Sunday Ambient #18

I added a new-to-me effect pedal to my synth arsenal - a Strymon Nightsky. Strymon is a well-known brand of higher end effects. Being the newbie to synths that I am, I normally wouldn’t be inclined to purchase something so specialized and pricey. However, I noticed a used Nightsky at a local Guitar Center for a great price. While I wasn’t very familiar with this particular Strymon model, the extensive modulation options made it quite compelling and I ended up walking out with it. I figured I could play around with it and if it didn’t click with me, Guitar Center has a generous return policy. The Nightsky is almost an instrument in itself. I spent a while playing around with it and after a couple of hours I feel like I’d barely scratched the surface of its abilities. It’s not just a reverb pedal - it’s built like a synth. It even has a sequencer! I’m posting a couple of recordings today. The new pedal really brought out a wide dynamic range in my initial experimentation. I decided to try out the compression and limiter abilities of my recorder. The limiter is used for the featured recording. The compressor is used for the bonus track. The former did pretty well at keeping a cap on the loudest regenerated sounds. The latter removed a bit too much of the dynamics for my tastes. Maybe you’ll like it better though. Sadly, neither algorithm is configurable in the Zoom HS6. Enough gear talk. Enjoy the tunes, preferably with headphones on. Life is too short to listen to music through crappy speakers. :) The track lengths are a bit longer today - thanks to my friend Jim for the suggestion! Bonus Track Instrumentation and Recording Tools * Moog Grandmother * Moog Subharmonicon * Strymon Nightsky * Mackie Mix8 mixer * Zoom HS6 recorder Patch Notes SH CLOCK OUT -> SH TRIGGER IN & GM CLOCK IN GM S/H OUT -> GM ENV AMT IN (in-line attenuator cable added) GM MOD WAVE OUT -> GM ATTENUATOR IN GM ATTENUATOR OUT -> SH VCO 1 PWM & SH VCO 2 PWM GM KB OUT -> GM MOD RATE IN This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit michaelconnell.substack.com