Upon wrapping my session last night with Naum, a post hardcore band from Alabama, I decided after a few days of disciplined tracking it was finally time to crack the pandora's box of modular synth world and show the dudes what is possible in a few hours of jamming and producing on the big box (this can absolute derail a session if cracked too early. Believe me.) We actually started from the place where my last live video track ("Bull Run') left off, unpatching the sequencing from my multiple ableton sends and instead distributing it across my array of hardware sequencers. This is not the first time I've pulled this trick, basically keeping a huge assembly of sounds and modulations but scrambling the inputs, but I think this was one of the more successful attempts. One thing that is particularly cool with this approach: there is nothing whatsoever that insists on patching the gate and melody of a voice to the same sequencer source. As such, I've got the Malekko voltage block sequencing a bunch of the gliding portamento melodies, but an entirely different and unrelated Tip Top trigger riot stream driving the rhythm gate pattern of the sound. It's basically several sequencers collaborating, which makes improvising interdependent moments super fun and rewarding.
As the night got super late, I started recording snippets before realizing a full, if somewhat structurally minimal, performance was possible. By three or four am I had this laid down. We had absolutely no preconceived ideas of what this track would sound like, but over time it took on a Year Zero era Nine Inch Nails meets 90s trip hop that got the collective heads in the room a-knodding. Cover photo by my photographically radical girlfriend, . Show her some love and please enjoy this track!
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