Matt Bowen's minutes of music, photography, et cetera
I actually wrote this one more than a week ago, but then got busy and didn’t have time to convert it to an mp3. It’s mostly done with the Kaossilator, and then I added a lead part in record. It’s not magnificent, but it’s helpful to maintain output.
Today I went to the Baltimore aquarium and listened to tortoise on the way up and back. I must have had “The Equator” stuck in my head, because I feel like I made music for turtles today. For reference, the equator (via YouTube):
Not much to say about this one other than warm weather plus marine life inspired it.
I wanted to use one of the drum loops tonight, and after fooling with the patterns looking for something fresh, and I came across a loop that reminded me a lot of the drums in NIN’s reptile:
I also very much wanted a bit less density after the past few days of thick ambient soup, so I tried some rests here and there (hard, since it’s kinda hard to stop playing with the touch pad on the Kaossilator). Overall, I’m pretty pleased with tonight.
I’m feeling very much under the weather today, which is why this minute comes much earlier than usual. However, I’m honestly pretty happy with how it came out; I decided to make something as heavy as my head feels, and I think I’ve gotten there. It was hard to find an instrument you could even hear over all these layers, but the solo is in there, I promise.
As I was saving the file today, I realized that I started this project about a month ago. I’ve definitely learned a lot about how to use the Kaossilator, and it’s done one thing that I had hoped: I am thinking about making music as I walk around and have downtime. Amusingly, as I think today’s minute reflects, the more I learn about the Kaossilator, the sloppier my loops sound, but that should clear up with more time. I’m looking forward to many minutes ahead.
I ended up taking a short trip away from home at the last minute tonight, but it has given me the opportunity to test my music production system’s portability. I threw my macbook pro, my motu, and the kaossilator in my bag, and for all intents and purposes, it’s like I was working at home. The next test will come when I can’t fit the motu and am working on just my iPod, but tonight’s adventure was encouraging.
This one definitely didn’t gel, but the solo over top of it was kind of fun. I think it may just be that by Friday, I am pretty drained, so it’s hard to even know what would sound good. But, the point of this project is making the music, and doing so consistently; some days, quality may not be ideal, and I’d say this is one of those days.
As I was playing last night, I ran across a very straightforward drum beat in the patterns section that I could control near the bottom of the Kaossilator’s pad. Once that was down, I wanted a bassline, but it ended up sounding a bit sinister. However, once the organ-thing came in, the song perked quite a bit up, which was good — I’m in a very good mood tonight, and there’s no need to write moody music when I’m not moody myself.
I experimented today with sequencing the drums entirely by hand, and going for a bit more complexity in the by hand pattern (not using the gate arpeggiator there). Again, it’s a bit busy, but I was pretty happy overall with the sound tonight.
I was more ambitious tonight, but not necessarily ready for my ideas. I’m still having some trouble keeping track of where I am in a 16-beat loop, which means some overlap here and there for a beat, which makes things sound a little funky. But, all is not lost — I think the overall experience is pretty perky and good for a Saturday night.
