LOW ARCHITECTURE 2: Jerome Little Torzal Bass

This onyx beauty is more precisely called the "Xavier Padilla Style Torzal 4-34 Bass", and was orignally designed and built by Jerome Little for that celebrated bassist. The above bass was built using my particular specifications (Nordstrand Fat Stack pickups,  ebony fretboard,  maple neck,  swamp ash body),  but what really sets this instrument apart are the ergonomics at work through both body design and gently, twisted neck.  Beyond its easy interaction with the human body,  it possesses a graceful beauty not often found in visually and physically heavy basses,  and this design ethic is so unique that the Torzal has been exhibited at the Smithsonian Institute in Washington. At first it may seem something of an exaggerated abstract design,  but one quickly warms to its utility as it wards off any thoughts of Carpal Tunnel.  It's not just a museum piece. 

THIS IS HOW WE DEFORM : SSF Quantum Rainbow

The good folks at Steady State Fate bring you five spectral densities of noise that are useful to almost any synthesist,  especially those with a propensity for the edgier and more unpredictable aspects of sound.  The pink,  red,  blue,  purple and white noise available here present audio,  voltage,  and modulation possibilities in a small (6 HP),  inexpensive package.  Add an attenuator for more subtle mixtures,  and you're in business.  Available at CONTROL in Brooklyn.

SEEN & HEARD

Here are ether^ra and This Second Sleep performing at some show early in their "careers" as rock militants at some indeterminate room somewhere on planet Earth (NY).  I do believe the guitar was raggedly Japanese with a terrible action and the bass, a powder blue Hagstrom from Sweden.  This was well before we could afford Telecasters or Jazz Basses.  That came a bit later.  The above image was used for an exhibition announcement for "works on paper"  at the South Houston Gallery in SoHo.  This preceded the area's strangulation by boutiques ,  so dirt and distortion could still be found on Prince Street.  A proto-punk art moment,  perhaps?

OSCILLATIONS: L' Enfer Est Intime C-60

This 1985 cassette compilation from the French Le Syndicat  label presents an early look into the noise scene before software pirated spontaneity and emotion from the genre of "Industrial Music" and codified its angst.  Much here can be said to fit into the above "ism" and related areas such as  Power Electronics,  Noise,  and Rythmic Electronics,  as do the cliches inherent in those forms.  The packaging is certainly the highlight here,  presenting a consistency of imagery by artist Zorin,  whose depictions of female genitalia are lovingly realized in ink or black marker,  and give realization to a visual analogue to industrial music's use of extreme sounds,  prohibited subject matter,  and anything of a transgressive nature.  All in all,  this is a better than average collection of international artists (John, Duncan,  Controlled Bleeding,  Etant Donnes,  Le Syndicat,  Pacific 231,  etc.) whose experimental sounds later found homes on more established and more widely distributed labels. Ultimately the personal,  the primitive,  and  the dissonant are championed by this package,  and help us to believe that hell is indeed intimate.  As if we didn't already know.

A DECISIVE VOICE?

A Buchla/Eurorack collision.

LOW ARCHITECTURE: Spalt Matrix Bass

You must keep in mind that generally speaking,  my appreciation of nearly any object is based on one thing,  the multitude of visual qualities that comprise that object. Was it the German Existential philosopher Heidigger that said  "the beautiful is that which pleases apart from concept"?  It is this phenomenological approach that first seduces me,  starting with the materials and their inherent qualities, and fnally the forms they take.  I was recently moving things around in my studio and decided I really must check out some of my instruments,  first my Zon Hyperbass (another wonderful design),  and then my custom made Spalt Matrix Bass,  a kind of Constructivist/Surrealist hybrid. The Matrix is a kind of sculpture that produces a wide variety of bass frequencies when played,  but can safely be said to satisfy its aesthetic conerns without producing a sound.

THIS SECOND SLEEP STUDIO UPDATE: Buchla Filled

I presently have both  eighteen and twenty four space powered boats,  but have decided to consolidate my favorite 200e modules into the bigger of the two,  thus preventing the redundancy that has hampered my appreciation/use of the 200e series. I'm quite pleased with the sheer number and quality of the oscillators (Verbos 258V Dual Oscillator and Harmonic Oscillator,  Cydustries ZOe, 259e Twisted Waveform Generator,  261e Complex Waveform Generator). The addition of the 296e Spectral Processor makes for some remarkable sounds and quite the light show. My Eardrill Pendulum/Ratchet now has more friends to play with in the area of rhythmic effects. If I had more space,  another filter besides the Triple Morphing Filter would be great to have,  considering the above oscillation sources.  Oh well,  they can FM eachother into oblivion. I also have Jason Butcher's cool little ring mod in the Module Module format,  but alas,  no space in this already loaded case.

A VISIT

DESIRE & DISSONANCE

One would think that agitated arpeggios,   shards of glassy noise,  and pummeling globs of low frequency dissonance would be enough to discourage anyone from discovering the joys of modular synthesis,  but quite the opposite is true.  Inhabitants of this particular world relish those sounds and more.  As a member of this tribe,  I also feel the lure of new machinery,  bigger powered cabinets,  and higher electrical bills.  With all this in mind I present my newest bit of sonic undoing,  the Monorocket M6104 2.1A.  At a whopping $200 price increase and only 28 hp additional space than its nearest Monorocket relative ,  it seems a tad over-priced,  yet it's well-built  and versatile when it comes to voltage variety.  Thankfully,  it's the modules one puts in this box that really count,  and thus far I've created quite the beast. Stuff like the Make Noise Brains/Pressure Points combo,  Intellijel Rubicon VCO,   Metasonix R-54 VCO/VCF,  Blue Lantern Asteroid Operator VCF/VCA,  Delptronics LDB drum module,  Flame FX-6 Multi Effect Module,  Doepfer A-149-1 RCV, Doepfer A-140 ADSR, and Doepfer A-143-3 Quad LFO all make for  peripatetic sound generation,  modulation,  and experimentation. BTW,  there is room in this cage for more aural terror.

LISTEN: PATCHING 4 TRANSIENTS with CYNTHIA

Cynthia Webster of CYNDUSTRIES fame was kind enough to share the following approaches to patching her fine 4 Transients module (eurorack version).  It seems that this module is far more than just an envelope generator. What follows is a deluge of information and possiblities.

Well there are so many things that you can do with the module for example, you can use the Gate Input or Button to fire each section,  and send the positive output to the CV input of one Filter (Low Pass), and the Inverted Output to another Filter (High Pass) ...

Feeding your audio signal into the two filters in series, (output of one filter into, into the input of another).  and firing a Transient (Envelope) will give you VC Divergence just like a Moog Filter Coupler and the 4T will spread and close the cutoff frequency like parting curtains.

How you adjust the filters makes a great difference, with lots of possibilities.   (Try the same patch with two oscillators instead of two filters, like a Moog VCO  Controller etc).

Another is to take the UP Output of one Transient section, and feed that into the Gate Input of another, and the UP Output of that one, into the Gate Input of another to form a chain.  Intercepting one of these with a DC coupled VCA (that can process control voltage signals and not just audio,  such as our Octal VCA).

Will make a great wobbly thing when the VCA (s) are varied.  (Also rhythmic variation is always available by pressing and holding the big red buttons, those can be played musically too!) 

Another is to take ~audio~ and feed it into the Gate Input and listen to the output, the Transients can be much much faster than typical Envelope Generators and in this regard the module can act as a Quad Waveshaper, or just use one or two sections to do that, and use the others as Envelopes to modify the Time Input on the others.

The Quick transients make super duper snappy envelopes great for percussion or for ringing Filters.  Can be used for Low Pass Gate "Buchla Banjo" sounds as a CV input to the LPG (or Filter) instead of tight narrow pulses from a VCO or LFO) .  Try an electric guitar as audio!

Of course mixing the Outputs of the Transients together with common (or Especially UN-common) Gate or Time CV inputs - makes some pretty wild event generators!  You can tap the output of each Transient section out to somewhere in your patch, and then bring the outputs of those effected VCOs, or other Envelopes, Filters, etc

Back into the CV inputs of other 4T sections... and then take the resulting mix of all of the Transient sections out to process the results of all the other stuff!

You can make a "ring of firing Transients" using the Quadrature Outputs of your Zeroscillator into each of the separate Transient sections, and then play with the Time Input CVs.  (Also try feeding the Transient sections ~Back Into~  any four VC Inputs of the Zeroscillator that is creating the Quadrature 4T firing in the first place.

Or, try mixing the UP Output with the Inverted Output  of any particular Four Transients section, and then make a ring of that using other transient sections.  

If you have Four Filters then you can carefully adjust the separate sections of the Transients into the filters and create cool and ~controllable~ Vocal sounds.  If a Zeroscillator is the incoming audio to the filters, then try feeding an output of a Transient section into the Time Reversal Input of the ZO, and you will get 

really wild vocal sounds.

Use the separate Gate Outs of a Sequencer, to fire off different Transient and filter combinations, and with careful adjustment and the audio in series,through those filters, you just may be able to make your synth speak, or say your name Arrrr-Th'uurrrr!

Ok, those are just a few suggestions. 

(Sorry it's hard to stop once you get your imagination going with all of the Four Transients possibilities, lol)   For example if you're running a sequencer and need an event to start say with a long slow attack on the pulse output of stage 4 (the fourth musical note in your sequence)...

usually with a sequencer running quickly, a traditional envelope doesn't have time to start that slow attack, let alone complete the whole envelope cycle, so pulling out the knob on the right side of each transient section will allow the envelope(s) to fully complete their cycle (or MIX of cycles)  even though the stimulus 

or sequencer has already moved onto other stages in the sequence.  This is like once you launch an event, it will complete its mission autonomously.  Or.., just push in the right side knob if you want to try something else.

PERCUSSIVE: DELPTRONICS LDB-1e

Having recently divested myself of my last vintage drum machine (a Roland TR-55,  now on sale at CONTROL in Brooklyn),  I decided to add this handly little (4hp) Eurorack module to my system.  It's really quite a wonder considering its size and the eight (bass drum,  low tom,  high tom,  snare drum, wood block,  hand clap,  closed hi-hat,  open hi-hat) analogue drum sounds it faithfully produces with the help of clock source or sequencer. Delptronics has produced a winner here,  and I can't wait to check this out with my Make Noise Pressure Points/Brains combo.  BTW,  an expander is promised,  so stand by for more percussive fun from the "little drummer boy" module. Please be aware that this module requires a +5v connection for use in your rack or powered case.