way the deep percussion blends together to for a sort of reverberating pad. I also enjoy the other percussive elements that feel like found sounds but also like synthesized sounds. The guitar seems like a great match too. I keep expecting it to become a bit more melodically dense in the middle and I’m unsure whether that ‘unfulfilled expectation’ is a negative or an asset; either way: I like it.
  • @DeDe - The texture of the bowed bass is really nice on this. It feels much more ‘rounded’ than a cello which feels like a great match. I like the use of the vocals and the synth. I like the sparse arrangement, but I’d also love to hear a version that builds up with more and more vocals, layering into a huge crescendo.
  • @Forelight - The thing that strikes me here is the subtle textures that you’ve found. Some of the sounds cut through more than others but don’t compete. I also like the transitions between the sections; I’m not very experienced with drones but typically more structured music so seeing that cross over explored is very interesting to me. I don’t know if it’s my imagination but I feel like a lot of it the interest tends to arrive on one place in the stereo field and sit there for a long time: I feel like slightly faster stereo motion in parts could add even more movement. In any case, I really like what you did here: Nice work!
  • @krakenkraft - Not only do I enjoy this very much, but I’m also really glad to see something like this done in Caustic. I know you can make real music with it but somehow it can feel somewhat like a toy which results in my playing more than creating. I did recently get SunVox for Android which I have similar fun with. Maybe this piece will encourage me to try Caustic again, and take phone based music creation more seriously. Once again, I really enjoyed this, and thanks for inspiring me to explore some different avenues.
  • @Ben_Hamilton - I liked listening to this very much. In a way, what you did here was something I wish I had done. That is to say, I play the piano but when I make music it’s mostly synthesizers (and sometimes samples). I don’t have a good bridge between those two words (apart from being able to play the keyboard). Hearing something you built up by layering several takes using traditional instruments makes me think I should try. I suspect part of my problem is I tend to play solo piano meaning lots of notes. What you showed me hear was starting simple then adding to build more form. Nice work, and thanks for getting me thinking along these lines.
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#123

Hi all, out of the many uncompleted sketches, I chose to share this one:

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