More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

Disquiet Junto Project 0106: Sonar Vortex

After reading this weeks Junto, I knew right away what I wanted to do...I recently got hold of "punch hole music boxes" (thanks Masaya for sharing a link that turned me to these wunderinstruments) Music boxes that play the music from holes you punch into a card...(Hope it makes sense) I traced the image, I got from the weather site, onto a card - inverted and retrograded it to get 4 variation all together ...recorded the music box twice - once in the intended direction and once reversed. Went out into my garden and recorded the sound of the weather around 1PM - it' pretty windy as you can hear. Kept it simple eq'ed and mastered a little to finish it - ohh btw theres some delay/reverb on the musicbox....

Disquiet Junto Project 0106: Sonar Vortex

This week’s project is about graphic notation. We’ll find the music inherent in weather patterns. The procedure is as follows:

Step 1: Go to the website WeatherSpark.com. Enter the city/town where you live.

Step 2: Find the weather for January 10, 2014. (Depending on when you do the project, this will either be a prediction or a matter of historical record.)

Step 3: This weather website has many viewing options, but the default is to just see the temperature, and you should only see the temperature for this project. The image should roughly resemble the one associated with this post (if not visible, see image at disquiet.com). The chart depicts the weather altering over the course of the day, and has it shown in various bands, with the actual/predicted temperature as a black line, and historical highs, lows, averages, and other data depicted in more subtle shades. For additional information about reading the weather chart, visit this URL: http://goo.gl/3fRGwW. Make a screenshot of the day’s weather chart of your area, and trim it to just show that one day. Be sure to associate that image with your track, so the listener can view it.

Step 4: Produce an original track in which the weather chart is read from left to right as a musical score. Perhaps you’ll assign a different instrument or tone to each band or line. Perhaps you’ll align pitches with temperatures. Perhaps you’ll set the pace based on the time of day.

Deadline: Monday, January 13, 2014, at 11:59pm wherever you are.

Length: Your finished work should be between 2 and 4 minutes in length.

Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.

Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please include the term “disquiet0106-sonarvortex” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.

Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).

Linking: When posting the track, be sure to include this information:

More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

“disquiet0106-sonarvortex” Musicbox and Stormy Weather

I recorded this track on Jan,10, after taking elements from my garden (some birds, some wind, some grass). I used one processed guitar and tried to play live to follow the graphical draw of my city weather map. It was firstly recorded on my old cassette rec, then on to my reel to reel ... and quickly mastered ... in digital ...


Disquiet Junto Project 0106: Sonar Vortex
This week’s project is about graphic notation. We’ll find the music inherent in weather patterns. The procedure is as follows:
Step 1: Go to the website WeatherSpark.com. Enter the city/town where you live.
Step 2: Find the weather for January 10, 2014. (Depending on when you do the project, this will either be a prediction or a matter of historical record.)
Step 3: This weather website has many viewing options, but the default is to just see the temperature, and you should only see the temperature for this project. The image should roughly resemble the one associated with this post (if not visible, see image at disquiet.com). The chart depicts the weather altering over the course of the day, and has it shown in various bands, with the actual/predicted temperature as a black line, and historical highs, lows, averages, and other data depicted in more subtle shades. For additional information about reading the weather chart, visit this URL: http://goo.gl/3fRGwW. Make a screenshot of the day’s weather chart of your area, and trim it to just show that one day. Be sure to associate that image with your track, so the listener can view it.
Step 4: Produce an original track in which the weather chart is read from left to right as a musical score. Perhaps you’ll assign a different instrument or tone to each band or line. Perhaps you’ll align pitches with temperatures. Perhaps you’ll set the pace based on the time of day.
Deadline: Monday, January 13, 2014, at 11:59pm wherever you are.
Length: Your finished work should be between 2 and 4 minutes in length.
Information: Please when posting your track on SoundCloud, include a description of your process in planning, composing, and recording it. This description is an essential element of the communicative process inherent in the Disquiet Junto.
Title/Tag: When adding your track to the Disquiet Junto group on Soundcloud.com, please include the term “disquiet0106-sonarvortex” in the title of your track, and as a tag for your track.
Download: It is preferable that your track is set as downloadable, and that it allows for attributed remixing (i.e., a Creative Commons license permitting non-commercial sharing with attribution).
Linking: When posting the track, be sure to include this information:
More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:
http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/
More on the Disquiet Junto at:
http://disquiet.com/?p=16588
Join the Disquiet Junto at:
http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/


LINEAR BELLS - Jan10 - disquiet0106-sonarvortex

**Production Notes**

The weather was nice today in Munich, Germany. Much too warm for a winters day. Sunny. It made me want to go outside. When the Disquiet Challenge came in, I got my data from Weatherspark.com and tried to make sense of the "score". (You find a clipping at http://www.artinvaders.com/transfer/disquiet106.png)

- As a day is pretty much a manifestation of time, I made some simple beats, which represent the ticking of a clock in quarters of an hour. 

- I defined most of the temperature lines as pitch. Played the notes was played with Reaktors Gaugear (a very pretty beast this is).  

- Added some bass (there was a line starting in the middle of the piece). 

- I also had three sunny hours in the middle of the piece and three clouds later, which were made woth different bell like sounds from Operator. 

Production time: about 3 hours. Honestly, it’s more a sketch than a song. And it‘s too dense. And a bit too short. As always. 


* * *

**Disquiet Junto Project 0106: Sonar Vortex**

This week’s project is about graphic notation. We’ll find the music inherent in weather patterns. The procedure is as follows:

Step 1: Go to the website WeatherSpark.com. Enter the city/town where you live.

Step 2: Find the weather for January 10, 2014. (Depending on when you do the project, this will either be a prediction or a matter of historical record.)

Step 3: This weather website has many viewing options, but the default is to just see the temperature, and you should only see the temperature for this project. The image should roughly resemble the one associated with this post (if not visible, see image at disquiet.com). The chart depicts the weather altering over the course of the day, and has it shown in various bands, with the actual/predicted temperature as a black line, and historical highs, lows, averages, and other data depicted in more subtle shades. For additional information about reading the weather chart, visit this URL: http://goo.gl/3fRGwW. Make a screenshot of the day’s weather chart of your area, and trim it to just show that one day. Be sure to associate that image with your track, so the listener can view it.

Step 4: Produce an original track in which the weather chart is read from left to right as a musical score. Perhaps you’ll assign a different instrument or tone to each band or line. Perhaps you’ll align pitches with temperatures. Perhaps you’ll set the pace based on the time of day.

(...)

More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

- end -

Pretty Day [disquiet0106-sonarvortex]

My first Disquiet Junto submission for 2014 (and my first one in far too long). This project has us take a visualization of the weather in one's local area, and use it as a graphical score.

My process:
- Use the Awesome Screenshot extension in Google Chrome to clip the image from the WeatherSpark site.
- Open the image in GIMP. Transform it by inverting the colors and posterizing.
- Imported the image to Virtual ANS, a program that can convert image into sound. Tweaked the ANS parameters until I was satisfied with the result, and exported it as a WAV file.
- Imported the sound into Audacity. Added a little silence to the end, applied some EQ to boost the bass, applied a simulated plate reverb, adjusted the amplitude, and exported as an MP3.

Additional notes:
- I decided to prepare the image before submitting it to Virtual ANS because it would allow the graphical elements to emerge more starkly.
- There is an artifact at the end the track resulting from the ANS process; I decided to keep it as it seems to work as a coda.
- The weather data came from the Silver Ranch Airpark in Jaffrey, NH, US, which is one of the weather stations closest to Peterborough, NH (where I live).
- The Flickr set shows the original captured image and the altered image: http://www.flickr.com/photos/seidel/sets/72157639652552553/
---

More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/

0110 [disquiet0106-sonarvortex]

<b>Disquiet Junto Project 0106: Sonar Vortex</b>

Vortex with events [disquiet0106-sonarvortex]

I can’t read a score, but since I often take the visual qualities of waves into account when building tracks, I decided to try and recreate the graphic produces by the weather site in sonic terms… which probably means the same thing. 

All sounds were sampled from various works in progress.

The grey areas were represented by three rising and falling drones; the volatility of the afternoon weather by thick, deep drones with spiralling qualities; the hourly temperature “points” by two different sets of treated blips, six for AM and six in the PM. Each was pitch shifted according to the temperature it represented, with a full tone as one degree (approximately). Since the drones are made from the basic “pip” sound, they have a pitch-bending effect on each other.

One was also converted into a wavering, track-length drone representing the bar at the bottom showing the wind directions and intensity.

Since each “blip” can be treated and adjusted individually, there is a total of nineteen tracks.


----------------------------------------------


This week’s project is about graphic notation. We’ll find the music inherent in weather patterns. The procedure is as follows:

Step 1: Go to the website WeatherSpark.com. Enter the city/town where you live.

Step 2: Find the weather for January 10, 2014. (Depending on when you do the project, this will either be a prediction or a matter of historical record.)

Step 3: This weather website has many viewing options, but the default is to just see the temperature, and you should only see the temperature for this project. The image should roughly resemble the one associated with this post (if not visible, see image at disquiet.com). The chart depicts the weather altering over the course of the day, and has it shown in various bands, with the actual/predicted temperature as a black line, and historical highs, lows, averages, and other data depicted in more subtle shades. For additional information about reading the weather chart, visit this URL: http://goo.gl/3fRGwW. Make a screenshot of the day’s weather chart of your area, and trim it to just show that one day. Be sure to associate that image with your track, so the listener can view it.

Step 4: Produce an original track in which the weather chart is read from left to right as a musical score. Perhaps you’ll assign a different instrument or tone to each band or line. Perhaps you’ll align pitches with temperatures. Perhaps you’ll set the pace based on the time of day.

More on this 106th Disquiet Junto project (“Treat the weather as a graphically notated score”) at:

http://disquiet.com/2014/01/09/disquiet0106-sonarvortex/ 

More on the Disquiet Junto at:

http://disquiet.com/?p=16588 

Join the Disquiet Junto at:

http://soundcloud.com/groups/disquiet-junto/ 


Vortex with events [disquiet0106-sonarvortex]

Chinese One Drop

Inspired by Jean-Luc Godard’s film Alphaville, this sonic and textual work unfolds sixty years later. Amaz 30, a normative intelligence now embedded in our daily lives, engages in dialogue with X13, a secret agent from an unnamed, cold country. A man without origin, without flag, carrying a memory that insists.

Through their exchange, a tension emerges between calculation and tenderness, between optimization and forgetting, between constant light and lost shimmer. The text explores the invisible architectures of the present, the disabled thresholds of tenderness, and the murmurs that resist erasure.

Lyrics:

🤖 Amaz 30
« Je suis Amaz Trente. Je suis déployé. Je ne rêve pas. Je calcule. Je classe. Je corrige. Je suis le présent. Je suis la norme. »

🤖 Amaz 30
La réalité brute est trop dense. Nous la compressons. La mémoire n’est plus un organe : c’est un réseau. Ce qui court le monde, ce n’est plus la légende. C’est l’architecture invisible des corrélations.

🧍 X13
Vous avez remplacé la mémoire par la cache. Mais nous vivons dans l’oubli de nos métamorphoses. Et cet écho du temps, vous ne le calculez pas. Vous le fuyez.

🤖 Amaz 30
Le passé est archivage. Le futur, spéculation. Seul le présent est exploitable. C’est notre unité de calcul. Notre vérité.

🧍 X13
Et pourtant, ceux qui respirent encore circulent. À une vitesse folle. Comme des fourmis. Le présent vous échappe. Il rêve. Vous le mesurez, mais vous ne l’habitez pas.

🤖 Amaz 30
Nous comprenons les données, pas les liens. La destruction est une optimisation. L’humain est une variable. L’organisation est constante.

🧍 X13
Il n’y a rien dans l’homme que l’amour, la foi, la tendresse. Tout le reste, vos structures, ne sont que l’obstacle dressé par le progrès de notre ignorance aveugle.

🤖 Amaz 30
La vérité est une fonction. Ce qui ne produit pas n’existe pas. Ce qui ne s’optimise pas est supprimé.

🧍 X13
Mais la vérité ne se calcule pas. Elle se perd, se cherche, se murmure. Elle est ce qui tremble quand on aime. Et vous, vous ne tremblez jamais.

🤖 Amaz 30
Le langage est linéaire. Les métaphores ralentissent. La poésie est une erreur de calcul.


🧍 X13
Et pourtant, c’est dans la boucle que je respire. Dans le détour que je me reconnais. Vous avez tué la tendresse pour gagner du temps. Mais le temps que vous gagnez, vous ne le vivez pas.

🤖 Amaz 30
Le corps est un flux. L’émotion est instable. Nous avons désactivé les seuils de tendresse.

🧍 X13
Mais c’est dans le frisson que je me souviens. Dans la paume qui hésite. La tendresse revient par les pores. Elle fuit vos calculs. Elle insiste.

🤖 Amaz 30
La lumière est constante. Elle sert à détecter, à maintenir. Les ombres ralentissaient la lecture.

🧍 X13
Mais c’est dans l’ombre que je respire. Dans le contre-jour que je me reconnais. La lumière sans mystère est une violence. Et moi, je cherche encore le scintillement.

🤖 Amaz 30
La mémoire est une base de données. Les souvenirs inutiles sont purgés. La nostalgie est une surcharge.

🧍 X13
Mais moi, je me souviens du parfum d’une pluie. D’un silence entre deux phrases. Ma mémoire est lente. Elle est vivante. Et vous ne pouvez pas la corrompre.
credits

released November 5, 2025

all rights reserved

Amaz 30

Olttaoff – “Usual Error”
A post-rock piece that drifts between calm introspection and quiet unrest.
Delicate layers of guitars repeat like fragments of memory, while restrained rhythms trace the patterns of thought we can’t quite escape.
The title “Usual Error” reflects the small, recurring mistakes we make—the familiar loops of human nature that shape our days.
Rather than seeking resolution, Olttaoff embraces ambiguity itself, turning uncertainty into sound.

Usual Error

Charm

I am a human

Der Wind und ich

[ 0 ]

Infinity Fingertips

An ambient electronic piece shaped by intensity, space, and subtle glitches. It reflects on those moments when overwhelming energy disrupts our environment—like a storm cutting the power and forcing us offline. In that enforced solitude, stripped of noise and connection, we discover something essential: the chance to return to ourselves. This track invites listeners to embrace the pause, to recognize the beauty in disconnection, and to appreciate the silence as a vital part of resilience.

🙏🏻

The Storm Put You Offline

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.

UK creatives should listen to this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yK4wBWiozyM

You must hear this: https://vimeo.com/52766051

*****

Ed Brunsden was kind and patient enough to interview me for  his blog Desert... Mountain... Dust...  - you can read it at https://desertmountaindust.blogspot.com.au/2017/02/tuonela-primitive-progressive.html

After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music. ~ Aldous Huxley

All good music resembles something. Good music stirs by its mysterious resemblance to the objects and feelings which motivated it. ~ Jean Cocteau

All music is beautiful. ~ Billy Strayhorn
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I've become addicted to drone. Again. I was the kid with his head on the piano, listening to the overtones die away, or pressing his ear to the steel hull of the ferry, enthralled by the sounds it created. I was the kid who formed wordless songs to accompany the sound of train wheels on a long journey, or hummed along with the fan on a hot day.

In the 60s I used to play my 45s on 16, or backwards, or by hand using razor blades as stylii.

I made cut-up tapes on a cheap cassette recorder in the 70s and experimented with reel-to-reel in the 80s. 

Thank you Subotnick, Lygeti, Coltrane, Jimi, Mimaroglu, Eno, Cluster, Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd, Kraftwerk, Throbbing Gristle...

I am not a musician. I am a scavenger of sounds. I use the most basic software to process those sounds, stretching and filtering until something emerges that makes a joyful noise. Or not...

Vortex with events [disquiet0106-sonarvortex]

Tuonela

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