The weblog of Vlad Spears: musician, science fiction hero, Max/MSP/Jitter gangsta, Daevl incarnate. Currently engaged in fast action on slow sculpture, I have an ongoing love affair with animism as an approach to creativity and an affinity for all things automata, gridded or digital.

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All written material on 2Second(fuse) authored by Vlad Spears is published under the Creative Commons Some Rights Reserved license, unless otherwise indicated.

 

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Create and Disseminate!

020070223 23:12 •

Dan Nigrin, sonic headmaster at Defective Records, has developed something special in Major Malfunction: an intuitive, multi-effect embodiment of disorderly conduct for Ableton Live. It’s fairly bristling with experimentation and fun FSU.

I’m currently at work on an ultra-top secret project for Sir Jeremy Logickal, and have been using Major Malfunction extensively on rhythm beds and layered string-like tracks.  Definitely slap it on basslines for instant click and cut.

Major Malfunction mangles source audio by triggering 5 effects plus a pass-through and random effect choice in an adjustable 64 step, bpm-synchronized sequencing grid.  In the image below I’ve shortened the grid to 16 steps and am adding entropy with the brilliant random effect in the last track.

Major Malfunction from Defective Records - partial screenshot.

Full screenshot from the Defective Records site.

The effects sequencing above rotated a slightly pitched down Casio SK1 disco rhythm from cultural repetition to artistically unrepeatable:

Casio SK-1 Major Malfunked (0:24, 44.1KHz, 128bpms, 565k)

Major Malfunction is massive FSU packed inside a single, very inexpensive plug-in.  If you’re an Ableton Live user into glitchy, mangled audio, Defective Records has a downloadable demo waiting for you right now.