I worked with a guy at the Labs whose MS thesis was on numerically simulating the attack transients of woodwind instruments.
So...a professional MIDIator?
2025-07-30 13:30:44
Music is fundamentally mathematical, and many of the aesthetic qualities we find beautiful or satisfying (in music and many other arts) can be measured and described in mathematical terms.
In my freshman year music tutorial at St. John's College (Santa Fé) we did a lab where we tuned two strings in unison and then changed the speaking length of one of them, listening for the places where they sounded consonant or dissonant and calculating the ratios where those things occurred. Then change the speaking lengths of both and tuned to unison again and repeat the process. Fun lab.
We ended up getting into a discussion about what, exactly, consonance and dissonance sound like, because a few people were taking consonance as meaning "pleasing to my aesthetic taste" and they had a taste for clashing waveforms. Once we all agreed with the literal sense of the words - together-sounding and apart-sounding - the conversation moved on smoothly.
2025-07-28 17:35:39
Here's one that will pull together two of the recent discussions here: metal, and math.
Tool - Lateralus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7JG63IuaWs
Tool was playing with the Fibonacci Sequence all through the song. The opening riff after the acoustic intro is measures of 9, 8, and 7 for the 16th step in the sequence (987). The lyrics also play with steps in the sequence:
Black [1]
Then [1]
White are [2]
All I See [3]
In My Infancy [5]
Red and yellow then came to be [8]
Reaching out to me [5]
Lets me see [3]
As below so above and beyond, I imagine [13]
Drawn beyond the lines of reason [8]
Push the envelope, [5]
Watch it bend [3]
Etc.
Not everything is done in sequence in the song, but there's enough to geek out over, and the rest is thematically related to the search for patterns and exploration.
And the outro lyrics: "Spiral out, keep going."
2025-07-27 21:59:17
Metal is a vast country and it is easy to get lost or to only encounter things that clash with your own preferences. I was a marginal metalhead for years before finding a bunch of bands that hit the sweet spot for me.
Learning the geography helps a lot with avoiding the things that annoy you and finding more that delight you.
2025-07-25 12:56:28
I've never been into Metal, but Ozzy was a beautiful, loving soul. RIP.
If you want a taste of Ozzy and Black Sabbath that wanders far afield of their usual heavy metal aesthetic, you should give Spiral Architect a try: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcQi7HP9Bjs Of all the things I value most of all
I look upon my Earth
And feel the warmth
And know that it is good
The album closer from Sabbath Bloody Sabbath starts with an arpeggiated acoustic guitar line that sounds like it comes straight out of a moody, early Genesis song. When the band comes in, it's built around strummed suspended chords that could be classic, early '70s Who, then this gives way to a chorus with a string arrangement - wholly unexpected, and hauntingly beautiful.
Ozzy's voice is not beautiful or versatile, but it is expressive and affective, and he uses it to great effect here.
Worth a listen, and it might make you appreciate Sabbath's musicianship and range a bit more. It's the song I keep coming back to since Ozzy's passing.
I was never a huge fan of Ozzy or Sabbath, but the metal bands I do love would never have been what they are without Sabbath's influence. Their music built a genre every bit as vast and varied as jazz. Their influence is staggering.
2025-07-25 00:57:04
I mean... Ozzy and Chuck Mangione are dead, why not America too?
I worked with a guy at the Labs whose MS thesis was on numerically simulating the attack transients of woodwind instruments.
So...a professional MIDIator?
Music is fundamentally mathematical, and many of the aesthetic qualities we find beautiful or satisfying (in music and many other arts) can be measured and described in mathematical terms.
In my freshman year music tutorial at St. John's College (Santa Fé) we did a lab where we tuned two strings in unison and then changed the speaking length of one of them, listening for the places where they sounded consonant or dissonant and calculating the ratios where those things occurred. Then change the speaking lengths of both and tuned to unison again and repeat the process. Fun lab.
We ended up getting into a discussion about what, exactly, consonance and dissonance sound like, because a few people were taking consonance as meaning "pleasing to my aesthetic taste" and they had a taste for clashing waveforms. Once we all agreed with the literal sense of the words - together-sounding and apart-sounding - the conversation moved on smoothly.
Here's one that will pull together two of the recent discussions here: metal, and math.
Tool - Lateralus
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7JG63IuaWs
Tool was playing with the Fibonacci Sequence all through the song. The opening riff after the acoustic intro is measures of 9, 8, and 7 for the 16th step in the sequence (987). The lyrics also play with steps in the sequence:
Black [1]
Then [1]
White are [2]
All I See [3]
In My Infancy [5]
Red and yellow then came to be [8]
Reaching out to me [5]
Lets me see [3]
As below so above and beyond, I imagine [13]
Drawn beyond the lines of reason [8]
Push the envelope, [5]
Watch it bend [3]
Etc.
Not everything is done in sequence in the song, but there's enough to geek out over, and the rest is thematically related to the search for patterns and exploration.
And the outro lyrics: "Spiral out, keep going."
Metal is a vast country and it is easy to get lost or to only encounter things that clash with your own preferences. I was a marginal metalhead for years before finding a bunch of bands that hit the sweet spot for me.
Learning the geography helps a lot with avoiding the things that annoy you and finding more that delight you.
I've never been into Metal, but Ozzy was a beautiful, loving soul. RIP.
If you want a taste of Ozzy and Black Sabbath that wanders far afield of their usual heavy metal aesthetic, you should give Spiral Architect a try:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AcQi7HP9Bjs
Of all the things I value most of all
I look upon my Earth
And feel the warmth
And know that it is good
The album closer from Sabbath Bloody Sabbath starts with an arpeggiated acoustic guitar line that sounds like it comes straight out of a moody, early Genesis song. When the band comes in, it's built around strummed suspended chords that could be classic, early '70s Who, then this gives way to a chorus with a string arrangement - wholly unexpected, and hauntingly beautiful.
Ozzy's voice is not beautiful or versatile, but it is expressive and affective, and he uses it to great effect here.
Worth a listen, and it might make you appreciate Sabbath's musicianship and range a bit more. It's the song I keep coming back to since Ozzy's passing.
I was never a huge fan of Ozzy or Sabbath, but the metal bands I do love would never have been what they are without Sabbath's influence. Their music built a genre every bit as vast and varied as jazz. Their influence is staggering.
I mean... Ozzy and Chuck Mangione are dead, why not America too?