like pebbles in a stream
from Shapes & Time by Lullatone
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about
Lately when people say “stream,” they probably mean a kind of broadcast on the internet. But if I say stream, I definitely mean a tiny little river - and that’s exactly the kind of stream I recorded part of this track in.
I knew I wanted to make a song that built up layer by layer. By chance, our buddy, Knobs, had just sent us a Habit pedal that can do nice overdubbing loops. With the settings right, you can get the loops to subtly devolve over time. Instead of just repeating, they get smudged each time they come around.
Which made me think, instead of only focusing on the building up, we couldn’t neglect the smoothing down - like rocks in a river.
Luckily our son was really into collecting rocks when he was little so we had a lot of “instruments” on hand. I recorded rubbing them around underwater - once for the left side and once for the right. If you listen with headphones it should feel like pebbles are rolling all around you.
I also wanted to record the final guitar sounds underwater using the tiny stream in front of our studio. I put my phone in a plastic bag and dipped it underwater, playing the guitar recording through its speaker. With a mic in another bag, I tried to record the sound. But the bag ripped! The mic fell into the muddy water and totally stopped working. (In the end I used an old GoPro as a mic to still get those muffled, low-pass, wet tones perfectly though.)
Later, back at the studio, as I was trying to salvage the wet mic with a blow dryer, I wondered if it was worth it to do such a silly experiment for an effect I could recreate on a computer so easily. But then I remembered, doing irrational stuff like this makes me the kind of person who thinks about fish and pebbles and not upload speeds when I hear the word “stream.”
”ストリーム”というと、最近はインターネットの配信のことを指すと思う。
でも僕がストリームと言う時は、小さな小川の事を間違いなく意味する。
そしてこのトラックは、僕の意味するストリームの中で録音した。
レイヤーをたくさん重ねた曲を作りたかった。たまたま友人がループをダビングできるHabitペダルを送ってくれた。正しくセッティングするとただ同じ音が繰り返されるだけじゃなく、毎回少しづつぼやけた音になってループが作られる。ただ重ねるだけじゃなくて、小川の中にある小石のように滑らかに音を積み重ねようと思った。
ラッキーな事に、うちの息子が小さい頃石を集める事が大好きだったので、家にたくさん”楽器”があった。水中で、石をこすり合わせた音を右側と左側で両方録音した。ヘッドフォンで聞くと、小石が自分の周りでゴロゴロ転がっているように聞こえると思う。
それからスタジオの前にある小川の中で、最後のギターの音を録音したかった。携帯からギターの音を流して、プラスチック袋に入れて小川に入れた。もう一つの袋にマイクを入れて録音しようとした。その時、マイクの袋が破れてしまった！泥水の中に落下したマイクはもう使い物にならなかった。（最終的には古いGoProをマイクとして使って、湿って籠った、低い完璧な音が録れた。）
水に落ちたマイクをドライヤーで乾かしながら、同じような音はコンピューターで簡単に作れるのに、こんな変な実験をした意味があったのかと考えたけど、こういう合理的じゃ無いことをやってるから、”ストリーム”と聞くと、アップロードのスピードじゃなく、魚と小石の事を考える人間になったのだと思った。
I knew I wanted to make a song that built up layer by layer. By chance, our buddy, Knobs, had just sent us a Habit pedal that can do nice overdubbing loops. With the settings right, you can get the loops to subtly devolve over time. Instead of just repeating, they get smudged each time they come around.
Which made me think, instead of only focusing on the building up, we couldn’t neglect the smoothing down - like rocks in a river.
Luckily our son was really into collecting rocks when he was little so we had a lot of “instruments” on hand. I recorded rubbing them around underwater - once for the left side and once for the right. If you listen with headphones it should feel like pebbles are rolling all around you.
I also wanted to record the final guitar sounds underwater using the tiny stream in front of our studio. I put my phone in a plastic bag and dipped it underwater, playing the guitar recording through its speaker. With a mic in another bag, I tried to record the sound. But the bag ripped! The mic fell into the muddy water and totally stopped working. (In the end I used an old GoPro as a mic to still get those muffled, low-pass, wet tones perfectly though.)
Later, back at the studio, as I was trying to salvage the wet mic with a blow dryer, I wondered if it was worth it to do such a silly experiment for an effect I could recreate on a computer so easily. But then I remembered, doing irrational stuff like this makes me the kind of person who thinks about fish and pebbles and not upload speeds when I hear the word “stream.”
”ストリーム”というと、最近はインターネットの配信のことを指すと思う。
でも僕がストリームと言う時は、小さな小川の事を間違いなく意味する。
そしてこのトラックは、僕の意味するストリームの中で録音した。
レイヤーをたくさん重ねた曲を作りたかった。たまたま友人がループをダビングできるHabitペダルを送ってくれた。正しくセッティングするとただ同じ音が繰り返されるだけじゃなく、毎回少しづつぼやけた音になってループが作られる。ただ重ねるだけじゃなくて、小川の中にある小石のように滑らかに音を積み重ねようと思った。
ラッキーな事に、うちの息子が小さい頃石を集める事が大好きだったので、家にたくさん”楽器”があった。水中で、石をこすり合わせた音を右側と左側で両方録音した。ヘッドフォンで聞くと、小石が自分の周りでゴロゴロ転がっているように聞こえると思う。
それからスタジオの前にある小川の中で、最後のギターの音を録音したかった。携帯からギターの音を流して、プラスチック袋に入れて小川に入れた。もう一つの袋にマイクを入れて録音しようとした。その時、マイクの袋が破れてしまった！泥水の中に落下したマイクはもう使い物にならなかった。（最終的には古いGoProをマイクとして使って、湿って籠った、低い完璧な音が録れた。）
水に落ちたマイクをドライヤーで乾かしながら、同じような音はコンピューターで簡単に作れるのに、こんな変な実験をした意味があったのかと考えたけど、こういう合理的じゃ無いことをやってるから、”ストリーム”と聞くと、アップロードのスピードじゃなく、魚と小石の事を考える人間になったのだと思った。
credits
from Shapes & Time,
released November 11, 2022
license
all rights reserved
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