DMUT – A Live Takes Deconstruction
This week I released the Live Takes video DMUT. I break down the work in today’s blog post.
The work is an extended drone piece. It uses an ambient loop made of many layers to create a sense of ceremony, trance, and motif. As it cycles, the listener focuses in and out of the various layers, as directed by the performer. The layers are structurally off-kilter and not quite in time. The listener is forced to reconcile the layers into a perceived new sense of time, that seems to change as the piece progresses. While the texture is rich across the frequency spectrum, it is surprisingly thin. There are many layers that are all easy to perceive, only fusing as the feedback becomes stronger.
The Arturia MiniBrute (original model) starts the work with a slow droning fuzzy pulse. The MiniBrute’s VCO is classic in its sound and modern in its design, with Sawtooth and Triangle simultaneous waveshapes that were individually mixed with white noise. A huge amount of vibrato and the “Brute factor” were brought all the way up. The LFO is slow and considered, with a “metalizer” and decreasing filter effect. This timbre is the organic heart pulse of the track. It is the industrial basis the rest of track is built around. It’s slow and deliberate build up is let off with a satisfying “thud”. The MiniBrute is a magnificent device that is utterly refreshing to play. As there is no way to save presets, I am forced to make anew sound, every time I go to play it. It stops the habit of quickly jumping to a preset I have made prior, (though of course I still see benefit to that style of music making for ease and defining “your” authorial sound as a musician).
The Arturia DrumBrute has a reversed analogue synthesized cymbal sound, a delayed rhythmic snare, and beeping “zap” sound. They are deliberately off grid and delayed to keep things moving along, but still woozy/wavey. The tones are industrial and digital in nature. Manipulating drum timbres into new textures, is something I am relatively new to. This idea is reminiscent of the style of Musique Concrete. None of the timbres are those I wold usually use in this way, but I look forweard to writing more drum sounds into my drone works.
The Korg Minilogue XD is used to make beeps. The preset patch used for this layer was Pulsating80s. it adds an interest point to the track and fits the industrial them of the song. It also has a chord layer that comes in a little later, that sounds deliberately out of key to bring tension and anxiety to the work. It seems like something is off towards the end. The beeping is the higher pitched, faster counterpoint to the distorted bass pulse. Clean, high, and clear; like the alarms of a machine. The constant beeping helps induce the feeling of trance. It is an immediate synthesizer to play. One can very quickly get a great sound from it.
The Korg WaveState uses a patch I made form the initial patch that fuses a sine wave with a light sparkly pad. Note: a tip I have about keeping your presets above the premade ones, is to put a symbol before the name like “$”. It plays a long drone that pulses and abruptly ends on the loop cycle. It helps build additional layers, while keeping things very sonically simple. You need clean sounds to contrast against the complex. The WaveState is a highly complex and deep instrument to craft sounds on. While I love sitting for hours tinkering with the machine, to create the perfect timbre; today, I found joy in making something very simple, that fit the theme of my piece.
There is a healthy layer of delay added to this track in a few forms. The Squarp Pyramid’s midi delay effect was added to some drums to repeat them very quickly. An auditory repeat is typically slower and more degraded than a midi delay – which allows the original note to be repeated multiple times. The Soundcraft Signature Series 22 MTK desk has a powerful inbuilt effects engine, that can be sent out the main outputs. I used a tape delay and a room reverb to create space and feedback. The end of the work uses feedback as a way to build towards the climax. The reverb is not added to all layers, keeping some layers more to the foreground. While the use of feedback, delay and reverb is well documented and a staple of the drone genre; I still see great value in these effects, to bring my vision to life.
The visuals for this week’s Live Takes were made with the Flasher Max patcher available on my website here. I had previously recorded some video of me playing live, but I found it to be distracting from the experience I wanted to create. The simple coloured squares provide interest, without disturbing the mood. The use of the hyper colours was intentional. Using neon pink, green, red, blue and more are test video colours. Washing it out with a dreamy white texture helps keep movement to them. They are spaced out with blacks and greys to make the bright colours pop. The speed of the flashing colours was slow and considered.
There is a sense of wonder to this track. DMUT takes the listener on a journey to an industrial field, where a ceremony has taken place. The layers swirl and fuse with each other, like they are in a dream. The daze of the feedback is used to create urgency and the abrupt end leaves the listener wanting more. The length of the work is about where I wanted it. It does not overstay its welcome, even for a nearly 7-and-a-half-minute track. Each time I listen to this track as the performer/composer, it is a new experience. The way the layers move in and out of the foreground, changes. This sense of uneasiness is deliberate and rewarding. The invocation of the desired themes is well and truly perceived. It feels like a while since I have written and recorded a Live Takes that so accurately tells the story I wish it to. A piece that I can keep listening to over and over is a wonderful treat.
Thank you dear reader, for indulging me on this journey of deconstruction. I hope it has been educative and a look into my mind as a creative. Let this work inspire you.
