Feb 2022 ambient unease calm tapeloop zecooploops 4-track cassette
Cassette Tape Loop number 2 is a *little* more calm and ambient... but with all the wobble that is inherent to cassette tape loops, it is never completely serene. As the tape plays, it struggles to maintain balance and order, speeding up, slowing down and stopping at random times. There is a calmness that never truly calm. Sound familiar?
I used my Boss RC-20XL looper pedal to set up single note based drones made with my Agile Les Paul, the Lovepedal Eternity overdrive, EHX Canyon delay, MXR analog chorus, Hermida EPH-3 tape delay and EHX Oceans 11 reverb. I played each note using both settings of my EBow to drone harmonics and recorded the 'single note' based drone onto a cassette track.
Then, I repeated this with another note in the chord onto the next cassette track, until I had four distinct "notes" on each channel of the 4-track. This song is made up of one minute of each track, stacked onto the one before.
I threw two different reverb effects on top of everything, in my DAW (Reaper) to give it a lot of space.
Relax. Close your eyes. See what happens.
The four individual tracks are here if you want to explore
https://files.fawmers.org/FAWM_2022/zecoop/ZeCoopLoops2_IndividualTracks.mp3
@gubna Apr 2022
I listened to this about 4 times in the past hour. Just keep hitting play. Great!
@gilhari Mar 2022
I love the results and I love this method of music making. it is fascinating and has such a cool ambiance.
@mosley Feb 2022
I love how this piece grows, and the tone and quirks of the cassette just add so much vibe, I love it
@abudabard12514 Feb 2022
This is like waiting at the space bus stop in a galactic neighborhood that you don't know very well and aren't super comfortable with yet. All the signs are in languages from beyond your capacity to perceive communication. It's raining a little but the rain isn't water, it's not sticky but it seems like it would be, from the color. It's got a smell like car battery ice cream. You look over to see some locals shielding themselves from the rain by breathing in until they puff up then expanding out like leathery beach balls and repelling the rain back up into the sky. As a result the shine from the streetlamps on the 4 dimensional time ground reflect rainbows with impossible colors and shades of octarine in all directions. Eventually the bus arrives. They only take exact change so you end up spending $1.50 more than you actually needed to. You're alright with that, you don't know the exchange rate for interstellar money.
@danvaillancourt Feb 2022
Super cool. The warbles and pitch fluctuation make this super special. I really like it!
@guatecoop Feb 2022
WOW. Another really strong feeling in this one, though it is definitely more calm than the first one. The wobble makes it pretty unsettling, really. This is great!
@karlsburg25 Feb 2022
I really want to see a video of you creating these things. I am literally fascinated by the tape loop as its something i never done. It must be so much fun. Part of me listening to this wants to go back to my uni days, have a few crazy mushrooms and sit in room with many like minded people going "Wow" ;-) . The great thing is by the end i can hear a brand new chord brought into the world. Woohoo
@slawbleu Feb 2022
I love that this is a lot different from the other loop piece, but still the same aesthetic...and still a bit terrifying (especially after the 3:00 mark or so). So much great unpredictable movement going on (thanks to the tape), even though the basic chord doesn't change.
@halfwayhome Feb 2022
The sound of a fleeting thought stretched out for generations.
I imagine.
I am now relaxed in torment. Thank you :)
@pike Feb 2022
I love this, very disconcertingly relaxing. I'm jealous of your tape deck, I bet it's a lot of fun to play around with like this.
@vomvorton Feb 2022
@adforperu is spot on with the GY!BE comparison, this feels like being trapped in a frozen Canadian warehouse with a bunch of anarchists who SEEM friendly, until you all go for coffee and you're the only one to ask for dairy milk. Excellent experiment!
@gubna Feb 2022
this is cool and actually very inspiring to me. I like stuff like this a lot! I don't know if I'd make an actual tape cassette, but I might try something like this with my loopers.
@judypie Feb 2022
Sounds like angry orcas to me! 100% we’re underwater. I played an underwater based horror game a while ago.. forget the name but this scary shit would fit perfect!
@unkept Feb 2022
Love the weird sounds of the tape speed changes, thanks slot for sharing this experiment and atmosphere you've crafted!
@w1n Feb 2022
Another cool and atmospheric track, really like your tape loop experiment based song. Just put on the headphones, closed my eyes and enjoyed.
@dreamscuba Feb 2022
This is superb, very haunting and atmospheric and strangely calming. Thanks for the detailed description on the gear used...
Very impressive tape loop creation. This is really art. Nice.
@bachelorb Feb 2022
This is crazy!!!! I think I heard the stop. To me it was kind of a Mars landscape kind of calm. I’m going to have to try doing this!! My eyes and patience are probably more suited to my r2r though......
@adforperu Feb 2022
'Uncertain Calm' - yeah sounds about right. Real GY!BE kinda feeling about this, I half expected some long-lost spoken radio transmission to fade in. Really enjoyed that sound with the tape drops around the 2 minute mark.
@aeye Feb 2022
These are super cool and funny enough this is something that would have reaaallly been useful for one of the earlier tracks we posted haha. I like the creativity behind the drones and just experimenting with sound.
@thedutchwidows Feb 2022
Ooh, these are so good. This one’s definitely getting used!
@jacobeverettwallace Feb 2022
This is eerie and nervy in an oddly tantalizing kind of way. Very darkly cinematic which I like a lot.
@tuneslayer Feb 2022
"Uncertain Calm" is right. I think I like it but I'm not entirely sure why. Which is fine; if I sat down and tried to analyze it I might find I was wrong, and that would suck.