Thursday, June 23, 2011

Finite Water Droplets

Friday marked the return of Doubles’ Dash Compo after being in hiatus for several months. Round 10 was declared MILESTONE ED, a truncated form of milestone edition. I offered my standard narration intro, which was disqualified since I recorded it alone. Level 99 and Wildfire co-created the hooky pop-rock song “If I Were a Dinosaur” with both members serving vocal duty for Level 99’s production. Obtuse’s un-tiss complemented Cyril the Wolf’s singing in “You Know…” breaking down halfway for layered murmuring. I sought out Xarnax42 and recorded a stream-of-consciousness speech, which became the basis for his ambient production “We didn't not enter. We win!”

Beigh effectively outperformed me with his combination of spoken word and singing, backed by Jakesnke17’s beat. mv served up his trip-hop and stepped up to the mic to perform alongside Wildfire’s choral harmonies, arguing that “reality isn't real”. As an act of spontaneity near the end of the submission stage, I showed AkogareZephyr a partially lyricized demo of me singing that she used as a vocal guide for what became “Before You Speak”. As Team Two Guys, One MIDI Controller, Fusion2004 and bjkmenu professed their love for burgers with piano, guitar and synth-laden waltz.

Saturday was the Grand Robot Master Remix Battle submission deadline for the third round of the Mega Man Bracket. All four entrants for the bracket successfully sent their entries along before the time ran out. TheGuitahHeroe did a dance-fied take on the Bubble Man and Heat Man themes garnished with chip sounds of the past. Sir_NutS’s “Encapsulated Heat” continues his retro streak, going for vintage vocoded electro that would not be out of place in a 80s club. prophetik offered a somber arrangement, putting together strings and harp with a pulse of acoustic drumming, shakers and layers of synthesizers. At the end of the bracket Hylian Lemon paid tribute to Hard Man and Spring Man using spacey arps, Theremin and lo-fi glitch beats next to flute and violins.

Lazy Sunday Compo went off to a slightly confused start as two instances of round 3 had been set for the night. One had a Father’s Day-based theme as the compo fell on the U.S. observance of the holiday; the other instance covered “The Overworld” as its topic. After being directed toward the correct one and doing my vocal intro for it, I went over to the alternate and recorded a narration for that one as well. mv shared “Fond Memories” using synth arpeggio and robust vocals accompanied with piano, strings and degraded drums. Jacob summoned exotic acoustic plucking into his entry, inviting listeners to journey through the jungle with a variety of ethnic percussion. Clockwerk uploaded a minimal techno blend of TR-808 and various pitched tones for “The Explosive BBQ”.

Pongball’s brief entry displays a whimsical tickling of the ivories, flute and wind chimes. Arcana’s opening kick-hihat pattern and violin expands with piano chords, snare and tom fills, adequately providing a backdrop for “The Last, Sweet Dance”. swordofdestiny sent off a series of horns for a somber orchestral tribute to his late father. Xarnax42 initially composed his bubbly, overworld-themed track for the alternate round 3, and then moved the tune to the correct page. liquid wind created two one-hour compositions and uploaded the second, an ambient set of airy pads and steady beat. Steam Dreams carried piano and acoustic strumming as he reminisced about his father attempting to teach him to appreciate baseball.

On Monday, People’s Remix Competition 196 reached its deadline with a trio of entries. The source tune came from Shinobi II and was selected by first-time PRC participant Amphibious, the winner of the previous round. Inrade submitted his first entry, a chilled out electronic take on the composition that he felt was developed on impulse rather than predetermination. toilet goat called upon tribal drums for his arrangement evoking eastern influences and fleshing things out with guitar shredding, all within the space of 38 seconds. Xsquader stated that he found the material difficult to work with, but nevertheless delivered a pounding dance remix and distorted rock solo.

For JHCompo on Tuesday I chose the “Fever” theme, but initially forgot to record an intro track for it. MandraSigma managed to put his extensive bass entry in first, prompting me to acknowledge this in my narration immediately after. The beginning of coda’s “dog disease” brings to mind THX’s famous “Deep Note” joined with a disaccord of various sounds. Jakesnke17 expressed a trip filled with hallucinations and impediments via glitch-tinged electro. bjkmenu showed off his guitar with his tune per usual, this time expressing “big daddy cain fever”. mv got down with “The Sickness” implementing his brand of trip-hop, singing the repeated line: “I don't want to feel so dead again...”

CFX Music was convinced that it was “ALl In YoUR HeAD” utilizing panning, compressed tones and distortion that falls away in favor of ambiance and coughing. chunter’s dance tune made use of Haruka Nana, a voicebank he programmed to sing “give me fever” among other things. Txai brought in the ghosts of the Sega Genesis with his short-but-rousing “nightmare headdy”. irrelevnt’s rock n’ roll interpretation of the theme contains heavily overdriven vocals, ending with breathing and an organ solo. mu submitted an electronic tune including elements of salsa and wah-affected melodies, topped off with crashing keyboard chords. The dark mood of soundshift’s track is steadied by a dance rhythm and generous helpings of cowbell. Finally Beigh’s heartbeat leads to piano ambience broken up with industrial percussion.

Trippycompo on Wednesday was based on a larger samplepack than usual, totaling over five megabytes. The pack contained a wide selection of bass sounds that MandraSigma had featured in his JHCompo entry the previous day, as well as the repeated spoken line “I love moltres.” Jakim’s entry logically puts the speech over the bass playing for his “Whatta” entry whilst fashioning a melody out of other clips. MandraSigma worked up a danceable beat, slowed down the moltres line and ran through a light piano-like riff. coda also stuck the speech within a flurry of arpeggiation in a little over half a minute. Shinyboom sped up the love for moltres in “Articuno's Lullaby”, employing a series of glitchy and discordant effects. passing_by’s “8192 hr sleep deprivation” seemingly goes through every sample in the pack, falling just short of two minutes and rounding out the edges of the compo that night.

The theme for Thursday’s OHC was "Stranded", and I decided to change things up by including a clip of the compo organizer starla speaking in my spoken-word intro. Tomapella's track rolls in the waves with e-piano, violin lead and soft drumming. Suzumebachi pushed his electro tune as quickly as his 56k modem would allow and worked in a climactic 3-4-5-1-8. Fusion2004 composed a solo piano piece in the final 15 minutes of the round. Bren typed up an alternative theme description to accompany his signature synth chord structures. jarski used the summary space to post a squirrel in a vending machine, and let the breakbeats do the talking. As he was "Stuck in the Middle of 500 Synths" sci had no choice but to be subjected to "something loud" and derisive laughter, surrounded by loosely jointed cacophony.

DDRKirby(ISQ)'s ambient entry evokes "Madness" before laying down hip-hop and eventually stomping dance. Arcana similarly starts off with one genre and layers in another, in his case an orchestra with four-on-the-floor. Destroid pondered the possibility of being stranded at the base of Rampkorv Industries and heightens this notion with frenetic electronics. dusthillguy brings along his FM snare and pitched voice-like tones, yelling out a certain part of the male anatomy. Despite his illness, mv submitted yet another vocal entry backed up by strings and funky drums. At the end of the listening party, munchi sampled various Batman-related dialogue and dropped the big beat with lo-bit chords.

For my Doubles' Dash stream-of-consciousness entry, one of the many random things I uttered was "finite water droplets". I can only imagine how amusing it would be if the weather forecast was announced this way. It's not nearly as strange as saying, for example, "cloudy with a chance of artichokes".

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.