Aphex Twin Analord track Visual Map

Someone on here was taking a music class and posted up a visual representation, sorta bar-by-bar of a track from Analord.

Who was that?

I'd love to see that again, been thinking of making one for fun.

That was ZoeB.

Oh, that. Yeah, that was me. I spent maybe an hour or so the other year repeatedly playing the first few bars of Steppingfilter 101 (and Vangelis's Alpha) while listening intently, to work out what the multitrack might look like when separated out. It's mildly rewarding and you can do it with absolutely any piece of music. I also managed to infer that way that Leftifeld's Open Up was probably recorded to sixteen track.

I haven't studied music in any kind of official capacity though since I got a D in GCSE music. :) It's just sort of fun to work out how it's put together, in order to better make your own music. For instance, through dissecting multitracks, you learn how each single instrument's part should be mind numbingly simple, with complexity arising only from the whole, the combination, the conversation between all the different instruments. The whole really is better than the sum of its parts.

If you want to hear something really impressive, check out one of Michael Jackson's vocal sketches for how Beat It ought to sound. That's what being so well trained in music that you miss out on your childhood gets you, although the trade totally isn't worth it. Still, it's amazing to hear how wholly formed these songs already were in his head.

Anyway, yes, I'd love to see more people make these sketches of tracks. Go for it!

wow. this MJ thing is great. Thanks for the reply!

Yeah, he knew how to make good music better than pretty much anyone, I think...