Unrest - modular synth ambient piece by POB [feat. Qu-Bit Electronix Bloom]

☉ U N R E S T ☉
by Patrick O’Brien “POB”
Free download on Bandcamp:
pobenergy.band...
THE STORY:
Capturing a moment of Summer 2020. Feelings of isolation, the civil unrest, the pandemic, the lost sense of time, and the longing to connect with each other.
While there's no defining tempo, the crawling pace represents the ongoing days in quarantine and how, at times, little seems to change.
0:05 Low airy drones represent the long and heavy breaths of the Earth as it continues to rotate day and night. The white noise that accompanies the breath expresses the corrosive parts of our air, whether it be smoke from fires, air pollution or COVID-19 spraying the globe.
0:14 A series of melodic sequencing plucking up and down in a semi-random pattern reminds me of the chatter of humanity - whether it's Black Lives Matter protests, politics, the pandemic, or mask shamers -- sometimes patterns make short little melodies where we have come together to make progress. The overall voice is muffled, only breaking the filter every now and then, representing the speeches, news briefings, or people screaming at each other.
3:47 The heartbeat is introduced, not sure where to land in the melodic structure but gets comfortable with a rhythmic pump.
8:49 The last voice comes in strong, echoing over all the sounds introduced before it. It cries out a message for peace, justice, a cure, to be loved, and to be with the ones you love.
12:32 As the voice sits in an isolated moment, it becomes instantly enlightened, portrayed through a series of arpeggiated notes, before tumbling back down to reality.
14:18 The voice finds the path to take, as the other voices are brought back into the mix - as if they never stopped. As our heroic voice begins to carry out the mission, it suddenly disappears, leaving its future a mystery.
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STEREO
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The patch uses 4 voices (Surface, Elements, Loquelic Iteritas, and Mangrove). As I started patching the first two voices, I stopped down to start recording, then patched the rest from scratch. This patch all stemmed from spending time manual-diving with the Qu-Bit Electronix Bloom.
PATCHING TIMELINE:
0:05 Starts with Elements with those long breathy tones, triggered by Noise Engineering Bin Seq that gates every 4 beats from the 4ms Quad Clock Distributor, which gets the master clock from 2HP’s Clock.
0:14 The Qu-Bit Electronix Bloom creates the unbelievable diverse nonrepetitive sequences to the Qu-Bit Electronix Surface throughout the piece. The Surface is also filtered by Qu-Bit Electronix’s Tone as separate stereo L and R channels to create unique panning effects CVed by the 4ms Quad Pingable LFO. The 2HP Clock is fed to Malekko’s Varigate 4 where the probability changes between eighth notes randomly. The triggers then feed Bloom’s clock.
3:47 The pulsing heartbeat is slowly introduced and finding its place in the patch, which is Noise Engineering’s Loquelic Iteritas with Erica Synths Black LFO as the VCA.
4:26 Aching heartbeat solo with Loquelic Iteritas.
5:38 Bloom/Surface reintroduced.
6:47 The walk away, giving the beast some generative time.
8:49 The main event: the Mannequins Mangrove’s powerful entrance. Melody sequence is created manually with Sputnik’s Modular Keyboard.
12:34 Arpeggiation solo with Sputnik’s Modular Keyboard, recording a CV pattern live to the LS1 Lightstrip midway through.
14:18 Reprise.
The entire piece is sent through Noise Engineering’s Desmodus Versio stereo reverb.
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I am Patrick O'Brien aka POB performing in Los Angeles.
Inquiries/Contact info: pob energy @ gmail
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Recorded August 26, 2020 in Los Angeles, California.