Thinking out loud...

[nowaysj]

Im still looking for another VST with a delay that goes down to 1ms, with automatable timing.

http://destroyfx.smartelectronix.com/so ... de-win.zip

[komanderkin]

related to the first part of the thread (regarding cassette tapes and how they affect the sound) - have any of you guys tried making impulse responses of your gear? the IRs won't capture any changes to the dynamics, but will (if done right) capture the frequency response, and thats exactly what i love about my cassette tape recorder. that, and a bit of noise.

anyway, i've tried capturing impulses from three different bits of gear i have (two old cassette decks and a tape delay) so that i can use some of that lofi feel without reconnecting the cables everytime i want to record something. the resulting impulses turned out pretty good, but they're still not 100% the same as what i get when actually recording to and then capturing from tape. i've experimented with using 1 sample long pops to trigger the tape, as well as short white noise bursts, but i got much better results with just short pops.

if anyone's interested i can post the impulses here and if someone has any tips about capturing IRs, please share!

[Huts]

anyone else get a huge kick out of hearing the origin of samples in your favorite tunes? Was watching House and heard James Earl Jones say the line from and I could help be laugh. Makes you really keep and ear out for cool vocal cuts

[nowaysj]

Crazy hearing drums samples that you've designed used in someone else's track. Kind of like seeing your ex in the arms of another man. Like I've known you so intimately, how can any other cherish you in the way I did?

[wub]

Giving serious consideration to challenging myself to make an EP over the weekend. Max 4 tracks, no more than 25mins total tune time. Make it a concept EP. Like a concept album, but sorry. Melancholic theme to proceedings, at least a vocal orientated track and maybe something that works by itself as a soundbed/ambience.

Could even take things one step further and release it as a single extended track blended together out of the individual parts, maybe with some sort of interlocking theme in the form of skits or some sort of looping commentary that joins the sections together. Less a DJ mix more a collage that would resemble an aural tapestry if experienced the right way.

4 tracks in under 48hrs is do-able.

[Sonika]

Hey Wub I have an old tape recorder that I'd love to start using/incorporating into my productions, and I'm using a Saffire interface...are you just hooking up your tape deck through some interface, pressing record in your DAW, and playing whatever you want to get from your tape?

[wub]

Hey Wub I have an old tape recorder that I'd love to start using/incorporating into my productions, and I'm using a Saffire interface...are you just hooking up your tape deck through some interface, pressing record in your DAW, and playing whatever you want to get from your tape?

Yes - although I don't have a proper audio interface, more a jumped up sound card, so I'm alternating the phono-phono leads on the front panel depending on whether I'm recording in or bouncing out.

[Hircine]

Hey Wub I have an old tape recorder that I'd love to start using/incorporating into my productions, and I'm using a Saffire interface...are you just hooking up your tape deck through some interface, pressing record in your DAW, and playing whatever you want to get from your tape?

http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1996_ar ... ssion.html that's the technique you are looking for, bouncing to tape, instantly re record the signal and sync everything

[Sonika]

Thank you Wub and Hircine

[Sonika]

Hey Hircine that link you gave me says I need a tape deck but I don't have one. I'm assuming I can use my interface, because a tapedeck is basically a type of interface?

[wub]

I guess it is postmodernist plague, where nothing has value and everything is relative. So people will just swallow the idea that everybody can be everything, and everything is everything. And nothing means anything anymore. Just give up in front of potential danger of brainwork and surrender in front of pranks.

The lame doodle is masterpiece, sound of distortion box is great noise album, etc.... But you can make critical evaluation = opinion based on something beyond mere gut feeling. You can value piece of creativity. If the artist or his followers can't take criticism, it's whole another issue.
Simple proof could be, that talking about book reference: When editor compiled book of avantgarde art - he makes the choices. He values what is worth of inclusion and what is not. Which works are good and which are shit. It would be utterly strange idea that you can't value avantgarde art!? Wouldn't this mean, every book is just compilation of whatever shit someone happened to make? But no. There is most often editor who compiles the essential and leaves out the shit. He/she is probably not afraid to make judgement or hide under idea that "everything is subjective", "nothing has value"...

This doesn't remove the possibility, that someone will always actually prefer the junk and gutter-trash, instead of "remarkable art", hah... Both trash and art is not beyond possibilities of finding value.

Often, the body of work, is important factor defining value. The doodle or black square itself may not have value, but its context in whole body of work and legacy of artist. His meaning in his time or in future.
In this angle, for example some works of David Jackman, are utterly useless. But those recordings in his discography together with other works create what IS Jackman.
One torn newspaper page with muddy footprint found from street is not remarkable art. But artistic intent, concept stretched beyond the mundane, may become so if it is well done. How can it be "well done", someone asks? I'd rather not take this discussion here. It may happen in "art section" if someone is into concept art?

[alphacat]

Thoughts on tape...

1)
2) Bouncing drum mixes down to tape =
3) Bouncing bass & drum submixes down to tape together =

In my experience the freq. response range varies depending on not only the deck but the tape stock used. Cassette's effective rolloff on the hi end is around 16kHz, but cheap tape will sometimes start rolling off around 12kHZ. The low end is a different beast: you'll capture it alright (esp. on reel to reel instead of cassette) but clarity/focus can sometimes be tough to get, and the more you lean on your DAW compressor to try and get some definition the more you'll start losing the beefiness of the sound.

Got a Tascam 4-track cassette recorder I've had since I was a young man and it's served me well - but it looks like I might be acquiring an old TEAC 1/4" reel to reel this weekend for free...

[wub]

You ever had much experience with low end roll off?

[alphacat]

On cassettes, absolutely. Subs at normal recording/playback speeds definitely take a hit.

HOWEVER...

Record it at double speed and then pitch it down half and there they are, but with a lot more noise too.

[nowaysj]

I guess it is postmodernist plague

There has been a very robust conversation around this topic for years. To look at this quote out of context renders it meaningless. Ha, jokes.

[wub]

Ok, quick bump on this thread as I finally got around to finding some other threads that interested me and I need a place to stash the links before I lose them again;

Live Jamming // Live Rigs // Hardware driven setups - http://www.dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=206320
303's, 808's - http://www.dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=193284
It ain't what you got, it's how you use it. - http://www.dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=192992
vinyl junkies youtube channel - http://www.dubstepforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=8&t=226143

[wub]

[wub]

Still on the matthewdavid tip (I go through phases where I can't get enough of this guy), few more interview/links etc that need checking out;

http://www.tinymixtapes.com/features/matthewdavid
http://peccanttapes.blogspot.co.uk/
http://thefindmag.com/?p=3006


It's a weird kind of juxtaposition of sounds really. On the one hand I just ordered the new release from Leaving Records to be whisked internationally to me, and on the other I'm writing this and listeing to the latest NeoSignal podcast.

There are similarities, naturally - not a completely random strand of listening, at least not right now. Lots of sound design, I guess. No stock beats or sounds. It's odd the more I think and listen to these, I understand more about what excites me in terms of sound production. Quirky shit. Not out and out weird for the sake of being weird, but just interesting. The sound design on NeoSignal's catalogue has always fascinated me, it's very much cutting edge neuro in terms of how I view it, but when coupled with the more organic beatless output from Leaving Records, it just kinda gels. Both make me want to throw off the oppressive shackles of the production trap I sometimes find myself in (hey, we all fall into the lobster pot sometimes, admit it) and just loop and fire and loop and fire and see what the fuck comes of it.

(((Speaking of which I found these earlier;



From the accompanying blurb;

Product Information

Philips CC-1 professionaly made endless loop continuos cassette. 1 minute duration, continuos repeat.

Sorry what? A looped cassette? Well how about that! See, this is the sort of shit I'd like to play with. Get it set to record, and then just have it with some instruments/the Chimera etc etc and see how long the tape will record for before it starts to heavily degrade from having layer after layer of sound recorded onto it. Then obviously bounce it all back in and see what background artifacts the whole thing has picked up.)))

Sound design. Sound design always needs work. It's organic, as I've stated already, but it evolves. Grows. Moves and is moving, you know? The most recent thread on emotions in music has served as a good remind of that. Bad moods and bd vibes lead to darker music, or at least music that is more reflective. That's not to say I'd advocating going out and stomping a kitten to death to get some militant vibes & dark chords busting through, but I think sound design (and we're keeping coming back to that in particular) is directly influenced more so by that kind of thing. For example, today from my window, it's raining. Has been since I got in the car this morning, will be at least til I get home. Studio machine is setup in such a way that I can sit at my desk with my feet up and stare out at the world. If that world is wet and grey and cold, chances are my noise making sessions won't have a Disney soundtrack vibe to them, yagetme?

EDIT; so yeah, after this vein of thought I went home and hey what would you know it was still raining. Every car that drove past I could hear that distinctive ssssssshhhhhhhhkkkkkkk sound as the tyres cut through wet road and pulled up the spray. Only thing is, this is South London so they were averaging about 20mph at that time on a Wednesday, so it was a very slow almost metronomic feel to things that I was vibing off as I had the computer on. Anway, came up with this;

Soundcloud

World away from the slightly more upbeat stuff I was cranking out following my 6 day weekend in Spain last week, and tbh I'm almost happier with it. Sure, there are things that need tweaking (this is the result of maybe a 90min session, tops?) like the flange is too overt in places and some of the automation on the bitcrusher on the main kick could do with toning down a bit as it goes almost too metallic at times but whatever, this was as pure a representation of emotion (and indeed, outside influence of the environment) as I've had recently.

[alphacat]

(((Speaking of which I found these earlier;



From the accompanying blurb;

Product Information

Philips CC-1 professionaly made endless loop continuos cassette. 1 minute duration, continuos repeat.

Sorry what? A looped cassette? Well how about that! See, this is the sort of shit I'd like to play with. Get it set to record, and then just have it with some instruments/the Chimera etc etc and see how long the tape will record for before it starts to heavily degrade from having layer after layer of sound recorded onto it. Then obviously bounce it all back in and see what background artifacts the whole thing has picked up.)))

This interests the fuck outta me, esp. modding it into some kind of smaller, portable Frippertronics rig...

[nowaysj]

Kind of feel like I've got to turn the internet/ipod/turntable off for a minute. Like no more input. Feel like too much musical input. I can't digest and process it fast enough. Feel like I need to just be thinking about my own sound and beats, like I'm super gravitational and get pulled around all these varying epicenters of really interesting artists. Feel like I've got to stop that for a while to work on this stuff... but then when I work in isolation, I kind of slump. Maybe I get lazy. Get okay with simpler loops, and rougher production, and less variation and just get kind of weak. Listening in the context of other music keeps me up, sets concrete levels and standards. Keeps me honest and strong. I don't know how to resolve this right now.