Today's doodle is a jaunty tropical island adventure!

Piña Colada Party

Today's doodle was mostly an excuse to jam out with the sounds of the Drum Block from Stardew Valley. It turned into a bit of a driving song, and then took on a thrilling feel, so I decided it was good minecart music. This tune is also a bit of a reference to the fact that, on every farm I've ever played, I have always placed flute and drum blocks around the minecart at the bus stop so that a jingle of random sounds plays whenever you run up to use it.

Minecart Ride

Qazwsx Edcrfv

No, Wreck Wroom isn't dead, she's just been resting :)

* * *

I've been looking around more lately
and I do not like what I see
The world's full of sad and scared people
living and dying inconsequentially
They've got more than I'll ever have
but I get to live clear and free
from this human fucking cancer
and its plastic legacy

Wreck Wroom - The Piscene Epoch

"In that time, I knew their voices only by the resistance I felt when I tried to sound my own.
They made my voice move as it had not before. For a moment I resonated, and felt dimensions of space, time, energy and imagination.
Slowly I learned to push my inner flame one way, then another.
Then I looked to explain things more. I began to feel around, and then I felt another, and more. Together we sang as we explored the extent of our bounds."

* * *

This is the start of a music series about a planet named Mastross.

This planet has abiogenesis much like our own, but rather than forming structures of increasing complexity from organic compounds like amino acids, Mastross has something more like a crystal-growing operation. Deep within underground aquifers and river systems, a strange electric crystal forms. This crystal is much like the piezoelectric quartz we have here on Earth, but is capable of a much more intricate lattice - one with naturally-formed, self-optimizing logic gates. When subjected to mechanical shock, electrons within the lattice are excited to a higher-energy state, causing them to escape the material as sparks of light and sound - but also powering the protocircuitry within crystal bodies. The rushing water provides enough vibrations to keep this electron flow going for millions of years and enough dissolved minerals for these crystal formations to grow to astonishing size and complexity.

This results in a race of beings, born from inorganic minerals, who in appearance and development more closely resemble computers than biological life. In other words, naturally evolved robots. In time these sessile crystalline beings will figure out almost everything. Their cultural and societal problems will be solved before any of them can take a single step in a motile body. Once they can move and replenish energy and communicate like we do, what will challenge them, and what will they do?

In this song we hear the initial winks of protoconsciousness - kindling being stacked up for the lighting of the secret inner fire we call "life". We hear crystal beings sounding their voices and eventually making contact, and then we hear them begin to figure out existence and shape their environment for the first time. I have much more to write about the ways they do this, but that's for another time. :)

Mastross 1: First, we were Crystals

First we hear the sound of the "callback routine" which proto-Mastrossians used. It sounds much like a dialup modem with handshakes and responses, and serves a similar purpose. These sounds wouldn't normally be very audible to the Mastrossians themselves, but are important to their long-distance networking.

The idea is promulgated: Groundwater is drying up, so they must find more reliable ways to acquire energy. To that end, they decide to try growing motile descendants. They try hydrophobic compounds and even primitive fins and sails, but none of these can achieve enough propulsion or steering accuracy. Ultimately, they decide to grow heavier crystal bodies which can snap off the main colony under their own weight. These are sent tumbling through underground rivers and currents, down slopes and into holes, looking for areas with water and useful minerals, and echoing their findings back. They are little more than beacon drones, and they cannot even see the sunlight or move yet, but they are Mastross's first independent free agents.

Eventually, they stumble across minerals with capacitance, and begin incorporating these into their own bodies, forming the first energy-storage and voltage-switching circuits. They can call louder and further than before, and they can spend more energy tuning their sounds higher in frequency. This lets them understand smaller and smaller objects. They come to know rocks and sand and water as more than mere substrate, and begin to obtain ideas of distance and measurement.

Mastross 2: Then we Set About the Business of Swimming

Today's doodle is a lot like reproduction: It's 5 pianos surrounding a drum kit.

Call Me When You Get There

Drunken one-take improv blues/rock/country thingy about me going on a safari to hunt and eat all the cryptids. This one's very inspired by Wendigoon. I had to look at his videos a lot to think up good cryptids to sing about, so I figured he might as well go in the cover image too. :)

* * *

I'm moseyin' through Bigfoot's barrio
Gonna boil me some cryptid stew
with the fat from a big Jackalope, yeah
and a couple Chupacabra steaks too
I'm searchin' with every stride
in my Mothman boots and my Wendigo hide
baitin' my trail cams with peanut brittle
'cause I've been cravin' some mighty strange vittles
Sssh, here they come right now...

Got 'em!
Right, what was I sayin'... oh!

I want a Yeti spaghetti plate
with Jersey Devil jerky and a Hodag hotcake
I could even go for a Nessie filet
with Mongolian Death Worm crème brûlée
Thunderbird drumsticks, Nandi Bear liver
a couple red onions and a gravy river
Owlman omelets and Goatman cheese
A little bit of everything, if you please

Cryptid Stew

They colonized the extent of the water. They found new places and minerals and discovered advanced chemosynthesis. Soon they were bristling with all manner of sensors - photocell eyes that could discriminate colors, transducers that could work like speakers of microphones, and much more. They came to know dimensions of time, space, thought and imagination. They tuned themselves and they fixed their environment so that it sang along with them. Thus did they begin to propel themselves, and thus did limbs occur as a means to control this movement.

Mastross 3: We Streamed Out like Flames and Lost Ourselves

Hammer (Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow)

Port Moonshade (Day)

The Sky Opened Up

Mastross 6: Mission to the Blue Star

"So it was that we discovered and mastered the secrets of black holes. Dimensions of space, time, thought and imagination unfolded before us, and we accepted our position. All was pursued, all was done, and all was claimed, until we at last were content that not even the Great Unknown remained unscathed."

Mastross 7: Starchildren in Vitro

132bpm. It is structured so that every 4-measure-long part is a unique percussion beat. 64 measures long with a tail at the end, so that's 16 different beats for you to play with. If you've never beat-sliced before, well, these beats are all so compatible that you'd have a hard time making something that sounded bad with these. Maybe it's good practice material.

This one's a jam I had on a Korg Minipops, DSK DrumZ MachineZ, and Take1 loaded with the FF7 soundfont and the Wutai percussion patch. No real tonality, although the toms are playing the notes C D G A B - very compatible with CMaj, GMaj, Em, Am, and C melodic minor. This is only likely to matter for really technical material though.

As for possible suggestions/inspirations - I think of it as a prize fighting song. Something like Smash TV, The Running Man, Retro City Rampage, etc. You're fighting off these waves of guys and collecting loot in an arena. Or, maybe you're racing a really goofy makeshift vehicle against a bunch of misfit motorists.

Feel free to use the material however you wish, and have fun!

Minipops Array (Free Drum Loops)

"You respect nothing, you create nothing, you think nothing. All the beauties of song, of words, of beasts and plants and the open sky, are lost on you, and denial is all you know. What the fuck are you even living for? My stubbornness will outlive yours. I will bring beauty, peace and tranquility to this land even if I have to build them on your disgusting corpse. You will rot on Earth and in Hell at the same time."

The Promise

This one makes me think of police in the big city. They're gathering and getting ready to take down a big crime lord or something. The gradual unsteadying of the song represents their tension as they wait for the perfect moment to strike. Gotta wait for these civilians to pass, or gotta wait for this traffic to clear out, but they also have to watch the building where the bad guy is. Imagine city noise, radio chatter, etc. to accompany this.
The synths are Axons, Behemoth, Nero, Imago, and an 808.

Downtown Takedown

Gwennie got into the mezcal and produced this. Huzzah! I sound like I'm doing the friggin JAWS theme or something lmao.
Original: https://soundcloud.com/sonic_kitchen/bork-em-and-smork-em

Bork 'Em and Smork 'Em (Boom Boom Remix)

It's that time again... time to throw a load of eldritch ingredients of questionable provenance into a bubbling stew and drink the result! Bass flute, soprano sax, Dulcet, and a few choice "incantations".

Frazzled Gremoid Creature - Hymn to the Cauldron

Time for some heavy metal. Bronze, to be exact!

Gongitar - Wayward Guns

I've been to a dozen doctors
who find nothing wrong with me
I've been doing everything right
It's a medical mystery
I get up and smoke ten pounds of crank
and dip my mug into a septic tank
like any other self-made man
living in a little Ameri-can

My lungs say "breathe" and my back says "creak"
My stomach says "eat" and my throat says "drink"
and I can hardly hear myself think
'cause my guts are hatin' my health
I can't take a step without feeling just fine
Can't get through the day without a totally good time
I tell you what, the world ain't worth a damn
and I've not yet begun to defile myself

Shut My Damn Guts Up

A looper jam which builds up to 8 instruments. This one is dedicated to an old pal, Bernhammer AKA Hand Of Doom!

Somnambulance

Playing with @Alexiabside 's tune "Like to Groove": https://soundcloud.com/alexiabside/like-to-groove-alexia-loops :)

Alexiabside - Like to Groove (Sonic Kitchen remix)

I fixed a roof recently and still had some scrap metal left over. The two pieces looked like big pizza slices. I shook them, wobbled them, hit them, clanged them together, and so on, then took some choice sounds from that session to make this.

Squid Fist

A piece written specifically to exploit glitches in both my arpeggiators and in ESOSVM. The arps keep playing when turned off, instruments start making up notes, and the VM, thinking the song hasn't ended, continues applying this song's instrumentation to the next song, leading to weird alarm noises. The last 60 seconds are the glitched version of the song meant to follow this one.

Marengi Mark Zero Takes Off to Planet Ashr

"This track will be recommended to the right audience." - SoundCloud
Do you not like the track? Be sure to let SC know their system needs some work.

Today's doodle is kind of like a miniature colosseum for your coffeetable. Zap the things you don't like with a shrink ray and chuck 'em in there. They'll know what to do! If they don't, the resident beasties will eat well tonight! It's a win-win for you and your homemade ecosystem video on YouTube regardless. I guess life in a jar is better than life in a bar, unless that bar is also a pub, in which case, I'll take the ale and fried food over the tubifex worms and planarians. I can only boogie down so much in that damn swamp water.

Varmint Garden

Today's doodle is the result of G and I playing a bunch of dumb stuff to try to make each other laugh. It's music for people who speed around department stores in rocket-powered trolleys and hotrodded power chairs.

Shopping Frenzy

I made a mumble rap mix live on stream to prove it could be done quickly and easily. Then I tried an autotune VST called Kerovee. It definitely gets that robot voice that mumble rap has, but when I discovered how playable it was, I threw away the idea of making ordinary mumble rap.

All Right Then

Yes, I believe you'll bloom like a field of dreams... A million flowers will grow toward your light and a million birds will sing in the voice of your heart!

Meditation No.111 - I Hope this is Enough

I got the Etherealwinds Harp VST and quite liked it. So as always, I started doodling music ideas. This is the result: A collection of soundscapes with no particular destination. Two harps, acoustic guitar, banjolele, my synth "Little Bastard", my gong collection, Quilcom Mystery, Quilcom Spinsynth, Quilcom Rank Two, Maxsynths DrumKit1, my narration, Gwenndau's bass, and coffee maker noises.

* * *

Erdifale vettr hane
Firamir ta ren agasho
Erdifala tana thettr fa wh na
Fa hralt fmera lagh

Road to Nowhere

Another jam on the latest version of LB... progressing from here will be quite convoluted! But, I can say that this synth is making quite satisfying sounds on its own now. The drum sounds are quite good too, and sound almost like an udu at times, but a lot of post gain is needed to get them loud and punchy enough to sit well in a mix. So, there's one of my next objectives: Make LB versatile and powerful enough to be able to serve as a drum machine on its own.

The Little Bastard is a Big Bastard Now

This piece is made by running Little Bastard in Obstinate mode. Fidget with the widget until the boondoggle lights up. Remember: lefty-tighty, righty-loosey, poggy-froggy, ducky-goosey. Whoa there, pardner. Looks like you got a dented manifold on your doodly-doo there. That's gonna be expensive to replace! First you're gonna need a big, flat gong. Now, take a doorstop spring and attach it to the edge. That'll do it! DOOOIIIOOIIOIOING! Oh, right. We should probably have ear protection for this, huh?

A Secret Inner Flame

Gongbox FM - AMF Pizza No.3

Zephy & Gwennie Picking Berries in the Woods

Experimental melodies which are horizontally symmetrical like a cartoon Christmas tree. The build-up and the fade-out of each chord and note contribute to the harmonic progression, as if the melody is being played and then unplayed. This note-stacking creates very wind-like overtones which gradually become a tornado of sound!

Second Wind

Today's doodle is a pretty martial-sounding one. I felt like making some wardrum type music so here it is. The cover image is my take on the Pink Dragon millipede :)

Skirmishers

Guided meditation: You begin studying geology at a university that is obsessed with urine, get framed for animal abuse, and then witness the total collapse of society

GeoTech Learning Center

Today's doodle is made with Little Bastard and is just a bit of fun!

Snacks Quest

0:00 HOW IT LOOKS
0:32 HOW IT SENSES
1:04 HOW IT MOVES
1:34 HOW IT EATS
2:06 HOW IT THINKS
3:10 HOW IT DOES
3:39 NAME?

* * *

Zeph's Music Challenge (ZMC) 001 - "Formed in Waves"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HacAIUtEBw

"Design an original character using only sounds. You may use vocal sounds, but no words. Your finished recording will be the character's body."

* * *

Here we have a very obstinate individual, and an overreactive or overdramatic one at that! It notices everything, whether it likes it or not. It moves sort of like a myriapod or a starfish. It drinks minerals by putting them in a crucible and melting them with its stare. It has not taken control of its imagination yet, and its emotions have not yet been introduced to its intellect. Everything in its mind is simultaneously isolated and harshly juxtaposed.

ZMC001 - Prisoner of Imagination

Frogs around a pond I recently built in my yard. Free to use.

Giltbronze Frogs 02May2024

Experimental & variety music from outsider artist Zephram Giltbronze.
I have no message and no legacy for you to carry forth. I'll die when it's time. I ain't gettin' in a freezer.

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