shades by daylight noise

The split

SHADES hears every moment of the mix at once, pitch by pitch, and splits it by what each part is doing: what holds is the surface, what jumps up across the whole spectrum together is the message. It isn't a cut in time, so a chord ringing under a snare is pulled apart from the snare in the same instant, and the two always add back up to the input.

SPLIT, the big knob: how ruthless the line is. Fully left a gentle tilt, both halves a blend; at noon a clean split; fully right a hard line, where only what's plainly held is the surface and every scrap of movement, breath and grit goes to the message.

SPLIT, the jack: its CV, added to the knob.

HOLD: how long a sound must hold to count as the surface. Fully left 20 ms, so anything tonal is surface and only the clicks are message; at noon 155 ms; fully right over a second, so every chord change and every note that moves is message, and only the drone is left.

LEFT, RIGHT: the mix in.

The glasses

GLASSES, a lit button and its gate: while it's held they're on. The surface drains away and the message comes forward. Let go and the mix comes back as it was. Play it as a breakdown button.

STARK: how black and white the message is made while they're on. Fully left it's natural; towards noon a gate closes in until only the hard edges are left in black silence; past noon they're crushed, down to one bit at full, every hit all or nothing.

BLEED: how much of the surface is left while they're on. Fully left none; at noon a grey ghost of it; fully right all of it, but grey: both sides together and dulled.

The billboard lights with the message while they're on, each half its side, low at the foot, and flashes on every hit.

The headache

ACHE: how fast the headache comes and how bad it gets. Fully left never. At noon it builds over six seconds of wearing them; at full it's bad in a second and a half. It squeezes and drives the message, and everything you hear through them sags in pitch and throbs, five semitones down at its worst.

Take them off and the mix is clean at once, but the ache lingers: it only starts to clear once they've been off a while, and put them back on before then and it's still there.

The floodlights under the billboard throb with it, and the billboard squints: its strips close in from the top and the foot.

What comes out

SURFACE: what's held, both sides together.

MESSAGE: what's sudden, both sides together. With SURFACE it adds back up to the input, whatever the glasses are doing.

LEFT, RIGHT: the mix, untouched with the glasses off, the world through them with them on.

ACHE: how bad the headache is, 0 to 8 V.

SEEN: a trigger on every hard edge seen while they're on.

Every out is 21 ms late: that's how long it takes to hear what's held.

Specs

Format

Width: 20 HP
Controls: a big knob, 4 knobs, a lit button

Inputs

LEFT, RIGHT: audio, ±5 V; RIGHT takes LEFT when it's empty
GLASSES: gate, high past 1 V
SPLIT: CV, added to the knob, 5 V the whole way

Outputs

SURFACE, MESSAGE: audio, mono
LEFT, RIGHT: audio, the mix
ACHE: CV, 0 to 8 V
SEEN: trigger, 5 V, 5 ms