This album is a collection of some of my work from 2012-2014, previously released under another artist name. These are the pieces that, in terms of style, I feel like I maybe would have made yesterday — but with much more experience, a different set of instruments and a rather different workflow. I felt they deserved to see the light of day once again.
With those extra years of experience, I remastered these tracks — in some cases adding touch of additional distortion, saturation, reverb, or other effects within limited frequency ranges in order to bring them out, in addition to fixing some minor technical issues and adjusting EQ and dynamics for fuller sound.
The recordings were made using 100% software. The host would have been FL Studio, but I couldn’t tell you what most of the synth or effect plugins I used. I would almost certainly have sequenced everything in MIDI piano rolls, in some cases not even able to render the full track in real-time, although some of the MIDI was recorded from controller performances rather than drawn in with a mouse.
Another thing that has changed since then is the use of samples. I used many more sample-based instruments at the time, and also some vocal samples. The song “Ode” here is a spooky rendition of Keats’ “To Autumn” using public-domain recordings from archive.org. I used FL Studio’s sample slicer to chop it into individual syllables or words, and let their timing be quantized (or otherwise disrupted a bit), giving it a more halting feel than the natural rhythm of the original. I was also known to load samples into a synth that expected single-cycle waveforms, resulting in very busy
Why “vol. 1?” I am currently working on a possible vol. 2. If I choose to release it, it will cover my favorites from 2016-2017. During that period I recorded over 380 pieces as I re-introduced myself to hardware synths, then got into modular. They were experiments and practice in sound design, technique and expression, which helped me to narrow my stylistic focus.
The cover art is a public domain photograph from Pexels by Le Thanh Huyen. For once, I only cropped it and added the title. Several photographers captured a similar scene under differing lighting conditions, possibly different seasons etc. but this was my favorite among them.
The album was released on Wep Ronpet (Opening of the Year), Year 34 of Kemetic Orthodoxy. In ancient Egypt, the dawn of Ra on the New Year, emerging from caverns under the earth, was the most important festival on the calendar. Di Wep Ronpet Nofret!