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Blues for a Red Planet

from Synchronicity by ThinkingMetal

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This is a favourite piece mainly because it was composed very quickly indeed, more or less spontaneously, in just twenty minutes. There was no plan, no design, no motive. Just a feeling that a piece of music was lurking quietly, off stage, and that given the right conditions it would emerge fully formed as though one were an archeologist unearthing a specimen with just a brush and a trowel, coaxing the delicate remains from the earth. Apologies to Stephen King for blatantly lifting that meme.

In truth, I was waiting at home for a friend to visit and, for one reason or another, he was running late. I was between projects and I didn't want to get started on a new piece of work only to be interrupted after a couple of minutes, and so I started messing about with a small step sequencer and my JD800, hunting for that elusive tune.

The simple repeating bass pattern came first, followed by the drippy tap sequence, hence the tracks alternative name, The Drippy Tap Song. The sequences are using a cyclic function and so each takes some time to repeat, creating that sense of long, complicated variations. Both sections were recorded and then copied a few times inside my editor of choice, Audacity, to give the piece a rough form and structure, and then I added a couple of chord washes over the top to give the music a sense of flow and motion, something to push the tune forwards. They too were copied a few times but, because each was a different length, the pattern never repeats. Is this lazy composing or just a useful tool?

A melody followed, as did the rhythmic sections and some extra choral washes to just add that certain fullness and, well, that was it, finished. Job done. If only all of my compositional projects would flow as smoothly.

The song did phenomenally well and was incorporated into the Desktopography compilation disc, Rainy Day, released in 2013, which did extremely well.

credits

from Synchronicity, released April 1, 2019

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ThinkingMetal Sunderland, UK

Thinking Metal has been composing and producing electronic music since 1995.

Our music has been licensed in 100+ countries.

Listen & enjoy. It's actually not all that bad once you get used to it...
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