slow the clocks

my grandmother's cuckoo clocks with counter-balances and springs

am autumn song for winding down

• play
• pause
• min volume
• max volume

posted by at the crossroads (7 comments total)

I didn't hear any clocks, but there's some nice sounds in there.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 1:41 AM on October 5, 2009

I can't wait to get home and play this super loud. Really beautiful tones in there.
posted by dobie at 10:26 AM on October 5, 2009

Really nice. I love how organic it feels, and with the title helping the imagination along, I do get the sense of timekeeping, or time crawling along. Can you elaborate on the process behind this? Is it a lot of time-stretching of samples of clocks?
posted by edlundart at 8:18 PM on October 5, 2009

This is the best thing I've heard in a while. It feels like being bathed in evening sunlight on a quiet october day. Amazing stuff.
posted by dobie at 9:27 PM on October 5, 2009

Wow-- those are some high compliments, dobie. Thank you for prompting me ahead.

There are no actual clocks used in this recording.

My long ago deceased grandmother had a collection of clocks in her parlor, aging. Some of them had these pine cone shaped weights hanging down, dangling, in various states of decay. I was a toddler then and memory is weird but I do remember climbing up an old couch to pluck one lead pine cone. The result was springs going Kr-Dho-ngng! A wooden crazy bird! Dusty couch, my father chastising me: DON'T TOUCH THAT!!

The sound and the smell that it made.

It is my clumsy acoustic guitar and some unintentional sounds that snuck in through a crappy iBook built-in mic. That, and a boatload of effects stacking. Tracks that are time stretched, pitch shifted, delayed, and reversed. Reversed again --- that process repeated many times: TAHT HCUOT T'NOD!!! It echoes.

But that's just my interpretation... and really beside the point.
posted by at the crossroads at 12:36 AM on October 6, 2009

Listened again. Still loved it. You've managed to get a lot of warmth out of a process that may seem cold to some. Beautifully done.
posted by edlundart at 8:30 PM on October 6, 2009

at the crossroads, I really like this a lot. There may've been unintentional sounds/noise but they collectively help add to the organic, warm feeling (I agree with edlundart). Clumsy guitar? Surely not here... And the mic works, too -- if everything sounded too clean, I think the piece wouldn't have quite the same dreamy-yet-realistic effect.

Out of curiosity, how many "raw" or "original" tracks did you record before you started working with/editing/stacking them?

Thanks also for sharing your story about the background behind the piece/title. This is a lovely tribute to your childhood memories.
posted by rangefinder 1.4 at 9:19 PM on November 5, 2009