Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Field Recording: 20091228-1136-LAKE_ALBERT
Descriptor: 20091228-1136-LAKE_ALBERT
Location: Meningie, Lake Albert, The Coorong
Date: 28/12/2009
Time: 11:36
Duration: 0:50
URL: http://milkcrate.com.au/fieldrec/20091228-1136-LAKE_ALBERT-crickets_and_cars.mp3
Cars and crickets. An area of desolation.
Friday, December 25, 2009
Thursday, December 24, 2009
Let's Control A_SID Via Arduino
I've made a simple MIDI --> Serial --> A_SID setup. It works like this:
1. Max/MSP Patch - route your MIDI data to this patch
2. Arduino Code - download and then upload to your Arduino board
3. Arduino Hardware - connect 5V, GND and TX to the correct points on the A_SID circuit (essentially replacing the existing serial connection header if there is one).
Get these materials here. Still working to smooth out some of the details, so no point in really using it now. Quick demo of Ableton Live control below.
Field Recording: 20091223-0423-OVER_THE_PACIFIC
Descriptor: 20091223-0423-OVER_THE_PACIFIC
Location: Somewhere over the Pacific Ocean
Date: 23/12/2009 (approx)
Time: 04:23 (approx)
Duration: 1:00
URL: http://milkcrate.com.au/fieldrec/20091223-0423-PACIFIC_OCEAN-aeroplane_signals.mp3
Flying from Los Angeles to Melbourne, it was what felt like the middle of the night - everyone was sleeping. I was awoken by these tones within the general noise of the aircraft.
Wednesday, December 23, 2009
A_SID MIDI Interpretation Layer Is On It's Way
I have started making a simple MIDI interpreter for the A_SID board that we put together during vblank's excellent hardware workshop during Blip Festival. It's almost there. I just have to work out some timing issues.
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Monday, December 21, 2009
Blip Festival 2009 - Day 3 - My $0.02
Presentations by David Viens with XC3N / No Carrier
David Viens presented an informative lecture about his Chipsounds plugin. He was an excellent speaker. I especially liked the discussion on LFSR analysis. XC3N then did a quick demo of the plugin.
I found No Carrier's presentation very inspiring. Clear, straight to the point and informative. What more could one want when it comes to a presentation about NES-based visualisation.
The J Arthur Keenes Band
Awesome singer / song writer with a great onstage persona.
Trash 80
Trash 80's set at the Blip Festival afterparty was well worth walking for 12 blocks in the sub-zero temperatures in snow. I've been wanting to see him play / DJ for a long period of time, of course.
Blip Festival 2009 - Day 2 - My $0.02
A_SID Workshop
Fun workshop with a cool outcome - to build a hardware-based SID emulation chip.
Starscream
A great concept set, executed wonderfully with humour and a beautiful groove.
Hally / CONDOM (Covox and Random)
Hally will save us. Here was the proof.
An amazing experience. CONDOM put on an immersive live performance "In a sense, it is a definition of itself. "
Sunday, December 20, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
A Render Of My Blip Festival Set
Circuit Bent "Traffic Police Guitar"
So cTrix, Carl Testa and I were strolling past a small 'miscellaneous goods' store in Brooklyn NYC yesterday and I saw this cool little "Traffic Police Guitar" sitting in the window at a bargain price. I can never go past a toy like this for bending purposes, even if I know that it just has a blob IC in it and not much else. Naturally, I had to purchase it. However, we didn't have any electronics materials so we just dropped by the hardware shop on the way home to grab a soldering iron and some other parts (specifically to bend this item, of course) - fun times were had. By the way, the first photo above shows James Bentley aka Calm Down Kidder showing off the item.
Blip Festival 2009 - Day 1 - My $0.02
Leeni
An excellent chip-based singer / songwriter with some exciting new material.
Minusbaby
A great concept set, executed wonderfully with humour and a beautiful groove.
Eat Rabbit
Just being himself, doing his thing. The visuals (which I thought were the evening's best) by Rosa Menkman went really well with the performance.
Friday, December 18, 2009
Field Recording: 20091211-1212-BRIGHTON
Descriptor: 20091211-1212-BRIGHTON
Location: Queenstown, South Australia, Australia
Date: 02/12/2009
Time: 05:08
Duration: 10:40
URL: http://milkcrate.com.au/fieldrec/20091211-1212-BRIGHTON-pool_pump%3bbird%3bchainsaw.mp3
Birds, chainsaws and a very loud pool pump.
Lazerbeat VS little-scale Nanoloop Jam
Thursday, December 17, 2009
BabyCastles / CDM Handmade Music Wrap Up
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Blip Festival Handmade Music Opener
Via CreateDigitalMusic.
"It’s the most wonderful time of the year. We get to enjoy the sounds and sights made by chips, independent games, and Novation Launchpad-controlled Sega Mega Drives. Blip Fest hits NYC this week in a celebration of vintage and lo-fi chips and the wonderful, blippy music they produce. To get things started right on Wednesday night, we have a special edition of Handmade Music, the DIY music party/science fair/noisy racket series, in a special location — the opening of Babycastles, a new, permanent home for independent games. (Think “indie arcade,” an idea I hope spreads worldwide.)
If you’re in the area, come check out some terrific independent games, meet artists, see in person the inventions of Australia’s Little Scale, and more."
Come along if you're in town. Read more here.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
You Can Listen To Blip Festival As A Live Stream @ WFMU Radio!
Monday, December 14, 2009
little-scale: I.F.E. (2009)
little-scale: I.F.E. (2009)
Cohesive game boy advance music. Written on the flight from Melbourne to Auckland. Recorded in Auckland airport.
Archive download here.
Individual tracks download: 01, 02, 03 and 04.
Field Recording: 20091213-2214-TULLAMARINE
Descriptor: 20091202-0508-QUEENSTOWN
Location: Queenstown, South Australia, Australia
Date: 02/12/2009
Time: 22:14
Duration: 0:50
URL: http://milkcrate.com.au/fieldrec/20091213-1014-TULLAMARINE-sonic_view_from_a_cheap_airport_hotel.mp3
A sonic view from the window of a cheap airport hotel.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
Lazerscale2010 Updated! Project Revealed!
The objective of the exercise is for each party to write 365 songs in 365 days.
1 - All songs must be written between January 1st and December 31st 2010.
2 - If either party goes 21 days without uploading a song the challenge is over.
3 - All songs must be a minimum of 60 seconds.
4 - Songs may be produced using any equipment.
5 - Songs don't need to be produced exclusively for 365s365d.
6 - Collaborations with other artists are acceptable and encouraged.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Max Patch for Radar Sequencer (SquareGeom)
Let's Tune the Game Boy Like a Japanese Koto
• 9/8
• 6/5
• 3/2
• 8/5
• 2/1
I've tuned the entire ROM to an A as a tonic note. The process was very similar to previous cases of retuning LSDJ for other purposes. I worked using a spreadsheet, which had the ratios and then calculated the frequencies for each note. Then, the data needed for the Game Boy to generate that frequency was calculated, and converted into hex. Finally, this block of hex tuning data was copied into the LSDJ ROM using a hex editor.
If anyone wants to see the spreadsheet or would like more details, please let me know.
On the Use of a DC Signal as a Compositional Element for Sega Mega Drive
Normally, a series of bytes is written to this area of memory - and the value is continuously changed - which is then heard a stream of samples, thereby giving rise to sample playback or software-based synthesis.
However, by simply setting the value of the DAC register without changing it over time, the sixth channel basically outputs a DC (direct current) signal. This DC signal seems to have some interesting interactions with the output of the other FM channels. For example, it is almost as if the DC signal can act as a filter for the other channels.
Here, you can listen to a single operator on channel one (in other words, a simple sine wave). The parameters of the channel playing the sinewave are not changed at all over time. The only element that is changed is the value of the DAC channel, which is slowly ramping down from a value of about 80 to 0 over a four bar length of time.
The musical effect is an interesting one, as both a) the signal sounds like it is slowly being rectified (or a low pass filter is moving up in frequency) and b) more noise from the power supply can be heard as the value approaches 0. Notice the artefact when the DAC value jumps from 0 back up to 80 in a single step. This creates an interesting pop, of course.
Here is an image of the sinewave when the DAC value is at a value of 80.
Here is an image of the sinewave when the DAC is at a value of 0.
The main differences are:
• The main waveform is lower in amplitude
• There are additional, non-smooth portions of the waveform appearing whenever the zero axis is crossed (this would account for what sounds like a filter filter frequency being moved)
• The sinewave is slightly cut off
Here is a slightly more musical example - a chord of five notes with the same DAC values as described earlier.
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
Square Wave-based Additive Synthesis for Sega Master System
By adding the three voices together at different octaves with different volumes, it's quite possible to generate various timbres that are usually impossible to produce using single voices. This is a basic form of additive synthesis, albeit with square waves.
In this example, all three voices are eventually played, but at different octaves. The upper two voices fade in and out over time.
This exploration of inter-oscillator timbre generation is related to previous examples of underclocking and phasing the voices of the SN76489, such as this timbral droner.