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Disquiet Junto Tracks

Disquiet Junto Project 0712: Zebra Code
The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code?

Step 1: Locate something you purchased or received that has a zebra code, or bar code, on the packaging.

Step 2: Interpret the bar code from Step 1 as a rhythm.

Step 3: Make music using the rhythm from Step 2.

This project was proposed thanks to Jason Richardson (aka Bassling), who shared this Boing Boing post:

https://boingboing.net/2025/08/19/will-it-riff-turns-product-barcodes-into-heavy-metal-jams.html

Deadline: Monday, August 25, 2025, 11:59pm (that is: just before midnight) wherever you are.

Details: disquiet.com/0712

Disquiet Junto Project 0712: Zebra Code

This is what came to mind for Disquiet 0635. 

Disquiet Junto Project 0635: ’Round the Bend
The Assignment: You’re in a duo, and your bandmate is a train.

Step 1: Listen to this short recording, under a minute, of a passing train, recorded by Todd (@Toaster) Elliott:
https://soundcloud.com/disquiet/train-source-1/ 27

And, if you’d like, to this longer one, which is a little over 10 minutes:
https://soundcloud.com/disquiet/train-source-1020 14

Both are available to download.

Step 2: Record a piece of music using the field recording as the rhythm track. You can use the shorter one, or a segment of the longer one. Make sure the original is audible in your final work.
More on the 635th weekly Disquiet Junto project, ’Round the Bend — The Assignment: You’re in a duo, and your bandmate is a train — at https://disquiet.com/0635/

Brain Train disquiet0635

I created this for Disquiet Junto Project 0655. The idea was to make soothing music for newborns (see project description and links below). While working on it I tried to keep in mind the open awareness that babies have naturally and what it must be like to wake up into the world for the very first time. The original piece was around a minute long. I looped part of it to add some length.

Cover art: water color by Renate McGregor

Disquiet Junto Project 0655: Soothing Sounds II
The Assignment: Make music for babies.

Step 1: Back in the early 1960s, Raymond Scott released a set of music for infants, titled Soothing Sounds for Baby. We’re going to produce music along those lines. Feel free to revisit Scott’s great collection. (Not one but two Junto participants give birth this month — one did a week-ish ago, and one is due to very soon. We’re doing this project in their honor and with their approval. Perhaps there are other brand new parents in our digital midst, as well. We did a project just like this one way back when we hit the 250th consecutive week, in October 2016.)

Step 2: Compose a piece of music intended for a newborn child, something peaceful as they first experience the world outside the womb.

More on the 655th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Soothing Sounds II — The Assignment: Make music for babies — at https://disquiet.com/0655/

Baby Breathes disquiet0655

Jonesing For A Laugh

The track was created for Disquiet Junto 0664. More on the 664th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Mother Beat — The Assignment: Record a piece of music in 29/16 time — at https://disquiet.com/0664/ 

Stammered - disquiet0664

Created for Disquiet Junto Project 0686

More on the 686th Disquiet Junto project, Catch Your Breath — The Assignment: Listen to yourself inhale and exhale; make music from what you sense — at https://disquiet.com/0686/

Let It Breathe [disquiet0686]

I created this for Disquiet Junto project 0687
More on the 687th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Applied Science — The Assignment: Record a piece of music that includes physiological and behavioral techniques — at https://disquiet.com/0687/

Nurture the Nature [disquiet0687]

Just This

Necropolis

This track was created for Disquiet Junto Project 700. 

More on the 700th weekly Disquiet Junto project, View Frame — The Assignment: Share a peek out your window and some sounds inspired by the view — at https://disquiet.com/0700/

A View For Two [disquiet700]

Disquiet Junto 0712 invited us to interpret a barcode as a rhythm.

The first barcode patent was issued in 1952, but they didn't look like the ones we usually see now: they were bullseye-shaped. Today's linear barcodes use what is called "many-width symbology", meaning that the vertical lines ("modules") in the barcode are different widths, from 1 to 4. The lines are printed vertically instead of horizontally so that if the ink smeared during printing, the code would still be legible and no information would be lost. 

Barcodes almost failed in the retail space, because no one wanted to be the first to invest the money to adopt them when they were unproven. They were a lot  more popular more quickly in the railroad business, where by the early 1960s optical scanners could read the color-coded barcodes on train cars as they rolled past at full speed.

The barcode I chose as source material for the prompt was from a tape dispenser that I bought to help my daughter pack to leave home. This piece is probably an aural photograph of the feelings I'm having right now, but that's neither here nor there. Where was I?

Instead of reading the barcode as if it were visually measuring out beats, I decided to decode the modules and transcribe the widths. This turned into the sequence 2 1 3 2 1 4 4 1 / 2 1 2 3 1 1 1 3 / 3 1 1 1 3 1 1 1 / 1 1, which I incorporated into this piece in several ways.

First, the percussion pattern is built by breaking the sequence into chunks of four numbers. These four numbers indicate the beat position of a series of drum kit components on a 16-step grid. So 2-1-3-2, the first sequence, means the kick drum hits on the 2nd, 1st, 3rd, and 2nd beats of the four divisions of the pattern. Next would be the snare, then the tom, and finally the hihat with 1-1-1-3. The sequence also determines the note length and note number of the "melodic" sequence. 

Finally, I translated the sequence into steps in a custom arpeggiator, with the width of the modules transposed into the vertical axis of the beats in the pattern. There are two arpeggiated synth tracks, running at different rates, played on the Logic ES2 and Alchemy software synths. A triggered vocal sample rhythmically reflects the numeric sequence. The rest of the synth parts came from the Roland boutique Studio Electronics SE-02, a reissue of the "Moog-adjacent" SE-01 analog monosynth of 1982.

There's a lot going on in this piece, but there's a lot going on over here, too. The sound that a single mom makes in her empty nest. Snapshot of a moment in time at 90bpm.

More on the 712th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Zebra Code — The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code? — at https://disquiet.com/0712/.

The Passage (disquiet0712)

Beats generated from barcode, other modular synth and piano.

Bar Beats  disquiet0712

A short electronic noise track inspired by a barcode, sounds created using Audacity with databending, delay, reverb, etc.

More on the 712th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Zebra Code — The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code? — at https://disquiet.com/0712/.

Barcode Blend (disquiet0712)

sound art for disquiet0712.

More on the 712th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Zebra Code — The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code? — at https://disquiet.com/0712/.

leaf litter (disquiet0712)

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

More on the 712th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Zebra Code — The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code? — at https://disquiet.com/0712/

250822 [disquiet0712]

I created this track for Disquiet Junto Project 0712. The assignment involved creating a rhythm by interpreting a barcode. I interpreted the thin lines of the barcode as snare hits and the thick lines as kick drum. I programmed the snare and kick hits into my sequencer with spacing loosely following the spacing in the barcode. I improvised various keys parts over this rhythm. The number code in the barcode guided note selection. To decide which notes I could select from, I set 0 at a Bb, then counting up or down in half steps I could use any notes that were numerically represented in the barcode. 
More on the 712th weekly Disquiet Junto project, Zebra Code — The Assignment: What rhythm do you hear in a bar code? — at https://disquiet.com/0712/.

Code Read [disquiet0712]

PatternOfEric