Disquiet Junto Project 0627: Just Ice Society
The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it.

Welcome to a new year of Disquiet Junto communal music projects. This week’s project is as follows. It’s the same project we’ve begun each year with since the very first Junto project, way back in January 2012. The project is, per tradition, just this one step:

Step 1: Please record the sound of an ice cube rattling in a glass, and make something of it.

It’s great if you can record your own ice sounds, but if you want some help, the always awesome Jason (Bassling) Richardson has provided some source audio:

WAV:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/e8qpnf0i1r2xhw1/bassling_-_pindari_glasses.wav/file

MOV:
https://www.mediafire.com/file/swq09kq409qhecg/bassling_-_pindari_glasses.mov/file

Background: Longtime participants in, and observers of, the Disquiet Junto series will recognize this single-sentence assignment — “Please record the sound of an ice cube rattling in a glass, and make something of it” — as the very first Disquiet Junto project, the same one that launched the series back on the first Thursday of January 2012. Revisiting it at the start of each January ever since has provided a fitting way to begin the new year. By now, it qualifies as a tradition. A weekly project series can come to overemphasize novelty, and it’s helpful to revisit old projects as much as it is to engage with new ones. Also, by its very nature, the Disquiet Junto suggests itself as a fast pace: a four-day production window, a regular if not weekly habit. It can be beneficial to step back and see things from a longer perspective.

. . .

Deadline: This project’s deadline is the end of the day Monday, January 8, 2024, at 11:59pm (that is, just before midnight) wherever you are. It was posted on Thursday, January 4, 2024.

. . .

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Disquiet Junto Project 0627: Just Ice Society

This was my contribution for the collaborative Disquiet Junto Project 0610: Speed Limit Pt 2

Here’s a copy of my post on the Disquiet Junto 0610 discussion thread:

Ended up using part 1 compositions by @Timshel0, @dequalsrxt, and @tristan_louth_robins for this piece since they all seemed to work well with the Basinski style vibe I had in mind. I layered them into Ableton Live at 60 BPM and edited the audio in various ways by stretching, warping, chopping and looping the samples. Thank you to the three creators for the opportunity to use these creations, but also apologies for my excessive manipulation and mangling of your source audio.  

I recorded the mix onto a Panasonic RN-125 microcassette recorder and then, played it back into Ableton at half speed. Final tempo should be around 30 BPM. Added plugin effects from Arturia Rev Intensity (reverb), Phonolyth Cascade (reverb), Soundghost Drift (for more tape effects) and AudioThing Noises to the final mix.

The ambiguous title was inspired by reflecting on news headlines referencing "...a fragile peace" in conflict areas around the world.   

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/
About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/
Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

A Fragile Piece [disquiet0610]

DISQUIET 0610
 30bpm, based on 2 tracks from disquiet 0609
Lazenbeeindusty's blankspace
Henk Lasschuit 's SpeedLimit pt 1

======================================================
More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

disquietjunto

disquiet0610_blanklimitz

Contains samples of the following:
https://soundcloud.com/red_robin/disquiet_junto_0603-refactored-drift-60-bpm
https://soundcloud.com/winterer/catnip-in-60bpm-disquiet0609
https://soundcloud.com/sunbear-323538505/disquiet0609

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

Three Passengers (disquiet0610)

This is my submission for this week's Disquiet Junto assignment.

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

Jovian Sferics [disquiet610]

Disquiet Junto Project 0610: Speed Limit Pt 2
The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed.

Combined two tracks that seemed like they shouldn't go together:

https://soundcloud.com/red_robin/disquiet_junto_0603-refactored-drift-60-bpm

https://soundcloud.com/atw/transient-melter-60bpm-disquiet-0609

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

Tristan Louth-Robins & ATW - Transient Drift (disquiet0610)

I decided to use the pieces by Forelight, Fake Genius and RadMusicLab which I loaded into my 1010Music Bitbox. After slowing them all down to half speed and subjecting them to some granularity I basically did a couple of improv sessions, triggering portions of the three samples using the touch interface of the 1010 and then adding some melancholic notes from the Terra, along with a bit of electric shocks from the Landscape HC-TT.

disquiet0610

Assignment: Select two or more tracks from the provided ones https://soundcloud.com/disquiet/sets/disquiet-junto-project-0609?si=7c2b7977f36f4e7c8598f9015f1472c2&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing, slow them to half their original pace — that is, to 30 BPM — and use editing techniques to combine them into one new piece of music.

I reworked and mashed together the following three tracks with additional instrumentation:

@ray_cobley https://soundcloud.com/ray_cobley/simply-sixty-disquiet0609?si=964f09599ede490c944c5b477b315984&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

@winterer https://soundcloud.com/winterer/catnip-in-60bpm-disquiet0609?si=a28240ff67dc40d79c9e3170502e9859&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

@atw https://soundcloud.com/atw/transient-melter-60bpm-disquiet-0609?si=eeb41b4e69524f06b852644eee40c388&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

Sixty Catnip Dark Corridor Melter (disquiet0610)

Credits to the originators of the tracks being combined here:
@he_nu_ri @Aaron_Taylor-Waldman and @noodletwister

[disquiet0610] Half - Time Triple

Special thanks to @RabMusicLab @user-248104983 and @andreas-kitzmann-27370936 for sharing their recordings

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

Slow & Low (RabMusicLab, Samplair, A.Kitzmann)(disquiet0610)

This assignment uses two songs from Disquiet0609 (made to be 60bpm) and combine them while setting the new song at 30bpm. I used Plucks & Pad from Noodle Twister (https://soundcloud.com/noodletwister/plucks-pad-disquiet0609) and combined it with SAMPLAIR's Disquiet 0609 (https://soundcloud.com/user-248104983/disquiet0609-60bpm). I altered the sounds and added LABS piano parts.

More on this 610th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Speed Limit Pt 2 (The Assignment: Combine two or more pre-existing 60 BPM tracks into something new — at half the speed), at: https://disquiet.com/0610/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0610-speed-limit-pt-2/

air space feat. Noodle Twister & SAMPLAIR [disquiet0610]

An Individual Conditional Expectation (ICE) is a type of plot that demonstrates the deviation from a predicted occurrence when some aspect of it changes. Resembling statistical visualizations popularized by Edward Tufte in the 1980’s, ICE plots represent information as a series of lines each representing a separate, unique data point.

Every new year brings a period of reflection, inevitably coupled with an optimistic array of good intentions. One might be compelled to plot these on an ICE or similar chart detailing progress toward a given milestone. For Suss Müsik, the 2024 plan includes critical objectives like “be nice, mostly” and “try to avoid hospitals.” The bar is admittedly set low around here.

For this recurrent Junto project (one of Suss Müsik’s favorites), the sound of ice in a glass was sampled and run through a sort of handmade grain synth. This weird rhythm makes its appearance later in the piece, following an organ prelude accompanied by an arpeggiated bell/harp pattern. The voices were digitally stretched to resemble nothing more than long breaths, perhaps metaphorically representing the deep exhale one emits after a challenging year.

The piece is titled 2101.06986, in tribute to the filename of a 2021 paper by three authors describing the use of slice visualization to model machine learning algorithms. (Another Suss Müsik 2024 goal is “title more pieces after numbers,” because why not).

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

2101.06986 [Disquiet0627]

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Thanks to Bassling for the Ice recording see his submission here .. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHp3Igh7JSg

Chilling With Ice (disquiet0627)

A response to Disquiet Junto 0627: Just Ice Society.

The vocals were created using AI-enhanced text-to-speech, using content adapted from WikiHow. 

Recorded and produced at NOSIGNAL Multimedia Labs, The Shambles, Chicago, IL USA.

About Disquiet Junto 0627: https://disquiet.com/2024/01/04/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Disquiet Junto

Making Ice at Home May Seem Overwhelming (disquiet0627)

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Slicing The Ice (disquiet0627)

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/

About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/ 1

Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/

Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Just Ice Society

Disquiet Junto | Just Ice Society - disquiet0627

Edited live jam, ice samples through no-input mixer feedback. I improvised for about 20 minutes. Cut it down to 4 segments that total 2 minutes. I also re-ordered the 4 segments into what felt like a fun structure. The ice samples come from my ice junto 1 year ago. 

The idea was to revisit the problem I was focused on last year with that junto piece — chasing a stronger sense of development and direction in my pieces. But through something closer to my current focus on live improvisation.

Last year when doing the ice prompt disquiet junto I was at a bit of a turning point in my production process. I knew my happy place was keeping production as close as possible to improvisation. But wanting stronger direction and development in my music led me to explore the slower process of editing and building things out on a DAW timeline. In the last 6 months I took a 180. I moved back to focusing mostly on improvisation, but with a new interest in structure. 

It’s been rewarding to revisit the material and problems I was playing with last year through a fresh lens. 


Disquiet Junto Project 0627: Just Ice Society
 The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it.
Welcome to a new year of Disquiet Junto communal music projects. This week’s project is as follows. It’s the same project we’ve begun each year with since the very first Junto project, way back in January 2012. The project is, per tradition, just this one step:
Step 1: Please record the sound of an ice cube rattling in a glass, and make something of it.

More on this 627th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Just Ice Society — The Assignment: Record the sound of ice in a glass and make something with it — at: https://disquiet.com/0627/
About the Disquiet Junto: https://disquiet.com/junto/ 1
Subscribe to project announcements: https://tinyletter.com/disquiet-junto/
Project discussion takes place on llllllll.co: https://llllllll.co/t/disquiet-junto-project-0627-just-ice-society/

Photo by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

New Old Ice [disquiet0627]

My 33 1/3 series book about the Aphex Twin album <i>Selected Ambient Works Volume II</i> was published in 2014. The book was one of the top 5 bestselling titles for the calendar year, and in 2015 was ranked by Pitchfork as one of the "33 best" of the 100-plus books in the 33 1/3 series. It has subsequently been translated into Japanese (2019) and Spanish (2018)

Since 2012 I have moderated the Disquiet Junto group, which began on SoundCloud. More at disquiet.com/junto. 

I've written for Nature, Pitchfork, The Wire, Down Beat, Boing Boing, NewMusicBox, Red Bull Music Academy, Art Practical, the website of The Atlantic, and many other publications. 

I've exhibited sound art at galleries in Los Angeles (Crewest), Manhattan (apex art), and Dubai (DUTAC), and I had a audio-visual installation at the San Jose Museum of Art as part of its 45th anniversary.

And since 1996 I've run the website Disquiet.com about the intersection of sound, art, and technology.

New Old Ice [disquiet0627]

Borhane

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