First autogenerative fully modular track: Lonely City 2am

Svetlovska

“I saw no city spread below, and no friendly lights gleaming from remembered streets, but only the blackness of space illimitable.” - H.P. Lovecraft, The Music Of Erich Zahn

Well, I finally managed to make a modular patch from scratch that auto generates something pleasing to my ears- listening to it, I realised it sounded like late night subway station sounds, but it’s all from whole modular cloth, no found sounds or sample devices used. (I’m using the Bitbox Micro to record the patch, not play samples)

This is the patch:

The only thing I added from IPad was the BeatHawk Grand Piano loop.

rottencat

I’m reading Neil Gaiman’s “Neverehere” about a society of unearthly creatures living in the London underground. This would be an excellent soundtrack.

jwmmakerofmusic

Damn! I wish I knew how to patch together something autogenerative that sounded that good in a modular environment! Well done mate.

auxmux

Nice work! This is great.

sigma79

Iv made sort of tracks. Where the elements sound like bikes etc but not a subway.

Nice though.

Thanks.

Svetlovska

@jwmmakerofmusic : I wish I did too! I am in awe of those people who know how to plug it up to get a desired effect ahead of time. For me, working with the modular is more like solving a puzzle, one step at a time. I catch a thread of something I like the sound of, ask myself ‘okay, now what if I plug this into that?’, and if I’m lucky, it goes somewhere toward the next step. This is why I use the BitBox to record everything just in case some magic happens. This is the first time I got something that continuously but coherently morphed in a pleasing way, courtesy of Rene, the Make Noise sequencer. Now I need to dig into this new bit of knowledge, add it to the kit bag. Damn but Modular is deeeeep…

@auxmux @sigma79 : thanks both for the listens and comments, glad you liked it.

@rottencat : I haven’t read that one, sounds interesting. The last of his I did read was ages ago, American Gods, before the tv series was made. As a sometime dabbler in fiction I have a love hate relationship with Gaiman, the fecundity of his imagination, and the way he effortlessly plays with materials I find fascinating as materials for my own stuff, but often difficult to co-opt in new ways, e.g. his playing with ancient myths in American Gods - fills me with unworthy ‘I wish I’d done that’ thoughts. Jealousy is never a good look…

rottencat

I’ve known about Gaiman for ages but it was only a few months ago that I read one of his books. Since then I’ve read 5 of them and some of the Sandman series and I’m pretty much hooked. I work part-time in a used bookstore so I’m waiting for American Gods to show up.

Somebody once wrote, “Comparisons are odious.” The best thing you can do is what you do. Keep plugging away until you find your thing.

nickneek

Good stuff @Svetlovska

btw if you like Lovecraft I highly recommend Thomas Ligotti. Dark weird stuff. He even has a story called "the last feast of harlequin" which is dedicated to Lovecraft.

Svetlovska

@nickneek : thanks, glad you liked it. Yes, I’ve got some Ligotti, his early stuff was heavily indebted to old HP. I need to try him again, the first time round he didn’t click with me, though I know he is very highly thought of in new horror circles.

@rottencat : yup, sixty years of plugging away so far… Maybe I’ll know who I want to be when I grow up…

Krupa

You make great machine that makes sound👍👍

I definitely get the neverwhere vibe that @rottencat picked up on too, the combination of the atmos, the machinery with the gentle piano screams haunted tube station at me

FastGhost

This is amazing, my dog is extremely interested in it.