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through-composed

April 16, 2009 · by · in ,

The best way to buy classical music, by the way, is on vinyl from thrift stores.  I picked up Debussy’s Nocturnes and La Mer, along with Tchaikovsky #6 and Sibelius #1…all for less than five bucks.  Look out for orchestra sampling hip-hop soon.

And, on the subject of classical music, all of my recorded compositions can be found here.  So far there’s one cunning tape piece, a recording of one of my improv maps, my string quartet, and my piece for the orchestra readings.  More will be added as they appear.

Finally, I’m working on some dubstep.  Loooook out.

oh, the huge manatee

April 13, 2009 · by · in , ,

I’ve been fighting with this really finicky acid house mix, so what do I do when I finally have time to DJ?  I put Ligeti and Richie Hawtin in a cage, and see what happens:

0: Gyorgy Ligeti – Lux Aeterna []
1: Gaiser – Chlorine [Minus]
// Richie Hawtin – DE9 Loops [Minus]
2: Heartthrob – Apprentice [Minus]
// Richie Hawtin – DE9 Loops [Minus]
3: Kyle Geiger – Glide [Drumcode]
// Richie Hawtin – DE9 Loops [Minus]
4: Rekorder – Rekorder 3.0 [Rekorder]

In non-techno news, I’m working on a string ensemble thing called SIX IMPOSSIBLE THINGS BEFORE BREAKFAST which should be hard enough to quiet all my viola-playing friends.  Also in the works are two simples pieces – one called TUNING and one called HEARTBEATS.  You can probably figure out what they are from the titles.

Finally, Braid is out for PC, and it’s diabolically amazing.  It calls itself a puzzle-platformer, but it’s at least 90% puzzle game, along the lines of Lolo or Solstice.  Highly, highly recommended.

oh right, music

April 11, 2009 · by · in ,

Marshall Jefferson – Mushrooms (Justin Martin Remix) [Troni Soundz]
Blu Mar Ten – If I Could Tell You [Blu Mar Ten]
Steve Porter – Rizer [PH]
Misstress Barbara – Dance Me To The End Of Love [Iturnem]

If someone told me last year that I would be listening to, and loving, a techno cover of a Leonard Cohen song, I would have laughed for daaaays.

Also worth pointing to is Bullion‘s 24-minute remix album / mashup / labour of love, Pet Sounds In The Key Of Dee, combining parts from the Beach Boys’ legendary album with beats from the late J. Dilla.  Google around and you’ll find a download link.  It’s very much a coherent, seamless whole, rather than a collection of remixes.  It’s also totally rad.

some things in the way

April 6, 2009 · by · in , ,


That need mentioning, as a way of restoring my internet-self to life:

NODAL:  A generative composition system, now available for PC.

And Yet It Moves:   A mind-bending puzzle-platformer.  Available at Greenhouse.

If you can find it, Grafite’s goal for Wolfsburg against Bayern is a thing of beauty.

(In retrospect, MYST was a really weird game, wasn’t it?)

fractal – oceanography

March 25, 2009 · by · in


…is out now, on Pacific Front.  You can buy it here and hear a longer clip of it here.  Remixes come from Rennie Foster, AFK, and Toby Emerson.  The original mix is a nine and a half minute jaunt through halftime breaks, minor-key counterpoint, huge bass riffs, and shimmering synths.  It is pretty rad, if I do say so myself.  I hope you think so too.

at midnight….

March 21, 2009 · by · in , ,

…all the film directors and the hollywood crew go out and round up everyone who knows more than they do.

WATCHMEN is an overwhelming and impressive film, and is almost certainly the best adapatation possible of a very difficult book.  With that said, it does nothing that the comic does not do, contains at least two of the worst scenes every filmed, and, with exception of Jackie Haley and Billy Crudup, has no performances worthy of the name.  It is an odd thing, really.  I can’t see how it could have been done better, but it left me almost totally cold.  Maybe Alan Moore is right, and it never should have been done at all?

RIP:  A Remix Manifesto is a snappy piece of documentary-ganada about remix/mashup/free culture.  It’s a very tight piece of filmmaking that brooks no delay and less dissent.  I do wish the film had at least mentioned people like, say, Steinski, Coldcut, and so on, rather than focusing on Girl Talk.  At least now I know that I need to pin him down and figure out how his software works.

The film’s biggest problem, for me, is that it tries to beat its thesis to death.  Mashups and remix culture are tremendously important, but they are not the sole and only future of culture.  Fair use, copyright, and patents have huge and obvious problems, but throwing them out totally is not the answer.  Lars Ulrich and Metallica are assholes, but they had a point.  It would have been nice to hear from, say, Luke Chable, who lost a record contract in the early ’00s due to a track of his being available on the internet.

Regardless of which way you swing on control of content and ideas, RIP is worth a look.  It may make you angry, it may make you want to support The Pirate Bay, but it provides an exceptional look at how our culture has fractured, changed, and grown in the 10 years since The Internet Happened.  And there is no turning back from that.

fractal – xanadu

March 15, 2009 · by · in

No idea when I found time to post this, and maybe that shows, but here it is:  

 

Download here.  Some neat things happen.  There’s a MASSIVE, spaced-out ambient intro, then some deep breaks, then a prettier ambient outro.
1: Poni Hoax – Faces In The Water (Ambient Edit) [Tigersushi]
// Luke abbott – Gates Part 2 [Border Community]
// Marc Mitchell – Souls On Board (Ambient Mix) [Proton]
2: Exoplanet – Obvious Encephalus [Proton]
3: Arthur Deep – Demonstraight [Proton]
4: Mango – Kisses (Chillout Mix) [Morphosis]
5: Fairmont – Gazelle Tool [Border Community]
6: Somfay – Folding Ghosts Into Orgami Stars [Archipel]
// Radiohead – Reckoner (Somfay Remix) []

frantic

March 14, 2009 · by · in , ,

School is busy.  And that’s the truth.

In this brief break, I would like to thank Yan Li for his wonderful, wonderful musical, LEFT, which I saw today.  Thanks are also due to the mad people behind Sonic Lab on Friday night, who put together a wide-ranging and mad-as-eggs concert.

In terms of shows, I am performing Hollas Longton’s piece, For Martin Arnold at his graduating recital on Saturday, March 28th, at 8:00.  I am also having a piece of mine played in the composition lunchtime concert on Friday, March 27th, at 12:30.  Both of those are in the recital hall at UVic.

I’ve not bought music in far too long, but I’ve been loving sets by Larry Levan, James Zabiela, DJ Koze, Eskmo, and Lazersword of late.  Don’t sleeeeeeep.

fractal – mistroad

February 19, 2009 · by · in , ,

I am delighted to tell you that I have a new track out, and on my own label no less.

It is called Mistroad, and is a Luke-Chable-ish sort of progressive house number.  Very Vapour,  very Ivan Gough, with lots of snappy percussion and brooding, odd synths.  If you don’t know what that means, you can listen to it here.

My comrade-in-arms Limbo did the remix, and he did a spectacular job.  His version sounds like snow melting, ice cracking, and water pouring down from thousand year old glaciers.  It’s pretty dubstep and it’s pretty rad.  You can hear it here.

You can buy the entire release at the Tide Pool website, here.  It will be out on Juno and Beatport soon.  And, because Tide Pool turning 25 is kind of a big deal, you can in fact download the original mix for free, at full bandwidth.  MP3 here, WAV here.  Tide Pool loves you, after all.

shows!

February 16, 2009 · by · in

– I am doing a live Nintendo DS jam with Will McFarland, of Debashment / No SRSLY fame, at the University Victoria on Friday, February 27th. The concert runs from 5 to 6 PM, and is in Fine Arts A146.

– My composition class is having a concert on Saturday, March 7th, at 3 PM, in the music wing recital hall. My string quartet will be played, along with works by a horde of brilliant second year students.

– There is a general UVic composition concert on Wednesday the 25th of February. It is at 8 PM, also in the recital hall. I have a short piece for organ being played.

– Finally, the UVic orchestra readings are on Monday, March 9, at 3.30 pm, in the Farquhar Auditorium. I have a piece up for that too.