Cradle -- Twin Analog Four Album Release, Bandcamp Codes with 72-page booklet, etc

Elektronauts Our Music
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Hey friends,

I finally released my first album in over 20 years. The last time I did that, it was self-pressed CDs and a copyshop. Before MySpace even. Nothing of that exists online anymore. Now here we go: I wrote Cradle on two A4s, at the beginning of 2022 – about four years after getting my first Elektron device.

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While writing these songs, my associations were strongly focused in childhood abuse, and the mess that a child might have to go through as a result. The music is uplifting nevertheless, with a heavier undertone that sometimes shines through. Several people said it sounds and feels videogamey, which I understand, but wasn’t my intention. Maybe it connects to the surreal way that humans connect to life when still children, and their brain waves don’t yet have their full range: I read that for children, life is like dreaming. Everything connects in the weirdest ways.



Anyway. The music was done, and it took over two more years to release. Apart from endless technical troubles (I see you, Overbridge), this gave me the time to expand the music into visual and verbal formats. On that path, I realized that the tracks, in their entirety, form a circle more than a line. The music doesn’t go from beginning to end, but cycles within itself.

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It led me to wonder whether these tracks really were about childhood abuse, or rather about life being circular, especially when you ascribe to the spiritual thoughts I care about. Emotional cycles, life cycles, cosmic cycles. One’s life as fragment of a continuous cycle, with infinite layers of meaning, infinite beginnings and endings.



Here are ten Bandcamp codes, to enter at https://cbh69.bandcamp.com/yum

  • ua4s-hpuf
  • 3btf-w3cn
  • pf55-y7cs
  • rd79-7v4d
  • 6jcf-35j7
  • kbhx-wf85
  • m6ps-52am
  • fyfc-bdug
  • m2ac-whau
  • gm9q-c5rp

[Edit:] Here are ten more codes:

  • a2m4-wxau
  • j7av-yfss
  • 7w78-7qhd
  • xs52-5zpc
  • 4q75-7t7w
  • 4bwb-v7m4
  • cxhm-geka
  • c4ef-uut7
  • es7x-evuv
  • rhls-78e9


The music is on many streaming platforms. I used CdBaby and it worked well for me:



Digital booklet: There’s a 72-page booklet that I wrote about in a previous post. You get the PDF with the Bandcamp album; it includes illustrated lyrics to the album, thoughts about each song, and drawings made by me, and by fellow artist Zofia Chrzanowska.

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Physical booklet: This 72-page booklet also exists as a physical thing: 20x20cm, in a limited edition of 50. You can buy it here.

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  • All drawings I made for this album can be seen here, plus
  • there’s a hub site with more info on the album here.



Thanks for your time, and thanks for all your support over the years!
Chris

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Thank you dear, I’ll listen to this with attention!

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That album is really, really good. So cohesive from end-to-end. I really enjoyed it and love the fact that it came from two A4’s. Nice work and thank you for sharing.
edit: I used code m2ac-whau

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Sounds lovely, I‘ve grabbed this code and will give it a good listen tomorrow. Thanks for sharing the origin story and congrats, you clearly poured your heart and soul into this!

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I popped in * fyfc-bdug

thanks for the chance to listen. look forward to hear it. congrats, it takes a lot to complete something like this

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  • m6ps-52am

Thanks.

It sounds really nice.

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I don’t know if you’ve listened to retro game soundtracks from Ben Prunty (FTL for instance) but I feel there are some common roots ^^

Lovely mood, thank you @chrisb78!

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Thank you for the music:-)
Will listen to it soon …

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Thanks for the recommendation, I’ll check it out!
I’ve gotten this game soundtrack feedback quite a lot. I used to program games, over 20 years ago, and I still do play them. Who knows how strong that influence is! <3

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Thank you so much for your very kind words!

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I felt the same way, could imagine these tracks sitting well in something like a dreamy scene from Link‘s Awakening! But it doesn’t scream videogame music either. Anyways, I‘ve really enjoyed it and think „coherent“ is a good way to describe what you’ve achieved here. A testament to working on something for a long time!

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I used rd79-7v4d, thank you so much!

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6jcf-35j7

Think i used the above. Thanks for the music!

Edit: Listening now. I like it! Doesn’t sound dated, yet has a nice melodic analog flavor, like a rediscovered vintage documentary soundtrack. Someone spent time making this music…

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I love that: doesn’t sound dated. I’ll have to print t-shirts with it :)))

Thank you for your words, honestly. It took four years to understand what I wanted to do with the A4, and then I realized I needed another one.
Step by step!

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Lol, love this. I appreciate the things that I liked about A4 in your music as well: it doesn’t have a specific character that it slaps in your face, which makes it easy to weave these gentle tones around each other. How are you using the two though?

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Re “doesn’t sound dated” … glad you took it in the positive spirit intended. I was trying to find a way to say that the melodic synth lead lines reminded me in a comforting way of some 20th century all-synth soundtrack, but that the music also sounds fresh.

Re “four years to understand what I wanted to do with the A4”: Understood. I’m still sorting out what music these boxes want me to make, and what I can persuade them to do. It’s interesting to use what are basically new species of musical instruments, where there are some limits but no rules ….

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The process was eventually one of total reduction, or maybe minimalism: I realized that I needed to commit to very few sound presets, to potentially not go anywhere else sonically.

This decision was essential, it allowed me to have some mental quiet, and see where these few, maybe four or five sounds, would lead me to.

The only place where I added sounds was for the drums, but even these stayed within limits.



The second A4 was only needed because I wanted to have several melodies at once, and sometimes wanted to emulate chords. Four voices simply didn’t suffice for that.

When I bought the Syntakt last year, this problem was immediately solved – it had enough tracks for me :slight_smile:

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So true about “new species of musical instruments”! I made several songs within the prior years, on OT, A4 and/or AR, but it became weirdly frustrating that these songs always were rather short (maybe a minute or a bit more), and never turned into something bigger.

From fine arts, I understand the power of working within the constraints of a work series, and that’s essentially how I ultimately approached this: to commit to specific sounds, and roll with it.

Everything else (like BPM or song length) then came from the melody that felt good enough to work with: choose sounds, find a melody that resonates emotionally, and then offer focused time for it slowly roast into something coherent.

There are several songs that didn’t end up on this album, because this process didn’t result in something I was happy with.

You win some, you loose some :slight_smile:

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I took the liberty to add a link towards your album, it was missing in your original post.
I hope it wasn’t intentional, otherwise feel free to remove it and accept my excuses for my intrusion.

Really enjoying the retro game soundtrack :slight_smile:

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Oh, oops, thank you for noticing and correcting!

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