Electronic Music 411 - Meek FM Typographic Synthesizer

05/16/08 + Zanf

An interesting project:

Recent Blog: first impressions (moans, glitches and suggestions)

05/18/08 + actuel

it's apparent papalote you're only viewing this from you're own vantage point and interests. it's shame when we start casting judgement because something doesn't personally peek our own framework. also, is it really vanity? (really?)

i dunno man, i think you're argument is weak and short-sited. the MPC could have been xxx, Live could have been xxx, Robert Moog could've not invented the Moog, you could've xxx, etc. this game is perpetual and to no real end, let alone worth using for the purpose of supporting your perspective.

if you don't like or aren't interested then wonderful, move on, but because you don't see personal use doesn't mean it's pointless. it just doesn't server you...simple. i'd like to point out that Archimedes, Thomas Adams, Galileo Galilee, Thomas Edison, and many others experience much of the some ridicule and cast-off drivel you're shoveling. i'm not saying MeekFM is inline with the above mentioned but merely that without folks inventing and fusing the world would be a very different place.

are you working on your geometric form of synthesis? cause that would sooooo much cooler. :D much better than a stupid topographical FM relational visual/synth. (sarcasm)

Recent blogs: Richard Devine Interview + Song..., ems 2006

edited: May 18 2008 + nagrom

nagrom: i'm not arguing on whether or not it's well done. i'm sure it's well done, i'm sure it's amazing as well ... but what would be the difference in sound, in the outcome, for example, actuel: of playing with this device versus playing with a step sequencer that reads off of toilet paper? where you can adjust the sensitivity to read not just the embroidery on the page, but the very fibers of the paper itself? come on guys.

(my comment about it being well-done was not in response to your criticism, it was a less-extreme criticism of my own)
1. "the outcome" of synthesizers does not always have to be electronic music. This particular device is also an installation (this is mentioned explicitly) and a beautiful synthesizer. It's like fixed-gear bicycles. Sure the output of a bicycle is _movement_, but for some people a beautiful bicycle is an end in itself. If we were living in a world where anybody who wasn't make music was wasting their time, then taking the extreme opinion that you have would make sense.
2. if you were using this thing to make electronic music, you would make different music than if you were using a toilet-paper-roll sequencer. Different gear leads to different sounds. (But if you were simulating a brain with a Turing machine made from a huge roll of toilet paper with stones placed on it to mark 1's from 0's, would it be conscious?)
But I still think it's silly.

Recent blogs: Interview: Mark N./Bloody Fist Records, Je Suis en Montreal, Electronic Music Search Engine

05/19/08 + flies

i like it b/c it's a twist on an old idea: going from image to sound. The twist is that the images they picked have 'graph structure', with nodes and conectors between nodes, plus shape/geometry. seems to me the alphabet is a fine choice for an interesting set of graphs.

The main thing i don't like about it is that it's rigidly loop-based. This makes it pretty useless for me.

@papalote: it's about as useless as a painting, i guess...

Recent blogs: grade school, bohdan pacynsky, meditate?

05/19/08 + nagrom

You guy should check out the link I posted to "Different Strokes". It's essentially the same thing, except you can just draw the shapes instead of having to use predefined ones.
Yeah, flies, it seems that the alphabet was chosen just because it's a preexisting set of shapes -- and probably he wanted to be able to show the thing to both synth-geeks and typographers. Double your audience with just one arbitrary decision!

Recent blogs: Interview: Mark N./Bloody Fist Records, Je Suis en Montreal, Electronic Music Search Engine

05/19/08 + flies

nagrom: link smaples or stfu!

Recent blogs: grade school, bohdan pacynsky, meditate?

05/19/08 + nagrom

download it and try it for yourself! Or check out Golan Levin's Ted talk: link

Recent blogs: Interview: Mark N./Bloody Fist Records, Je Suis en Montreal, Electronic Music Search Engine

05/19/08 + flies

bah trying things yourself is for wusses (with osx). levin is pretty cool. one thng that kinda bothered me was the way everything was monotimbral. the development was poor, kinda similar to a jam band performance i saw once where the guitarist soloed, and when he finished his musical phrase he just changed effects and started a new solo.

That said, there were some really cool parts. The 5-6 minutes after the vector shapes (~7.5 minutes) were the best, especially the attractor color dots beginning around 8.75 minutes. Some of the visuals were cool, some weren't, they all reflected the action of the music well.

Recent blogs: grade school, bohdan pacynsky, meditate?

05/19/08 + flies

it was particularly disappointing to see him say 'i wanted to show what computers can do that people haven't thught of before', and then begin with an exact rip of xenakis from the 70s...

given, that quickly morphed into something new and different. the beginning was the weakest part for me.

i'd like to see him in a group improv setting, tho, definitely. his variability would be a strength there.

Recent blogs: grade school, bohdan pacynsky, meditate?