Author: Marc Weidenbaum

Disquiet Junto Project 0645: Speed Trap

The Assignment: Record something, slow it down, and then record over it.

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto music community, a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have five days to record and upload a track in response to the project instructions.

Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) There’s no pressure to do every project. The Junto is weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when your time and interest align.

Tracks are added to the SoundCloud playlist for the duration of the project. Additional (non-SoundCloud) tracks appear in the lllllll.co discussion thread.

These following instructions went to the group email list (via juntoletter.disquiet.com). 

Disquiet Junto Project 0645: Speed Trap
The Assignment: Record something, slow it down, and then record over it.

As always, it helps to read the instructions in full before proceeding, and considering the steps as a whole.

Step 1: Record something to serve as roughly half of a complete track.

Step 2: Slow the result of Step 1 to half its original speed.

Step 3: Record something in addition to the result of Step 2 to complete the track.

Tasks Upon Completion:

Label: Include “disquiet0645” (no spaces/quotes) in the name of your track.

Upload: Post your track to a public account (SoundCloud preferred but by no means required). It’s best to focus on one track, but if you post more than one, clarify which is the “main” rendition.

Share: Post your track and a description/explanation at https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0645-speed-trap/

Discuss: Listen to and comment on the other tracks.

Additional Details:

Length: The length is up to you.

Deadline: Monday, May 13, 2024, 11:59pm (that is: just before midnight) wherever you are.

About: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Newsletter: https://juntoletter.disquiet.com/

License: It’s preferred (but not required) to set your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., an attribution Creative Commons license).

Please Include When Posting Your Track:

More on the 645th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Trap — The Assignment: Record something, slow it down, and then record over it — at https://disquiet.com/0645/

Chris Hanlon’s Attenuated Rhythm

A modest percussion technique

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

A glistening scintillate largely constitutes the ethereal substance of Chris Hanlon’s “Long While,” which joins a growing amount of recording these days that blurs the line between ambient music and ambient sound. The melty bits of warped tape here, simulated or otherwise, further that instinct by lending a nostalgic quality. But what really makes the piece, what distinguishes it, is a sequence of occasional muffled thuds, something like footsteps, or a cane on a carpeted floor, or even distant bombs going off. These are almost — almost, but not quite — far enough apart to not count as rhythmic, but there is a pace to them, and that’s the point: just enough time for each pair of thuds to frame what comes between, and to make you wait for the next. The element is a welcome addition. Hanlon is based in Belfast, Ireland.

Heavy Metal

An ongoing series cross-posted from instagram.com/dsqt

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

A glimpse of the rear of a synth PCB before the module goes back into the slightly rearranged case. This one looks like the map of a city metro line. Oddly, the name of the module, the Bizmuth, was a word in the New York Times Strands puzzle today, May 7, 2024.

The Memory System Modules Are Live

A great addition to VCV Rack

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

The four free software modules that make up the Memory system for the also free VCV Rack virtual modular synthesizer became available earlier today. At their core, the modules enable a musician to record music and access the audio with different virtual tape heads that, per the documentation, “move independently within it.” The quartet of modules popped up in the VCV Rack online library as part of the Stochastic Telegraph brand, which has previously released five other modules, including a linear function generator called Drifter, a trigger utility called Fuse, a programmable sequencer (among other things) called BASICally, a note-taking blackboard called Fermata, and a value logger (TTY). The new modules are Depict, Embellish, Memory, and Ruminate:

These are the modules by Mahlen Morris that I’ve mentioned here twice previously. To support the appearance of the modules in the VCV Rack library, Mahlen has also released a new video in which he does a walk-through of the various parts of the ensemble and some of what they’re capable of:

Tantalizingly, he opens the video by saying that the Memory system consists of four different modules “at the moment” — suggesting more modules may be in the works, in addition to potential upgrades of the existing modules. And, I’m pleased to report, some of the opening example features guitar recordings I made for Mahlen.

On Repeat: Schulz, Opstad/Richter, Oval

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I’ll later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all.

▰ The ever prolific Jeannine Schulz just released NØinmi TwØ, which, based on its typographic and cover treatment, seems to be (maybe?) part of an ongoing series of hers. As is often the case, there is a strong presence of processed field recordings. One track, “twØ​,” stands out with its brittle, infinitesimal beat.

https://jeannineschulz.bandcamp.com/album/n-inmi-tw

▰ The score to The Veil, the new spy thriller TV series, features original music by Jon Opstad (Bodies, We Hunt Together) working from themes by Max Richter (The Leftovers, Arrival, Ad Astra). It’s a post-classical effort, with the presence of some choral vocal parts, as in “Exploring the Camp,” that distinguish it from a lot of TV scores.

▰ Now / Never / Whenever, Vol. 7 is the latest in Oval’s occasional series of short, pay-as-you-like releases (you can get them free, but paying a small amount keeps them in your Bandcamp library, which is useful in the mobile app). The second track, “September Scab,” is particularly lovely. Apparently it’s a “quasi-cover,” as Oval puts it, of the A.R. Kane song “Scab.” Oval refers to this version as “faux jazz,” and I don’t myself really hear the jazz in it, but it’s a nice combination of disintegrating keyboards at atmospheric whirring.

https://oval.bandcamp.com/album/now-never-whenever-vol-7