It’s been a minute! I hope that everything is ok and that the force remained with you all! The snow is here in France, so the only thing to do is to make music!! :)
I decided i’d release this EP here instead of going label chasing.. It allows me to have everything ‘internet’ under the same umbrella, and i’ve always wished to release some of my music myself…
This EP is a collection of researches that i picked from my last year of work, moments of genuine inspiration or rewarding experimentations, the two being often tied..
I was in a mindset where i wanted to make music that expressed its disinterest in being heard, music that just exists by itself. When I listen to music, I love feeling that it doesn’t need me. It fit well into my thoughts, which were a little more introspective than usual. The decisions were made very consciously, in a way to make it less convenient for anybody other than me to be able to give a fuck about it. I didn’t deconstruct at all because I didn’t want to hear an origin or a thought process, post-everything ends up biting its tail, it’s a no go, for me it expresses its disinterest in its attitude more than in its musical form. It’s like a beautiful landscape, it exists by itself.
I always think that with music you can’t communicate the simplest things such as asking somebody sitting at the table to pass you the salt, and for sure that music won’t help out for that matter haha!
On the merrier side, the gear side ;), i embraced signal degradation. From the starting point to the mastering i think the main thing i had in mind was signal degradation.
Everything was mastered thru a Manley Vari Mu, which is a quite slow, high end compressor. Not very lofi you might think. While it sure could be nice on a lot of the material, i also knew it wouldn’t handle more ‘modern’ things as subtly, so i set the manley with a lil longer release and lower threshold to make sure it would really be grabbing a little too much and thus adding degradation. My mixes were perfect in the box, and didn’t need any particular hardware treatment, i just did it because i could and maybe it would alter the sound a little more? I remember the day we did it, we were sitting next to the compressor, listening to how it really was reducing gain to the point of altering a bass, we looked at the gain reduction meter, and said ‘ beautiful ‘. The setting is easy to remember input to max, output i don’t remember but it doesn’t matter, it depends on your gain staging, release set not to the fastest position, just one step on the left, threshold to maximum possible below zero, attack to the fastest.. It can appear drastic, but in reality, it’s still a very nice sound :). 95% of the time i use the manley with input to max and gain stage before accordingly..
I’m going to spoil you guys on a few of the pieces that i’ll release in the future, but fuck it, i’ve been too inconsistent for it to matter anyway lol
1. Hier Matin, Le Déluge:
I did this track very quickly some day in september last year, i don’t remember much of the actual making, and i didn’t think much of it when i finished it, but i listened to it a few weeks later and in // to what i was living at the time, it took another meaning for me.. Hier Matin, Le Déluge means yesterday morning, the flood/the deluge, the biblical western civilization vision of the end of the world haha. At first it had an intro with modulated noise and everything it sounded like being hit by a wall of water, then underwater, going down until nothing but silence to appreciate the moment, and let the music begin, but it was a minute long, and i just wanted to hear the music, so i got rid of it and only kept the music part. I’m a product of my time of well haha..
Dave Smith Tetra, Powertran Digital Delay Line, Iphone 5 mic, Flo Audio custom impulse.
The Powertran DDL was made in 81 in uk, it was a diy kit that was sold thru i don’t remember which diy publication of the time (i wasn’t born yet lol), it was conceived by Tim Orr, who worked with EMS among other companies.. I’m so in love with that rack that i never dared to try making impulses of it, in case i wouldn’t succeed lol.. I will once it’s time!
2. Anhédonie:
I remember absolutely nothing about this track, apart that i used the Access Virus Ti only on it. I liked the opposition between how the music is nostalgic and how the drums are stupidly loud. It reminds me a little of what i feel when I listen to bossa nova, but my wife will tell you that i often say that things remind me of bossa nova too haha! For me both the melody and the drums express the same thing!
3. Contemplativecore:
I used the Virus Ti only once again, i dirtied up the result with an Elektronika RC-02 russian digital delay from the early 90s, it added a very nice sheen of grit which i found contributed totally to the intention. I’m very happy with that delay, it has a sick sound! The bit crushing was done in the virus by running the oscillators into the bit crushing saturation mode. And last but not least a good old iPhone 6 mic.
4. Pertinente Allégresse:
To under translate the title i’d say that it means Pertinent Joy. It’s a track that i remember doing, in january 2016, i finished it at 9 am, and then i did the next song on this Ep.
It only uses the Dave Smith Tetra into a boss ce-3 in stereo mode but used in mono, and one of my personal impulses :) And that’s it! I remember that when i finished it i was so overwhelmed by the joy of having made that track that i poured a few tears for myself, greatly thankful for being able to experience such a feeling. Intellectual and music lover bliss, from my side of the taste of course.
5. Le Rythme Respiratoire
Is the track i did just after Pertinente Allégresse, the sun was sadly up already, and i felt i still had a song in me, fuck daytime right?
Virus Ti for almost everything, with tiny swirls from the Tetra + a boss ce-3 and an iPhone 6.
6. Sybarite
Sybarite was a tune that i did to try out new samples i had just done of a theremin i have. It has always been a great source of sounds for me, it’s handmade by a dude in the south of france, it’s gnarly as fuck, but it’s an endless sound provider… And i also used one of my homemade vst synths!
7. Maturescence
I remember i was really high when i did that track, i was experimenting with phase a lot, and was just basically working on that, i loved how the track made me feel like i was assisting to something in movement behind a glass wall. Works very well with headphones, the bass will choke you :)
Access Virus Ti + Tetra + homemade delay
8. Holoending
Holoending was done in august 2017, i’ve done it with an Akai S2000. I rebought an akai and a Yamaha A3000 this summer, went the whole scsi hell way, changed the floppy disk drives with usb floppy emulators, changed green leds with purple ones.. I had a very 1995 geeky summer, which was really great haha! And I wish to add that contrary to internet belief, the S2K is super easy to use, so grab one if you can find one locally for cheap, it’s a nice sound source!
And that’s it!
Once you’ve bought it, share it on soulseek/music blogs/torrent/youtube! I’d rather be pirated than putting that music on any of the streaming services!
I'm really happy to be releasing that EP this way, it means a lot to me, and i hope that you'll enjoy it too :)
I wish you guys the best end of the year possible, a merry xmas and everything, may 2018 bring us even more joy to be alive!
My philosophy in life, and in sound has always been that i wanna be free. Knowing how to do things myself, at least understanding intellectually the principle of something that i can then turn into a know how, and make my own.
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