doncbruital (FMA Admin)

While the reader is, of course, already well aware of the undeniably extraterrestrial qualities of the modular synthesizer, c'mon, let me go on about it a little anyways. To be honest, I sort of can't help but get really stoked just thinking of the way in which the instrument allows Sound, that most elusive creature, to be created from scratch and manipulated at the purest, most basic of levels, getting tweaked and shaped, proceeding constant through time on a slow evolutionary scale, yeah, a cosmic scale even, waveforms like planets, their orbits being drawn by an unseen hand at the module controls. I can't underline this quality enough: folks, if you ever really need reminding of the interstellar nature of things (like, if start taking the seasons for granted, or otherwise forget how cool the sun and moon are), just turn on a synth jam, let it draw you into its orbit, surrender to its gravity--and you'll be right as rain.

And as luck would have it, there has never been as good a time to get ahold of such grooves as now, never as good a place as earth (actually, judging by the attached picture this one's probably not true). Point is, only here and now are we lucky enough to have at our discretionary disposal this here Free Music Archive, and the wealth of righteous synthjourneys by PULSE EMITTER, aka Portland's Daryl Groetsch, contained therein. Groetsch, who's got more modules than the Apollo missions and a history of releases under his belt so storied it ought to go up on that lunar plaque, has been at it for years--there are few brands more trustworthy. His work runs the gamut from blippy harsh assault to blissed out slowsynth transcendence (as evidenced by his Meditative Music series of releases, in which the descending waveforms mimic sleepytime winddown brainsignals). Representative selections from all corners of this diverse ouvre are available here on the FMA, as well as an extraordinary live-on-WFMU performance from Brian Turner's show. Listen, and get a feel for that Kosmische vibe that's all too often forgotten.