at the end,

it all comes together. the analog gear i was using at the beginning of the course all ended up in my last patch~~gain, compression, filters, delays, ring mods, the same fucking samples,

,

,

its all here. fin

the patch for FLATHEAD LOBOTOMY

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still using that old sample of a screwdriver being thrown at a drumset that i recorded on the sk-1~~channels 1,2,5,6 are different segments of the sample multiplied by each other with a ring mod and tuned to minor second intervals with a bandpass filter with a high q factor and theyre all delayed from one another to give a periodic wavy texture. the remaining channels are other sections of the same sample, eqd to emulate a bass and snare and something made of wood. the drums come in all on their own meter (e.g. the bass and snare are ALMOST 3:2 but eventually everything falls out of sync). its almost impossible to focus on anything at all..

8 CHANNELS BABY

étude no. 2

étude no. 1

a patch i made for a four-channel piece

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i used the sample of me dropping a screwdriver on a floor tom that i recorded on my casio sk-1, chopped into 4 different segments and processed through band-pass filters which i tuned dynamically throughout the piece. the samples are “overdriven” digitally to create a clipped signal. i experimented with setting the q factor to the highest possible value and the frequency with the kslider, converting th e midi notes to frequencies

more music coming soon !! im currently working on modeling my hardware in max, or at least trying to come up with something similar that will allow me to create without the restriction of sample buffers or hard-coded limits. i have been using analog gain, compression, frequency filters, and feedback and feedforward delays, but working with max will allow me to utilize a lot of other audio signal processing tools. 

i found this patch in a cycling ‘74 forum, it’s a ‘merzbow style noise generator’ written by Akihiko Motsumoto. it reads a wav file and passes it through several biquad filters, and allows one to graphically alter the center frequency, slope, bandwidth and q factor. it also includes a digital model of merzbow’s marshall amp. i may end up using some of these objects in my patch, after i finish recreating the sounds of these pedals.

this was my first attempt at a noise track, i used a fairfield circuitry ‘the unpleasant surprise’ (experimental fuzz/gate) to generate line-level noise, which i filtered using the gate and low-pass. i “played” the jack to generate different frequencies on two separate tracks, which i panned hard left and right. i also used the demo function on my keyboard, which played a sample of me yelling FUCK into the mic

fun with loops and gain/comp

this track was initially intended to be an 8-channel piece until i accidentally deleted my sample. it was written using a casio sk-1 keyboard and an sm 58 to record the sample, which was a recording of a screwdriver falling onto a drum head, pitched down to the lowest note on the keyboard. the sk-1 erases all samples when it powers off, and power is cut after 7 minutes of inactivity. this limited me to one session, otherwise i would lose my sample. i had to carry my keyboard with me when i took breaks and press a key every now and then so it wouldn’t shut off, until i realized that i could just tape a key down (which also meant i didnt have to hold the key down to get the sample to loop). after leaving the keyboard on for a few hours i got worried that the battery would die, so i plugged in an ac adapter, which killed it immediately (it takes 7.5 v, i used a 9 v). at this point i had only recorded tracks for 3 channels, so i decided to just use one for a mono piece.

the sample is processed through an analog feedforward delay and gated fuzz. the events and timings are:

1:00: fade up the delay, turning it forward from unity

2:00: frequency becomes audible, mix towards 100% wet

3:30: increase gain

5:00: decrease onset (open gate)

7:00: end

making noise ☺

thinking about starting a harsh noise project with ian. i havent done much with noise prior other than a little piece i did for art_x last year in this class and i’m super unfamiliar with the genre (merzbow) . hoping this will expand my depth as an artist and enable me to think more creatively etc

some inspo for a potential project