Name: Sunday in the Park with Borg
Channel: Mike Peake
Description: "Sunday in the Park with Borg" is a song by Mike Peake. Self-playing patches on the Moog Modular synthesizer, edited into coherence. No keyboards were used. Lots of info in the "story" section. Minimal EQ and FX use, no compression or limiting/ mastering.

Sunday in the Park with Borg

Mike Peake

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Self-playing patches on the Moog Modular synthesizer, edited into coherence. No keyboards were used. Lots of info in the "story" section. Minimal EQ and FX use, no compression or limiting/ mastering.

analog modular synthesize

Mike Peake

Abstract and other electronic music

Song Info

Genre

Electronic • Ambient

Charts

Peak #20

Peak in subgenre #5

Author

Mike Peake

Rights

2002

Uploaded

December 21, 2003

Track Files

MP3

MP3 6.4 MB • 128 kbps • 0:00

Story behind the song

No compression or limiting is present. Only very minor EQ was used, and a touch of reverb and echo.

Synthesizer used: Moog Modular consisting of:


            4) 901b oscillators
            2) 921b oscillators
            1) 921 oscillator
            2) 904a lowpass filters
            1) 904b highpass filter
            1) filter/attenuator panel
            1) 905 reverb
            3) 911 envelopes
            4) 902 VCAs
            CP3 mixer

            CP3a mixer

      My 911s are modified to accept V-Trigger. The 921 Auxilliary square wave output can fire the envelopes. Most of these sounds involve the 921 firing the envelopes and being modulated via another oscillator, and then the 921 in turn modulating that oscillator. "Two oscillators modulating" was the original title of this piece and it reflects the majority of the sounds, in terms of tempo as well as filter and pitch modulation. The modulating oscillators often had their outputs patched back to their inputs to skew the waveforms.

      The "screaming" patch is the same patch as the swirling FM sound which builds to end the first section; it involves patching the final VCA output back into the oscillator inputs. I was searching for "monster" sounds ala' Forbidden Planet. Many patches make use of amplitude modulation, especially the quiet section after the intro build. Sometimes the filters were used in self-oscillation to provide clean sine waves. The glurpy "drainpipe" sound in that section is a feedback patch involving square waves and the 905 reverb (I manually decreased the amount of modulation and you can hear the square wave at LFO rates at the end of the section). The vocal sounds were done by patching a single sawtooth oscillator into the highpass of the Filter Attenuator, then multing it into one lowpass and also the highpass, which then is patched into the other lowpass for a dual bandpass effect with resonance. The outputs are mixed. Fc modulation consists of the 921b positive and negative outputs used on the pairs for contrary motion. Two free-running square waves, mixed and attenuated to produce intervals, modulate the "solo yodeling" voices in addition. The "telemetry" sound in the intro was done by soft sync'ing two square waves and modulating the pitch of an oscillator, which is run into a pair of filters for resonance. Note the speeding up and slowing down of this sound; two oscillators modulating. The same with the "ting-zuzz" AM sound in the second section, as well as the filter sweeps in the end section (left in so people would know that it's a Moog).

      No keyboards or manual triggers were used in the creation of this piece. Sections were recorded (typically in three-minute lengths) and moved around, as well as featuring level automation (fades as well as quick on/off edits as on the "scream" and "solo yodeling". The "kick drum" and "hand drums" in the vocal section were done by manually riding the 921 pitch control and repeatedly placing the same several seconds of successful sync'ing in tempo with the illusory tempo of the "yodeling". The "kick drum" sound is one very lucky continuous section of a large recording; the oscillator modulating the 921 got the tempo and the "swing" just right for it to fit. Amazing. The hand drum section was probably the only section which was created while monitoring the other tracks.

      External FX: EQ, especially on the very low bass right after the intro build (18dB of boost in the midrange only). No other EQ anywhere near that strong was used, although some cutting of bass was done, as in the section right after the intro build; the continuous glassy AM sounds had their bass cut. Alesis XT:c reverb, Yamaha e1010 analog delay, A/DA STD-1 analog delay, EH 16-Second delay, Deltalab Acousticomputer for pre-delay into Lexicon PCM-70 reverb (barely used).


      -Glassy AM
Two self-oscillating 904as, one into VCA audio in, one into VCA control in. 921 modulates VCA leve