Battle 49 : “The Tale of the Tortoise and the Hare”

OP-1 Battles
#1

2111 : To celebrate the hundredth birthday of the famous and still incredible OP-1, Jean-François Lelièvre and Hans Igel will be using this unequalled synth as the main tool for travelling into time and space. We remind you that S&T Race isn’t about finishing first, but reaching the end at the same time while taking the most elegant paths in time and space…


Choose two Tape tracks for JF Lelièvre and H Igel.
Pan them right and left (not necessarily full left/right).
On these tracks, you’ll have to record audio, but never at 100% (1:1) speed nor constant speed.
On the two other tracks, you might draw the audio landscape for the time race in normal speed, unless you want to add time-space artefacts.

The track must embed at least one sample that was captured while traveling.
Not while driving though !
While walking is OK enough :wink:

All audio must come from the OP-1 (sample-based drums or synths accepted)
You may sample the radio, especially if it fits the two main rules above.

Everything done within OP-1 obviously.
The track should be around 3:00 long.

Deadline is 10/10 10:10 GMT.

Curated by @jshell, @Zach_Lambert and @LyingDalai


Here are a few techniques that both explain the concepts and give some ideas :

Non-constant speed :
  • Tape mode, blue knob / arrows
  • stutter effect (Tape mode, preset button 6)
  • reverse effect (Tape mode, preset button 5)
  • tape stop (Tape mode, preset button 4)
  • break loops by setting loop start and end on the fly (Tape mode, preset buttons 1 and 2) and releasing it (preset button 3)
  • use sample synth or drums engine with lfo on loop position to achieve granular effects
Not 1:1 (100%) speed
  • different tape speed (Tape mode, white knob)
  • reverse playback (Tape mode, Shift+Play)
You may sample using album or drums sample engine and sample back on tape, cricket style.
Or record a lot of experiments and cut it into pieces, ant style.
Any other technique that could fit non-constant / non 1:1 tape speed is perfectly ok.

#2

Love the ruleset!

#3

WTF are these guys (or will be)?

Cool rules. Will the hosts be allowed to participate in the competition? (I’m voting Yes)

#4

Of course we may participate! But receive no vote, as is customary.

Would be nice if when submitting, people would explain how they chose to bend space and time :wink:

The tips and tricks thread might hide some inspiring techniques such as lofi timestretching…

#5
WTF are these guys (or will be)?

Cool rules. Will the hosts be allowed to participate in the competition? (I’m voting Yes)

Either these two guys are famous, and I’m too ignorant to know them, or they are aliases of forum members? I shall Google.

I may finally enter this one. Love the concept.

#6

Ahah, I’ll tell you eventually.
But they are not born yet.

#7

Cool rules :slight_smile: Somehow
never really used the tape tricks stuff in past, nice excuse to check that chapter :slight_smile:

#8

Cool rules! Will get my OP1 this week and may get involved. :smiley:

#9

I think I’ll lose my battle virginity for this.

#10

Perfect, got to make something !

#11

Yep my pal, you got to !

:smiley:

#12

Have already been tweaking some knobs for a few days but couldn’t come up with something nice yet. Anyways, great battle again! <3

#13

Can I ask a clarification about the rules? They state that (sample) speed must not be 100% original nor constant, but some of the examples you give (like editing sample starting point) do not alter sample speed per se, they just adjust the linearity (time) of the sample playback? So is it enough to alter either time (linearity) or speed of the original recordings or samples?


I hope you can understand my question, the rules are quite… philosophical. =)

I’m asking this because it’s much more challenging if sample speed needs to be tweaked constantly than simply messing with the loop markers constantly, for example, when creating harmonies between Lelièvre’s and Igel’s travels.

Btw. I used to live on a street named after Igel! Strange distortion in the time-space continuum…
#14

OK.

Let’s be clearer : the TRACKS of Lelièvre and Igel should not be recorded 100% 1:1 speed nor the same speed. The speed while recording these track must not be linear, put simply.
Now your drums/synth samples can be linear, no pb with this (although you can alter them as well to introduce the kind of time/space warp we’re after).

Picture Lelièvre and Igel’s tracks (e.g. Track 2 and Track 3) are their trace through space/time. You can get locally linear, if you want to take a rest (Lelièvre is known for this) but then you’ll have to go double speed to catch time back.

Idea is mostly stutter and reverse and stop the Tape while recording (onto Tape itself, or onto Album and bounce back to Tape, as you wish), get these tracks to always question the normal constant 1:1 speed !!
:smiley:
This normal constant 1:1 should be kept for your two remaining tracks (surrounding tracks 1 & 4 in above example) : in our tale they picture the public watching the space-time race.

Not sure I’m clearer, but after all your own interpretation of space-time warp may be as valid as mine : it has yet to be invented !

In my own version, I’ll record Lelièvre track first, sampling radio, scratching it like hell until I find some nice loops or gems and other pleasant artefacts.
Then I’ll challenge this track with Igel’s one, sampling the neighborhood forest noises and going granular.
Then cut and paste to get something almost coherent.
Then I’ll add the public.
At least that’s my plan. Lelièvre and Igel only know what will occur. But they aren’t born yet, hard to ask 'em.

#15

I’ve been playing with my old Fostex 4 track tape recorder the past few days. Yesterday I decided to play some time-stream tricks on me without me knowing it, recording the first few minutes of my session at a very wrong speed before braking on the tape. So I have some lovely super distorted slow Octatrack and A4… something… can’t wait to get back to the OP-1 and carry some of these accidents back through the rift.

#16

Cool thing to sample indeed :slight_smile:


#17

It’s a Grimm challenge!

#18

Cheers @LyingDalai for the clarification! I think I got it now. =)

#19

prfrr. ok.

#20

Hey there !
How are things going ?
Twisting time ?