Free book about a friendship I’ve learned a lot from. A good friend is more enriching than we realise. A good friend challenges, stretches and encourages us. A good friend lifts us up from the dirt, and says, “come on, you, let’s go together, you and I, and face it”.
Written, performed, recorded in 1 hour. My 2 year old broke the family electric guitar, and about 9 months later I finally got it fixed, so I am writing some of the kind of music that’s in my blood - punk, metal, thrash, hardcore. Laid down guitar in Garageband, and used Garageband’s virtual drummer, then “sang”
Live looping album recorded using a Boss RC20XL pedal, a Cort 6 string bass and an acoustic guitar. All a bit experimental and winged on the fly. Standard! I gigged some of this stuff, it was a trainwreck and I almost flung my bass in a skip on the way home!
Funk, electronic, rock and weird Primus-y style bass stuff. Made during my summer holiday between 2nd and 3rd year of university. I think this is the first album I made on CD instead of cassette.
Collaboration with Matt Rimmer from Vibration White Finger. The production is all over the place but this are still some of my favourite songs I’ve ever co-written.
A really puerile tape where I recorded my mates farting and made a song out of it. Pretty sure Ben, Dave, Tom and Rem were on this recording, sounds like a few others too?
Recorded whilst my youngest child is feeling unwell in time snatched in between checking temperatures, fetching drinks and ice lollies and bringing blankets.
I found a sonic sketch on my Tracker from last week’s kids’ BJJ class that I’d hated at the time but listening back I liked the filthy distorted over-the-top bass so I removed all the melody (which wasn’t sitting right) and started again from the bass.
The K2 (MS20 clone) sequenced by a Polyend Tracker. No effects at all, just into an audio interface. Dirty dark industrial droning. I’ve heard of making gradual, gentle adjustments and I still have no truck with it.
Electro-dub-reggae produced on #polyendtracker . I sampled my new Behringer K2 for the siren and synth lead, and sampled my Behringer Pro-VS for the stabs and chords.
I had 30 minutes whilst the kids were watching the end of a movie. I scampered into the studio, wired the Behringer Brains oscillator through the Gristleiser I built and made a quick track.
I was wondering if I could kind of make a Behringer Grind by using the Edge as a sequencer. Well, kinda! Only 8 steps but I can trigger patch changes and gates with it.
First jam with the Brains. It’s sequenced with an Oberkorn which is sequencing pitch, exciting the low pass gate, and sequencing morph parameter and engine. I’m also using a quantiser, not sure what scale it’s set to!
Been feeling rough lately, not much energy at all, but as the skies began to bruise in this kingdom of rains, I managed this moody Saturday evening tune.
I started this track on 28th Jan, but it didn’t sit right. The mixer I use is primarily for church usage, and I had a couple of services I needed it for, and when I got home I couldn’t be bothered to recable it all… So there it sat! I didn’t do any music for two months, I was more busy fixing things and writing games.
I built a FuzzDog SpectreVerb pedal, which I completed this morning. I modified it with the “dwell” mod which allows it to go into self-oscillation. I did this little track with a Behringer TD-3-MO, a Behringer RD-6, and this pedal I’ve built :-) Also using an analog mixer this time, which is nice for the NIM-style parts of this piece.
My kids have been calling everything and everyone “Nannenbaws” recently, I have no idea what it means. This techno track is made live using the Analogue Solutions Oberkorn analog sequencer along with the Behringer Edge percussion synthesiser.
Just got back from church prayer meeting, feeling full of joy and energy despite the horrors of the world, because God is in control and Jesus is coming back. How can anyone have peace without that assurance? As hard as life is, the hope of the Gospel is an anchor for the soul.
Before I was properly awake I had a little acid improv session. A random pattern, with some simple 909 clone action and some improv keys… I’m all over the place but I’m enjoyin me’sen, innit!
Using the TD-3-MO to generate a kick drum. TD-3 through hand built octave master and blue moon phaser. Snare from RD-6 through hand built delay. Hats from RD-6. Reverb is a HoF.
I discovered no input mixer music this week, and gave it a go! No input mixer music means you make music from feeding the mixer back into itself, generally through effects pedals; there are no external instruments.
Chaotic, fuzzed-out, glitchy industrial/electronic dawless improv. The main synth is the Make Noise 0-coast, driven through a hand-built Green Ringer and a hand-built Reasonably Good Mangler. The other synth is a simple Eurorack voice pushed through a hand-built phaser.
Gloomy dungeon synth meets house. Lead line from Make Noise 0-coast, sequenced with Oberkorn analog sequencer. I played the bass/pad live (which is why there are so many fluffs!), it’s an NW1 wavetable oscillator.
My first play with the Make Noise 0-Coast semi-modular synth. This thing’s a beaut when combined with the Oberkorn analog sequencer! The additive approach of adding overtones and harmonics is a pretty new world to me; I’ve used a wave folder before but not had this level of flexibility.
Ducking the bass by using triggers from the RD-6 to trigger an inverting envelope which I’m then voltage offsetting. Lead line/texture from nw-1 oscillator, which I’m tweaking live. I also adjust the ducking amount and rate live.
Messing with sequence lengths on the Oberkorn. You can almost play this thing like a guitar…. The first track of CV goes to the NW-1’s pitch via a quantiser module. The other two CV channels modulate some of NW-1’s parameters.
Metal version of my favourite Christmas carol, “Little Donkey”. Although there’s no Biblical evidence that Mary rode a donkey, one day a donkey and her colt WOULD carry the King of Kings into Jerusalem - it was prophesied in Zecheriah 9 and the fulfilment of that prophecy is recorded in Mark’s Gospel, chapter 11, Matthew 21, and John 12.
Live acid improv using Behringer RD-9 (909 clone) and TD-3-MO (303 with Devilfish mod clone). I missed quite a few of the drops on this track - dropping bass in on beat 2 instead of 1 - but it’s always great fun to make acid. I used chorus on the TD-3-MO
I set my cupboard studio back up! I own about 50% as much Eurorack gear as I used to. Already regret selling! Kick from an SR16. The SR16 is funny over MIDI; the claps on the RD6 interfere with it sometimes. Bassline is TD-3-MO through some chorus.
I like some of the sounds on the Alesis SR-16 but I don’t enjoy the sequencer. Thankfully, it speaks MIDI so I was able to drive it from the RD-8. In this sketch, I blend the analog RD-8 with the SR-16 in real time.
Using: - Behringer RD-8 drum machine - Bitcrusher pedal I built from a kit - Echo Blue Delay pedal I built from a kit - Great Warship I built from a kit - Reverb pedal I built from a kit
I built a Bitcrusher pedal this weekend and used it on the RD-6 drums. Melody line played on a TD-3 through Octafuzz and Echo Blue Delay pedals that I built
I’ve built some effects pedals lately, from kits from Jed’s Peds and PedalParts (FuzzDog). Here I use a Great Warship Fuzz and a Echo Blue Delay on a Korg Monologue. Reverb is a HoF.
Clipping all over the place! That’s a shame. My little Behringer UB202 audio interface doesn’t have heaps of headroom, so it’s quite hard to get a lot of level without clipping, but this is the worst I’ve ever known it on a recording I’ve done. It’s because I had a lot going on - analog beats from the Behringer RD-9 (909 clone) and the TD-3 (TB-303 clone) which is pretty raunchy with the accent/resonance. Some compression would have helped here! Ah well, it was a fun jam.
Some chord patterns I’ve been playing with. It’s coming off a bit My Bloody Valentine, and a bit Justin Broadrick… I like it! The drums are just the 8-beat pattern on the Mooer GE-100.
Experimenting with the modulation matrix on the Behringer Deepmind 6. Lots of subtle (and not so subtle!) modulations in here, and I just get so much joy from playing this keyboard. “On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. “ - Jesus Christ
Beats on RD-6. Snare’s going through a Behringer reverb pedal, gated setting. Keys on (damaged, volume pot’s bust) Monologue. FX loop via Church Reverb setting of a TC Electronic Hall of Fame reverb, which arrived yesterday and sounds great I still can’t play keyboards with any degree of skill, so I’m mostly just banging notes in and hoping they settle into the reverb!
More polymetric rhythms from the Elektron Model:Cycles. I just love playing with this sequencer! It’s only a 1 bar pattern but through differing track lengths, probability-based sequencing and conditional triggers, I got a much more lively sounding song.
My 4 year old daughter recorded a story about her cat teddy, “Mittens”, which I then re-amped through a vocoder, which I played using a Korg Monologue as a controller. I set it to a beat on an RD-6.
My 2 year old triggering the TD-6 drum machine, my 4 year old on Volca Keys and me bashing away on a Korg Monologue. All day the little one has been saying “I’m Sky Mice!” and no idea what she means but now it’s our band name :-)
3 layers of Korg Volca Keys played live, with beats from a TD6. I’m starting to play chords, my timing isn’t great but I’m starting to feel more at home on a keyboard. Long way to go though!Vocals from the Sky Mice.
Layering Korg Monologue synth sounds on a 4 track, and only hearing the track I am recording. I thought it might be interesting to see what came out, and I notice that I often time things the same, even though I couldn’t hear the other tracks.
I got a Korg Monologue yesterday, and I decided to use it as a drum machine! What an amazing synth, incredibly versatile. Made me feel like a superstar DJ dropping beats in and out!
Dark synth pop moody jam. I don’t often listen to music these days but the last couple of days I’ve listened to a lot of synth stuff and really enjoyed it, this is something of an attempt at a synthesis of that input! I deliberately tried to make the bass filter fuzzy and drifty, enough PWM and discordant blend to get that classic vintage vibe. I wish I had a few more modulation sources but that’s part of the fun sometimes - improvising!
This was better whilst I was composing it, but then the kids wanted to play and it kind of lost momentum and they reprogrammed the TR6! Snare pattern got a bit annoying on listening back to this but there are some nice sounds in there at times, hence the track title! I’m enjoying having arps from the Keystep, it’s a fun way to work.
I was on holiday this week, and took my Pocket Operator. I sampled my brother and my lil nephew along with the classic Amen Brother break and cut it all up into a little junglist sonic collage.
sequence from the Oberkorn, played the lead line live on the NW1 via the Beatstep, percussion samples from the Pocket Operator My 2 year old tinkered with some parts of this so technically a collaboration!
First jam in months… Contains a sample of Carter from the Unsafe Space podcast. We’re in a very nihilistic era. There is hope, though. There is Truth and He’s knowable!
Sampled both my RD-6 and a cheap Yamaha keyboard into the Pocket Operator and made a simple track out of it. After making this beat, I quickly sickened with Covid-19 and spent nearly 36 hours straight in bed sweating and shivering!
5 minute jam on a Pocket Operator PO-33 - recorded a few seconds of my kids playing in the bath then sliced it up and sequenced it. Played a little melody based on a sample of me making a noise, pitched up.
Feeding channel 1 into the clock speed to get swing on the Oberkorn. I sync’d out to the RD-6 and got it to do swing by setting the resolution to 1PPS.
Waldorf NW1 vocal sample sync’d up with a bit of help from my mate Jon - the secret was controlling the wavetable position with an envelope with just the right amount of offset.
A bit of an iteration on my last track, went for a pentatonic so it was less spooky and attenuated the delay to reduce the clipping, then I added some beats.
Using the Oberkorn for the sequence into the Dreadbox Hysteria with the quantise mode on, and tapped the pulse out into the White Lines oscillator and played with pitch for oscillator sync effects.
My youngest daughter had a toddler ragefit this evening and this song was my calm down time afterwards! Simplest patch I’ve ever recorded - just a slightly off sinewave, with a bit of LFO modulation, into a low pass gate, into a crossfader with a delay, into the mixer with a reverb.
Inspired by a guy on the Internet (who did it much better than me!) I’ve built all my synths into a cupboard to keep them away from the kids! Using the Oberkorn to ping a LPG to generate percussion, then using envelopes to modular the filter, I got a shuffling squelchy groove going. I used the Oberkorn’s third CV line to modulate its timing which gave me a shuffle, which I enjoyed
Trying to sync up Circles and Oberkorn - didn’t come out how I planned it but that’s always the fun! Heavily compressed the snare and hats for part of the track using the Waldorf compressor module Getting some nice sounds out of the Dreadbox Hysterial by finding sweet spots on the PWM. Maybe the wasp filter was a bit full on for this jam, but it was fun!
Had a bit of a false start with this one - track kicks in around 20 seconds in! I don’t know why I always default to acid techno on equipment! I banged out a quick acidy number and then tried this downtempo moody jam
Made some of my own percussion using an attenuverting mixer, an LFO, an AR envelope, a trigger delay and coloured noise, and mixed it with the rest of the ‘rack
Some polymetric riddims from the ‘rack. Realised I can send different levels of volume into low pass gates to get more human-sounding melodies, rather than everything being at a uniform level
Vocals by Lil Nephew. Sequenced on the Beatstep Pro, bassline is going through the Wasp filter - absolutely LOVE this filter. It does incredible sub-bass but I had to edit that bit out because the waveform went all square on screen! Used an oscillator and S+H module as a bandulu bitcrusher
One quantised melody pushed through 3 oscillators tuned to an A minor chord - or, at least, they were until the baby kicked off and I had to go upstairs and try to settle her!
Mixing noise and atonal melody through the A-Logic, then randomising the filter, and putting one quantised and one unquantised lead line in the stereo channels. Delay for everybody!
My two year old helped out with this track - she did her first Eurorack patching here! Some of the volume spikes are her “modulating” the audio interface :-)
In terms of sheer value for money, the Doepfer dual trigger delay is right up there - combined with a pair of cheap low pass gates from Takaab, you have a great “sort-of-delay” effect for bouncy callbacks
A (nearly!) all-behringer, all-red funk jam! I used the TD-3 for the bassline, through a Behringer octaver pedal for more body. The “lead” bit is through the Neutron. I didn’t realise it was all-Behringer until I had recorded it! The drums are from the Arturia Drumbrute Impact.
An acid jam on the TD3 and Drumbrute. My first experience programming patterns into the TD3, it’s quite fun actually, bit of a weird interface but that’s the appeal IMO.
I used the TD3 as a “master” here - I hooked the CV and gate into Eurorack and built a voice, and what do you know, the tracking is fantastic - well done Behringer!
Took delivery of a Behringer TD3 today and I LOVE IT! Had to sell some modules to buy it, worth it though! Beats from the Drumbrute. Performed live, no overdubs. Samples Kanye West’s interview with Zane Lowe - www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuOCvKvrwI8 . TD3 is a bit hummy here, I used too much gain on the desk and too little on the TD3, so next time I use it it’ll sound cleaner.
D-day veteran Harry Billinge gave an incredible interview on BBC News recently, speaking movingly of his love for his brothers in arms and his saviour Jesus Christ. Harry’s urgent message of love is as timely now as ever.
I’m using the sequential switch all the time now, on this new track I used it to cycle through 4 different levels of voltage going into the filter, and blended that with an inverted envelope to get quite a tubby bass sound.
Lead from the Neutron. Bass comes from cycling through the waveforms of the White Lines oscillator using a sequential switch with every 4th bar left empty. Stabs from the other white lines through the audio divider.
More experiments with the Synthrotek sequencer, plus using the Doepfer slew limiter to get more interesting articulation - nice that you can put slew on, say, ascending tones (voltages) only, creates cool effects.
Used a pure analog sequencer here - and what fun it was! The random function is great fun, it seems to jam on random steps for a few beats before moving on. No quantising, just random knob positioning!
Some good sounds in here through the Doepfer audio divider but my kids kicked off just before I was about to record so I couldn’t really get in the flow of it properly… Oh well.
I used a Pico A-Logic to get more interesting modulations from two LFOs. I routed this into two in sequence attenuators so I could get some minimal pitch modulation and it made this swelling didgeridoo like bass sound. I blended this through the filter on the Neutron and ran a sequencer at audio rate to generate the bleepy computery sounds and hand-modulated the rate at which I was clocking the sequencer to get weird variations.
Earlier this year, I wrote a series of stories about a fictionalised version of my mate “Robbo”. These stories became increasingly silly and forumulaic, until I had the idea of feeding them through a Markov chain to generate a new story.
I use music to record how I’m feeling, what’s going on in my life and my family, and as a buttress against passivity. I thought I’d do a to-camera video on that topic, inspired by the thoughtful modular synthesist justrichardcharles
It’s a pretty bananas effect! VCA/VCF, tremolo, distortion/fuzz. The internal LFO has 4 waveforms - square, triangle, saw up and saw down (is one of those called sharktooth?). It was designed by a chap from the legendary industrial maniacs Throbbing Gristle, hence the name.
My wife’s amplifier was broken so I tookdd it apart and fixed it. And it worked! But then it blew up. So I built a new amp based on the simple “Ruby amp”.
It often seems like tech thought leadership is the equivalent of being in the playground and contending that “Mr T always beats Superman” and doubling down on it constantly. “Approach X is the golden hammer!”
I was asked to speak to residents of a retirement community about this very precious passage. It tells us a lot about who we are, who Jesus is, and the hope that we have in approaching Him for mercy.
This multimeter was beeping. I know they beep, but it was beeping just at me in such as the basic environment of the room. It was beeping when it was off, beeping when it was off. Then it wouldn’t turn on at all. In the innards I found a duff fuse, but was it a poisson rouge?
I bought a broken C64 mini from eBay, hoping for an easy fix. It was described as not powering up. After many hours gazing through my microscope looking for shorts, my kids suggested I “put something else” in there… So I found a Raspberry Pi 3 that I thought was busted but actually turned out to work fine when I gave it enough amps, and installed RetroPie on there…
I bought this Atari 2600 Jr as spares+repairs. It didn’t power up, and when I persuaded it to power up, I found a number of other problems whilst jabbing at it with my tools…
I found this CPC 464 plus in a skip about a year ago. I hadn’t tried to power it on until recently… And I went on quite the journey towards getting it up and running! There was a rather insane gotcha along the way!
I bought this kit just over a year ago, and I finally got around to building it! In this video, I go through the whole journey of building an effects pedal from a kit from start to finish, including the soldering, unit testing, enclosure drilling and painting, assembly and final testing. It’s a really cool delay-ish echo-ish reverb pedal that, with the mod, can go into self-oscillation for atmospheric soundscapes.
How does one solve a puzzle box when the key to the puzzle is within the box? This is the glasses repair experience for the myopic man! One of the bridge pieces broke off my glasses - can I fix it?
I’ve wanted a function generator for a while. They can be useful for testing circuits by feeding in a known frequency and testing to see if it degrades (for example). Amazon sold me one for £6.99. I shouldn’t buy things from Bezos, really, but I do, and SO DO YOU. Probably.
I bought this Atari 2600 as spares+repairs from eBay. It came with 2 controllers, TV cable and a power supply - which was busted. This wasn’t a hard fix but I did make an explosion… Never copy me, I have NO IDEA what I am doing!
The Nutribullet I’ve had for about 9 years started to shriek at me. I didn’t like this. I put it in a cupboard. But then I took it OUT of the cupboard and tried to fix it!
I was given an XR-12 by a kind Christian brother (thanks Steve!) for use in church. I’ve got a moderate amount of experience with audio and computers, so after a bit of learning the ropes at home, I am confident with it. However, most of the folks at church who will be using the new mixer won’t have had much exposure to such things. So, it seemed a good idea to get a simple physical interface that is closer to the aging analog desk the XR is replacing.
Ryan from @leadbylies brought me this faulty Focusrite Clarett Octoplus to look at. It had been shutting itself down, and getting worse and worse, to the point where it wouldn’t power on at all.
I bought a second hand faulty SNES for £27 on eBay. It wouldn’t power up, and what’s more, the top half of the casing crumbled to bits as I opened it! Lots of plastic rattling around? Can I fix it?!
I bought a Sega Master System 2 on eBay for spares+repairs. The description said that the sound was “fuzzy” and it was actually just white noise… This video is the tale of tracking down that fault and maybe… Just MAYBE… fixing it?!
I bought a Pixel Chix car as spares+repairs from ebay. I did a bodge fix at first by cleaning the battery contacts in-situ, and it worked intermittently but was unreliable, so I attempted a “proper” fix….
There are many good desires in the Christian heart that may not come to fulfilment, but God through Solomon grants us great peace and rest about those matters.
You’ve probably heard a lot about Britain, about how the inner cities can be a bit… stabby? You may also have heard that British people don’t legally have the right to defend themselves… Well, I’m glad to say that’s nonsense! Here are a couple of ways you can defend yourself!
I have always wanted an Atari 2600. Not the original VCS with the wooden cheeks, but the sleek black plastic wedge. It was something about how they looked… I was rummagin’ on eBay and found one in spares+repairs.
Why can’t we punch or run in our dreams? American friends tell me their bullets in their dreams just dribble out of their guns! Does this point to our helplessness against spiritual entities? What (or who!) can protect us in our dreams?
In some circles it’s common to hate on “cultural Christianity” but what better evangelism is there than for people to grow up in the church, hearing the Word, observing the sacraments, being amongst God’s people?
The sun is shining, I’m breathing, my heart is beating, I have food, drink, clothes, a roof, employment, am not currently broke, I have the riches of friends and family. There are not currently bullets and bombs going off in my street. But this isn’t why I have hope.
When I speak to beginner musicians, they often seem shy about playing with other musicians. How do you know you’re ready? And, for Christians, when are you ready to join a church’s worship team?
I built an envelope filter from FuzzDog (PedalParts). It turned out really nice! I used to have an EHX Bass Balls back in the day and I like this better!
Paypal’s user agreement added a creepy clause, there was outcry, they removed it… Then they snuck it back in. I cancelled my account and called them to repentance.
I got a 3D printer, used it a few times, and was lax about using gloves/fumes etc, but then freaked out a bit about the ABS and chucked it all in the garage for a bit… Then I calmed down and decided to figure out how to use it more safely.
I changed strings from roundwound to flatwound and filmed and explained the process. I also covered the basics of tuning the instrument, wearing in new strings, and then took the restrung bass for a test drive :-)
A dozen or so different styles of bass lines, applied to the same simple 2-chord sequence (G-C). This is just to give a bass player a few ideas about how different styles of bassline can affect the feel of a song. Of course, there are infinite options for basslines, this is not an exhaustive (or particularly high quality!) list!
Hear a few different styles of plucking/picking/“right hand” on the electric bass guitar. This isn’t so much a tutorial as “hey here are some sounds you can make if you want”! Pick haters are haters.
I’ve been playing bass nearly 30 years. I’m not brilliant or anything, but I want to share what I know, particularly for the youngsters in my church coming up learning the instrument :-) In this video I talk through what the bass guitar is, how it fits in to music, how to get started, a few notes on buying a bass, and a little demo of how to practise, then a little example of how I practise.
I built a super simple opamp based boost pedal using a kit from eBay. There’s a tiny little piece of stripboard in there with the components soldered to it.
On the times we’re living in. The “great reset”. Possible election fraud. Churches who have abandoned the clear testimony of Scripture. Cultural suicide. Industrial scale abortion. Fake man-centred righteousness. Hubristic utopianism. Sounds pretty familiar to Bible readers… How then should I respond?
I like reading. I like getting better at things. The two are, in my view, intrinsically related. This shouldn’t be a revelation to anybody! However, one weird thing stops me from reading as much as I’d like to…
Earlier this year, I wrote a series of stories about a fictionalised version of my mate “Robbo”. These stories became increasingly silly and forumulaic, until I had the idea of feeding them through a Markov chain to generate a new story. I then routed this as audio through my Eurorack modular gear to make bizarre “not really music”.
An anti tutorial about me, a novice, building a Kubernetes cluster on Raspberry Pi by essentially catapulting myself headlong into a solid wall of incomprehension until the wall broke. Then I wondered why I did it.
Understanding things is hard. Explaining things is harder. This article intends to help you communicate and reason with clarity using simple questions to contextualise your work. It’s written with software in mind but is more broadly applicable.
The Open Door is a weekly breakfast and community primarily for the homeless and vulnerably housed in the Cardiff area. I gave a brief talk on Mark 9:17-26 on how to deal with doubts and struggles.
The Open Door is a weekly breakfast and community primarily for the homeless and vulnerably housed in the Cardiff area. I gave a brief talk on Matthew 16:13-16. It’s not intended to be a watertight apologetic argument, more a way to start people thinking about who Jesus is.
I was recently introduced to a young person who was looking to make her own games. I had a brief conversation with her sharing my experience of making indie games in the first decade of the 2000s, and I thought I would write down what I see as the key points.
I was asked to speak at a church service in Cardiff. Here is the message I gave. I’m not a trained preacher but did my best to speak the truth as I understand it.
After reading “The Importance Of Being Earnest” on the train back from Birmingham, I feel moved to reassure you all that my girl’s surname is NOT “Bunbury”…
Sat on a second hand sofa I ponder on who He is And wonder surges in my heartFrom an ever-deepening well of gratitude I look up towards the light And my curtains seem to me as stained glassAnd my home feels like a cathedral Echoing my whispered word of thanks …
In the Bible, this guy James writes about the tongue, saying “a small rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot chooses to go, even though the winds are strong…
This morning in church was harvest festival and instead of having some fossilised bread and a soup tin mountain the pastor brought us some alarming statistics…
I don’t mean literally, obviously, I mean figuratively. I mean, if my eyes weren’t in my head, then bees could get in, and that really would be terrifying. Bzz.
The Sky Mice themselves designed the concept and sprite work for this Arduboy platform game! My kids (5 and 4) designed a little video game for the Arduboy open source 8 bit platform with 1 bit graphics. The children did the sprite work (graph paper!) and game design, I just implemented what they described! It’s playable in-browser :-)
A highly fashionable shoot ‘em up, where Thomas the rotating horse takes on hordes of creatures to avoid turning into a running shoe. Maybe in May! Playable in-browser.
The most realistic simulation of Amoeboid combat ever devised! Old ladies battle men holding sausage dogs! Animation by the amazingly talented Jonathan Reynolds. Playable in-browser.
“They’re coming… they’re… everywhere…” Squad based RTS where you battle zombie hordes. Sprites by Andrew Canham. Music by Davey J and myself. Playable in-browser.
A classic Streets Of Rage style beat ‘em up where a young boy has to face his own nightmares. Beautifully animated by Mark Bankhead. Playable in-browser.
Recorded whilst my youngest child is feeling unwell in time snatched in between checking temperatures, fetching drinks and ice lollies and bringing blankets.
I found a sonic sketch on my Tracker from last week’s kids’ BJJ class that I’d hated at the time but listening back I liked the filthy distorted over-the-top bass so I removed all the melody (which wasn’t sitting right) and started again from the bass.
The K2 (MS20 clone) sequenced by a Polyend Tracker. No effects at all, just into an audio interface. Dirty dark industrial droning. I’ve heard of making gradual, gentle adjustments and I still have no truck with it.
Electro-dub-reggae produced on #polyendtracker . I sampled my new Behringer K2 for the siren and synth lead, and sampled my Behringer Pro-VS for the stabs and chords.
I use music to record how I’m feeling, what’s going on in my life and my family, and as a buttress against passivity. I thought I’d do a to-camera video on that topic, inspired by the thoughtful modular synthesist justrichardcharles
I had 30 minutes whilst the kids were watching the end of a movie. I scampered into the studio, wired the Behringer Brains oscillator through the Gristleiser I built and made a quick track.
It’s a pretty bananas effect! VCA/VCF, tremolo, distortion/fuzz. The internal LFO has 4 waveforms - square, triangle, saw up and saw down (is one of those called sharktooth?). It was designed by a chap from the legendary industrial maniacs Throbbing Gristle, hence the name.
I was wondering if I could kind of make a Behringer Grind by using the Edge as a sequencer. Well, kinda! Only 8 steps but I can trigger patch changes and gates with it.
First jam with the Brains. It’s sequenced with an Oberkorn which is sequencing pitch, exciting the low pass gate, and sequencing morph parameter and engine. I’m also using a quantiser, not sure what scale it’s set to!
My wife’s amplifier was broken so I tookdd it apart and fixed it. And it worked! But then it blew up. So I built a new amp based on the simple “Ruby amp”.
It often seems like tech thought leadership is the equivalent of being in the playground and contending that “Mr T always beats Superman” and doubling down on it constantly. “Approach X is the golden hammer!”
I was asked to speak to residents of a retirement community about this very precious passage. It tells us a lot about who we are, who Jesus is, and the hope that we have in approaching Him for mercy.
Been feeling rough lately, not much energy at all, but as the skies began to bruise in this kingdom of rains, I managed this moody Saturday evening tune.
This multimeter was beeping. I know they beep, but it was beeping just at me in such as the basic environment of the room. It was beeping when it was off, beeping when it was off. Then it wouldn’t turn on at all. In the innards I found a duff fuse, but was it a poisson rouge?
I started this track on 28th Jan, but it didn’t sit right. The mixer I use is primarily for church usage, and I had a couple of services I needed it for, and when I got home I couldn’t be bothered to recable it all… So there it sat! I didn’t do any music for two months, I was more busy fixing things and writing games.
I bought a broken C64 mini from eBay, hoping for an easy fix. It was described as not powering up. After many hours gazing through my microscope looking for shorts, my kids suggested I “put something else” in there… So I found a Raspberry Pi 3 that I thought was busted but actually turned out to work fine when I gave it enough amps, and installed RetroPie on there…
I bought this Atari 2600 Jr as spares+repairs. It didn’t power up, and when I persuaded it to power up, I found a number of other problems whilst jabbing at it with my tools…
I found this CPC 464 plus in a skip about a year ago. I hadn’t tried to power it on until recently… And I went on quite the journey towards getting it up and running! There was a rather insane gotcha along the way!
I built a FuzzDog SpectreVerb pedal, which I completed this morning. I modified it with the “dwell” mod which allows it to go into self-oscillation. I did this little track with a Behringer TD-3-MO, a Behringer RD-6, and this pedal I’ve built :-) Also using an analog mixer this time, which is nice for the NIM-style parts of this piece.
I bought this kit just over a year ago, and I finally got around to building it! In this video, I go through the whole journey of building an effects pedal from a kit from start to finish, including the soldering, unit testing, enclosure drilling and painting, assembly and final testing. It’s a really cool delay-ish echo-ish reverb pedal that, with the mod, can go into self-oscillation for atmospheric soundscapes.
How does one solve a puzzle box when the key to the puzzle is within the box? This is the glasses repair experience for the myopic man! One of the bridge pieces broke off my glasses - can I fix it?
I’ve wanted a function generator for a while. They can be useful for testing circuits by feeding in a known frequency and testing to see if it degrades (for example). Amazon sold me one for £6.99. I shouldn’t buy things from Bezos, really, but I do, and SO DO YOU. Probably.
I bought this Atari 2600 as spares+repairs from eBay. It came with 2 controllers, TV cable and a power supply - which was busted. This wasn’t a hard fix but I did make an explosion… Never copy me, I have NO IDEA what I am doing!
The Nutribullet I’ve had for about 9 years started to shriek at me. I didn’t like this. I put it in a cupboard. But then I took it OUT of the cupboard and tried to fix it!
My kids have been calling everything and everyone “Nannenbaws” recently, I have no idea what it means. This techno track is made live using the Analogue Solutions Oberkorn analog sequencer along with the Behringer Edge percussion synthesiser.
I was given an XR-12 by a kind Christian brother (thanks Steve!) for use in church. I’ve got a moderate amount of experience with audio and computers, so after a bit of learning the ropes at home, I am confident with it. However, most of the folks at church who will be using the new mixer won’t have had much exposure to such things. So, it seemed a good idea to get a simple physical interface that is closer to the aging analog desk the XR is replacing.
Ryan from @leadbylies brought me this faulty Focusrite Clarett Octoplus to look at. It had been shutting itself down, and getting worse and worse, to the point where it wouldn’t power on at all.
I bought a second hand faulty SNES for £27 on eBay. It wouldn’t power up, and what’s more, the top half of the casing crumbled to bits as I opened it! Lots of plastic rattling around? Can I fix it?!
I bought a Sega Master System 2 on eBay for spares+repairs. The description said that the sound was “fuzzy” and it was actually just white noise… This video is the tale of tracking down that fault and maybe… Just MAYBE… fixing it?!
I bought a Pixel Chix car as spares+repairs from ebay. I did a bodge fix at first by cleaning the battery contacts in-situ, and it worked intermittently but was unreliable, so I attempted a “proper” fix….
Just got back from church prayer meeting, feeling full of joy and energy despite the horrors of the world, because God is in control and Jesus is coming back. How can anyone have peace without that assurance? As hard as life is, the hope of the Gospel is an anchor for the soul.
There are many good desires in the Christian heart that may not come to fulfilment, but God through Solomon grants us great peace and rest about those matters.
Before I was properly awake I had a little acid improv session. A random pattern, with some simple 909 clone action and some improv keys… I’m all over the place but I’m enjoyin me’sen, innit!
You’ve probably heard a lot about Britain, about how the inner cities can be a bit… stabby? You may also have heard that British people don’t legally have the right to defend themselves… Well, I’m glad to say that’s nonsense! Here are a couple of ways you can defend yourself!
Using the TD-3-MO to generate a kick drum. TD-3 through hand built octave master and blue moon phaser. Snare from RD-6 through hand built delay. Hats from RD-6. Reverb is a HoF.
I have always wanted an Atari 2600. Not the original VCS with the wooden cheeks, but the sleek black plastic wedge. It was something about how they looked… I was rummagin’ on eBay and found one in spares+repairs.
Why can’t we punch or run in our dreams? American friends tell me their bullets in their dreams just dribble out of their guns! Does this point to our helplessness against spiritual entities? What (or who!) can protect us in our dreams?
In some circles it’s common to hate on “cultural Christianity” but what better evangelism is there than for people to grow up in the church, hearing the Word, observing the sacraments, being amongst God’s people?
The sun is shining, I’m breathing, my heart is beating, I have food, drink, clothes, a roof, employment, am not currently broke, I have the riches of friends and family. There are not currently bullets and bombs going off in my street. But this isn’t why I have hope.
When I speak to beginner musicians, they often seem shy about playing with other musicians. How do you know you’re ready? And, for Christians, when are you ready to join a church’s worship team?
The Sky Mice themselves designed the concept and sprite work for this Arduboy platform game! My kids (5 and 4) designed a little video game for the Arduboy open source 8 bit platform with 1 bit graphics. The children did the sprite work (graph paper!) and game design, I just implemented what they described! It’s playable in-browser :-)
I discovered no input mixer music this week, and gave it a go! No input mixer music means you make music from feeding the mixer back into itself, generally through effects pedals; there are no external instruments.
Chaotic, fuzzed-out, glitchy industrial/electronic dawless improv. The main synth is the Make Noise 0-coast, driven through a hand-built Green Ringer and a hand-built Reasonably Good Mangler. The other synth is a simple Eurorack voice pushed through a hand-built phaser.
Gloomy dungeon synth meets house. Lead line from Make Noise 0-coast, sequenced with Oberkorn analog sequencer. I played the bass/pad live (which is why there are so many fluffs!), it’s an NW1 wavetable oscillator.
My first play with the Make Noise 0-Coast semi-modular synth. This thing’s a beaut when combined with the Oberkorn analog sequencer! The additive approach of adding overtones and harmonics is a pretty new world to me; I’ve used a wave folder before but not had this level of flexibility.
Ducking the bass by using triggers from the RD-6 to trigger an inverting envelope which I’m then voltage offsetting. Lead line/texture from nw-1 oscillator, which I’m tweaking live. I also adjust the ducking amount and rate live.
Messing with sequence lengths on the Oberkorn. You can almost play this thing like a guitar…. The first track of CV goes to the NW-1’s pitch via a quantiser module. The other two CV channels modulate some of NW-1’s parameters.
I built an envelope filter from FuzzDog (PedalParts). It turned out really nice! I used to have an EHX Bass Balls back in the day and I like this better!
Metal version of my favourite Christmas carol, “Little Donkey”. Although there’s no Biblical evidence that Mary rode a donkey, one day a donkey and her colt WOULD carry the King of Kings into Jerusalem - it was prophesied in Zecheriah 9 and the fulfilment of that prophecy is recorded in Mark’s Gospel, chapter 11, Matthew 21, and John 12.
Live acid improv using Behringer RD-9 (909 clone) and TD-3-MO (303 with Devilfish mod clone). I missed quite a few of the drops on this track - dropping bass in on beat 2 instead of 1 - but it’s always great fun to make acid. I used chorus on the TD-3-MO
I set my cupboard studio back up! I own about 50% as much Eurorack gear as I used to. Already regret selling! Kick from an SR16. The SR16 is funny over MIDI; the claps on the RD6 interfere with it sometimes. Bassline is TD-3-MO through some chorus.
Paypal’s user agreement added a creepy clause, there was outcry, they removed it… Then they snuck it back in. I cancelled my account and called them to repentance.
I like some of the sounds on the Alesis SR-16 but I don’t enjoy the sequencer. Thankfully, it speaks MIDI so I was able to drive it from the RD-8. In this sketch, I blend the analog RD-8 with the SR-16 in real time.
I got a 3D printer, used it a few times, and was lax about using gloves/fumes etc, but then freaked out a bit about the ABS and chucked it all in the garage for a bit… Then I calmed down and decided to figure out how to use it more safely.
I changed strings from roundwound to flatwound and filmed and explained the process. I also covered the basics of tuning the instrument, wearing in new strings, and then took the restrung bass for a test drive :-)
A dozen or so different styles of bass lines, applied to the same simple 2-chord sequence (G-C). This is just to give a bass player a few ideas about how different styles of bassline can affect the feel of a song. Of course, there are infinite options for basslines, this is not an exhaustive (or particularly high quality!) list!
Hear a few different styles of plucking/picking/“right hand” on the electric bass guitar. This isn’t so much a tutorial as “hey here are some sounds you can make if you want”! Pick haters are haters.
I’ve been playing bass nearly 30 years. I’m not brilliant or anything, but I want to share what I know, particularly for the youngsters in my church coming up learning the instrument :-) In this video I talk through what the bass guitar is, how it fits in to music, how to get started, a few notes on buying a bass, and a little demo of how to practise, then a little example of how I practise.
Using: - Behringer RD-8 drum machine - Bitcrusher pedal I built from a kit - Echo Blue Delay pedal I built from a kit - Great Warship I built from a kit - Reverb pedal I built from a kit
I built a Bitcrusher pedal this weekend and used it on the RD-6 drums. Melody line played on a TD-3 through Octafuzz and Echo Blue Delay pedals that I built
I’ve built some effects pedals lately, from kits from Jed’s Peds and PedalParts (FuzzDog). Here I use a Great Warship Fuzz and a Echo Blue Delay on a Korg Monologue. Reverb is a HoF.
I built a super simple opamp based boost pedal using a kit from eBay. There’s a tiny little piece of stripboard in there with the components soldered to it.
Clipping all over the place! That’s a shame. My little Behringer UB202 audio interface doesn’t have heaps of headroom, so it’s quite hard to get a lot of level without clipping, but this is the worst I’ve ever known it on a recording I’ve done. It’s because I had a lot going on - analog beats from the Behringer RD-9 (909 clone) and the TD-3 (TB-303 clone) which is pretty raunchy with the accent/resonance. Some compression would have helped here! Ah well, it was a fun jam.
Some chord patterns I’ve been playing with. It’s coming off a bit My Bloody Valentine, and a bit Justin Broadrick… I like it! The drums are just the 8-beat pattern on the Mooer GE-100.
Experimenting with the modulation matrix on the Behringer Deepmind 6. Lots of subtle (and not so subtle!) modulations in here, and I just get so much joy from playing this keyboard. “On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. “ - Jesus Christ
Written, performed, recorded in 1 hour. My 2 year old broke the family electric guitar, and about 9 months later I finally got it fixed, so I am writing some of the kind of music that’s in my blood - punk, metal, thrash, hardcore. Laid down guitar in Garageband, and used Garageband’s virtual drummer, then “sang”
Beats on RD-6. Snare’s going through a Behringer reverb pedal, gated setting. Keys on (damaged, volume pot’s bust) Monologue. FX loop via Church Reverb setting of a TC Electronic Hall of Fame reverb, which arrived yesterday and sounds great I still can’t play keyboards with any degree of skill, so I’m mostly just banging notes in and hoping they settle into the reverb!
More polymetric rhythms from the Elektron Model:Cycles. I just love playing with this sequencer! It’s only a 1 bar pattern but through differing track lengths, probability-based sequencing and conditional triggers, I got a much more lively sounding song.
My 4 year old daughter recorded a story about her cat teddy, “Mittens”, which I then re-amped through a vocoder, which I played using a Korg Monologue as a controller. I set it to a beat on an RD-6.
My 2 year old triggering the TD-6 drum machine, my 4 year old on Volca Keys and me bashing away on a Korg Monologue. All day the little one has been saying “I’m Sky Mice!” and no idea what she means but now it’s our band name :-)
3 layers of Korg Volca Keys played live, with beats from a TD6. I’m starting to play chords, my timing isn’t great but I’m starting to feel more at home on a keyboard. Long way to go though!Vocals from the Sky Mice.
Layering Korg Monologue synth sounds on a 4 track, and only hearing the track I am recording. I thought it might be interesting to see what came out, and I notice that I often time things the same, even though I couldn’t hear the other tracks.
I got a Korg Monologue yesterday, and I decided to use it as a drum machine! What an amazing synth, incredibly versatile. Made me feel like a superstar DJ dropping beats in and out!
Dark synth pop moody jam. I don’t often listen to music these days but the last couple of days I’ve listened to a lot of synth stuff and really enjoyed it, this is something of an attempt at a synthesis of that input! I deliberately tried to make the bass filter fuzzy and drifty, enough PWM and discordant blend to get that classic vintage vibe. I wish I had a few more modulation sources but that’s part of the fun sometimes - improvising!
This was better whilst I was composing it, but then the kids wanted to play and it kind of lost momentum and they reprogrammed the TR6! Snare pattern got a bit annoying on listening back to this but there are some nice sounds in there at times, hence the track title! I’m enjoying having arps from the Keystep, it’s a fun way to work.
I was on holiday this week, and took my Pocket Operator. I sampled my brother and my lil nephew along with the classic Amen Brother break and cut it all up into a little junglist sonic collage.
sequence from the Oberkorn, played the lead line live on the NW1 via the Beatstep, percussion samples from the Pocket Operator My 2 year old tinkered with some parts of this so technically a collaboration!
First jam in months… Contains a sample of Carter from the Unsafe Space podcast. We’re in a very nihilistic era. There is hope, though. There is Truth and He’s knowable!
Sampled both my RD-6 and a cheap Yamaha keyboard into the Pocket Operator and made a simple track out of it. After making this beat, I quickly sickened with Covid-19 and spent nearly 36 hours straight in bed sweating and shivering!
5 minute jam on a Pocket Operator PO-33 - recorded a few seconds of my kids playing in the bath then sliced it up and sequenced it. Played a little melody based on a sample of me making a noise, pitched up.
Feeding channel 1 into the clock speed to get swing on the Oberkorn. I sync’d out to the RD-6 and got it to do swing by setting the resolution to 1PPS.
Waldorf NW1 vocal sample sync’d up with a bit of help from my mate Jon - the secret was controlling the wavetable position with an envelope with just the right amount of offset.
A bit of an iteration on my last track, went for a pentatonic so it was less spooky and attenuated the delay to reduce the clipping, then I added some beats.
On the times we’re living in. The “great reset”. Possible election fraud. Churches who have abandoned the clear testimony of Scripture. Cultural suicide. Industrial scale abortion. Fake man-centred righteousness. Hubristic utopianism. Sounds pretty familiar to Bible readers… How then should I respond?
Using the Oberkorn for the sequence into the Dreadbox Hysteria with the quantise mode on, and tapped the pulse out into the White Lines oscillator and played with pitch for oscillator sync effects.
My youngest daughter had a toddler ragefit this evening and this song was my calm down time afterwards! Simplest patch I’ve ever recorded - just a slightly off sinewave, with a bit of LFO modulation, into a low pass gate, into a crossfader with a delay, into the mixer with a reverb.
Inspired by a guy on the Internet (who did it much better than me!) I’ve built all my synths into a cupboard to keep them away from the kids! Using the Oberkorn to ping a LPG to generate percussion, then using envelopes to modular the filter, I got a shuffling squelchy groove going. I used the Oberkorn’s third CV line to modulate its timing which gave me a shuffle, which I enjoyed
Trying to sync up Circles and Oberkorn - didn’t come out how I planned it but that’s always the fun! Heavily compressed the snare and hats for part of the track using the Waldorf compressor module Getting some nice sounds out of the Dreadbox Hysterial by finding sweet spots on the PWM. Maybe the wasp filter was a bit full on for this jam, but it was fun!
Had a bit of a false start with this one - track kicks in around 20 seconds in! I don’t know why I always default to acid techno on equipment! I banged out a quick acidy number and then tried this downtempo moody jam
Made some of my own percussion using an attenuverting mixer, an LFO, an AR envelope, a trigger delay and coloured noise, and mixed it with the rest of the ‘rack
Some polymetric riddims from the ‘rack. Realised I can send different levels of volume into low pass gates to get more human-sounding melodies, rather than everything being at a uniform level
Vocals by Lil Nephew. Sequenced on the Beatstep Pro, bassline is going through the Wasp filter - absolutely LOVE this filter. It does incredible sub-bass but I had to edit that bit out because the waveform went all square on screen! Used an oscillator and S+H module as a bandulu bitcrusher
One quantised melody pushed through 3 oscillators tuned to an A minor chord - or, at least, they were until the baby kicked off and I had to go upstairs and try to settle her!
Mixing noise and atonal melody through the A-Logic, then randomising the filter, and putting one quantised and one unquantised lead line in the stereo channels. Delay for everybody!
My two year old helped out with this track - she did her first Eurorack patching here! Some of the volume spikes are her “modulating” the audio interface :-)
In terms of sheer value for money, the Doepfer dual trigger delay is right up there - combined with a pair of cheap low pass gates from Takaab, you have a great “sort-of-delay” effect for bouncy callbacks
A (nearly!) all-behringer, all-red funk jam! I used the TD-3 for the bassline, through a Behringer octaver pedal for more body. The “lead” bit is through the Neutron. I didn’t realise it was all-Behringer until I had recorded it! The drums are from the Arturia Drumbrute Impact.
An acid jam on the TD3 and Drumbrute. My first experience programming patterns into the TD3, it’s quite fun actually, bit of a weird interface but that’s the appeal IMO.
I used the TD3 as a “master” here - I hooked the CV and gate into Eurorack and built a voice, and what do you know, the tracking is fantastic - well done Behringer!
Took delivery of a Behringer TD3 today and I LOVE IT! Had to sell some modules to buy it, worth it though! Beats from the Drumbrute. Performed live, no overdubs. Samples Kanye West’s interview with Zane Lowe - www.youtube.com/watch?v=QuOCvKvrwI8 . TD3 is a bit hummy here, I used too much gain on the desk and too little on the TD3, so next time I use it it’ll sound cleaner.
D-day veteran Harry Billinge gave an incredible interview on BBC News recently, speaking movingly of his love for his brothers in arms and his saviour Jesus Christ. Harry’s urgent message of love is as timely now as ever.
I’m using the sequential switch all the time now, on this new track I used it to cycle through 4 different levels of voltage going into the filter, and blended that with an inverted envelope to get quite a tubby bass sound.
I like reading. I like getting better at things. The two are, in my view, intrinsically related. This shouldn’t be a revelation to anybody! However, one weird thing stops me from reading as much as I’d like to…
Lead from the Neutron. Bass comes from cycling through the waveforms of the White Lines oscillator using a sequential switch with every 4th bar left empty. Stabs from the other white lines through the audio divider.
More experiments with the Synthrotek sequencer, plus using the Doepfer slew limiter to get more interesting articulation - nice that you can put slew on, say, ascending tones (voltages) only, creates cool effects.
Used a pure analog sequencer here - and what fun it was! The random function is great fun, it seems to jam on random steps for a few beats before moving on. No quantising, just random knob positioning!
Some good sounds in here through the Doepfer audio divider but my kids kicked off just before I was about to record so I couldn’t really get in the flow of it properly… Oh well.
I used a Pico A-Logic to get more interesting modulations from two LFOs. I routed this into two in sequence attenuators so I could get some minimal pitch modulation and it made this swelling didgeridoo like bass sound. I blended this through the filter on the Neutron and ran a sequencer at audio rate to generate the bleepy computery sounds and hand-modulated the rate at which I was clocking the sequencer to get weird variations.
Earlier this year, I wrote a series of stories about a fictionalised version of my mate “Robbo”. These stories became increasingly silly and forumulaic, until I had the idea of feeding them through a Markov chain to generate a new story. I then routed this as audio through my Eurorack modular gear to make bizarre “not really music”.
Earlier this year, I wrote a series of stories about a fictionalised version of my mate “Robbo”. These stories became increasingly silly and forumulaic, until I had the idea of feeding them through a Markov chain to generate a new story.
An anti tutorial about me, a novice, building a Kubernetes cluster on Raspberry Pi by essentially catapulting myself headlong into a solid wall of incomprehension until the wall broke. Then I wondered why I did it.
Understanding things is hard. Explaining things is harder. This article intends to help you communicate and reason with clarity using simple questions to contextualise your work. It’s written with software in mind but is more broadly applicable.
The Open Door is a weekly breakfast and community primarily for the homeless and vulnerably housed in the Cardiff area. I gave a brief talk on Mark 9:17-26 on how to deal with doubts and struggles.
The Open Door is a weekly breakfast and community primarily for the homeless and vulnerably housed in the Cardiff area. I gave a brief talk on Matthew 16:13-16. It’s not intended to be a watertight apologetic argument, more a way to start people thinking about who Jesus is.
I was recently introduced to a young person who was looking to make her own games. I had a brief conversation with her sharing my experience of making indie games in the first decade of the 2000s, and I thought I would write down what I see as the key points.
I was asked to speak at a church service in Cardiff. Here is the message I gave. I’m not a trained preacher but did my best to speak the truth as I understand it.
After reading “The Importance Of Being Earnest” on the train back from Birmingham, I feel moved to reassure you all that my girl’s surname is NOT “Bunbury”…
Sat on a second hand sofa I ponder on who He is And wonder surges in my heartFrom an ever-deepening well of gratitude I look up towards the light And my curtains seem to me as stained glassAnd my home feels like a cathedral Echoing my whispered word of thanks …
In the Bible, this guy James writes about the tongue, saying “a small rudder makes a huge ship turn wherever the pilot chooses to go, even though the winds are strong…
A highly fashionable shoot ‘em up, where Thomas the rotating horse takes on hordes of creatures to avoid turning into a running shoe. Maybe in May! Playable in-browser.
This morning in church was harvest festival and instead of having some fossilised bread and a soup tin mountain the pastor brought us some alarming statistics…
I don’t mean literally, obviously, I mean figuratively. I mean, if my eyes weren’t in my head, then bees could get in, and that really would be terrifying. Bzz.
Live looping album recorded using a Boss RC20XL pedal, a Cort 6 string bass and an acoustic guitar. All a bit experimental and winged on the fly. Standard! I gigged some of this stuff, it was a trainwreck and I almost flung my bass in a skip on the way home!
The most realistic simulation of Amoeboid combat ever devised! Old ladies battle men holding sausage dogs! Animation by the amazingly talented Jonathan Reynolds. Playable in-browser.
“They’re coming… they’re… everywhere…” Squad based RTS where you battle zombie hordes. Sprites by Andrew Canham. Music by Davey J and myself. Playable in-browser.
A classic Streets Of Rage style beat ‘em up where a young boy has to face his own nightmares. Beautifully animated by Mark Bankhead. Playable in-browser.
Funk, electronic, rock and weird Primus-y style bass stuff. Made during my summer holiday between 2nd and 3rd year of university. I think this is the first album I made on CD instead of cassette.
Collaboration with Matt Rimmer from Vibration White Finger. The production is all over the place but this are still some of my favourite songs I’ve ever co-written.
A really puerile tape where I recorded my mates farting and made a song out of it. Pretty sure Ben, Dave, Tom and Rem were on this recording, sounds like a few others too?
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