Congroovent

Congroovent is Jeanette C.s July 2019 EP dedicated to Irish DJ and presenter Annie Mac: happy birthday Annie! You are a never ending spring of sublime and pristine electronic music! It is a joy to listen to you talk about music with musicians and producers.

• Title: Congroovent
• Released: July 18, 2019
• Genre(s): synthwave, darkwave, EDM, club, drum & bass

The EP is also available on SoundCloud.

Tracklist

1. "Get A. Mac (a tribute to Annie Mac": the DJ and BBC radio 1 show host Annie Mac has been a source of sublime electronic music to me over the past two years. This is to you Annie: happy birthday and thanks for the inspiration and a great show! I'd like to celebrate with this synthwave and dance tune. The aural cake is decorated with all those blinking LEDs from loads of lovely hardware synthesizers: may they never be snuffed! You can find more about Annie Mac on her own website AnnieMacPresents.com or discover DJ sets and more on her SoundCloud account. There is no affiliation or other connection.
   Links: [Download "Get A. Mac" MP3 (3.7M) [Download "Get A. Mac" OGG (3.3M) [Download "Get A. Mac" FLAC (23M)
2. "Chronophysis": the passage of time is unforgiving, as is this hard, minimalist, rhythmic club tune. Originally inspired by DJ and hardware connaisseur Deadmou5, it found it's own heartbeat and loudly tools its bell, calling the worshippers to the temple of dance. Special thanks go to little, seet Hanna, one of my best friends youngest daughter, for donating the claps.
   Links: [Download "Chronophysis" MP3 (4.8M) [Download "Chronophysis" OGG (4.1M) [Download "Chronophysis" FLAC (26M)
3. "Strain of thought": a more abstract and darker take on electronic music, swaved in synthetic clouds, bridging the ambient and the danceable with its Drum & Bass groove. It has come far from its spiritual mother: Static by London based electronic duo Dusky.
   Links: [Download "Strain of thought" MP3 (4.8M) [Download "Strain of thought" OGG (4.4M) [Download "Strain of thought" FLAC (34M)
4. "Cool, blessed hand (instrumental)": an atmospheric, compasionate Drum & Bass track which can't dny its heritage in the fantastic UK based artist Dimension. This is the instrumental mix, the full version is yet to be released.
   Links: [Download "Cool, blessed hand (instrumental)" MP3 (5.0M) [Download "Cool, blessed hand (instrumental)" OGG (4.5M) [Download "Cool, blessed hand (instrumental)" FLAC (33M)

Technical background

This EP mainly owes its sound to an eclectic and selective family of hardware synthesizers:

• Roland JV-1080: the 90s classic, a sample based module with a few expansion boards and a great and powerful architecture (especially considering the time)
• Waldorf Microwave XT: this series goes back to the beginning of wavetable synthesis with the PPG Wave clearly audible in its ancestry. Also a flexible and intriguing architecture with lots of modulation sources to get the sounds moving
• Dave Smith Instruments (DSI) / Sequential Prophet 12: the powerhouse and horse of sound design with its hybrid digital analogue synthesis, great performance controls and extremely accessible user interface, the Prophet is an indispensible and inherent part of all these songs, trying it on for basses, drums, delicious pads, sound effect and leads: the Prophetis all over this!
• Arturia MiniBrute: almost a modern classic and evidence that sonic giants to have to be physically huge. No Brute no sub-bass in these tracks. It is quite capable of filling other rolls with surprising aptitude
• MakeNoise 0-Coast: the semi-modular east and west coast pack of dynamite drives a lot of the treble aggression as well as precisely plucked arpeggios and a hefty kick drum to be reckoned with. Besides that it is a beautiful, little instrument with lovely colourful LEDs, especially the green <3

This project though would be incomplete without the software: all tracks were sequenced, recorded, mixed and mastered on Linux, not to forget Yoshimi, which soon celebrates its 10th birthday, LinuxSampler and Csound to delve deeper into the depth of synthesis and sampling. All MIDI was sequenced using Midish, all audio work was powered by Nama. All involved software is open source, though the used pianos are commercial.

Acknowledgements

Many, many thanks to my patient, audiophile and knowledgeable friends for their helpful feedback and suggestions along the way. You are the best friends in the world!