All posts by erstlaub

Ends and Beginnings

The last few pieces of 2017 hit late, Skull Friday being a tribute to DIL23 (David Law) who passed away in December. I only met him in real life a few times but his enthusiasm, support and humour for things, particularly online, means the space he leaves will be noticed by many.

And then some long, cold drones to see through the longest night.

And turning around, the first of 2018 pushes things further into indeterminacy and planned chance.

As ever, thanks for stopping by, listening, watching and generally supporting. If something hits you, be sure to tell all your pals about it as I’ve got a fairly shallow social media pool to send this stuff out to and who knows, maybe some amazing rich patron or commissioner is desperate to part with their cash in return for a grumpy Scottish man plugging things into other things and moving knobs about.

Ta.

D

Winter Rituals

Still churning away, still rubbish at updating this blog (I’m never sure if anyone even bothers to look this way for stuff any more) but there you are.

Here’s the haul since my last post, as ever, it’s possible to chuck a few coins in the hat by buying stuff on Bandcamp or even subscribing (which gets you everything released from the past/present and up to a year into the future) which could net you a ridiculous 59 releases and counting!

Thanks for the support, expect more of the same going forward.

D

7 and a bit more.

So yes, another huge gap in posts. I’ve not really beed resting on my laurels though, there’s been another 7 new pieces on Bandcamp over the last wee while so fill your boots.

As always, if you enjoy this work, feel free to chuck a few coins in my direction by buying albums/subscription via BC. As a treat for scolling down through all these, there’s a wee video I made the other day of me performing a BoC excursion while nursing a hangover.

Cheers.

D

50 minutes for 50

Sooooo, yesterday, I posted the 50th release on my Bandcamp page in the 2 and a bit years since I started it. It’s another of my sprawling, minimalist epics in which very little happens over quite a long period of time.

Here it is in all its glory

I also put together a short video excerpt just as it’d been a while since I’ve done any shooting/editing and felt like sharpening things up a little. (plus some folks don’t have the interest/patience/attention span for the full 50 minute long experience…

As with most of my works, they’re free to DL and stream if you’re into them but of course, if you’d like to (and can afford to) I’m more than greatful to receive a few bucks (after PP and BC have taken their cuts) and of course you can also become a subscriber which basically means you get all the stuff, the odd bit of personal chat off me and of course the satisfaction that for as little as £20 a year, you’re directly supporting an artist that hopefully does something that means something to you (plus y’know, website hosting and eating and all that isn’t really getting any cheaper).

Thanks as ever for the support, I’ll probably get round to posting again in another 50 releases.

D

If you’re interested in that sort of thing, the patch notes follow.

Batumi channel 1 clocking Brainseed (to cycle in).

Maths channel 1 sending an inverse AD function to modulate the overall time of Batumi.

Divided Channel 2 of Batumi, Random Output causing Brainseed to record new note CV from a wavefolded Tides when it’s value goes above 1.5v.

Quantized output and trigger from Brainseed to Rings strum and pitch ins.

An A171-2 exponential envelope triggered by another divided channel of Batumi is rippling the decay time of Rings causing certain semirandom notes to ring out longer.

An AD envelope from Maths (triggered by another divided square from Batumi) causes a dynamic movement of Rings brightness.

A pitched down sample of something stringy and washy is playing back from Phonogene (with a it’s transpose input being gently modulated by noise being attenuated through Blinds driven by a sine from Batumi). A gentle sine (batumi) and offset are being mixed through Maths middle section to make the SOS act like a VCA subtly changing the level of it.

A sample/copy from the phonogene was frozen into Clouds and pitched down around a 5th.

Mixed on a behringer mixer with Strymon BlueSky and ElCapistan Pedals on the Aux bus and recorded to a stereo pair in Reaper via Focusrite Saffire Pro

Trubhand

Yes yes, I know, I always end up starting these about how bad I am about updating things. I figure anyone that’s super into my work probably looks at my twitter or the modular synthesizer bore forums where I tend to post/complain about things.

Anyway, recently, the ever ace Moving Furniture got round to releasing Trubhand – 2x 23 minute long fairly minimalist modular synth workouts that I carved out last February when we were still living in Bad Zwischenahn, DE. It is available as a CD (DL code included) in a nicely unusual A5 sleeve so that it sits awkwardly with most of your other CDs.

Here is some waffle that I wrote about it:

Trübhand was summoned in February of 2016. My wife and I were living in north Germany in exile at the time as a result of untenable UK visa policy. As someone who always has a strong reliance on landscape in my work, the absolute flatness of the area was further adding to my homesickness and feelings of isolation. At night, in the alien darkness, I would close my eyes and rend the landscape. I would summon great mountains, pulling up grassy slopes that gave way to jagged cliffs, dragging down the clouds to create negative space.

Trübhand, (loosely translating as Cloudy or Turbid hand) has multiple facets:
– The left hand and the right hand, two separate aspects of the same whole, discrete manifestations of the body into the physical or magickal realm.
– The popular idiom, ‘the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing’, a process of improvisation, sculptural patching and allowing time to factor in large. Long, slow modulations unfolding in space, resonant structures rising and falling, trying to find definition within the apparent flatness.
– The feelings of occluded emotion, dullness and slowness of mind that can result in periods of depression.

Trübhand was recorded in Bad Zwischenahn, DE, in early 2016 using a small case of eurorack modules, a mixer and a couple of guitar pedals as two separate live performances to a zoom H4 recorder.

Here is a nice wee bit of writing about it courtesy of the Swirls of Noise site.

In other news, things rattle onwards, ever onwards. More new lengthy modular meditations have been captured for dissemination via my bandcamp I’m mostly posting things as free/pay what you like/can these days as the endless jossle and competition of the music playing field is just exhausting and depressing. I’d much rather just give people music that can hopefully heal or help them cope with the mess of living at the moment and live in hope that those who can, will feel compelled to stick their hand in their pocket and chuck a few bucks in the tin.

 

Stein und Flechten

I’m always completely toot at updating this thing, truth be told I’m never really sure how much it’s ever read but so it goes….

Since the last time I posted, we’ve properly moved to Arbroath where I work and it’s just swell here in the Angus Riviera. Wife has finally got her paperwork through which has been an ongoing nightmare for us for the last three years and has seen us move to Germany, submit several trees worth of paperwork, move back from DE, submit another trees worth of papers along with our passports etc and then wait wait wait wait. The whole thing has been a dreadful and stressful affair and we’re eternally thankful to all of our friends and family who have helped us out along the way. We’re so lucky to have had a strong support network, I just can’t imagine how hard it must be for many struggling through the archaic and arcane home office system. It’s probably going to get even worse soon, good luck if you’re going to be affected by it.

Here are a couple of new pieces recorded today based around a fairly complex but endlessly enjoyable self affecting patch.

Patch Notes:

Maths Channel 4 is self cycling. The EOC is clocking Batumi, NanoRand and both sides of A149-1.

A random LFO from Batumi is attenuated in the middle channel of Maths and is fed to the both input of channel 4 meaning that each time the envelope reaches its end, a new value is fed in which changes the length of the next slope.

The 2 channels from A149 (QRV and SRV) are going to both channels of the A156 Quantizer that is sends new 1v/oct information to STO1 and 2 (STO1 is being FM’d by STO2).

The FM amount and Shape control of STO1 are being modulated via Blinds with assorted channels from Batumi/NanoRand.

STO1 is passing through Optomix being opened by the varying channel 4 of Maths and straight into a mixer with Strymon BlueSky and ElCap Pedals on the Aux bus.

Moos is using the same patch as above but with depper FM and modulations, a shorter envelope and un underlying drone from MI’s Tides.

Finally, from a few weeks ago, here’s a short piece I made looking forward to returning to Twin Peaks later this year.

Most of my recent things on Bandcamp are up for free / pay what you like but please do chuck a few coins into the tin if you appreciate the work, it does make all the difference.

As the world seems to be turning more and more to shit and racism/facism, please do try your best to be the best sort of person you can be. It’s going to be a tough one but if we look after each other it can only be a little bit lighter a load.

Cheers

D

Sedna (for Peter Christopherson)

I’ve been on trains the last few weeks looking at the sea and thinking about what a great chasm has been left in the absence of Coil. This is dedicated to Peter Christopherson on the 6th anniversary of his passing.

It’s mostly an STO and Tides being collided inside Warps parasites and some randomly generating Rings bits, modulations to various places from the Batumi. As usual, there’s strymon el cap and bluesky on the mixer busses and it’s recorded live out to a zoom H4.

Thanks Sleazy and Jhonn for all that was left behind.

“Do not lose sight of the Sea”

Resonantes (nach Radigue)

A new piece in tribute to the mighty Eliane Radigue.

Patch Notes: Mutable Instruments Rings in western chords mode, being excited by some filtered noise (with the cutoff frequency being modulated), it was also fed into Clouds and frozen. There are some light modulations passing around from Batumi and that’s about it. I’ve no idea where all the weird background reed sounding business came from (or maybe I’m hallucinating that after having had this patch playing for about 4 hours before bothering to record it).

Canadidonts

A quick and dirty BOCesque jam with the eurorack, beatstep pro, el cap and bluesky pedals and a mixer.

7 note seq from Rings on the BSP
STO Bassline on the BSP
A Trigger seq on the BSP is playing back a sequence from the Microbrute.

Drums:
Bass Peaks
Snare Peaks
Hi Hat QR2 to uvcf to vac1
Tides doing a noisy beep
Stuttery pitch modulated Phonogene sample ‘scratch’

Modulations:
Xaoc Batumi and SSF QR2 providing modulations and noise.

mixer with Strymon El Capistan and BlueSky pedals on the sends.

Audio recorded to zoom h4, video on old iphone 4, light from a cheapo ripple projector.

 

A Pool of Calm

So lately, in attempt to try to process the noise and general ongoing awfulness unfolding in the world, I’ve been creating these long pieces that I hope can give the listener a calm space to inhabit.

All pieces are built and performed on my eurorack modular, mixed on a behringer mixer with Strymon BlueSky and El Capistan pedals in the aux busses and recorded as a stereo track to a Zoom H4 recorder.

If you enjoy these works, please to share them, write something nice about them somewhere or support this work by purchasing these or other releases via bandcamp or just try to be decent to someone, vote for being progressive, for less borders and more care or something along those lines. Lets try and make the world the best we can in the face of all this regressive, small minded hatred that seems to pervade.