Do Some No-Input Mixing (Disquiet Junto 0232)

disquiet · 2016-06-10T02:25:26.543Z

Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group on SoundCloud.com and at disquiet.com/junto, a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have just over four days to upload a track in response to the assignment. Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. There’s no pressure to do every project. It’s weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when you have the time.

This project was posted in the afternoon, California time, on Thursday, June 9, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, June 13, 2016.

These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto):

Disquiet Junto Project 0232: No Input
The Assignment: Record a piece of music exploring the concept of “no-input mixing.”

This week’s project explores the concept of no-input mixing. For background, including a tutorial, this Synthtopia article, summarizing more detailed coverage by the Department of Performance Studies at Texas A&M, might prove useful:

Synthtopia – 27 Oct 14

No Input Mixing Tutorial

No Input Mixer Tutorial – Try this at home! :D #TTNM was uploaded by: The Tuesday Night MachinesDuration: 144Rating:

Step 1: Read up, if it’s not already familiar, on the concept of “no-input mixing,” which involves creating feedback by taking the output of a mixer and plugging it into the input of the same mixer, thus exposing and building on inherent (i.e., noisy) sonic properties of the device.

Step 2: Experiment with no-input mixing.

Step 3: Record a short piece of no-input mixing music.

Step 4: Upload your completed track to the Disquiet Junto group on SoundCloud.

Step 5: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.

Step 6: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.

Deadline: This project was posted in the afternoon, California time, on Thursday, June 9, 2016, with a deadline of 11:59pm wherever you are on Monday, June 13, 2016.

Length: Length is up to you, though between two and three minutes seems about right.

Upload: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, only upload one track for this project, and be sure to 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. Photos, video, and lists of equipment are always appreciated.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please in the title to your track include the term “disquiet0232.” Also use “disquiet0232” as a tag for your track.

Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

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

More on this 232nd weekly Disquiet Junto project — “Record a piece of music exploring the concept of ‘no-input mixing.’” — at:

http://disquiet.com/0232/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/junto/

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

Subscribe to project announcements here:

http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Disquiet Junto general discussion takes place at:

http://disquiet.com/forums/

Image associated with this project is by Andy Piper and it is used thanks to a Creative Commons license:

Switched on

disquiet · 2016-06-10T14:02:51.512Z

The first two tracks are live. Tracks will be added to this playlist for the duration of the project:

ioflow · 2016-06-11T04:54:43.773Z

i had a ton of fun with this project. i’ve never done any kind of no-input or noise music, so i had quite an adventure. i used a self-patched modular setup. here’s my track, followed by process notes:

i was originally planning on doing something with my mackie mixer and strymon effects pedals, a multitracked pitched ambient drone sketch, but…i didn’t have enough 1/4" cables. so i figured i could try it with a mixer eurorack module: mutable instruments shades.

i normally mostly use shades to control the amount of modulation sent to clouds. but on its own, once self-patched, shades puts out a surprising amount of extremely low-frequency noise when adjusting knobs, as i saw with a spectrum/eq utility in ableton live. i had an idea: why not excite that activity with a modulator such as tides? i already had the parasite alternative firmware running on tides, so it was just a matter of sending one output of random control voltage into shades, and from there into my audio interface.

the result was seven minutes of hilarious, delightful knob-wiggling, which i then edited down to under three minutes. this track is a sample of the wildly varying textures, drones, static pops, pitched buzz, and burbling gloops obtained with this tiny self-patched rig. just two modules, but so much fun!

disquiet · 2016-06-11T05:26:16.302Z

And yours was the 5,500th extant track in the Junto!