The Generative Tuba

The glorious web video series of id m theft able

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

There’s a running series on the YouTube channel of user “id m theft able” that is one of my current favorite things on the internet. (I put quotes around that name simply so it’s clear where the name begins and where it ends, and also so it’s clear that the sentence constructed around the name isn’t disintegrating as you read it.) Each of the user’s videos in this series places a tuba somewhere, “with a microphone in it,” as the description always points out.

We then hear both the sound of where the tuba has been placed — along a river bank, adjacent to a waterfall, in the wind and rain, in the snow — and that sound echoing inside of (tracing the contours of, limning the deep recesses of) the tuba itself.

The footage generally runs, uncut, for about an hour. Which is to say, it doesn’t blink. YouTube is filled with nature footage. And if you spend time in the realm of ambient electronic music, there’s a lot that’s shot of battery-powered setups out in the wild. But the generative tuba is the rare drone music video that is, truly (an oft misused term), of nature.

There are 11 videos thus far: [youtube.com](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ObK3aMmc7Ao&list=PL0N7tO24231cLRJPE5LOXr1O64jvgalow).

Time with the Mux

Up and away

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

This is the rear of another module I’ve enjoyed but am putting back into the pool. It’s the Befaco Muxlicer, and in many ways it did exactly what I wanted, sorting through variations, treating disparate elements as equals. But I’m going to try some other approaches to the same end, and see what comes of it. I may end up with one of these again down the road, but for the time being I’m keeping my setup fairly compact. Before sending it off, I wanted to capture its beautiful printed circuit board.

Disquiet Junto Silent Film Project (2020)

A non-weekly offshoot of the communcal music prompt series

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

I’m writing about an upcoming project, a special one that will be apart from our regular weekly undertakings.

It’s been on my mind to do a non-weekly Disquiet Junto community project for a long time — not for all 438 weeks of the Junto’s existence, but several years. I’ve had some such projects in the planning stages, but time is always tight, and there are a lot of factors to balance.

A Junto member, Robert Precht, got in touch recently with the proposal that Junto participants each score a part of a silent film. It was an excellent idea, and one that naturally suggested itself to being applicable in a longer time span than our normal four-day window.

Details are still being fine-tuned, including which film it will be (we’ll do something from the public domain). If you’re interested in participating, please fill out the following form. Expressing interest at this stage isn’t a commitment. Once the project begins, you’ll have a roughly month to complete your part of the project.

https://forms.gle/rzBEb44asVZq4aSVA/

It’s a Google form. If for some reason you don’t want to use the form, just email me at [email protected] expressing your interest. Thanks.

Three creative constraints are noted in the sign-up form:

1. No copyrighted sound (that is, copyrighted by anyone other than the individual participant) can be used in this project

2. No intelligible vocals can be used in this project (keeping true to the film’s silent origin).

3. Each individual (or act, collective, band, etc.) can only contribute one track to this project.

Once the number of participants has been set, the film will be divided into sections for the individuals to score. The length of these segments will, of course, vary to some degree. Source audio may be provided for continuity. That’s still being discussed, as are other details.

Thanks very much for your interest, and, as always, for your generosity with your time and creativity.

Buddha Machine Variations No. 36 (Glass Tiles)

A series of focused experiments

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

Been a few days since the previous Buddha Machine Variation. The camera died, after it had [stopped playing nice with audio](https://disquiet.com/2020/05/20/paper-music/
). And I got a new, smaller synthesizer case (from Pulp Logic, who were super helpful with plotting it out). This is the first time I’ve ever used an expression pedal with my synth, thanks to one of the three tiles in the upper left corner of the box. (“Tiles” being a term for the shorter modules seen top and bottom here, above and below the ER-301 module.) Very simple little patch. Just a proof of concept. The tiny foot (well, hand) pedal is triggering the recording of a microloop (400 or so milliseconds) of the choral audio coming from the Philip Glass 80th-birthday edition of the Buddha Machine. The expression pedal is varying how much we’re hearing the inbound Glass loop, and how much we’re hearing the microloop. If you’re wondering where the Buddha Machine is sending its audio into the synth, there are jacks in the side of the case itself.

For further patch-documentation purposes, here are two shots of the synthesizer:

Video originally posted at youtube.com/disquiet. There’s also a (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLAgCxRbmR1MIM4mCYe17nERi9xeEWAD2w) of the Buddha Machine Variations.

Current Listens: Ayako Okamura Tunes the World

Heavy rotation, lightly annotated

/ By Marc Weidenbaum

This is my weekly(ish) answer to the question “What have you been listening to lately?” It’s lightly annotated because I don’t like re-posting material without providing some context. In the interest of conversation, let me know what you’re listening to in the comments below. Just please don’t promote your own work (or that of your label/client). This isn’t the right venue. (Just use email.)

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NEW: Recent(ish) arrivals and pre-releases

▰ The score to the upcoming second season of *Homecoming* is by Emile Mosseri, who previously scored the excellent *The Last Black Man in San Francisco*. It opens with violins that manage to be both atonal and syrupy, and gets even better from there. If A Winged Victory for the Sullen composed a season of *Westworld*, this is what it might sound like. Mosseri also scored the upcoming Miranda July-directed film *Kajillionaire*. The first season of *Homecoming* had no score, in the traditional sense. Instead, it utilized the scores of dozens of other films (see Chris O’Falt’s detailed coverage back in 2018: [indiewire.com](https://www.indiewire.com/2018/11/homecoming-score-classic-thriller-movie-soundtracks-sam-esmail-complete-list-1202018145/)), from *The Parallax View* (Michael Small) to *The Day The Earth Stood Still* (Bernard Hermann).

▰ Twenty tracks of downtempo, sample-laden excellence: *Selected Instro Work​(​s) 17​-​19 II* is the latest set from Philadephia-based hip-hop producer Small Professor.

▰ Take a minute and a half to listen to how Japanese musician Ayako Okamura tunes the world, finding the fundamental pitch of field recordings and accentuating the inherent music. (Presuming you, like I, don’t know Japanese, be sure to turn on the automated translation.)

▰ *White Moths* is a half hour of the artist known as junklight improvising in deep, often delicate melodic territory. It isn’t drone, per se. It’s drone by association.