ever since listening to the thinner (ye olde netlabel) releases, dub house / dub techno was one of my favourite genres. I am still a learner, and this album (sometimes more clearly, sometimes not) shows my journey, with "reeboatgnist" being from around 2000 and "Just to quickly follow up" being one of the latest from 2018. I have been focusing on live performing and live streaming which is why there's no recent release in this album.

If you want to support me and my music, and you want to posess remastered, high quality copies of the tracks, I'm selling this Album on Bandcamp:

https://halfbyte.bandcamp.com/album/blue-triangles

Buy on Bandcamp

Blue Triangles

Weekly Beats 2024

Finally, some music I feel confident enough to upload.

This track wants to have some vocals, I feel, but I definitely don't feel confident enough for that.

The track is my first track built from start to finish in Ableton 11 which feels like a really solid release. (No comping used, haha)

Probability Zone

Just a dubtechno experiment. The voiceover is more or less a placeholder with a lot of blabbering that will hopefully replace with me having something to say soon.

voice of reason

Another demo arrangement of our #tagtoolmusic session with @benjaminrabe and Fabric Lenny. 

kniffke

Born out of some improvisation with my Korg Montron combo, an original Monotron and a Monotron Delay. The basedrum you hear (and the noisy hihat-ish sound in the background, which is just a filtered version of the original) is the filter of the Monotron self oscillating, fed through the Monotron Delay and then recorded and looped in ableton.

The grit of the Monotron Delay gives the whole thing a lot of character, quite typical for dub techno beats.

Originally the thing (as it was an LFO fed filter sweep) was straight four to the floor, but I decided that this was not what I had in mind and I built a drum rack out of different parts of the original beat filtered to the desired frequency range.

The dub techno stab is a sampled single shot played with the Monotron (also fed through the delay, which creates these weird off beat sounds) turned into a proper stab using simpler, an auto filter, a ping pong delay and a reverb (and some EQ for good measure).

The bass sound uses an Ableton Simpler with the exact same sample looped and filtered.

The synth effects are pure Monotron Delay, freely recorded and then somewhat chopped up and put into place.


Monotronic

WB1413 No Silver Bullet

Surphin Surplus

Weeklybeats 2024 is starting and I wanted to get something done quickly as I knew I wouldn't have much time left during the rest of the week.

This is built around a simple melody on Klevgrand's Speldosa. I absolutely love the sound of it but it is so. hard. to. mix.

I find the track slightly boring, as there's not much happening chord progression wise but I ran out of time in the window that I had.

In the end probably more a sound design exercise than a song writing exercise.

WB2401 It Makes A Sound

Unfortunately I had to skip last week due to some health issues. This week was a bit busy so again, this is more a sketch that shows the potential.

The name is a nod to the all time classic Mango Drive from Rhythm&Sound, which in turn is a remix of Mango Walk.

I don't see this as a sort of reproduction or even remix but more of a study of the spirit and the techniques of the original. 

Produced using the Ableton 12 Beta, but hardly using any of the new functionality (I used "strum" for the second guitar-ish synth chord)

It would by quite easy to stretch this to 5-8 minutes with some melodic variations and some proper dub style echo automations but I ran out of time as I won't have much time during the weekend. (Writing this on friday)

WB2403 Mango Sykkel

This week I stood in my own way, started way too late on Thursday and then ended up with something completely unusable. I thew away everything melodic, just kept the beat and started from scratch.

The sounds are a bit stereotypical, but I like the anthem-ish sound of the super saw synth.

Again, sloppy arrangement, but at least this one has a couple of transitions if a bit random.

WB2404 Drilling Through

No idea what this is. The groundwork, including parts of the pads in the background, the bleepy melody and the two drum loops were done on the OP-1, but then I pivoted to Ableton Live as I was getting nowhere on device.

I tried to add more to this but the song actively resisted.

WB2405 Clamshell

I went into the week thinking that trying to do some minimal techno could be fun. I then unexpectedly had time over the weekend, as I was trying to get rid of some cold viruses. 

This became a fun excersise in time and space with various different time signatures running against each other and constantly changing amounts of reverb on the main pieces. I also had a bit more time for arrangement so not only is this the longest beat this year so far, it probably also has the best breaks and transitions.

If you can't tell, I am quite happy with this one :)

WB2406 Drain The Groove

Another surprisingly long one. Heavily inspired by listening to too much Von D, but hopefully able to give it my own spin and atmosphere. Lots of different delays and reverbs, definitely not skimping out on the post processing.

It is developing slowly but I wouldn't have it any other way in this case.

WB2411 This Is Not a Cake

I wanted to do this for a while, sort of to prove myself that I'm able to do it. I am somewhat ambiguous towards the lofi genre and do enjoy listening to the Girl's stream from time to time, but I didn't have to create this to figure out that most of those tracks are relatively low effort.

Still, it was fun to play around with some nice chord progressions and the lead melody. 

WB2412 Stereo Type

Just a quick lofi remix as the chords lent themselves very well to it. Basically the track you would expect when the chords start.

Waiting for departure (lofi recapitulation)

When playing around with Pigments presets, I came across this lovely lush pad that instantly reminded me of Goldies "Timeless". This track is clearly inspired by Timeless, one of my all time favourite drum and bass songs. It is still a weekly beat so it lacks a lot of the finesse and the storytelling that makes Timeless so compelling, but I think it works for a tribute of sorts.

WB2445 Callback

Had to ease myself back into Weekly Beats on my home turf. Had the idea for the glitchy delay effects on the main stab this morning and am somewhat happy with the result. I'm wondering if I maybe overdid the compression on the main stab a bit, but I do like the aesthetics of it.

Mostly Ableton stock, except for a bit of processing and the fill drums.

I'll try to live stream my weekly beats session next week, see https://halfbyte.org/ for details and schedule.

WB2601 Next Cross Over

I was struggling this week, hard. Started with something completely different but failed to get it anywhere. Then just dropped an interesting sample into Granulator III and tweaked it a bit and ended up with this. It is very unfinished, too short for my taste, but it is a submission and I am happy that I pushed through. 

WB2606 Sample My Theorem

This track really had a life of its own and went places I didn't intend it to go.

The end result is somewhat of a banger, I hope. 

It would go great with UK drill lyrics, but since I don't have a rapper at hand, you'll have to trust me on that.

On second thought: https://youtu.be/4G0Tlbihoho

WB2608 Ok Lets Go

Definitely more mellow than last week's entry. Happy with the result, even though this was a rather quick one. Could do with a bit more variation in a final mix outside of WB.

All in all, nice little row of different DnB genres and eras this month. Let's see what the next month brings. Happy to listen to something else than sped up breaks for a change.

WB2613 In Spite Of The World

Given that the original has some latin flavour, I had this idea to pick up this weird brazil funk trend of slowing everything the fuck down.  The end result is kinda cool, I think. Not like Justin Bieber in Paulstretch cool, but kinda nice actually. I love the crunchy breaks.

In Spite Of The World (SLOWED)

Originally I was planning on something a little a little more abstract but after a bit of experimenting in the beginning this track basically made itself.

The base sample is an E-Piano loop I recorded (or rather: bounced in Ableton) and then slowed down to 50%. As usual, a lot of XLN RC-20 and Cymatics Origin involved in getting the sound as crunchy and noisy as possible.

All in all, this took about 2 hours start to finish and I am happy with the result. Could I have taken a couple of extra passes on the noodling or at least make it a tiny bit more quantized? Sure. Do I think it would've helped? Probably not.

WB2616 Several Instances

This was one of those weeks where, several hours into one track, you have to abandon it because it simply does not speak to you anymore. So I started from scratch and came up with this Garage thing.

I'm happy with the strings that work quite niceley against the e-piano just by inverting a couple of notes on the chords. 

WB2619 More To The Groove

Okay, so I finally gave in and got me some vocals off of Vocalfy. I'm happy with the end result and it was a fun experience, but it somehow feels like less of an accomplishment because of how much the vocals drive this beat?

Dunno. I really enjoyed the process and that's worth something, I guess. And the end result is a bop. I think.


WB2622 Secrets (When the lights go low)

WB2624 Sodium Permanganate

There are some obvious references in this one, but I'll leave them up to you to figure them out. Minimalistic house, slow, just a few elements dropping in and out.

Didn't spend a ton of time on this one but love the end result.

WB2625 People Mover

Okay, the heat wave is over but I still feel like moving like a snail, so this slows the heck down.

Didn't have that much fun arranging this one, but the sound design was a nice excercise.

I mixed this only with somewhat crappy headphones, so I guess the mix could be better.

WB2627 Flaked Dub

Been very short on time (Last work week before vacation, you know the drill), so this is a quick, ambient-ish dub techno something. 

WB2628 Backup Dub

This came out surprisingly happy after playing around with this chord progression. It clearly asked for a happy rave stab/piano kinda sound and I had to oblige.

WB2629 Wave Your Hands

This one resisted a bit in the arrangement and mastering stage. Also, I'm still not sure where the dreadzone people got all their amazing audio snippets from and so this one is a bit dry and dare I say boring.

Also, what would you call that dreadzone type dub/reggea/house/techno genre? No idea.

WB2630 Moose Dub

This one could do with a bit more variation and maybe a rhodeish lead on top, but I am happy with the sound aesthetics. I had Bukem's Demons Theme running in my mind and was in a bit of a Jungle Daze (I hope you see what I did there). 

WB2631 Phase Change

I've had the OP-1 for something like 5-6 years now, but this is the first time I actually managed to get a song together, as the tape based editing drives me nuts every time.

Anyway, after a loooooong gap, I'm back.

WB1830 - Operator On Deck

Look, I know this isn't a proper english word. Naming is hard.

This started off as a sound exploration (I wanted to figure out how to do the Bass sound from Saian Supa Crew's "Polices") and then the chords turned it into something else. Ideally, I'm imagining an Anderson .Paak voice croaking over it, but the simple lead melody will have to do for now.

WB2632 Reconned

Once again, I have no idea what this is. Instrumental Triphop? Ambient Breaks? Whatever it is, it was a fun exploration of a triplet style beat, the resonator variations and chords somehow matching on top of that, while I have no idea *why* it works. The lead melody, while simple, adds a bit of wistful longing to the mix and gives this (for me, somehow) a bit of a James Last "Biscaya" vibe, which is why I added the ambient noises.



WB2633 Because You Know

Yet another weird ambience plus beat plus something, mainly because I had the sound idea of the squelchy bass out of my head. This track needed an almost full restart but it ended up ... somewhere in the end.

Credits for the Background ambience: https://freesound.org/people/USBMED_Ambiences_Sound_Library/sounds/638388/

WB2634 Monster Crunch

WB2635 Division By Zero

WB2636 Lootbox

Okay, now we're getting into difficult territory, I had nothing 3 hours ago and I'm submitting this knowing that this needs another hour or so mixing because I want to be done. WB feels like a chore right now. I know this is going to get better again, but at least I didn't give up.

Regardless, this is a weird one. I worked on and off throughout the week on a different track but today I finally completely lost the interest in it. Instead, I had this disco-ish octave bassline in my head and I started tweaking it until it sounded interesting. 

WB2637 After Four Minutes Of Slience

Still in a slump. At least this time I was able to sorta kinda drag myself out of it but not without leaving two beats behind this week. The result is a trap/drill mess that goes kinda hard but is rather simple.

I've recorded some vocals (beyond the ad libs included in this version), you can find that version here:https://soundcloud.com/halfbyte/raise-the-stakes-low-bars

WB2638 Raise the Stakes - no bars

This is the version with vocals as a proof

Raise the Stakes - low bars

Still not feeling great about the music I make, but this was at least a little bit of fun to make. It's a kinda irritatingly sombre hardcore breakbeat rave kinda bop, with a stupid vocal shout no less!

I'm especially happy about the beginning where it sounds like a really sophisticated, dunno, D'n'B tune and then the stupid vocal comes it and everything devolves into chaos :)

WB2639 Hardcore Tragedy

Yeah, no, I have no idea what this is. I played around with a melodic sample from a sample pack I recently aquired and somehow the sample didn't really want to be boxed in to a specific genre.

WB2640 Arrival At Seraki Station

After listening to the tune again, I found it to be one of the best pieces of music I ever created - And that's why I wanted it to be on soundcloud.

I made this tune around 2000 in Heidelberg (stayed there for 6 months on an internship).

(This track is now part of my "Blue Triangles" album available on bandcamp.)

Reeboatgnist

Just do it.

A rage track inspired by dumb people.

half/byte

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