The Anthropocene: The Age of Mankind

An ocean that contains as much plastic as fish, an atmosphere filled with CO2 choking the whole mankind and mass extinction of animals. The destructive influence of mankind will be at least as disastrous as the asteroid element that wiped the dinosaurs off the planet. Reason for Dutch scientist Paul Crutzen to introduce a new geological period: the Anthropocene, or the age of mankind.

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FM Synthesis

FM synthesis is short for frequency modulation synthesis . Simply put, FM synthesis uses one signal called, the “modulator” to modulate the pitch of another signal, the “carrier”, that’s in the same or a similar audio range. This creates brand new frequency information in the resulting sound, changing the timbre without the use of filters. FM synthesis can create both harmonic and inharmonic sounds. To synthesize harmonic sounds, the modulating signal must have a harmonic relationship to the original carrier signal. As the amount of frequency modulation increases, the sound grows progressively complex. It was discovered in the 1967 experiments of John Chowning at Stanford University. At first, Chowning was using complex waveforms to modulate the pitch of simple sine waves. This resulted in supersonic signals at frequencies over a million Hertz. [FISEA 1988] Workshop: John Chowning, Zack Settel & Ernst Bonis – FM-Synthesis/Psycho-acoustics. Yamaha...

Genesis P-Orridge

Last month, industrial performance artist and provocateur Genesis P-Orridge performed her final concert at London venue Heaven. It wasn’t just a farewell to her audience, but also a means for Genesis P-Orridge to bid farewell to herself. Recently she told the New York Times that the course of her chronic myelomonocytic leukaemia meant that she had “less optimistically, a year, maybe six months. And then I’m on the downward slope to death”. As with the Fall’s Mark E Smith in January this year, it’s difficult to imagine the UK music underground without this constant fixture. The death was confirmed by Genesis's daughters, Genesse and Caresse, the musician and artist, who had been battling leukaemia for two-and-a-half years, was 70. “It is with very heavy hearts that we announce the passing of our beloved father, Genesis Breyer P-Orridge,” Caresse and Genesse P-Orridge said in a statement shared online. “S/he will be laid to rest h/er other half, Jaqueline “Lady Jaye” Brey...

Don Buchla

Buchla formed his electronic music equipment company, Buchla and Associates, in 1962 in Berkeley, California. He was commissioned by composers Morton Subotnick and Ramon Sender , both of the San Francisco Tape Music Center, to create an electronic instrument for live performance. Buchla began designing his first modules for the Tape Music Center in 1963. His inventions were prized for the flexibility and richness of the sounds they produced and the possibilities they suggested. Mr. Buchla disliked the term “synthesizer,” which suggested to him a synthetic imitation of existing sounds. The instrument was named the "Buchla 100 series Modular Electronic Music System," and was installed at the San Francisco Tape Music Center in 1965 and moved to Mills College in 1966. Subotnick completed his first major electronic work, Silver Apples Of The Moon , with another unit that Buchla had built and shipped to New York. He was best known for the many devices he designed for ...

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