Spiral Revelation by Steve Roach

[warrendaly]

I'm enjoying the album a lot, I love a lot of Steve Roach's creations. Here's the details from Projekt Records:

The sound of life, interconnected and unfurling
The spiral – a visual symbol of eternity – is a reoccuring metaphoric theme in Steve Roach’s pioneering electronic work. Interpreted into musical form, these six spiraling sonic experiences offer a living activation that connects with a sense of the infinite. Roach’s long history and love of analog sequencer-based styles reveal a continuing, evolving awakening within Spiral Revelation’s 63 minutes. Using only analog and hardware instruments to focus the mind’s ear upon a filigree of intricate patterns woven with a direct hands-on approach, the artist sculpts and caresses sound into being in real time. An emotional through-line brings life to these pieces as the unfurling of time’s windings connects to the vivid present, life-affirming and illuminated. A masterful expression of an artist who has infused his soul into the art form of electronic music.

https://projektrecords.bandcamp.com/album/spiral-revelation

[Sonic Bodhi]

I love everything by Steve Roach- thanks for this!

[ablaut]

Yeah, Steve Roach is great.

But "using only analog and hardware instruments"... only? What marketing claptrap! It is not a feat (you just need money), or in any way somehow better than digital or software. The tools you use shouldn't matter, unless your composition is about the process.

[Sonic Bodhi]

I can't really fault any musician for using the process that works the best for them- I started out in the 80's using hardware (when that was all we had!), and for the longest time, years after I had built my first p.c. and upgraded several times, I started using DAWs and VSTi's and VST's. I got diverted for the longest time on this, and got pretty good at it, too. However, I recently made the decision to shift back to hardware based recording to get away from being too dependant on the p.c. I didn't want to have to fire up a computer and open a bunch of pieces of software to be able to record, and the fan noise from my p.c. was interfering with my creative process. Still haven't solved the fan noise problem, but now I only have to run the p.c. when exporting a mixdown for post-processing such as noise redux, e.q. filtering, and loudness matching, etc. It's not been my intention to totally abandon all the wonderful software I've gathered over the years like Ableton Live, FL Studio, Reason, and all the great Native Instruments vst's such as Kontakt, Reaktor, Absynth, Massive, etc. plus the many other VSTi's I've collected over the years. I just have little desire to create music over a background of ever-present white noise that is the array of case fans in my large computer case that was supposed to be quiet, but turned out to be louder than the last case I had. It interferes with my process. Once I solve this problem, I'll get back into using my DAWS and VST's in conjunction with the hardware I've acquired- I do use a variety of iOS apps to enhance the experience of using my Kronos. There are some really good synth apps available on the App Store. Recently, I've acquired an app version of the Korg M1, as well as the Mini-Moog. Plan on getting the Korg Wavestation when next it goes on sale.

I get what you're saying- the music comes through the player, and not necessarily the instrument- whether analog or digital, hardware or software, the inspiration still comes from the same source. For years I created on a shoe-string budget, and learned a lot from the software solutions I was using. It's only been recently that the better 'toys' have been within reach of my budget, so why not take advantage of it? We do, after all, only get a limited amount of time on this earth, so let's not leave it with any regrets, I say...