The four free software modules that make up the Memory system for the also free VCV Rack virtual modular synthesizer became available earlier today. At their core, the modules enable a musician to record music and access the audio with different virtual tape heads that, per the documentation, “move independently within it.” The quartet of modules popped up in the VCV Rack online library as part of the Stochastic Telegraph brand, which has previously released five other modules, including a linear function generator called Drifter, a trigger utility called Fuse, a programmable sequencer (among other things) called BASICally, a note-taking blackboard called Fermata, and a value logger (TTY). The new modules are Depict, Embellish, Memory, and Ruminate:
These are the modules by Mahlen Morris that I’ve mentioned here twice previously. To support the appearance of the modules in the VCV Rack library, Mahlen has also released a new video in which he does a walk-through of the various parts of the ensemble and some of what they’re capable of:
Tantalizingly, he opens the video by saying that the Memory system consists of four different modules “at the moment” — suggesting more modules may be in the works, in addition to potential upgrades of the existing modules. And, I’m pleased to report, some of the opening example features guitar recordings I made for Mahlen.
On Sundays I try to at least quickly note some of my favorite listening from the week prior — things I’ll later regret having not written about in more depth, so better to share here briefly than not at all.
▰ The ever prolific Jeannine Schulz just released NØinmi TwØ, which, based on its typographic and cover treatment, seems to be (maybe?) part of an ongoing series of hers. As is often the case, there is a strong presence of processed field recordings. One track, “twØ,” stands out with its brittle, infinitesimal beat.
▰ The score to The Veil, the new spy thriller TV series, features original music by Jon Opstad (Bodies, We Hunt Together) working from themes by Max Richter (The Leftovers, Arrival, Ad Astra). It’s a post-classical effort, with the presence of some choral vocal parts, as in “Exploring the Camp,” that distinguish it from a lot of TV scores.
▰ Now / Never / Whenever, Vol. 7 is the latest in Oval’s occasional series of short, pay-as-you-like releases (you can get them free, but paying a small amount keeps them in your Bandcamp library, which is useful in the mobile app). The second track, “September Scab,” is particularly lovely. Apparently it’s a “quasi-cover,” as Oval puts it, of the A.R. Kane song “Scab.” Oval refers to this version as “faux jazz,” and I don’t myself really hear the jazz in it, but it’s a nice combination of disintegrating keyboards at atmospheric whirring.
I do this manually at the end of each week: collating (and sometimes lightly editing) most of the recent little comments I’ve made on social media, which I think of as my public scratch pad. Some end up on Disquiet.com earlier, sometimes in expanded form. These days I mostly hang out on Mastodon (at post.lurk.org/@disquiet), and I’m also trying out a few others. I take weekends and evenings off social media.
▰ If you have trouble keeping a journal, write down the most mundane aspects of your day. The things we take for granted are often the things that, down the road, experience a change that is otherwise hard to track back in retrospect — or foresee in advance. Just noting those items, duties, processes, and instances can cement thoughts and provide a foundation for something to linger on and write about.
▰ Yow, 30 MPH gusts are something else
▰ The Punisher does a bit of time-sensitive acoustic deduction in the first issue of the new run (with a new title character) by David Pepose (author) and Dave Wachter (illustrator):
▰ My guitar teacher, looking further ahead in the score: “And you know this chord.”
▰ Me not recognizing the chord but, yes, seeing it later in between where I have gotten so far and where he is currently: “I think you mean I will have known this chord.”
▰ The funny thing about practicing “Easy Living,” the Robin/Rainger tune, in guitar class so as to learn more about 7th chords is that life is thus not particularly easy
▰ A day in which both the Connections and Strands games in the New York Times have the same word (“aioli”). I’d always wondered if the editors kept an eye out for such things, or weren’t concerned. Either way, both puzzles were fun (earlier this week).
▰ Halfway through episode 5 of the Colin Farrell show Sugar I said something out loud — something that turned out to be the case in the episode 6.
(And just as a side note, the whole thing looks like an Ed Brubaker / Sean Phillips jam. I’d swear the storyboards must resemble one of their comics.)
▰ The café has played Lucinda Williams, the Kinks, Sam Dees, and Pavement, and I’m easily twice the age of anyone apparently employed here. Everything will be fine.
▰ For every 10 browser tabs I have open, at least one will be for some esoteric-to-me guitar chord
▰ There are days when I’m not even sure which is my default web browser, and so I find a link in an email and click on it to remind myself
▰ According to my notes, I finished reading three books this week (while juggling more than I usually do, and adding several more in the process), a novel and two graphic novels. The novel is The Return of the Solidier by Rebecca West, about which I can’t say enough. It’s fantastic, and it sent me subsequently to The World Set Free by HG Wells (with whom she had a long out-of-wedlock relationship that early on yielded a son, the writer Anthony West); I’m just over the 50% mark on that one. Also In the Sounds and Sea by Marnie Galloway (a wordless comic with a mythical, Odyssean narrative) and the first volume of a new, ongoing Blade series, written by Bryan Hill and drawn by Elena Casagrande.
The Assignment: Record music for a party of your choosing.
/ By Marc Weidenbaum
Each Thursday in the Disquiet Junto music community, a new compositional challenge is set before the group’s members, who then have five days to record and upload a track in response to the project instructions.
Membership in the Junto is open: just join and participate. (A SoundCloud account is helpful but not required.) There’s no pressure to do every project. The Junto is weekly so that you know it’s there, every Thursday through Monday, when your time and interest align.
Disquiet Junto Project 0644: Event Horizon The Assignment: Record music for a party of your choosing.
Step 1: Imagine a party you want to attend.
Step 2: Write some music that would be appropriate as background music for that event.
Tasks Upon Completion:
Label: Include “disquiet0644” (no spaces/quotes) in the name of your track.
Upload: Post your track to a public account (SoundCloud preferred but by no means required). It’s best to focus on one track, but if you post more than one, clarify which is the “main” rendition.
License: It’s preferred (but not required) to set your track as downloadable and allowing for attributed remixing (i.e., an attribution Creative Commons license).
Please Include When Posting Your Track:
More on the 644th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Event Horizon — The Assignment: Record music for a party of your choosing — at https://disquiet.com/0644/
