OC V2 - Lag Time Generator / ARP 2600




Mark Thibideau - LAG TIME GENERATOR


My long journey with the ARP 2600 began in the early 90’s.
After finding out that Depeche Mode used one and my favorite producers (Flood) had one, I knew that I eventually wanted to own one of these machines. Upon the first time I played with the 2600 i knew I was going to have this machine for a long time. It made so many strange sounds that my other synths couldn’t do, and with the offering of modular patching, my head could explode from sound making possibilities. The Arp synth offers a aggressive and big sound that can scream at you, commanding attention.
For lag time generator, I used this synth for all sounds, drums and even a lot of the processing ( built in spring reverb and processing through the preamp, filter and ring mod).
Making music with this machine is always fun and interesting. always getting sounds that are unexpected and unique.

Mark

OC V2 "Foraup"



When I was a young boy/man, I drove motorcycles. I had two Yamaha 125cc motocross off-road machines, and a 400cc road bike. I enjoyed the feeling of acceleration by being thrust through open space.
There was a feeling of solitude and peace, as I was so carefully wrapped in leather and plastic. When driving, I was enveloped in the rising and falling pitch of the engine vibrating through my skinny 16 year old body.
One day this solitude was interrupted by a minivan. Traffic had backed up considerably &, as I turned the corner, it had just begun to rain. I was an inexperienced rider and applied the brakes too quickly and began to slide on the newly slippery oil soaked pavement. In slow motion, I began to gently lay the bike on the road but not before rear ending the back of that minivan. The motorcycle fell to the left and the gas tank split my femur in half.
I was rescued by that poor minivan driver, and a group of military personnel, who happened to be driving behind me. They held my leg in place on the highway until the ambulance arrived. I was in shock, shivering and shaking. They saved my life. Right next to the femur there exists a large vein, which when severed by a splintered bone, can cause one to bleed to death within minutes.

I am pretty lucky.
These days I get my kicks in different ways.
love, Jakob
(Obsolete Components)

"Foraup" is being released as part of Obsolete Components 2nd techno music compilation "volume 2" on November 28th 2011. Available on Itunes, Beatport, and What People Play.
All sounds derived from a Yamaha DX100 FM synthesizer, serial number #23160.

soundcraft

OC VOL II /Electric Lairs /Glitterbug


Electric Lairs 

 "Electric Lairs" is entirely based on the Yamaha CS15. No other sound sources have been used. Besides EQs on the channels, I only used some reverb, tape delay and a little bit of compression on the bass drum part. Also, I didn't sequence it, all parts are played live and recorded and mixed in Logic Studio.

I love the CS15, and it's one of the synths that has stayed with me throughout all studio changes. Generally, I don't really like to keep a lot of things around, and I believe in "traveling instruments"- I buy something, use it for a year or two, and let it go again to replace it with something new. I love the idea that especially vintage instruments travelled through the hands of generations of musicians and were an inspiration to many. Very few instruments actually remain with me for longer periods. 

 My CS15 is one of these instruments that I will never let go of. Mine also has a bit of a sad story, since before me it was owned by Christian Morgenstern, who suddenly died in 2003. A mutual friend, Falko Brocksieper, was asked by Christians parents to take apart and sell off his studio after he passed away, and Falko asked me if I would maybe like to have this very particular one. I took it and loved it ever since.

The CS15 basically does not sound like anything I have ever heard elsewhere. It's noisy, it's dark, it's unpredictable and it sounds of electricity to it's very core. It's not a necessarily a very pleasant synth, but it has character and patina, it's a sound universe on it's own, more so than pretty much any other synth I have ever put my hands on. That might also be one of the reasons why many people actually can't really relate to it; it's also quite hard to program since a lot of parameters work and sound totally differently than one expects. 

And here some pictures of the baby that this track came to life through (Photos taken by Ronni Shendar):


Glitterbug




OC VOL II / Partial / Matt Thibideau


Partial
I made the track Partial using our newly fixed Synclavier PSMT system. It has 32 voices of stereo sampling, 16 voices of FM synthesis, the full blown sequencing and re-synthesis system. Things can get really complex .
I decided to work with it because, even though it samples, it has this massive sound and adds a great quality to everything you sample into it. This is due to the very expensive military grade convertors and Analog VCA's on every voice card. There are very few modern hardware samplers that enable you to record at 100khz.
This machine has become one of my main go to samplers in recent projects including the song Partial for OC II.
Partial was entirely composed internally with the Synclavier's sequencer and mixed in an analog environment. I used samples I recorded from a vintage buchla modular synthesizer that resides at OCAD. It's a very different synthesizer that can sound FM in some ways. I took many samples of the recordings and shaped all of the sounds within the synclavier to make up everything from the drum sounds to chords and pads. Enjoy!
Matt Thibideau