Marc Weidenbaum's Blog, page 270
May 2, 2019
Modular Synthesizer Statistics
Number of comments when the module is teased: 1,000
Number of comments when the module is announced: 100
Number of comments when the module is released: 10
Number of comments when an album comes out using the module: 1
Disquiet Junto Project 0383: Interstellar Ambience
Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group, 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. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) 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.
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, May 6, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the late morning, California time, on Thursday, May 2, 2019.
These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto):
Disquiet Junto Project 0383: Interstellar Ambience
The Assignment: Record the sound of an apartment on a large interstellar ship.
Step 1: The goal is to record an artificial rendering of background ambient sound. The inspiration is, if you’re familiar with them, those YouTube videos in which people have stitched together loops of ambience extracted from movies like Blade Runner, anime like Ghost in a Shell, and TV shows like Star Trek. The issue to consider is that many (though not all) of those YouTube future-ambience videos consist of short tight loops that repeat for hours, which isn’t how actual ambient sound generally proceeds. There are elements to a given place’s soundscape that ebb and flow, shift and morph, as time proceeds, and many of the YouTube sci-fi film-ambience videos lack that quality.
Step 2: Create and record the sound of a future interior space, specifically an apartment on a large interstellar ship. Make the recording fairly long, half an hour if possible. Imagine it will be played on loop for a longer period of time. (The word “apartment” is being used instead of “compartment” to make it clear this is a personal space.)
Bonus Option: You needn’t create your work as a fixed recording. If you have the means to code a generative system, that is certainly an option.
Seven More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:
Step 1: Include “disquiet0383” (no spaces or quotation marks) in the name of your track.
Step 2: If your audio-hosting platform allows for tags, be sure to also include the project tag “disquiet0383” (no spaces or quotation marks). If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to subsequent location of tracks for the creation a project playlist.
Step 3: Upload your track. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your track.
Step 4: Post your track in the following discussion thread at llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0383-interstellar-ambience/
Step 5: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.
Step 6: If posting on social media, please consider using the hashtag #disquietjunto so fellow participants are more likely to locate your communication.
Step 7: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.
Additional Details:
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, May 6, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the late morning, California time, on Thursday, May 2, 2019.
Length: The length is up to you. The longer the better, in this case (a rarity for a Junto project).
Title/Tag: When posting your track, please include “disquiet0383” in the title of the track, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.
Upload: When participating in this project, post one finished track with the project tag, 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.
Download: Consider setting your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution, allowing for derivatives).
For context, when posting the track online, please be sure to include this following information:
More on this 383rd weekly Disquiet Junto project — Interstellar Ambience / The Assignment: Record the sound of an apartment in a large interstellar ship — at:
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0383-interstellar-ambience/
There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.
Image associated with this project adapted (cropped, colors changed, text added, cut’n’paste) thanks to a Creative Commons license from a photo credited to
Pedro Moura Pinheiro:
April 27, 2019
What Sounds Looks Like: Brands of Sounds
Remains of the day. This is the blackboard at the end of the class this past Wednesday, week 11 of 15 in the undergraduate course I teach on sound in the media landscape. Week 11 marks the start of the third and final arc of the course. Arc one is “Listening to Media,” three weeks on learning to pay attention with and to one’s ears. Arc two is “Sounds of Brands,” from which the course takes its name; in it we discuss how things (companies, products, services, etc.) express themselves in sound (jingles, product design, retail design, etc.). Arc three of the course is “Brands of Sounds,” which flips the second arc on its head. We look at how things related to sound (musical instruments, headphones, streaming services, record labels, bands) express themselves in non-sonic ways.
This begins with a discussion of what sound looks like. The lengthy class discussion yielded this mid-period Basquiat.
April 26, 2019
Life on the Virtual Run
This is my ongoing battle with Twitter: I change my location in the settings so that the odious “Trends” appear in a language I don’t understand (preferably one I find geometrically appealing, like Korean or Thai). Time passes. Those items begin to appear translated. I move on. I’m a virtual international fugitive.
I try to tweet the Twitter I want there to be in the world. The Twitter from back when I would just call out the sounds I heard around me, and people would respond in kind. The Twitter when people would share thoughtful observations or fragments of culture they come upon. The Twitter before Twitter was synonymous with bad actors.
I’ve long thought of Facebook as a place where I realize how little I have in common with my friends, and Twitter as a place where I realize how much I have in common with people I don’t know. Twitter increasingly makes it difficult to maintain that usage, but for now it remains worth the effort.
Currently my Twitter trends have me in Tokyo, and they appear to be about new sports cars and anime releases. I was “in” Tijuana for awhile, and then Seoul, until the Translator Sentinels (as I picture my tireless virtual opponents) caught up with me. Who knows where I’ll be this time next week.
April 25, 2019
Disquiet Junto Project 0382: Understanding McLuhan
Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group, 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. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) 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.
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, April 29, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, April 25, 2019.
Tracks will be added to the playlist for the duration of the project.
These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto):
Disquiet Junto Project 0382: Understanding McLuhan
The Assignment: Remix samples of an interview with Eric McLuhan on his father and media theory.
This project is being done in coordination with Fabricatorz Foundation and ONG Record’s O.N.G.2 experiential club night on Saturday, April 27, in Saint Louis. Many thanks to Jon Phillips for having made this project happen.
Step 1: Download and listen to the provided samples of Eric McLuhan, son of media theorist Marshall McLuhan, at this URL. The following samples are made from a radio interview of Eric McLuhan about his father and media theory. The McLuhan Institute authorized use (for this one-time artistic, non-commercial purpose). Have fun!
https://ong.gg/saintmcluhan/junto
Step 2: Create an original piece of music employing one or more of those samples. Consider the theme of “media ecology” as you do so.
Background: Marshall McLuhan developed the concepts of media theory and media ecology in his seminal work Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (1964). Media ecology is the study of media, technology, and communication and how they affect human environments. Media ecology refers to the context and the environment in which a medium is used. Marshall McLuhan’s work on media began in St. Louis while he taught at Saint Louis University from 1937-1944.
Seven More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:
Step 1: Include “disquiet0382” (no spaces or quotation marks) in the name of your track.
Step 2: If your audio-hosting platform allows for tags, be sure to also include the project tag “disquiet0382” (no spaces or quotation marks). If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to subsequent location of tracks for the creation a project playlist.
Step 3: Upload your track. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your track.
Step 4: Post your track in the following discussion thread at llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0382-understanding-mcluhan/
Step 5: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.
Step 6: If posting on social media, please consider using the hashtag #disquietjunto so fellow participants are more likely to locate your communication.
Step 7: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.
Additional Details:
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, April 29, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, April 25, 2019.
Length: The length is up to you.
Title/Tag: When posting your track, please include “disquiet0382” in the title of the track, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.
Upload: When participating in this project, post one finished track with the project tag, 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.
Download: When applying a license, such as a copyright or Creative Commons license, keep in mind that these tracks are for non-commercial purposes only, and only for this project.
For context, when posting the track online, please be sure to include this following information:
More on this 382nd weekly Disquiet Junto project — Understanding McLuhan / The Assignment: Remix samples of an interview with Eric McLuhan on his father and media theory — at:
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0382-understanding-mcluhan/
There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.
April 24, 2019
Aliens Were Among Us
My lucky find at the record shop yesterday. This full-length album was released, in 1977, because the previous one (note this is “The Second Whale Record”) had sold some 100,000 copies, a surprise hit in its day. The alien intelligence of these voices strains my capacity for description and comprehension. Fascinating to imagine the voices had such a command of the public’s imagination that this translated into actual record sales. A bit like Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares (the Bulgarian women’s ensemble) a decade or so later, only this choir is submerged.
Morning Sounds
Morning sounds: I hear the fan in the bathroom. I hear a plane overhead. There’s the low-level whine that my ears experience during high-allergy times. I hear cars at varying distances. I hear the distinct heavyweight industrial rumble of a recycling truck. I hear the pneumatic blast of a bus coming to a halt.
April 23, 2019
Uprooted on CD
Did I mention I really enjoy writing liner notes? Just got these copies of Uprooted, the new Michel Banabila album, for which I had the pleasure. Much of my early music education came from reading liner notes, especially on jazz albums. When I started working as an editor, it was the writers of those liner notes I would sometimes find myself reaching out to when assigning stories, extending my education further.
You can listen to Banabila’s album here: banabila.bandcamp.com. You can also read the essay in full at the initial post: “The Uprooted Orchestra.”
April 18, 2019
Disquiet Junto Project 0381: Shared System
Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto group, 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. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) 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.
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, April 22, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, April 18, 2019.
Tracks will be added to the playlist for the duration of the project.
These are the instructions that went out to the group’s email list (at tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto):
Disquiet Junto Project 0381: Shared System
The Assignment: make music using a free software synth assembled by Scanner.
Step 1: This week’s project involves all participants working with the same instrument. The instrument is a specific set of modules in a free software synthesizer. The software is Reaktor Blocks Base. It comes as part of the free Reaktor Komplete Start, which is available here:
https://www.native-instruments.com/en/products/komplete/bundles/komplete-start/
(Certainly if you’d prefer to emulate this week’s “shared system” using VCV Rack, or another piece of software, or your own hardware modules, that is totally fine.)
Step 2: The musician Scanner (aka Robin Rimbaud) graciously agreed to create a shared system based on Reaktor Blocks Base. It consists of these modules:
Bento Box Osc
Bento Box SVF
Bento Box VCA
Bento Box Mix
Bento Box Env
Bento Box LFO
Bento Box S&H
Bento Box 4 Mods
Here is some background on Scanner’s thought process in the development of this system: I think it would be interesting to present a limited package of blocks they can use, and to not use a traditional sequencer. Instead, people would consider how an LFO or modulation can move a sound or series of sounds around. (In some sense, this is a more West Coast than East Coast approach.) I’m concerned if we include the sequencer then it would suggest lots of decent pattern-oriented music wrapped around a similar theme or approach. This idea of such reductionism is basically about avoiding the obvious in these encounters and leaving the creator to think a little more than they might have to otherwise. It could perhaps be reduced further, but it’s enough to get people shaping sounds and creating shapes. Any less and it could potentially be too limiting and uninspiring. It’s truly a Bento Box Delight. I presume there’s a modest learning curve for some users, but there’s a guide that seems very clear on the NI website.
Step 3: Create a piece of music using only the modules (one of each) as described in Step 2 above.
Seven More Important Steps When Your Track Is Done:
Step 1: Include “disquiet0381” (no spaces or quotation marks) in the name of your track.
Step 2: If your audio-hosting platform allows for tags, be sure to also include the project tag “disquiet0381” (no spaces or quotation marks). If you’re posting on SoundCloud in particular, this is essential to subsequent location of tracks for the creation a project playlist.
Step 3: Upload your track. It is helpful but not essential that you use SoundCloud to host your track.
Step 4: Post your track in the following discussion thread at llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0381-shared-system/
Step 5: Annotate your track with a brief explanation of your approach and process.
Step 6: If posting on social media, please consider using the hashtag #disquietjunto so fellow participants are more likely to locate your communication.
Step 7: Then listen to and comment on tracks uploaded by your fellow Disquiet Junto participants.
Additional Details:
Deadline: This project’s deadline is Monday, April 22, 2019, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted in the morning, California time, on Thursday, April 18, 2019.
Length: The length is up to you.
Title/Tag: When posting your track, please include “disquiet0381” in the title of the track, and where applicable (on SoundCloud, for example) as a tag.
Upload: When participating in this project, post one finished track with the project tag, 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.
Download: Consider setting your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution, allowing for derivatives).
For context, when posting the track online, please be sure to include this following information:
More on this 381st weekly Disquiet Junto project — Shared System / The Assignment: make music using a free software synth assembled by Scanner — at:
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
Subscribe to project announcements here:
http://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co:
https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0381-shared-system/
There’s also on a Junto Slack. Send your email address to twitter.com/disquiet for Slack inclusion.
Image associated with this project adapted (cropped, colors changed, text added, cut’n’paste) thanks to a Creative Commons license from a photo credited to Ananabanana:
April 13, 2019
Aphex Twin in Translation
I just today received copies of the brand new Japanese translation of my book on Aphex Twin’s landmark album Selected Ambient Works Volume II. My book was published in 2014 to coincide with the album’s 20th anniversary, and the Japanese translation arrived this year to coincide with its 25th.
This is especially a thrill because I spent many years working in manga, helping shepherd the translation into English Japanese comics. I was the editor-in-chief of the English-language edition of the major Japanese manga magazine, Shonen Jump, and of its sibling, Shojo Beat, and as a vice president of their publisher, Viz Media in San Francisco, had the opportunity to meet and interview many major manga creators, including Masashi Kishimoto (Naruto) and Akira Toriyama (Dragon Ball). It’s very nice to be now have sent my own book in the opposite direction.
The edition is absolutely beautiful, with a wraparound cover partially obscuring the classic Aphex Twin logo, and lovely details throughout — in particular, note how there is a little table of contents on the bottom of each left-hand page, with a tiny arrow showing you which chapter you’re in.
I look forward to learning how the quotes from Alvin Lucier, Daphne Oram, and Fernando Pessoa were translated, in particular the Pessoa and Lucier given how much their work engages with variations on source material, notably Pessoa’s numerous alternate heteronyms and the decay inherent in Lucier’s “I Am Sitting in a Room.”
The Japanese book is considerably larger than the original English book (top), and even than the recent Spanish edition (middle), which came out in late 2018. I’m not aware of any planned additional translations, but these sure make me happy.
