cloudskipper

Sonic State - musician gear news site that has been around since the 90s
Hack a Day, Metafilter, used to be Boing Boing but they started a lot of advertising sadly

How old are you? It happened in the 60s to 90s… It’s not Indian but has some Indian music elements to some of the songs, the music in named after the beach where they had the parties.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goa_trance
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1cciUE5aefU
https://www.gqindia.com/entertainment/content/the-incredible-true-history-of-goa-gil-psychedelic-trance-and-the-end-of-the-hippy-trail

Ahhh I see, yeah there’s breath controllers which are kind of like headphones with a little microphone but it’s a wind sensor instead, but I’m looking for something to input notes. There are some new kalimba type instruments that are coming out that look quite cool, so that could be an option as well. I enjoy my kalimba but the sound is a bit limited, I usually just sit and pluck it outside to relax. Anyway, it was lovely chatting with you :)

Oh very cool! I always wanted to try one but I never got around to it, some time I should just pick one up next time I’m able. What do you use it with usually? Agree about the recorders haha, I think it turns a lot of kids off.

Yeah true, there’s also MIDI guitars but those are again pretty expensive for a decent one. I think the wind controller will be good. Maybe if I found something cheap I would rip the frets off of it but I think I would feel bad destroying and instrument I’m not Pete Townshend :P

I have no problem learning technique, I just don’t like following a lot of rules :) There’s also e-bows and things like that as well. Facebook Marketplace in my area is the most boring crap imaginable sadly.

Sadly no I never made it over there despite listening to that music for 30+ years ahah, I suppose it’s changed quite a bit now though. Anyways, it seems like a beautiful place regardless.

It’s a style of trance music that matures on the beaches of Goa India, in the 60s there was a lot of travelers to India after the Beatles and the hippies all went over there, there were some people who just stayed. Over some time people kept bringing different kinds of records to these beach parties, and some DJs began spinning some industrial/EBM music, which mixed with some weird sound effects and other records, you get an early proto trance. From there some influences came from Indian music, other electronics music going on in Europe at the time, and the psychedelic hippie culture that was still going on in Goa. Here’s some examples:

Hallucinogen - LSD - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIsVzSMRw8E
The Muses Rapt - Spiritual Healing - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VXAu_8z7hs
Prana - Indigo - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9rehcTJtGVs
X-dream - Our Own Happiness - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IE-Flmw3_4Q
Prana and Athena - Moretsu - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwiX7UhQFOc

Well, I could go on, if you would like more I’d be more than happy!

Yes :) I listen to a lot of goa trance which uses a lot of those scales, also a lot of psychedelic trance, psy dub, has a lot of different influences and uses a lot of those different scales. I think a lot of them are using loops and stuff because I don’t think the majority of them have sarod, sitar and tambura players in their studios lol. Those instruments are also quite expensive. I would love to sit down with a sitar or a gayageum which is a Korean type of zither, there’s lots of cool youtube videos of people playing cover songs on them haha.

Oh that’s a lovely show, I never got to listen to it live really but I have a bunch of recordings. There are all sorts of MIDI controllers nowadays, like wind controllers, that take your breath and finger positions and turn it into MIDI notes and velocity. Many other cool gesture controllers too. So chances are if you know an instrument there is a MIDI controller that can covert it to something a synthesizer can understand if it were to interest you.

I hope so, I’m ready at least, I dunno about you but I was an early adopter to all this junk so maybe it will just take some time for others to catch up. Thanks, I will check out the book it sounds familiar and interesting.

Oh yep, I have several Eventide harmonizer pedals, notably Pitch Factor for that kind of thing. Before I had an Alexander Marshmallow which is a real fun pitch shifter, a Meris Hedra and Red Panda Particle (granular) but I had to sell a bunch of stuff recently so I cut down on my pedals a lot.

Well, that’s a good album, but I wouldn’t necessarily call it the best ambient album or anything, it’s just the “first” or whatever. There’s a vast spectrum of ambient music from light to dark to quiet to walls of noise.

I agree with you on the last part, and I’m just as guilty about it so I can’t say a word, I just let it happen because I really thought everyone being online and talking would lead to a new universal understanding and world peace. Well, not quite that, but something near it at least. I suppose I’ve always had high expectations perhaps.

It’s getting a bit more popular these days, some of them have them built in, on synthesizers you have an oscillator pitch or frequency control that you can set from 0 Hz to 20 kHz sometimes, so you can set that up however. I have a Squarp Pyramid that has some microtonal scales built in, so I can play them on my MIDI keyboard and it uses that scale for the MIDI instrument I have selected.

I got into it through ambient music. People like Brian Eno, Steve Roach, Vidna Obmana, Steve Hillage, Richard James, Taylor Dupree, lots of IDM too.

Yeah that’s what I’m saying, would be good to have a place, but then I guess before you have that you have to have a culture that respects and would keep that place clean for everyone else. That’s really sad to hear I hope things get better than normal soon.

Keyboards, synthesizers… I’ve kinda always been into atonal or microtonal sounds. I do it mostly for my own enjoyment really I just like messing with sound :3 I am working on some less sequenced and more tonal stuff, it’s all without computers though. I can kinda play a didgeridoo too :D

Ah yeah that is kind of a bummer that you have no where to play, I think every community should have a square or something, where people can rent it for cheap for a few hours or a day or whatever, and perform their music or poetry or play or whatever. I guess we did have that, at some time, it needs a comeback I think. That would expose more people to music, they could just come and go at their leisure. People could also welcome others to play with them if they like.

This was way before youtube, but I agree on that. I actually wondered what the state of music education was after youtube since you can look up so many different educational videos, exactly what you are looking for, instead of having to learn a bunch of stuff first, since people love short cuts.

Right, good point on that last part and fully agreed, it enriches everything and it feels so good to be able to have a second voice in a way. A more expressive one that can sound any way you want. I think a lot of people feel like if they don’t have anyone to perform for there is no point, but it is personally enriching first and foremost.

I tried to take bass guitar lessons when I was a teen and just couldn’t get into it for that reason, finally the teacher just started teaching me some songs that I brought tapes of and that helped a lot more. I’m more of a fiddle around and see kind of person so I just want to interact with the instrument and see where it takes me. So, now I am into synthesizers where it’s not exactly imperative that you know any music theory at all, physics knowledge is just as helpful sometimes, and I have a lot more fun with musical experimentation that way. I would like to try to take up a wind instrument because those have always sounded so lovely to me. I guess it depends on what your aim with music is, if you want to excel and join a prestigious school and/or orchestra then you’ll need to learn all the theory, if you just want to make music you can really just pick it up and go. Virtuosos are rare despite what social media would have us believe, the rest of us need practice and experimentation. Learn the basics and then let your mind wander and experiment, come back to it when you think you’re ready to incorporate more.

From what you are describing it sounds like music education is getting a lot more rote, and just something to put on a college application or something like that. Or another accomplishment to check off, instead of being a beautiful expression of your soul. Everyone has their reasons I suppose and that’s valid.

Yeah, there are cool bikes of all sorts for sure, I would like to try sometimes. I was just saying the particular bike (harleys, choppers, big loud things) and lifestyle that was sold as freedom was anything but, those bikes cost as much as a car now.

Being from the home state of Harley Davidson, more sympathetic I could not be. I hate it lol. They have giant rallies here all the time, back some years ago there was some big anniversary and the whole city was literally filled with them. It was kinda cool but loud as hell. I had a lot of thoughts about how the thought of freedom became intertwined with the freedom of mobility and for a while the motorcycle was sold as the ultimate symbol of freedom in stuff like Easy Rider, it went from hippies into bikers and addicted a generation to leather and gasoline. They did a hell of a job with it.

Yeah that’s the whole thing, it’s not just that they think your idea is wrong, it seems like they just plain don’t want you there at all. It’s messed up. It’s not the left by any means. Those people are crazy or are pushing an agenda idk which. Maybe they just enjoy their little club.

I made one little comment about China’s social credit system and got absolutely bombarded with comments in minutes, that never happens with any other content, it is very fishy and some of the comments are so long, anyways I’ll never make that mistake again. re-blocked.

I do remember hearing that as well actually, and at a point in the late 90s early 2k it might be true. It sure seemed that way anyways.

I remember when it was like 50%. /s kinda

Humm I’m not sure, I thought it was a bit about condoms or something, haha.

I swear there is a George Carlin bit about this but I can’t find it in my super quick search, I heard it on a record when I was like 11 or 12 so it’s possibly my memory is foggy lol.