10 May 2010 conrad   » (Journeyer)

Monday Music: Birk by Kobi

Made with AUBE on Linux a few years ago, this is Birk by Kobi:

AUBE/Metadecks Live is a music production tool designed for live use. A track like this is made by setting up a bunch of sample, rhythm and effects units, playing them for a while and recording the result.

The rhythms are made with a simple drum machine, which is basically a matrix of triggers tied up to sample players. These are fed through a cascade of delays to get the rolling effect -- I love feeding a short delay to provide echo into a longer delay which matches the beat, so that the individual sounds combine with each other to make a more complex rhythm.

The rhythm is sent through a resonant low-pass filter; as the track starts off, the cutoff of that filter is raised to give the effect of opening up the whole track. It's a pretty simple technique, used in tracks like Fatboy Slim's Right Here, Right Now.

The filtered version is called the "wet" part of the mix, and the unfiltered version is the "dry" part. Changing the amount of these is useful: the dry part provides definition (the attacks of each drum are clearly audible), and the wet part has a more interesting texture. In a sequencer you might program the "wetness" of the effect; I like to work with it more directly by feeding the two versions into a cross-fader and switching between them live. If you are quick enough with the controls then your other arm is free for doing handstands :)

Syndicated 2010-05-10 00:00:00 from Conrad Parker

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