VersusConduct
VersusConduct is available on CD from CD Baby: cdbaby.com/cd/scattertape.
You can listen to and download tracks from the album via Last FM: last.fm/music/scattertape.
To download the artwork, click here.
Happy listening.
Tracklisting:
01) waves combine
02) grain harp
03) shaped like a gable tie
04) a 'semi-circuit' winder
05) steam flare
06) growstave
07) grounding a roughbar
08) amplified by plastic
09) flueast
10) threebitts;
11) when cooling tank glass
12) fencestoat
13) highContainer
14) ping_staple
15) xscaber
16) wyred downwynd
17) oscillatorTape
18) phonics marker set
19) bantham untuned
20) ushalled
21) shelving a tempered string
22) a;varytone
23) (six) nearsines
24) nut_crumble
25) yellowExplorer
26) mystery catskip
Description
VersusConduct is home to 26 tracks completed between January 2007 and February 2008. The tracks were created using a selection of old circuit bent keyboards, a synthesiser and Max/MSP software, plus any other odds and sods that made a worthy noise. The album is based around the idea of using unusual electronic and digital sounds in a fashion that suits them, rather than in a more traditional convention. Melodies and beats are sidelined in favour of processing timbres and frequencies, alongside randomly triggered glitches and artefacts. The outcome of this process often results in sounds with uncomfortably high frequency content, motifs played over inharmonic intervals and rhythmic loops twisted through granular synthesis.
Sleevenotes
A decade has passed since I first started recording music. Back then it was all processed electric guitar fed into a four track recorder. Imagine lots of slow, moody minor chords and riffs drowned in reverb and you'll be on the right lines.
During the next few years my desk began to fill up with more and more musical gear in an attempt to elaborate and diversify the music I wanted to achieve. There came a sampler, a sequencer, a synthesiser, a mixer, the turntables, another sampler, a 16 track recorder, more guitar effects, plus various computer hardware and software thrown in along the way. I genre-hopped through all the dance/electronic subcategories, depending on whatever I was most attracted to at the time. After several years of building up and experimenting with all manner of musical paraphernalia, the time had come to knuckle down and start churning out the tracks.
At this point it should have been easy. My plan was to structure and produce every element of every track to perfection. Hours went into programming and tweaking drum patterns. Hours went into manufacturing the sweetest, most poignant melodies and riffs. Hours went into developing rich bass lines to embellish tracks with grooves and punctuation.
Whatever I tried, it didn't seem to work. The music became a mishmash of styles lacking character or distinction. The array of digital music equipment chained together around me made the process of creating and recording tracks laborious and uninviting. Output slowed and died away.
In the following months my radar started picking up a few new signals of interest. Processes such as controlling feedback loops and circuit bending caught my attention. I learnt ways of imposing noise artefacts and randomisation into sounds, using and pushing instruments in ways they aren't supposed to be used. Forcing these sorts of oddities into my music went against everything I had learnt and practised previously. It blasted away the restrictions I had placed upon myself, enabling me to create music in a manner that was exciting and rewarding.
VersusConduct is the conscious decision to disregard the musical rulebook my brain had adopted in the past. It is a collection of tracks free from conventions and formalities. Tracks are kept short and decisive without needless repetitions. Melodies and beats are often sidelined in favour of processing timbres and frequencies. Randomly triggered glitches and noises bubble away in the background. Sounds with uncomfortably high frequency content ring out, motifs play over inharmonic intervals, and rhythmic loops stutter through their undetermined sequences.
Most of the sounds on this album originate from a few dinky keyboards and toys I had as a child. These served as a basis for exploration and manipulation, twisted via rewiring and re-sampling their output. Waves Combine was the first track recorded in January 2007 and provided a reference point for the subsequent tracks, suggesting an agitated mood and tonality that could be anchored from. The evenings of the following twelve months were spent creating more material for the album. In January 2008 the best of the recorded material was taken forward to form the other tracks that make up VersusConduct.
Enjoy...