Multi-track recording of sounds made with an Arduino-based DIY synth, with four 4-bit channels and basic waveforms.  This is literally the first piece of music I've ever made, so it's very basic, structurally.  I was listening to a lot of Berlin School style music at the time (especially RedShift) and wondered how well the ambient, sequencer-heavy style would translate into something vaguely chiptune-esque.  I don't think it turned out too badly, although I bet a much better chiptune interpretation of that style could be pulled off with more practice and experience.  I was also inspired by the story of Soyuz T-13, a Soviet space mission in which two cosmonauts travelled to the Salyut 7 space station after it had been broken-down and uninhabbited for months.  When they boarded the station they found it completely without electrical power, and the walls covered in ice!  They slowly bought the station back to life over the course of days by making many manual repairs, working in gas masks and fur-lined coats but with bare, freezing hands because the repairs required too much dexterity for gloves.  Amazing to imagine!  The gradual lengthening of the higher-pitched sequence at the end of the piece is supposed to be evocative of various space station systems coming back online, bit by bit...

Tags: ambient, arduino, diysynth, experimental, spacemusic, week 5 2012, View by:Luke Maurits