Diary of a free album

Over at Fwonk*, everyone understands the beautiful feeling one gets from giving music away for free.

After weeks and months crafting sounds, sculpting waveforms, noodling with synths, slicing samples and polishing the resulting noise into something wonderful, it is with pride and pleasure that we release our musical offspring into the world to be heard and played and enjoyed.

So we've been following bass music's 'Diary of a free album' with interest.

Baoginga and I.D. - whose album 'Big Monster' provided some of the biggest dancefloor smashing moments of 2008 - have just released a free album. Their diary tracks the process, their intentions in making it a free release and their approach to self-promotion.

It makes a very interesting read and is symptomatic of the changing face of the music industry as musicians sieze the publicity tools and wrestle the creative process out of the hands of major labels.

You can hear a minimix of the album here:
I.D. & Baobinga - Bass Music Sessions Album Preview by I.D.

Read the diary here. And download the album here - it's a no-minimum, pay what you want effort, with all proceeds donated to charity.

Moog for you

Moog synthesizers are the epithome of electronic music instruments. The bold combination of wood, metal and electricity seems like a chimera born out of the depths of Haefestus' forge.

Compliments aside, the Moog synth sound helped to define the sound of rock music and electronic music during the seventies and forth. Years have passed, we have seen the apparition of virtual analogue synths, virtual instruments for our PCs and Macs, we have seen the rise and fall (and rebirth) of Frequency Modulation synthesisers, romplers, samplers and grooveboxes, and yet, the Moog sound still shines on top.

During the seventies we had the luck of listening to the works of Wendy Carlos and many others, yet, many of the albums are lost in second hand album bins or garage sales.

So, check this blog, listen to the music, then buy the albums you like. They are very much awesome in mp3 format, but they are better yet when you listen to them in their vinyl incarnations.