Thwarted Drone

 Yes well. I spent a while setting up the corner - MS20, Synthi, Lyra and some modules. Once in a tranquil state I began recording and went live on OBS. Pat stuck her head up and told me she was off to see her mate. Later she rang to ask me to close the back door. When I returned from doing that I noticed laptop has rebooted itself - as it fucking well does all too often. Windows 11 has been a nightmare so far, a total mistake. HP should rethink forcing it on people until it is stable. Grrrr. Anyway, recording is kinda ambient but has random noises and clashes - not ideal should a coder wish to code to it. This is a concept I recently discovered and may try to control my dynamics in future. Anyway, recording sounds ace despite the wonk. 

In the end I got three pieces, long, medium and short, which I am already mentally framing with other pieces. Listening back through much of the music I've recorded in the last few months, there's a lot of mediocre rambling nonsense, I can't deny it. Oddly enough, the best of it has been made under the focus of playing online to camera, even if I don't tell anyone. However, I think I might drop the whole going live in favour of recording direct to the camera. The quality of audio taken from OBS isn't as good as I'd like. 

I also think it's time to look at a more linear approach again as the discipline feels like something I should try and regain. Hopefully this doesn't mean computer-based though but Cirklon still isn't up to it and won't be for some time. Have some ideas in mind but I know of no hardware that will do the job I want. An Atari ST running Cubase would probably suffice ;)

Today (Monday) I took the three 'thwarted drone' fragments and gave them some breathing space using short sections from two other recent recordings. I imported to Logic and let it play through, adding some overdubs that were needed. I did a quick bounce so I can listen through tomorrow to identify any final tweaks but it was sounding good just on the strength of the original drones and fixes to where they went awry. 

Tuesday, the structure is right but the sound has changed too much - not sure if I left the compressor on when bouncing in Wavelab or whether it's the filter in Logic changing the sound too much when open. Either way, a promising start but has lost the vibrancy of the original recordings so that's today's thing to fix. Worth doing though. 

Well, I messed around with it but maybe lost what it was I liked about it, just listening through - the 'Heaven & Hell' choir and mayhem isn't terrible but the processt reminded me how little I enjoy sitting at a computer and trying to make something work when just playing a new thing is always better. Oh well. I'll let it sit a spell. In the meantime, replacing KX-8 with Casio piano seems to work, or will once I get stand situation better sorted out. No controls, mod wheel or PB but not a major issue given how rarely I use Logic these days. Can always draft in a small keyboard with mod wheels if necessary. Sorta wish I hadn't given the Novation Remote 25 to Andy M now but it'll be fucked after so long, or at least will stink of tobacco. Pleased the Casio just took over USB input and drove Logic as the Yam did.

Today (Wednesday) I heard the sound of the Pobblebonk (Eastern Banjo Frog) for the first time. I simply have to get it into my Octatrack for percussive use ASAP. Oh, I ordered a Cat and it's coming today. Also, the BlackBox has a beta version that finally does the big thing I wanted - 

• When record quantization (Rec Quant) is anything but none, you will always record a clip and the length in beats will be embedded in the WAV file for future use.
• You can now create clips that are non-power of two length. Use recording quantization as desired and Length: Custom to capture. The result will default to Clip Mode and automatic playback (RecToPlay) will work as expected.

Excellent!!! Will be trying that out today. 

And it works - very nicely. Hard going if not clean multiples of bars though just in terms of stopping when you want. Fnal step needs to be you can specify the length prior to recording but it's a huge improvement. As Tim would say, I'm stoked. At least I think that's it. 

Cat arrived but after tea so I'll play with it tomorrow. Good build quality though, nice sliders. Will also work on my new piece tomorrow once Pat on the way north. Have advertised KX-8. 

Well, after a firmware update to fix the hanging and missing notes, the Cat is now sounding very good indeed, very beefy. Has some wackiness (the undocumented sync modes) but generally I think I like it. Cross mod in particular is wild plus you can source S&H from a VCO which is always good fun. Repeating envelope a bit pointless I always thought but there you go. Later Tim came round and we must have sat in the sun for  a while as my nose is red. Or maybe it's just cos we drank like bastards. Recorded a short cat duet too.
Tony has sorted my gear - DRM1 was simply wrong-quoted fuse for its real load so nothing hugely wrong. RC-505 needs new power supply, nothing more and it seems the TT-78's power supply is also inadequate - so will need to find a replacement. So all good really, nothing major at all and I can pop the TT-78 where the RD-9 currently sits and save some desk space, if necessary. 

Today is Friday. Gonna walk the dogs soon then plan an afternoon of nonsense. Fave beer has gone up though so not buying on principle. We'll see how long that lasts!