Cornucopian 105

Cornucopian 105 recontextualises what are acceptably useful strategies within composition, putting the listener in touch with many musical forms that would otherwise be excluded by purist notions towards music. Cornucopian 105 introduces new ideas into contemporary popular culture, exploring unique hybrids, which exhibit themselves in terms of perceived origin.

Kymera

Vocal sources by Sianed Jones. Kymera is a work of journeying through many distant spheres. Kymera even travels around many continents with elements of yodeling and chanting from many different cultures as sourced by Sianed. The hard, powerful, but staggered bass drum sounds carry connotations of cultures which do not exist and yet are so apparent in their musical form that they seem to clarify other sections, providing a false sense of familiarity. The core of Kymera is formed from transformations using a new time stretch algorithm developed using cdp spectral subprograms. This algorithm was developed as a means of countering the traditional phase vocoder time stretch and produces the unique spacious and staggered expansive textures used on both drum and vocal sources. The vocal sources were chosen to appear as unprocessed session recorded vocals. In reality however, the source material was recorded long before composition commenced and each vocal phrase was cut and pasted note by note giving the illusion of a seamless melodic structure. In some ways, having a melodic content is a default element from the use of variously pitched and phrased vocal sources and this obviously filters its way through to the final form of Kymera. This was then taken further by the inclusion of small fragments of distorted TB303 Bass line. Even the drum parts in Kymera seem to dance around a melody, carefully interweaving their way around the pitched vocal transformations. Kymera's relaxed and accessible nature clearly shows that it is not a predetermined work. Its material has not been forcibly engineered into place no matter what its acoustic nature really was. In fact, for this work, much of the source and transformed material dictated the way in which it could interact with the other parts, which in effect created a natural flow within the dynamic structure of the work.

Nautilus 110

Nautilus was set out with some strict guidelines for its construction long before composition commenced. The main objectives were the expressive nature of drum parts, spatialisation nonconformity and anomalous behaviour. One of the possible reasons for Nautilus 110's disturbing yet engaging quality is the distinct lack of any spatialisation. This is not simply limited to the non use of reverberation devices, but also engulfs the nature of the work by the non attempt to synthesize spaces on any level (that is, no natural reverb inside of the sound objects and no attempt at building psychoacoustic reverberant devices). The careful use and interplay of transformed elements, as the basis for constructing various sound stages was largely pioneered in Nautilus. The imagery of this work is of dark brown, distant cavernous spaces with undisclosed subversive undercurrents, sultanas and a light banana soufflé.

Perpendicular Endurance

Vocal sources by Juliet Russel. Perpendicular Endurance is inspired by the work of J.W. Dunne who hypothesizes on a grand unifying theory of space-time and the way in which the human consciousness can transcend multidimensional limitations. Perpendicular Endurance was originally conceived as a work for dance for the 'practica armonica' dance company.

kosmik@inorbit.com

Neurotic, Erotic and Robotic. An experimental work exploiting the relationships between various synthesis sysytems with the emphasis on fast attack. Every sound is an original synthesised element. The sounds were arranged into banks on an EMU ESi32 sampler and sequenced via midi using Cubase on a Pentium 1 PC. The work explores the harmonic relationships of very short percussive elements, produced using various synthesis types, outside of the restrictive interfaces of traditional rhythm programmers. A style reflecting the elctro genre was chosen to exploit the heavy weight analogue elements. The FM and digitised wavetable sounds complement these as they forge and weave a spikey mid range rhythm around the fat analogue low frequency sounds.

Cak Kake

Clarinet sabotaged from Pete's mum. Like climbing Mount Everest, making a piece from Pete's mum was just one of those things that have to be done in life. If you ever heard her practice you would understand…. Humour is perhaps the strongest feature of cak kake. Its title does not even escape this intention being a tribute to pete's mum's notorious cake baking extravaganzas! Because Cak Kake was exclusively made using clarinet material (apart from the small section of unprocessed speech) and despite the apparent contradiction, it is perhaps one of the purest works made because it adheres so closely to its original state. With its components simply being presented to the listener rather than having been carefully interwoven by many stages of processing.

Lips On Nips

Lips on Nips is an experimental work using multi-layered and recontextualised systems of pre and post technoacoustic developmental strategies aimed at the exploration of non self-referential deployment in rhythmical evolution.

Rasp

Rasp was commissioned by the Sonic Arts Network and the Arts Council of England. Rasp was very much composed with the idea of investigating distortions. Not only distortions in the audio domain, but also distortion of the roles different pieces of equipment played in the composition, challenging their conventional use within a particular genre. This distortion of cultural placement was taken one stage further with the use of extreme distortions placed upon sampled drum loops. Rasp was the first piece which gave direct control of progressive rhythmical transformations, challenging notions of subtle background washes or pads, as is so often the case for indefinable texturally based passages. Rasp took these textures and moved them from being subtle variations to a level that engulfed the entire soundscape with rich stabs of rhythmical power. 

Movie Score

Movie Score is an orchestral work evocative for the dual roles of simplicity in presentation and complexity in expression. Developing a hidden path through means of textural counter play, it creates a unique reality within its own temporal sphere.

Amerika Off Line

Miami USA

Operation Rice & Beans.
Mixing it up in Miami with Colombians, Cubans & Costa Ricans.
A hip hop crossover with a poke at USA political scandals.

Big Up Ya Self

Reykjavik & Akureyri - Iceland

Operation Northern Lights.
They appeared like a magic carpet of intense colour & flickering light.
Went snow biking, fishing in an Eskimo style & endulging in hot spas, the source of which is a volcanic glacier.
All the central heating is free because extremely hot water is piped direct from this source. You won’t see any trees either. The ground is rock formed from lava.
I checked out the house where Reagan & Gorbachov had their summit meeting.
Continued composing in Reykjavik and hung out with a Swedish girl, Yvonne, who was teaching African dance to Icelanders!

Cutting & scratching. DJ Precise & Scratch Daddy Addy.

98K Platinum

Kyoto, Osaka, Tokyo - Japan

Operation Shinkunsen.
A week in Japan. Riding the bullet train at high speed from Osaka to Tokyo.
There are incredible underground malls and those ’girls knickers vending machines’!
Japanese hospitality is impressive and I ate lots of seafood.

The Krakker Hack Down

Glasgow - Scotland & Barcelona – Spain

Operation Radar.
Composed during trips to Glasgow to play a live set at the Radar Rephresh night, Glasgow Arts School. Glasgow is a great city that totally rocks & the people know how to party.

The only track with an acid line using a software emulator of an mc202 that a mate programmed for me.

Continued the Track in Barcelona. Barcelona is full of wicked Gothic architecture. The architect responsible for much of it is Antoni Gaudí (1852 - 1926). Check out the gorgeous Sagrada Família Cathedral, which is still yet to be completed! Gaudí also designed the Parc Güell. I reckon he would have loved acid music and electroacoustic transformations.

I later changed the mix to this version after checking the mosaics in the Parc Güell. You get a great view of the city from here.

Power User.

Gent Belgium, Hamburg Germany

Operation RaveMiester:

I spent a lot of time in Belgium & Germany and worked on this track finishing it in time to play at a rave in Hamburg.
In Gent i would often visit my favourite cocktail bar – The Sous Sol (now ceased trading). Once, I got so wrecked on their cocktails, I fell down a manhole. Gent also has some fine Gothic architecture and enough churches!

Hamburg is chilled city with a great park & has good artistic karma.

Fantasy Friction Channel

Leeds, Sheffield Twin Towers, up and down the M1 - UK.

Operation Sublevel.
Composed over several sorties up & down the M1 with my friend Dave Noyze on the wheel.

Dave is now doing a PhD researching Cellular Automata in Sydney Australia.

The Power Book was constantly plugged into the cigarette lighter socket. Composed as a big respect to all the people we met in Leeds during 1999 & 2000.
This one has a really fresh Techno buzz about it. I reckon it’s shaped by the gateway to the Industrial North!

Sublevel - Hyde Park, was the place to buy records.

Internet Exploder

Aricebo & Old San Juan, Puerto Rico

Operation 151.
Made on a 5-day trip to Puerto Rico with my mate Dave Noyze, where I did a live gig in Old San Juan. Composed after visiting the Radio Telescope at Aricebo, home of the SETI project. (Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence). You have to check out this awesome piece of engineering.
Made a low altitude flight in a 4 -seat propeller plane over the island, circling above the SETI institute. The pilot was drunk & smoking - right next to the fuel tank!

Old San Juan is the place for gorgeous girls & 151 Rum that knocks your head off! Checked out a Rain Forest too. Full of Keoki frogs. A really beautiful place to be.

Tease 130

London N16, Kessingland - UK & Dublin – Ireland

Operation Chamber.
Composed with Peter Green. The geezer with whom I pioneered the blend of Club & Electro acoustic Music back in 1995 on my Machine Codes label. (We went on to make the Virtual Farmer Album, CAT070).

Laptop Dancing had to reflect several styles including Classical.
Pete gave me a score (not £20) and I produced the rhythm section around it. I programmed most of the drums in Dublin and we mixed it down in Kessingland near Lowestoft, not far from where I grew up.
I’m surprised I got anything done in Dublin. They definitely invented the ‘Hard Rocking Lifestyle”. I love it there.

Phantomz In My Brain

Tel Aviv, Galilee, Tiberius, Jericho, Tzfat – Israel

Operation Mystic.
So far the album encompasses the essentials of Braindance but I needed to explore my passion for sound design in greater depth.
In order to achieve this a fresh charge of inspiration was required.
So, I went to Israel for the Millennium, stayed for 3 weeks and did Christmas & New Year gigs in Tel Aviv. I also visited Galilee, Jericho, Tiberius, Jerusalem & Tzfat.
These places are fundamental to both Christianity & Jewism. And as well as the history there is the gorgeous scenery. Shame about the politics.
Galilee is beautiful. I visited the ‘church of the hearts’ which is the location the loaves & fishes miracle from the bible.

Tzfat (pronounced safed) is a city on a mountaintop, sometimes referred to as the city of mystics & kabalists. It contains a holy Jewish Cemetery. This was very interesting.