A couple of years ago, I spent some time learning how to use Apple Logic software.
Most of the stuff I recorded was sequenced MIDI, with some of the instrument sounds coming from standard Logic patches and others from custom Sculpture or EXS24 patches.
I also did some heavy manipulation on some of the tracks, just trying all kinds of things to get familiar with Logic.
Track info.:
- Phaunckah (3:37) – Pass the collards, please.
- Nature Boy (2:26) – I thought it would be funny to do an un-natural version of “Nature Boy.” (song copyright 1947 by Eden Ahbez)
- Arne Saknussemm (3:30) – Legendary explorer in Jules Verne’s Journey to the Center of the Earth.
- Mu (2:14) – The keyboard sounds like the one on Sun Ra’s tune “Mu.”
- Elf Percussion (2:36) – Tiny drummers.
- Jaunty (3:48) – Somehow this sounds jaunty.
- Polyester (2:00) – Pure 1970s plastic. The vocal shouts are canned in Logic software.
- Mandibles (1:00) – Seems like what a preying mantis’s thought processes might sound like.
- Creacher Dance (1:24) – Inspired by the house elf Creacher in the Harry Potter books.
- Mercury (0:38) – This was not played in real time.
- Thonk (1:28) – The bass sounds like it’s going thonk.
- Old Growth (3:20) – Represents an old growth forest, or a wise person who’s grown very old.
- Mandibles Piano (1:00) – Just for fun, the original unmangled keyboard version of “Mandibles.” No changes were made to the notes for the transmogrified final track (#8 above).
This is a screen capture from Logic showing the key mapping used as one technique for modifying “Mandibles”:
Goethe wrote that architecture is frozen music – this pattern looks something like a cityscape, so maybe this supports that idea. Or maybe it’s just a random interesting shape.
