Link (expires 4/1): https://we.tl/7vCNMine7j

Remember those Chipmunks songs a guy slowed down? I re-created that with mid-side processing on The Romantics “What I Like About You.” Low quality (source file; mp3) but you get the point and it’s weirdly addictive to listen to. For me, anyway.

The mids and bass are glitchy and don’t resonate like they would with an analog source, I assume because of the mp3 data compression.

In a related story, I have not worked out as I planned to this morning.  The working theory is that I’m metaphorically hung over from yesterday’s political victory for health care and the weeks and months of tension that preceded it.

Setting my controls for the heart of the sun:

I’ve set up and torn down my synth stuff enough lately, with more to come, that I built a synth board this weekend.

Neither the board or the rig is very fancy but they’re fun to make sounds with.  Three sound sources (Alesis Micron, Korg Volca Bass, iPad mostly running the Poly app) route to a mixer.  The mixer has an effects loop (pedals are in that loop) and sends dual mono out (not stereo; one output is the dry signal, one is the wet from the effects).

Now that things are laid out I’ll buy some shorter cables to reduce all of that mess.

When I plugged in to test everything out and set levels I ended up writing and recording the backbone of a new Night Mode piece.  That’s always a good sign, when new gear or new arrangements of gear inspire music right away.

We hit three really significant milestones on projects this week: Mars Lights finished basic tracking (drums & 2 guitars) for our double LP, I finished recording drums for the howie&scott record, and I ordered parts for a fun of five Falcon Heavy Drive pedals.

I don’t know exactly when to say we started the Mars Lights project.  We started setting up mics in 2015 on July 1, were checking placement and phase and did some recording (maybe just testing, maybe truly aiming for real takes) on August 18, and were in full swing by September 11.  Call it a year and a half, done amidst a two-year-old (Charlie) and a new arrival (Caroline); in my mind that’s making good time.

We’re going to start booking shows again, and Drew and I will work on overdubs when we’re not practicing.  It’s possible we could have something out in 2017, though 2018 seems more likely.

I’ve collected potential h&s songs and riffs for as long as we’ve written them.  Some that will be on this record date back to 2003, possibly 2002.  I started to see the outlines of the tracklist in 2013-14, and broached the subject with Scott in July 2015 (probably the 9th or 10th).  Since then I’ve been working on the demos, wrote a new thing or two, had my first drum recording session in September 2016 and now have finished the drums.

My goal now is to get the songs to a point where Scott can do his parts by the time his students are off for the summer.  I haven’t decided to what extent that means just throwing down scratch guitars and vocals for him to react to, or actually working on my real parts.  The latter is better in theory, but I may not have time; we’re envisioning layers of various guitars, bass, and keys entering and exiting throughout the songs and those parts take time to write, dial in sound for, and record.  Maybe a hybrid approach will work, trying to get the two most important parts down or something.

The Falcon Heavy Drive has grown out of my experience using the first Falcon I built (which now I think of as a prototype) and some electronics things I’ve learned since I first did the design.  It sounds similar to the prototype but everything about it has been implemented better and it’s more flexible with an added bass control and more ways to route the mid notch.  I’m pretty psyched to have it on my board myself, get it into others’ hands, and to clear off the board for new designs.

Dad listened to the Night Mode “Vikram Ray” single (below) and shared his thoughts.  As part of my response I wrote what’s below (in lightly edited form), which seemed to capture something I’ve struggled to express about how I hear and listen to repetition- and drone-based music.

“At its heart I’d call Dirac Spike psychedelic music, even though sonically it’s not what would typically be associated with that.

“One of the main responses the music hopefully elicits is a sort of meditative feeling, a sense of the self going on a bit of an inner journey, or relaxing its grip on second-to-second physical reality for a little while.

“The music does this through repetition and variation, so it was a very different experience to compose than other things I’ve done.  Think of it in contrast to a pop or rock song, which in some ways is a constant stream of new ideas; new lyrics, new chords, new riffs, new sounds, even as verses and choruses might repeat.

“A function of a pop song is entertainment, engaging the mind and its inner monologue.  Psychedelic music can function to free or relax the mind, slowing down our inner monologue or separating us from it for a while, which is a good feeling I think.

“There are ways to mix the two (pop / psychedelic) of course, and people might have either type of response (entertainment and engagement, or relaxation and egoless-ness) to either type of music.  I think about creating in each style very differently, and I think that on the whole people’s responses in aggregate correlate generally with what I’m saying.”

We’ll drop Night Mode’s second album, Dirac Spike, on 3/31. Here’s a song from it, “Vikram Ray.”

It’s taken almost six months to get my chops up (Caroline Pluff was born and, y’know, holidays) but I’m returning to Sound+Vision studios at the Lawrence Public Library on March 6 to continue tracking drums for h&s’ fifth record.

Seven more songs (four for the record, three for b-sides) are on the docket, after I did five in the first session.  I hope that the combination of having gone through the process once and the tunes being easier will let me get through them all.

Matt’s going to loan me a couple extra snare drums that may circumvent the nasty snare-tom sympathetic resonance on the library’s otherwise outstanding-sounding C&C kit.

The goal is for me to have the drum tracks edited and a main guitar track and scratch vocal recorded by the time Scott’s students are out for the summer, so we can do his parts during his break.

Progress seems agonizingly slow in the midst of life.  But it’s not nothing.

Or users of other streaming services?

I’m looking at options for moving MFR onto the big streaming platforms.  What do you use, what do you like?

Artists, what digital distributors have you used?  I’m specifically interested in RouteNote; https://routenote.com/

1. Mixing a 4-song EP I recorded with Cory back in November
2. Designing and testing the Falcon Heavy v2.0 pedal
3. Mod work on my Sunmachine Fuzzo))) and Basic Audio Scarab Deluxe pedals
4. Having fun with the new Volca Bass synth
5. Listening to great new stuff from Nilsson to Run The Jewels to Martin Gore