Release date: April 18, 2026
If you wish to pay for it (you don't have to), please use Bandcamp.
Download Hi-Res Audio version.
Apps that will endlessly compose and perform the piece in realtime. They are generative but have nothing to do with AI. See the about page for more info.
DESKTOP APPS — MacOs — Windows — Linux
MOBILE APPS — iOS — Android (coming soon)
"The feeling of past time is a present feeling." – William James, The Principles of Psychology, 1890
This collaboration between Celestial Migrant and Alex Bradley is informed by the writings of Rupert Sheldrake and Andrea Hairston. The past becomes the future, the future becomes the past, both always present. The unvisitable country, the untakeable journey, always here. "That tomorrow will not be for ten thousand generations."
Celestial Migrant composed the algorithms and played the resultant virtual environment live, then sent it to Alex. Alex recorded electric guitar played with an E-bow live and sent it back to CM. CM then applied the algorithms to Alex's recordings, and put them in the virtual environment. What you hear as the album is CM playing that resultant virtual environment. The infinite version is that resultant virtual environment itself, which will play itself endlessly.
Musically, the algorithm respects the octave and the just intonation fifth, and oscillates between two sets of freely intoned random choices, one set centred around the fourth and sixth, the other around the second, fifth and seventh, wandering up to a three-quarter tone around the just centre. There are 12 voices, and each voice independently chooses and changes its pitch set over time. CM has seven voices, Alex has four, and there is a twelfth voice that plays a sparse arpeggio. The virtual environment chooses randomly from seven different modes that determine how these different voices interact over the course of the performance.
These pieces are not meant to be listened to from beginning to end. Just listen until you've had enough. Best to get the infinite versions, which endlessly compose and perform the piece live in realtime. Every performance is unique.
ABOUT ALEX BRADLEY:
Alex Bradley is a sound artist based in Bristol UK. He has been composing and producing for over 35 years playing in bands, making solo albums, designing installations and performing nationally and internationally. His most recent works are multi speaker and ambisonic installations. His first instrument is guitar. He is an activist and trade union officer and works part time at Royal Mail which suits him fine.
ABOUT CELESTIAL MIGRANT:
Celestial Migrant is made up of an Australian installation and performance digital artist, a sound designer and a composer. In 2023, we embarked on releasing a series of four albums a year, two at a time, for seven years. Each album explores a specific aspect of the triangular relationship between digital virtual spacetime, coded generative algorithms and ambient music theory. Real-time virtual environments are our composition tools and our instruments. We are based on Kirrai Wurrung (Eastern Maar Nation) and Wurundjeri (Kulin Nation) land in Australia. For more information, see the about page.
Cover art: A figure copied from Ernst Heinrich Weber and Wilhelm Eduard Weber’s Wellenlehre auf Experimente gegründet (Wave theory based on experiments, 1825) demonstrating “the chasing produced by water-waves in a circular vessel”, from John Tyndall’s Sound (1869). Public Domain.
#ambient, #generative, #experimental, #drone