#Movuary day 3 brings you a classic example of why I should not be allowed to make music like this, whatever this is supposed to be. I don't know how to classify it, and I wrote it. Creapy broken jazzy dub and bass? I dunno...
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/03-Impulsive_Behavior.flac
#Movuary day 4 is far less complex or refined than anything I've done so far.
I had a bad night's sleep, and a roaring headache, so I woke up and made this thing. Pretty much just slapped it down and said "to hell with it."
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/04-A_Bad_Nights_Sleep.flac
Posting for the forth time, because I keep breaking stuff.
For #Movuary day 5, I decided to do something a little different. Thus, Cheap Plastic Oxygene was born.
This is a cover of Oxygene, Pt. 4 (1976), using slightly tweeked stock sounds from the Move, except for the drums, which I found from a sample pack of vintage drum machines.
I ran into a whole bunch of limitations making this one. There was more I wanted to do, but I ran out of space in the clips, and didn't have any spare pads left for resampling without further compromising stuff. There are a couple of glitches, which I left in there, because imperfections FTW, or something.
With apologies to Jean-Michel Jarre for butchering his fantastic work.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/05-Cheap_Plastic_Oxygene.flac
#movuary day 6. It's the log song from Ren & Stimpy Show. Some may recognize the first part from something else.
Short, boring, to the point.
I am just so pissed off today. I will make no further comments.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/06-Log.flac
#movuary day 7 isn't a track. Not exactly. It's an attempt to simulate shortwave radio conditions using a groovebox, which is, let's just say, not ideal, and certainly outside of the intended scope for such a thing. This was done by automating the parameters of a compressor, a phaser with it's frequency turned down all the way, and a couple of different high pass filters over time. The radio noise was sampled by plugging my Tecsun PL-990X shortwave radio into Move's line input, and tuning to a frequency somewhere around the 40m band with nothing going on.
I did this soon after I got my Move, but touched it up a bit since then.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/07-Radio_Move_International.flac
#movuary day 8 is a thing that I put together in about five minutes. I call it the Dance of Doom.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/08-the_Dance_of_Doom.flac
#Movuary day 9:
When Flipper the Dolphin (now known as Deejay Flippa) isn't saving people in the waters of the Florida Keys in the 1960s or whatever, he's in the studio making mad beats about the injustices of the world, with his man Calquale.wav from the 1995 Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia.
Yes, I was, in fact, rather bored a while back. Interestingly, by original Ableton Move broke while I was making this, so I didn't get to finish it until I got the replacement unit.
I have posted this before, but this is a slightly different mix with a couple of bugs fixed and new ones added.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/09-They_Call_Him_Flipper.flac
#movuary day 10:
a Total Loss.
Several years ago, I had a dream. In that dream, someone (not me) was standing, watching as everything they knew and loved was burned in a fire. There was a sequence playing in the background. This is my attempt to somewhat re-create what I heard, at least in part, in this dream.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/10-a_Total_Loss.flac
#movuary day 11: Ya Got Me.
This is based on samples from my Franklin Language Master 6000 SE talking dictionary. I sampled the really dirty pulse wave it produces in test mode, as well as some common phrases. This was all made with just three tracks, because I couldn't think of what to do with a fourth one. It's pretty busy as-is.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/11-Ya_Got_Me.flac
#movuary day 12:
This is not a keygen. It is, however, a sequence I made from memory after hearing one in the early 2000s, not having heard it for years before that. I have since heard the original. I got some notes wrong, but oh well. I'm keeping it like that.
This also happens to be a variation on the Alf theme, composed by Alf Clausen. An Alf for an Alf. How convenient!
HQ download, for what it's worth: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/12-Not_A_Keygen.flac
#Movuary day 13:
Point and Click.
This requires a bit of an explanation.
In 1998 (May 19, 1998, specifically), I downloaded some weird, not at all accessible MIDI sequencer thing. I don't remember the name of it. Seems like maybe it had the word art in it somewhere.
Anyhow, I opened it, and clicked on a bunch of unlabeled graphics with my screen reader, which produced this odd thing in E flat pentatonic major.
So, because I'm feeling very uninspired at the moment, I hooked a MIDI interface up to move, and another one to my computer, recorded this MIDI file into Move, added a drum track, and now I'm posting it here. The Melody is unedited from it's original, except for one note that I didn't like.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/13-Point_and_Click.flac
#Movuary 14: Bad Brailler.
This is a much extended version of one of my earliest Move projects, using a bunch of samples I recorded of my Perkins Brailler from 1962 as the drum track.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/14-Bad_Brailler.flac
#Movuary day 15:
Winter Hates Your Move.
Several years ago, @FreakyFwoof showed me an advert for gillette energizing moisturiser, featuring the phrase "Winter hates your face."
Makes me laugh every time I hear it, especially the way this guy said it.
So, back in December, during a particularly cold, snowy day, I demucsed stems from it, so much as I could, and imported elements into Move to have some fun with it. This is the result.
Drums, bass, the vocal, and the mod-like power chord electric guitar all come from the original advert.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/15-Winter_Hates_Your_Move.flac
#Movuary day 16: Axel F.
In December, I had a goal to cover Harold Faltermire's Axel F for the 40th anniversary of the movie Beverly Hills Cop, which was December 5, 2024, using Ableton Move, so I did that.
Being a product of 1984 myself, it just seemed like a good idea.
At the time I did it, this was the most complicated sequence I had ever done on this little four track groovebox. Don't think that's the case anymore.
It's also a demonstration that you can really do a lot with only four tracks and a little creativity. There are lots of "but it only has four tracks" Move haters out there.
There is absolutely no way I will ever get the sounds exactly right using a tool like this. In this case, I'm aiming for close enough to be recognizable, both in terms of the sound and the sequence.
All sounds were stock, except for the kick and snare drums, which really could have been stock, but I found slightly better versions of those sounds in a sample pack and used them instead of the stock versions.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/16-Axel_F.flac
#Movuary day 17: No News Is Good News.
This is an attempt at making some kind of news bed type thing.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/17-No_News_Is_Good_News.flac
#Movuary day 18: Xander Square
This is an idea that I sequenced originally in May of 2006 on my Yamaha Motif, now redone in Move. It's still about as finished as it was in 2006, I.E. not at all, really, but I'm posting it anyway.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/18-Xander_Square.flac
#Movuary day19: My Paradox.
I woke up this morning with the chord progression from Black Street's 'My Paradise" stuck in my head, so I moved it... kind of. It's also a good excuse to have some solo fun with a synth lead sound.
For this one, I hooked up a MIDI keyboard, though I played most of the e-piano part on the pads. I made about 90% of this sequence without using the Move's screen reader.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/19-My_Paradox.flac
#Movuary day 20: It's Thursday!
Well, yeah, but that's also the name of the track.
I woke up this morning feeling crappy, stuffy and headache-y, so I sampled a bunch of angry metal noises from a library called Black Metal, as well as a couple of Korg iKaossilator loops I made in 2016, synced using Ableton Link and sampled from my iPhone using a direct USB C connection (no external DAC), told my non-existent Sharp EL-640 to keep reminding me that it's Thursday, and made a track out of all that.
Appropriately enough, I was dealing with quite an annoying little bug in the current Move beta firmware while making this, so I was rather angry and annoyed. Totally fits.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/20-Its_Thursday!.flac
#Movuary day21: Happy Modulation.
This is a track made with FM sounds. The drums are from a Yamaha PSS-170. It's way, way too happy for these times.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/21-Happy_Modulation.flac
#Movuary day 22: Heidenröslein.
This is an extended and remixed version of a one-shot loop I made on October 11, 2024, the first day I had my Ableton Move,
This is an arrangement of Franz Schubert's Heidenröslein. Those who know me well will know why I did this.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/22-Heidenr%c3%b6slein.flac
#Movuary day 23: Time Is Up.
Seems appropriate to post this today, though it's a thing I made back in October, then finished in November after getting my replacement Move.
I've been away from home for a little over six months, and I'm going back in a few hours, with trepidation for various reasons. Yep, time is up, indeed.
This is based around the dingdong sound from my Radio Shack Vox Clock II talking clock, and the spoken words "time is up." Also features a cheap Russian-made watch going ticktock in the background throughout much of the piece.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/23-Time_Is_Up.flac
Edited to fix a bad note in the bass line and change some levels in the mix. Thanks for pointing that out, @FreakyFwoof
#movuary day 24: Jazz Is Broken.
So, Onj sent me an unfinished set to play with, thus, I played with it. This originally had drums, keys, and a pluck/almost e-piano sounding thing. I added a sign wave lead and an organ, hastily recorded with my Hamond-suzuki XK-2 a few minutes before leaving for the airport, so I didn't have time to do anything truly exciting with the organ. It was a one-shot recording. Did weird broken stuff with the track, because jazz is broken.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/24-Jazz_Is_Broken.flac
#Movuary day 26: Sliding Sideways.
This is what happens when I don't at all take anything seriously, and do something odd with the four random sounds it throws at me when creating a new set.
HQ download:
http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/26-Sliding_Sideways.flac
#Movuary day 27: This Is A Doob.
Here is a silly minimal thing with Softvoice TTS saying "this is a doob" a lot throughout.
If you know, you know.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/27-This_Is_A_Doob.flac
#Movuary day 28: a Sad End.
Well, here we are at the end of this Movuary journey, with a sad, slow thing in F miner that makes me wish for better times.
HQ download: http://www.borris.me/audio/movuary2025/28-a_Sad_End.flac
#Movuary postmortem report:
I came up with the idea to post a track created on Ableton Move every day in the month of February, and, WOOHOO! I succeeded! I suck at following through on things like that.
Almost every track I posted was created the day of posting, or perhaps the night before. A few were older projects that were touched up. Only one was completely unedited from it's original state from when I made it in December.
4 out of 28 tracks were made using an external MIDI keyboard instead of, or in addition to using Move's pads. These were days 10, 19, 21 and 22. Otherwise, everything was either step entered or played live using the pads.
Total running time of all posted tracks: 56 minutes, 7 seconds.
Total directory size of the project, once converted from 32-bit FP wave to 16-bit flac with dithering at compression level 8: 285 MB.
The shortest track was day 7: Radio Move International, which is 37 seconds.
The longest was day 23: Time Is Up, at 3 minutes 34 seconds.
Day 11: 'ya Got Me' had the highest number of boosts.
Day 24: 'Jazz Is Broken' had the most favorites.
Day 12: 'Not A Keygen' was the least loved, both in terms of favorites and boosts.
My personal favorite to actually make was probably day 5: 'Cheap Plastic Oxygene' with day 1: 'Only the Beginning' coming in at a close second.
I really had fun with this project, and learned some things about this device, and myself as a musician limited in space and scope due to lack of all my instruments at the moment.
Turns out having some limitations, like only having four tracks to play with, and only directly supporting 4/4 time signatures unless you get creative with loop lengths makes you think about things in interesting ways, at least in my case.
I would like to once again say how cool it is to have an accessible groovebox at my disposal. Unfinished and undocumented though the screen reader functionality currently is, with a few small things missing, I can pretty confidently say that there really isn't anything I can't do with this device that anyone looking at the display can... Well, OK, let's not talk about the initial setup. That's a bit of an issue right now, but I have some geeky workarounds for those things, and hopefully, that part will improve. But, once it's all set up, even the very few things that don't speak yet are easy enough to work around to the point where I usually don't feel like I'm missing much.
So, anyway, this was fun, and I'm glad I did it. Thanks for coming along for the ride with me.
@BorrisInABox Do you have a zip of your #Movuary folder like Andre does? I'd love to download it if so.
@jaybird110127 @BorrisInABox It's actually a folder higher in the dropbox but you wouldn't be able to see that without a direct link. Patrick, feel free to send him the root Movuary folder, if you like.
@FreakyFwoof @BorrisInABox To be clear: what I mean is lossless audio of completed things, not project or other files you can use on a Move. I don't have a Move.
@jaybird110127 @BorrisInABox No, like I said his folder is sttored next to mine, but you couldn't get higher in the tree without a link to that. I fully understand what you were asking...