Listening to art. Playing with audio. Sounding out technology. Composing in code.

Monthly Archives: February 2008

Tangents / Video Streams (ping pong, Electroplankton, anechoic …)

[ February 29, 2008 / Department: field notes / Leave a comment ]

Videos Worth Streaming: Robot orchestra made of ping pong balls and glasses (engadget.com). … And a band whose instruments are a Nintendo DS (with Electroplankton) and two handheld Apple products (dhadm.com). … Music made only from sounds from the Windows OS (youtube.com — easily six or seven people sent this link to me separately, and thanks to you all). … A harp made from laser beams (engadget.com). … Ancient interview with Robert Fripp in an anechoic chamber (youtube.com, via twitter.com/kucharo). … The Meek FM, by Rob Meek and Frank Miller, is where fonts and synthesizers meet (meekfm.org, via engadget.com). … Scratching video vinyl (createdigitalmotion.com). … A sequencer triggered by bubble gum (engadget.com). … And a similar one, with ball bearings (engadget.com). … Howard Sandroff on the early days of what became Max/MSP (gearwire.com). … Australian documentary on Japanese experimental music (pinktentacle.com). The site refers to it as “experimental Japanese music,” but that may be the subject for another documentary. … Kenneth Kirschner in concert (via his brother’s blog, billinexile.com). … Winners of last year’s Circuit Building Challenge (createdigitalmusic.com). … Destroying nine Buddha Machines (youtube.com).

[ Topics: gadget, live-performance, software, video, video-games / Leave a comment ]

Tangents / Macero, Mosquito, videos …

[ February 29, 2008 / Department: field notes / Leave a comment ]

Quick News, Links, Bits, Reads: A belated R.I.P. for Teo Macero, studio maven and Miles Davis fellow maverick (latimes.com, nytimes.com, jazztimes.com, pitchforkmedia.com). … The Mosquito, a high-pitched anti-truancy weapon mentioned here previously (disquiet.com, disquiet.com), is under investigation by England’s commissioner for children (nytimes.com). … Creating music from Pi at (avoision.com, via engadget.com and boingboing.net). … Circular analog synth (future-retro.com, via engadget.com). … Why do beluga whales enjoy the clarinet note G? Ask collisiondetection.net. … Urban sound is one of the factors that Dan Hill wrestles with in his essay on “the street of the future” (cityofsound.com, via williamgibsonbooks.com). … A review of a Robert Henke (aka Monolake) performance at a planetarium (skynoise.net). … Heather Powazek Champ meditates on a “bag of hush” (hchamp.com). … An album made entirely from the Kaossilator (createdigitalmusic.com). … An “instrument” by Jun Murakoshi that amplifies the world, much like a seashell (junmurakoshi.com, via boingboing.net). It’s a prototype, so you can’t purchase one down by the seashore yet. … Thread on “victorian synthesizer” at the freakangels.com/whitechapel forum, spun from the steampunk webcomic. … An album of Kraftwerk covers ends with a cease and desist form Sony (audioobjekt.com). Apparently the Fourth Law of Robotics has to do with not coveting thy neighbor’s source code.

[ Topics: copyleft, gadget, live-performance, software / Leave a comment ]

Drone MP3 by (and Interview with) Joanna Brouk

[ February 28, 2008 / Department: downstream / Leave a comment ]

Back in 1972, Charles Amirkhanian interviewed the under-recognized composer Joanna Brouk. Audio of the interview is interspersed with examples of her work, which as heard in this 70-minute recording is comprised of slow, lengthy, drone-like performances on acoustic instruments (notably piano) that have a nearly glacial approach to melody, but that don’t dispense with melody entirely (MP3). One can recognize in the pieces root notes and variations and a clear sense of compositional narrative, but it requires not so much patience and attention as it does an appreciation for a pace that essentially allows for a note to complete its decay before it is succeeded by another note.

Just to define “under-recognized,” in contrast with many subjects of Amirkhanian’s extensive catalog of interviews, a Google Blog Search today for “Joanna Brouk” yields exactly two entries, both from the past month or so (google.com/blogsearch). More details at archive.org, where the Amirkhanian interview is housed as part of the Other Minds collection. Any additional information about Brouk and her work would be appreciated.

[ Topic: free / Leave a comment ]

Simple Tom Moody MP3

[ February 26, 2008 / Department: downstream / Leave a comment ]

The 8bit, lo-fi artist Tom Moody says he likes “tunes built around a single sound.” His song “Nice Nemesis,” a post about which on Moody’s blog included that clause, is certainly simple enough to meet those standards (MP3). The question, though, is which single sound is the center of this poppy little merrygoround.

Is it the occasional burst of a human “huh”? The sonar ping that marks the passing of every few bars? The Casio dub that suggests a video-game simulacrum of a nightclub? The crackling percussive foundation? The appearance of a little watery melodic sequence that serves as a kind of bridge? Somehow all those elements, and more, are sequenced into just over two minutes, and yet the overall effect is, indeed, bright and easy. More details at tommoody.us.

[ Topics: 8-bit, chiptune, free / Leave a comment ]

Buddha Machine Jam MP3

[ February 25, 2008 / Department: downstream / Leave a comment ]

Just to follow up on this morning’s mention about a difference between two generations of the Buddha Machine, here’s a late-night jam on various instruments atop a bed of drones familiar to anyone who’s picked up one of FM3′s little sound-art gadgets. The track, titled “Buddha Machine Music,” is by Jupiter Watts, a self-styled “rock band with noisy/ experimental tendencies” from Atlanta, Georgia. The slo-mo exercise in psychedelia mixes loosely strung guitar with the Machine’s output (MP3). More info at the band’s blog, jupiterwatts.blogspot.com.

[ Topics: free, gadget / Leave a comment ]

Disquiet

ambient/electronica