I have finished the final track for the Excursions in Time release, entitled “Destination Rue de Verneuil”. Last night I finally recorded a performance that felt right for this closing track on my album. The track is 11:32 long which brings the total time for the release up to 62mins. For me it’s just right for this type of music. I used every patch cable that I have to make the track, except one little shorty. (Need to get more …
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Curving Through Spacetime
This is my most complex patch so far, and I’ve been working on it for a week. I incorporated a few new things this time, such as recording the chordal pads in Tim Exile’s Endlesss app. I played them by hand in the app on my iPhone and recorded them into the Morphagene, which was clocked so that I could fade the chords in and out and they would still be in sync.
I also used the interface that I …
Ambient Trance Experiment
I added a few new modules to my system recently which inspired me to record a new track utilizing them. The track begins with a bass line generated from a Poly-D analog synth, patched in and controlled by the modular system. I built a custom interface to bring the Poly-D’s back panel ports onto a panel in the modular synth.
The new modules include a VPME QD drum module with QEX expander, Strymon Starlab experimental reverb, and an ST stereo …
Abandoner Remix
This is a remix project that I made a while ago and decided to add visuals now for submitting the track to YouTube.
In late 2008 Porcupine Tree founder Steven Wilson announced a remix competition for the song “Abandoner”, from his debut solo release – Insurgentes. I was pleased to find that my remix was chosen as one of the eight finalists which Steven had whittled down from over 200 submissions. Although I didn’t win I was very surprised to …
First Track From New Release
Something wonderful happened a few nights ago. I was working with the modular synth and I began to tweak a patch I had just put together. I did a little of this and a little of that and things began to fall into place. It was becoming interestingly rhythmic with nice variations. I let it continue to play while getting ready to shut things down for the night. While doing all that I suddenly realized how much the music was …
Generative Music
Tonight I took my first steps in creating generative music with the modular synth. After studying the manuals to several of the modules I’m beginning to explore a little more deeply into their complex inner workings.
From Wikipedia; “Generative music is a term popularized by Brian Eno to describe music that is ever-different and changing, and that is created by a system.”
Or to put it another way, as Eno himself has said, “Generative music is a lot like gardening, …
Modular Synthesis
Recently the components for my new modular synthesizer began to arrive.
I’ve wanted a modular for quite a while. My very first synth was a modular, a Paia that I built from a kit. I couldn’t afford a Minimoog at the time, which I wanted very much. But it was completely out of my budget at $1500 in 1975, so I built the $240 Paia instead. It actually was a better first synth for me because building it, and then …
Hammond M3 organ
The latest acquisition to my studio is a Hammond M3 organ. It now resides in what I call the “vintage” area of the studio due to being made in 1955, and it’s directly beside a Masco guitar amp from 1946. So being 68 and 77 years old does allow me to truthfully use the word vintage. 😁
I’ve had the Masco for years, but the M3 arrived recently on a whim. I owned one previously (with two Leslie 145 speakers) back …
Abbey Road Studio
Here is my Abbey Road shot, unfortunately I’m not in it because I was by myself. However, I did have an amazing top-to-bottom tour of the entire studio, compliments of a producer friend who set it up for me after working there a few weeks earlier. I visited in October 1989 while attending a training course for audio console manufacturer Solid State Logic in Begbroke, not far from Oxford.
I also spent time in London and was very lucky to …
Robert Fripp Q&A
January 2000, Robert Fripp held a four hour Q&A session at our studio that also included a listening party playing tracks from the then-unreleased King Crimson album “The ConstruKction of Light”. I admire Robert not only for his musicianship and musical vision, but also for his teachings and philosophies regarding life and work.
Roughly 70 people attended the Nashville event from as far away as Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Missouri, Georgia and Louisiana. The session lasted almost four hours and included …