the music of sound

I’ve been searching for a good Vibes/Vibraphone sample library to buy in Kontakt format & I would prefer it to be a download… So I searched & finally found what looks to be a great library from the Vienna Symphonic Library & its downloadable, but…

So its a downloadable library right, which costs EU75 but I have to have a USB Key on each computer that I want to use it on. I write music at home on an PT LE/ableton LIVE setup but then mix at my work studio PT HD & carrying USB keys backwards & forwards is a sure fire way to lose one, AND to destroy any chance of just being in the mood ie inspiration strikes, I want to use my vibraphone but oh FCK! the USB key is at home! So add two USB keys to the bill at EU58 each AND it costs EU55 to ship me the stupid keys in the first place…. What is the point of having a download library for sale if it can’t be used via downloading?

So please, please Sonic Couture or ToneHammer – there is a significant instrument waiting for your skills AND you also get to show some Austrians how to do business in the 21st century….

PS: I don’t ‘like’ that I have to use an iLok with my ProTools systems either but I don’t begrudge it because you cant download ProTools, the iLok just comes with the hardware (& if AVID wanted to be a bit more helpful, maybe they could build the iLok inside the hardware, so it cant be broken or stolen or annoy people quite so much)

Going postal is one of those American idioms at which the rest of the world just go ‘huh?’…. or in more modern parlance; WTF? Of course the urban dictionary can provide answers: “Gone crazy or insane; irrational. Came into use after a number of workplace shootings by disgruntled U.S. post office workers.” How did those postal workers get disgruntled, so disgruntled to bear arms? Maybe its the setting, I laughed (yes out loud) when I read some random twitter debris: “I need a gun… to protect me against all the gun nuts’ – indeed!
But twice now I’ve been a recipient from someone going ‘postal’ – not in the literal sense but using the moving of ‘real’ objects via the postal system to mess with my mind…. The first time I think actually involved a courier, but heres what arrived at my studio one sunny morning back in the early 2000s…

Scary huh? What would you think if it turned up at your place unannounced? I of course called my few exGFs & left enough pauses for any one of them to make a point, but no takers… a week passes… I start to assimilate it into the debris in my studio.. another few weeks pass… we get a turnover for another episode of a TV series that we’re working on at the time & FCK! There it is ONSCREEN – it a FCKNG PROP!!!!! Call up the production office… muffled laughter… “Richard (production recordist) thought you might need it to record” – nice one! Thanks for not including a note, or a return address or anything… Well you know what they say… No? well revenge is a dish best served cold; I bide my time (is a decade long enough?) but in the meantime it serves well as a bookend to hold my DVD collection vertical.. Years pass & I change addresses two or three times…. but then this arrives in the post:

But I confess, it wasn’t entirely random; its creator emailed first, asking for my postal address in a manner not dis-similar to poetry (and not Nigerian spam poetry either) yet here I am, wondering about the intent… sonic product placement in a film or album? it DOES make some cute sounds, although the drumstick-like object made from chewing gum is a little disconcerting…. but the cassette tape IS sealed; there is no evil intent….

Conclusions? Conclusions will have to wait until I get my stethoscope (contact mic) out & verify what my ears are hinting at: used very, very carefully it makes exquisite percussive sounds… And apart from the objects entombed, the rubber band taped in place reminded me of this video which given enough downtime I have tagged to remix into some kind of aphexian cat-powered windowlicker bizo:

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So if I build a samplebank from this object, how does it compare with the weirdest object you’ve sampled? PS thanks to you both, oh crazy atom-shifters! Music this way comes! For anyone else so inspired, my postal address is: POBOX 6829, Marion Square, Wellington 6141, New Zealand…. But please do include a return address (physical & email) so I can send you what I make with your gift…. domo arigatou!

I love these polar photographs – here’s a little tutorial

> A link to the ultimate productivity blog – touche!

>Cinema Sampling, or How To Be Sergio Leone with a Few Easy Beats (yeah, right)

> Clutter is procrastination: “When you deal with things in tiny little bits, before they build up, it’s easy. Deal with them while they’re easy so you don’t have to deal with them when they’re hard.”

>Let Me See Your Package is dedicated to all things CD, DVD, and vinyl packaging related.

> Movie poster mashups

>The Strange And Frightening World Of . . . Basic Channel – hugely influential record label & production team merging dub & techno, amongst other things….

> New Aphex Twin! Download a live set with new material here

> Copyright vs Copyleft

>Trading Scarcity: Is This the Killer App for the Real-Time Web?

>Lily Allen stirred up a few extreme reactions via a blog post about filesharing, but some of the more considered discussion on Mefi is worth a read. If you don’t have time to sort the wheat from the chaff here’s a few I thought worth some thought:

- ‘The core of the “music business” was a high cost of entry to record and distribute music, not the inherent value of the music itself. Those high costs of entry are gone. Therefore, the “music business” is dying. This is simple economics. You cannot fight it.’

- ‘There will always be music, even if it was outlawed.’

- ‘Piracy isn’t theft. It’s something different. We’re still deciding what it is as a culture.’

- ‘We need a central repository of positions from artists. You check, see how they’d like you to experience their music. You give the artist a bit of respect, entirely apart from various forms of bullsh+t economic rhetoric — just *respect* — and you try to adhere to their wishes.’

I think this last one is a very valid point – too much of the rhetoric & extreme reactions occur through generalisation i.e. trying to consider bands who became famous via the old music industry with bands who have only ever existed in the new environment: while both entities make music, their two situations are so disparate as to be incomparable.

> Eno discussing his debt to Jon Hassel: “making musical particle colliders where we could crash different cultural forms with all their emotional baggage and see what came out of the collisions…”

> Direct download link to a free 5MB Kontakt sampleset by ToneHammer of 1850s Phonautogram recordings! “They were made by projecting sound into a cylindrical horn attached to a stylus, which in transferred the vibration into lines over the surface of soot-blackened rolls of paper. These captures were purely optical. No device existed which could translate the recorded acoustic information back into sound, until the First Sounds organization acquired the artifacts, with the help of the French Academy of Sciences. They worked with scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and other experts to devise a method of scanning and deciphering the images. In the spirit of celebrating the past and present day sonic pioneers who brought this piece of history to us, we converted one of the sets into a playable instrument. We chose the D Major scale recording titled “Gamme de la Voix – Vocal Scale (May 17, 1860)”, since it made for the most direct and flexible instrument. You’ll notice that the distorted fidelity, pitch and tone yields a smeared and crackling quality, sounding somehow between a frail and warbly voice and a washed out flute. We think it actually sounds beautiful and reminds us of the humble beginnings that modern audio-visual media has grown from. If you happen to make any cool music with this little instrument, please do share it with the folks at First Sounds. They’re very interested in hearing how people use these sounds in creative ways. We’ve included Kontakt, EXS24 and SFZ formats, as well as a set of synthetic drum sounds made from the same source material. In the Kontakt version, the modwheel controls subtle vibrato and tremolo effects.”

> The excellent OSX app AudioFinder now spots to ProTools! Considering the massive difference in price AudioFinder is a serious contender against SoundMiner (you could have a holiday away with the money saved!)

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Diego Stocco – Experibass from Diego Stocco on Vimeo.

“Few weeks ago I visited a luthier looking for instruments parts, I had an idea in mind for an instrument I wanted to build. My curiosity was to hear the sound of violin, viola and cello strings amplified through the body of a double bass. I came up with a quadruple-neck experimental “something” that I thought to call Experibass.

To play it I used cello and double bass bows, a little device I built with fishing line and hose clamps, a paintbrush, a fork, spoons, a kick drum pedal and a drum stick. I hope you’ll like it!”

Its the work of Diego Stocco (he of the tree music) – check all his videos out on vimeo – awesome work Diego! Very inspiring!

I’m sure most people reading this know what a Casio SK1 is – if not have a read here or here or watch some of the videos below… Anyway I have a spare Sk1 (I own 3, none of them have been circuit bent) and rather than sell it on TradeMe/Ebay I thought it might be more interesting to trade it… But trade it for what? Well, thats where I am completely open to suggestions, but I figure there is a better chance of it ending up in the hands of someone interesting that way, than in the hands of whoever is prepared to pay the most. So I’m not interested in swapping it for cash… but post your proposition in the comments….

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ps if you just want samples of the built in drum sounds, have a look here at freesound

do bem™ – Açaí Juice 100% fruit (Tic Tic Tac Wafer’s Keyboard) from Hardcuore on Vimeo.

Creation Direction: Hardcuore
Art direction, design and animation: Breno Pineschi and Rafael Cazes
Design assistent: Luiza Rosa
Photography: Breno Pineschi
Soundtrack: “Tic Tic Tac – Carrapicho” (João Brasil Tecnobrega’s Remix)
Sound Effects: João Brasil

Whatever its selling, I’d buy it!

Its late Monday & its already a busy week: I’ve finished patching my conform & I’m back into actually contributing sound – Hallelujah! But my stash of links worth sharing is starting to overflow, so the detritus installment arrives early this week…. Take a deep breath & see how many tabs you can open in your browser (& your mind) in one go:

>I’ve been loving Nikolas photos since he first started posting them on the 12k forum late last year, but do check out his flickr stream – such beautiful work; it instantly evokes music in me.. & he is generous enough to share some of his textures incase you want to try your own post-processing…

> Apparently Nissan wants to give their ’silent’ electric cars some Blade Runner-esque appeal – its nice sentiments but naive: ten minutes after they release the car some kid will hack the OS and release a virtual “blowoff valve + fat exhaust’ patch and we will be right back where we are now… ie marginally better for the planet & no better for our ears…

> Why economics condemns 3D to be no more than a blockbuster gimmick (via the Guardian)

> Seems there is an official effort to Shush Loud TV Commercials
me? I just MUTE THEM ALL!

> The carton above is from the excellent, sardonic Business Guys on Business Trips site and it leads me directly to some closely related geniuses…

> The “music industry” (don’t laugh) apparently wants performance compensation from iTunes for the 30 second audition files that “shoppers can stream before they buy, industry officials believe they should be paid a ‘performance’ income from Apple, much like when a song is played in a public venue like on the radio or at a sports game. It’s the same situation, they say, for movies and TV shows that feature licensed music.”

> installed iTunes 9 yet? No, me neither…. but lifehacker has a list of five features they want to see in iTunes & I concurr on at least the last one: “Bloat is probably the number one complaint…. ”

>One thousand soul 45s for free download? I think I am in sample & recycle heaven…. and please “no complaining that I don’t know what these are. No whining about early cut offs or janky recording. There are over a thousand recordings of 45’s made by a record dealer over the past few years….”

>Experiments with long exposures & different light sources as brushes

>Courtesy of Upstart Blogger; “Meet the music industry’s new misinformation puppet and learn how to benefit from her tricks

> Analog vs Virtual from an interview with Rob Modell/DEEPCHORD: “It’s more like buying a pet rather than a musical instrument; you learn its personality for months after you get it. When you buy a software synth, you can pretty much understand its personality in fifteen minutes.”

>And lastly, twitter though the ages – remember to read it from the bottom up….

Punch Drunk Love

Director – Paul Thomas Anderson + Wikipedia
Composer - Jon Brion

Sound re-recording mixer – Gary Rydstrom
Sound re-recording mixer – Michael Semanick

Supervising sound editor – Phil Benson
Sound designer – Christopher Scarabosio

Sound effects editor – Aura Gilge
Sound effects editor – J.R. Grubbs
Sound effects editor – Stephen Kearney
Sound effects editor – Kirk Denson

Production sound mixer – Ron Judkins
Boom operator – Robert Jackson

Dialogue editor – Jonathan Null
Dialogue editor – Ewa Sztompke

ADR recordist – Rick Canelli
ADR mixer – Thomas J. O’Connell

Foley artist – Dennie Thorpe
Foley artist – Marnie Moore
Foley artist – Jana Vance
Foley mixer – Tony Eckert
Foley mixer – Ben Conrad
Foley recordist – Frank Rinella
Foley recordist – Frank ‘Pepe’ Merel
Foley editor – Andrea S. Gard
Foley editor – Shannon Mills

First assistant sound editor – Jennifer Barin
Assistant sound editor – Chris Barron
Assistant sound editor – Coya Elliott
Assistant sound editor – Stuart McCowan
Assistant sound editor – Marcie Romano
Assistant sound editor – Steve Slanec

Additional production sound mixer – Peter F. Kurland
Additional boom operator – Knox White
Additional boom operator – Lawrence L. Commans
Utility sound – Kat Craig
Sound utility – Peggy Names
Sound recordist – Sean Landeros
Sound recordist – Kathleen McCart
Sound recordist – Eric Bretter
Sound recordist – Jeremy Peirson
Sound recordist – Gary Ritchie
Assistant sound engineer – Koji Egawa
Assistant sound engineer – John Hendrickson
Assistant sound engineer – Steve Mixdorf
Sound mix technician – Brandon Proctor
Machine room operator – Sean England
Machine room operator – Mark Purcell
Sound editorial technical support – Noah Katz
Sound editing intern – Michael Lemass

PostProduction Sound – Skywalker Sound

Total Budget (est) – US$25M

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Love when he reslices the beat

Altmusic is very proud to present Chris Watson.
Chris Watson is a heavyweight in the avante garde world for his work with field recordings. A founding member of late ’70s techno and synth-pop innovators Cabaret Voltaire and, later, ambient-industrial fusioners the Hafler Trio. In something of an odd switch, Watson left the music industry behind in 1985 to work as a sound recordist for the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. He quickly branched out into production for film and television and has since handled field recording for a number of nature programs and documentaries, including David Attenborough’s “The Life of Birds” which won him a BAFTA for best factual sound in 1998.
In 1996, after collecting hundreds of hours of location recordings from less accessible regions of the world, Watson returned to music production, releasing his first-ever solo album “Stepping into the Dark”, on the Touch label. Actually a compilation of recordings of natural settings spanning from Inverness to Kenya to Venezuela to Cumbria, the release was lauded internationally and received an Award of Distinction at the Prix Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Austria. His second album “Outside the Circle of Fire” was released in 1998 and “Weather Report” from 2003 was listed amongst the Guardian newspaper’s “1000 albums to listen to before you die”.
In 2006 he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Technology degree by the University of the West of England “in recognition of his outstanding contribution to sound recording technology, especially in the field of natural history and documentary location sound”

AUCKLAND – 7th Oct @ The High Seas with Richard Francis and Rosy Parlane 8 pm $10
Free artist talk at 5.30

DUNEDIN – 8th Oct @DPAG with psn electronic
8 pm $10/$8

CHRISTCHURCH – 9th Oct @84 Lichfield Street with Stanier Black-Five and Sea of Holes
9 pm $10

WELLINGTON – 10th Oct @ Adam Art Gallery with Live Soundmap of Red Rocks 8 pm $10
Workshop at Freds 4 pm

More info at The Audio Foundation

Wahooo! This is one gig I’ll definitely be going to!

Red Rocks is a good choice for a local recording spot too… Despite it being only 15minute from central Wellington, with the help of a 4WD you can get to seal colony & depending on the weather & tides, some wild waves.. Heres a video I shot there a while ago:

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Ah – just checked his website, his tour includes Japan, Australia & NZ

Japan:
2 day workshop at the Film School, Yokohama, followed by performance piece

Australia:
Open Frame in Brisbane

New Zealand:
In residency