More New Music: “8/22/22 (Perseus Galaxy Cluster)”
Posted on August 22, 2022 Posted by John Scalzi 23 Comments
NASA’s Exoplanets Twitter account posted this yesterday:
And I was all, huh, I wonder if I can make some music out of that.
The answer is: Apparently! Although I didn’t end up using the original audio file. What I did was make a MIDI file out of the original audio, quantize it for time and key, and use that for several individual tracks, time-stretching the information to 16, 32 and 64 bars, and then putting various voices and effects on the tracks. And then adding drums. As one does.
I mentioned all this to Athena, and she was, all “so, you sampled a black hole.” And, well. Yes! Sort of. I’m a science fiction author, I’m allowed.
The resulting track is a) short, and b) asymmetrical. It’s not a song; it’s a musical composition. And — this is a real surprise, I know — it’s pretty noisy. Once again, it’ll be up on music services in the next few days, but right now here is the only place to hear it. I hope you like it.
(Update, 8/24/22: It’s now up on the major music services, including Spotify, TIDAL and YouTube/YouTube Music)
— JS
Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving With a Galaxy Cluster?
😍
So freakin’ cool!
Impressive. Bound to knock a few heads off. It had mine bobbing, and nary a snake to be seen.
No foolin’ a good track.
The last third got a little “on the floor” for my – admittedly odd – ear, but twas compelling nonetheless.
That rocks! I kept adding a couple of voices humming, droning, scatting, no words, just interplaying with the piece. Female and male.
i really like this! enough so that i forwarded it to some noise/electronic music maker friends, and i’m picky af about music!
This is exactly need for background music at work. Thank you!!
It starts off as, well, to me it sounds like what would happen if Prince and the band Boston wrote something together (the Boston song Foreplay/ Replay – that’s the actual name of the song! – has a 2 minute intro that i SWEAR sounds like what moving thru space SHOULD sound like)
And then, part way thru, a House DJ gets it.
Pretty awesome!
It is reminiscent (reminds me anyway) of the background music/sound/noise used for “the monolith” in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Fascinating!!! 🖖🏻
One is reminded of Pink Floyd’s “Echoes.”
Well, this one is, anyway.
I don’t quite understand. Even though there can be sound in the nearby area because of sufficient density of gasses, how did that sound cross all the vacuum of space for us to hear it from Earth?
Honestly, that would fit right in as part of the soundtrack to the Mass Effect series.
In space no one can hear me scream, “Stop it”.
HeadSpace ‘Hallelujah’ methinks…DaveO’
John, your remix of the black hole’s sounds is mentioned in an article by The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/aug/23/it-takes-time-to-reveal-its-profundity-our-music-critic-reviews-the-sound-of-nasas-black-hole .
Arnold Winter:
Yup. I’m amused.
Over on Breaking Cat News, ” Edwardian Wall Dust” is being suggested as someone’s next band. That’s always on topic, right?
Ah, but did you clear rights to those samples? Betcha not, You might find out kind of lawyers black holes have… (Note to self, stay at least a few light minutes away from Scalzi…)
Sounds like a squarepusher trackfrom selection Sixteen. Schizm Track #2 Mix…
Personally, I thought it sounds like something from Doctor Who. I liked it!
Why is everyone acting like this is such a new thing? We were doing this back in the 90s. https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/xte/learning_center/listen.html
You did a pretty good job. I’m also thinking of sampling it, the sounds are great.