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Ben Ramsay's analysis of ‘Internal Clock’ by Monolake

Mon, 02/20/2012 - 22:47 — BenR
Analyst's name: 
Ben Ramsay
Year of analysis: 
2012
Composition title: 
Internal Clock

 

Monolake’s ‘Internal Clock’ was released on the 2009 album ‘Silence’ on the Imbalance Computer Music label from Berlin, Germany. The piece is an outstanding example of where contemporary dance music, which some might call electronica or IDM, crosses over with acousmatic composition traditions.

This analysis aims to explore how we might apply current acousmatic music theory to explain some of the sounds, shapes and arrangements within the field of IDM and less conventional forms of electronic dance music. 

AttachmentSize
Internal Clock analysis - BR.pdf4.36 MB
References: 

 

Elert, G. (2011). "The Physics Hypertextbook." Retrieved 1st November, 2011, from http://physics.info/newton-third/.

Emmerson, S. (1986). The Language Of Elecroacoustic Music. London, Palgrave Macmillan.

Emmerson, S. (1999). "Aural landscape: musical space." Organised Sound 3(2): 135-140.

Landy, L. (2007). Understanding The Art Of Sound Organization. Chicago, MIT Press.

Smalley, D. (1997). "Spectromorphology: explaining sound-shapes." Organised Sound 2(2): 107-126.

 

Comments

Wed, 02/22/2012 - 17:12 — mikegatt
mikegatt's picture

Thanks for this Ben! I hadn't heard of the piece prior to your post and I can see why you chose it. We need more of this to really have a nice diversity of analyses on OREMA.

It is interesting to see that you have used tools such as spectromorphology and the language grid. I know that this piece does allow this sort of analysis due to its content, but it would be interesting to see if these theories could be implemented onto other electronica or IDM pieces. 

 

Wed, 02/22/2012 - 21:28 — ambrose.seddon

Yes, thanks. As Mike says, it would be interesting to see other pieces in this genre discussed with these tools.  
 
A great piece and interesting analysis. I found the spatial design very significant i.e. the more weakly source-bonded material in the distant space and the more strongly source-bonded material in the proximate space. But because of this, I didn't hear the causal linkage at 0'23 quite so strongly - to me the elongated sound seemed to emerge and co-exist with the metallic iterations, although, as you say, the pairing is significant. 
 
I appreciated the discussion of the 'drum machine' - I found the percussive elements engaging because of all those subtle spectromorphological variations, which seemed to me to be enhanced by the unpredictable rhythmic patterns - you almost know what's going to happen, rhythmically, but it rarely turns out exactly that way. Well, that was certainly the case for me on initial listening.
 

 

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