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MFSA008: How Many Watts Is That Lightbulb?

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA008: How Many Watts Is That Lightbulb?

00:00 / 2:05:54

5IcCP (Custom) (Custom) Happy new year! The start of a new calendar year is always an exciting time. The past twelve months have been exceptionally pleasant for me, and hopefully they’ve been pretty good for you too. This is Episode 008 of Music For Small Audiences, and it’s called How Many Watts Is That Lightbulb? It’s just over two hours long, and it’s a largely instrumental mix of groove-driven progressive house and melodic techno, punctuated with regular deep dives down to the slow-and-low and a couple of very energetic high points. I like instrumental mixes – they give thoughts room to breathe.

May your thoughts breathe deeply and easily, and I hope you have a happy new year.

MFSA007: A Girl With A Bicycle

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA007: A Girl With A Bicycle

00:00 / 2:12

This is Episode 007 of Music For Small Audiences. It’s a two hour and twelve minute mix, and it gets its name from the fact that, well, I like the idea of a girl with a bicycle. Bicycles are a unique form of transportation – fun and practical, they give you both independence and fitness. I like both of these traits in people. Hope you enjoy the mix!

MFSA006: Six Dishes Beats Four Decks

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA006: Six Dishes Beats Four Decks

00:00 / 1:30:34

Episode 006 of Music For Small Audiences is called Six Dishes Beats Four Decks. It’s a 90-minute mix of groovy tunes. The name comes from the acknowledgement that we are all good at different things, and from the understanding that anything we put our mind to and practice consistently, we will get at least passably good at. There are times – such as when I am hungry – that I wonder how much better I would eat if I put as much time in to learning to cook as I have in to learning to mix music together. Having seen someone juggle six dishes, I must say I am impressed. I have enough trouble BBQing a steak and pan-frying cheese at the same time.

In his book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell suggests that it takes on the order of 10,000 hours of proper effort in order to master a given area of expertise. Given how many hours each of us is allotted to spend here on earth in a single lifetime, I guess that means you can only get so good at so many things. Does that mean we should choose our hobbies carefully? Or merely that we are what we repeatedly do?

MFSA005: Free And Clear

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA005: Free And Clear

00:00 / 1:23:11

polarbearsswimming Episode 005 of Music for Small Audiences is called Free And Clear. It was recorded as a live set a few days ago, and the title and content reflect my mood this week, having finished a rather challenging semester of study. Now, with the southern summer rolling in, the days are getting longer and the sunsets pinker, and I am feeling the relief of not having to juggle work, study and personal priorities until the fall semester starts up in late February.

This mix is 83 minutes long in total. The first hour or so is deep and melodic progressive house. There are some big names in here, and some little ones, some new tunes and some old ones, with a bit of a twist at the end. Enjoy, and whatever you are up to, peace.

MFSA004: Sun in the Evening

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA004: Sun in the Evening

00:00 / 2:01:55

Episode 004 of Music For Small Audiences was mixed live a few weeks ago, during the first week of Daylight Savings Time here in Australia. With the arrival of Daylight Savings Time, the sun returns to the evenings, opening up a whole world of weekday evening options.

Spring in Melbourne being what it is, the weather changes quickly. ‘Four seasons in a day’ is a well-worn cliche that actually describes the variability pretty well. One of the more unusual weather phenomena we seem to see during the spring is rain falling while it is sunny. It is not something I am used to seeing, and I find it special every time it happens. This mix starts out with the sounds of rain, and works through four seasons of its own from house to ambient and back again, over the course of two hours and two minutes. I hope it brightens and brings a refreshing change to your day wherever you are.

MFSA003: Fonda and the Five Minute Banana Bread

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA003: Fonda and the Five Minute Banana Bread

00:00 / 2:25:57

This is Episode 003 of Music for Small Audiences. I have called it Fonda and the Five Minute Banana Bread. Fonda is a Mexican restaurant. Five minute banana bread is troublesome, because it doesn’t take long to make and tastes very, very good.

My intention in making these podcasts available was to showcase a broader side to my musical tastes. This mix covers a lot of ground in this regard, starting with laid-back electronica and working its way through some downtempo grooves of varying intensity for the first forty minutes or so, before settling into a deep groove that builds and bubbles away over the course of the ninety minutes that follows. It was mixed live.

MFSA002: The Heater Is On Wheels

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA002: The Heater Is On Wheels

00:00 / 1:59:50

Episode 002 of Music For Small Audiences is called “The Heater Is On Wheels”. It is just under two hours in length, and while it covers plenty of ground in terms of tempo and energy level, it’s underpinned throughout by warm and creatively tuned melodies and expressive grooves.

September 2013 - Adelaide Weekend 091 (Custom)

I have always enjoyed the interplay between electronic and acoustic instruments, and particularly the less-than-perfect timing and tuning that any ‘real’ instrument has as a result of its real-ness. To me, some of the real creativity in electronic music production is found in creatively modulating pitch and groove in a manner similar to that which one might expect to hear from an acoustic instrument. Rather than being stifled by rhythms locked down to millisecond-perfect grids and tuning left pitch-perfect to the exact cent, the songs in this mix breathe and wander, combining both the warmth of real instruments and the precision of modern technology. Mixed live on a cold southern spring evening, this mix should bring a warm change to your ears whatever your weather.

MFSA001: Back From Aireys Inlet

Music For Small Audiences

MFSA001: Back From Aireys Inlet

00:00 / 79:02

This is episode 001 of Music For Small Audiences. It is a live set recorded last month after a particularly nice weekend away on Australia’s southern coast, in a little town called Airey’s Inlet on the Great Ocean Road, about two hours west of Melbourne.

Now podcasting…

Apropos of nothing, here begins my podcasting series Music For Small Audiences.

As an irregular series, Music For Small Audiences is an ongoing journey through some of the music that I have enjoyed listening to and playing for others over the years. The title gives away the game in that this is music for living rooms, cars, and headphones. While I paid my dues (and sometimes my rent) as a progressive house and trance DJ, the sounds you’ll hear here are broader than that, covering found sounds, ambient, techno, trip hop, nu disco, and more. This of course alongside the groove-driven melodic style I’ve based my sound around in recent years. Light on vocals, long on meaning.

If none of this makes any sense to you don’t worry – just give things a listen and you’ll figure out pretty quickly whether we’re on the same page or not. Each person’s musical taste is unique, and describing music in words is a pretty inexact science, to put it mildly.

It’s available via iTunes by clicking here, or you prefer you can click on the title of each entry above and download or stream straight from this website. If you like what you hear, subscribe! New mixes will be added regularly.