ribbon by daylight noise

ribbon

she walks your song

20 HP

Whatever you play into it is laid out as a course along a lit line: every hit, swell and drop-out an obstacle of one of four kinds, each with its own gate. A small walker jumps them with a chirp of her own. Stumble too often and she wears down; clear a long run and she blooms.

Listening

It hears whole mixes, not one drum at a time: a kick under a bass, a snare in a full song, a pad swelling in under everything. Each event it hears goes on the course as an obstacle, sorted by what it is.

LEFT, RIGHT: the song in, listened to as one and passed through untouched.

BUSY, the big knob: how many events count. Fully left only the biggest hits; at noon the beat's own; fully right every flicker, every hat and ghost note.

TANGLE: how readily one event counts as two kinds at once. Fully left never; at noon a kick and a snare together; fully right nearly everything.

The walker

The course is a bar long. Behind her on the line is the half bar she's walked; ahead, the next half bar as it went last time round. What was there a bar or two ago she sees coming; anything else is a surprise.

SKILL: how good she is. Fully left she stumbles on nearly everything; at noon she clears what she saw coming; fully right all but the worst. Its jack is its CV.

Her form: a stumble wears her down a form, through three worse ones to a flickering speck; six clears in a row bring her back up one, and twelve from her plain form make her bloom.

START, a lit button and its gate: a fresh walker in her plain form. Its cap glows while she's at her worst.

CLOCK: a pulse a beat; the course steps in sixteenths of it. Unpatched, a sixteenth is an eighth of a second.

What comes out

BLOCK: a gate for every low thud, a kick or a bass hit, 6 ms after it.

WAVE: a gate for every noisy burst, a snare, a clap or a hat, 6 ms after it.

PIT: a gate for every drop-out, where the song stops dead, about 20 ms in, high while it stays down.

LOOP: a gate for every long swell, a riser or a pad coming in, high while it swells.

STUMBLE: a trigger every time she stumbles. FORM: her form, 0 V at her worst to 8 V blooming.

VOICE: her voice alone. LEFT, RIGHT: the song exactly as it came in, with her voice at CHIRP's level.

Specs

Format

Width: 20 HP
Controls: a big knob, 3 knobs, a lit button

Inputs

LEFT, RIGHT: audio, ±5 V; RIGHT takes LEFT when it's empty
CLOCK: clock, a pulse a beat, rising past 1 V
START: gate, rising past 1 V
KEY: V/OCT, 1 V an octave, C at 0 V
SKILL: CV, added to the knob, 5 V the whole way

Outputs

Gates: BLOCK, PIT, LOOP, WAVE, STUMBLE: 0/5 V, STUMBLE a 10 ms trigger
LEFT, RIGHT: audio, the song and her voice
VOICE: audio, her voice alone
FORM: CV, 0 to 8 V