tangible waves

Jamuary 2021 #2 – A Meditative Jam

Posted on by The 5th Volt

This jam is much slower and almost follows a very slow breath – in – out – in – out. The finale somehow became strangely ominous, but as I don’t really know where inspiration leads me, I just have to follow.

Again the thumbnail was made by my son Robin, who’s getting really good at this!

This recording is also the first made with my new audio interface, the Behringer UMC-404 HD and. oh boy, does this make a difference! No more hissing noises! Clean sound, manageable levels, I should have bought this ages ago! This time I’ve also recorded it straight into Reaper and applied some light compression to the mix.

Interview with Tim Held at Podular Modcast

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Tim Held has established quite a following with his weekly podcasts which he aptly named Podular Modcast. He approached Robert and I at Synthbooth and asked us whether we would like to do an interview with him to which we gladly agreed. This was again one of those 2020 Zoom interviews over 3 continents: Tim in Seattle USA, Robert in Germany near Munich and I in Australia. It was a very relaxed interview with Tim being a fantastic host and interviewer.

At the end he posed a patch challenge for the words “PURE DAWN” to which I obliged mainly because coincidentally I had recorded a good 30 minutes of birdsong one morning just a few days prior and I always wanted to use this in a song anyway. So my track at the end of the interview features our early morning bird concert.

I hope when you listen to this interview you will enjoy it as much as I did while being “on the show”. Thanks to Tim for doing this and thanks again to Robert for the creation of this fabulous synthesizer system.

https://podularmodcast.fireside.fm/tangiblewaves

Presenting AE Modular at ELK ELEKTRONIK

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Last weekend I travelled the 5 hours up north to Wollongong for the Synth Meet at ELK ELEKTRONIK to perform and present the AE Modular system.

There were only 10 people due to the COVID restrictions, but it was fun and totally worth it.

Thanks a lot to Jono who let me stay at his place and to Ed and Hannah from ELK who organised the event.

Jono has so much gear and his blog is a treasure trove of knowledge on how to use and repair it.

AEther Waves Vol. 2

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Today we released the second volume of AEther Waves, a collaborative album, made by 26 members of the AE Modular Forum. It features almost 2 hours of a wide variety of sounds which are all 100% made with the AE Modular synthesizer from tangible waves.

All proceeds are donated to support Musicians Without Borders who use the power of music to bridge divides, connect communities, and heal the wounds of war. Their vision is to inspire people worldwide to engage as peacemakers and use music to transform lives. You can find more info on their website: www.musicianswithoutborders.org

Livestream for SynthBooth 2020

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Today I was on a Zoom call with Robert which was streamed live to the tangible waves YouTube channel. Robert talked about how the AE Modular system came about and we gave a quick overview of the various modules that are available from the tangible waves website. I then showed a performance that showcased most of those modules.

Saturday Synth Jam – A Day On Mars

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Join me for a day out on Mars as we will follow those smart little robots Spirit Rover and Curiosity as they discover the Red Planet. This Saturday Jam starts with an ambient wave sequence from the Korg Wavestate followed by a thumping beat from the AE Modular. The final part of the journey is supported by a song composed and performed on the Synthstrom Deluge.

I’m so happy that I again found the inspiration to combine these three amazing instruments into one coherent performance. It took a whole day to experiment, patch, tweak, practice, perform and finally mix and master the video. Even though I had to do it from good old Earth, it was a day well spent!

This track is now also on Bandcamp!

AE Modular Jam – Windy Night

Posted on by The 5th Volt

Jamming with all the new modules. I really love the SPRING REVERB for the atmosphere it can create when coupled with a DELAY … it’s a great ambient backdrop. The SEQ16 is vastly improved when followed by the QUANTIZER. Finally real notes that sound good together! There is a lot of modulation in this piece, things fade in and out and filter cutoff frequencies are controlled by LFOs and ENVs. It just shows that it’s incredibly useful to have a bunch of the those and VCAs to be able to do that.