— PLANET://DAMAGE

NEW MUSIC: Glitch Baby Go

Hello, friends, stalkers, random link waltzers, intelligence community ninjas and various demons with Minimoog filters as their filth neurons. On top of the page there’s a new track called GLITCH BABY GO that I did – something I was basically working on in September (apart from a load of freelance design & script works for zaibatsus). I loved working on that as I haven’t been properly pouring out my headmeat babies through music, only through words or graphic design – this was definitely a different approach. (One that requires less coffee but more headphones, then meeting more people to listen to your track on their phones, tablets, computers, car stereo, normal stereo, partyplace and the occult little sound system you made from their cat’s hymen.)

Most of my musician or producer friends I was talking to were usually advocates of one DAW over the others: this obviously saying a lot about their workflow or underlying concept of production. Most recommendations were clearly pointing towards Ableton, a few towards FL Studio… and my choice to work with Renoise, a DAW that basically grew out of oldschool tracker software made my friends question my common sense, because writing music in anything that looks like Excel is just bad karma, they said. Well, I grew up on FastTracker and whenever I hear music it runs from top to bottom in my head, not from left to right. That’s one thing. The other is: Renoise does look a bit more intimidating than Ableton but that sort of non-userfriendly and very mathematical feel makes you go more creative and more understanding of what you’re trying to accomplish. No, it’s not easy but for people who love their obsctacles in order to make them more creative, it’s a godsend.

Glitch Baby Go grew out of Syskon, one of my favourite tracks that I’ve done back in the 90s. Changed most of the instruments, kicks, turned the bassline from a collection of three very similar offset-shifted bass samples to a combination of three very different sounding instruments, added a lot of samples from William Gibson’s Neuromancer audiobook and some glitch vocals, did some mastering… I particularly liked messing around with the Glitchmachines Hysteresis glitch delay and the FerricTDS tape dynamics simulator, both VST plugins free.

Good glitching – more stuff coming up soon. Hopefully sooner than later. Heh heh. Heh. Hrrrr.

DAMAGE CAPTURE FILE 03: a tree in the shape of WTF [cyberpunk, glitch and counterculture]

Hello. Etape 3 for Capture File: a coffeebreakful voyeurism into cultural products of cyberpunk, futurepresent, glitch culture and whatnot, every Friday from now on in the eurozone. This week: @dawe_’s idea of what it can be like in my head nowadays in the form of a Japanese abstract/glitch video (above, HiDM2_9 by Japanese visual cacophony masters BRDG), followed by stuff like: a possible reason for the Neuromancer movie’s delay, news about the Blade Runner 2 script, loads of music finds and some music production links as well. If you have anything to add, share or comment, do so in the comments or drop me a mail to info@planedamage.com. And, yeah, have a great weekend.

BALLISTIC AUDIO LOOT:

My recent ballistic audio loot is pretty much governed by a refueled interest to write music again. I was into *FastTracker 2.08 a lot at the end of the nineties (you can check some of *my stuff I’ve uploaded to Soundcloud), a bit of *Rebirth.. and after reacting quite badly to a Hungarian music producer’s reponse (who thought that you can only make music with real gear, not softsynths… a year later Yonderboi’s LP came out, all done on a single PC… fate is apparently not without a sense of irony) I finished writing music. Time to re-evaluate. So I’m pretty much motivated by lots of oldschool stuff at the moment. (Or I’m just getting old and nostalgic, could be either at this point.)

VANDALAZE‘s new EP “Dog Jerk” is something I’ve listened to a lot on Bandcamp recently.. love the cheesy 80s sound with the industrialish/cyberpunkish overtones Cory flavours his tracks with – combine that with the Dog Jerk music video’s look that clearly has a lot in common with early MTV days, it\s just a must-have. Review will be coming up soon on it, until that, *grab this EP from slimetrax.bandcamp!

Synthwave, outrun electro, retro electro or however you call it, a heartfelt return to the 80′s pop/synth sound is making a comeback now and I’ve been listening around for powerful artists.. if you want to take a quick bite, *PERTURBATOR is the guy you’ll need. Amazing production quality, great tracks, very coherent production, mind-blowing atmosphere. His recent new album Dangerous Days is a further proof of godlike qualities. If you want to grab more synthwave stuff, try *CARPENTER BRUT or *VOGEL.

There’s always room on my Nexus for soothing ambients. Pete Namlook & Mixmaster Morris’ project DREAMFISH is something I don’t delete from my music-storing devices ever, but here’s a close contender, the first track off the 2011 album “Someone Gave Me Religion” by Arnaud Rebotini (of the Black Strobe fame). Delete the ambient channel from GTA IV and play this in your car on repeat! (As a subtle side effect, it’s gonna rain. Always.)

I have a lot of demoscene music in my queue, but this one should be the very first, a mixtape of Amiga tracks with a whole lot of beat to them… and be prepared for some great demoscene materials in the upcoming Capture Files!

MOVIE NEWS:

Opinions on AUTOMATA, the latest android-craze movie featuring Antonio Banderas went (and are still going) from fiery to icy.. personally I would really love to see a different and realistic take on AI portrayal, without big budget movie clichés, as a form of compromising for a wider audience. The possibility is there but I won’t say anything until more materials emerge… shown from October 10th in the USA. And as for other news:

• Minority Report TV show reportedly in development: “The director is reportedly working to turn his classic sci-fi film into a television show, which would be produced by his company Amblin Entertainment. Amblin is reportedly looking toward Max Borenstein, writer of this year’s Godzilla, to write and create the series — it isn’t clear if Borenstein has signed on just yet, but he has been thanking people who congratulate him on Twitter.
• Peter Hoffman Can’t Escape Prosecution Over Film Tax Credit Fraud: Hoffman, who is an executive producer on the upcoming $60 million budgeted Neuromancer, is known as an important middleman between Louisiana tax breaks and film companies. The case figures to be closely watched by insiders.
• Blade Runner 2 script finished and “damn good” according to Ridley Scott: The story will bring back Harrison Ford, who starred in the 1982 film as one of the eponymous replicant hunters. Scott says that Ford’s character is “a survivor after all these years,” which, certainly, is a curious fact in and of itself given the ambiguous ending of certain cuts of the film.

MUSIC TO LOOK OUT FOR:

*THE FUTURE SOUND OF LONDON, one of my favourite projects of all time, returns with Environment Five, an album that contains 13 all-new tracks that were composed in the first half of 2014! It’s a concept album focusing on “the space / time / dimension that exists when we die”. That’s gonna be some real interesting bardo work when this gets released on September 15th!

Texan splatter industrial gods *MENTALLO & THE FIXER release the 3CD pack `*Zothera` on Alfa Matrix this autumn. Two CDs contain their seminal albums Revelations 23 and Where Angels Fear to Tread, whereas the third CD entitled Apocrypha would contain rarities, remixes and the like. Release: Sep 26th, expect a review a lot sooner!

New-wave EBM powerhouse duo *YOUTH CODE are about to punch us all in the face with their new EP “A Place to Stand” that comes to us sooner than a month via *Dais. Pitchfork *shared a track off the new LP (embedded on top) – is that an indication as to where the new LP is headed? Release: Sep 23th!

*Tympanik Audio‘s always amazingly cerebral compilation Emerging Organisms just got to its fifth etape. Contains stuff from a whole generation of great new artists, from Zinovia to Idlefon, from Tangent to Ocoeur… release: Oct 7th!

STUFF THAT WILL SEND YOU REELING:

Mike Winkelmann aka *beeple. His stuff came to me on half a dozen platforms in a week or so, so I have to share his greatness with you: his site’s *here and one of the best sites this year, The Creators Project, recently released *this post about him.

These are “audio life forms”, 3D objects that react to bird sounds in a droolingly glitchy matter. Amazing. Visualizing is done by Andy Thomas who shared a lot more from his amazing work *on his site.

cEvin Key of *Skinny Puppy telling great stuff about the bass grandiosity of *SubPac and the not so great stuff about how touring can turn your ears into flipflops.

Facial projection mapping. I got this from literally everyone, a bit sad that I ended up sharing this with you a lot later.

MUSIC PRODUCTION LINKS
A buddy of mine started writing music in *FRACT OSC (which is a game about returning sound into a silent world and also about setting up a sequencer and some oscillators in the meanwhile) and I’m busy making an ambient tracks with *Caustic‘s Modular synth but I fail every time because the loop I made sounds so good I just put it on repeat while I’m working on my new book and then two hours later I realize I didn’t tweak a single knob. Caustic’s actually free for PC, so feel free to download it and have a go, the *YouTube tutorials are AMAZING.

It’s one thing that the *Glitchmachines site is full of amazing high-res wallpapers (they’re not categorized as wallpapers per se, but it’s hard not to use them as wallpapers when they lok this good) but they also have a HUGE batch of free sample packs (around 1.5 gigs altogether) and also two great plugins, one for buffer effect, the other one’s for glitch delay. I’m weeping now, obviously.

PREVIEW: Guardians of the Galaxy

TL;DR: Javaslom, IMAX3D. Ha nekem volt időm megírni, neked is legyen elolvasni, részletezem dühös punk szóvirágokkal, hogy miért.

Túlzófokig csúsztatott pozitív csalódás és értetlenség habzó elegye vagyok.
Magyarázom.Mila Kunis nyári wachowskista szabadesésére, a Jupiter Ascendingre hegyeztük magunkat egész nyáron, a filmipar eltolta a randit jövő februárra, a lógó arcunk mellett ittmaradt Laurence Fishburne indie scifije, az egészen furcsa hangulatot keltő The Signal, meg a csapból is robbanáshangokkal folyó szenzációmaradék, a 2008-ban rebootolt Marvel-szupercsapatos egészestés-teljespupillás, a Guardians of the Galaxy. A marketing puszta ereje persze elég ahhoz, hogy bármit áttoljon a fogyasztók már így is kellemetlenül vékony tűréshártyáján (ízlelgessük ezt a fogalmat még egy kicsit), de nem tudok kellemetlenül zsánerelitista dühös kérdőjel lenni, amikor megkérdezem, hogy tényleg a Blue Swede Hooked On a Feelingje kell, hogy szóljon a jövőben bármilyen műszerfal és bármilyen zenelejátszó környékéről? Nem kvantumambient, nem a fehangzásrólkete huszadik árnyalatáról elnevezett pupillapuhító zaj, nem flex-egyszerűségű spacepunk, hanem… értitek. (A magyarázat persze adott, az emberi főhős Peter Star-Lord Quillt a nyolcvanas években vitték el a Földről, amilyen zenék akkor beragadtak neki, azt a hangzást vitte magával az Univerzumba. Siouxsie Sioux, Joan Jett, Nina Hagen. Ennyit mondanék az űrbe vihető , a theremint meg a TB-303at inkább bedugom az ágyneműtartóba, ne is kerüljön egy lapra az oldalra kikacsintós, kalapbancsajozós funk emlékével sem.)

Persze, vélem érteni a marketinget, észak-am piacra célzunk, paperback-gyűjtögető apák tinédzserkori emlékeire, a családjaikra, az egyértelmű geek targetmasszára. Persze, kell a comic reliefként és női fogyasztók figyelmére mágnesező mosómedve (Rocket Raccoon) meg a Vin Diesel hangján háromszavazó borderline vegán öntudat (Groot), az emberi főhős (Space-Lord) botor lúzerséggel színezett tinédszer attitűdje meg mindennapos brit túlélési mechanizmus, ha a briteket megfogtuk, mindenkit megfogtunk az európai kontinensen. Széttárt kezekkel padlózok a konyhapadlómon, persze, hogy elmegyek megnézni a csapattal moziba, hogyne mennék, de most hallok először a Marvel-univerzum ezen szegletéről, továbbá ha már space operát szeretnék, akkor Mass Effect, Cowboy Bebop remake (de csak Keanuval) vagy egy jól irányzott Firefly restart. Így is elég sok hiány van az űrben már, miért tennénk bele a bro-kultusz világmegmentő képzetét, csak azt ne. És tényleg, miért Blue Swede? Hollywood arra tenyésztette ki Celldwellert meg Blue Stahlit, hogy ha a futura egy hajszálnyit is megjelenik, akkor ők gyártsák le a hangokat hozzá.

Így esett, hogy reggel tízkor (ha ismersz, itt már hangosan nevetsz) egy jól kinkelt tumblrszendvics közepén (balra 5149eszter, jobbra kanly) félig alvó húsködként, egy indokolatlanul kék, mondjuk ki: unheimlich 3D szemüveg alatt remegek meg, ahogy a képernyő azt mondja nekem, beugrókérdés: elszámol nekem egy sietve lerenderelt alagútban tíztől egyig, próbáljak közben nem hányni a motion sicknesstől, attól csorog minden szekundum, ha sikerül, továbbmehetnek a pupilláim.

Továbbmentek.

Így lett a Guardians of the Galaxy életem első filmje, amiben értelmét látom a 3D-nek, ami nagy szó, mert a Tron rebootot is levett szemüveggel néztem meg (utána pedig a Király utcai templomon keresztül próbáltam többször is bemenni a Kuplungba, úgyhogy előfordulhat, hogy félrecsúszott a mozgásérzékelésem, de így jár az, aki a tudomány nevében). Az első negyedóra, mondjuk ki, túl részletgazdag lett, amit mondathat velem a kávéhiány is, meg az is, hogy többször le akartam állítani a filmet, hogy visszatekerhessek egy pár részletre. A vizuál ugyanis sűrű, színpompás és gyors, pont elég ahhoz, hogy a hozzám hasonló, túltolt ingerküszöbű dühös felkiáltójeleket is megfogja. (Mielőtt megkérdezed, nem sikerült visszatekerni.) A film kezdeti felütése, a meglepően gyors dobbantás a The Kyln max-sec börtönéből tökéletes preview, lejön belőle, hogy a részletgazdaság és a látványvilág gond nélkül adja el a filmet, a történet pedig csak viccként van a filmben, pontosabban szólva: azért van történetünk, hogy kellően sok helyzetkomikumot lehessen elszórni, szituációst és karakterek közöttit egyaránt.

Eladták nekem az egészet, Eszter, érted?, bukik ki belőlem valahol hat perc környékén, AHAKUSSNÉZEK, ő valahogy így reagál rá, úgyhogy tudom, hogy őt is megvették, pedig egymás mellett egész gonosz kritikusként foglaltunk helyet, kitettek nekünk egy repülő mosómedvére szögezett, animált Photoshop color pickert, mi pedig lenyeltük engedelmesen. Amúgy szólok, jó íze volt és mosómedve ide vagy oda, az eddigiekből ítélve a legjobb comic relief karakter bőven Groot és Rocket Raccoon kettőse lesz, várom is a spinoffot belőlük, a többi karakteről ugyanis kellően kétdimenziós és kétjellegű, Gamora szép és halálos, Drax dühös és erős, Star-Lord pedig szemtelen és emberi, én pedig minden végtagommal harcolok azellen, hogy ne egy embernek drukkoljak egy különböző fajoktól hemzsegő univerzumban. Kötözködnivaló tehát bőven van, ahogy egy középre főzött mainstream film esetében ez a spacepunkoktól bőven elvárható, a coolness factor és a hangulat viszont átvisz mindent. Mindent. Még a Blue Swede szemöldöktépő zenéjét is.

Úgyhogy augusztus 14, premier.

Az IMDB reviewk ezrei szerint 9/10 a film.
Hajlok arra, hogy azt mondjam: megértem, miért.

det schlecht fabriek

“CVs are very much like olives, opera, anal sex and the elusive mother-in-law: they’re the product of acquired taste.”

I have a new book draft finished and sent out to a group of fierce pre-readers, hullo and everything, been a few months since I last posted anything – I’ve been thinking a lot. (A lot of my good friends would pass me another mug of DEATH COFFEE to me at this point without a word and look amused. Come join me, said the DEATH COFFEE PARTY TRAIN.) Got three synopses on my desk – two for books, one for a movie -, which is also littered with (yes, sentient coffeemugs) specials of >>Computer Music about music making (there’s a free Windows version of >>Caustic, the best music making app for Android and >>Bitwig Studio has also been released, gaining traction and awesome reviews), a shitload of books to read (like >>Assimilate, a volume of academic essays on EBM/industrial, as rockingly reviewed by @rotnoxious into Auxiliary a couple of months ago, >>check page 29 here), the CDEP of my best friend’s new band has also found its way here, together with an assortment of very black and highly dysfunctional Blackburn safety light chargers.

So the desk is chaotic, littered. Heaving. And the mind’s similar, something like MEMORY. An insane amount of people who are merely the photographs of themselves. No novas against the skyline, no promises fulfilled, no appreciation mustered from the remainder of a chemical halo of goodwill. An insane amount of experience. An insane amount of burning backups. An insane amount of coping.

Great releases so far this year: >>Attrition, >>Angelspit, >>BAAL, >>Defrag, >>Illuha, >>Swans, >>Vaniish…actually owing a couple of you guys mixes and reviews as well. With one book draft penned and more work to compensate for all the [yeah, whatever], it should arrive to you a lot faster now.

On that happy note, martial artists and horses.

The next round is on you.
Literally.

If you’re still reading this – drop me a few lines to planetdamage at gmail. I like to know my readers. And I miss the scent of novelty.

See you around. Soon.

pd.LIFESIGN [2014 march]

straying not for the lesser sentiment of folly but for the greater sentiment of dereliction, someplace else this is a tree in the shape of hatred

Three months of unevenly distributed focus is what happened. Sometimes I drank a coffee and then went out to the kitchen to make another one and I didn’t fully realize a day passed and I hadn’t noticed. Living on borrowed Tumblr attention deficit time. There were weeks of toothache, I remember that, because I now know the map of street samurai grey clinics who do things in your mouth that you don’t want to fully remember. On other weeks projects flourished and exams were passed gloriously, like driving theory and gun & rifle theory and practice, because fuck you that’s why. Post-thirtyish fear of closure, typical of our generation. Then there were long weeks when I couldn’t write and that meant trouble (Zinta was the first to call me trouble and she was SO right about that) because three books mean a lot of stress if two of them need serious worldbuilding. So I started writing a fourth one because I could easily do 20 pages a day about abstract visuals. Quite a tricky period to wade through, waist deep in bad timing and worse circumstances but things just never give themselves easily, do they.

But do I fucking hate telling you all my projects are in progress, so at least one book’s coming out by Q3. Hopefully two altogether by the end of the year but after all the challenges that seem to end up on my windshield… let me digress.

Kopi luwak is off my bucket list. Comes via cold drip with a faint fruity touch and I might even think it’s overhyped. Italian triple ristretto is still Hiroshima strength for the mind.

#whatsinmybag – nowadays with a whole lot more painkillers

Don’t even ask.

Took up Yang style taiji after long years of hiatus and as it’s springtime, my original Sinred is out from the freemasonic shed – this was taken during an urban tour: this was the place where I loved for one and a half decades and more importantly, this is the place where ld50.hu was conceived, born and raised.

Which inevitably leads us to my next point, which is…

AD RIPOFF: blackphone / else mobile

Politically correct rephrasing would go for inspiration or idea osmosis but I’m sick to the guts with polcorrect even after a year of London. So, my friend Dawe_ (who happened to hand over the first draft translation of my debut book yesterday) sent me this video just a few minutes ago about an Android phone called BLACKPHONE which, according to promised details, could be Snowden’s favourite phone if it comes to its privacy settings. Here’s the vid. Watch it. I’ll tell you what my problems are after the break.

Introduction to Blackphone from BLACKPHONE on Vimeo.

So, my problem is that I know where this could have come from and there’s a strong chance it did. Five years ago The Visionare produced an image video for this company called ELSE MOBILE and the music was done by one of my favourite musicians ever, Ben Lukas Boysen aka HECQ. Copy’s VERY similar, protagonist character type very similar, AR-enriched shots very similar.

What’s your take on this?

If you want a good ad, go for this instead.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtqfT6gPygU

UPDATE 1
The Blackphone ad in question has been removed. Here’s a new one for you. Visually different, copywise it still strikes a few familiar chords but then again, what doesn’t?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WczXWirN9oo

The big bad Planet://Damage post for 2013

Hi.
Let’s recap.
Day One of 2k13, North London. Circle of friends, merriment. Cold. Working for a startup that’s just like my old community site in Budapest, only that it’s ran and paid for by coders who believe real content is cats and a community is not forged by giving it time to fertilize itself and let people loosen up enough. I rebel in the name of almost a decade of experience. This, obviousl