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Music studio (a work in progress). I have almost everything depicted here and am gradually learning to work it all. I drew this to keep track of all the different cables but it's helping me conceptually. I find I'm not intimidated by Cubase (beginner set); it's just a fancier version of MusicWorks and the notation software I've been using--in fact all the big music and paint programs are just refinements of clunky interfaces from the 80s. I will have to spend some time learning to control the instruments with the sequencer, however. I got some good results with the Sid last night but the MIDI connections are imperfect. Still trying to find a balance between having basic studio competence and doing things "wrong," which can lead to good results. As for the lack of a musical keyboard in this setup: I actually prefer entering notes on an old-fashioned staff, that's a matter of choice. Making music player piano fashion perversely appeals to me and gives me a greater range than playing notes. This is not ambient or noise music I'm making, these songs have tunes, but I am more interested in composing and sound-sculpting than playing; it's posthuman in that sense.
"Blues for DG" [mp3 removed]. This is me tickling the synth ivories and slappin the skins roadhouse blues style. Not really, but it was done in real time bending notes and then edited down. I originally called it Blues for Donald because I was imagining variations on a few notes like his iterations of aluminum cubes out in Marfa, only bluesy, but I changed the title because I hate overt homages to past art and don't want it to be "about" the Judds. "DG" is a complete red herring.
UPDATE: Trimmed about a minute out of this.
My music studio setup from a few months ago. I got the idea of using this particular Photoshop filter for a studio photo from a prog rock musician I admire, whose site is no longer online apparently. A line out from the Mac SE (the screen on the right) goes to the mixing board on the left (note improvised gear rack). Another line out from the PC (floor) also feeds into the mixer, and the audio is then routed back into the PC through the LP recorder box on the floor. The audio out from the PC was the voice of Microsoft Sam reciting numbers in German, gradually slowing down and changing pitch because there wasn't enough memory in the text reader. Beats came off a DIY drum program streaming off the internet. The SE, running MusicWorks, supplied a background jingle. I've recently started using off-the-shelf software and felt I needed to post this to establish my street (Povera) cred. I consider all this visual art, for any curator who thinks I've stopped working. This is why I probably won't apply for a Creative Capital grant: they'd never understand. I'm not sure I do.
Surfing around electronic music links yesterday. Throb.com has vanished. That was the site for a great record store where I bought a lot of vinyl from '99 - '03. Somewhere owner Load Rezenhand has a shop's worth of amazing inventory in storage--if I was rich I'd track him down and buy it all. One of the most helpful people at the store that I found early on was DJ Prozac. Incredibly knowledgeable, with discriminating taste and a strong point of view (until I found this Discogs link I didn't know his name or that he'd made these tracks). His taste was consistently harder, harsher, and more experimental than what I liked but he took pity on me and recommended more of the "beautiful" or seductive electro and tech-house I was looking for. He is friends with artist Meredith Danluck and through her he briefly became electronic music maven of the art stars. (Well, I'm told one relatively famous artist who used a Wolfgang Voigt composition in his work learned about him through Zach.)
Some survivors (more on all this later):
http://www.selwaymusic.net/
http://www.satamile.com/label.jsp
http://www.satelliterecords.com/live/index.php
"Pops at 49" [mp3 removed]. Noisy, dirty micro-trance. If it was a car someone would write "wash me" on it. Pops commencing at :49 are pretty jarring but as Pee Wee Herman would say, "I meant to do that" (I think); gratuitous filter sweep at 1:49 takes you to climax, meaning the loud end of the song.
"XP Hardware Failure: Intro and Main Theme" [mp3 removed]
Made this awhile back and never put it up. Inspired by Clown Staples' immortal "Windows Noises," I did what many did on hearing that music--said "I could do that." Of course I couldn't, but it's taken a few months to see the charm in my own klutzy hubris. It's all done--poorly--using the little sndrec32.exe editor lurking in every Windows OS, with some help from Goldwave, a shareware .wav editor. Think I'm ready for drum and bass now.
Old School Techno from Dallas, Part 2
Ravestock '94, Dallas. That is seriously a lot of stripes. And girls.
x-eleven "Ecstasy" 1992 [mp3 removed]
Previous post on x-eleven is here. Since it was written, Gary Wicker has put up some more tracks, including "Ecstasy," the one highlighted above. Not sure where it's going at first, the sampled "ooh" sounds silly, but at the 90 second mark it grabs your attention, and at 120 seconds, when the Larry Heard-ish house part with the synth-flute kicks in and those "oohs" become joyful, stuttering vocal science, it really takes off. Some of the appeal is rooted in time travel but this is among the happiest music you'll hear, and Wicker feeds the retrograde desire to hear lots of arpeggios played at high speed. Haven't checked out Todd Hixon's videos yet, also from the vault, but will--just wanted to get this track up. It's weird, I'm nostalgic for a scene I never participated in, except in my studio listening to these tunes on the radio. I moved to NY the next year and found drum and bass everywhere--right about the time Wicker sold his gear and stopped making x-eleven tracks. "Ecstasy" is earlier--'92.