500 Million Years From Now

Posted on August 11, 2009 by John CS Keston

dots It was recently estimated by Edward Guinan at the XXVIIth General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union that our lonely planet is nearing the end of its habitability for life as we know. Albeit, on a cosmological timescale. Between .5 and 1 billion years from now, increases in the Sun’s temperature will cause the Earth’s oceans and atmosphere to evaporate.

Shortly after reading this article I opened up my Ableton Live set from Sunday night to listen to some of the loops I had captured with the GMS during the show. After opening the document I pressed play and heard a stark landscape of reverberation. I saw visions of a lifeless, peace 500 million years from now.

What had happened was that when saving the document I had left all my master effects in their last position. I decided to capture these sounds and vary them over time. The effect chain on the master track included a low pass filter, bit reduction, delay, and reverb with nine parameters mapped to knobs on a controller. Here’s what I ended up with on the second take.

500 Million Years From Now

Precambrian Resonance on iTunes

Posted on August 10, 2009 by John CS Keston

Recently my solo project, Ostraka, became available on the iTunes Store. Now it’s possible to buy individual tracks. My label partner, Unearthed Music, only sells full albums rather than individual tracks. At such a low volume the transaction fees make individual track sales impractical. That’s why we let Apple handle it for us. Right now the album is floating around in the lonely outskirts of cyberspace, with no ratings or reviews. If anyone is so inclined, please consider visiting the link below to deposit feedback.

Precambrian Resonance on iTunes

Ostraka with Dial System Live

Posted on August 4, 2009 by John CS Keston

5tgr5tdry My new duet, “Ostraka with Dial System” (John Keston and Graham O’Brien) is performing at the Kitty Cat Klub in Minneapolis on Sunday, August 9, 2009. This group combines the stochastic, angular melodies produced by the GMS with live drumming. Gestural video input is simultaneously projected onto a screen and processed into musical data. The results are captured in real-time and molded into spontaneous compositions. Special guests include DJ Zenrock and Terr the Om.

To get an idea of what you might hear, have a listen to these examples from a rehearsal recording that was made in May, 2009.
Ostraka with Dial System Jam #2

Ostraka with Dial System Jam #3

365 Sounds in 365 Days

Posted on July 28, 2009 by John CS Keston

regis_fire_diamond Today is the official release date for Precambrian Resonance. As I mentioned, the release is timed with my 365th sound posted on Audio Cookbook in 365 days. For my 365th sound I am presenting Fire Diamond. It is track number thirteen on the album. Whereas most of this release is a departure from my usual approach, in my opinion, this track is the most similar to my previous work out of any others within this collection. I hope you enjoy it and the rest of the album. Thanks to everyone who helped me complete this work, especially Nils Westdal, who proved to me that introspective music can be beautiful through his albums, Flavor Country, and Transdimensional Bypass.

Listen to Fire Diamond on Last.fm.

Last.fm Preview of Blitzen Machine

Posted on July 24, 2009 by John CS Keston

Blitzen Machine is one of the first tracks that I finished for Precambrian Resonance, and one of the few that includes a keyboard solo, although I’d describe the solo as melodic passages with improvised variations.

Regular ACB listeners might hear sounds that were originally One Sound Every Day entries, like AM Radio Static. I also included techniques that I described in Robot Music and in Robot Conspiracy as a basis for the track. For this album I essentially have an online diary that describes how each of the pieces were produced, the concepts involved, and sounds used right here on Audio Cookbook.

Listen to Blitzen Machine on Last.fm.