This manual documents all 17 modules included in the Brain Recordings bundle. Each entry covers the parameters, how to approach the module, and notes on the internal architecture derived directly from the gen~ code.
Brain Recordings is built entirely in native gen~ with no external dependencies. Every module runs inside Ableton Live as a standard Max for Live device and is fully compatible with Push 3 Standalone, with parameters mapped directly to the encoder banks.
The modules span a range of generative strategies: chaotic attractor synthesis, granular feedback, physical modelling, stochastic sequencing, electromagnetic field recordings, and adaptive nonlinear oscillator networks.
Important — read before using
Several modules are autopoietic: they are self-organizing systems that take time to settle, accumulate energy, and develop their characteristic behaviour. Do not expect immediate sound on all modules. Some may take 10 to 60 seconds before significant output is audible.
This is not a bug. It is by design. The generative processes are slow, probabilistic, and evolving. Give them time. Start with low parameter values, let the system run, and wait for accumulations, pressure states, and energy releases to emerge naturally.
These instruments behave more like ecosystems than synthesizers. Patience and exploration are the primary techniques.
Many modules in Brain Recordings have no native reverb. This is a deliberate architectural choice, not an omission.
The priority was keeping each device as lightweight as possible — especially for Push 3 Standalone, where CPU headroom matters and where Ableton's own built-in reverb suite is already exceptional. On Standalone, Push ships with a comprehensive set of high-quality reverb and space processors available as insert effects on any channel. Use them.
Inside Ableton Live, the options multiply further: convolution reverbs, algorithmic spaces, granular diffusion, chorus, ensemble, and modulation effects can all be stacked after any device in the chain. The modules are designed as sound sources and processes — not closed systems.
That said, several modules do include internal spatial processing where it is architecturally inseparable from the synthesis: Spirochaeta Digitalis uses a five-buffer recursive feedback reverb as part of its core organism; Schall and Minuscolo have built-in delay feedback networks; Backrooms and Futurstage include algorithmic reverb as structural components of their sound architecture; HarmoNish uses the Airwindows Galactic reverb port.
For modules without native reverb, the internal drift and modulation structures already provide continuous slow movement: LFO-driven pitch instability, stochastic envelope variation, chaotic attractor displacement, per-channel asymmetric detuning. These are not static sources waiting for external reverb — they are already in motion. Space, when needed, is yours to add.
Six resonant layers driven by a Lorenz strange attractor. White, pink, and brown noise layers combine with stochastically triggered sinusoidal resonators whose frequencies are continuously displaced by chaotic drift. A five-buffer feedback reverb with 8-stage allpass diffusion returns the signal back into the oscillators. The organism feeds on itself.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Chaos | 0–1 | Controls Lorenz attractor step size and drift coefficient on all six resonators. At low values the system is relatively stable; at high values frequency content becomes increasingly unpredictable and spectral density fluctuates wildly. |
| Density | 0–1 | Trigger rate multiplier for all six resonant layers simultaneously. Also controls the noise layer amplitude. Low density produces sparse, isolated events; high density creates continuous layered texture. |
| Metal | 0–1 | Crossfades between noise-dominated and resonator-dominated output. At high values, ring modulation between resonator pairs is introduced, creating inharmonic metallic artifacts. |
| Space | 0–1 | Reverb size — scales the five delay buffer read positions from short ambience to vast spatial diffusion. Also controls reverb feedback amount and damping frequency. |
| Brutality | 0–1 | Activates the high-frequency resonator layer (res5) and increases trigger rates across all layers. Raises the soft-limiter drive coefficient, pushing the signal into harder saturation. Handle with care at high values. |
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain. |
16 oscillators in dual detuned pairs traverse a pentatonic scale through probabilistic event triggers. Oscillator pairs share envelope windows but drift independently. Mu-law companding on the bass register preserves low-end body without muddiness. Four-tap algorithmic reverb with allpass diffusion. Never repeats the same harmonic configuration twice.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Event | 0–1 | Controls trigger rate for all four envelope groups simultaneously. At low values events are rare and long; at high values the pad becomes dense and constantly re-triggering. Envelope duration is inversely scaled — faster events produce shorter notes. |
| Bright | 0–1 | Wavetable mix crossfade between pure sine and a wavetable waveform stored in four 1024-sample Data buffers. Also controls the lowpass filter cutoff (800–8800 Hz). At minimum the sound is sinusoidal and dark; at maximum it is spectrally rich. |
| rootFreq | 0–1 | Sets the root pitch of the pentatonic scale from MIDI 36 (C2) to MIDI 84 (C6). All 16 oscillators retune relative to this root when a new event triggers. |
| Wow | 0–1 | Tape-style pitch instability: slow wow LFO (0.3–1.1 Hz) plus high-frequency flutter (4.5–7.5 Hz) plus microscopic noise drift. At high values the pad has an audible, organic pitch wavering. |
| Detune | 0–1 | Independent per-oscillator random drift coefficient. Controls the amount of microtonal spread between the 16 voices. Low values produce a tight unison; high values create a wide, beating ensemble. |
| RevSize | 0–1 | Reverb room size. Scales the four delay buffer read positions. Higher values produce a vast, slow-decaying space. |
| revDamp | 0–1 | High-frequency damping inside the reverb network. At high values the reverb tail becomes dark and muffled. |
| padAmp | 0–1 | Output gain with quadratic scaling (amp²) for a more natural volume response. |
Four probabilistic grain streams with independent LFO-modulated trigger rates write into a shared 65536-sample circular buffer. Three delay taps read back at LFO-modulated positions, feeding into the next generation of grains. The feedback loop can remain a whisper or accumulate into dense spectral mass — determined by the relationship between tape age and feedback amount.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Density | 0–1 | Grain trigger rate multiplier for all four streams. Also modulates LFO-driven trigger variation. Higher values produce denser textures with more overlapping grains. |
| Width | 0–1 | Stereo field width. At 0 the output is mono; at 1 LFO and drift modulations spread the image to maximum width. Uses mid/side processing internally. |
| Tape Age | 0–1 | Controls HPF cutoff (increasing age raises the highpass), feedback delay times, and soft saturation drive. Higher age produces a more degraded, lo-fi character with longer echo tails and harder saturation. |
| Grain | 0–1 | Multiplier for the high-frequency grain stream (stream 3) trigger rate specifically. Controls the density of fine-grained high-register scatter independently of the main density control. |
| Metamorph | 0–1 | Feedback pitch modulation amount. At higher values the grain oscillators are frequency-modulated by the delay feedback signal, causing pitch smearing and self-referential spectral mutation. |
| envDecay | 0–1 | Base grain duration. At 0, grains are very short (8 ms); at 1, grains extend up to several seconds. Interacts with density — long grains at high density produce heavy overlapping masses. |
| Pitch | 0–1 | Base grain oscillator frequency (20–400 Hz). This is the fundamental centre of the spectral mass before spread and randomisation are applied. |
| Spread | 0–1 | Frequency randomisation range applied to each new grain trigger. Higher spread values produce more scattered, inharmonic textures. |
| FbAmt | 0–1 | Delay feedback gain. This is the primary control for feedback accumulation. Keep below 0.6 initially — above 0.7 the system can build into dense, slowly self-sustaining resonance masses. |
| DelayTime | 0–1 | Global scale for the three delay tap times (0.3× to 2.8× base times). Higher values produce longer, more separated echo repetitions. |
| Freeze | 0–1 | Suppresses grain trigger generation, leaving the feedback loop to recirculate existing buffer content. A gradual freeze captures and sustains the current spectral state. |
| Chaos | 0–1 | Controls the rate of the internal chaos memory smoother, which displaces grain frequencies stochastically. At high values grain pitches become increasingly unpredictable. |
| Tilt | 0–1 | Spectral tilt EQ. At 0 the output is dominated by the lowpass-filtered signal; at 1 the highpass component is boosted, shifting spectral weight toward the upper register. |
| Gate | 0–1 | Noise gate threshold. At 0 the gate is open; higher values suppress low-amplitude signal, creating silence between louder textural events. |
Seven sine oscillators spanning three octaves select pitches from a modal scale (Phrygian, Locrian, or Mixolydian) through independent asynchronous event timers. Each voice has its own envelope duration and pitch class probability. Wow and flutter degrade the intonation over time. Vinyl dust and crackle noise layer the harmonic texture with a sense of physical age.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Root | 0–1 | Root pitch from MIDI 36 (C2) to MIDI 55 (G3). All seven voices select pitches relative to this root. Sweep slowly — the modal context remains consistent across the range. |
| Decay | 0–1 | Controls the lowpass filter cutoff (900–1500 Hz) applied to the final output. Higher values allow more harmonic brightness through; lower values darken the sound significantly. |
| Wow | 0–1 | Tape pitch instability: layered slow wow (0.7–2.7 mHz), fast flutter (41–121 mHz), and a slow sway LFO that also modulates event timing. At high values the modal purity completely dissolves into pitch drift. |
| Dust | 0–1 | Vinyl surface noise amplitude — two filtered noise streams and a probabilistic crackle generator. Adds physical material texture to the harmonic field. |
| Speed | 0–1 | Event tempo — controls the base note duration from 12 seconds (slow) to 2 seconds (fast). Each voice has a different speed multiplier so they remain asynchronous regardless of this setting. |
| Mode | 0–1 | Three-way modal selector: 0–0.33 = Phrygian, 0.33–0.66 = Locrian, 0.66–1 = Mixolydian. The interval structure of all seven voices changes at the threshold. Changes take effect on the next event trigger per voice. |
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain with quadratic scaling. |
Three coupled Van der Pol nonlinear oscillators with a self-monitoring adaptive control layer. The system continuously measures its own energy and diversity across three timescales and adjusts mu damping, coupling strength, feedback depth, and noise injection in real time to maintain target states. Three delay buffers feed back into the oscillators. It never converges. It never repeats.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Ctrl 1 — Drive | 0–1 | Base mu parameter for the Van der Pol oscillators (0.15–4.95). At low values the oscillators produce nearly sinusoidal output; at high values the waveform becomes highly distorted and the system operates in a more energetic regime. |
| Ctrl 2 — Coupling | 0–1 | Base coupling coefficient between the three oscillators (0.02–0.77). Low coupling = independent oscillators; high coupling = tight mutual influence that can lead to synchronisation events before the adaptive layer breaks them apart. |
| Ctrl 3 — Adapt Speed | 0–1 | How quickly the adaptive control layer responds to deviations from target states. Slow adaptation produces long, smooth transitions; fast adaptation causes frequent micro-adjustments. |
| Ctrl 4 — Memory | 0–1 | Delay buffer feedback retention depth (0.90–0.9995). Controls how long previous states persist in the three delay buffers. Near maximum values create extremely long memory — the system responds to events that occurred many seconds ago. |
| Ctrl 5 — Feedback | 0–1 | Base feedback gain from the resonant delay network back into the oscillator acceleration equations (0.12–0.90). Raises the overall influence of past states on current behaviour. |
| Ctrl 6 — Target Energy | 0–1 | The energy level the adaptive layer tries to maintain (0.03–0.38). This is the most direct amplitude control — but it works through adaptation, not direct gain. The system seeks this level rather than being set to it. |
| Ctrl 7 — Target Diversity | 0–1 | The target divergence between the three oscillators (0.05–0.90). High diversity forces the system to maintain contrast between voices; low diversity allows them to converge. |
| Ctrl 8 — Output Gain | 0–1 | Output gain with cubic saturation above threshold. Higher values push the system into harder saturation states during high-stress periods. |
Three sinusoidal oscillators tuned in golden ratio intervals (1 : 1.618 : 2.414) with sample-and-hold pitch modulation, LFO micromodulation, and ring modulation crossfades. A two-tap delay network feeds back into oscillator phase — the feedback pitch-modulates the frequencies, creating recursive self-referential behaviour. Inspired by the drone work of Jaap Vink.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Density | 0–1 | Sample-and-hold trigger rate. Controls how frequently a new random pitch offset is sampled and applied to the oscillator frequencies. At 0 pitches remain nearly static; at higher values pitch variations are more frequent. |
| FbAmt | 0–1 | Delay feedback gain. This is the primary instability control — higher values increase the recursive pitch feedback into the oscillators. Above 0.7 the system may enter unstable, self-generating states. |
| ModRate | 0–1 | LFO rate multiplier for all three modulation oscillators (ratios 0.271 : 0.181 : 0.109). Controls the speed of the micro-modulation that creates the characteristic beating and shimmer. |
| FreqCenter | 10–1000 Hz | Base frequency of oscillator 1. Oscillators 2 and 3 are tuned at 1.618× and 2.414× this frequency. This is the fundamental pitch control of the entire network. |
| Sat | 0–1 | Waveshaping amount — crossfades between clean signal and a combined tanh/cubic saturation curve. Adds harmonic content and edge to the drone without full distortion. |
| Wet | 0–1 | Dry/wet mix between the direct oscillator output and the full feedback/delay processed signal. |
| HPF Amt | 0–1 | High-pass filter coefficient. Removes low-frequency content from the feedback path. Useful for preventing low-frequency buildup at high feedback amounts. |
| Gain | 0–1 | Output gain into a tanh limiter. |
Lorenz and Rössler strange attractors simultaneously drive four FM operators and three waveshapers, whose outputs feed six cascaded resonant noise channels with cross-injection between bands. Sub-bass oscillators descend below 30 Hz with pulse modulation. A dynamic compander manages gain at high energy states. Atonal, companded, never melodic.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Depth | 0–1 | Sub-bass oscillator amplitude and frequency range (14–42 Hz). Controls the infrasonic and deep bass content. At high values the physical sensation of the sub-bass dominates. |
| Collapse | 0–1 | Rössler attractor step rate and FM operator 2 modulation index. High collapse values create strongly non-linear, collapsing spectral behaviour with heavy waveshaping. |
| Radiation | 0–1 | FM operator 3 root frequency range and modulation index. Also controls drift speed on several layers. Creates the mid-to-high frequency radiation character of the texture. |
| Tension | 0–1 | Lorenz attractor step rate and FM operator 1 modulation index. Also controls the lowpass filter cutoff on the output stage. Higher tension = brighter, more energetic spectral content. |
| Vastness | 0–1 | Six-buffer reverb size. At maximum the reverb feedback approaches 0.95 with extremely long delay times — the space becomes cavernous and the sound field is almost entirely reverberated. |
| Erosion | 0–1 | Waveshaper drive for three waveshaping operators. Also controls noise layer contribution. Higher erosion values progressively destroy spectral coherence through heavy distortion. |
| Void | 0–1 | FM operator 4 modulation index (sub-bass FM synthesis) and tan()-based waveshaper for the lowest register. Creates the characteristic “void” quality — dark, distorted, near-silent spaces punctuated by sub-bass events. |
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain into a tanh limiter with internal dynamic compander. |
Direct homage to Iannis Xenakis's 1958 electroacoustic piece Concret PH. A probabilistic glass particle generator: stochastic excitation drives two independent oscillators and four second-order resonant IIR filters. Shatter density controls secondary impact probability. Brightness maps to the spectral centroid of the glass mass.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Density | 0–1 | Primary particle trigger probability per sample (logarithmically scaled from 0.5 to 400 Hz equivalent event rate). Controls the overall density of glass particle events. |
| Brightness | 0–1 | Spectral centroid of the particle events — maps to oscillator frequency range (8 kHz to 26 kHz). Also controls the four resonator frequency positions as multiples of this base (×0.85, ×1.15, ×1.45, ×1.78). |
| Shatter | 0–1 | Secondary shatter event probability and decay time. Controls the density and duration of the secondary “shatter” oscillator triggered by the primary glass events. Higher values produce more complex multi-stage impact textures. |
| QRES | 0–1 | Resonator Q factor (decay time of the four IIR resonators). At low values resonators decay quickly; at high values they sustain, creating a more bell-like or glass-bowl quality behind the particle texture. |
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain with quadratic scaling. Particle synthesis can be quiet — do not hesitate to push this parameter. |
Inspired by the Faitiche aesthetic and Jan Jelinek's sound — microsound textures assembled from paper grain, room resonance, and rare object excitation events. Silence is structural: density and silence depth interact to create long passages of near-quiet punctuated by micro-events. Four physical resonator models (wood, glass, metal) respond to rare triggers.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Density | 0–1 | Base event probability for paper and micro events. Interacts exponentially with Silence Depth — at high silence depth, even high density produces very few events. |
| Paper Grain | 0–1 | Bandwidth of the bandpass filter applied to the paper noise events, and amplitude of the brown noise “paper slide” component. Higher values produce coarser, more audible paper texture. |
| Room Size | 0–1 | Amplitude and frequency of three room tone oscillators (45, 90, 135 Hz). Simulates the acoustic character of a specific room. Higher values make the room presence more audible. |
| Silence Depth | 0–1 | The most important parameter. Multiplies event probabilities by (1 - silence²) or (1 - silence³). At high values, minutes can pass between audible events. This is the structural silence control. |
| Micro Detail | 0–1 | Amplitude and rate of the high-frequency fiber events filtered above 2–8 kHz. Controls the finest-grained texture layer — the microscopic detail beneath the paper events. |
| Resonance | 0–1 | Q and decay time of the four physical resonators triggered by rare events. Also controls the resonator frequency range. Higher values produce longer-sustaining, more pitched resonances. |
| Stereo Width | 0–1 | Mid/side stereo width applied to the final output. At 0 the output is mono; at 1 maximum stereo spread is applied. |
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain with quadratic scaling. The output of this module is intentionally quiet — amp adjustment is often necessary. |
A tape pad with harmonic structure built from minor third, fifth, minor seventh, sub-octave, and octave oscillators. Per-channel wow, flutter, and microscopic drift simulate Nagra tape machine instability. Airwindows Galactic reverb ported to gen~ provides a vast, diffuse space. Push 3 pads select root frequency directly in real time with optional pitch glide.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Amp | 0–1 | Output gain. |
| Base | 0–127 | Root MIDI note. All harmonic oscillators (minor 3rd, 5th, minor 7th, sub, octave) tune relative to this value. On Push 3, the pads directly control this parameter — each pad selects a different root note. |
| Tone | 0–1 | Lowpass filter cutoff (700–5200 Hz with LFO modulation) applied after saturation. Controls brightness of the final tone. |
| Warm | 0–1 | Tape saturation drive (tanh). At 0 the oscillators are clean; at 1 the harmonic content is heavily saturated with a warm, analog character. |
| Low | 0–1 | Low frequency content control — crossfades between a lowpass-filtered and full-band signal. Lower values emphasise bass register warmth; higher values open up the full harmonic spectrum. |
| Wow | 0–1 | Pitch instability — asymmetric per-channel wow and flutter, plus random drift. Left and right channels wow independently for organic stereo movement. |
| Hiss | 0–1 | Tape hiss amplitude. Two filtered noise streams simulate the high-frequency noise floor of analog tape. At subtle levels adds warmth; at high levels becomes audible hiss. |
| Crackle | 0–1 | Dust and dropout simulation. Probabilistic crackle events plus slow dropout amplitude modulation. Simulates physical tape degradation. |
| Glide | 0–1 | Pitch glide time (0–2000 ms) when changing the Base note via Push pads. At 0 changes are immediate; at higher values pitch slides smoothly between notes. |
| Width | 0–1 | Stereo width via mid/side processing at the output stage. |
Drone oscillators and neon hum generators navigate probabilistically selected pitches from a modal vocabulary. A cross-feedback maze delay routes left into right and right into left at independently modulated delay times. Isolation filtering progressively narrows the spectrum. Glitch anomaly injection inserts noise bursts at random intervals. Spaces that feel fluorescent-lit and wrong.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Hum Level | 0–1 | Neon hum amplitude — a 50 Hz fundamental with a partial square wave component, flickering via anomaly interaction. Controls the electrical hum character of the space. |
| Isolation | 0–1 | Spectral isolation — simultaneously raises the HPF cutoff and lowers the LPF cutoff, progressively narrowing the bandwidth. At maximum, only a very thin midrange band remains. |
| Anomalies | 0–1 | Probability and amplitude of glitch noise injection events. Also modulates the neon hum flicker. At high values the signal is frequently interrupted by bursts of noise. |
| Drift Freq | 0–1 | Speed of the tape-style LFO that pitch-modulates the drone oscillators and controls event timing variation. Higher drift = faster, more audible pitch instability. |
| Drone Amp | 0–1 | Amplitude of the main drone oscillator layer (two pairs of sine oscillators with independent slight detuning). |
| Maze Size | 0–1 | Cross-feedback delay feedback coefficient (0.5–0.98). At high values the maze delay becomes nearly self-sustaining, recirculating the drone indefinitely with spatial rotation between L and R. |
| Resonance | 0–1 | Sinusoidal waveshaping applied to the filtered signal — adds soft resonant edge to the drone without true feedback resonance. A subtle timbral modifier. |
| Root Freq | 0–1 | Root pitch (MIDI 28–52, D1–E3). All pitch selections are drawn relative to this root using intervals of a unison, fifth, major seventh, and minor second. |
Four stereo electromagnetic field recordings captured with a Rowaves & Schwarz VLF receiver, Zoom F6 field recorder, and LOM Uši microphones. Ionospheric whistlers, Schumann resonances, power-line harmonic hum, and atmospheric discharge events rendered as living, drifting stereo textures. The electromagnetic environment as direct instrument.
How to useEmulation of radio frequency guard band interference and half-duplex crosstalk phenomena. Six tunable frequency nodes drift independently against each other through slow LFO and noise modulation. The preloaded field of drifting carriers generates beating, phasing, and spectral collision artifacts characteristic of shortwave radio crosstalk.
Parameters — Push 3 Encoder Banks| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Tune 1–6 | Six independent carrier frequency tuning controls. Each node drifts around its tuned centre frequency via slow LFO and noise modulation. The interference pattern between nodes depends entirely on their frequency relationships. |
A bubble mass generator with physically modelled resonance descending into infrasonic territory below 18 Hz. Warm bubble accumulations build pressure and dissolve inside a vast Quark reverb space. Size controls resonant body dimensions, focus shapes the spectral envelope, mix controls dry/wet balance. The system collapses under its own low-frequency pressure.
Parameters| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Time | Bubble event timing and the overall temporal density of the generation process. |
| Size | Resonant body dimensions — controls the fundamental frequency of each bubble. Large size = deep, infrasonic content below 18 Hz. Small size = higher, warmer bubble pops. |
| Focus | Spectral envelope shaping — controls the bandwidth and harmonic focus of each bubble event. |
| Mix | Dry/wet balance between direct bubble signal and Quark reverb output. |
Four probabilistic grain streams spanning low sub to high-frequency scatter, feeding into a shared feedback delay network. Grain pitch is continuously displaced by LFO, drift, and feedback modulation. Tilt EQ shifts spectral weight between deep low-end warmth and harsh upper-register crumble. Tape age adds saturation character to the delay feedback path.
Parameters| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Density | Grain trigger rate across all streams. Controls overall texture density from sparse to continuous. |
| Width | Stereo field width via mid/side processing. |
| Tape Age | HPF cutoff raise, delay time extension, and saturation drive. Ages the feedback path character. |
| Grain | Independent rate multiplier for the high-frequency grain stream (stream 3 specifically). |
| Metamorph | Feedback-to-pitch modulation routing amount. Higher values create self-referential pitch mutation. |
| Amp | Output gain. |
| Decay | Base grain duration (8 ms to 8 seconds). |
| Pitch | Base grain oscillator frequency centre (20–400 Hz). |
| Spread | Frequency randomisation range per grain trigger. |
| FbAmt | Delay feedback gain — primary accumulation control. |
| DelayTime | Global delay tap time scale. |
| Freeze | Suppresses grain generation — recirculates buffer content. |
| Chaos | Stochastic grain pitch displacement rate. |
| Tilt | Spectral tilt from low-dominated to high-dominated output. |
| Gate | Noise gate threshold — creates silence between loud textural events. |
A concrete sampler player with fixed bathroom texture recordings activated through gestural control. Scrapes, water drops, ceramic strikes, pipe resonances, and tiled-room reverberation mapped to performance gestures. The bathroom as recording studio and musique concrète source material. Objet sonore as direct instrument.
Parameters| Parameter | Description |
|---|---|
| Speed | Playback speed and pitch transposition of the texture samples. Values below centre pitch down and slow; above centre pitch up and accelerate. |
| Filter | Lowpass filter applied to the sample output. Controls spectral character from full-range to heavily filtered. |
| Reverb | Additional reverb send beyond the natural room character already present in the recordings. |
| Amp | Output gain. |
A recursive FM oscillator with self-modulating phase feedback network. Carrier and modulator oscillators feed back into each other through a continuously evolving phase history loop, creating unstable, aggressive FM timbres that resist static tuning. Fully compatible with Ableton Piano Roll and Push 3 — responds to MIDI pitch, velocity, and note length. The Blast Room industrial reverb is built into the signal chain. The only instrument in Brain Recordings designed as a conventional pitched voice.
Parameters| Parameter | Range | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Freq (CAR) | 20–2000 Hz | Carrier frequency root. When MIDI notes are active this acts as the root pitch — MIDI note numbers transpose relative to this value. Default 200 Hz = approximately G3. |
| Mult (RATIO) | 0–20 | Frequency multiplier for the FM modulator relative to the carrier. Integer ratios produce harmonic FM; non-integer ratios create inharmonic, metallic, or noisy timbres. |
| Amn (DEPTH) | 0–1 | FM modulation depth. At low values the timbre is relatively clean; at high values it becomes dense with sidebands and increasingly aggressive. |
| Fdbk (FEED) | 0–1 | Self-modulation feedback. Feeds the carrier output back into its own phase calculation through a one-sample delay. Above 0.7 the feedback begins to destabilise pitch. |
| PhaseFm (MOD PHASE) | 0–1 | Phase offset of the FM modulator oscillator. Shifts the harmonic content without changing pitch or ratio. |
| PhOscc (CAR PHASE) | 0–1 | Phase offset of the carrier oscillator. Affects the attack character of each triggered note. |
| FME (FM ENV) | 10–5000 ms | FM envelope release time. Longer values create a slow FM tail after the note attack; shorter values produce a punchy transient. |
| RelFm (RELEASE) | 10–2000 ms | Main amplitude envelope release time. Shorter values produce a tight percussive response; longer values allow the FM tail to bloom. |
| Metal (Blast Room) | 0–1 | Presence control of the Blast Room reverb — boosts metallic frequencies in the 800–2500 Hz range. |
| Room (Blast Room) | 0–1 | Dry/wet mix of the Blast Room industrial reverb. At 1 the industrial space dominates the output. |