i spent the summer and fall of 1997 programming drum tracks into an ry30, notating them into a tablature program and sequencing them using noteworthy composer. i did not know how i was going to record these tracks. i think i was expecting to use the computer, but that was probably naive; instead, i was gifted a 4-track recording machine. i then spent the next year and a half rearranging and rerecording the songs i programmed over that period. as these tracks were recorded into my pc, they are time stamped...so i have a much clearer understanding of when they were finished.
the jump to incorporating computers into the recording process is something i always wanted to do, it's just that it wasn't really previously feasible. first, there was a learning curve. i was a smart kid, though; the learning curve was just a time concern. the larger problem was simply access to a pc. i did have a pc at my disposal, but it did not have a modem and it was only equipped to run windows 3.1, which basically meant i could run civ 2 and wolfenstein and little else. the windows 95 computer had dial up but it was in a central location for family use.
when we moved across the city, my dad bought a new computer and i happily inherited his old one. this gave me internet access, which allowed me to download some freeware. it also gave me the time i needed to learn how to do certain things.
i'm separating out a handful of my first electronic sound experiments and collecting them together into an ep. what these blasts of noise have in common is that they were constructed on a windows 95 computer out of samples or generated sound and with very primitive software while i was waiting to get some kind of recording equipment. most of it was pasted together meticulously using the windows 95 sound recorder; the rest of it was constructed in cool edit, which i used as a sort of a synthesizer.
for the most part, these weren't really ever meant to be songs. i ended up using them as connectors, introductions, background. "continuity". yet, i find the idea of throwing them together here to be interesting from an autobiographical perspective.
created in mid 1997. sequenced in november, 2013. as always, please use headphones.
credits:
j - cool edit (wave synthesis, digital wave editing), windows 95 sound recorder (sampling, digital wave editing), yamaha ry30 drum machine (programming)
released dec 1, 1997
1) the beginning is from a disney film or something, i can't recall which one. it's all wiped away by a wash of war drums and civ2 samples. it's more misanthropic than anti-war, really.
2) noises generated with cool edit. it seemed like the coolest thing in the world, at the time.
3) homer, indeed. i think that might be the ry30 with the drums, recording directly into the back of the pc.
4) i'm using cool edit as a synthesizer and a wave editor, but i think the core of it was done with the sound recorder.
5) some more sound created and manipulated in cool edit.
6) so, there's this dude, and he sounds sort of like one of the monsters from doom II, and he lures a cow with a weird mating call and then attacks it and it's kind of twisted and hilarious. subtle vegan brainwashing? yes, but more on an environmentalist level.
7) the guitar loop is taken from a popular nirvana song, whereas most of the building sound pasted on top is from civ 2. no real message here. just a particularly savvy squirrel that's getting ready for winter by building some kind of fortress.