Art + Music + Technology – Details, episodes & analysis

Unfortunately, today is the last day of podcasting for the Art + Music + Technology podcast. Health issues have gotten in the way, and it would be impossible to continue.

You can read the transcription of this article, as well as finding some interesting writing on my Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/posts/66445163

Thank you for being such a great group of friends and supporters during this long series of music 

Oh yeah! I’ve been working on getting this interview for a while. It combines modular synths (love ‘em), compositional techniques, an extremely busy schedule – and even using the voice as an instrument! The time that I got to spend with Martha Bahr (Panic Girl) was more than amazing – it was transforming for me. The way that Martha approaches her work is going to be helpful to anyone making electronic music.

So I just spilt the beans on a few of the topic we covered, but we were all over the place. And we got along like old friends – even though I don’t think we’d ever met. Martha is super-easy to talk to, and leads a very interesting life, so doing this interview was like falling out of a tree.

I don’t need to talk this one up much – truly one of my favorite interviews ever. Dig in!

Oh, and you can check out her new album here: https://iuwerecords.bandcamp.com/album/washed-ashore

Transcription available at http://www.darwingrosse.com/AMT/transcript-0380.html

Exclusive extra content on the Patron page: https://www.patreon.com/darwingrosse

I’ve long been interested in sound design and post-production work, so when I got the opportunity to interview Peter Albrechtsen and David Barber, I jumped at the chance. Peter and David worked on the movie The Killing Of Two Lovers (by Robert Machoian), which is rather unique because it has no traditional musical score; all of the sound in the movie is a combination of location sound, foley and designed sounds, carefully mixed into a minimalist-but-complex soundscape.

In our discussion, we learn about how this kind of work was developed, how Peter and David worked together to pull it off, and the lengths taken to perfect the sound of the movie. We also learn about each of their backgrounds, as well as explore the future work they are planning. And, as a bonus, we get to learn about how post-production works in a fast-paced, highly collaborative environment.

You can find The Killing Of Two Lovers on streaming services, and I strongly suggest you checking it out. It’s a wonderful experience, and will open your mind to new ways of considering movie sound.

Enjoy!

Transcription available at http://www.darwingrosse.com/AMT/transcript-0371.html

Exclusive extra content on the Patron page: https://www.patreon.com/darwingrosse

I've known Stefan Brunner for some time - going back to some of the early Cycling '74 company meetings (I somehow remember him laying out a figure-8 bike path in an alleyway in SF...), but I've never really cornered him on his artistic work. This last February, we found ourselves in a restaurant, and I poked him to explain a little more about his artwork. He started revealing, and I was stunned - I knew he was an active artist, but didn't realize how deeply he was embedded into the thing. From Arto Lindsay to large orchestras to a duet with a mad turntablist, he was multi-disciplinary to the extreme.

And he is also a killer developer - both of deep C++ code as well as a variety of devices in Max for Live. All of this reveals itself in his work, which tends to simultaneously be abstract and deep, and which is always exploring the edges of the medium. His work with Pedro Lopes as The Hour Of The Wolf is a great example: just when you think it is totally non-representational, Stefan will peel off a beautiful guitar riff to center your mind. And that's just one manifestation of his work; whether it is coding, working on installations, working on compositions or performing, there's a grounding in the world along with the flights of impressionism.

You can check out more of Stefan's work at https://stb.klingt.org/, The Hour Of The Wolf at the link above, and his work (along with Timm Ringewaldt) as Audiokolor at http://audiokolor.org/. Enjoy!

Fans of VCV Rack and Voltage Modular will be all over the name VULT, but it's also making its name known for both hardware modular gear as well as nifty DSP trickery. Created by Leonardo Laguna Ruiz, Vult produces some of the best virtual modules I've tried, and is branching out into hardware modules and even DSP programming languages. And, of course, this amazing body of work is coming from an equally amazing guy.

Leonardo is one of those pan-continental, pan-discipline people that will make you love the modern world. Leveraging a love of recording technology with an education in electrical engineering, he is one of those guys that thinks in differential equations. His passion is in modeling, and his work shows it: the filters, oscillators and other devices that he's created are fabulous examples of math-in-audio at its best.

In our chat, we talk about the modules, the language, hardware developments and Leonardo's beginning story. The whole thing is inspiring, and it'll make you want to crack those books again. Enjoy!

In the introduction of the podcast, I mention the opportunity to support Paul Birken's upcoming 'zine release. If you are interested, you can check out the first edition here, find out more on Facebook, or touch base with him at [email protected]. Support the 'zine cause!

I first knew Doug Lynner's work as the editor/publisher of Synapse Magazine, an electronic music magazine before most people even knew that was a thing. Doug laid the groundwork for magazine-as-history in our cultural world, and took the opportunity to leverage his position and location (L.A.) to get a lot of great interviews over the magazines short-ish lifetime.

I have a couple of listener requests to have a chat with Doug, which caused me to do a little background work. My God - what a career. Between his CalArts education, the magazine work, his bands and his long history with Serge systems (including being an artist/demo dude for Serge himself), he was clearly a touchpoint for the things that interest all of us.

He continues full-force, doing one-on-one teaching, producing a weekly live performance radio show on KZSU (https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/bloopandquack) and releasing new work based on his Modular Tonalism system. All of it is intriguing, and after listening to this chat, I'm sure you are going to want to learn more.

Check out all of Doug's work at https://www.neatnetnoise.com/, or at his bandcamp site (https://douglynner.bandcamp.com/). Enjoy!

Marco Petracca owns many names, but my favorite is HHNOI - his artist name for his work with composition using modular synths. Marco has made some careful choices about how he approaches musical development, how he chooses his tools and how he separates his recording work from his live performance. The result is a satisfying combination of well-crafted songform and beautiful sound design.

I first ran across HHNOI as I became fascinated with the Modularfield label, and was really pleased when Markus (from Modularfield) opened the door for a discussion with Marco. We got along great - it was clear that we had shared a lot of experiences: living through the tumult of recording format changes, watching analog come, then go, then come back again, and struggling with synchronization among all these systems. So we have a lot to talk about.

You can check out Marco's work at his Modularfield page, on the HHNOI site, or on his Soundcloud page. This was a fun discussion for me, and I hope it is a great listen for you, too. Enjoy!

I've known Wes Milholen for a while - I first met him as he was working on some of his first replacement faceplates. He was part of the Denver/Boulder modular scene, and we spent time at meetups and performances. I always found his crisp and clean designs to my liking, and found him to be a thoughtful developer and talented performer.

He's gone on to do a lot more stuff: module development, more panel designs, and even design work for VCV rack. As you'll hear in this interview, he views design work to be his calling, and it shows in everything that he touches.

We had a great talk - some reminiscing, some product history talk, and a lot of discussion about the world of modular synthesis. Wes has his finger on the pulse of that world, and has some good insight on where things came from and where they are going.

Check out his work at https://grayscale.info/, https://1979.ws/ and https://vcvrack.com/. He's also hanging around mose social media sites and Muffwiggler's forum.

Enjoy!

Let's face it - we didn't get into sound design in order to hang out with a bunch of strangers. We tend to be an insular community, and can barely look beyond our shoes to interact with one another.

But the Internet can change all of that, right? Well, maybe - but social media interaction isn't necessarily any easier for meeting people than house parties are. Along comes Holly Vernon with a smart prospect: create a network of connections that can be used to help us find each other, introduce ourselves in a safe way, and build up connects when and where we need them.

I happened to hear Holly talk at Synthplex, and found the proposal quite interesting. It can be as simple as posting social media content with the #exsoso hashtag, or you can add your name to the database and use that database to draw people into performances, workshops or whatever you happen to be doing in a new area.

Pulled together from Holly's experience finding people to meet, this is a growing opportunity for people interested in breaking out of their shells and finding collaborators, performers or performance locations. You can learn more about the Experimental Sound Society at exsoso.com, or search for the #exsoso tag on various social media platforms.

Enjoy!

Back in Podcast 38, we talked to Jim Coker - the developer behind Numerology and the company Five12. Well, it's been five years, and a lot has happened since then. I met up with Jim at Synthplex, and got a quick catch-up; I also realized that we needed to have another interview, because things have gotten very real for him since we last talked!

It's all about hardware, baby. In this case, that would be the Vector Sequencer: a no-holds-barred sequencer for Eurorack systems that brings much of the sequencing power of Numerology into the Eurorack world. This device provides many of my favorite features into its 3u height, so you can expect that I wanted to know how that could happen.

As always, Jim was willing to share - and to be patient as I marveled at what he pulled off. This sequencer is significant enough to occupy the center of a decent studio (much like Numerology itself), and bring the step sequencing game to a new level of awesome.

You can learn more about both Numerology and the Vector Sequencer at five12.com

Enjoy!