This album was a study in making minimalist music with only a single synthesizer. Aside from some spatial effects in my DAW, I used only the tools provided by my Pittsburgh Modular Microvolt 3900 semi-modular synth.

With the exception of the final track, which is a drone, the note selection was delegated to the arpeggiator, which offers a random sequence generator feature. My process for each piece was to randomize the arpeggiator numerous times until I found a sequence that resonated with me. From there, I would consider the options available on the synth to vary the timbres and textures in a way I felt suited the sequence and my own taste. This process actually became a little more difficult during the course of recording roughly 30 of these studies, because I found that a sequence which I might have rejected earlier on as being ugly, once I applied timbral treatments on the synthesizer, revealed unexpected beauty.

I recorded this music a few weeks before my other recent album, The Burbles, and it was where I began learning and developing some of the techniques that are important to the music I've made since.

One technique that emerged early in these studies was the use of the random voltage source to gently modulate the looping function generator, which often controlled the filter cutoff. This causes the phrase length to change so that even if the arpeggiator is constantly repeating 8 notes, the perceived phrases would rarely ever stay 8 notes long. Sometimes it gives the impression of polyphony despite the music almost always being monophonic. Sometimes this gives the illusion of new material prismatically emerging when in fact is none.

In a few cases, there are in fact two voices, with one being a drone along with the primary sequence. This was achieved by patching the low frequency oscillator into the audio path.