Compositor 4

Sigh...

OK, since I ALWAYS feel like a radio amateur (WX9T...held an Extra ticket for coming up on a couple of decades now) and I've got a composition background (otherwise there wasn't a lot of point in going to Germany some years back and studying with Stockhausen) AND I might've done one or two or way more things with varying electronic and electroacoustic systems and such in the past...oh, what the f...thirty years? I think? AAAAND also having had a look at the site for this...this...whatevertheHELLthisis...

I call 'shenanigans'.

Firstly, to do anything like what is described here, interpolating VLF signals (which is gonna be a laff-riot in any sort of developed area due to the mains frequency leakage from power systems, all sorts of RF squeeeel and bbbbbzzzzzzz from any number of electronic devices ranging from computers to LED bulbs to...well, you name it!) is going to require some sort of VLF input setup. Now, in THEORY, you can attach a very long antenna to the input of any old soundcard you have laying around (although this works better with an RF amplifier inline) and pick up a lot of...well, see above...but then you're going to have to make use of this signal-soup. Now, the site claims (I...think?) there's some sort of noise-cancellation setup in this, but, seriously...having messed about down in that part of the RF spectrum at points in my past, I just DO...NOT...SEE...how you're going to sort the various CW and FSK signals (and loads of geomagnetic noises...which, frankly, are a helluva lot more sonically interesting in of themselves) out of the wash of EM garbage that tends to swamp that frequency range 24/7/365. Especially without the assistance of an actual SDR, which I see no mentions of on the Compositor website. Odd omission, that, for a system that's so radio-dependent.

Various other things don't add up. How does 'altitude' fit into a scheme involving radio signals? Sure, at some frequencies (VHF and upwards) line-of-sight effects determine what can be received, but how, pray tell, do I use this 'altitude' control to...ah...change my present line-of-sight horizon? I think? Otherwise, not...? And how do I store 16km of coax to feed the SDR that isn't there anyway, much less get...an...antenna...up 16km...?????? WHAT!?!?!?!

Let me do some more Vicodin, and I'll get back on this...

[PAUSE FOR MIND-ALTERING SUBSTANCES]

OK...maybe that's better. Now, reading elsewhere, I see some mentions of 'kernel' architecture. I know what that is, having cut my teeth on a few versions of UNIX over the decades. Buuuuut..a 'kernel' is simply a core bit of code (hence the name; it's supposed to evoke a 'tiny bit of seed' that the processes grow out of via the code) that is small and viable to any incoming process.

Ableton Live 9.x is not what I'd call a 'kernel'. Yr.Typ. UNIX kernel is maybe some kBytes in size. Ableton Live is...is...ahhh...reallyhonkinBIG. It's not a kernel. No. NononononoNO. >THWAP< BAD programmer! NO pocky!

Detroit techno used organ as a primary instrument. Ah....hah. Mmmmmmmmmmmnope. I've seen quite a bit of this stuff (I even nearly got my finger broke by Carl Craig one night @ the Sardine Bar, when he and I were moving a table...TRUE STORY) and know some of the people who cook this stuff up, including Juan (of the Belleville Three that Mr. Ruslan mentions) Atkins. And what jazzed him up in that first incarnation of Cybotron was no organ. No. That first album, 'Clear', comes right out of the electronic scene in Germany, from artists such as Klaus Schulze, Tangerine Dream, Kraftwerk, and especially a little (HA! it's an hour long) ditty called 'E2-E4' by one Manuel Gottsching which has pretty much ZERO organ playing on it. But beside that,