The third in a little chance inspired pieces. This one was rather simple. I recently bought the Ableton Live 9 Suite upgrade and wanted to test the new (and rather brilliant) audio to midi feature. I decided to use on of my own tracks as the sole sound source. To choose which it would be I decided to roll three dice and times the result to choose an article number from my blog. I rolled a 3, a 6 and a 4. So, track 72 – Milk Spilt, was used.

Why the title? I completed this as dawn broke and the sky really was a milky white in nature!

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Milk.mp3
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Whilst rummaging through old hard drives, cd and dvd disks, I stumbled across something that was probably my first ‘proper’ attempt to create a piece of meaningful music by myself. It’s from 2003, not long after I had lost my Mother and was living in Spain feeling that my life at the time was playing itself out, without me having any sense of control.

Hearing it for the first time in years, it’s thrown me straight back to the moment I made it. I know I used an early version of Reason, with a few samples and, oddly for me, my dodgy vocal via a dodgy mic.

I won’t treat it as a finished work… it’s very muffled and missing something… so not bothering with a 96kbps version, but thought I would share it because its heart was (and still is) in the right place.

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Separation.mp3

The last in my little series of space sample pieces. This one includes Vostock 3 & 4 as well as a couple of other gems nestled amongst a gently rolling melody. Like most of my output it’s a lights out, headphones on piece.

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Vostock.mp3
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Another little piece playing around with a few more of the lovely space samples from http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/sounds/sounds.htm. This has snippets and loops from the ISS, from Soyuz and a Maroc Morse Code satellite broadcast. The melody was a live improvisation using Animoog on the iPad recorded directly into Ableton Live.

I hope you enjoy it?

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ISS & Other Satellites.mp3
ISS & Other Satellites 96kbps.mp3

My next little piece using the wonderful samples at http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/sounds/sounds.htm includes recordings from the Vjezna HF Transmitter talking to Soyuz and a more modern transmission between the ISS and TsUP. The melody was made using a sample from China 1 broadcasting the tune “The East is Red”, which I have looped and heavily effected.

It’s quite hypnotic and calming… try listening to it on a loop before sleep? You’ll soon be floating in your dreams.

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Vjezna.mp3
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This piece is born out of my second session playing with the lovely bunch of space samples from http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/sounds/sounds.htm.

It uses a couple of tones from an old Chinese satellite along with a drone made using csGrain on the iPad.

It has a mysteriously haunting feel to it that I remember from my late night shortwave radio explorations.

I hope you like it?

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China 2.mp3
China 2 96kbps.mp3

Whilst looking for a little sonic inspiration, I came across a lovely batch of fantastic recordings at http://www.svengrahn.pp.se/sounds/sounds.htm. I use a couple of the space recording samples to flesh out this simple little motif that throws me back to the repetitive melodies that I would regularly discover somewhere odd along the shortwave frequencies as a child.

This is the result of my first hour with these samples to hand… expect more, hopefully more developed ideas to follow!

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Soyuz.mp3
Soyuz 96kbps.mp3

This simple piece was made during late yesterday evening and finished in the small hours of this morning.

On a personal level, I have been trying to reach the light at the end of what has felt like a never ending tunnel of darkness, hence the lack of output for many months. Thankfully, the thoughts and sounds in my head are getting brighter and more uplifting as the days move on.

September, usually a month I dread for a few reasons, has unusually been a month of reawakening.

Using Ableton Live and a few home-made Absynth patches, this is how it all sounds to me.

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Reawaken.mp3
Reawaken 96kbps.mp3

Sorry it’s been so long since I posted something new. I have been sidetracked by a combination of work and homelife issues. I have been struggling to make anything, other than my contributions to the Disquiet Junto project.

Here’s a piece made in the early hours of the last two nights. It evolved through playing with the randomisation function of Absynth to created a rich layer of sounds all playing the same, simple riff. A few other samples have been included to give it a little momentum and richness.

It goes by the name of Yclept. ;)

I hope you like it?

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Yclept.mp3
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Just a little announcement to let you know that my latest release ‘hiemal’ is now available to download for free from Bandcamp. Grab it while you can as Bandcamp does limit the number of free versions.