I am Ashley Elsdon

someone who's doing some things

Tag: music

I love music. Making music, listening, talking about it and anything else too.

Inception: The Soundtrack

Posted by on in Films, Listening, Music

I am somewhat obsessed at the moment by Inception. The film, the app, and now I’ve bought the soundtrack too, which is a very good one by Hans Zimmer. But in some ways it just isn’t as good as using the Inception app, which is a much more immersive experience.

Increasingly I find that I prefer reactive and generative music to linear music or recorded music. I think also that it’ll be a prompt for finally getting into doing some RJDJ scene work and Pd building.

Milkytracker is on Android now!

Posted by on in Making things, Mobile Applications, Tech

Who knew? Not me that’s for sure anyway! And, what’s more, it appears to be compatible with my old Orange San Francisco. Excellent. I shall download that and then maybe not really use it for a while then dramatically rediscover it in a few months.

Sounds like a plan doesn’t it?

Fun with Mixtikl

Posted by on in Creative Process, Mobile Applications

One of the applications I’ve always wanted to spend more time with is Mixtikl. It is such a deep and complex application for iOS or Mac, or any other platform for that matter. I spent almost two hours with Mixtikl today, and enjoyed it so much. Even so I know that I’m still just scratching the surface of what this application is capable of.

I love the generative possibilities and the ability to set rules within each cell. It really does stretch the limits of what you can do with mobile music.

The other thing I love is the ability to be able to tweet a mix and share it instantly.

I’m looking forward to even more time with Mixtikl and going deeper and deeper with what it can do.

Inception (the app this time)

Posted by on in Listening, Mobile Applications, Sounds, Tech

I’ve been using this off and on over the last few days and I think I’m actually enjoying it more than I did when it first came out. I’d deleted it off my iPhone so I’d lost all the ‘dreams’ that I’d unlocked, but that doesn’t really matter.

I really love the whole augmented audio concept, and couple with the fact that I really love Inception the movie, the app is a natural fit.

Haven’t got on so well with their Dimensions app so far though. Perhaps I should give it another try.

Today’s listen: Dali’s Car, The Waking Hour

Posted by on in Listening

I can still remember when this first came out. I was so impressed, even though it is a relatively short album, and their only release, it was an amazing listen and still is to this day. Not just for Karn’s fantastic bass and Pete Murphy’s amazing voice, but the range of textures and rhythms that each track has.

It is such a shame that Mick passed away before they could make a wholly new album. There is some material as yet to be released, and I hope that’ll be this year. It’s a must buy for me, but if you don’t know the Waking Hour, then you should.

http://rcm-uk.amazon.co.uk/e/cm?lt1=_blank&bc1=000000&IS2=1&bg1=FFFFFF&fc1=000000&lc1=0000FF&t=thepeoplofthe-21&o=2&p=8&l=as4&m=amazon&f=ifr&ref=ss_til&asins=B001MTX0DC

Back to Reaktor

Posted by on in Creative Process, Making things, Tech

I decided that I really should get better acquainted with Reaktor. I’ve had the software for ages, and aside from a little tinkering with it I’ve done very little. So I’ve started at the beginning again and decided to work through the tutorials before I dive in to make anything for myself.

Happily it all came flooding back to me when I got to it, and I was able to get going very quickly. One thing that surprises me though is that there seems to be no book about Reaktor. You can find books on almost all other major music applications, but none on Reaktor that I can find anyway.

Not that I’m planning to write one you understand.

More Karn

Posted by on in Listening

I’ve been continuing to listen to Mick Karn’s albums over the last few days. The first two are really the ones I love the most, and his work after that was interesting but I didn’t enjoy it as much with one or two exceptions.

Having said that it’s been really good to listen to his work again and enjoy it together as a complete body of work. I think there’s a lot to be said for that, and this might become an annual occurrence.